Violence towards Members of the L.G.B.T.Q. Community Research Outline

I. Members of the L.G.B.T.Q. community are more likely to victims of hate crimes.

A. One source that will be used is the New York Times article, “L.G.B.T. People Are More Likely to Be Targets of Hate Crimes Than Any Other Minority Group.” The article gives several reasons why the violence towards this group is growing. One of which is that as some people become more accepting, then groups that oppose it become more radical.

B. This was especially true after gay marriage was legalized, “The flip side of marriage equality is that people who strongly oppose it find the shifting culture extremely disturbing” (Park & Mykhyalyshyn, 2016, para. 9).

C. Underreported incidents are another reason for the violence to be getting more attention. It was hard to determine how many attacks occurred because people were afraid of coming forward.

II. Another source that comments on how the perception of violence towards gays and lesbians is changing is in the book, Violence Towards Gays and Lesbians.

A. .In the book, it mentions that violence towards gay people is starting to become as big a social taboo as violence towards children and women (Comstock, 1992, p. 1). 

B. Previously, members of the L.G.B.T.Q. were not welcomed and people did not want to protect their rights, or their safety, similar to how many people did not stop violence against African Americans before the Civil Rights Movement.

III. Also, it is important that one knows what makes a crime a hate crime. The book, Hate Crimes: The Rising Tide of Bigotry and Bloodshed, demonstrates what makes a hate crime.

A. “hate offenses are directed against members of a particular group simply because of their membership in that group...the victim’s basis for an attack may be a victim’s race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation or gender” (Levin & MacDewitt, 2013, p. 5).

IV. One aspect that needs to be addressed is how members of the L.G.B.T.Q. community interacts with the police in their communities.

A. The way a community polices hate crimes may affect how they are handled, and in the article, “When love meets hate: The relationship between state policies on gay and lesbian rights and hate crime incidence” studies this. They found that certain policies in the police force encourage discrimination, and this may lead to increases in hate crimes (Levy & Levy, 2017, para. 1).

V. Also, this paper cannot be written without mentioning one of the worst hate crimes perpetrated against the L.G.B.T.Q. community in the United States, the Orlando Night 

A. The article, “Senseless violence: a global problem with psychological ramifications” looks at how the Orlando nightclub shooting affected people’s thought towards hate crimes, and how senseless violence affects communities (Rokach, Ahmed & Patel, 2017, para. 10). It is sadly one of many examples of hate crimes in the country’s history.

References

Comstock, G. D. (1992). Violence against lesbians and gay men. Columbia University Press.

Levin, J., & MacDevitt, J. (2013). Hate crimes: The rising tide of bigotry and bloodshed. Springer.

Levy, B. L., & Levy, D. L. (2017). When love meets hate: the relationship between state policies on gay and lesbian rights and hate crime incidence. Social science research, 61, 142-159.

Park, H., & Mykhyalyshyn, I. (2016) L.G.B.T. people are more likely to be targets of hate crimes than any other minority group. The New York Times, Retrieved from www.nyt.com

Rokach, A., Ahmed, R., & Patel, K. (2017). Senseless violence: a global problem with psychological ramifications. Routledge.