World
Out in the World: LGBTQ news from Europe and Asia
Human Rights Watch in new report criticizes Jordanian government
Jordan
The government of Jordanian King Abdullah have systematically targeted lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights activists and coordinated an unlawful crackdown on free expression and assembly around gender and sexuality, Human Rights Watch said in a report released earlier this month.
In its Dec. 4 report, HRW documented cases in which Jordan’s General Intelligence Department (GID) and the Preventive Security department of the Public Security Directorate interrogated LGBTQ activists about their work, and intimidated them with threats of violence, arrest and prosecution, forcing several activists to shut down their organizations, discontinue their activities and in some cases, flee the country.
Government officials also smeared LGBTQ rights activists online based on their sexual orientation, and social media users posted photos of LGBTQ rights activists with messages inciting violence against them.
“Jordanian authorities have launched a coordinated attack against LGBT rights activists, aimed at eradicating any discussion around gender and sexuality from the public and private spheres,” said Rasha Younes, senior LGBT rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Security forces’ intimidation tactics and unlawful interference in LGBT organizing have driven activism further underground and forced civil society leaders into an impossible reality: severe self-censorship or fleeing Jordan.”
Three activists said the Amman governor interrogated them after they preemptively cancelled the screening of a film depicting gay men. Two LGBTQ organization directors said that because of official intimidation, they were forced to close their offices, discontinue their operations in Jordan and flee the country.
One activist said Preventive Security officers made him sign a pledge that he would report all his venue’s activities to the governor. Another activist reported being targeted online while social media users called for him to be burned alive.
One of the few LGBTQ rights activists who has remained in Jordan described her current reality: “Merely existing in Amman has become terrifying. We cannot continue our work as activists, and we are forced to be hyperaware of our surroundings as individuals.”
More recently, in October 2023, an LGBTQ rights activist said he was summoned for investigation by the intelligence agency. During the interrogation, the activist said intelligence officers searched his phone, intimidated him and threatened him with a travel ban, while asking personal questions about his sexual orientation and sexual relations with other men. After three hours of questioning, the activist said the officers told him he could leave.
“They [Jordanian authorities] invest in intimidation to destroy our minds and isolate us,” the activist said. “Their tactic is to target us mentally, leaving no evidence of our torment behind.”
Jordan’s constitution protects the rights to nondiscrimination (article 6), the right to personal freedom (article 7), and the right to freedom of expression and opinion (article 15).
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Jordan is a state party, provides that everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression, assembly and association. The ICCPR, in its articles 2 and 26, guarantees fundamental human rights and equal protection of the law without discrimination.
The U.N. Human Rights Committee, which interprets the covenant, has made clear that discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity is prohibited in upholding any of the rights protected by the treaty, including freedom of expression, assembly and association.
France
Legislation that was introduced last month by the openly gay Socialist Senator Hussein Bourgi to acknowledge the French state’s responsibility in the criminalization and persecution of gay men between 1945 and 1982 was adopted.
However, the section of bill that called for compensation of the victims of French homophobic laws, in effect during that period by offering them a lump sum of €10,000 ($10,752.75) was not approved.
Speaking with various French media outlets, Bourgi, who authored the bill, said: “It is high time to bring justice to the living victims of legislation which served as the basis for a politics of repression with brutal and punishing social, professional and familial consequences.”
Agence France-Presse reported:
Bourgi’s text focuses on a 40-year period following the introduction of legislation that specifically targeted homosexuals under the Nazi-allied Vichy regime. The 1942 law, which was not repealed after the liberation of France, introduced a discriminatory distinction in the age of consent for heterosexual and homosexual sex, setting the former at 13 (raised to 15 at the Liberation) and the latter at 21.
Some 10,000 people — almost exclusively men, most of them working-class — were convicted under the law until its repeal in 1982, according to research by sociologists Régis Schlagdenhauffen and Jérémie Gauthier. More than 90 percent were sentenced to jail. An estimated 50,000 more were convicted under a separate “public indecency” law that was amended in 1960 to introduce an aggravating factor for homosexuals and double the penalty.
“People tend to think France was protective of gay people compared to, say, Germany or the UK. But when you look at the figures you get a very different picture,” said Schlagdenhaufen, who teaches at the EHESS institute in Paris.
