SPC1017 Group 1 Blog 2 - Andres E Bravo

I am part of group 1 in SPC1017, and we presented last in our class. Our group worked very fast on our project and even with the complications of the people absent on the day we presented I believe that the people that showed up and myself did a great job. We all were pretty efficient and fast on deciding work for the agenda and study guide using pictures and diagrams of what everyone is going to do. I assigned myself the topic of LGBTQ Rights and Discrimination and I also talked about Chapter 1 in the study guide. I enjoyed and I was honored talking about this topic because I have many friends from that community, and I talked with them about the topic to be updated and correctly informed.

Notably, as of January 2021, 29 countries recognized same-sex marriage. By contrast, not counting non-state actors and extrajudicial killings, only one country is believed to impose the death penalty on consensual same-sex sexual acts: Iran. The death penalty is officially law, but generally not practiced, in Brunei, Mauritania, Nigeria (in the northern third of the country), Saudi Arabia, Somalia and the United Arab Emirates. As well as LGBT people face extrajudicial killings in Afghanistan under the Taliban rule, and in the Russian region of Chechnya. Sudan rescinded its unenforced death penalty for anal sex (hetero- or homosexual) in 2020. Fifteen countries have stoning on the books as a penalty for adultery, which would include gay sex, but this is only enforced by the legal authorities in Iran.

In 2011, the United Nations Human Rights Council passed its first resolution recognizing LGBT rights, following which the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights issued a report documenting violations of the rights of LGBT people, including hate crimes, criminalization of homosexual activity, and discrimination. Following the issuance of the report, the United Nations urged all countries which had not yet done so to enact laws protecting basic LGBT rights.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights in the United States have evolved significantly over time, however LGBT people in the USA may face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBT residents. Until 1962, all 50 states criminalized same-sex sexual activity, but by 2003 all remaining laws against same-sex sexual activity had been invalidated. Beginning with Massachusetts in 2004, by 2015, LGBT Americans had won the right to marry in all 50 states. Additionally, in many states and municipalities, LGBT Americans are explicitly protected from discrimination in employment, housing, and access to public accommodations.

Many LGBT Americans still continue to face legal and social challenges not experienced by non-LGBT residents, particularly in states with large conservative populations, such as in the Deep South, many parts of the Midwest, in rural areas, and in some Native American tribal nations.

Many LGBT rights in the United States have been established by the United States Supreme Court. In five landmark rulings between the years 1996 and 2020, the Supreme Court invalidated a state law banning protected class recognition based upon homosexuality, struck down sodomy laws nationwide, struck down Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act, made same-sex marriage legal nationwide, and prohibited employment discrimination against gay and transgender employees.

LGBT-related anti-discrimination law regarding housing and private and public services varies by state, leaving residents of some states unprotected. Twenty-three states plus Washington, D.C., Guam, and Puerto Rico outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation, and twenty-two states plus Washington, D.C. outlaw discrimination based on gender identity or expression. The Equality Act, which is currently proposed in the United States Congress, would outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity nationwide.

Family law also varies by state. Adoption of children by same-sex married couples is legal nationwide since June 2015 following the Supreme Court's decision in Obergefell v. Hodges (though Mississippi did not have its same-sex adoption ban struck down by a federal court until March 2016). Policies regarding adoption vary greatly between jurisdictions. Some states allow adoption by all couples, while others ban all unmarried couples from adoption.

Hate crimes based on sexual orientation or gender identity are punishable by federal law under the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009, but many states lack state-level hate crime laws that cover sexual orientation and/or gender identity. LGBT people of color face the highest rates of discrimination and hate crimes, especially trans women of color.

Civil rights for LGBT people in the United States are advocated by a variety of organizations at all levels and concentrations of political and legal life, including the Human Rights Campaign, Lambda Legal, GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD), American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the National Center for Transgender Equality, and the National Center for Lesbian Rights.

On June 26, 2003, the Supreme Court ruled in Lawrence v. Texas that intimate consensual sexual conduct is part of the liberty protected by substantive due process under the Fourteenth Amendment. The majority opinion, written by Justice Anthony Kennedy, explicitly overruled Bowers v. Hardwick, a 1986 decision that found sodomy laws to be constitutional. Despite this ruling, some states have not repealed their sodomy law and local law enforcement officers have used these statutes to harass or arrest gay people.

Prior to the 2003 Supreme Court ruling in Lawrence v. Texas, same-sex sexual activity was illegal in fourteen U.S. states, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. military. By that time, twenty-nine states, the District of Columbia, and five territories had repealed their state's sodomy laws by legislative action. After the repeal of "Don't Ask Don't Tell" in 2011, the U.S. Congress repealed sodomy laws in the U.S. military in 2014. Twelve states have had state Supreme Court or state Appeals courts rule that their state's sodomy laws were unconstitutional. Georgia, Louisiana, Massachusetts, and Minnesota have all had their state sodomy laws struck down by the courts, but the legislatures have not repealed those laws. On April 18, 2013, the governor of Montana signed a bill repealing that state's sodomy law; it had previously been nullified by the Montana Supreme Court. On April 23, 2014, the governor of Virginia signed a bill repealing that state's sodomy law. On October 1, 2020, a bill repealing Maryland's sodomy law went into effect without the governor's signature.