Being LGBTIQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Intersex, and Queer/Questioning) in Sri Lanka is no walk in the park. Apart from adult consenting same-sex relations being criminalised under Section 365 and Section 365 A of the Penal Code (a vaguely worded and archaic law that epitomises the concept of the colonial hangover), LGBTIQ people face a huge amount of social stigma, discrimination, and institutionalised homophobia.
LGBTIQ rights advocacy organisation EQUAL GROUND recently published their flagship research “Mapping LGBTIQ Identities in Sri Lanka”, which provides one of the deepest statistical and emotional insights to date into Sri Lanka’s LGBTIQ community. One of the many statistics noted in the report is that 12% of the total population interviewed identify as LGTBIQ (when extrapolated, that works out to roughly one in eight people across Sri Lanka).
Brunch spoke to EQUAL GROUND Executive Director Rosanna Flamer-Caldera to learn more about what “Mapping LGBTIQ Identities in Sri Lanka” has shown us.
Why is it important to map LGBTIQ identities in Sri Lanka?
Many people in Sri Lanka think that the LGBTIQ community is just a handful of people making a noise, but what they fail to realise is that there are LGBTIQ people from all walks of life – villages, towns, everywhere. Most often these people are in hiding and scared to come out because they are afraid of what will happen if they do, and rightly so, because there is so much intense homophobia and discrimination that LGBTIQ people face.
Mapping, or rather, attempting to map LGBTIQ identities in Sri Lanka, is a way to find out quantity-wise, just exactly how much of Sri Lanka’s population identifies as LGBTIQ. To say exactly is also a loose term. It is important to map this because we need the Government of Sri Lanka and the people of Sri Lanka to understand that there are many of us, not just a few.
Mapping and finding out statistics give us a broader picture of what the community looks like and quantifies that. This information can then be used to help convince the Government and the people that there are many of us from all walks of life, that we’re all citizens of this country who contribute to its economy, and to its culture and that we shouldn’t be marginalised.
What did this latest report show about the Sri Lankan LGTBIQ identity and what does this mean from a practical perspective?
In 2017, we did a pilot study of four districts that showed that LGBTIQ persons numbered over 19.6% of the population, which is quite high. The researcher pointed out that this number might be high because the enumerators (the people out in the field interviewing respondents) were all trained by EQUAL GROUND and were sensitised to the LGBTIQ community, having served as field officers in those districts and were known for being LGBTIQ friendly. Therefore the people in these areas would have been comfortable disclosing their Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity, and Expression (SOGIE) to them.
This recent report was conducted by KANTAR Lanka (Pvt.) Ltd. for EQUAL GROUND and even though we sensitised their enumerators, most people didn’t know who they were, and so I think that a lot of people would have been afraid to disclose their identities. Sadly, we will never be able to get a real picture of exactly how many people are LGBTIQ, but what we can do through things like this mapping study, is give an estimate based on the findings of the research which has shown that around 12% of Sri Lanka’s population identifies as LGBTIQ.
A lot has come out of this study from a practical standpoint. For one thing, the majority of the LGBTIQ population haven’t revealed their SOGIE to their families for fear of rejection. A lot of these people have experienced lots of bullying in their childhood. The main fear of many LGBTIQ people was that of getting arrested and being harassed and discriminated against by law enforcement and by their family, by their friends. There is a lot of perspective to be gained from this study to ascertain exactly what LGBTIQ people are going through in their daily lives.
We also learned more about how LGBTIQ persons themselves perceive being LGBTIQ. Basically, in their mindset, many feel that it is better to be straight and carry on because that way they can basically get somewhere in life without suffering too much pain and anxiety. But the other side of this is that when you try to hide who you are from the world, that becomes more of a burden than coming out and having to face discrimination from others. My own personal opinion is that those who have come out feel some sense of freedom from being out. This is not to say that people who are out do not face any stigma or discrimination because they absolutely do, but most people who have come out have learned how to deal with it as well as how to support other people facing discrimination.
To me, if you look at how LGBTIQ people are treated, you can see that there is something fundamentally wrong in any country where its government feels compelled to marginalise a community based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. The LGBTIQ community can and do easily contribute to the economy, to arts and culture, and the industry, and not in the stereotypical form of being hairdressers or designers. They could be rocket scientists, top-notch lawyers, Heads of State, or anything they want, really, but are stopped because of how people treat them and the way institutional homophobia treats them.
