Pride Month: LGBTQ+ and Courtroom Victories
At The Animal Law Foundation we work to establish principles that protect animals under the law. In Pride Month, we want to take a moment to reflect on five legal victories the LGBTQ community and those lawyers working on behalf of them have had in the courts in the UK and beyond.
1. One, Inc. v. Olesen (1958)
This US case involved the publication of a magazine for the gay community called ONE: The Homesexual Magazine. Following editions being seized by LA postal authorities on the grounds of violating obscenity laws, the magazine took them to court. The case made its way up to the Supreme Court which ruled that material aimed at a gay audience was not inherently obscene.
2. P v S (1996)
This European Court of Justice case confirmed a UK’s employment tribunal’s view that Cornwall County Council had unfairly dismissed a person after they informed them that they were undergoing gender reassignment surgery. This was the first case of its kind that protected trans people from discrimination in employment.
3. Sutherland v. United Kingdom (1997)
The European Commission of Human Rights ruled that there was no justification for the age of consent for homosexual acts being higher for gay people in the UK and as such it violated Articles 8 and 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights. This resulted in a Bill being proposed that reduced the age from 18 to 16, which eventually passed in 2000.
4. NGOs Coordination Board v Eric Gitari and others (2023)
This Kenyan case involved the non-governmental coordination board refusing to register six names proposed by the National Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission and the Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Council. Whilst same-sex unions remain illegal in Kenya, the Kenyan Supreme Court found that this was discriminatory and infringed the constitutional right to association. The court stated: “Human rights are inherent and held simply because of being a human. All human beings, including LGBTIQ persons, are entitled to the full enjoyment of all the rights under chapter four of the constitution, not by reason of their sexual preferences as LGBTIQ but as human beings. Just as the rights enjoyed by heterosexuals are not based on their sexual orientation but by virtue of common humanity.”
5. Caso Olivera Fuentes v Peru (2023)
This case against Peru involved two gay men in a supermarket being asked to stop behaving affectionately towards one another or exit the shop. One of the men, Olivera, complained to the consumer protection authorities who supported the claim that same-sex displays of affection can be detrimental to children. He then appealed to the Peruvian courts, who also dismissed the case. The case was taken to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights which found Peru violated rights to equality before the law and to judicial protection.
Despite these legal victories, it is important to remember that we must never get complacent, protections are only as strong as those supporting them. This can be draining, but together we have got this.
