Keynote Graeme Reid (Deutsch)Konferenzbericht / Conference ReportFotos der Konferenz / PhotosGrußwort Lars CastellucciInvite/ Einladung
Video keynote by Graeme Reid, UN Independent Expert on protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, on the role of queer rights in the human rights system at the International Conference “The right to belong and the threat of authoritarianism” on September, 22 2026.
Excellencies, colleagues and friends,
The protection of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and gender-diverse people is sometimes treated as a niche issue, a specialised question, separate from broader concerns about democracy and the rule of law. Yet the treatment of vulnerable minorities, including LGBT people, often provide important insight into the health of democratic institutions and the extent to which the rule of law protects everyone.
In what follows, I will focus on that connection. I will look at the political use of hostility towards LGBT people; the restrictions on civic space that frequently accompany it; and the role of courts and other independent institutions in upholding equal protection. I will draw mainly on examples from Russia, Poland, Hungary and parts of Africa.
The term “bellwether” is useful, although it needs to be used with some caution. The relationship is neither automatic nor linear. The pattern is nevertheless sufficiently consistent to warrant attention. When political leaders deliberately mobilise hostility towards a small and often poorly understood minority, the methods they use frequently extend well beyond that minority. Very often, their actions are a precursor to the erosion of democratic institutions and fundamental freedoms.
Democracy depends on pluralism, equal citizenship, accountable institutions, an independent judiciary, a free press, and a civil society able to organise and speak. The rule of law requires public power to be constrained by law, laws to be clear and applied without discrimination, and everyone to have access to an effective remedy.
These principles are tested most directly in relation to people who are politically marginal, unpopular or outnumbered. Their protection indicates whether equality before the law has substantive meaning and whether democratic institutions can withstand the pressures of majoritarian politics.
A common feature of attacks on LGBT people is the deliberate stoking of moral panic. This is particularly apparent with the rise of authoritarian populism, and the proliferation of illiberal democracies. Unscrupulous politicians cast LGBT people as an “ideology”, as agents of foreign influence, or as a threat to children, the family, culture and even the nation. The realities of people’s lives and the specific human rights abuses they experience recede from view, replaced by “gender ideology”, “propaganda”, or the alleged corruption of national values.
The term “gender ideology” has been deployed as an intentionally vague, empty signifier, a form of symbolic glue uniting disparate conservative movements in opposition to the rights of LGBT people, particularly of transgender people, reproductive autonomy, comprehensive sexuality education, measures addressing gender-based violence, and efforts to challenge rigid gender roles. At their core, these campaigns seek to restrict people’s ability to make fundamental decisions about their bodies, relationships, and lives.
This rhetoric often draws much of its power from the relative invisibility of LGBT people. Legal prohibition, stigma and the risk of violence often force people to conceal their sexual orientation or gender identity. Invisibility facilitates misrepresentation, reinforcing a cycle in which those most affected have the least opportunity to respond.
These developments have consequences for civic space. Measures directed at sexual orientation and gender identity frequently restrict freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association, the topic of my 2024 report to the Human Rights Council. Laws prohibiting so-called “propaganda” or “promotion” affect teachers, journalists, health workers and civil society organisations. Restrictions on registration and funding impede human rights defenders. Vague language creates conditions for selective and arbitrary enforcement.
The democratic significance lies in the powers being asserted: the power to determine which ideas may be discussed, which organisations may operate, who may participate in public life, and which forms of identity are compatible with national belonging. It also lies in the independence of the institutions able to review those powers.
The Russian Federation provides a striking example. Its federal “gay propaganda” law, adopted in 2013 amid mounting political opposition, prohibits even neutral science-based information about homosexuality. The law served a broader political project. Domestically, it helped consolidate a conservative support base. Internationally, it positioned Russia as a defender of “traditional values” against a supposedly decadent West. Far from preventing propaganda, the label itself serves a propagandistic purpose, disguising an anti-LGBT and anti-human rights measure as the protection of children.
At first an administrative offence, the law subsequently expanded, while independent organisations, media, and political dissent came under increasing pressure. Across these fields, political techniques included the construction of an internal enemy, the conflation of criticism with foreign interference, vague prohibitions, and selective enforcement.
The restrictions imposed on LGBT people formed part of a much larger project of political control – an early indication of where the Russian State was moving, and the methods that would be deployed.
Poland offers a different example, some of which is documented in my country report published in 2024. Under the previous government, formed by the Law and Justice party, LGBT rights and women’s reproductive rights became prominent wedge issues within a broader erosion of institutional checks and balances. Local authorities adopted resolutions declaring themselves free from “LGBT ideology” or endorsed so-called family charters. These measures were largely symbolic in legal terms, yet their social and political significance was considerable. They identified some citizens as falling outside the legitimate national community.
This took place alongside pressure on judicial independence, media freedom, and civil society. LGBT activists faced arrest, prosecution and lawsuits. Courts, independent media, ombudspersons, and civil society organisations were increasingly portrayed as obstacles to the will of the majority.