“France was not this cradle of human rights we like to think of,” he added. “The revolution tried to decriminalise homosexuality, but subsequent regimes found other stratagems to repress gay people. This repression was enshrined in law in 1942 and even more so in 1960.”
The legislation won the backing of Justice Minister Éric Dupond-Moretti in President Emmanuel Macron’s government. However, Dupond-Moretti agreed with the removal of the compensation provision by the right-wing and center senatorial majority. Dupond-Moretti justified this choice noting concerns over “legal difficulties,” telling French magazine Le Monde that “putting into practice” of this compensation measure “appears extremely complex” due to the difficulty of providing proof of an old conviction and its execution.
The Dupond-Moretti added “It was not the law which was responsible for this harm” but “French society, homophobic in all its components at the time” adding, “This is not the fault of the Republic. The law of memory is enough.”
The bill must now be taken up by the lower house, the National Assembly, to be passed and then adopted.
Scotland
The Court of Session in Edinburgh has ruled that Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s U.K. government acted within the law by invoking Section 35, which blocked the measure passed by the Scottish Parliament, that would have make it easier for transgender people to change their legally-recognized sex on documents.
The actions by Scottish Secretary Alister Jack, with Sunak’s backing kept the act from receiving the signature of King Charles III and becoming law.
The Gender Recognition Reform bill was introduced by the Scottish government in the country’s Parliament in the spring of 2022 was passed in a final 86-39 vote days before last Christmas. The sweeping reform bill modifies the Gender Recognition Act, signed into law in 2004, by allowing trans Scots to gain legal recognition without the need for a medical diagnosis.
The measure further stipulates that age limit for legal recognition is lowered to 16.
In a statement released in January of this year, Jack said:
“After thorough and careful consideration of all the relevant advice and the policy implications, I am concerned that this legislation would have an adverse impact on the operation of Great Britain-wide equalities legislation.
Transgender people who are going through the process to change their legal sex deserve our respect, support and understanding. My decision today is about the legislation’s consequences for the operation of GB-wide equalities protections and other reserved matters.
I have not taken this decision lightly. The bill would have a significant impact on, amongst other things, GB-wide equalities matters in Scotland, England and Wales. I have concluded, therefore, that this is the necessary and correct course of action.”
The Scottish government sued Westminster in the Court of Session, Scotland’s highest civil court, arguing that Jack did not have “reasonable grounds” to block the bill. The BBC reported that in her ruling for the UK governments, Judge Lady Haldane dismissed the Scottish government’s appeal and said the block on the legislation was lawful.
Haldance noted that Jack followed correct legal procedures when he made his decision to invoke section 35 and that the Scottish government had failed to show that he had made legal errors.
The judge wrote: “I cannot conclude that he (Mr. Jack) failed in his duty to take such steps as were reasonable in all the circumstances to acquaint himself with material sufficient to permit him to reach the decision that he did.”
Haldane also said that “Section 35 does not, in and of itself, impact on the separation of powers or other fundamental constitutional principle. Rather it is itself part of the constitutional framework.”
Stonewall UK, the nation’s largest LGBTQ advocacy group, expressed its disappointment with Haldane’s ruling in a statement released this past week:
“We’re disappointed that the Court of Session in Scotland has found in favour of the UK government’s unprecedented decision to use Section 35 to block the Gender Recognition Reform Bill from Royal Assent. This bill was one of the most debated in the Scottish Parliament’s history and was passed by a resounding majority of MSPs drawn from all major Scottish parties.
This unfortunately means more uncertainty for trans people in Scotland, who will now be waiting once again, to see whether they will be able to have their gender legally recognised through a process that is in line with leading nations like Ireland, Canada and New Zealand.
Whatever happens next in discussions with the UK and Scottish governments on this matter, Stonewall will continue to press all administrations to make progress on LGBTQ+ rights in line with leading international practice.”
UNITED KINGDOM
Anti-LGBTQ rhetoric used by British Equalities Minister Kemi Badenoch during her speech on the floor of the House of Commons on Dec. 6, prompted Labor MP Chris Bryant, an openly gay lawmaker, to rise in opposition and declare her speech left him feeling unsafe.
The debate was triggered by Badenoch claiming that the UK does not recognize self-ID from overseas countries for trans people, PinkNewsUK reported. In his retort to her statements, Bryant explained: “I feel, as a gay man, less safe than I did three years or five years ago.”
