Robert Hampton

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3rd May 2011

Hate Kills
Posted by at 7.07pm | No responses | Gay

I pre-scheduled this post before I left for Tallinn on 3rd May!

Homophobic attacks are on the rise, a development which the Guardian describes as “shocking”. Personally I’m not that shocked – as gay visibility continues to increase, a backlash was sure to happen. That backlash can manifest itself in many ways, and sheer senseless violence is at one end of that spectrum.

According to the report linked above, the statistics for London show that – although anti-gay crime has dropped by 3% in the capital as a whole – in the West End it has increased by 20%. This is worrying, as the area continues to be the home of most of London’s gay bars and clubs. If gay people are not safe there, where are we safe?

I’d be interested to see the statistics for homophobic crime in the rest of the UK. Liverpool is often cited as a homophobic city on the basis of some high-profile attacks on gay people which took place over the past few years. I’d like to see what the facts and figures say.

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