Abrogation of Section 377: Law can only change law, not behaviour of people

It will take decades before we can actually eradicate the stigma of being gay or transgender, as a homophobic population will continue to judge and discriminate.

Business Standard :On September 6, India saw victory of law and love. The five bench Supreme Court unanimously passed an order on IPC Section 377, making the country really free for everyone – including gays and transgenders for the first time since 1861. India has become a better country since then. Many trans and homo children, both girls and boys, have been violated within families and their parents have long lived in constant fear of their children being considered criminal. The Supreme Court ruling will give solace to them.

But the law can only change the law, not attitudes and behaviour of people. It will take many more years or decades before we can actually eradicate the stigma of being gay or transgender. While many remain indifferent, the trans and homophobic population will continue to judge and discriminate. At best, many of them will be indifferent and ignore their existence and at worst, we will continue to see hate crimes and violence targeting them. Moral policing often does not have relationship with what law says or what the reality is. The following opinions, which do not have any grounding based on facts and experience, typify the mindset of several religious leaders and fanatics: “They can be what they want to but let them not advertise it”, “So now they are going to ask for gay marriages and spoil our culture”, “All this has been brought to our country from the West”. So on and so forth.

ALSO READ: How the SC judgement on Section 377 ties constitutional values with emotion

Changing such thought processes is an uphill task and can be achieved if it is tackled effectively on three fronts: increase solidarity from within and empower the community, sensitise and engage with policymakers, and educate masses through platforms that involve members of the community and the general population. As long as the general population does not interact and engage with community members, it will not be aware that there is a human being behind a gay or transgender identity. And that is simply not a matter of just sex or gender!

In one of our projects, which serves 6,000 transgenders across six sites, we were able to document some 450 cases of violence and discrimination within a span of about two years. In fact, in every discussion we had with them, we were apprised about insults and violence they faced. We also found that only cases involving extreme physical brutality that were filed as FIRs with the police, were reported as violence by the law keepers...Read More

How Section 377 verdict paves way for those devoid of mental health rights

The Mental Healthcare Act, 2017 was quoted by three of the judges in the Section 377 verdict.

It is befitting that mental health was a key focus and an essential aspect of the inalienable rights accorded to the LGBTQIA+ community on September 6, 2018. The Mental Healthcare Act, 2017 was quoted by three of the judges in the Section 377 verdict. The colonial-era penal code was questioned against the newer definitions of functioning, illness and finally, rights.

The country’s mental health professionals and premier mental health institutes have often obfuscated and erased their own history of deeply problematic practices and thoughts that have left thousands with irreparable damage. In mere hours after the judgment, stories had started pouring in about the unquestioned malpractice the community had often been subjected to. 

There were transgender individuals who were given electroconvulsive therapy, gay men who were treated for ‘invisible disorders in their brain’ and structured programmes which were created to annihilate and repress any aspect of a person that was non-conforming. The phrase ‘conversion therapy’ doesn’t begin to capture the horror that the marginalised have been subjected to.

ALSO READ: How the SC judgement on Section 377 ties constitutional values with emotion

Most transgender persons are familiar with humiliating psychometric tests used to assess gender dysphoria before they could assert their own right of choice and self-determination. The assessment would often be reflective of the psychiatrist’s agreement with the choice, rather than an objective report. Psychiatrists and psychologists would attempt to ‘counsel’ them against it, or treat it as a strong case of denial. 

Even today, there is no model of sensitisation or caution in this assessment process and there is often a reported sense of violation and harassment. In 2018, the World Health Organisation finally questioned the inclusion of gender dysphoria as a mental disorder and shifted it to the sexual health chapter instead, removing the idea of treatment being associated with gender non-conformity.

The mental health profession has often been critiqued for its comfort with diagnostic labels and its understanding of non-normative as solely a disorder. These understandings have been more rapidly changing and questioned due to the work of activism as well as more queer therapists coming to the forefront. 

However, given the silos that therapists often work in, percolation of alternative understandings takes time and is inhibited by the nature of power structures within the medical profession. The external frameworks used by the mental health profession have had the capacity to oppress the marginalised, just as much as they have provided safe spaces....Read More

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