Beginning in the sixteenth century, the spread of homophobia in the peninsula was closely connected to the Tridentine ritual sanctifying Christian marriage, which replaced the old-fashioned virtues of celibacy with its exemplary nature. With the heterosexual model established, the stage was set for the repression of all deviances. The new development began a little earlier, in fact, with a decree by Pope Clement VII (on February 24, 1524) assigning the suppression of all sodomy within the peninsular kingdom of Aragon to the sole jurisdiction of the
Inquisition
.The decree explicitly described the homosexual habits of the Moorish minority, and the danger of “putrid contamination from these few black sheep to the healthy faithful.” The repression of the homosexual men and women of Aragonese Spain began later, under the reign of Philip II (starting in 1560) and would continue unabated until the end of the seventeenth century. The distinction was made between “perfect” sodomy (where it involved two males), and “imperfect” sodomy (when it took place within a heterosexual relationship).
As late as 1630, the Inquisition hit hard and fast, overseeing the investigations in four-fifths of all trials. The people targeted were most often clergy (a direct effect of the Counter Reformation) and peasants. Very specific groups were also singled out: sailors, slaves, students, shepherds, all of whom shared in common a sense of social instability and few local roots. The number of foreigners indicted was flagrant: Italian sailors from the coastal ports, French travelers in Catalonia, Portuguese, and Turks. Homophobic repression and xenophobia were closely linked; this association ensured that the tribunal would have the people’s collaboration, by way of denunciations. After a trial that would run for six and a half months, the guilty party incurred a punishment of 200 lashes of the whip and would be sentenced to the slave galleys for three to seven years, followed by an equivalent amount of time banished from the district. The sentence would be communicated to them during an
auto da fé
(a lavish public ceremony, well-attended, which was intended to illustrate the example not to follow). Even worse, those homosexuals convicted of repeated practices would be sentenced to death; these cases made up a quarter of the accused. Capital punishment, known as
relaxe
(because the tribunal relaxed the punishment to the secular arm, the only group permitted to mete out a sentence of death), would follow about twenty-four hours after the
auto da fé
. Victims would be burned at the stake, which generally took place outside the walls of the city where the tribunal was based (Barcelona, Valencia, or Saragossa). But the energy of this machine of repression dwindled with the state’s bankruptcies and devaluations. The priorities of Philip IV and his
favorite
, the Count-Duke of Olivares, seemed to be quite different from those of the inquisitors and their repression of everyday sodomy. No more accused were sentenced to death after 1633. As somber as this description may seem, the situation should be qualified further. Compared to other European countries, Spain stopped punishing homosexual acts very early. As well, however terrible the juridical practices of the Inquisition may have seemed, they did at least offer the accused the guarantee of a trial with due process; the same could not be said of the expeditious methods of the Castilian civil tribunals and the inflexibility of their verdicts. In Catalonia, for example, the position of chancellor of the
audiencia
(the civil court) was awarded to an ecclesiastic who, when he served beside his inquisitorial colleagues, refused to assign the death sentence—the inquisitorial tribunal of Barcelona only burned four homosexuals at the stake between 1560 and 1700. Records of trials and testimonies still exist today thanks to the Supreme Inquisition’s system of secret archives. Queen Maria Cristina put an end to the tribunal’s activities by royal decree on July 1, 1835.
The penal code of 1822, inspired by the French penal code, abandoned the
criminalization
of sodomy. It decriminalized private homosexual practices between adults, a measure conserved in the later penal codes of 1848, 1850, and 1870. By the second half of the nineteenth century, as in the rest of Europe, homosexuality progressively became construed as a mental illness, part of the psychiatric domain.
Nonetheless, the
army
’s military code (1884) and that of the navy (1888) preserved the crime of homosexuality, until the Military Justice Code of 1945, which unified the army, navy, and air force. Article 69 of the 1928 penal code, adopted under the dictatorship of General Primo de Rivera, reconnected with the past by imposing a punishment of two to twelve years in prison for anyone convicted of indecent offenses with a person of the same sex. Article 616 also stipulated that “whosoever engages habitually or scandalously in indecent acts with a person of the same sex, will be fined 1,000 to 10,000 pesetas and will be declared unfit for public service for a period of six to twelve years.”
