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Breaking the Silence: Criminalisation of Lesbians and Bisexual Women and its Impacts

This report, the second edition to an original published in 2016, considers the history, extent and nature of laws criminalising consensual sexual intimacy between women, and the anti-LGBT criminal laws of all varieties that foster and perpetuate homophobia against lesbian and bisexual women as a particular group.

Long read

Lawrence v Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003)

Lawrence v Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003)

The US Supreme Court declared unconstitutional a Texas law that prohibited sexual acts between individuals of the same sex. Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the majority, held that the right to privacy protects a right for adults to engage in private, consensual homosexual activity. The judgments of the Supreme Court being authoritative in all states, this judgment effectively decriminalised same-sex activity across the United States in 2003.

Kanane v State, Court of Appeal, 2003 (2), BLR

Kanane v State, Court of Appeal, 2003 (2), BLR

Judgment of the Court of Appeal at Lobatse, Botswana, found that a 1998 amendment making Section 167 of the Penal Code gender neutral rectified the previously discriminatory male-only provision criminalising same-sex activity between men. The Court held in favour of the state to retain criminalisation of same-sex activity in Botswana under Sections 164(c) and 167 of the Penal Code and that they were not in violation of the Constitution.

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