Mindy Survivor, 25, never had a formal coming-out as a transgender woman in Jamaica. But around the time she was 15 years old, her gender identity became clear to those around her. “Everyone found out the person that I am, because I couldn’t just hide it like that. I have to be myself,” she said.
The revelation did not go over well. She was “forced out on the street,” because her family suddenly didn’t “want anything to do with me.” And on the street, it was “survival of the fittest.” Survivor recounted the “terrible” daily ritual of trying to find food, while evading violence from transphobic attackers.
Survivor was not always successful in staying safe. She has been the victim of physical attacks “a lot of times.” She recounted one horrific encounter, when a man attacked her with a knife at a public transportation center. She spent several weeks recovering in a hospital. Survivor did not bother reporting the incident to authorities. In her view, “police and the bad guys” are one and the same.
Survivor is sadly not an outlier in Jamaica. A 2014 report from Human Rights Watch documented 56 cases of violence against LGBTQ people. Of these cases, only four resulted in arrests or prosecutions. Why? Many queer people there fear for their lives and don’t trust the police to help them.
LGBTQ young people are particularly at risk. Like Survivor, they are more likely to experience homelessness — rejected by parents and family members due to society’s intolerance. In fact, most Jamaicans would throw their kids out for being gay, according to one disturbing report. In 2014, Vice released a widely viewed short documentary, Young and Gay: Jamaica’s Gully Queens, which showed this plight. Over 3 million on YouTube alone have watched how a group of gay, bisexual, and transgender youths in their teens and early 20s, known as “gully queens,” survive by living in the storm drains of Kingston, Jamaica’s capital.
In this underground community, love and support formed in the midst of oppressive conditions, including violence, rape, harassment from police, and discrimination. But the circumstances that forced many of these people into the gullies, including a culture of homophobia and transphobia, left few options of escape.
One might expect that the abuse of these young people would spark systemic change in Jamaica — that the government might step in, or international human-rights groups. But according to Dane Lewis — the head of J-Flag (Jamaica Forum for Lesbians, All-Sexuals and Gays), the country’s most prominent LGBTQ advocacy group — in the past few years, “the situation really hasn’t changed.”
Lewis said his organization has received no support from the Jamaican government in establishing a shelter or finding even temporary housing for these young people. “This is not an issue that is going away tomorrow,” he said, adding, “Displacement and homelessness is almost a factor of life amongst many members of the LGBT community.”
“I haven’t seen any changes. It’s getting harder and harder,” confirmed Survivor.
One of the major causes of LGBTQ homelessness in Jamaica is stigma — “a deep-seated prejudice that is almost a cultural phenomenon,” Lewis said. According to a recent study provided by J-Flag, which was prepared by Market Research Services Ltd. in Kingston, the general population has only a 10 percent tolerance for LGBTQ people, with 56 percent disagreeing that LGBTQ people even experience the same human emotions as straight people.
Politicians and employers have significantly more tolerant views of queer people, the survey reported. Yet Jamaica’s laws, dating to its colonial era, still criminalize homosexuality. For example, the Offenses Against the Person Act outlaws “the abominable crime of buggery” and “gross indecency,” so acts of love between men could result in years of imprisonment, blackmail from neighbors, or public shaming from local media.
In 2006, Time magazine questioned whether Jamaica was “the most homophobic place on Earth.” It’s a title that human-rights groups and media outlets have often applied to the country as well. But Lewis said that brand is “unfair,” and doesn’t encapsulate the complete picture of what it’s like to be LGBTQ in Jamaica.
For example, Lewis, who is gay, had a relatively positive coming-out experience. His parents asked about his sexual orientation after a few of his marriages with women failed. He told them the truth, and it was a “liberating experience.”
“Thankfully, my parents didn’t treat me any differently, unlike what I had seen other friends of mine experience and the stories I heard about others. I was very fortunate that my experience was very supportive,” he said.
“It’s very complex,” he said, of the issue of LGBTQ acceptance. He recounted an instance where a gay man was disowned by his family — but later effectively adopted by his partner’s relatives. Different generations have different levels of stigma as well. For older folks, said Lewis, sexuality is much less of an issue, so there are scenarios where queer young people will move in with grandparents or older relatives, after being rejected by parents. “It’s not easy to say that uptown is better than downtown, or rural is less safe than urban. It just is different from person to person. The experiences actually vary quite a bit,” Lewis said.
There are other factors tied to acceptance. “Not everybody has the same ability to move freely,” admitted Lewis. Jamaican society is divided by class as well as skin color, which are hangovers from its eras of slavery and colonialism. This adds “a double layer of issues people have to deal with,” he said.
Survivor attested that for those queer people who are not from “high society,” the situation is bleak. “We’re not accepted here in Jamaica,” she said flatly. “We don’t have any rights here.”