PinkNewsUK also noted that Bryant said: “Why? Sometimes because of the rhetoric that is used, including by herself [Badenoch] in the public debate.” He added that some MPs had cheered for Badenoch’s statements on the trans community, and for statements against gender-affirming care for trans people, which could lead to LGBTQ people feeling even less safe in the UK.
“Many of us feel less safe today, and when people over there cheer as they just did, it chills me to the bone, it genuinely does,” Bryant said.
She hit back with force, challenging him to identify which words precisely were so problematic. She later criticized the attempts of trans activists to use emotional blackmail to try to shut down debate.
The UK government has updated the list of countries from which gender-certificates will be accepted.
Replying to Bryant, Badenoch said: “He says that my rhetoric chills him to the bone. I would be really keen to hear exactly what it is I have said in this statement or previously that is so chilling.” She added that the current Tory government had done work on “our HIV action plan” and “around trans healthcare,” as well as “establishing five new community-based clinics for adults in the country.”
“There is a lot that we are doing, so it is wrong to characterize us as not caring about LGBT people,” she said.
Bryant’s colleague, Ben Bradshaw, also failed to get the better of Badenoch. He complained the UK had recently fallen in a set of international rankings on LGBTQ rights. She calmly pointed out that those rankings reward states that adopt the Stonewall-supported policy of self-ID and punish those who do not. To cheers from the Tory benches, she declared “Stonewall does not decide the law in this country,” referring to Stonewall UK, the nation’s largest LGBTQ advocacy group.
POLAND
In a turn of events Monday, the lower house of the national legislature of Poland, elected Donald Tusk as the new prime minister after Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki failed to win a vote of confidence by lawmakers in his government.
248 MPs voted for the election of Tusk as prime minister, 201 were against and no one abstained in the 460-seat lower house of Parliament.
“This is a truly wonderful day, not only for me, but for all those who have deeply believed for many years that things will get even better, that we will chase away the darkness, that we will chase away evil,” the 66-year-old new prime minister told Parliament after his election.
There had been considerable turmoil in the Polish government, particularly in Parliament, as many accused the ruling conservative right-wing PiS (Law and Justice Party) of Jarosław Kaczyński, who until last month held the post of deputy prime minister, of leading the country backwards into an authoritarian state.
The PiS lost their parliamentary majority in the critical elections this past October after a larger proportion of the country’s 18-29 year-olds had turned out to vote than over-60s and election officials said that turnout was probably 72.9 percent, the highest since the fall of communism in 1989.
Voter anger had steadily risen over erosion of women’s reproductive rights eroded and Polish LGBTQ people who had faced a government hate campaign that drove some to leave the country and caused the European Commission to threatened to pull economic aid and as the BBC reported, the EU is still withholding more than €30 billion ($32 billion) in COVID-19 recovery funds because of its concerns about the politicization of Poland’s courts.
The Polish government has repeatedly clashed with the EU over the rule of law, media freedom, migration and LGBTQ rights since PiS came to power in 2015.
Tusk, who had served as European Council president from 2014-2019 is expected to improve Warsaw’s standing with the EU. Additionally he previously served as Poland’s prime minister from 2007-2014.
“At the invitation of President Andrzej Duda, after the vote in the Sejm, a meeting was held with Prime Minister Donald Tusk. It was agreed that after obtaining a vote of confidence, the swearing-in of the new government would take place on Wednesday, Dec. 13, at 9 a.m. at the Presidential Palace,” a spokesperson for Duda said in a statement released late Monday.
Additional reporting from Human Rights Watch, Agence France-Presse, Le Monde, The BBC and PinkNewsUK.
Honduras
Realidad LGBTQ en Honduras: fuga o muerte
Observatorio KAI+: 35 asesinatos anti-LGBTQ en 2026
TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Las cifras encienden todas las alarmas: 35 muertes violentas de personas LGBTQ, 195 casos de violencia generalizada y 11 personas asistidas para refugiarse en el extranjero. Las mujeres trans encabezan las víctimas mortales con 11 casos, seguidas de los hombres gay con 10.
Esa es la realidad de las poblaciones sexualmente diversas que pinta el boletín número 14 del Observatorio de Violencia hacia las Personas LGBTI+ de Honduras KAI+, correspondiente al período de enero al 8 de agosto de 2026.
