The demonstration commemorates 400 people detained and disappeared by state terrorism in Argentina.
Tribute to the disappeared LGBT+ people due to State Terrorism, during the week of Remembrance and the anniversary of the coup in Argentina.
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BUENOS AIRES, Argentina . More than 20 LGBTQ+ organizations gathered this Saturday in Buenos Aires to commemorate the 30,000 disappeared victims of state terrorism in Argentina and the 400 LGBTQ+ people who were detained and disappeared. The event took place in Plaza Carlos Jáuregui and brought together LGBTQ+ activists and human rights advocates.
Nora and Norma's hug
At the event, Nora Cortiñas, of Mothers of Plaza de Mayo – Founding Line, embraced Norma Castillo, a long-time activist for human rights and the LGBTIQ+ community . In 2010, Norma married Ramona "Cachita" Arévalo, her great love, in the first same-sex marriage in Latin America and the Caribbean performed through a court.
The tribute was attended by officials Greta Pena, head of INADI, and Agustina Ponce, Undersecretary of Diversity Policies at the Ministry of Gender. Also participating were Ernesto Gaya, from the HIJXS – CABA group, and representatives from the organizations that make up the Pride and Struggle Front.
What happened to the repression of diversity?
There was emotion, remembrance, a drum circle, a fair, and a symbolic waving of green handkerchiefs to commemorate the 30,000 disappeared on the 47th anniversary of the coup d'état in Argentina on March 24th. The following statement was read: “The dictatorship not only involved political but also moral authoritarianism. The repression of the popular movement did not exclude the persecution of lesbians, bisexuals, gays, queers, transvestites, and trans people as part of the mechanisms for disciplining society. But this repression of diversity was not socially processed nor included in the legal cases for human rights violations. Therefore, while acknowledging the historic advances in Memory, Truth, and Justice, we want to make visible the history of state violence against LGBTI+ people who were, are, and will be part of the struggles of our people .”
From Madrid, another veteran activist, Héctor Anabitarte, participated with these words : “ They wanted to eliminate all sexual expression that wasn't imposed by the Judeo-Christian tradition and its heteropatriarchal conception of what a society should be. They knew very well that sexuality itself is challenging, disruptive, destabilizing, and the administrators of morality and guilt couldn't tolerate it,” he wrote. And he recalled: “ All rights, including the right to control one's own body, the only thing that truly belongs to us. As the lesbian poet Alejandra Pizarnik so aptly put it: ‘May your body always be a beloved space of revelations.’”
What does the document that was read say?
Rabbi Marshall Meyer (1930-1993) of the Bet El Community, a member of the National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons (CONADEP), stated in a 1985 meeting with the veteran activist Carlos Jáuregui that the Commission had identified four hundred homosexuals on its list of people reported missing. While they had not disappeared for that reason, the treatment they received had been especially sadistic and violent, as had that of Jewish detainees. It was only in 2011 that CONADEP received statements from transvestite and transgender people detained in clandestine centers.
From the LGBTI+ movement, we want to make visible the history of our struggle. That's why we honor the Homosexual Liberation Front (FLH), which called upon us to love freely in a liberated country. At the same time, we demand the right to the truth: to know what happened to the LGBTI+ people who were detained and disappeared, to learn their stories of activism, and to have the repression they suffered because of their sexual orientation and gender identity brought to light.
During the first year of the coup, the Nuestro Mundo Group, the predecessor of the Homosexual Liberation Front (FLH)—founded by, among others, Héctor Anabitarte, a postal workers' union delegate and Communist activist—denounced to the media the arbitrary arrests of LGBTI+ people. They also reported how these individuals were forced to sign incriminating statements based on police edicts such as "2H." Writer and FLH activist Néstor Perlongher (1981) also made similar denunciations, pointing to the existence of a "moral cleansing" carried out through raids and arrests.
"They are among the 30,000"
We want to make visible and reclaim the stories of persecuted activists, who we now know suffered particularly brutal treatment because of what we now call sexual orientation and gender identity. We do not separate their personal stories from their political and social activism; they are part of the 30,000.
At the start of Remembrance Week, we want to express ourselves and embrace one another to continue defending our democracy, which is celebrating 40 uninterrupted years. And to continue building, with the example and guidance of the 30,000 disappeared, that free, just, sovereign, and diverse nation we dream of.
Anniversary of the genocidal coup
47 years after the genocidal coup, we say:
We are community, pride, and struggle!
Long live the FLH!
There are 30,000 of us!
400 LGBTI+ Detained and Disappeared, Present!
We stand with the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo, the Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo, the Families of the Disappeared for Political Reasons, and HIJOS. Adding the banner of diversity to the historic demand for Memory, Truth, and Justice.
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