Dr Susan Hawthorne
Conference on Hopes Fulfilled or Dreams Shattered. Centre for Refugee Research, UNSW, Sydney. 25 November 2005.
This
paper is dedicated to the countless – and uncounted – lesbians who continue to
be tortured around the world[1]
Lesbians are not the political
priority of any well-funded policy-making organization. Not in Australia, nor
internationally. In Australia there is the Coalition of Activist Lesbians
(COAL), the only formally registered lesbian NGO, but all its work is done on a
shoestring and in a voluntary capacity. In addition, lesbians tend to be
invisible both in policies of governments and in agendas of social justice
organizations. Indeed, the reason I am today is because I noticed that lesbians
were not mentioned on the program.
When it comes to campaigns on
violence against women, lesbians are either left out or included only in a
footnote or in passing in the term sexual orientation or same-sex relationships
or sexual minorities.[2]
None of these specifies lesbians. In campaigns or documentary research on these
groups, lesbians are once again referred to in much less detail, if they are
included at all. Because lesbians are “disappeared” in the mainstream
terminology and because no one wants to make lesbians the centre of any
campaign, lesbians continue to be tortured around the world. The torture of
lesbians occurs under every kind of political regime, and the so-called
developed world is not immune.[3]
But who cares? Is it, as Monique Wittig argued that “lesbians are not women”,
or as popular discourse would suggest homosexuals are not lesbians?
Or is there a clue in the following
statement from a Peruvian lesbian:
When I speak of
my right to my own culture and language as an indigenous woman, everyone agrees
to my self-determination. But when I speak of my other identity, my lesbian
identity, my right to love, to determine my own sexuality, no one wants to
listen (ILIS Newsletter 1994:13).
It is this distancing of political
support from others, who may well deem themselves progressive, that is a
feature of lesbian existence. Lesbians have supported, fought for, with and
alongside a host of other people for political rights, but when on the rare
occasions lesbians ask for support we find that “Only other dykes are proud of
dykes” (Hanscombe 1992).
Lesbian Refugees: Why do lesbians flee?
In many countries being a lesbian carries an immediate jail sentence; places
like Algeria, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Morocco, Tunisia, the Bahamas, Trinidad
and Tobago, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Oman and Romania. Persecution,
however, extends to countries where theoretically, to be a lesbian is not an
infringement of the law, but in reality, it remains so. This is the case in
Colombia, Nicaragua, Sri Lanka, Brazil. In others, death is the penalty. This
is the case in Afghanistan, Bahrain, Iran, Kuwait, Mauritania, Qatar, Saudi
Arabia, Chechen Republic, Sudan, northern Nigeria, Taiwan and Yemen (Amnesty
International 1997: 77-90). In Iran the methods of execution are cruel and
painful “hanging, stoning, being thrown off a cliff or high building, or facing
a firing squad” (Reinfelder 1996: 12). Other reports indicate that lesbians
“have been beheaded or stoned to death” (ibid: 12). Under fundamentalist
regimes the torture of lesbians can even be justified on the basis that the man
is doing his sacred duty.
Monika Reinfelder notes that in
1990 the German government granted asylum to an Iranian lesbian “who would have
faced the death penalty had she been forced to return to Iran” (1996: 18).
Social stigma
Giti Thadani (1996) in her research
on lesbian existence in India, found many examples of lesbians committing
suicide. She cites the cases of Malika (20) and Lalita (20) who attempted
suicide by drowning together when one failed an examination that would mean
separation; also of Jyotsana and Jayashree who jumped in front of a train
because they could not bear the separation caused by their respective
marriages; of Saijamol and Gita who committed suicide in a joint poisoning; of
Gita and Kishori, both 24-year-old nurses who hung themselves from a ceiling
fan in the hospital quarters (Thadani 1996: 102-104). Although under Section
377 in India, lesbianism is not named as a crime, in a way reminiscent of Queen
Victoria’s England, nevertheless it has been used to harass lesbians and put
pressure on lesbians to enter heterosexual marriages (Voices Against Section
377 n.d.: 31-32). When the pressure to heterosexualise lesbians is extreme,
lesbians suffer and some, as indicated by the above examples, are driven to
suicide and self-annihilation.