Según el informe, los departamentos con mayor concentración de asesinatos son Francisco Morazán (12), Cortés (5) y Comayagua (4). Sin embargo, el dato más revelador de la impunidad es que los 35 casos permanecen en etapa de investigación preliminar, con apenas dos capturas reportadas.
«No queremos vivir con miedo»: defensores
Lucía Barrientos, de la Asociación Ixchel, resume el sentimiento colectivo. «Hoy las personas LGBTI en Honduras vivimos en estado de alerta. Muertes que, al hacer un análisis, tienen una conmoción de que muchas personas de nuestra población han sido torturadas, que han sido crímenes de odio», señala.
Barrientos subraya que en el país no hay una ley que tipifique el crimen de odio, lo que deja a la población en un limbo legal y expuesta a la violencia sin protección efectiva.
Entretanto, Jennifer Córdoba, de la Colectiva de Mujeres Trans Muñecas de Arcoíris, lamenta que las autoridades no estén haciendo nada para defender los derechos humanos.
«Ver ese tipo de violencias en el país que se incrementan, ver que las autoridades de nuestro país no están haciendo nada para la defensa de los derechos humanos, no crear una política pública que respete los derechos humanos de la población LGTBI», afirma Córdoba.
Violencia generalizada y discriminación sistemática
Los 195 casos de violencia generalizada incluyen amenazas (19), maltrato familiar (25), abuso de autoridad (14), discriminación por orientación sexual o identidad de género (14), lesiones (10) y agresiones sexuales. Las mujeres trans son nuevamente las más afectadas, con 32 casos registrados.
Dany Montesinos, de la Asociación LGBTI Kukulcán, advierte: «Esta es una violencia general, estructurada. No tenemos un patrón determinado. La alerta que estamos poniendo es que, en comparación con otros años, esto está siendo más creciente».
Un elemento crítico señalado por el boletín es que casi el 70 por ciento de los casos de violencia generalizada (137 de 195) carecen de categorización desagregada sobre la orientación sexual o identidad de género de la víctima, lo que evidencia la ausencia de protocolos adecuados por parte de las instituciones estatales y una invisibilización sistemática.
Migración forzada, huir para vivir
Entre los hallazgos más dolorosos está la asistencia a 11 personas LGBTQ que han buscado refugio en el extranjero. Ocho se han ido a Estados Unidos, dos a España y una al Reino Unido. Los motivos incluyen amenazas, discriminación, abuso de autoridad, agresiones sexuales y físicas.
Como señala un testimonio: «Tuvieron que irse, se vieron obligadas a huir por amenazas, por la discriminación, por el abuso de autoridad y agresiones sexuales. Estos datos nos muestran que la migración de las personas LGBTI no responde únicamente a razones económicas, sino a la necesidad urgente de proteger su vida y sus derechos».
Recomendaciones ante un Estado ausente
El boletín concluye con un llamado urgente al Estado hondureño. Exige fortalecer las investigaciones de muertes violentas e implementar políticas públicas de protección integral. Además, capacitar a funcionarios en diversidad sexual y derechos humanos y garantizar que los casos avancen más allá de la etapa preliminar.
Barrientos lo resume con claridad. «Exigimos al Estado respuestas inmediatas, justicia y protección real para nuestra población. No queremos retroceder, no queremos volver atrás, no queremos vivir con miedo, no queremos salir a la calle y saber que no puedo expresar mi amor hacia mi pareja o hacia otra persona porque puedo amar y ser muerta».
El Observatorio KAI+ recuerda que detrás de cada cifra hay seres humanos: madres, padres, hijos, hermanos y familias que dependen de ellos. La indiferencia institucional, advierten, no puede seguir siendo una puerta abierta a la impunidad.
Netherlands
Trans, nonbinary Americans find refuge in the Netherlands
DAFT visa offers fast-track to permanent residency, citizenship
Editor’s note: International News Editor Michael K. Lavers and Photo Editor Michael Key were on assignment in the Netherlands from July 28-Aug. 10.
AMSTERDAM — A transgender American couple who live in the Netherlands say President Donald Trump prompted them to leave the U.S.
Jack Reaves, who is a trans man, and his wife, Iskara McCoy, who is a trans woman of color, moved to the Netherlands from Reno, Nev., in 2024. The couple now lives outside Utrecht, a university city that is roughly 30 miles south-southeast of Amsterdam.
