Dr Pierre Brouard, Acting Director of the University of Pretoria’s Centre for Sexualities, Aids and Gender, details a lesser-known form of gender-based violence: intimate partner violence in LGBTQIA+ communities.

When we think of gender-based violence (GBV) in South Africa, our immediate thought is of a woman being hurt or abused by a man, often one she knows. A less common manifestation is violence towards a man by a woman. When it comes to LGBTQIA+ people, we know that violence is aimed at them because they may challenge or offend gender norms and expectations. But a hidden challenge is forms of GBV inside LGBTQIA+ relationships and communities, especially intimate partner violence (IPV).

Also known as domestic violence, partner abuse or dating violence, IPV refers to the various means of control used by an abuser against their partner in an intimate relationship. According to the Centres for Disease Control, IPV includes many forms of abuse, including “physical violence, sexual violence, stalking and psychological aggression (including coercive tactics) by a current or former intimate partner (such as a spouse, boyfriend/girlfriend, dating partner, or ongoing sexual partner)”.

IPV within LGBTQIA+ relationships, on first thought, is counterintuitive, because one assumes that same-sex relationships, or relationships where the partners have challenged gender norms in some way, would reject the very gender role stereotypes that seem to underpin GBV and IPV in heterosexual spaces.

But in fact, IPV in LGBQIA+ relationships is not as uncommon as we would think. One US study found that lesbian and bisexual women were more likely to have ever experienced IPV in their lifetime than heterosexual women; that slightly more bisexual men than heterosexual men experienced IPV; and that more than half of all trans and non-binary people had experienced IPV at some point in their lifetimes. And a substantial body of literature has shown that gay and other men who have sex with men (MSM) experience IPV at rates that are substantially higher than those experienced by men who do not have sex with men, and rates that are comparable or higher to those among heterosexual women.

Understanding IPV in LGBTQIA+ contexts

Apart from the fact that all toxic relationships can be violent, we cannot underestimate the impact and power of social stigma (in the forms homophobia and transphobia) in perpetuating gendered violence among queer people. Inside LGBTQIA+ relationships, abusers may capitalise on a partner’s fear of being stigmatised by threatening to “out” them to family, friends or co-workers if they do not remain in abusive relationships. And, as the Human Rights Campaign has noted, abusers can “weaponise the stigma faced by LGBTQ+ people by manipulating their partner into staying by claiming nobody else will love them, or they may capitalise on abuse survivors already being socially isolated … in order to further isolate their victims and continue their abuse”.

Furthermore, as the Human Rights Campaign points out, abusers may also take advantage of patriarchal societal expectations around gender, sexuality and power. For example, myths and expectations about the “typical” IPV scenario of a cisgender man abusing his cisgender woman partner may lead abusers to gaslight their LGBTQIA+ victims into thinking they cannot be abused because their relationship does not conform to these stereotypes. Stereotypes around some LGBTQIA+ people can also be used to manipulate victims into unwanted sexual contact; for example, the idea that bisexual people are “hypersexual” and must therefore always be available for sex.

And while certain power imbalances that partly drive IPV (around class, age, access to resources and education, among others) cut across all identities, the fact that systemic homophobia and transphobia might make some LGBTQIA+ people more vulnerable to poverty and homelessness means they can more easily be abused and harmed.

In male-male relationships more specifically, evidence suggests that further drivers of IPV include lack of “outness”, disagreements around sexual positioning, threats to masculinity created by both men striving to be the “alpha male” in the relationship, gender role conflict and substance use.

Factors relevant to Southern Africa

A study of gay and other MSM in South Africa and Namibia found that while there were lower rates of IPV than the North American literature suggested, the factors most likely to increase IPV risk were high levels of alcohol consumption, higher levels of internalised stigma around being gay, and a harsher legal and social climate (such as in Namibia), with these factors leading to pressure and violence within these relationships.

As far as lesbian women are concerned, South African research suggests that power disparities within relationships, informed by normative, taken-for-granted understandings of gender roles, were a key driver of IPV. Although these were same-sex relationships, the parties had internalised patriarchal ideas about “gender complementarity”, where the more feminine-identified, or “femme”, partner was expected to act in ways that were subservient to their more masculine-identified, or “butch”, partner. And when they did not, violence was one outcome.

As the authors of this study noted, these lesbian women had internalised a “grammar” for respectable relationships in their context (setting out a language and structure for how men and women should relate to each other) and “conforming to aspects of these dominant regulatory systems affords participants access to a measure of social credibility and belonging”.

How IPV can be addressed in LGBTQIA+ worlds

As is evident from this brief overview, IPV within LGBTQIA+ worlds and relationships is complex and multi-layered. There is no single or simple explanation, nor can one easily generalise about LGBTQIA+ people.

Violence within these contexts is not simply a manifestation of psychopathology; it is inextricably bound up with broader patriarchal norms and values in which we are all marinated, the stresses of living a minority life, and the lack of opportunity for many LGBTQIA+ people to achieve the markers of social success and dignity: a good education, decent work, access to non-judgemental physical and mental health care, and spaces to live and socialise safely.

Undoing patriarchy, and the problematic ideas about gender it propagates, will go a long way to changing the way we all think about relationships. Challenging stigma attached to being part of our LGBTQIA+ communities will help to form healthier intra- and inter-personal relationships with self and other. Making life safer, healthier and more hopeful for LGBTQIA+ people will contribute to well-being and safety at home, and out in the world.

Finally, normalising the idea of gender-equitable relationships is a good thing, not just for heterosexual people, but also their LGBTQIA+ counterparts.