Ugandan lesbian, Claire, seeking
asylum in the UK, speaks of the difficulty of getting through the system. She
notes at the end of her talk that without the help of the Lesbian and Gay
Immigration Group she wouldn’t have survived. She says, “I would now be dead –
either at the hands of those I’d been returned to in Uganda, or, more likely,
at my own hand because I could no longer keep fighting and I didn’t know how
to, could no longer stand the pain and fear or could not bear to be sent back
to a slow and cruel death” (Townley 2005). Claire is now fighting to get asylum
for her lesbian partner who helped her escape. Her girlfriend arrived a few
weeks after Claire, but Claire cannot find her and believes the traffickers
whom her girlfriend borrowed money from are either holding her hostage in debt
prostitution or she is, perhaps, already dead.
It’s unusual for lesbian couples to be accepted as refugees.
An exception is the case of two lesbians from Mexico accepted as refugees by
Canada in 2001. They were admitted on grounds of belonging to a particular
social group: lesbian partners who are victims of domestic violence. One woman
testified that two men attacked them in 1998 while visiting a relative. The
husband, after learning about their lesbian relationship took away her child.
In 1999, they were “beaten, confined and sexually assaulted by Mexican police,
hired by the ex-husband.” (Godfrey 2001) <http://www.gaylawnet.com/news/2001/im010712.htm#gay_men>[4]
False medical diagnoses
Equating lesbian existence with
psychiatric disorders is not new. It is a particular way in which families deal
with unruly young women. Alla Pitcherskaia, a lesbian from Russia, was charged
with the crime of “hooliganism” (Crimes
of Hate 2001: 20). Long-term forced
institutionalisation can be the ultimate result for many young women,[5]
and as in Alla Pitcherskaia’s case, her girlfriend was also “forcibly held in a
psychiatric institution” (Crimes of Hate
2001: 20). Alla Pitcherskaia’s crime consisted of continuing to work with a
lesbian youth organisation. Alla Pitcherskaia fled to the USA after threats to her
liberty because of her alleged “hooliganism” and her activism, lodged an
application for asylum. Initially it was rejected because “they claimed the
motive for the forced institutionalization was the desire to ‘treat” or ‘cure’
and not to punish and therefore was not ‘persecution’ (Crimes of Hate 2001: 19).
Another case of a lesbian seeking
asylum is contained in the Crimes of Hate
Report: “Irina, a Russian lesbian, claimed asylum in the USA on the grounds
that she had been tortured or ill-treated by a range of people, including
police, private investigators and her own family members. Irina described how
in 1995 her sisters demanded she give up custody of her son and get psychiatric
treatment to “cure” her of her homosexuality. Her mother threatened to disclose
her sexual orientation to the authorities unless she gave up her son. Irina's
parents hired two investigators to probe into her lifestyle. The investigators
claimed to have a video tape of Irina having sex with her partner and
threatened to report her to the police unless she paid a large sum of money.
Irina and her lover went to the police to report this attempt to blackmail
them; the officer responded by sexually harassing them. One day, the
investigators abducted her at knife point and took her to an apartment.
Together with another man, they raped Irina to “teach her a lesson” and
“reorientate” her sexual identity. Irina decided not to report the rape to the
police because of her past experience at their hands” (Crimes of Hate 2001: 22).
Poverty and imprisonment
Peruvian
human rights worker, Rebecca Sevilla notes that “Prostitutes get a very rough
time in jail. But the treatment of lesbians is even worse” (Amnesty
International 1997: 24). She comments that this is because “however degrading
prostitution can be, it is still regarded as normal behaviour, whereas
lesbianism is seen as too threatening to the status quo” (Amnesty International
1997: 24).
Christine,
a Ugandan lesbian activist was arrested along with her friend Norah. Christine
was taken to a detention centre, beaten and threatened with rape by the
soldiers. She was later raped by three male detainees. As she remembers:
Coming midnight,
they said 'we want to show you something'. They took my clothes off and raped
me. I remember being raped by two of them, then I passed out (Crimes of Hate
2001: 4).
There is a double jeopardy for
lesbians who are arrested. Not only are they at risk of torture from the guards
but, as Christine’s story indicates, also at the hands of other prisoners.
Imprisonment
is on the increase worldwide. And prison populations include lesbians.
Violations of lesbians occur in countries where there are not legal sanctions
against living as a lesbian,[6] but in countries where there are no specific protections
for lesbians the violations intensify and some lesbians are subjected to
torture and abuse.
Ostracism and punishment by family
Zimbabwe’s
President Mugabe considers gays and lesbians “less than human” (Crimes of Hate 2001: 6; also see Tiripano. 2000). Tina Machida is a
Zimbabwean lesbian who lives in Harare. She writes:
They locked me in a room and brought him everyday to rape
me so I would fall pregnant and be forced to marry him. They did this to me
until I was pregnant… (Machida 1996: 123).
