April 12, 2022

11:04

Ívina Garcia – Cenarium Magazine

MANAUS – After the decision made by the Superior Court of Justice (STJ), about the application of the Maria da Penha Law in cases involving transgender women, a survey released by the Trans Observatory, on Sunday, 10, shows that 31 trans women were murdered in Brazil, only in the first quarter of 2022.

In the North Region, four occurrences were registered. In Amazonas, one murder occurred in Manaus and one attempt was registered in Iranduba, in the metropolitan area of the capital. The other two homicides happened in Roraima and Pará.

Although the law was approved for trans women, it is applied after the violence has taken place, reverberating the absence of prevention policies. Álex Sousa, a non-binary trans person and LGBTQIA+ activist, believes that education is the basis for advancement.

“Just focusing on creating laws protecting trans people is just trimming the branches of a tree. We know that new branches will continue to emerge. For an effective protection of trans bodies it is necessary to uproot the tree, it is a groundwork that takes time,” declares the activist, who also recalls that Brazil remains for the thirteenth consecutive year the country that kills the most trans people in the world and that preventive laws do not always help save lives.

“Sometimes we don’t even have time to resort to justice when our lives have already been taken. Not only because of our identities, but also because of our individualities,” she points out.

In a country with conservative ideologies, Álex sees misinformation as the basis for disrespect. “Conservative ideology is dominant in institutional spaces, which prevents this debate from being done seriously, which prevents sex education in schools, for example, which should also include the debate about respect for gender diversity. Transphobia has several forms, and all of them kill, either by homicide or suicide.

The data on violence against trans people are part of a monitoring conducted since 2016, available at the Trans Observatory, which also points out 32 human rights violations, six suicides and eight attempted murders.

The research is part of the work developed by the ‘Trans Brazil Network’ to map and collect data about the trans population. In the workshop held earlier this month by the institution, data from the ‘Trans Census’, conducted in 10 Brazilian capitals, were presented, showing that 58% of the interviewees are black and mixed race, 42.1% did not finish high school. The economic scenario is that 82.4% are in the context of prostitution and 91% have an average income equal to or less than one minimum wage.

Slow steps

“Brazil has been walking like a tortoise. Little by little they are realizing that we are beings, that we are in Brazil, that we live in Brazil, and that we need to be looked at”. The statement is from Bruna La Close, president of the Manaus LGBTQIA+ Pride Parade Association (APOLGBT), and LGBTQIA+ rights activist. She believes that the approval is an important step towards the reduction of violence against transgender people, which often starts at home.

Despite the advance, Bruna sees the current scenario as far from ideal and points to the impunity of cases involving the trans community. “I see this as a lack of commitment to the investigations of each case. Many cases don’t receive a response, which feeds criminality and increases impunity, collaborating with the mortality of transgender people,” she points out.