Legal status of homosexuality in Brazil

During the Portuguese colonization of Brazil, homosexuality was illegal in the country between 1533 and 1830, due to the imposition of the Portuguese Penal Code, which was influenced by the British Buggery Act 1533.[1]

Decriminalization of same-sex sexual activity by country or territory
  1790–1799
  1800–1829
  1830–1839
  1840–1859
  1860–1869
  1870–1879
  1880–1889
  1890–1929
  1930–1939
  1940–19491
  1950–1959
  1960–1969
  1970–1979
  1980–1989
  1990–19992
  2000–2009
  2010–2019
  2020–future
  Same-sex sexual activity legal3
  Male same-sex sexual activity illegal
  Same-sex sexual activity illegal
1During World War II, Nazi Germany annexed territory or established reichskommissariats which extended Germany's laws against same-sex sexual activity to those territories and reichskommissariats. Same-sex sexual activity was previously legalized in the following countries or territories before German annexation or establishment of reichskommissariats: Bas-Rhin (legal in 1791), Belgium (legal in 1795), Belluno (legal in 1890), Friuli-Venezia Giulia (legal in 1890), Haut-Rhin (legal in 1791), Luxembourg (legal in 1795), Moselle (legal in 1791), Netherlands (legal in 1811), Nord (legal in 1791), Pas-de-Calais (legal in 1791), Poland (legal in 1932), and Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol (legal in 1890). All countries and territories listed that where annexed or established into reichskommissariats by Nazi Germany during World War II where restored as independent countries or reincorporated into their previous countries during or after the war and thus re-legalized same-sex sexual activity in those areas.
2In May 1973, the Libyan Arab Republic annexed the Aouzou Strip from Chad. Libya's laws against same-sex sexual activity where thus extended to the annexed Aouzou Strip. In August 1987, during the Toyota War between the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya and Chad, Aouzou fell to the Chadian forces, only to be repelled by an overwhelming Libyan counter-offensive. The Aouzou dispute was concluded on February 3, 1994, when the judges of the International Court of Justice by a majority of 16 to 1 decided that the Aouzou Strip belonged to Chad. Monitored by international observers, the withdrawal of Libyan troops from the Strip began on April 15, 1994, and was completed by May 10, 1994. The formal and final transfer of the Aouzou Strip from Libya to Chad took place on May 30, 1994, when the sides signed a joint declaration stating that the Libyan withdrawal had been effected.
3Same-sex sexual activity was never criminalized in the following countries and territories: Benin, Burkina Faso, Cambodia Central African Republic, Chad (excluding Aouzou Strip), Clipperton Island, Republic of the Congo, Côte d'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, French Polynesia, French Southern and Antarctic Lands, Gabon, Laos, Madagascar, Mali, Mayotte, New Caledonia, Niger, North Korea, Rwanda, South Korea, Vietnam, and Wallis and Futuna. Same-sex sexual activity had also never been criminalized in continent of Antarctica.

In 1830, eight years after the end of the Portuguese domain, sodomy laws were eliminated from the new Penal Code of Brazil.[2]

After the French overseas territories located in the Americas, Brazil was the first country in the New World and Southern Hemisphere to legalize homosexuality. Today in South America only Guyana, a former British colony, considers homosexuality illegal.[3]

Since 1985 the Federal Council of Medicine of Brazil does not consider homosexuality as deviant.[4] In 1999, the Federal Council of Psychology published a resolution that has standardized the conduct of psychologists face the question: "... psychologists did not collaborate with events or services proposing treatment and cure of homosexuality." In 1990, five years after Brazil removed homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses, the General Assembly of the World Health Organization (WHO), with headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, removed homosexuality, in the International Classification of Diseases (ICD).[5]

See also

References
  1. British Buggery Act 1533 and Portuguese Penal Code 1533 (in Portuguese)
  2. The Penal Code and the Homosexuality (in Portuguese) Archived 2012-07-29 at Archive.today
  3. In South America only Guyana is anti-homosexual (in English)
  4. Homosexuality is not a deviant - Federal Council of Medicine of Brazil (in Portuguese) Archived 2011-07-06 at the Wayback Machine
  5. Homosexuality is not a deviant - Federal Council of Psychologists of Brazil (in Portuguese)
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