“LGBT Migration between the 1960s through 2017 From Mexico To The United States” by Ishalaa Ortega
For multiple reason the United States is the best option for Mexican LGBT immigrants when facing oppression, discrimination, and persecution. June 28th 1969, became the historical date that marked the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) modern rights movement. On that day, the LGBT community world while felt the meaning of hope and resistance. The year before in Mexico City, on October 2nd 1968 “La Matanza de Tlatelolco” occurred. The government using military forces and tactics, killed approximately 325 people, mostly university students. Regardless socio-economic status, gender or sexual orientation, thousands were injured, women, men, and children. They were protesting peacefully against the injustice of the Mexican’s government led by President Gustavo Díaz O. This comparison shows how behind Mexico was and continues today when addressing civil rights.
At that time migrating from Mexico wasn’t complicated, the border wasn’t as guarded as today. People can come to the United States and go back to Mexico almost freely. LGBT community members mostly were “people in the closet” (phrase we all know to label people who is LGBT but do not want to admitted publicly), because of that today we don’t have realistic statistics on how many people were LGBT from that exodus of Mexicans, but certainly many see the Stonewall riots as the possibility to be free even if they do not come out as LGBT.
David Carter wrote “Stonewall: the riots that sparked the gay revolution” a book that gives a broad picture of what happened before and after that night of gay revolution. Carter omitted mentioning Martha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera the original founders of the movement. The book is being acclaimed by the experts as a good point of reference to cite the modern LGBT rights history in The United States. The first organization created after the Stonewall night was “The Gay Liberation Front” a whole section is dedicated to them on Carter’s book. While in New York LGBT people can gather at least in some “Mafia clubs”, a name given to the bars owned by Mafia members that allow-to-enter LGBT people. In the 1960s showing gay patrons was illegal, two men or women dancing together as a couple was prohibited. Where the law saw deviance, however, the Mafia saw a golden business opportunity. On the other hand Mexican LGBT community didn’t even have that opportunity to gather even on that type of places. What they do was to have secret and small “fiestas homosexuales”. Sporadic gay parties that were planned to be at a hidden and private properties. And if by any chance the police find out, they offered money as a bribe to get
away of the embarrassed they will suffer when the police call their families to tell them they were homosexuals, they also sell the property as soon as possible or the government will take it away from them.
There was this incident at one of those Mafia clubs in New York City, two lesbians where dancing and a business men try to cut in, they didn’t let him and the guy punch one of the girls in the face. The Gay Liberation Front, led by Martha Shelley an American lesbian feminist activist, did an action to demand a better approach and treatment for LGBT clients. They organized a takeover of the bar, which consist on playing the jukebox and dance but not buying any drink. The owners didn’t understand and Shelley when to speak with them:
“I’m standing there with my knees shaking, and I tell him why we’re there. He says. ’Do you know who I’m?’ I said, I don’t know, and I don’t care, but we‘re the Gay Liberation Front!” (Carter, 225)
Mexico, in 1971 “EL Frente de Liberacion Homosexual” (FLH) was created, one of the first LGBT organizations of Latin-America. The word Gay wasn’t being used in Latin-America yet. The organization name was a translation of “The Gay Liberation Front”. The FLH was a consequence of a discriminatory action against a gay employee working for SEARS, a department store located in Mexico City, the employee was fired because his sexual orientation.
While in 1970 New York City celebrated the first anniversary of Stonewall with a march, reinforcing the spirit of the LGBT community to keep fighting. Mexico’s government kept that opportunity far away from the brave LGBT activists that tried to celebrates “La Marcha De Orgullo Homosexual” (Homosexuals’ Pride March). They made it possible in 1979, ten years after Stonewall. The march wasn’t popular at all, over a thousand people celebrates LGBT pride under a hostile environment full of insults and violent acts against the marchers, and the police abuse and oppression was definitely noticed. The march served as a thermometer to measure the difficulties existing in Mexico, making the existence of the LGBT community, miserable. Motivational factor to run away, leaving behind family, friends and culture.
Mexico has a deplorable long history of civil rights violations, but when addressing LGBT rights it needs to be multiply by hundreds the severity of those violations. The Mexican national newspaper library had a record of the atrocities that government, religious leaders and common people did and keeps doing against the LGBT community specially transgender women. Today Mexico has the second place behind Brazil, in the shameful world list of countries with more LGBT hate crimes. From 2014 to 2017 a total of 202 deaths were reported as homophobic hate crimes, more than 100 were transgender women. The Mexican Committee Against Discrimination affirms that only 1 from every 4 LGBT people murders is reported, but the Mexican government do not categorized under the law the term hate crime to increase the punishment to those who deliberately killed an LGBT person just for being LGBT.
