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[AcademicSaucer]

Latin America offers a contradictory narrative: The region has the highest rates of violence against the LGBT community, according to research done by Transgender Europe, a non-governmental organization, but it also has some of the most progressive laws for LGBT equality and protection.
While many LGBT rights in the United States are tied up in legal wrangling in individual states, in Latin America, laws about same-sex marriage and adoption, changing gender on national ID cards, and anti-discrimination laws all went into effect in the past decade -- many of them before the US Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage.

Catholic and evangelical churches also play a large role in shaping societal and political opinion in the region.
"If you look at religion as a variable, what you find is that the more Catholic the country, the more likely they are to be accepting of homosexuality and vice versa," Encarnacion says. "The more Protestant they are, the less likely they are (to be) accepting, and the less likely they are to have an active gay rights legislation."

Encarnacion adds that LGBT people living in countries dominated by evangelical churches tend to be the ones that have the hardest time.
The Catholic and evangelical churches have similar views on homosexuality, although there are notable differences.
While both oppose homosexuality, "the Catholic clergy tends to be less opposed to anti-discrimination statutes than the evangelical clergy," explains Corrales. "Sometimes, the Catholic clergy has come out in favor of civil unions while still opposing gay marriage."

In the region, public opinion seems to be shifting toward tolerance. A survey by ILGA showed that 81% of people in the Americas have no concerns about their neighbors' sexuality.

In Bolivia, transgender and transsexual individuals are allowed to change their national ID cards, but the country -- along with Paraguay -- has instituted a constitutional ban on same-sex marriages.

Source :http://edition.cnn.com/2017/02/26/americas/lgbt-rights-in-the-americas/

 

[Appleman]

Brazil being 3rd considering that other thread really makes this all feel pretty relative

 

[jmdajr]

I always view all of Latin America as being mostly Catholic. Guess that is a mistake?

 

[DeviantBoi]

I always view all of Latin America as being mostly Catholic. Guess that is a mistake?

There's a lot of money to be had in evangelical churches and you don't have to share any of it with the Pope in Rome.

 

[Camp Freddie]

There's probably a greek joke in there about Paraguay being the way it sounds like it would be. And Homer Simpson thinks Uruguay is pronounced u r gay so I guess the Simpsons was right again.

I'm surprised that more Catholic correlates with more gay-friendly. But I guess evangelicals are even worse.

 

[AcademicSaucer]

There's probably a greek joke in there about Paraguay being the way it sounds like it would be. And Homer Simpson thinks Uruguay is pronounced u r gay so I guess the Simpsons was right again.

I'm surprised that more Catholic correlates with more gay-friendly. But I guess evangelicals are even worse.

protestantism was a mistake

 

[Corginand]

Wonder what are the exact views from those that answered 'neither'. Like, they don't care whether homosexuality is legal or not? If it's not legal people will suffer just for not being born straight. To me, saying they don't care makes them sound like they have a serious lack of empathy :/

 

[FunkyPajamas]

I always view all of Latin America as being mostly Catholic. Guess that is a mistake?

Christian/Catholic mainly, but as DeviantBoi said, there's a lot of evangelical churches and stuff like that.

 

[Abilidebob]

I always view all of Latin America as being mostly Catholic. Guess that is a mistake?

Sadly the Evangelical have been growing over the years as Catholics have been shrinking in Brazil. Pretty much all of our extreme bigoted politicians are Evangelics.

 

[Dusk Golem]

Wonder what are the exact views from those that answered 'neither'. Like, they don't care whether homosexuality is legal or not? If it's not legal people will suffer just for not being born straight. To me, saying they don't care makes them sound like they have a serious lack of empathy :/

I have a sneaking suspicion I know at least one kind of viewpoint that fits in that neither category. I have an aunt who is completely against public displays of affection, she just hates it for some reason. In her own words, she doesn't care what people do in their bedroom, and even mentioned doesn't care if they're straight, gay, or whatever. Just as long as she doesn't have to be around whatever she doesn't care what people do.

