Conservative Gender and Sexuality Regimes: Threats to Democracy and Human Rights

• In Event: From Breakthrough to Backlash: Global LGBT Rights in Comparative Perspective

Abstract

Whether as part of an ethno-religious group in Nigeria or a group of white nationalists in the U.S., male supremacists fear feminist and other progressive movements, and they police gender and sexuality as part of their agenda. Drawing largely on interviews and case study research conducted in Nigeria and Mexico, this paper examines the oppositional overlap regarding LGBTQ and women's rights. This paper argues that conservative gender and sexuality regimes utilize religious and national discursive oppositional structures as well as religious-state ties to deny the human rights of women, men, and children on particular issues, such as gender-based violence and reproductive rights. Influential male supremacists and their networks, including transnational networks, thwart democratization in direct and indirect ways, as evidenced in the case studies. At worst, LGBTQ and women’s rights activists are silenced, threatened, or killed with impunity. The case studies from Nigeria and Mexico show how the oppositional patterns can be found in different subnational and national contexts, and the case study findings are complemented by findings in other countries and regions.

Author

• Cheryl O'Brien, San Diego State University