Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Globalised Imaginaries of Love and Hate: Immutability, Violence, and LGBT Human Rights

  • Published:
Feminist Legal Studies Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The U.S.-led global LGBT human rights campaign, formalised on International Human Rights Day 2011, sutures human rights policing with a politics of protection. Centred on a singular LGBT victim of violence, the campaign’s multiple projects legitimate military and financial intervention under the auspices of human rights. This article examines the regulatory production of globalised LGBT rights through the nexus of international LGBT human rights/hate crime laws, U.S. asylum law, and equal protection treatment of sexual orientation. I argue that the juridical and ideological frameworks that guide state action in each of these areas converge in the construction of an immutable LGBT identity that is the object of racialised, culturally othered violence. This rendering of sexual difference through the flattening of culture elides structural violence and advances human rights imperialism.

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

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. Clinton, Hillary (2011) “Remarks in Recognition of International Human Rights Day,” 6 December.

  2. Obama, Barack (2011) “International Initiatives to Advance the Human Rights of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Persons,” 6 December.

  3. This LGBT humanitarian imperialism can be viewed as one facet of a broader assemblage of homonationalist processes (Puar 2007).

  4. Although humanitarian law—concerned with suffering resulting from armed conflict—is distinct from human rights law, Ticktin (2011a) and others have noted their frequent overlap (as when human rights are used as justification for war itself, and when humanitarian organisations advocate for human rights). In this article, I focus on how and to what ends state-centred human rights campaigns take on an imperialist moralism that likewise characterises many humanitarian efforts (Bernstein 2010; Halley et al. 2006; Ticktin 2011a, b).

  5. Refugee Act of 1980, Pub. L. No. 96-212, 94 Stat. 102 (1982) codified at 8 U.S.C. §1101(a)(42)(A) (1988); Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, Pub.L. 82-414, 66 Stat. 163 codified at 8 U.S.C.

  6. Matter of Acosta, 19 I & N Dec. 211 (BIA 1985) at 233.

  7. Hollingsworth v. Perry, 133 U.S. 2652 (2013).

  8. Frontiero v. Richardson, 411 U.S. 677 (1973) at 686.

  9. Supra n 6; Watkins v. U.S. Army 875 F.2d 699 (9th Cir. 1989).

  10. Supra n 6 at 233.

  11. Hernandez-Montiel v. INS, 225 F.3d 1084 (9th Cir. 2000) at 1093.

  12. Supra n 8 at 726.

  13. Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003).

  14. Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U.S. ___ (2015); United States v. Windsor, 570 U.S. ___ (2013); Supra n 6.

  15. Brief of Constitutional Law Scholars et al. as Amici Curiae, Hollingsworth v. Perry, United States v. Windsor (filed February 28, 2013), Obergefell v. Hodges (filed March 6, 2015).

  16. Brief Amici Curiae of American Psychological Association et al., Hollingsworth v. Perry (filed February 28, 2013), United States v. Windsor (filed March 1, 2013), Obergefell v. Hodges (filed March 6, 2015).

  17. Supra n 17 at 8–9.

  18. Brief of Amici Curiae GLMA: Health Professionals Advancing LGBT Equality and The American Academy of Nursing Concerning the Immutability of Sexual Orientation, Hollingsworth v. Perry (filed February 26, 2013), U.S. v. Windsor (filed February 26, 2013), Obergefell v. Hodges (filed March 5, 2015) at 13–27; While the GLMA brief argues that Lisa Diamond’s research demonstrates the innateness of sexual orientation, Diamond herself asserts that reliance on the immutability claim is unscientific, unnecessary, and unjust. Diamond and Rosky (2016) argue that legal rights should not be attached to a particular etiology of sexual orientation.

  19. Supra n 17 at 8.

  20. Supra n 17 at 10.

  21. Supra n 16 at 19–20.

  22. Supra n 14 Obergefell at 2596.

  23. Supra n 14 Obergefell at 2596.

  24. Supra n 14 Obergefell at 2596.

  25. Matter of Toboso-Alfonso, 20 I & N Dec. 819 (BIA 1994).

  26. Gomez v. INS 947 F.2d 660 (2d Cir. 1991) at 664; As Ramanathan (1996) observes, this visibility requirement has been used as justification for negative rulings, as judges opine that an applicant can avoid future harm by being “discreet,” or by making one’s group membership less visible.