Have similar mapping studies been done before? What have they shown? What are the differences that have been noted?
As I explained, EQUAL GROUND conducted a pilot study in 2017 which involved only four districts and where the percentage of those who identified as LGBTIQ was much higher, likely because the people were more comfortable with the enumerators who were firmly known to be LGBTIQ friendly.
Most of the issues that LGBTIQ people face that we found in our pilot study were very similar to what was found in the latest mapping study. We had similar amounts of LGBTIQ persons who had been asked to leave their jobs or refused employment, who had been kicked out of their homes by families who were not accepting, who had been forced into heterosexual marriages and so on.
One area that the study only lightly touches on is LGBTIQ persons in forced heterosexual marriages, and this is something we might conduct an independent study on. Especially concerning is LBTQ women in heterosexual marriages who suffer physical and mental violence because of this marriage.
What were the biggest challenges EQUAL GROUND faced when working on the report?
One major challenge was Covid-19. We didn’t really face very many challenges in getting and compiling information, but because of Covid-19, we had to stop sending enumerators out into the field, and eventually, we ended up being able to speak with less people we had initially planned on speaking to.
The report talks about the importance of LGBTIQ role models (and the lack of such role models). Why are such role models important?
Speaking of role models, EQUAL GROUND recently did a social media campaign called “Who are We?”, which shows the rest of the community that there are so many of us who have actually come out and done well for ourselves and that we don’t need to be hiding in a closet and thinking we’re worthless. Because we’re not worthless. The campaign featured LGBTIQ people like Brandon Ingram and Bhoomi Harendran who have made a real success of their lives regardless of what they may have gone through as children, teenagers, and even as adults.
With role models, we constantly talk about LGBTIQ people in the news and media, we talk about people who have made it, from presidents and prime ministers to actors and doctors to scientists to show that LGBTIQ people can and do build success for themselves, regardless of what they want to do. Look at Alan Turing, the father of modern computer science. If he was able to say “hey, I’m gay”, maybe we wouldn’t have lost such a brilliant mind when we did, but unfortunately things were very different in England then – and yet, look at what he did with his short time.
What were the other key findings of the report?
One of the important findings from the report was how non-LGBTIQ persons perceive the LGBTIQ community. There were lots of preconceived notions that we were able to quantify. For example, many people think that LGBTIQ persons are facing the consequences of sins from their past lives. About 56% of non-LGBTIQ persons do not want to associate with any LGBTIQ people. Another very popular belief is that homosexuality is an import of western culture – of course, that idea has been put into people’s heads by our governments post-independence.
The report also showed that many non-LGBTIQ people believe that the LGBTIQ community should be given equal rights, but we also found that a lot of the time this is because they feel sympathy for the LGBTIQ as opposed to believing in equal rights for everyone. Many non-LGBTIQ persons agreed that LGBTIQ people should get equal rights.
Another perception that non-LGBTIQ people have is that legalising same-sex relations will lead to more people identifying as LGBTIQ, but this is not the case, legalising same-sex relations will not open some sort of faucet. However, being able to say it without legal repercussions and harassment will lead to more people not hiding their orientations.
At the end of the day, LGBTIQ persons face a lot of homophobia, even in the West. Look at the US and Trump’s Government who tried to overturn every single advancement made in LGBTIQ rights. Just in the last year, even after Joe Biden has been in office, about 14 states have passed legislation against the LGBTIQ community. We always have to be vigilant and looking over our shoulders because we never know where the hate will come from. In the past few months alone, there has been a spate of anti-LGBTIQ legislation in Uganda, killings in South Africa, Tonga, and Ghana, arrests in the Cameroons, a call for repeal in Botswana – the list seems endless and hopeless at the moment. Many of these countries are also within the Commonwealth and have clung to British Sodomy laws just like Sri Lanka.
What needs to happen now?
The number-one priority, of course, is what we have been wanting all along, the decriminalisation of consensual adult same-sex relationships and the enactment of non-discrimination policies by the Government, the business community and other public communities so that no person is discriminated in this country because of their sexual orientation or gender identity/expression.
These are the kinds of policies that make communities and countries more wholesome to live in. The quality of life is better, and everyone contributes to the economy, wellbeing and quality of the country.
The full report can be found on EQUAL GROUND’s website: https://www.equal-ground.org/wp-content/uploads/Report_EG-edited.pdf