“We’d been keeping an eye on things during his (Trump’s) first term in 2016, which was pretty terrifying,” Reaves told the Washington Blade on Aug. 24 during a WhatsApp interview with him and McCoy. “We knew that there was a lot of anti-trans legislation and just anti-trans feelings from the Republican/MAGA party at the time.”
The Biden-Harris administration took office on Jan. 20, 2021, two weeks after thousands of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol — the insurrection took place shortly after Congress began to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election that Joe Biden won.
“Joe Biden was elected, and we were like, okay, well maybe things will turn around,” said Reaves. “But it was very clear very early on in the Biden presidency that that wasn’t going to happen.”
“There weren’t any meaningful changes, and then with Trump getting ready to win the next election and MAGA really looking like they were going to continue to gain more power, we were like, well time to get out.”
Reaves and McCoy are two of the four trans and nonbinary Americans who have moved to the Netherlands with whom the Blade recently spoke. The interviews took place during World Pride, which took place in Amsterdam from July 25-Aug. 8, or in the days after the biennial event ended.
The Dutch American Friendship Treaty, or DAFT, allows American citizens to live and work in the Netherlands as self-employed entrepreneurs.
DAFT visa recipients must keep at least €4,500 ($5,244.19) in a Dutch business bank account and need to register their business with the Dutch Chamber of Commerce. DAFT visa recipients can apply for permanent residency in the Netherlands or the European Union seven years after they receive it.
Reaves and McCoy and the two other trans and nonbinary Americans with whom the Blade spoke for this story either received a DAFT visa or plan to apply for one.
Kai, who is nonbinary, and their husband, who is a trans man, moved from New England to the Netherlands in August 2021. They now live in Haarlem, a small city that is roughly 12 miles west of Amsterdam.
Kai told the Blade on Aug. 20 during an interview from their home that friends moved to the Netherlands in 2017 after they received a DAFT visa.
“The prompt was the 2016 election for them,” said Kai.
Kai and their husband were living in a collective household in August 2020 when they “decided we wanted to have some kind of change.”
“We suspected that politics was going to get worse, even if it got better soon, that it would probably get worse again later, and that the country politically was going downhill,” they said.
Kai told the Blade a lack of promised disability payments and poor health in the U.S. were also factors.
“When I had been to visit the Netherlands to visit the friends that were living here, I found that my body was healthier, even though I was only here for one or two weeks at a time,” they said. “I was able to do more things, eat more things that I couldn’t go or eat while living in the U.S.”
The fourth American with whom the Blade spoke identifies as a “disabled transgender queer” person. He asked to remain anonymous.
He and his daughter, who is also trans, arrived in the Netherlands in July. He referred to the Holocaust and its impact in the Netherlands when the Blade interviewed him in Amsterdam on Aug. 6.
“I’m the trans parent of a trans adolescent who knows our family history, which includes genocide from the Holocaust,” he said, pointing out 85 percent of Dutch Jews died in the Holocaust. “(My daughter) said my grandparents came to New York right before the occupation, and so my daughter said from our history that targeted communities have to get out early, so this was last summer, so how will we know we need to leave and where will we go?”
“I started looking into that, and we started planning our move,” he added.
He pointed out the “murder of opposition politicians” — specifically former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark Hortman, who were shot to death inside their home in June 2025 — and “harassment and prosecution” of journalists in the U.S. — federal authorities in January arrested former CNN anchor Don Lemon less than two weeks after he entered a Minnesota church with a group of protesters who confronted its pastor who works with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement — since the Trump-Vance administration took office as signs he and his daughter may need to leave the U.S.
Federal authorities charged Lemon, independent journalist Georgia Fort and two protesters with conspiracy and interfering with worshippers’ First Amendment rights during the protest.
An ICE agent on Jan. 7 shot and killed Renee Good, a 37-year-old Minneapolis woman who left behind her wife and three children. U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents on Jan. 24 shot and killed Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old nurse who worked for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs in Minneapolis.
Pretti and Good were American citizens.
The shootings took place after the Trump-Vance administration deployed thousands of federal immigration agents to Minnesota during “Operation Metro Surge.”
“We were thinking, depending on what happens with the midterms,” said the trans person in Amsterdam with whom the Blade spoke. “But then you’re like, you know what, every day more people are coming and we should just do this thing.”
The Trump-Vance administration since it took office on Jan. 20, 2025, has implemented several anti-trans executive orders and policies.
