Video: Documentary explores Jamaica’s underground gay and trans community

Jul 28 2014
Written by Alice Milliken

Illustrated rainbow pride flag on a pink background.

A new video documentary was released today highlighting the lives of homeless gay, bisexual and transgender (GBT) youth in Jamaica.

The Vice.com video: ‘Young and gay: Jamaica’s Gully Queens’ takes the viewer into the water gullies of Jamaica’s streets to meet and talk with the GBT youth who live there.

Violence against the GBT community is common in Jamaica, where an anti-buggery law of 1533 threatens a prison sentence of up to ten years. The law does not apply to lesbians.

Jamaican LGBT activist and lawyer Maurice Tomlinson, who is fighting to overturn Jamaica’s anti-buggery law, discusses the importance of changing both national law and culture to improve the life experience of the LGBT community.

Earlier this year Chanel 4’s Unreported World released a documentary on the same subject titled: ‘Jamaica’s Underground Gays.’

Last July Dwayne Jones, a 17 year-old trans teen, was brutally murdered in the suburban parish of St James, generating international attention.