About this text
By Niels Nyegaard, Postdoctoral Fellow at the Centre for Gender Research, University of Oslo
This text was first published in 2022.
2022 is a special year to celebrate Pride in Norway. The 21st of April of this year marked the 50th anniversary of the Storting repealing section 213 of the Norwegian Penal Code, which prohibited sexual acts between men. On this day, Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre issued an apology for the fact that Norwegian authorities had criminalized sexual relations between men until 1972.
This anniversary will undoubtedly also play a central role during Pride itself, given that the decriminalization of sex between men is often held up as the first milestone in the political fight for LGBT+ equality in Norway. This led to further rights for LGBT+ people, such as providing gay and lesbian people with access to marriage equality, adoption, and donor inesemination in the 2000s.
While the decriminalization of sexual relations between men in 1972 is worth celebrating, it is also possible to take a more critical look at the celebration of this anniversary in Norway. What is particularly noticeable is that this anniversary primarily focuses on the historical experiences of gay men. In some respects, this is not surprising, given that section 213 only mentioned sexual relations between men.
We can, however, wonder why this event is framed as a historical milestone for everyone in the LGBT+ community. It wasn’t. This change in the law did not affect lesbians, because sex between women was not prohibited by section 213. Additionally, the change in the law did nothing to help the struggles fought by trans and intersex people in the 1970s regarding access to legal gender recognition and gender affirming care.
Danish examples
We often see that gay men’s experience is regarded as representative for all LGBT+ history. In the book Den store homoskandale [The Great Gay Scandal] (2021), I have uncovered a similar phenomenon in Denmark. In this book, I focus on the differences between the historical experiences of gay men, and those of lesbian women. Two examples can illustrate these differences.
In Denmark, the foundation of Forbundet af 1948, the country’s largest foundation for gay people, now known as LGBT Denmark, is often viewed as a historical milestone: the kickoff of the fight for equal rights for gay people and lesbians. The truth, however, is that the association was founded in the 1940s as a place for men. Lesbians were not permitted to join, and many felt discriminated by the male members. It was not until the 1980s that the association became more balanced in terms of gender. One reason that this happened is that lesbian activists began to apply in larger numbers as the women’s movement of the 1970s began to fade away.
Another example is the introduction of registered partnerships. Even though the enaction of registered partnerships is often framed as a groundbreaking event for gay equality in Denmark, it was mostly gay men who opted for partnership in the 1990s. This is because registered partnership did not bring with it the rights that were most important to lesbian couples, such as access to adoption and donor insemination.
It was not until the 2000s that lesbian couples started to enter registered partnerships at the same rate as gay male couples. This occurred because the legal benefits that went along with partnerships were expanded to include the aforementioned rights. This culminated in the introduction of a gender-neutral marriage law in Denmark in 2012.
The diverse history of LGBT+ communities
These examples show that historical milestones have not necessarily had the same significance for all groups gathered under the LGBT+ umbrella. LGBT+ history contains internal differences and diverse experiences. This is worth keeping in mind when we celebrate anniversaries of the battles that have been won.