Brazil registers the highest number of transfemicides in a year | News

Brazil continues to be the most unsafe country for transvestites and trans people, as it was the first to report the highest number of transfemicides in a year for the thirteenth consecutive time with 125, according to the report by the organization Transgender Europe (TGEU).

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70 percent of all recorded murders took place in South and Central America, with 33 percent in Brazil, equaling a total of 125 murders, followed by Mexico with 65 deaths and the United States with 53.

For its part, the National Association of Transvestites and Transsexuals (ANTRA) of Brazil reported 175 transfeminicides in 2020 alone and mapped 80 deaths in the first half of 2021.

The report of the European entity showed that the number of murders of trans women and transvestites in the world between October 1, 2020 and September 30, 2021 amounted to 375 murders, the highest recorded since 2008, when they began to publish these statistics.

Another of the data presented by the organization confirms that in the last 13 years, at least 4,042 trans and gender diverse people were murdered between January 2008 and September 2021.

Likewise, 58 percent of murdered trans people whose profession was known were sex workers, according to figures published by the organization, which also noted that 96 percent of people murdered worldwide were trans women.

Meanwhile, the average age of the murdered people is 30 years old (the youngest was 13 years old, and the oldest, 68 years old); 36 percent of homicides occurred on the street, and 24 percentage points occurred in their own homes.

The project also indicated that the figures reported in 2021 represent seven percent more than those published in 2020. Similarly, other data found that there was a record for the first time in Greece, Kazakhstan and Malawi.

Transgender Europe in its published report valued that "the data indicates a worrying trend regarding the intersections between misogyny, racism, xenophobia and hatred towards sex workers, with the majority of the victims being black and color trans women, migrants and sex workers”.

Other data from Brazil

In the first half of 2021, some 89 trans people were murdered according to the National Association of Transvestites and Transsexuals (Antra) of Brazil, and in this period Antra also recorded 33 assassination attempts and 27 human rights violations against this population.

The data offered shows that 80 percent of the cases were classified as cruel because there were practices such as carbonization, stoning and decapitation. The data offered also indicates that transfemicide in the country intersects with the categories of class and race.

For his part, the coordinator of the Estudos Transviades Magazine and the Brazilian Institute for Transmasculinities (IBRAT), Kaio de Souza Lemos, expressed that the lack of police reports turns transphobia into an invisible crime, which makes it difficult to map public policies.

In October 2021, the Jornal Hoje media outlet conducted an investigation where it requested the number of cases of homophobia and transphobia registered in the police stations of all the states of the country, through the state secretariats of public security through the Law of Access to Information (LAI).

Said analysis showed that only 15 states and the Federal District reported the figures, 10 states said that their systems do not allow them to know their own statistics on these crimes, and the state of Santa Catarina gave an inconclusive answer. This was also confirmed by the communication platform Brasil de Fato.

On the other hand, the black trans psychologist and activist, Gilmara Cunha, appreciated that the black trans woman is not recognized and, in the favela, the vulnerability is even greater. “The favela is a space where machismo, transphobia and prejudice are reproduced. If the number of dead trans women in drug-controlled favelas is no longer accurately quantified, it is even worse,” Gilmara Cunha remarked.