The Global Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Individuals' and Couples' Sexuality

The COVID-19 pandemic and its related restrictions significantly impacted individuals' health, wellbeing, and security. Isolation, limitation of movement, social distancing, and forced cohabiting have had a strong influence on all areas of people's lives as well as on their sexuality. Investigating how the COVID-19 outbreak and its consequences impacted people's sexuality was the primary aim of this review. Particularly, we focused on: (1) the variables associated with the improvement or the deterioration of individuals' and couples' lives during the pandemic; (2) the use of sex as a coping strategy; (3) the impact of COVID-19 outbreak on LGBT people. Results have shown that the worsening of sexual life seems to be related to couples' conflict, emotions and psychological difficulties, being female, being single or away from the partner, being a health care worker, and having children. Moreover, a detrimental effect on sexuality was associated with stress, forced cohabitation, routine, anxiety and worry about the job and the pandemic, feeling partner distance, being unhappy with their partner, and lack of privacy. On the other hand, improvements in sexuality were associated with living happily with a partner, being happy and satisfied with a partner, feeling less stressed and more bored, having more free time, having fewer recreation opportunities, and having minor workload. During the pandemic, there was an increase in using sex toys, pornography consumption, masturbating, and trying sexual experimentations. Among LGBT people, an increase was found in the number of casual sexual partners potentially due to the perceived lower likelihood of transmission through sex. Moreover, the increase in sexual activity may have represented a coping strategy to quarantine-related distress.

Working With Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender People in Care Relationships

This chapter details some key considerations for health and human services professionals working with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in care relationships. Reflecting on the impacts of stigma and discrimination as well as the social, cultural, and political contexts of LGBT communities and carers, this chapter will explore some of ways these factors (as well as heterosexist and cis-genderist assumptions about families and partners) impact the identification, support, and recognition of LGBT people in care relationships. Finally, this chapter will recommend strategies to reduce poor mental health and wellbeing outcomes among people in care relationships where one or all people involved are LGBT, and explore some key actions that may assist health and human services better support and include LGBT people in care relationships.

Working With Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender People in Care Relationships

This chapter details some key considerations for health and human services professionals working with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in care relationships. Reflecting on the impacts of stigma and discrimination as well as the social, cultural, and political contexts of LGBT communities and carers, this chapter will explore some of ways these factors (as well as heterosexist and cis-genderist assumptions about families and partners) impact the identification, support, and recognition of LGBT people in care relationships. Finally, this chapter will recommend strategies to reduce poor mental health and wellbeing outcomes among people in care relationships where one or all people involved are LGBT, and explore some key actions that may assist health and human services better support and include LGBT people in care relationships.

Sulitnya Orang Indonesia Menerima Kaum LGBT

LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) is no stranger to today’s society. Even so, it is known that LGBT people in Indonesia are actually considered as “untruthful” people from various perspectives, both from the point of view of society, religion and law. This article will look at how difficult it is for Indonesians to accept LGBT people. This paper will also look at the theological point of view on LGBT from theories about sexuality and spirituality. AbstrakLGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Biseksual, Transgender) sudah tidak asing di telinga masyarakat dewasa ini. Meski demikian dikenal, LGBT di Indonesia sebenarnya dianggap sebagai orang “tidak benar” dari berbagai sudut pandang, baik dari sudut pandang masyarakat, agama dan hukum. Tulisan ini akan melihat mengenai masih sulitnya orang Indonesia menerima kaum LGBT. Tulisan ini juga akan melihat sudut pandang secara teologis mengenai LGBT dari teori-teori mengenai seksualitas dan spiritualitas.

Border Regimes: Homophobia and LGBT Place Making in Six Ordinary Cities in Europe

European nation states increasingly hail LGBT identities as part of modern values; LGBT recognitions have become a symbol of secular achievements. Discourses around gay rights and sexual diversity are increasingly pitted against presumably homophobic and intolerant ‘others’. An increased intolerant and repressive attitude towards migrants and racialised minorities is justified by their supposed threat to exactly these values. LGBT people are finding themselves positioned as ‘border patrollers’ who can count as part of the modern liberal nation. This paper analyses 92 interviews with LGBT participants who live in six small and medium sized ordinary cities in Europe. It discusses how their fear of homophobia is evaluated according to perceived sexual and gendered norms and attitudes at the neighbourhood level. Neighbourhoods are considered either LGBT friendly or unfriendly according to their socio-demographic characteristics that focus on social class and/or migration and that intersects with race, ethnicity and religion. Based on the findings, neighbourhoods are both a geographical and a cultural terrain that can be understood, organised and contested through a sexuality discourse in the production of border regimes that discipline and produce the confines of the normative, the ‘modern’ and the ‘backward’. Not only are LGBT people positioned as border patrollers but their fear of homophobia is also expressed through bordering. The neighbourhood can then be understood, organised and contested through a sexuality discourse in the production of border regimes.

In Good Company? Personal Relationships, Network Embeddedness, and Social Inclusion

How do individuals’ networks of personal relationships affect their social in‐ and exclusion? Researchers have shown that micro‐level, informal relationships can be highly consequential for social inclusion, but in complex, contradictory ways: Personal networks reflect the degree of relational exclusion and protect against (other forms of) exclusion, but they also erode in conditions of exclusion and reproduce exclusion. While network researchers have widely studied some of these mechanisms, they have yet to embrace others. Therefore, this thematic issue reconsiders the complex relationship between personal networks and social inclusion. It offers a unique vantage point by bringing together researchers who work with different marginalised social groups, typically studied separately: refugees, transnational migrants, indigenous people, older people, people experiencing poverty, LGBT people, and women who have experienced domestic violence. This combination allows us to detect commonalities and differences in network functioning across historically excluded groups. This editorial lays the theoretical groundwork for the thematic issue and discusses the key contributions of the seventeen articles that compose the issue. We call for more attention to relationship expectations, the reciprocity of support flows, and contextual embeddedness, and question universally adopted theoretical binaries such as that of bonding and bridging social capital.

Protecting difference: A discussion on transphobic and homophobic hate crime in the Irish context

Ireland has been applauded internationally for its legislative progress in supporting the rights of (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) LGBT+ citizens. Yet much of the positive change within the social and political context of sexuality and gender expression has been achieved by campaign groups, operating outside government boundaries. Notwithstanding these advances, LGBT+ people continue to face discrimination, abuse and violence. Concerns surrounding acts of aggression towards transgender and gay people call for an ongoing dialogue between legislators, policymakers, and practitioners to explore ways in which safety can be ensured. This article draws from an emerging body of scholarship and research to question the effectiveness of current social policy and legislation in Ireland. It offers a discourse on hate crime related to transphobia and homophobia, while challenging the existing political thinking. Multi-agency collaborative working is suggested as key to fostering solutions together with changes in legal paradigms, and the continued formation of policy aimed at safeguarding the LGBT+ community.