Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Pleasures, Perversities, and Partnerships: The Historical Emergence of LGBT-Police Relationships

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Handbook of LGBT Communities, Crime, and Justice

Abstract

Relationships between LGBT people and police have been turbulent for some time now, and have been variously characterized as supportive (McGhee 2004) and antagonistic (Radford et al. 2006). These relationships were, and continue to be, influenced by a range of political, legal, cultural, and social factors. This chapter will examine historical and social science accounts of LGBT-police histories to chart the historical peaks and troughs in these relationships. The discussion demonstrates how, in Western contexts, we oscillate between historical moments of police criminalizing “homosexual perversity” and contemporary landscapes of partnership between police and LGBT people. However, the chapter challenges the notion that it is possible to trace this as a lineal progression from a painful past to a more productive present. Rather, it focuses on specific moments, marked by pain or pleasure or both, and how these moments emerge and re-emerge in ways that shaped LGBT-police landscapes in potted, uneven ways. The chapter concludes noting how, although certain ideas and police practices may shift towards more progressive notions of partnership policing, we cannot just take away the history that emerged out of mistrust and pain.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 169.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 279.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 219.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Agee, C. (2006). Gayola: Police professionalization and the politics of San Francisco’s gay bars, 1950–1968. Journal of the History of Sexuality, 15(3), 462–527.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Altman, D. (1971). Homosexual: Oppression and liberation. Sydney, NSW: Angus and Robertson.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ames, L. J. (1996). Homo-phobia, homo-ignorance, homo-hate: Heterosexism and AIDS. In E. D. Rothblum & L. A. Bond (Eds.), Preventing heterosexism and homophobia (pp. 239–252). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Amnesty International. (2006). Stonewalled—still demanding respect: Police abuses against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in the USA. London, UK: Amnesty International Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baird, B. (1997). Putting police on notice: A South Australian case study. In G. Mason & S. Tomsen (Eds.), Homophobic violence (pp. 118–131). Annandale, NSW: The Hawkins Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bartkowiak-Theron, I. (2012). Reaching out to vulnerable people: The work of police liaison officers. In I. Bartkowiak-Theron & N. Asquith (Eds.), Policing vulnerability. Annandale, NSW: Federation Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bartkowiak-Theron, I. (2011). Partnership policing for policing organisations. In P. Birch & V. Herrington (Eds.), Policing in practice (pp. 180–204). South Yarra, VIC: Palgrave MacMillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Berman, A., & Robinson, S. (2010). Speaking out: Stopping homophobic and transphobic abuse in Queensland. Bowen Hills, QLD: Australian Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bernstein, M., & Kostelac, C. (2002). Lavender and blue: Attitudes about homosexuality and behavior toward lesbians and gay men among police officers. Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 18(3), 302–328.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blair, J. (1999, September 7). Quietly, police are making largest effort in US to add gay officers (p. 1). New York Times.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bongiorno, F. (2012). The sex lives of Australians: A history. Collingwood, VIC: Black Inc.

    Google Scholar 

  • Buhrke, R. A. (1996). A matter of justice: Lesbians and gay men in law enforcement. New York, NY: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bull, M., Pinto, S., & Wilson, P. (1991). Homosexual law reform in Australia. Trends and issues in Criminal Justice, no. 29. Canberra: Australian Institute of Criminology.

    Google Scholar 

  • Burke, M. E. (1993). Coming out of the blue: British police officers talking about their lives in ‘the job’ as lesbians, gays and bisexuals. London, UK: Cassell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Carbery, G. (1995). A history of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. Parkville, VIC: Australian Lesbian and Gay Archives Inc.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chan, J. (2007). Making sense of police reforms. Theoretical Criminology, 11(3), 323–345.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chauncey, G. (1994). Gay New York: Gender, urban culture, and the making of the gay male world, 1890–1940. New York, NY: Basic.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cherney, A., & Chui, W. H. (2011). The dilemmas of being a police auxiliary—An Australian case study of police liaison officers. Policing, 5(2), 180–187.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Colvin, R. A. (2012). Gay and lesbian cops: Diversity and effective policing. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Comstock, G. D. (1991). Violence against lesbians and gay men. New York, NY: Columbia University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dalton, D. (2007). Policing outlawed desire: ‘Homocriminality’ in beat spaces in Australia. Law and Critique, 18, 375–405.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • D’Emilio, J. (1983). Sexual politics, sexual communities: The making of a homosexual minority in the United States, 1940–1970. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • D’Emilio, J. (1993). Gay politics and community in San Francisco since World War II. In L. D. Garnets & D. C. Kimmel (Eds.), Psychological perspectives on lesbian and gay male experiences (pp. 59–79). New York, NY: Columbia University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dickter, C. L. (2012). Confronting hate: Heterosexuals’ responses to anti-gay comments. Journal of Homosexuality, 59(8), 1113–1130.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Disman, C. (2003). The San Francisco bathhouse battles of 1984. Journal of Homosexuality, 44(3), 71–129.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dodge, K. S. (1993). ‘Bashing back’: Gay and lesbian street patrols and the criminal justice system. Law and Inequality, 11, 295–368.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dwyer, A. (2014). ‘We’re not like these weird feather boa–covered AIDS-spreading monsters’: How LGBT young people and service providers think riskiness informs LGBT youth-police interaction. Critical Criminology: An International Journal (special issue on “Queer/ing criminology: New directions and frameworks”).