I have a feeling some are in that sort of mindset, and others probably just have the "live and let live, look out for yourself, I have no stake in the matter one way or another so I don't care what happens to this other group let them work whatever out," mentality.

 

[Ahasverus]

Can confirm. I really appreciate the legislative protections and general anti discrimination anrrative the government has in here, but there is still a bubbling sense of unease that comes with the evangelical pastors literally calling for blood, not to mention good ol fashioned homophobia.

I kinda feel it's going downhill if we catch the far right wave.

 

[Linkark07]

Surprised CNN didnt take Panama into consideration.

Anyways, I can say is that in here, there are many people from the LGBT community, While sex crimes are rare, most people usually look with disdain people from the LGBT community.

That said, both, the Catholic Church and the Evangelical Churches, have a strong grip on the Panamanian society. For example, we still don't have sexual education because our lawmakers are filthy cowards who are afraid of the sheeps who protest saying sexual education teach their children how to be gay/lesbian or teaches them to be transsexual (yes, really). We still don't have in our law same sex marriage.

 

[pixelation]

I always view all of Latin America as being mostly Catholic. Guess that is a mistake?

Speaking strictly about Mexico the answer is yes.

 

[Skellig Gra]

Doesn't seem that perplexing to me. If you are LGBT in most of Latin America you should be very careful who you reveal it to.

 

[Drencrom]

Uruguay is the friendliest huh? I'll be damned.

 

[Coriolanus]

Isn't particularly perplexing. At least wrt Brazil, we've terrific laws in many areas. Our laws regarding prisoner rights, teenager and child protection, education, healthcare, government transparency and the like are pretty god damn awesome. Our constitution is freaking amazing wrt civil rights.

Sadly, there is quite the difference between having the laws and executing the laws.... and that's when shit hits the fan.

So you've countries with (often) modern legislation but a horrendously corrupt/lazy/underfunded/outdated state apparatus, and that throws a spanner in the works. Given that these conditions are the rule of thumb for almost all of south america....

 

[gutter_trash]

Brazil is huge and diverse. Regionalism is still a thing. A gay couple may be fine in cities like Rio and Sao Paulo but be damned if they decided to do a road trip into the farmer states

I always view all of Latin America as being mostly Catholic. Guess that is a mistake?

Prostantism and Evanglicals are way more prominent in Latin America than in Spain + Portugal.

some was about breaking from the establishment of the Catholic Church over time.

some of it were Evangelical, Mormon and other missionaries spreading their faith .

IMO, Latin America's Machismo levels are still holding progessiveness back by a decade or two when compared to Spain + Portugal who have legalized Same Sex Marriage in 2005 and 2010 respectively

 

[Muppet of a Man]

Evangelicals are the scourge of christianity, much like radical islamic sects are to islam.

 

[gutter_trash]

Evangelicals are the scourge of christianity, much like radical islamic sects are to islam.

I 100% agree,

literalists are dangerous

 

[Rayis]

I blame the US for exporting evangelism to Latin America, my family turned into evangelicals due to American missionaries and they're all horribly homophobic, never revealing my sexuality to them .

 

[Poor GRIMES]

I always view all of Latin America as being mostly Catholic. Guess that is a mistake?

tbh the philippines is super catholic and is the most LGBT friendly nation in asia. its not just religion that drives homophobia TBH

 

[Muppet of a Man]

I 100% agree,

literalists are dangerous

I actually see the greatest fight of our time being between the literalists of the world versus the interpretationalists. Literalists in every area are batshit insane and there is a paramount need to keep them in check and prevent the further spread of their inane way of thinking.

 

[Disxo]

No, I disagree, Uruguay is gay friendly yes.
The countryside? No, not at all.

"Puto" "Maricon" "culo roto" "Torta"
This bullshit is said even by my close friends casually, no, we are not that friendly of a country, at least in the rural areas where "Lo mataron por puto" (They killed it for being a faggot) is a joke.

 

[SilentRacoon]

Evangelicals are the scourge of christianity, much like radical islamic sects are to islam.

This is a perfect description of evangelicals, they are a widespread cancer.