Trump hours after his second inauguration signed the “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government” that, among other things, declared the federal government will only recognize two genders: male and female. The directive also banned the State Department from issuing passports with “X” gender markers.
The Pentagon reinstated a ban on openly trans servicemembers. The Department of Education has rescinded agreements with school districts that were designed to protect trans students. The Trump-Vance administration’s anti-terrorism strategy specifically targets “radically pro-transgender” groups.
The U.S. Supreme Court earlier this summer upheld state laws banning athletes from school sports teams that correspond with their gender identity and block gender-affirming care for minors. The Trump-Vance administration since it took office has moved aggressively to curtail these treatments.
“On the one hand, it’s like as if people don’t recognize that that these things make it impossible to have a trans life,” said the trans person with whom the Blade spoke in Amsterdam. “But of course, that’s what Project 2025 is trying to do … make it be impossible to exist.”
McCoy said her and Reaves’s oldest child, who is also trans, has an “X” gender marker on their U.S. passport. McCoy’s grandmother with whom she was very close recently died, but her family attended her funeral virtually from the Netherlands “because we didn’t want to risk returning to the States at that point.”
Kai also noted trans and nonbinary Americans who are trying to leave the U.S., but don’t have passports and other documents with gender markers that match their gender identity.
“That’s terrifying, and it prevents you from doing things like leaving the country,” they said. “Even if it’s not a ban on leaving the country, it still prevents you from leaving the country if those things don’t match in the right way, depending on which immigrations person you get at the border.”
“On this end it wouldn’t matter as much,” added Kai. “But on the other end, it does matter and that is super frustrating and exhausting.”
Dutch ‘very into their bureaucracy’
Kai and the three other trans and nonbinary Americans with whom the Blade spoke said navigating the Dutch health care system upon their arrival in the Netherlands was one of their biggest challenges.
“They’re very into their bureaucracy and they’re very into following guidelines as if they’re laws, and they’re the only ways you do things,” said McCoy. “Once they start working for you. They work. Once you’re in the system, once you’re onboarded, once they’re caught up, then everything goes pretty smoothly.”
Reaves noted McCoy “had a little bit easier time as a trans woman who’s already passing.”
“They were just like, oh, well, it’s clear you’re a woman, so here’s your hormones, and here’s the fast path to diagnostics,” Reaves told the Blade.
Reaves, on the other hand, had been on testosterone for six years before he and McCoy moved to the Netherlands. Reaves said it took nearly a “full year of re-diagnostics before I could get back on testosterone and continue to determine care.”
“They were just like, ‘Well, you kind of look like a woman, so we’re gonna make you do the full diagnostic phase again,’” recalled Reaves.
Reaves told the Blade his doctor prescribed him the wrong type of testosterone. Health clinics that specifically treat trans and nonbinary people use what he described as “extremely outdated language,” but Reaves noted the facility’s doctor helped him get an appointment for his top surgery.
“Now that I’m fully onboarded, I think it’s actually been a little bit better than the U.S.,” he said, noting he receives testosterone blood tests at home. “The follow-ups are really easy.”
Kai also discussed the challenges navigating the Dutch health care system.
They said it would “have been a lot harder to receive care” if they had already undergone hormone replacement therapy, seen a psychiatrist, or had had surgeries. Kai told the Blade they “made the choice” to tell the clinic where they were receiving care that they were a man, as opposed to saying they are nonbinary.
“That’s not true, but I look enough like a man, and then I’m going to get the care that I need,” they said. “I’m sure it’s very different and difficult for folks, especially who are nonbinary, to say I am actually a woman, or I am actually a man, and to pretend that … and that’s still what the system says.”
“Just like with any system, if you want to get your needs met from the system, sometimes you have to meet the system where it’s at, and then once you get your needs met, then outside of the system you can be whoever you want,” Kai added.
Kai noted Dutch activists are “working to get some of those laws and some of those policies changed.” Their husband is working with one group “that is working to change things from if you don’t have a psychological diagnosis of being trans, then getting that care is going to be really hard.”
“What this group is working on is trying to get trans care to be — it’s what they use in the U.S., which is like informed consent, which is not what they use here,” said Kai. “But they’re working on putting together something to like push to governmental level to policy level to say that trans care should be informed consent, not the diagnosis.”
Gay PM: Netherlands needs to do more to defend trans people, rights
The Netherlands in 2001 became the first country in the world to extend marriage rights to same-sex couples.