In 1981 when the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) was discovered the entire world demonized, criminalized, excluded, and condemned homosexuals, (as the LGBT community was known at that time). HIV/AIDS was called the “Homosexual Cancer” for the
high amount of gay people contracting the virus. Also called the “Four H’s disease” because the disease affected mostly Heroin users, Haitians, Hemoglobin-derivatives patients, and Homosexuals. Reinforcing the racism, homophobia, eugenics believes, and judgmental mindset the world have. Leaders of every religion on earth used this epidemic to convince their followers that “God” was punishing certain people for their sins. With that hateful statement many people died, as consequence of the null or negligent response the government and health field workers have to fight HIV/AIDS. Without remorse they denied services to HIV patients based on religious believes, something that today we continue struggling with, under protection of “freedom of faith” laws, that are nothing but licenses to disvriminate. In the 1990s, LGBT AIDS’ patients in U.S- Mexico border do not have access to medication at all, nonprofit organizations in border’s cities like Tijuana and San Diego come together and tried to help. What the organization did was implementing a system to collect medication left behind when patients were change from one medication to another or when unfortunately they past away in California. They sent whatever they collected to Tijuana and the organizations there made small bags with medication that last about a week and distributed to Mexican HIV/AIDS’ patients. Sometimes patients get medication for a week and after they run out they have to wait for months to get another bag especially because the system was on first come first serve. Today any doctor will say that far from making them a favor, this noble actions dangerously played with those patients physical and mental health.
The last Mexican census shows that approximately 83% of México’s population are Catholics, this religious led many crusades against the Mexican LGBT community, promoting hate and bigotry among their vast majority. This mindset guide religion’s fanatics to create a hostile environment for LGBT people, increasing infant and juvenile bullying, homophobic hate crimes, murderers, employment and housing discrimination, and government harassment and persecution.
In the 1990s when gays, bisexuals, and transgender people were dying at a high scale because of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) complications, the movement for LGBT civil rights were place aside to prioritize the fighting against this terrible pandemic. Today is counted by millions the HIV/AIDS’ related deaths around the world. Billions of dollar are being invested, entire business born around the HIV/AIDS creating a lucrative industry that made some people multimillionaires. The medicine it is been monopolized making the prices unreachable for the people living with HIV, instead of being moderated and provided by the government. LGBT people started migrating because of the pandemic since the very beginning looking for better medical approach and medication, regardless the lack of possibility to be able to fix legal status while living in the United States, at least they will be able to get HIV’s medication and that was reason enough to look forward to migrate to the United States by so many LGBT people:
“President Obama on Friday announced the end of a 22-year ban on travel to the United States by people who had tested positive for the virus that causes AIDS, fulfilling a promise he made to gay advocates and acting to eliminate a restriction he said was “rooted in fear rather than fact.” (Preston, New Yok Times, Oct. 30, 2009).
In the early 2000s the fight for marriage equality or gay marriage as we know it starts a long and difficult journey before it became a reality. The world seems to be ready for a substantial change, thanks to the millennials’ or generation Y (people born in 1980-2000s) that openly accept the LGBT community at every professional survey that was conducted. This generation shows in a certain way the impact of technology and how humans can easily change from an ideology to a completely different point of view. LGBT in Mexico also have its own generation of millennials, a generation more academically prepared. Unfortunately the corruption, incompetent government, and catholic culture continues ruling the country holding the progress and success for LGBT Mexican people.
Immigration Equality, the nation’s leading LGBTQ immigrant rights organization states on their webpage that in 1994, Attorney General Janet Reno declared as precedent the “Matter of Toboso-Alfonso” case in which a gay Cuban man was found to be eligible for withholding of removal on the basis of his membership in the PSG of homosexuals. Thanks to that decision now LGBT people fleeing from Mexico or anywhere else in the world, have a great opportunity to be protected under this immigration law. Asylum means hope for many LGBT Mexicans immigrants that were able to fix their undocumented status. Feeling themselves somehow protected was enough for many LGBT immigrants who desperately look for this opportunity instead of ended up being discriminated, persecuted, rape, committing suicide or getting killed because their sexual or gender expression in Mexico.