 

[IrishNinja]

Evangelicals are the scourge of christianity, much like radical islamic sects are to islam.

can't argue with that

 

[Alex_Mexico]

There's probably a greek joke in there about Paraguay being the way it sounds like it would be. And Homer Simpson thinks Uruguay is pronounced u r gay so I guess the Simpsons was right again.

I'm surprised that more Catholic correlates with more gay-friendly. But I guess evangelicals are even worse.

You'd be surprised how relatively progressive Catholicism is (especially outside of the conservative-as-fuck USA) when compared to other Cristian denominations.

Catholicism believes in science, accepts global warming, and doesn't hate gays. It's only very strong stance that's not unlike Protestants is abortion but even then it doesn't get to some extremes.

I'm not saying Catholicism is the shit. There's a lot that could be better but as far as Christian religions go Catholics are the liberal uncle that makes the other conservatives in the family uncomfortable. Relatively.

 

[Mimosa97]

When you see the kind of negative impact evangelicals have on the US, I just hope that latin america stays catholic in the future. Those are some scary numbers though. I didn't know catholicism was losing so much ground to evangelicalism.

 

[Phobophile]

So Brazil is gay friendly but super transphobic? We had a thread posted not too long ago today about a trans person getting battered to death in Brazil. Is that an outlier or more indicative of the culture?

Edit: http://m.neogaf.com/showthread.php?t=1350530

The source article is The Mirror, though, so take from that what you will

 

[NHarmonic.]

The catholic and evangelist churches here in my country are the ones constantly fighting against marriage equality here in my country (Chile), though we were able to establish civil unions.

 

[FerDS]

I love how Venezuela is just out the study

 

[Sblargh]

This is kind of an beneficial side-effect of our institutions not being very democratic.
The people are very homophobic and conservative, to the point of brutal violence as the study shows, but the elites, who don't generally give that much of a fuck about the will of the people, are more progressive.

So a lot of these laws are just judges signing stuff, people getting mad, but whatcha gonna do? People vs judge, the judge always win in Latin America.
-
The catholicism angle is also weird. The bishops of Brazil are a very progressive institution, to the point that crazy conservatives will call them communist. But the average catholic just don't give a fuck, also the average priest in a small town doesn't give a fuck.
Conservative catholics here are just fine saying the pope is an idiot, ignoring everything he says, and then just being catholic. The opposite, of course, also true, when the pope is conservative, progressive catholics will just say he is an idiot and everyone just keep on believing whatever they believe regardless of what the church is actually doing.

The catholic church might still have the power of making people go to the ritual and coughing up money, but it has absolutely no power in changing minds. The pope is always speaking to an audience that already made up its mind.

 

[red13th]

Speaking of Brazil. Homophobia and transphobia are everywhere, especially outside of the large urban areas. My state has fines for homophobic/transphobic conducts and at work I joined a group that works with the government institutions that issue those fines. I've took part of only a few meetings and it has been an eye-opening experience.

 

[gutter_trash]

I love how Venezuela is just out the study

nobody dares set foot into a Chaos State

 

[AcademicSaucer]

When you see the kind of negative impact evangelicals have on the US, I just hope that latin america stays catholic in the future. Those are some scary numbers though. I didn't know catholicism was losing so much ground to evangelicalism.

THe problem is the protestantism that is growing in Latin America isnt the one from Europe but from USA.

 

[Jotaka]

Evangelicals are the scourge of christianity, much like radical islamic sects are to islam.

. Yep I can confirm that this is true... evangelicals teaching are evil

 

[gutter_trash]

THe problem is the protestantism that is growing in Latin America isnt the one from Europe but from USA.

I was surprised that there was a Mormon Church in Montreal for Latinos.

If it is big enough to build one in Montreal, Canada for Latin Americans, how big really is Mormonism in Latin America?

That and Evangelicalism are US created sects that spread via American missionaries.

The best way to compare is to see how secularism spread in Europe in contrast while Latin America is being Evangelized

 

[clemenx]

No, I disagree, Uruguay is gay friendly yes.
The countryside? No, not at all.

