Decriminalization of homosexuality
During the French Revolution in 1791, the National Constituent Assembly abolished the law against homosexuality as part of adopting a new legal code without the influence of Christianity.
[5] The decriminalization of homosexuality spread across Europe by Napoleon's conquests and the adoption of civil law and penal codes on the French model, leading to abolition of criminality in many jurisdictions and replacement of death with imprisonment in others.
[6][7] Via military occupation or emulation of the French criminal code, the Scandinavian countries, Spain, the Netherlands, Portugal, Belgium, Japan, and their colonies and territories—including much of Latin America—decriminalized homosexuality.
According to Dan Healey, archival material that became widely available following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 "demonstrates a principled intent to decriminalize the act between consenting adults, expressed from the earliest efforts to write a socialist criminal code in 1918 to the eventual adoption of legislation in 1922.
"[16] The Bolsheviks also rescinded Tsarist legal bans on homosexual civil and political rights, especially in the area of state employment.
In January 1923, the Soviet Union sent delegates from the Commissariat of Health led by Commissar of Health Semashko[18] to the German Institute for Sexual Research as well as to some international conferences on human sexuality between 1921 and 1930, where they expressed support for the legalisation of adult, private and consensual homosexual relations and the improvement of homosexual rights in all nations.
[26] One explanation for these legal changes is increased regard for human rights and autonomy of the individual[27] and the effects of the 1960s sexual revolution.
[28] The trend in increased attention to individual rights in laws around sexuality has been observed around the world, but progresses more slowly in some regions, such as the Middle East.
[38] Most Caribbean countries are former British colonies and retain the criminalization of homosexuality; Belize was the first to decriminalize it after the law was ruled unconstitutional in 2016.
[42] LGBTQ activism against criminalization can take multiple forms, including directly advocating the repeal of the laws, strategic litigation in the judicial system in order to reduce enforceability, seeking external allies from outside the country, and capacity building within the community.
[44] In 1981, the Council of Europe passed a resolution urging the decriminalization of homosexuality and the abolition of discriminatory age of consent laws.
[27][53] Following decolonization, several former British colonies expanded laws that had only targeted men in order to include same-sex behavior by women.
The rise of Evangelical Christianity and especially Pentecostalism have increased the politicization of homosexuality as these churches have been engaged in anti-homosexual mobilizations as a form of nation building.
That year both the Roman Catholic Church (especially Archbishop Simon-Victor Tonyé Bakot [fr] and Cardinal Christian Wiyghan Tumi) and the media began to make homosexuality a political issue.
[67] In Uganda, proposals to deepen the criminalization of homosexuality such as the so-called "Kill the Gays" bill have gained international attention.
