By Sofia Gonzalez Brodin

 In 2023, Davita and Ebba met at a party for lesbians. One year later they got married. What was supposed to mark the beginning of a life-long partnership, was about to end tragically when Davita received notice that she was about to be deported from Sweden on the basis that she had not been able to provide “reliable information” surrounding her sexuality. Growing up in Uganda, Davita was repeatedly told that homosexuality was considered a disease and a curse. Today, Uganda is regarded as one of the most LGBTQ-hostile countries in the world where the recently implemented “Kill the gays”-law enforces death penalty for same-sex intercourse. Having already been imprisoned for her sexual orientation, a potential deportation from Sweden would pose a direct threat to Davita’s life. As she told Aftonbladet: “They are sending me to my death”. Luckily, for Davita and Ebba, the Swedish Migration Agency recently decided to grant Davita a residence permit, but for many other LGBTQ migrants, the journey towards safety, self-fulfillment, and peace is long and uncertain, as they continue to face significant legal, social, and political obstacles. A crucial part of this ongoing struggle stems from the ways in which LGBTQ migrants have to prove their sexual orientation and gender identity to immigration officers and judges in the country of asylum. As such, there appears to be a categorical fetishism inherent in these institutions and in the general ways migration policies are intended and configured. 

Gay enough? 

Asylum law in Sweden (among other countries) allows individuals to seek asylum due to persecution or a well-founded fear of future persecution on the basis of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, or membership of a particular social group. However, in order to qualify under a “particular social group” individuals must be able to prove their membership in that group. For LGBTQ migrants, the process of proving one’s sexual orientation or gender identity to an asylum officer or judge is far from straightforward. Like Davita, many LGBTQ migrants are denied asylum as they fail to “provide reliable information” about their sexuality, or more simply, because they are not perceived as “gay enough” by the authorities. As such, although the framework for accepting LGBTQ asylum claims no longer relies on stereotypes and sex acts (such as during the 90s and early 2000s), but rather centers around individuals’ “coming out story”, crucial challenges remain. 

Challenging Western understandings 

Initially, just as sexual and gender expressions may vary drastically across cultures, identity development is also subject to cultural variation. What this means is that not everyone will have a neat and linear story surrounding the development and realisation of their sexual orientation or gender identity. As decolonial feminists have emphasised, the hegemonic position of Western temporal assumptions frames identity development as a sequence of clearly defined milestones that are often tied to specific ages or stages of life. This became particularly evident during a proceeding where a gay claimant from Ghana experienced great difficulty trying to make his asylum claim comprehensible to a U.S judge as his sense of time differed drastically from the Western understanding of linear progress, for example as he did not know how old he was and could not connect his “coming out story” to a specific age. Likewise, transgender migrants have experienced great difficulty when seeking asylum as they identify in gender non-conforming ways that directly challenge our Western understanding of transgender people. Similarly, in many cultures, no distinction is made between gay and trans people, which often tends to lead to misunderstandings and disagreement between claimants and judges. 

Categorical fetishism in migration policy 

These issues highlight the ways in which asylum processes create specific barriers for LGBTQ migrants and define gender and sexuality in specific ways. The challenges that LGBTQ migrants face in their struggle to claim asylum seem to represent a larger issue concerning the categorical fetishism in migration policy, resulting in individuals being denied asylum if they fail to meet the specific criteria of a certain category: categories which, in addition, are designed according to westernised standards and understandings. As such, the dominant categories used to decide who is legitimately or illegitimately claiming asylum fail to adequately capture the complex interplay of factors that drive people to migrate, clearly representing a disjuncture between policy categories and the actual experiences of those on the move. Recognizing how asylum decisions shape broader cultural notions of citizenship and structure our understanding of national belonging, more attention needs to be directed toward the experiences of LGBTQ migrants and asylum-seekers.