In 1932, the Second Spanish Republic (1931–39) removed these two items from the penal code. General Franco’s dictatorship would leave matters as they were until July 15, 1954, when Articles 2 and 6 of the law on vagrancy were modified to include homosexuals in the same category as procurers, professional beggars, and the mentally ill. Homosexuals found in violation of the law were interned in specialized institutions, and later prohibited from living in certain predetermined areas.
On August 4, 1970, this law was replaced by one in which homosexuals as such were no longer targeted, but rather those guilty of repeated homosexual acts. The punishments remained unchanged. And while specialists of the law have noted a homophobic sensibility in both the Supreme Court and the spirit of the laws covering homosexual matters, accounts of the end of the Franco era describe a state of relative tolerance. As well, the first gay liberation group was created in response to the new law, which would not have the mention of “homosexual acts” removed until a decree on January 11, 1979.
The 1978 Constitution, in Article 14, stipulated that all Spaniards were equal before the law, and may not be discriminated against on account of birth, race, sex, or opinion; homosexuality was not specifically named. Fortunately, the interpretation of discrimination in this regard was extended to “any other personal or social condition or circumstance,” leaving the door open to other applications.
A survey carried out by the Center for Sociological Research in 1988 on the tolerance of homosexuality in society revealed that 50% of respondents believed that homosexuality was reprehensible, 28% were indifferent, and the remaining were tolerant of it. Around the same time, sociologist Jesus Ibanez set out to prove that most Spanish are unconsciously homophobic by asking the question: “Would you approve if all pharmacists and all homosexuals were killed?” The answer most often took the form of a new question: “Why pharmacists?”
Spain’s admittance into the European Union on January 1, 1986 permitted the country to benefit from the various European resolutions concerning gay and lesbian rights, including the one on February 8, 1994 which charged the European Commission with establishing a recommendation for all countries of the Union to abolish homophobic
discrimination
. Certain innovations, such as those granting the right of
marriage
or an equivalent legal union to gay and lesbian couples, led certain Spanish autonomous communities to adopt new laws on the status of common-law unions, including homosexual couples. The communities involved included Catalonia (1998), Aragon (1999), Navarre (2000), and the Valencian Community (2001). While the People’s Party (PP) has called for the Spanish government to adopt the steps taken by the various autonomous communities, the Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE), for its part, announced that as of April 2001, it would adopt laws on homosexual unions in any autonomous community it leads. According to Pedro Zerolo, former president of the National Federation of Lesbians, Gays, Transsexuals, and Bisexuals (FELGTB), discussion on the status of couples is not longer pertinent, as the Socialist government passed legislation unconditionally authorizing gay and lesbian marriage and the right to
adoption
.
Coming out of the
closet
is becoming more common: dancer Nacho Duato, writer Terenci Moix, and even the Catalan socialist deputy Roberto Labandera, to name a few. In September of 2000, Lieutenant Colonel José Maria Sanchez-Silva appeared on the cover of the gay magazine,
Zero
; in an accompanying article, he declared that he wanted to “exercise his right to proclaim his homosexuality and to force laws to adapt to the social reality.” But writer Francisco Umbral, who considered coming out of the closet to be akin to
exhibitionism
, wrote: “The one thing that pregnant women, infatuated fiancées, and homosexuals all have in common is the need to tell everything. Like those who claim to have seen the Virgin at Lourdes or Claudia Schiffer naked.” As well, highly visual language stigmatizing homosexuals abounds: to “release one’s feathers” and to “lose one’s oil” (
soltar o tener pluma, perder aceite
) for men; “trucker-girl” and to “make scissors” (
camionera, hacer tijeras
) for women.
For the first time in 2001, Spain included an accounting of gay and lesbian common-law unions. The survey determined that there were 10,474 same-sex couples (3,619 female and 6,855 male), representing just over one-tenth of 1% of Spain’s 9.5 million households. The FELGTB responded that the results were misleading given the strong stigma still attached to homosexuality and the need for many gays and lesbians to remain “in the closet.” But the fact that homosexuals were included in the census at all was a major step.
—André Fernandez
Aliaga, Juan Vicente, et al.
Identidad y diferencia, sobre cultura gay en España
. Barcelona/Madrid: Egales, 2000.