Poland also demonstrates the importance of institutional resilience. Courts reviewed discriminatory measures, civil society documented their impact, European institutions invoked shared obligations, and local authorities eventually repealed the resolutions. Legal institutions, civil society and regional systems reinforced one another while domestic protections were under pressure.
Independent courts have played an important role, for example in parts of Africa. In recent years, courts in Namibia, Mauritius and Botswana have struck down laws criminalising consensual same-sex intimacy. Kenya’s Supreme Court upheld the right of an LGBT organisation to register. These judgments applied established constitutional guarantees of dignity, equality, privacy, and freedom of association to people who had historically been excluded from their protection.
This is a central legal point. Protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity involves the application of existing human rights. These include privacy, equality, non-discrimination, freedom of expression and association, and protection from violence. Everyone has a sexual orientation and a gender identity. Variations in sexual orientation or gender identity cannot place a person beyond the protection of the law.
Questions of culture and tradition inevitably arise. Concepts of sexuality and gender vary across time and place. LGBT terminology cannot encompass the full diversity of human experience, and attention to local histories and meanings remains important.
Universality nevertheless remains the governing principle. Cultural variation cannot justify violence, arbitrary detention, censorship or unequal protection. The Vienna Declaration recognises national, regional, historical, cultural and religious particularities, while affirming the duty of every state to protect all human rights and fundamental freedoms.
It is also important to resist the framing of human rights of LGBT people as a marker of Western modernity. That framing obscures the agency of activists in every region who draw on locally meaningful language and experience to claim dignity and protection. It also allows governments to dismiss their own citizens as agents of foreign influence. Human rights acquire meaning through their application to the lives of people in all regions.
The language of “the family” and “traditional values” assumes a democratic significance when it subordinates individual rights to an officially approved social order. Families are important sources of care, solidarity and belonging. States have an obligation to protect people in their diverse family forms. An idealised concept of the family should not determine who qualifies for equal citizenship.
Several priorities follow from this analysis.
Governments should repeal laws that criminalise consensual same-sex relations and laws that censor discussion of sexual and gender diversity. Any restriction of rights must comply with the requirements of legality, necessity, and proportionality.
Courts, national human rights institutions and ombudspersons must remain independent and accessible. Their ability to apply constitutional and international guarantees impartially is especially important when public prejudice is strong.
States must also protect civic space. LGBT organisations, journalists, researchers, health providers, and human rights defenders must be able to speak, assemble, associate, and seek resources without being characterised as threats to national sovereignty.
Political leaders have a particular responsibility to reject scapegoating, including when it appears electorally advantageous, an issue that I address in a report to the UN General Assembly focusing on obstacles to electoral participation. Democratic debate accommodates profound differences of belief. It must remain grounded in the equal dignity of all people and in the rejection of incitement to violence and dehumanizing rhetoric.
Those engaged in defending democracy should recognise LGBT rights as integral to that work. Restrictions initially directed at an unpopular minority establish powers and precedents with much wider application. Censorship introduced in the name of protecting children can silence educators and journalists. Restrictions on foreign funding can weaken civil society more broadly. Politicised courts that fail one minority become less capable of protecting others.
That is why the treatment of LGBT people can serve as a bellwether. It shows whether universality is being upheld in practice, whether the rule of law constrains the exercise of power, and whether democratic institutions are capable of sustaining equality in the presence of difference.
The strength of a democratic society is revealed in how disagreement is governed, whether all people can participate without fear, and whether minorities remain protected when exclusion is politically expedient.
Under Viktor Orbán, Hungary experienced a sharp erosion of democratic norms, accompanied by anti-LGBT rhetoric and legal restrictions. When the authorities banned Budapest Pride, hundreds of thousands attended. The scale of the turnout signalled growing resistance to the government’s approach and a recognition that the rights of LGBT people were inseparable from democratic rights more broadly.
When LGBT people are pushed out of public life, democracy itself becomes narrower. Attacks on vulnerable minorities are a recurring feature of authoritarian populism and can presage wider assaults on democratic institutions and the rule of law. Although the immediate effects fall disproportionately on those targeted, the powers and precedents established have much wider consequences.
This should concern everyone.Thank you.
Graeme Reid, UN Independent Expert on protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity
Video keynote by Graeme Reid, at the International Conference “The right to belong and the threat of authoritarianism” on September, 22 2026.
Find more conference inputs, articles and photos here:
KonferenzberichtEinladung und Programm/ Invite and programFotos der Konferenz / PhotosGrußwort / Welcoming adress by Lars CastellucciKeynote Graeme Reid (Deutsch)
A publication for Hirschfeld Eddy Foundation as part of the project “The Pink Factor: LGBTQI+-Rights in the Geopolitical Conflict about Values and Resources”.
Schlagwörter english, Menschenrechte, PF-2025, UN