What to Consider When Reporting on LGBTQ+ Communities
Pride Month may be over, but pride for the LGBTQ+ community is all year round. Queer people face levels of discrimination all over the world that ranges from civil discriminations (such as a lack of marriage equality) to capital punishment. The United States has seen an alarming amount of anti-queer and anti-trans legislation being drawn up by Republican lawmakers in at least 30 states. Pride is more necessary than ever for the community.
Queer people face a complex set of challenges based on their identity. Sexuality and sexual orientation are uncomfortable topics in some cultures, which leads to another layer of complexity for some when reporting on the community. So what are the best practices when dealing with the LGBTQ+ community in reporting?
LEARN ABOUT WHAT THE COMMUNITY ENCOMPASSES
One of the hardest things for non-LGBTQ+ people to grasp is the sheer breadth of identities that are under the LGBTQ+ umbrella. Gender and sexual identities are complex. Reporting on a transgender person and reporting on a person who identifies solely as bisexual will not encompass the same set of issues, although plenty of the issues will be intersectional. Do not assume one issue applies across the spectrum of the LGBTQ+ experience, though – that is harmful stereotyping.
UNDERSTAND THE LEGAL ISSUES, BUT ALSO THE DAILY AND PERSONAL ONES
Queer people are constantly fighting legal battles, but these more often than not only underscore personal, day-to-day interactions. What kind of discrimination do queer people face on a daily basis? For instance, queer people report being called slurs often, and slurs are considered acts of violence in that they are used to provoke a “fight or flight” response. Your audience should know the day-to-day challenges as well in order to receive greater context for the scope of your reporting.
CALL OUT MYTHS AND IDENTIFY ANTI-LGBTQ+ TALKING POINTS
A lot of misinformation is circulating regarding the LGBTQ+ community. Some of it is silly (such as the idea that you can tell someone is gay by the sound of their voice or by simply looking at them) but some of it is actively harmful. Right-wing sources in the United States have been circulating false information painting LGBTQ+ as groomers, a hysteria accusing LGBTQ+ people of building relationships, trust, and emotional connections with children so they can manipulate, exploit and abuse them. Presenting clear data and facts and challenging these dehumanizing portraits of queer people is important, both for establishing truth, and spreading awareness of the nature of that disinformation.
TERMINOLOGY IS IMPORTANT
As stated above, the queer community includes a mind-blowing breadth of identities. Asking the source or subject themselves about what terminology they prefer to use, how they think of themselves and how they think of others is all key to accurately reporting on LGBTQ+ identities. Cognition is directly related to how one conceives of themselves and to how they relate to others, meaning the subject’s experience itself is dictated by the boundaries through which they perceive themselves and others. This terminology also defines how the community views itself – it’s important to let the community speak for itself.
IT’S NOT ALWAYS A SAD STORY
There is a running joke amongst LGBTQ+ people that the only two types of gay movies are either sex comedies or tragedies, wrought with death and suffering. The queer experience doesn’t only straddle “sex” and “sad.” The queer experience is just as varied as the heterosexual experience, often moreso, because of the wide variety of identities present in the queer community. The problem of queer pain’s overrepresentation in media has become so intense that the “bury your gays” trope is well-documented.
In order to educate the population on a community, you must first educate yourself on it. Introducing people to the queer community in writing is not ideal as it’s an extremely complex community that doesn’t always value the same things, but in order to try, you must give an idea of the scope of that variation. Respect for identity should come first and foremost in any questions, and ultimately, journalists must be prepared to learn rather than to educate.
RELATED READING: How Can Journalists Effectively Report on LGBTQ+ Youth?
