Sexual Assault Resource Center

LESBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENDER SURVIVORS

People who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender, and also as survivors of sexual assault face not only the barriers to seeking help that all survivors face, but also a range of obstacles that are unique to the LGBT community.

Some of the issues that are unique to LGBT survivors are listed below.
LGBT survivors, like all survivors,

  • often feel self-blame, shame, fear, anger, and depression
LGBT survivors may also
  • Feel reporting will only reinforce negative stereotypes
  • Individual may not be “out” yet to family and friends and this could provide a significant barrier to reporting if the perpetrator was of the same gender identity
  • May raise questions about sexual orientation
  • Concern about how others may perceive you
  • Questioning whether it was perpetrated as a hate crime (directed against the survivor’s sexual orientation or gender identity)
  • The LGBT community can be small and tight-knit which can increase the reluctance to seek help regarding an assault or an abusive relationship, due to fear others will find out May feel ostracized from both mainstream society and the LGBT community,
  • May feel that their sexual orientation or gender identity is focused on more than the assault itself.
  • Transgender people may not want to seek hospital care because it would mean revealing that they are a gender other than the sex they were born to, which in turn might cause discrimination.
  • May also feel that they were punished for not acting in accordance with society’s prescribed gender roles, and this may increase the amount of shame that they feel as a result of an assault.
  • May be reluctant to tell family and friends who do not approve of their lifestyle
  • LGBT survivors may lack support not only from the community at large, but also from the LGBT community itself
LGBT survivors who do choose to come forward face a range of difficulties that heterosexual survivors do not face.
  • Survivors who are not “out” may not want to seek counseling for fear that doing so will mean disclosing their sexual orientations
  • There is often heterosexism and homophobia in the systems that are designed to help survivors.
    • This can mean overt discrimination against LGBT survivors,
    • It can be the assumption that all survivors are heterosexual.
    • The legal system may also be discriminatory, and may not even recognize same-sex assault.