Transgender people are by far the community that suffers the most, and feeling their existence as transgender people recently is being recognized and gradually accepted, it is giving them resilience to keep going. Seeing The United States intentionally given more recognition and rights to this particular community regardless that some states like Texas and North Caroline keep pushing back approving laws to deny basic human rights to them, like using a public restroom choosing the gender they identify with. Those feelings of freedom are filling with optimism and the desire to reach the goals that this community had since the very beginning. They been dreaming with having access to everything with equity, having real economical, educational, and health justice, and those dreams made trans-people specially transgender women of color to not to give up. Strength that keep them yearning that somewhere in the world there is a place where they will be accepted and allow to be who they are.
When LGBT people arrived to The United States they go through the very same issues any other immigrant go through whether undocumented or not. Struggles like underpayment, rejection, exploitation, racial bias, discrimination, language barriers, culture differences, housing, race segregation, and many other injustices that immigrants communities face every day in the United States in order to survive.
It is ease for many people to ask that if an immigrant is suffering somehow here in the U.S. soil, why they don’t to go back to their origin country. When you ask that offensive question to an immigrant, the answer is simple, the incidents or struggles suffered here in the United States is multiplied at least ten times back in their countries. That’s the reason why LGBT people choose prison instead of deportation, they preferred risking their lives through the desert instead of misery and discrimination, they choose this government based on racism that those based on corruption, they choose an opportunity to be who they are instead of living their lives hiding themselves or being a target from homophobia and transphobia, because at least here the opportunity to make the American dream come true could be real.
In 2010 Mexico approved marriage equality and adoption for LGBT people, a law that its not applicable in many Mexico states. The law is been well applied in Mexico city or Distrito Federal where was approved, unfortunately for the rest of the country it is been a really slow process, under different ideologies the states governments are being negligent when applying this law depending on their political party, religious believes, corruption, and media misleading coverage. Unfortunately asylum grantees slow down for Mexican LGBT migrants under the mistaken thoughts that because gay marriage was approved the circumstances change and there is no more discrimination or government persecution against this community.
In Geneva, Switzerland on December 6th 2011, Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton delivered a historical speech. She stand up loud and clear to defend the LGBT rights in front of world’s leaders at the United Nations Assembly . Recognizing the past and present fails on the subject that the United States have, and the hard work ahead of us to ensure that human rights are been applied with equity to every human being regardless of everything, including sexual orientation and gender identity:
“This recognition did not occur all at once. It evolved over time. And as it did, we understood that we were honoring rights that people always had, rather than creating new or special rights for them. Like being a woman, like being a racial, religious, tribal, or ethnic minority, being LGBT does not make you less human. And that is why gay rights are human rights, and human rights are gay rights” (Clinton,2011).
While in Mexico at that time President Felipe Calderon Hinojosa strategy against the drugs and crime already killed officially around 40,000 people, and disappeared thousands more. He started a war against organized crime that increase violence and death among innocent people. As a consequence for that “Self-Defense” armed groups appeared and a mass migration to the United Stated was motivated. Of course LGBT people run away too, because the violence was aggravated against them.
The new government under President Donald J. Trump administration it is like a slap in the immigrants communities face, a wakeup call. Pres. Trump’s policies against undocumented communities are a consequence from the racism the United States embrace since colonial’s times, white supremacy terrorist groups that exist in the country celebrate and claim that a group of them is inside the white house. They feel supported and identified with. They totally support the almost white-men-only administration type of President Trump. Mexico being the closest Latin-America country it is the place that produce more immigrants, every law implemented against immigrants have a great repercussion impacting the physical and mental health of entire populations. Either those living here in the U.S. or those family member living back in their countries regardless being LGBT or not.
There is nothing an undocumented person can do to fix the hostile political environment in the U.S., they cannot vote, it means they do not count under the law. While people ignore the straggles of immigrants, the fact of being the target of hatred and exclusion increase especially for those who besides being undocumented and brown also have the label of being LGBT people. If they are already here, they must keep working and contribute, behave to not to brake the law, be prepare for the worst to reduce the anxiety, study as far as they can, and most important to became a U.S. citizen as soon as they have the opportunity. Are the only tools to fight back the constant discriminatory laws they being suffering for centuries.
To conclude, an suggestion must be made, to invite everyone to open their mind and see that attacking, discriminating, and excluding people because of their particularities should not be considering human’s actions and everyone must stop being part of a systematic culture that promote hatred and exclusion within one an other. Let’s welcome each other and embrace our differences.