Bergman, Emilie, and Paul Julian Smith.
¡Entiendes!
Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press, 1996. [Published in the US as
Entiendes?: Queer Readings, Hispanic Writings
. Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press, 1995.]
Borrillo, Daniel, and Pierre Lascoumes, eds.
L’Homophobie: comment la définir, comment la combattre
. Paris: Ed. Prochoix, 1999.
Boswell, John.
Christianisme, tolérance sociale et homosexualité
. Paris: Gallimard, 1985. [Published in the US as
Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality: Gay People in Western Europe from the Beginning of the Christian Era to the Fourteenth Century
. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1980.]
Carrasco, Raphaël.
Inquisición y Represión sexual en Valencia
. Barcelona: Ed. Laertes, 1986.
Fernandez, André:
Au nom du sexe
. Paris: L’Harmattan, 2001.
García, Cárcel Ricardo, and Martinez Doris Moreno.
Inquisición, Historia Critica
. Madrid: Temas de Hoy, “Historia”, 2000.
Graullera Sanz,Vicente. “Delito de sodomía en la Valencia del siglo XVI.” In
Torrens, Estudis i investigacions de Torrent i
comarca. Torrent, Spain: Publicació de l’Arxiu, Biblioteca i Museu de l’Ajuntament de Torrent, 1991–93.
Llamas, Ricardo.
Teoría torcida, prejuicios y discursos en torno a “la homosexualidad
.
”
Madrid: Siglo Veintiuno de España Editores, 1998.
Mirabet y Mullol, Antoni.
Homosexualidad hoy
. Barcelona: Editorial Herder, 1985.
Nogueira, Charo. “El Nuevo Censo contabilizará las parejas de hecho y las uniones homosexuales,”
El País
(August 15, 2001).
Pérez Canovas, Nicolas.
Homosexualidad, homosexuales y uniones homosexuales en el Derecho español
. Granada, Spain: Editorial Comares, 1996.
Perry, Mary Elizabeth. “The ‘Nefarious Sin’ in Early Modern Seville.” In
The Pursuit of Sodomy: Male Homosexuality in Renaissance and Enlightment Europe
. Edited by Gérard Kent et al. New York: Harrington Park Press, 1989.
Villena, Miguel Ángel: “Un teniente coronel se declara ‘gay’ y pide respeto para los homosexuales,”
El País
(September 3, 2000).
—Against Nature; Criminalization; Decriminalization (France); Fascism; Inquisition; Latin America; Theology.
SPORTS
The world of sports, with its hyper-masculine tendencies, has proven over time to be resolutely sexist and homophobic. Theoretical approaches and empirical studies, conducted in
North America
and Europe with male and female athletes of all levels, revealed evidence not only of homophobic behavior, but also an entrenched homophobic culture. These findings are not solely concerned with the practice of sports, but also its social representations. Sports foster an environment that is particularly conducive to stigmatization, apprehension, or outright rejection of those who do not adhere to the heterosexual norm. The characteristics specific to sports authorize the social function of homophobia in the establishment of a sexual
symbolic order
.
The modern concept of organized team sports was invented in
England
in the second half of the nineteenth century. Born out of an industrial, liberal, capitalist, and colonial society, it was immediately considered a means of virile training for the young men of Britain’s elite, then consequently for all male members of the elite in the West. Reserved for men, sports corresponded both to a new type of physical leisure and a conditioning pedagogy aimed at producing physically strong men with equally strong characters.
After 150 years of development, sports remain a male prerogative, for the most part: practiced and watched mainly by men, it is also men who occupy the vast majority of management, training, and coaching positions, as well as
media
. Sports also reveal our cultural attitudes toward physical differences. These are categorized and organized into a hierarchy, from which they can then be evaluated. Differences are generally divided according to age, gender, physical size and weight, and skill level. Except for some mixed sports, organized competitions are usually premised on a strict separation of the sexes. All of these differentiations are descended from the reference point of the virile male athlete, who represents the ideal physical standard, and to whom all other performances are compared. The historic classification of bodies resulting from this depicts the model of the male conqueror as the ideal that one must strive to match, indicative of sports’ close-minded, virile legacy that continues to this day.