    Google Scholar 

  • Dwyer, A. (2011). ‘It’s not like we’re going to jump them’: How transgressing heteronormativity shapes police interactions with LGBT young people. Youth Justice, 11(3), 203–220.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dwyer, A. & Ball, M. (2013). GLBTI police liaison services: A critical analysis of existing literature. Changing the way we think about change: Shifting boundaries, changing lives. Refereed Conferencing Proceedings of the Australian and New Zealand Critical Criminology Conference, Tasmania, Australia.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dwyer, A. & Hotten, J. (2009). ‘There is no relationship’: Service provider staff on how LGBT young people experience policing. The Future of Sociology, Refereed Conference Proceedings of The Annual Conference of The Australian Sociological Association, Canberra, Australia.

    Google Scholar 

  • Faderman, L. (1991). Odd girls and twilight lovers: A history of lesbian life in twentieth-century America. New York, NY: Penguin Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Feinberg, L. (1996). Trans gender warriors: Making history from Joan of Arc to Dennis Rodman. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fillichio, C. A. (2006). The new beat. The Public Manager, 56–59.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fleming, J. (2011). Community policing: The Australian connection. In J. Putt (Ed.), Community policing in Australia. Research and Public Policy Series 111. Canberra, ACT: Australian Institute of Criminology.

    Google Scholar 

  • Guerra, L. (2010). Gender policing, homosexuality, and the new patriarchy of the Cuban Revolution, 1965–1970. Social History, 35(3), 268–289.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Groves, M. (1995). Not so tasty. Alternative Law Journal, 20(3), 123–127.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gunther, S. (2009). The elastic closet: A history of homosexuality in France, 1942-present. Hampshire, England: Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hayes, S., & Dwyer, A. (2011). Queer cops in Queensland: Exploring LGBT narratives in the Queensland Police Service. In B. Scherer & M. Ball (Eds.), Queering paradigms II: Interrogating agendas (pp. 277–293). Oxford, UK: Peter Lang.

    Google Scholar 

  • Herman, D. (1997). The antigay agenda: Orthodox vision and the Christian right. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Hermant, N. (2013, February 21). Russia backs law banning homosexual ‘propaganda’. ABC News. Retrieved from http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-01-26/russia-backs-law-banning-homosexual-propaganda/4485354.

  • Jennings, R. (2007). A lesbian history of Britain: Love and sex between women since 1500. Westport, CT: Greenwood World Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jivani, A. (1997). It’s not unusual: A history of lesbian and gay Britain in the twentieth century. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Johnson, D. K. (2004). The lavender scare: The Cold War persecution of gays and lesbians in the Federal Government. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kendall, G., & Wickham, G. (1999). Using Foucault’s methods. London, UK: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Leinen, S. (1993). Gay cops. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • LeVay, S. (1996). Queer science: The use and abuse of research into homosexuality. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Los Angeles Police Department. (2012). Police interactions with transgender individuals. Retrieved from http://learningtrans.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/lapd-transgender-policies.pdf.

  • McGhee, D. (2004). Beyond toleration: Privacy, citizenship and sexual minorities in England and Wales. The British Journal of Sociology, 55(3), 357–375.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McGovern, A., & Lee, M. (2010). Copy[ing] it sweet: Police media units and the making of news. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 43(3), 444–464.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Meem, D. T., Gibson, M. A., & Alexander, J. F. (2010). Finding out: An introduction to LGBT studies. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Moore, C. (2001). Sunshine and rainbows: The development of gay and lesbian culture in Queensland. St Lucia, QLD: University of Queensland Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Moran, L. (1996). The (homo)sexuality of law. London, UK: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nixon, C. & Chandler, J. (2012). Fair cop: Christine Nixon. Melbourne, VIC: Melbourne University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Noonan, A. (2012). GLLO unit dissolved. Star Observer. Retrieved from http://www.starobserver.com.au/news/2012/03/02/gllo-unit-dissolved/73063.