  27. In re Soto Vega, No. A-95880786, Immigration Ct. 2003 (BIA 2004).

  28. Although a number of the cases that exhibit the most egregious expressions of stereotyped expectations of gay identity have been vacated and remanded by appellate courts, there are countless other cases that do not reach the higher courts (Vogler 2016). Moreover, these expectations nonetheless shape the scope of possibility for asylum claims, within which applicants, lawyers, and judges operate.

  29. Gender is also important to a set of asylum cases that address gender identity, even though it has not been recognised as the basis for a PSG.

  30. Attorney General Order No. 1895-94 (June 19, 1994); Pitcherskaia v. INS, 118 F.3d 641 (9th Cir. 1997).

  31. See Thomas M. Davies, Jr. Papers and Lecture at http://digital.sdsu.edu/.

  32. Supra n 8 at 1093.

  33. Supra n 10 at 1093. Legal scholars posit that this PSG enables recognition of a limited subset of gay and lesbian asylum claimants.

  34. In 2015, with Avendano-Hernandez v. Lynch, 800 F.3d 1072 (9th Cir. 2015), a U.S. court first recognised the distinction between sexual orientation and gender identity.

  35. Reyes-Reyes v. Ashcroft, 384 F.3d 782 (9th Cir. 2004).

  36. While the applicants’ self-identifications were not always visible in the secondary documents, and “transsexual” and “transgender” were Davies’ own descriptors, many of the later applicants had undergone hormonal and surgical transitions and presented in accordance with expectations of femininity. Both Hernandez-Montiel and Reyes-Reyes described being perceived by self and others as “dressing like women” and Reyes-Reyes adopted a number of traditionally feminine names. Applicants’ own testimony, where visible, reflected a complex interplay of gender and sexuality in self- and societal understandings.

  37. Davies affidavit, January 2, 2004, at 12.

  38. REAL ID Act of 2005 (H.R. 418, 109th Cong.); Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense, the Global War on Terror, and Tsunami Relief Act of 2005 (H.R. 1268, 109th Cong.).

  39. Wayne (2016) suggests that an analogueous credibility issue could arise for transgender applicants, and particularly for those whose gender identities are fluid.

  40. Murray (2015) suggests that a similar narrative exists for the English-speaking Caribbean.

  41. To streamline the discussion, I draw representative excerpts from a 2015 affidavit; Davies affidavit, January 27, 2015, at 12.

  42. Supra n 38 at 276–7.

  43. Civil Rights Act of 1968 (Pub. L. No. 90–284, 82 Stat. 73 (1968) (codified as amended at 18 U.S.C. § 245(b)(2)(2012)).

  44. The 1990 Act (Pub. L. No. 101–275, 104 Stat. 140, codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. § 534) required the FBI to aggregate and report annual hate crimes data, and the 1994 Act (Pub. L. No. 103–322, 108 Stat. 1796) instituted federal sentencing enhancement for hate crimes; Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009, Pub. L. No. 111–84, § 4707, 123 Stat. 2835, 2838–41 (codified as amended at 18 U.S.C. § 249 (Supp. 2012)).

  45. Written submission of Human Rights First, June 25, 2009.

  46. Supra n 1.

  47. Supra n 1.

  48. Supra n 1.

  49. Tillerson, Rex. 2016. Human Rights Reports – Secretary’s Preface. Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor; This coincides with UN emphasis human rights violations in Central America, as evident in the UN Committee against Torture and UN Special Rapporteurs’ “concern about police brutality and homophobic violence” in Colombia, Honduras, and Ecuador (ILGA 2016, 167).

  50. U.S. Embassy in Honduras website.

  51. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration replaced an indefinite deferral with a 1-year deferral in 2015.

  52. International Human Rights Defense Act of 2014 (S. 2472; H.R. 5128, 113th Cong.); International Human Rights Defense Act of 2015 (S. 302; H.R. 590, 114th Cong.).

  53. Berry, Randy (2015) “Remarks at Welcome Reception to Commemorate the Announcement of Special Envoy for the Rights of LGBT Persons Randy Berry,” 27 February.

  54. Trump, Donald J (2016) “Donald J. Trump Republican Nomination Acceptance Speech,” 9 November.

References

  • Acer, Eleanor. 2004. Refuge in an insecure time: Seeking asylum in the post-9/11 United States. Fordham International Law Journal 28: 1361–1396.

    Google Scholar 

  • Agathangelou, Anna M., M. Daniel Bassichis, and Tamara L. Spira. 2008. Intimate investments: Homonormativity, global lockdown, and the seductions of empire. Radical History Review 100: 120–143.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Anker, Deborah, and Sabi Ardalan. 2011. Escalating persecution of gays and refugee protection: comment on queer cases make bad law. NYU Journal of International Law & Politics 44: 529–557.

