CA Attorney General’s New Hate Crime Report Shows Anti-LGBTQ+ Incidents On A Big Rise

CA Attorney General's New Hate Crime Report Shows Anti-LGBTQ+ Incidents On A Big Rise

As Pride Month came to a close, the California Attorney General released the 2023 Hate Crimes in California Report with some disturbing news. We would assume the state that has gay meccas San Francisco, Palm Springs, Los Angeles, and San Diego would be very LGBTQ+ friendly. Not so much. Even though hate crimes in general decreased in California, anti-queer hate crimes, including criminal activity, increased at an alarming 86%.

The 2023 Hate Crime in California Report classifies criminal activity that targets a person based on their nationality, religion, gender, sexual orientation, and other differentials. The data is collected, analyzed, and reported "to provide valid measures of crime and the criminal justice process."

Anti-gay (male) bias events fell from 271 in 2022 to 231 in 2023, at a decrease of 14.8% but anti-LGBTQ+ bias events rose from 81 in 2022 to 151 in 2023, for an increase of 86.4%. In 2013, the Department of Justice expanded the gender bias for the California hate crime data collection system to include “gender nonconforming” to reflect modifications implemented at the national level.

 

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Perhaps this info isn't quite so shocking given the very visible and legal conservative fight against the LGBTQ community happening nationwide. With more than 500 anti-queer legislative bills being introduced this year in the US, it is almost encouraging hate crimes by their very existence. LGBTQ issues are a big hot topic in this year's presidential election. Biden has used his platform to fight and promote equality rights for all. And, well, we know how Trump feels about our community and what he would implement to further restrict our visibility and rights.

Coming up on the ballot in November in California is ACA5. It is a Constitutional Amendment that will permanently delete the language of Prop 8 from California's Constitution. For those of us who were around, Prop 8 was a California ballot proposition and a state constitutional amendment that was introduced to ban same-sex marriage. Unfortunately, after much activism by the LGBTQ community, it did pass in 2008 and took immediate effect after the vote that November. In the end, Prop 8 was ruled as unconstitutional by a federal court that went into effect until 2013.

 

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Since November 2022, 10% of the individuals within the California Legislature identify as queer, a record first for the United States. Even so, it is alarming to see this kind of rise in hate crimes and we know what could be on the horizon. If that is what is happening in what is considered the most liberal state, we can only imagine what is happening in other states, and this is only the reported crime rates.

You can check out the full 2023 Hate Crime in CA Report here.

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