The country’s nondiscrimination and hate crimes law include gender identity and expression. The Dutch government in 2021 formally apologized to trans and intersex people who were forced to become sterile in order to legally change their gender — The Gender Change Act, which was also known as the Transgender Act — was in place from 1985 until 2014.
Prime Minister Rob Jetten, who is the country’s first openly gay head of government, during a World Pride Human Rights Conference panel conceded the Netherlands needs to do more to defend trans people and their rights. Boris Dittrich, the Dutch Senate’s First Vice President and a member of Jetten’s D66 party who was previously global advocacy director for Human Rights Watch’s LGBTQ Rights Program, at the end of the panel asked about protecting intersex babies from what advocates maintain are unnecessary surgeries.
Reaves admitted he and his children are struggling to learn Dutch, but he added he and his family “appreciate” the Netherlands and “really enjoy living here.”
“I struggle in the Netherlands,” Reaves told the Blade. “I don’t speak the language
“It’s hard being away from home and your own culture and the things you grew up with,” he said. “But I’m safe here, and so that like gives it extra points.”
McCoy said their daughter has “experienced zero transphobia here so far.”
Kai told the Blade that their friends warned them that Dutch people would “call you out or they’ll stare at you or will be mean to you” if they “look nonbinary.”
“I had never had that experience,” they said.
All four of the people with whom the Blade spoke said they plan to apply for their Dutch or EU citizenship once they are legally able to do so. They all expressed reservations about returning to the U.S., even once the Trump-Vance administration is no longer in office.
“I’m actually very nervous that even if things turn around in the U.S. as far as getting rid of Trump, that people are still going to be anti-trans,” said the trans person with whom the Blade spoke in Amsterdam. “The poison’s in the water.”
Reaves said the U.S. “doesn’t really feel like it’s a safe place for trans people to come to.” McCoy added she would consider visiting the U.S., but “I would not move back.”
“That’s too risky,” she said. “It can change anytime.”
“It would probably take like a decade of democratic legislative changes before I would feel safe coming back,” added Reaves.
Canada
Monument to LGBTQ Canadians officially unveiled
Thunderhead honors those who suffered government-sanctioned discrimination
A monument that pays tribute to LGBTQ Canadians who suffered government-sanctioned persecution and discrimination officially opened in Ottawa on Aug. 21.
Former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Governor General Louise Arbour, and Women and Gender Equality Minister Rechie Valdez are among those who attended the ceremony.
A Canadian government press release notes Thunderhead, which is located on Parliament Hill, “recognizes the historic discrimination faced by 2SLGBTQI+ (two-spirit, lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, intersex, plus) people in Canada, including during the LGBT (lesbiennes, gaies, bisexuelles, trans) Purge.”
(French and English are Canada’s official languages.)
Trudeau in 2017 formally apologized to Canadians who suffered persecution and discrimination under the country’s anti-LGBTQ laws — including those convicted of “gross indecency” before Canada decriminalized consensual same-sex sexual relations — and policies. Trudeau also formally apologized to those who were fired from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the country’s military and civil service from the 1950s to the mid-1990s because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.
The Canadian government later settled a class action lawsuit that LGBT Purge victims filed.
The settlement funded the monument.
The Canadian government’s press release notes an “all Canadian team” from Winnipeg, Manitoba, designed it. The monument is also located on the Anishinabe Algonquin Nation’s traditional territory.
“It celebrates the resilience and achievements of those who fought for equality, educates visitors, and inspires the change still needed so that everyone can openly love who they love and express and identify themselves as they choose,” reads the press release.
“Thunderhead stands as a tribute to the lives, stories, and contributions of 2SLGBTQI+ people across Canada,” said Prime Minister Mark Carney on Facebook. “It’s reminder of the discrimination too many endured — and honors those who fought to build a country where everyone can live freely, safely, and with dignity.”
New book examines Trump cuts to LGBTQ healthcare
E-INFOSOL leaders encourage youth to pursue tech careers
Milo Yiannopoulos deported to UK
San Francisco, long a queer safe haven, remains competitive for homebuyers
For LGBTQ youth starting with nothing, Pride House in Florida offers help
Dolly Parton dies at 80
Music icon and dear LGBTQ friend Dolly Parton remembered
New data shows record-high LGBTQ population amid Trump attacks
Push to elect more LGBTQ ANC members yields results