    Google Scholar 

  • Berg, Laurie, and Jenni Millbank. 2009. Constructing the personal narratives of lesbian, gay and bisexual asylum claimants. Journal of Refugee Studies 22(2): 195–223.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Berger, Susan A. 2009. Production and reproduction of gender and sexuality in legal discourses of asylum in the United States. Signs 34(3): 659–685.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bernstein, E. 2010. Militarised humanitarianism meets carceral feminism: The politics of sex rights and freedom in contemporary antitrafficking campaigns. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 36(1): 45–71.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bricmont, Jean. 2006. Humanitarian imperialism: Using human rights to sell war. New York: NYU Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (2016) “Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2016”.

  • Cacho, Lisa Marie. 2012. Social death: Racialized rightlessness and the criminalization of the unprotected. New York: NYU Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cantú Jr., Lionel, E. Luibhéid, and A.M. Stern. 2005. Well-founded fear: Political asylum and the boundaries of sexual identity in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. In Queer migrations: Sexuality U.S. citizenship, and border crossings, ed. Eithne Luibhéid and Lionel Cantú Jr., 61–74. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Clarke, Jessica A. 2015. Against immutability. Yale Law Journal 125: 2–102.

    Google Scholar 

  • Conroy, Melanie A. 2009. Real bias: How REAL ID’s credibility and corroboration requirements impair sexual minority asylum applicants. Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law & Justice 24(1): 1–47.

    Google Scholar 

  • Conyers, John James Jr., Keith Ellison, Hank Johnson, Marcy Kaptur, Jan Schakowsky, and Jose E. Serrano. 2016. The Guardian, 8 July.

  • Diamond, L.M., and C.J. Rosky. 2016. Scrutinizing immutability: Research on sexual orientation and US legal advocacy for sexual minorities. The Journal of Sex Research 53(4–5): 363–391.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dorell, Oren. 2015. Exclusive: First diplomat for LGBT rights speaks out. USA Today, 26 April.

  • Frank, Dana. 2012. U.S. has blinders on in Honduras: The State Department ignores the evidence of human rights abuses. Los Angeles Times, 24 August.

  • Grewal, Inderpal. 1998. On the new global feminism and the family of nations: Dilemmas of transnational feminist practice. In Talking Visions: Multicultural Feminism in a Transnational Age, ed. Ella Shohat, 501–530. Cambridge: MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grewal, Inderpal. 2005. Transnational America: feminisms, diasporas, neoliberalisms. Durham: Duke University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Halley, Janet E. 1994. Sexual orientation and the politics of biology: A critique of the argument from immutability. Stanford Law Review 46(3): 503–568.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Halley, Janet E., Prabha Kotiswaran, Hila Shamir, and Chantal Thomas. 2006. From the international to the local in feminist legal responses to rape, prostitution/sex work, and sex trafficking: Four studies in contemporary governance feminism. Harvard Journal of Law & Gender 29: 335–423.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hanna, Fadi. 2005. Punishing masculinity in gay asylum claims. Yale Law Journal 114(4): 913–920.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hathaway, James C. 1991. Reconceiving refugee law as human rights protection. Journal of Refugee Studies 4(2): 113–131.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hong, Grace Kyungwon, and Roderick A. Ferguson (eds.). 2011. Strange affinities: The gender and sexual politics of comparative racialization. Durham: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • International Lesbian, Gay, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA). 2016. “State sponsored homophobia report: A world survey of laws: Criminalisation, protection and recognition of same-sex love”.

  • Keenan, Sarah. 2014. Subversive property: Law and the production of spaces of belonging. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lamble, Sarah. 2013. Queer necropolitics and the expanding carceral state: Interrogating sexual investments in punishment. Law and Critique 24(3): 229–253.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • LaViolette, Nicole. 2009. Independent human rights documentation and sexual minorities: An ongoing challenge for the Canadian refugee determination process. The International Journal of Human Rights 13(2–3): 437–476.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, Rachel. 2013. Deportable subjects: Lesbians and political asylum. Feminist Formations 25(2): 174–194.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Marouf, F.E. 2008. The emerging importance of “social visibility” in defining a “particular social group” and its potential impact on asylum claims related to sexual orientation and gender. Yale Law & Policy Review 27(1): 47–106.

