The Steinberg-Graff Fund for International LGBTQI Rights has been established to support LGBTQI organisations campaigning for legal reform and human rights protections in some of the places where it’s hardest to be LGBTQI. Managed by the award-winning charity GiveOut, the Fund is generously sponsored by Jon Steinberg and Josh Graff.
Around the world LGBTQI people lack basic legal protections and face grave human rights violations. International human rights laws obligate states to promote and protect the human rights of all persons without discrimination, yet LGBTQI people are frequently excluded from this.
Private, consensual same-sex sexual activity is still criminalised in 69 jurisdictions, at least 6 of these implement the death penalty, and the gender identity and expression of transgender people is criminalised in 14 countries. Only 5% of United Nations member states prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in their constitutions, and just 14 countries globally have banned so-called “conversion therapy”.
LGBTQI people living in places where they lack legal protections risk arrest, blackmail, extortion, stigma, discrimination, and violence. And a growing international backlash against recent advances in LGBTQI human rights is threatening to roll-back existing protections.
In response, LGBTQI organisations are working to ensure that the human rights of their communities are enshrined in law. But they lack sustainable funding and resources – especially in the Global South and East.
Recognising this need, the Steinberg-Graff Fund for International LGBTQI Rights has been established with GiveOut to support LGBTQI organisations working to advance the legal rights of their communities around the world. Through the Fund, GiveOut will provide grants to a small number of partners pursuing deep, systemic change to ensure that the human rights of all LGBTQI people are protected and respected.
