"We should all be outraged when people suffer discrimination, assault and even murder - simply because they are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. We should all speak out when someone is arrested and imprisoned because of who they love or how they look. This is one of the great, neglected human rights challenges of our time. We must right these wrongs. Governments have a legal duty to protect everyone. But far too many still refuse to acknowledge the injustice of homophobic violence and discrimination."
With those words, the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon began his speech at the Conference on Human Rights, Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity in Oslo, Norway last April.
It's sad how in New York City, probably the most open-minded city in America and the place where same-sex couples usually feel free to demonstrate their love without being afraid of what might happen to them, was the location of recent attacks that left the LGBT community in awe.
Nick Porto and Kevin Atkins were vocal about the attacks against them near Madison Square Garden on May 5. They were physically injured by a group of men that also verbally accosted them. They posted a photo on Facebook followed by their story that went viral in the social media.
"This is just proof that the fight for equality is far from over. This happened in Midtown, during the day, with a ton of people around, just across the street from the New Yorker. When are we safe?" expressed Porto in his statement.
That same week, two men reportedly shouted anti-gay slurs as they attacked a man who was leaving a West Village bar, and a few days later, two unidentified men were beat up in Port Authority in an unrelated event. Police caught two of the aggressors, but the rest escaped. The victims were taken to Bellevue Hospital where one underwent eye surgery.
"I am outraged by this string of assaults," New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, a lesbian, said in a statement. "These vicious assaults are not reflective of the diversity that defines New York City."
May 17 is a very important day to the LGBT community, because it was a day like today, in 1990 that homosexuality was removed from the International Classification of Diseases of the World Health Organization (WHO). To commemorate that event, the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia (IDAHO) was created to raise awareness of LGBT rights violations and is coordinated by the Paris-based "IDAHO Committee," founded and presided over by Louis-Georges Tin.
"Homosexuality is not a problem, but homophobia is: it's discrimination. It is based on a set of undeserved stigma, disadvantageous prejudice, rooted stereotypes and uncritically accepted taboos. It decreases life expectancy, the risk protection and access to services," wrote Ricardo Bucio Mujica, president of the Consejo Nacional Para Prevenir la Discriminación (CONAPRED) in Mexico.
"Sexual orientation and gender identity is a human rights issue, social and political obligations, and it's not something that comes from the depths of each person. This certainly has advanced in many ways around the world, although it remains a subject of great complexity," expressed Bucio Mujica.
William Hague, Britain's Foreign Secretary and First Secretary of State, released a statement to mark this important date:
"On International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (IDAHO), our clear message is that human rights are universal and should apply equally to all people, as enshrined in Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. To render consenting same-sex relations illegal is incompatible with international human rights laws, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights."
Below is a video that actor George Takei, who's also an activist for gay rights, reposted on his Facebook page, and as he described it, it's "powerful and eye opening" and might help people look at homosexuality in a different way.
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