Brian Moore, a professor of History and Africana & Latin American Studies at Colgate University, also pointed to the period of British rule, from 1655 to 1962, as formative to the island’s views on family and acceptance.
“The British culture that was promoted during the colonial period stressed Christian monogamous marriage between man and woman, and the nuclear family unit, and in that context homosexuality would have been considered a sinful abomination,” said Moore. These attitudes have carried over to present day.
In addition, an overall lack of education regarding the LGBTQ community, particularly transgender issues, contributes to stigma across the board, as do prejudices preached from the pulpit of the religious community. “The several Protestant churches in Jamaica, many of which are fundamentalist, have for a long time had considerable influence on the attitudes of their congregations, and that accounts for much of the homophobia that has existed in the country,” Moore attested.
That said, it is impossible to paint the lives of LGBTQ people — and attitudes toward them — with broad brush strokes in Jamaica. In January, Steven Anderson, a preacher who advocates that gay people should be stoned to death, was banned from visiting the island nation due to his beliefs. Tens of thousands signed a petition urging this action, and the government listened, making international headlines.
Lewis points to his own organization, J-Flag, as another example of this complexity. J-Flag, which offers support and advocacy for the LGBTQ population, threw the first-ever Pride in Jamaica in 2015. The weeklong series of events included a gala, picnic, speakers, garnered hundreds of attendees — and had no real security issues.
By all measures, it was a success. For many, Pride became a symbol of hope, as well a pushback to Time’s label as the “most homophobic country.” Many were “elated” to have “opportunities to share some of our history” and “opportunities for people to come together and celebrate themselves,” said Lewis. “It says volumes about our work and the need for us to continue.” Happily, Pride has now become an annual event.
However, even with this victory, Lewis can’t deny the day-to-day realities many LGBTQ young people still face.
“To say that we’ve had Pride, and to say that homophobia still isn’t alive and well, is not true, because it certainly does impact people’s lives — how young people navigate educational institutions, spaces without bullying, what happens in safe communities, at church, what happens in the dance halls. Sometimes there still are expressions of anti-gay sentiment,” Lewis said.
Jamaica’s situation for LGBTQ people has been complicated by politics in the United States. Former President Barack Obama condemned homophobia and conveyed his “dismay” about Jamaica’s lack of support for LGBTQ rights, when he visited the island nation in 2015. The Trump administration, on the other hand, has signaled that it will withdraw international humanitarian aid and be less welcoming of refugees fleeing persecution — all factors of distress for LGBTQ Jamaicans.
And the U.S. is contending with its own epidemic of violence against LGBTQ people. The year 2016 was the deadliest on record for this community, with the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs reporting a 17 percent rise in hate crimes from the previous year. Trans women — and in particular, trans women of color — are most at risk. At least 28 trans Americans were shot or killed in 2017, according to the Human Rights Campaign. At least seven have been killed in 2018.
In addition, from Russia to Indonesia, there is a surge of countries around the world passing anti-LGBT legislation. This is a backlash to the gains the movement has made in the Western world, and a result of the loss of a vocal ally in an American president.
“It’s a concern to many liberals about how it’s a possible step back, decades if not millennia from initiatives the Obama administration pushed in terms of more rights and tolerance for the LGBT community,” confirmed Lewis. “It’s a concern about what will happen. What will happen regarding funding? What will happen [with] just how people are able to navigate life? Where will the U.S. be — still a safe space, or a safer space for LGBT persons who want to seek asylum even? Those are grave concerns.”
Since few expect the government to help create these safe spaces in Jamaica, some individuals have taken matters into their own hands. Savannah Baker, a creative director who is half Jamaican, launched a crowdfunding campaign in order to raise funds for housing homeless LGBTQ youth. As of the time of this article’s publishing, Baker has raised over $15,000 of a $50,000 goal.
In support, London artist Ray Blk featured four of the “gully queens,” including Survivor, in a music video, “Chill Out,” which was created with Baker, director Philippa Price, and Kelly Connor, the market editor of Vogue.com. The video begins with voices of hatred — Jamaican men screaming, brandishing baseball bats, threatening violence — before transitioning to a humanizing portrait of the queens.
“It was a really moving experience,” Baker said of launching the project. She hopes to raise enough resources to provide these young people with health resources and mental counseling, as well as job training in the fashion industry and the business world — avenues away from more dangerous underground markets like sex work. However, “the first step is a safe haven,” she stressed. “Every day is life or death [for them].”
At present, Survivor lives in a shelter with about 17 other people. She is “grateful” for the roof over her head, but she feels like she has no support. “I’m all alone, no family no friends for a couple years now,” she said.
But her experience has not limited her dreams: friends, family, a house, a career. Survivor has skills as a hairdresser and a cosmetologist. But due to discrimination, she cannot find employment. She just wants to be “a civilized person doing a job.”
“It’s so hard just to sit down everyday not having anything to do, not having an income. It’s like you’re not living. And that’s what I’m here doing,” she concluded.