The beginning of Brazil’s LGBTQIA+ movement
Hey y’all, so inspired by this post, I decided to make one post about Brasil’s LGBTQIA+ history. My sources are going to be at the end, if you can read in Portuguese, check them out! This is not an all-encompassing post by any means, k?
As a national organized movement, it starts around 1978, in the middle of our last military dictatorship, succeeded by the 1964 coup d’état. There were many civil movements protesting the regime and everything that came with it. Politically organized movements like the “Somos: Grupo de Afirmação Homossexual”, “Movimento Homossexual Brasileiro”, “Grupo Gay da Bahia” etc. These movements were centered around the experience of brazilian gay men (and I don’t mean this as something derogatory, because LGBTQIA+ people were systematically persecuted, criminalized, beaten, tortured and murdered) and were somewhat hostile to women, because of misogyny. So, lesbians (there was no separation between lesbians and bisexuals, nominally speaking) created specific movements centered around feminism like the “Grupo de Ação Lésbico-Feminista” (that firstly, acted inside ‘Somos’). On those years (1978-1980), LGBTQIA+ groups primarily acted in consonance with labor movements and produced printed material, like “Lampião da Esquina”:
The lesbians started really participating in feminist public events but were deemed too “radical” by middle/upper class feminists, that considered low/working class heterosexual women would not be interested in being lumped together with sapatonas (it’s a term that can be considered a slur depending on who is calling you that but was reclaimed by the movement). The tensions with the gay group “Somos” escalated and in 1980 the “Grupo de Ação Lésbico-Feminista” parted ways with “Somos” and became “Grupo de Ação Lésbica Feminista”.
As we were in the middle of a military dictatorship, arbitrary arrests, torture and extortion were common, targeting not only dissidents, but also LGBTQIA+ people, sex workers, non-whites and the unemployed. On July 13th, 1980, organized LGBTQIA+ and feminist movements, together with the “Movimento Negro Unificado” protested in São Paulo’s downtown and the protest is considered our firt march (not to be confused with the fist pride parade). The lesbian movement also produced its printed material, lChanacomchana:
On July 23th, 1983 a group that was selling Chanacomchana inside a bar, frequented mostly by lesbians, called Ferro’s Bar, was expelled and thus prohibited from frequenting the bar. In August 19th, 1983 the bar was invaded in what is considered the little “brazilian Stonewall” and as the invasion gained press coverage, the owner allowed them to start frequenting again and also go back to selling Chanacomchana.
So now you ask me: where are the T in LGBT? For that part, I’m going to present you with a term that is very common in PT-Br and, I believe, in América Latina also, Travesti. Travesti is always accompanied by the article ‘a’, that in portuguese indicates grammatical gender. The military dictatorship and its enforcers (ya know, cops) usually didn’t made distinctions, everyone was homosexual or “degenerate”. The term ‘trans” wasn’t very common. Together with half of our LGBTQIA+ population, they were suffering with torture, violent psychological intervention, you name it. But in that time, people considered travestis and trans people to be “only” drag queens, so they were involved in “artistic backgrounds”, because they were only allowed to exist like this, with no political involvement whatsoever, because if they were politically participant and were trans outside this “artistic background”, they were committed or straight up murdered.
An orgnized political movement came only after the end of the military dictatorship, in 1985. In 1992 some local political movements started, with the creation of the “Associação das Travestis e Liberados do Rio de Janeiro”, “Associação das Travestis de Salvador”, in 1995 the “Grupo Filadélfia de Santos”, “Grupo Igualdade”, in 1999 the “Associação das Travestis na Luta pela Cidadania” and in the 2000s the national movements, like “Articulação Nacional de Travestis, Transexuais e Transgêneros” and the “Rede Trans e o Instituto Brasileiro de Transmasculinidades”.
The LGBTQIA+ movement grew, with the first Pride being held in 1995 and after, in multiple cities. The multiple movements that stated to pop up all over the country and gained traction, resulting in public policies.
In 2020, we have yet MANY obstacles. Being LGBTQIA+ in our current political context is something very powerfull and at the same time, painfull, so I’m going to link some news (in english) and refrain from talking about it. My main purpose was to talk about the movement’s origin, so here it is. Links 1, 2, 3 and 4
My sources for both photos and information 1, 2, 3, 4.
