Acting “Straight”: Socio-Behavioral Consequences of Anti-Queer Hate Crime Victimization

Abstract

Research on the consequences of hate crime victimization primarily focuses on adverse health and economic effects with limited attention devoted to the socio-behavioral impact of crime. Informed by Intersectionality Theory (Crenshaw, 1989) and relying on 400 in-person structured interviews with LGBTQ Latine immigrant victims of crime in Miami, this research finds that 23% of victims had to change housing, 13% began avoiding queer venues/friends, and 35% started acting stereotypically “straight” because of the crime. New immigrant victims were more likely to experience forced relocation due to crime. Victims were more likely to adopt heteronormative behavior/appearance as a result of victimization if they were non-Cuban-American, had higher income, and were more closeted. Findings suggest that coming out can be an important crime control strategy. The paper concludes with a discussion about the benefits and limitations of adopting the intersectionality perspective in quantitative research, and three-stage venue-based sampling used to recruit participants.

Keywords:

• Hate crimes
• victimization
• LGBTQ
• intersectionality
• venue-based sampling

Acknowledgement

I am grateful to numerous contributors and partners on this research project, including all LGBTQ respondents who took the time to tell their story and help improve the system we rely on for justice and fairness. I want to express my deepest gratitude to my husband, Glen Greeley, for supporting me throughout the three years of this research. This work is dedicated to our son, George Greeley-Kutateladze, who passed away at the age of two on February 20th, 2020.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 The term “Latine” uses a gender-neutral e, which replaces the gendered endings a and o (Latina/Latino). This term is increasingly used within the Latine LGBTQ community.

2 Some local prosecutor’s offices report that anti-LGBTQ hate crimes are, in fact, the most common hate offenses they handle. For example, the Brooklyn District Attorney reports that among 70 cases processed by its Hate Crimes Unit over a recent two-year period, top targeted groups were LGBTQ individuals (34%), Jewish persons (30%) and African-Americans (14%). For more information, visit http://www.brooklynda.org/hate-crimes-bureau/

3 The term “socio-behavioral” is used in this study to refer to human motivations, activities, psychological processes, and interactions (with families, friends, coworkers, communities, and larger societies), as well as to potential changes in these behaviors/processes due to victimization.

4 When determining the sample size, prior literature was reviewed, which lead to one study specifically focusing on Latino men who have sex with men (MSM). Stueve and colleagues (2001) interviewed 400 respondents across 32 venues in New York City. Although the focus of their research was on demographic and sexual risk profiles, their sample of 400 provided sufficient statistical power to detect various significant results. In addition to being informed by this 2001 study, limiting the current study’s sample size to 400 was also determined by the anticipated costs associated with recruiting study participants.

5 This finding is consistent with the reporting from the BJS’s National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) from 2004-2015, which shows that most victims (98.7%) cited offenders’ use of hate language as evidence of a hate crime (Masucci & Langton, 2017). Earlier research on this topic suggests that “survivors of bias victimization may tend to interpret all of the negative events in their lives as resulting from sexual prejudice” (Herek et al., 1999, see p. 950).

6 This measure echoes that 52.7% of Miami residents are of Cuban origin (Miami-Dade County, 2011).

7 While the initial interview tool also captured “male” and “female” categories, with feedback from the community groups who felt strongly about moving away from these traditional gender categories, these categories were ultimately removed from the final questionnaire.

Additional information

Funding

This project was supported by Award No. 2017-IJ-CX-0031, awarded by the National Institute of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice. The opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this publication/program/exhibition are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Justice.

Notes on contributors

Besiki Luka Kutateladze

Besiki Luka Kutateladze is an associate professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida International University (FIU). He is also the associate director for prosecution and courts in the FIU Center for the Administration of Justice, and co-founder of Prosecutorial Performance Indicators, a project that brings data culture into the field of prosecution. Dr. Kutateladze specializes in prosecutorial decision making, equality, racial/ethnic disparities, hate crimes, and performance measurement and evaluation. Prior to his appointment at FIU, Dr. Kutateladze was the founding research director at the Institute for State and Local Governance (ISLG), and the research director for the Prosecution and Racial Justice Program of the Vera Institute of Justice. From 2008 to 2013, he played a crucial role in the development of the United Nations Rule of Law Indicators, and their implementation in Haiti and Liberia.