Her rape
took place at the hands of her parents in the mid-1980s, in an effort to “cure”
her of her lesbian existence.
Ugandan lesbian, Claire, came from a very high status
family. She was banished from her village and her father’s Will was overturned.
She became politically active in the opposition party as a polling observer,
was arrested, tortured and raped. (Townley 2005). She then escaped from Uganda
and applied for asylum in the UK. Her persecution in Uganda is intensified by
her lesbian identity. As both her party political activities and her status as
a lesbian work to amplify her chances of arrest and torture. And, as in the
case of Consuelo Rivera-Fuentes in Chile, rape of lesbians under such
circumstances takes on a particularly strong element of punishment.
Political activism
Consuelo
Rivera-Fuentes was politically active in Chile in the 1970s. She was arrested
and tortured. As a political prisoner, she was marked because she was a lesbian
and the torture meted out to her was directed at her sexuality. So again, a
double jeopardy, arrested for resistance against the government, punished as a
lesbian.
As the story of Alla Pitcherskaia
suggests, political activism in a youth organization can also attract
incarceration in mental hospitals. Lesbian activists are particularly
vulnerable as two stories from the last year indicate.
In Sierra Leone, on 29 September
2004 FannyAnn Eddy was found dead after being repeatedly raped. She had been
working in the offices of the Sierra Leone Lesbian and Gay Association (Human
Rights Watch 4 October 2004, Morgan and Wieringa 2005: 20). The media would
have us believe that lesbians no longer suffer the pain, humiliation and shame
of systematic discrimination and torture, let alone murder.
Less than a year before her murder she had given testimony at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in Geneva. At that time she said:
Silence creates vulnerability. You, members of the
Commission on Human Rights, can break the silence. You can acknowledge that we
exist, throughout Africa and on every continent, and that human rights
violations based on sexual orientation or gender identity are committed every
day. You can help us combat those violations and achieve our full rights and
freedoms, in every society, including my beloved Sierra Leone (Eddy 2004).[7]
Just four months ago, on 20 July
2005, Ugandan lesbian activist Victor Julie Mukossa’s house was raided in an
attempt by the police to arrest her. Victor Julie Mukossa is the chairperson of
Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG). She went into hiding. Another lesbian activist
from Kenya was “arbitrarily arrested and detained” and “subjected to
humiliating and degrading treatment”. Amnesty International ai-news@amnesty.org 2 August 2005.
The Unnoticed: Lesbian Refugees
At the 6th International
Interdisciplinary World Women’s Conference in Kampala in 2002, I was speaking
about lesbian issues in a session towards the end of the conference. A woman
approached me and said that there were big problems for lesbians in Uganda, and
that gaining recognition as refugees was particularly difficult for lesbians.
The above stories show that there
is no shortage of stories which indicate a need for lesbians to flee their home
countries. And this is only the tip of the iceberg as many lesbians do not make
their sexuality visible for fear of further harm – by the state, the community,
officers or members of their own family.
Two authors have suggested that
there is no documentary evidence on lesbians (McGhee 2003; Magardie 2003). Both
these authors had read most of the same material as I have including the case
of Norah and Christine mentioned earlier. The records state that so fearful
were Norah and Christine of their safety, they fled to a neighbouring country.
There too, lesbian existence was criminalized and so they were unable to claim
asylum. They “were forced to spend several months in
hiding while they tried to find a way to get protection as refugees” (Crimes of Hate 2001: 5).
It seems,
therefore, that even when the evidence is in front of the researchers’ eyes, it
is not seen.
This is a
significant problem faced by lesbian refugees: invisibility. The cases do exist
and must be made visible. Reinfelder comments that:
The hatred of lesbians in
most countries, has prevented many persecuted lesbians from applying for
refugee status on the basis of their sexual orientation” (Reinfelder 1996: 18).
Many
lesbians therefore apply for asylum on the basis of political persecution. But
this can result in a failure to prove their status as refugees since the worst
abuses have occurred to them because they are lesbians. If this cannot be
revealed, the case is weakened.[8]
If those
whose cases are recorded go unnoticed, how much more invisible are those
lesbians who have not identified themselves. Lesbians do marry men as a way of
protecting themselves. Sometimes this is a mutually agreed arrangement,
sometimes not.
The Lesbian Body Tortured
Within
heterosexual discourse the lesbian epitomises the body untrammelled. The
lesbian body is a body out of control in a heteropatriarchal sense, that is, it
is ungoverned by heteropatriarchal rules. For the torturer, the prisoner’s body
has also become a body out of control and such lack of control is shown each
time pain is inflicted.
… all wave after
wave of electricity, no control … I am losing control of my/self … I
can’t stop the shit, the piss, the tears, the jerks, the yells
(Rivera-Fuentes and Birke 2001: 655; italics and ellipses in original).
Elaine
Scarry writes of the prisoner’s lack of control, and way that responsibility
for it is deflected back to the prisoner so that the confession “will be
understood by others, is an act of self-betrayal” (1985: 47).
There is
an element here of just why it is that sexual orientation has been considered
outside the ambit of UN Human Rights rules and why lesbian refugees struggle so
hard to be recognised, heard and acknowledged as “genuine” refugees. It is
about the self-betrayal of the body. If lesbian existence is a choice, so the
argument goes, then the lesbian can just as easily choose not to be a lesbian.
The problem is that her body betrays her. Her speech as a lesbian is taken to
be a self-betrayal. It is read this way, rather than as a problem of patriarchy
and oppressors. It is an instance of what Mary Daly names as “reversal”. The
victim is the one at fault, not the perpetrator.
… what they will never understand is that I
love you precisely because you are not a man (Rivera-Fuentes and Birke
2001: 656; italics and ellipses in original).
The
torturer through this process, dispenses all culpability, all responsibility
for the pain inflicted on the tortured person. His conscience is clear. It is
all her fault. If only she would do what is best for her. In fact, he will help
her by raping her, by showing her just what a real man can do for her, just how
what she needs is “a good fuck, from real men” (Rivera-Fuentes and Birke 2001:
656).
The
prisoner of torture is considered out of control; the lesbian is considered out
of control. The tortured lesbian is therefore doubly out of control (and in a
society where lesbians are defined as mentally ill, triply out of control).
Since she is so clearly out of control, anything that happens to her is her
fault because if she chose to behave differently, she would not be tortured.
The torturer is therefore able to abandon all sense of responsibility for his
actions and for his beliefs about lesbians. It is in her interest that he
torture her, rape her, show her just how good he is. Or, as Elaine Scarry
writes, “Every weapon has two ends. In converting the other person’s pain into
his own power, the torturer experiences the entire occurrence exclusively from
the nonvulnerable end of the weapon” (1985: 59).
Sexuality and Living One’s Own Life
One of
the arguments raised against lesbians (and against all LGBTI peoples) is that
if one just chose to behave differently then you wouldn’t be persecuted. This
is a red herring and a very poor legal precedent has been set in the 1998 case
of a gay man from Sri Lanka who was told that he should “function as a normal
member of society” (Millbank 2003). If he acted more discreetly there would be
no infringement of his fundamental human rights. This is the basis of the idea
that for the lesbian “anything that happens to her is her fault”. Including
ostracism, emotional violence, rape, torture and murder.
As a
lesbian I have chosen to live that way, often against family and social
pressures. And although in Australia in my particular social class and culture,
those pressures have diminished in the last thirty years, that is not
universally the case in Australia, and more particularly not the case in many
other countries.
Lesbians
are a vulnerable group, made more so by a patriarchal culture that is
unescapable. That is, even when lesbians go into exile, patriarchy frequently
accompanies them – as extended family, as community – and this can create
complex difficulties in claiming asylum.
So I’d
like to finish with some guidelines.
Guidelines for officials interviewing lesbian refugees[9]
• It
should not be assumed that women presenting for asylum are seeking asylum
simply because their spouse or another male family member is doing so; they
might need asylum in their own right, and for very different reasons, including persecution on the basis of their
sexual orientation.
• Some
women may however be persecuted because of their association with men who are
under threat. If they are lesbians, their level of risk may be increased.
• It
should not be assumed that a married woman cannot be a lesbian. In some
countries marriage is the first level of protection a lesbian might seek.
• Lesbians
seeking asylum are likely to be politically active, but even lesbians who are
not politically active come under threat in some countries.
• Do
not assume that because a woman does not use the word lesbian to describe
herself, that she is not a lesbian. It may have been too dangerous for too long
for her to be able to speak the word lesbian (or the equivalent in her
language) out loud.
• Do
not assume that because there is no word for lesbian in any particular language
that there are therefore no lesbians in that society or linguistic group.
• Do
not assume that if a woman comes from a country where it is not illegal to be a
lesbian, that she is therefore not able to claim having been tortured or in
danger of torture or other external harm to her self.
• Do
not assume that your interpreter is open to her experience. The interpreter may
be hostile to her claim.
• Lesbians
who have been tortured will find it difficult to speak of their experience.
Speaking to a stranger is difficult, speaking to a strange man might be
impossible. Uniformed men may precipitate reliving the experience of torture.
• As
a result of trauma, some lesbians may be unable to relate the experience at
all, or may appear detached and emotionless. This should not be read as
evidence of fabrication.
• Lesbians
who are refugees might also be in danger from their families, in particular
from the men in their families. Her confidential interview should not be shared
by asking questions about her sexual orientation of other family members.
References
Amnesty International. 1997. Breaking
the Silence: Human rights violations based on sexual orientation, London:
Amnesty International United Kingdom.
Amnesty International. 2001. Crimes of hate, conspiracy of silence, Torture and
ill-treatment based on sexual identity ACT
40/016/2001.
Amnesty International. 2001. Broken bodies, shattered minds —Torture and ill-treatment
of women, AI Index: ACT 40/001/2001.
Amnesty International. 2005. “Uganda: Intimidation of lesbian and gay
activists.” ai-news@amnesty.org 2
August. AI Index: AFR 59/003/2005.
Eddy, FannyAnn. 2004. “Testimony by FannyAnn
Eddy at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights. Item 14 – 60th Session,
U.N. Commission on Human Rights.” http://hrw.org/english/docs/2004/10/04/sierra9439.htm
Godfrey, Tom. 2001. “Mexican Gays Get Asylum:
Canada’s 1st Lesbian Refugees.” Toronto
Sun. 8 August. http://www.gaylawnet.com/news/2001/im010712.htm#gay_men.
Hanscombe, Gillian. 1992. Sybil:
The Glide of Her Tongue. Melbourne: Spinifex Press.
Hawthorne, Susan. 2004a. “Research and Silence: Why the torture of
lesbians is invisible.” Collected Papers
and Presentations. Proceedings of Women’s Studies Association Conference
(NZ), Massey University, Palmerston North: pp. 64-72.
Hawthorne, Susan. 2004b. “The Torture of Lesbians: Where is the outcry?” Reproductive Rights Newsletter. Vol. 82,
No. 2, pp. 12-14.
Hawthorne, Susan. 2005. “The Invisible Torture.” Arena Magazine. No. 78. August-September. p. 10.
ILIS Newsletter 15 (2) 1994.
Machida, Tina. 1996. Sisters of Mercy. In Reinfelder, Monika (ed.) Amazon to Zami: Toward a global lesbian
feminism. London: Cassell: 118-129.
Magardie, Sheldon. 2003. ‘Is the applicant
really gay?’ Legal responses to asylum claims based on persecution on account
of sexual orientation. Agenda: Women, the
Invisible Refugees (55): 81-87.
McGee, Derek. 2003. Queer Strangers: Lesbian
and gay refugees. Feminist Review: Exile
and Asylum (73): 145-147.
Millbank, Jenni. 2003. “It’s not reasonable for
homosexuals to ‘be discreet’ in fear for their lives.” On Line Opinion. 18 December. www.onlineopinion.com.au
Millett,
Kate. 1994. The Politics of Cruelty: An
Essay on the Literature of Political Imprisonment. London: W.W. Norton.
Morgan, Ruth and Saskia Wieringa. 2005. Tommy Boys, Lesbian Men and Ancestral Wives:
Female same-sex practices in Africa. Johannesburg: Jacana.
Reinfelder, Monika. 1996. Persecution and Resistance. In Reinfelder,
Monika (ed.) Amazon to Zami: Toward a
global lesbian feminism. London: Cassell: 11-29.
Rivera-Fuentes, Consuelo and Linda Birke. 2001. Talking With/In Pain:
Reflections on bodies under torture. Women’s
Studies International Forum 24, (6): 653-668.
Scarry, Elaine. 1985. The Body in Pain: The Making and Unmaking of the World. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Souhami, Diana. 1999. The Trials of
Radclyffe Hall. London: Virago.
Thadani, Giti. 1996. Sakhiyani: Lesbian Desire in Ancient and Modern India. London:
Cassell.