  • Nussbaum, M. C. (2010). From disgust to humanity: Sexual orientation and constitutional law. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Palmiotto, M. J. (2011). Community policing: A police-citizen partnership. New York, NY: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Queensland Police Service. (2011). Good practice guide for interaction with transgender clients. Brisbane, QLD: Queensland Police Service. Retrieved from http://www.police.qld.gov.au/Resources/QPS/specialist/OSC/cscpb/documents/Good%20Practice%20Guide%20Interaction%20with%20Transgender%20Clients%20V12.pdf.

  • Radford, K., Betts, J., & Ostermeyer, M. (2006). Policing, accountability and the lesbian, gay and bisexual community in Northern Ireland. Belfast, Ireland: Institute for Conflict Research.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rosen, S. A. (1980). Police harassment of homosexual women and men in New York City 1960–1980. Columbia Human Rights Law Review, 12, 151–190.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rubensztein-Dunlop, S. (2013, March 6). Police investigate Mardi Gras brutality claims. ABC News. Retrieved from http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-03-06/claims-of-police-brutality-at-mardi-gras-parade/4554958.

  • Rydstrom, J., & Mustola, K. (2007). Criminally queer: Homosexuality and criminal law in Scandinavia, 1842–1999. Amsterdam, Netherlands: Aksant Academic Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schaffner, A. K. (2012). Modernism and perversion: Sexual deviance in sexology and literature, 1850–1930. Hampshire, England: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Smaal, Y. (2012). “Indecent and indecorous” behaviour: Police and sex between men in turn-of-the century Queensland. Paper presented at the Homosexual Histories Conference, Brisbane, QLD.

    Google Scholar 

  • Smaal, Y., & Moore, C. (2008). Homophobia in Fin De Siecle colonial Queensland. In S. Robinson (Ed.), Homophobia: An Australian history (pp. 63–85). Leichardt, NSW: Federation Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stein, M. (2012). Rethinking the gay and lesbian movement. New York, NY: Taylor and Francis.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stewart, C. (1997). Sexual orientation training in law enforcement agencies. In J. T. Sears & W. L. Williams (Eds.), Overcoming heterosexism and homophobia: Strategies that work (pp. 326–338). New York, NY: Columbia University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stryker, S. (2008). Transgender history. Berkeley, CA: Seal Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Thompson, S. (1997). Hate crimes against gays and lesbians: The New South Wales Police response. In G. Mason & S. Tomsen (Eds.), Homophobic violence (pp. 132-146). Leichardt, NSW: Federation Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tomsen, S. (2009). Violence, prejudice and sexuality. New York, NY: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tomsen, S., & Markwell, K. (2009). Violence, cultural display, and the suspension of sexual prejudice. Sexuality and Culture, 13, 201–217.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wertheimer, D. M. (1997). Treatment and service interventions for lesbian and gay male crime victims. In G. M. Herek & K. T. Berrill (Eds.), Hate crimes: Confronting violence against lesbians and gay men (pp. 227–240). Newbury Park, CA: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Willett, G. (2008). From ‘vice’ to ‘homosexuality’: Policing perversion in the 1950s. In S. Robinson (Ed.), Homophobia: An Australian history (pp. 113–127). Leichardt, NSW: Federation Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wilson, E. (2008). ‘Someone who is sick and in need of help’: Medical attitudes to homosexuality in Australia, 1960–1979. In S. Robinson (Ed.), Homophobia: An Australian history (pp. 148–171). Leichardt, NSW: Federation Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wolff, K. B., & Cokely, C. L. (2007). To protect and serve? An exploration of police conduct in relation to the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender community. Sexuality and Culture, 11, 1–23.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wotherspoon, G. (1991). City of the plain: History of a gay sub-culture. Sydney, NSW: Hale and Iremonger.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Justice, Queensland University of Technology, Gardens Point Campus, X Block, 2 George Street, Brisbane, QLD, 4001, Australia

    Angela Dwyer

Authors
  1. Angela Dwyer
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Angela Dwyer .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. School of Criminal Justice, University at Albany, Albany, New York, USA

    Dana Peterson

  2. School of Criminal Justice, Rutgers University, Newark, New Jersey, USA

    Vanessa R. Panfil

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2014 Springer Science+Business Media New York

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Dwyer, A. (2014). Pleasures, Perversities, and Partnerships: The Historical Emergence of LGBT-Police Relationships. In: Peterson, D., Panfil, V. (eds) Handbook of LGBT Communities, Crime, and Justice. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9188-0_8

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation