Half of LGBT Members in the EU Avoid Public Places Because of Harassment

A new study by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) sheds light on the levels of discrimination faced by LGBT members of the EU community, with important findings related to how this demographic experiences street harassment.

According to the FRA’s website, the results of the online survey of more than 93,000 LGBT individuals “provide valuable evidence of how LGBT persons in the EU and Croatia experience bias-motivated discrimination, violence and harassment in different areas of life, including employment, education, healthcare, housing and other services.”

A video on the FRA YouTube page illustrates that one-half of all respondents avoid public places, two-thirds avoid holding hands when in public, and four-fifths frequently overhear jokes being made at the expense of LGBT individuals.

In all countries, when asked “Where do you avoid being open about yourself as L, G, B or T for fear of being assaulted, threatened or harassed by others?” respondents reported the highest levels of fear in public spaces (restaurants, public transportation, streets, parking lots, parks, and other public premises) and lower (though still significant) levels at home, work, and school. Similarly, respondents overwhelmingly identified the “street, square, car parking lot / public place” when asked where their most recent incident of physical/sexual attack or threat of violence occurred.

The most serious incidences of harassment occur, in all countries, when there is more than one perpetrator, and these perpetrators tend to be male and often strangers to the harassed individuals (an indicator that many of these “most serious” incidences probably happen in public). A notable portion of this harassment (second only to ‘someone else you didn’t know’) was perpetrated by teenagers or groups of teenagers, a reminder that, while we tend to think of younger individuals as more accepting of non-normative identities, there is still a culture of intolerance that circulates globally.

This study underscores the importance of Stop Street Harassment’s and other organizations’ goal of educating the public about how critical this issue is to the lives of so many women and LGBT individuals (and women who identify as LGBT). While folks across all identity categories experience street harassment in unique ways, we are united in our goal of research, education, and mobilization so that surveys like these are no longer needed.

This is a guest post by Patrick McNeil. Patrick is finishing his master’s thesis at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C., where he is pursuing his Master’s in Women’s Studies. His work focuses on whether and how gay and bisexual men experience street harassment and how this form of harassment intersects with and diverges from the gender-based street harassment of women. Follow him on Twitter at @patrickryne.