Common Challenges For LGBTQ+ Folks When Moving Abroad and How To Overcome Them
With the worldwide increase in support for LGBTQ+ travel, it may seem like the world is opening up to our community. And it is, for economic reasons. But tourists are temporary, and can be tolerated for a limited time in some countries. However, for LGBTQ+ expats and immigrants, we must face a similar reality that the local LGBTQ+ community faces when choosing to relocate.
Relocating abroad means taking your whole life to a new place, and with that comes many challenges. That doesn’t mean it can’t be the most thrilling, exhilarating time of your life. In fact, as Tom Hanks says in A League Of Their Own, “It’s the hard that makes it great!”
All expats face several common challenges like adapting to cultural norms and new customs, overcoming language barriers, navigating a new government’s bureaucracy, and integrating into the social network in a new country - even just the basics like apartment hunting, lifestyle changes and grocery shopping can feel daunting at times.
For LGBTQ+ folks and our families moving abroad, there are layers on top of the common challenges, or even extra challenges that queer folks face. This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t move abroad. In fact, I think it’s incredibly important that we move abroad and grow as individuals and as an international community.
It simply means that it is important to go into your move informed of what these challenges might be, how to talk about them, and how to overcome them so that you can have a successful expat life for as long as you desire. Common challenges LGBTQ+ expats face include:
1. Visas for Spouses
Getting permission to live and work in a new country, i.e. acquiring a visa or residency permit, can be tricky, and often only one partner qualifies. However, if the target country doesn’t recognize same-sex couples, getting a spousal or a partner visa, or qualifying for a family reunification visa can be difficult. This means that if one of you gets a job, the other person often has to figure out a way to get their own visa, whereas heterosexual couples are almost always allowed to keep their family together through marriage and spousal visas.
2. Marriage Recognition
Even if a country allows same-sex marriage, it can be confusing to know if they recognize our marriages in the same way. Some countries might recognize same-sex partnerships, but in a parallel system to heterosexual marriage. This can affect rights, healthcare and other services. It’s just best to know before you go how same-sex marriage is recognized and if there is equality or parallel parity to heterosexual marriage (or no recognition at all).
3. Safety and Security
As we all know, being part of the LGBTQ+ can mean facing additional safety concerns. While it is essential to check safety information and connect with other LGBTQ+ people in the area, that’s an obvious answer. The real challenge here is that among our home culture, we can often identify subtleties in cultural cues to determine whether someone might not be friendly with queer folks. We might detect one word choice that indicates homophobia, and that might get our spidey senses to get us out of a situation. When you are abroad and in a new cultural context, you won’t be able to rely on your spidey sense and street smarts at first. It’s best to find community and learn about those cultural clues to stay as safe as possible.
4. Coming Out at Work
If you relocate to work abroad, you’ll be adapting to a new and different work culture. Much like what was mentioned above, it can be a difficult decision to out ourselves at work if we don’t understand societal cues and rules. It may never even be an issue, depending on your office and of course your country of choice to relocate to.
5. Finding Community
It's nice to have friends and chosen family who understand us. Some countries have LGBTQ+ safe spaces like bars, clubs or LGBTQ+ centers, and those can be good places to start. If you relocate to a country that is very LGBTQ+ friendly, then the safe spaces are more out in the open. If you live somewhere that’s not as friendly, the community might be more underground, and finding it will be more challenging.
6. Buying Clothes Abroad
This is one that many folks overlook, but it can be incredibly important. Getting clothes that fit our style and gender identity might be harder in some countries. It’s really important to make sure you have a lot of gender and intently affirming clothes before you move, or you’ll always be waiting for your next trip back ‘home’ to buy new clothes or paying loads to ship them over.
7. Choosing A Neighborhood To Live In
Deciding where to live is important and queer folks need to make sure we’ll feel accepted in our neighborhood or town of choice. Not only safety-wise, but also just to avoid any odd whispers or lack of community feeling in a more conservative location. One way to make certain of this is by hiring a queer (or LGBTQ+ friendly) realtor who understands your needs. You should also be researching ahead of time, and asking fellow expats if you’re able to connect to them beforehand via a Facebook group or other groups.
8. Finding Schools for LGBTQ+ Families
As an LGBTQ+ family - whether that’s two queer parents or a family with queer kids (or both!) relocating abroad means making certain to find schools that support us with a culture of acceptance and a zero tolerance policy for hate. This isn’t something that is necessarily advertised on their school website. You’ll also find that many countries aren’t as articulate around issues like racism and homophobia, and inclusivity and diversity, so there isn’t a common vocabulary to use to ask about the issues either. They just aren’t on the surface of conversation the way they might be in your home country. As a result, you’ll have to research by joining many groups, both for LGBTQ+ expats and locals abroad as well as different expat family sites as well as speaking to the staff and asking direct and indirect questions about LGBTQ+ acceptance.
Basic Criteria for Checking LGBTQ+ Friendliness
You want to know whether the country you’ve been hoping to move to is LGBTQ+ friendly, and to what degree. If a country doesn’t have a supportive legal and social policy for queer folks, it doesn’t mean you can’t move there. It does mean, however, that your safety and security is up to you to protect more than expecting laws and regulations to help. Some folks are comfortable dipping back into the closet or living privately, while others want to live out and proud and know they are legally supported.
Here are some things to look for in order to gauge a country’s temperature as far as the LGBTQ+ community.
- Is LGBTQ+ marriage legal? Is there a separate but equal ‘partnership’ tier?
- Are there legal protections for LGBTQ+ workers?
- Are there legal protections around LGBTQ+ discrimination and hate crimes?
- Are there supportive rules to help transgender people?
On a more negative note:
- Are LGBTQ+ relationships against the law?
- Is society openly homophobic?
- What are the transgender murder rates? (Harsh, yes, but this is measurable and a clear indicator.)
Check out this blog post for more helpful information: 7 Resources for LGBTQ+ Folks Ready to Move Abroad