Tiripano, Tsitsi. 2000. “Fighting for Lesbian and Gay Rights in
Zimbabwe”. Off Our Backs. Vol. 30,
No. 4. April. 1, 6-7.
Townley, Ben. 2005. “The wounds to my spirit are difficult to recover
from.” GAY.COM. 1 February.
Voices Against Section 377. n.d. Rights
For All: Ending Discrimination under Section 377. New Delhi.
[1] I am
grateful to a lesbian in Uganda who may prefer to remain anonymous and who drew
my attention to the injustices against lesbians in her country in 2002; to
Consuelo Rivera-Fuentes and Lynda Birke (2001) whose article I stumbled across
soon afterwards; to the anonymous researchers at Amnesty International whose
reports on the torture of lesbians provide so much of the first hand material,
and to Lara Fergus who sent me the Crimes
of Hate document from Amnesty International; to Monika Reinfelder whose
book Amazon to Zami (1996) contains
some of the other first hand accounts; and to an unnamed friend with whom I
discussed at length her experience of torture. I thank her for her time and
generosity in sharing what was an extremely painful experience.
[2] As in
other research on homophobia and sexism lesbian existence tends to be
confounded with the lives of gay men, or subsumed under the broad and
unsatisfactory term of homosexuality, or of queer or LGBTI. All these terms are
used to simultaneously contain and exclude lesbians. A more recent term –
same-sex attracted – fails for the same reasons. Lesbians who are tortured
disappear. Lesbians are to be found as side issues in the literature on torture
of LGBTI (Breaking the Silence, 1997;
Crimes of hate,
conspiracy of silence, Torture and ill-treatment based on sexual identity ACT 40/016/2001), and secondly as a side issue on
the torture of women (Broken bodies, shattered minds —Torture and ill-treatment
of women, AI Index: ACT 40/001/2001).
There is a significant shift in the balance of cases reported by Amnesty
International between 1997 and 2001. This could be due to several factors 1) a
greater willingness on the part of AI to look into torture of lesbians 2) an
increase in the incidence of torture of lesbians 3) an increase in the
reporting of the torture of lesbians 4) a combination of these and other
factors.
[3] This
paper draws on research presented at a number of conferences since 2003. See
Hawthorne 2004a, 2004b and 2005 for published versions.
[4] An
interesting point is raised by the way this case is indexed. As you can see
from the web reference it is incorrectly indexed under gay men. I have found a
number of instances like this. So it is not surprising that lesbians disappear
in the literature on refugees. Another article under
tells of the case of a Ugandan lesbian
seeking refugee status in the UK, but no where does it indicate that the asylum
seeker is a lesbian until she speaks and says “I’m Claire, I’m a lesbian and
I’m from Uganda …” (Townely 2005).
[5] Think
about the lesbians you know who have been incarcerated and labelled as mad.
Think about the “treatment” they have received. Was it electroconvulsive
therapy? What is the difference between this and the shocks given to prisoners
who are tortured? Was it the use of drugs? What is the difference between this
and a host of other silencing techniques used by torturers? In most instances
the difference is simply the name of the institution in which it occurs; in
some instances there is also a difference in intensity, or in the fact that
“patients” are given shock treatment while unconscious. See Millett (1994) for
a discussion of the similarities. Rivera-Fuentes and Birke also discuss the
role of doctors in places where torture is inflicted (2001: 658-660).
[6] Robin
Lucas jailed for credit card fraud in 1995 in California. As was reported:
One evening in
September 1995, three male inmates unlocked the door of her cell, handcuffed
her and raped her. Robin Lucas suffered severe injuries to her neck, arms, back
and vaginal and anal areas (Crimes of
Hate 2001: 18).
[7] In
reading this statement by FannyAnn Eddy, I am reminded of another woman who was
silenced and who, surprisingly, spoke out about “the deadly campaign of
silence”, Radclyffe Hall. In an unpublished article about The Well of Loneliness she wrote: “Not only has this constituted a
grave danger to the inverts themselves who, in addition to all else have not
hitherto dared to proclaim their existence, (a most undesirable state of
affairs and one likely to render them morbid,) but this campaign of silence has
been a grave danger to a hetero-sexual society, that has resolutely refused to
face a problem which was and is above all social.” (Souhami 1999:158).
[8] The
Appendix contains some guidelines for how to treat lesbians applying for asylum
on the basis of their sexual orientation.
[9] The
idea for this came from a similar list of guidelines contained in Agenda: Women, the
Invisible Refugees (55).