"Puto" "Maricon" "culo roto" "Torta"
This bullshit is said even by my close friends casually, no, we are not that friendly of a country, at least in the rural areas where "Lo mataron por puto" (They killed it for being a faggot) is a joke.

I won't say is not an issue but none of those have the same "weight" and history of "fag" in the english language. Translating any of those to "faggot" is just being lazy

 

[Fuu]

Brazil being 3rd considering that other thread really makes this all feel pretty relative

Massive and diverse country. Lots of problems, but the frequency of several issues heavily depend on which region/city you are.

 

[Disxo]

I won't say is not an issue but none of those have the same "weight" and history of "fag" in the english language. Translating any of those to "faggot" is just being lazy

Well, I lack the vocabulary but you are right.

 

[Cocaloch]

There's a lot of money to be had in evangelical churches and you don't have to share any of it with the Pope in Rome.

Also some people like, you know, actually believe in their religion.

protestantism was a mistake

Evangelical makes more sense the Protestantism. Though my understanding is that the Presbyterian church of Mexico split with the US because mainline protestants in the US are too progressive.

I blame the US for exporting evangelism to Latin America, my family turned into evangelicals due to American missionaries and they're all horribly homophobic, never revealing my sexuality to them .

Eh. That seems to be removing agency from Latin Americans.

You'd be surprised how relatively progressive Catholicism is (especially outside of the conservative-as-fuck USA) when compared to other Cristian denominations.

Catholicism believes in science, accepts global warming, and doesn't hate gays. It's only very strong stance that's not unlike Protestants is abortion but even then it doesn't get to some extremes.

I'm not saying Catholicism is the shit. There's a lot that could be better but as far as Christian religions go Catholics are the liberal uncle that makes the other conservatives in the family uncomfortable. Relatively.

You're missing a lot of differences between mainline Protestants and Catholics. To be crude Catholics are in between Mainline and Evangelicals. They certainly aren't the "liberal uncle".

The catholic church might still have the power of making people go to the ritual and coughing up money, but it has absolutely no power in changing minds. The pope is always speaking to an audience that already made up its mind.

This is nonsense. Religion is important to many people for reasons besides the person in charge at the moment. Religion has a major effect on people's world-views.

THe problem is the protestantism that is growing in Latin America isnt the one from Europe but from USA.

The US has mainline sects as well. It's a specific strand of religious thinking that's problematic more than sectarianism itself.

 

[FunkyPajamas]

I was discussing something like this in another thread, but what you read in wiki/reports about how the government supports LGBT* rights vs how the church/people behave is day and night apart. What's worse is that specifically in the case of Colombia there's an idiotic right-wing political movement that's against LGBT* rights and they're probably going to make a huge push come election year.

I've read good things about LGBT* rights in Montevideo, Uruguay. Been meaning to go there with a friend to enjoy the city. Hopefully soon.

 

[FerDS]

nobody dares set foot into a Chaos State

 

[Kid Ying]

Massive and diverse country. Lots of problems, but the frequency of several issues heavily depend on which region/city you are.

Yeah. In Rio its quite common to see gay couples and no one cares, but if you go to some places like piaui, where most of my family lives, things get a little rougher.

 

[smurfx]

lots of machismo crap in latin america and i'll say that is the most significant contributor to assaults on gay people over there. not to discount religious motivation as well.

 

[AcademicSaucer]

The US has mainline sects as well. It's a specific strand of religious thinking that's problematic more than sectarianism itself.

Which one?

 

[Soran]

Evangelists put homosexuals in the same category with rapists and murderers according to the preaching they do in the streets. They are truly the most cancerous Christian religious out there.

 

[nacimento]

Uruguay benefits from being very secular for over a century, when their president introduced a really strict separation of church and state and the people went along with it.

In Brazil, gay marriage was legalized by the supreme court, but in Argentina it was by law. Bergoglio, now "progressive" pope Francis, whined about the devil's victory and so on.

 

[hydrophilic attack]

well fuck evangelicals tbqh