    Google Scholar 

  • McKinley, Michelle A. 2009. Cultural culprits. Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law & Justice 24: 91–165.

    Google Scholar 

  • McKinnon, Sara L. 2016. Gendered asylum: Race and violence in US law and politics. Champaign: University of Illinois Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Meyer, Peter J. 2016. “Honduras: Background and U.S. relations,” May 23. Congressional Research Service.

  • Meyer, Peter J. and Clare Ribando Seelke. 2015. “Central America regional security initiative: Background and policy issues for Congress,” December 17. Congressional Research Service.

  • Miller, Teresa. 2005. Blurring the boundaries between immigration and crime control after september 11th. Boston College Third World Law Journal 25(1): 81–123.

    Google Scholar 

  • Morgan, Deborah A. 2006. Not gay enough for the government: Racial and sexual stereotypes in sexual orientation asylum cases. Law & Sexuality: Rev Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Legal Issues 15: 135–161.

    Google Scholar 

  • Murray, David A.B. 2015. The homonational archive: Sexual orientation and gendered identity refugee documentation in Canada and the USA. Ethnos 82(3): 520–544.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Neilson, Victoria. 2005. Homosexual or female? Applying gender-based asylum jurisprudence to Lesbian asylum claims. Stanford Law & Policy Review 16: 417–444.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pilkingston, Ed, and Nina Lakhani. 2016. US investigating allegations Honduran military had hitlist of activists to target. The Guardian, 8 July.

  • Puar, Jasbir. 2007. Terrorist assemblages: Homonationalism in queer times. Durham: Duke University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Puar, Jasbir. 2013. Rethinking homonationalism. International Journal of Middle East Studies 45(2): 336–339.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ramanathan, Erik D. 1996. Queer cases: A comparative analysis of global sexual orientation-based asylum jurisprudence. Georgetown Immigration Law Journal 11: 1–4.

    Google Scholar 

  • Razack, Sherene. 1995. Domestic violence as gender persecution: Policing the borders of nation, race, and gender. Canadian Journal of Women and the Law 8: 45–88.

    Google Scholar 

  • Razack, Sherene H. 2004. Imperilled Muslim women, dangerous Muslim men and civilised Europeans: Legal and social responses to forced marriages. Feminist Legal Studies 12(2): 129–174.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Reddy, Chandan. 2005. Asian diasporas, neoliberalism, and family: Reviewing the case for homosexual asylum in the context of family rights. Social Text 23(3–4): 101–119.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Reddy, Chandan. 2011. Freedom with violence: Race, sexuality, and the US state. Durham: Duke University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Rehaag, Sean. 2009. Bisexuals need not apply: A comparative appraisal of refugee law and policy in Canada, the United States, and Australia. The International Journal of Human Rights 13(2–3): 415–436.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Spade, Dean. 2013. Intersectional resistance and law reform. Signs Journal of Women in Culture and Society 38(4): 1031–1055.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Spade, Dean, and Craig Willse. 2000. Confronting the limits of gay hate crimes activism: A radical critique. Chicano-Latino Law Review 21: 38–52.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ticktin, Miriam. 2011a. Casualties of care: Immigration and the politics of humanitarianism in France. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Ticktin, Miriam. 2011b. The gendered human of humanitarianism: medicalising and politicising sexual violence. Gender & History 23(2): 250–265.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Vogler, Stefan. 2016. Legally queer: The construction of sexuality in LGBQ asylum claims. Law & Society Review 50(4): 856–889.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Volpp, Leti. 1996. Talking “culture”: Gender, race, nation, and the politics of multiculturalism. Columbia Law Review 96(6): 1573–1617.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Volpp, Leti. 2000. Blaming culture for bad behavior. Yale Journal of Law & Humanities 12: 89–116.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wayne, Adena L. 2016. Unique identities and vulnerabilities: The case for transgender identity as a basis for asylum. Cornell Law Review 102: 241–270.

    Google Scholar 

  • Yoshino, Kenji. 1998. Assimilationist bias in equal protection: The visibility presumption and the case of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”. The Yale Law Journal 108(3): 485–571.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Grand Valley State University, 1 Campus Dr, Allendale, MI, 49401, USA

    Leifa Mayers

Authors
  1. Leifa Mayers
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Leifa Mayers.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Mayers, L. Globalised Imaginaries of Love and Hate: Immutability, Violence, and LGBT Human Rights. Fem Leg Stud 26, 141–161 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10691-018-9375-2

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10691-018-9375-2

Keywords

Search

Navigation