Hate Crimes Against Trans People: Assessing Emotions,Behaviors,and Attitudes Toward Criminal Justice Agencies

Introduction

Over the past two decades, a growing body of research has developed on the impacts of hate crime (see inter alia, Herek, Cogan, & Gillis, 2002; Herek, Cogan, Gillis, & Glunt, 1997; Iganski, 2008; Iganski & Lagou, 2015; McDevitt, Balboni, Garcia, & Gu, 2001). These studies have shed important light on both the disproportionate levels of targeted abuse experienced by certain minority groups and the heightened impacts that hate crimes are likely to have on victims. In the main, research has shown that hate crime victims are more likely to experience emotional traumas such as shock, anxiety, fear, anger, and depression (see, for example, Corcoran, Lader, & Smith, 2015; Iganski, 2008). Some researchers have also shown that certain psychological impacts (such as depression) can last for longer periods of time when compared with nonhate motivated victimization (Herek et al., 1997). Studies have also indicated that hate crimes are more likely to involve physical violence resulting in injury—though research here has been less conclusive (see, for example, Cheng, Ickes, & Kenworthy, 2013; Corcoran et al., 2015).

Hate crimes are not only likely to “hurt more” than nonhate motivated crimes, but it is also often asserted that incidents will have similar impacts on other group (community) members (Iganski, 2001). A recent study by the Sussex Hate Crime Project found that hate crimes against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people and Muslim people not only traumatized direct victims but also had substantial negative impacts on other members of the victim’s group which were similar to those of direct victims (what the authors call “indirect hate crime”) (Brown & Walters, 2016). They reported that indirect victimization (in this case, personally knowing other victims of hate crime with similar identity characteristics) was clearly associated with different behavioral intentions (pro-action and avoidance) ¹ which were mediated by various emotional reactions (anger, anxiety, and shame; see also Bell & Perry, 2015; Perry & Alvi, 2012).

This growing body of work has provided important information on the emotional, behavioral, and spatial impacts of hate crime. However, the literature has tended to examine the impacts of hate crime on entire groups of people (such as Jewish or LGBT people). The homogenizing of victim groups means that differences and similarities that exist between members of those broad categories are yet to be comprehensively explored. ² In relation to anti-LGBT hate crime, trans ³ victims have typically been subsumed into one single LGBT identity (Antjoule, 2016). ⁴ Many studies on anti-LGBT hate crime have therefore failed to fully investigate the possible differences in impact between LGBT victims (Woods & Herman, 2014). The small number of studies that have focused solely on anti-trans hate crime suggest that trans people may be the most vulnerable of all victims of hate crime—both in terms of the disproportionate levels of violence experienced and the emotional and behavioral impacts caused by such incidents (Stotzer, 2009). There is also some evidence to show that trans people’s experiences of hate victimization is likely to be compounded by law enforcement agencies, with some studies suggesting that police officers regularly expose trans victims to direct and secondary victimization (Turner, Whittle, & Combs, 2009).

This article builds on this body of work by extrapolating data from the Sussex Hate Crime Project in the United Kingdom which looked at the direct and indirect impacts of anti-LGBT hate crime (see, Brown & Walters, 2016). Using quantitative survey data, we compare and contrast trans people’s direct and indirect experiences of hate crimes (using quantity and frequency), together with their emotional and behavioral reactions to an imagined hate crime scenario, with those of (non-trans) LGB people. ⁵ We then examine trans people’s attitudes toward the criminal justice system, including respondents’ perceptions of the police, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), and the Government. These analyses have enabled us to provide a comprehensive assessment of trans people’s lived experiences and perceptions of individual, social, and structural prejudice.

Understanding Anti-Trans Hate Crime

Before examining the prevalence of hate crime among trans people, their emotional and behavioral responses to hate crimes, and their perceptions of the criminal justice system in the United Kingdom, it is important first to situate these findings within contemporary debates about the meaning of certain gender identities, expressions, and gender-based prejudices including “trans,” “transgender,” and “transphobia.” As Chakraborti and Garland (2015) note, the study of hate crime requires recognition of the complex relationships between gender, sex, and sexuality, acknowledging both the social (normative ideas and prescriptions) and individual-level (sense of self) factors and how these interrelate. To understand “trans” as an identity category and also transphobia and its permutation, anti-trans hate crime, it is important to distinguish between “sex” (biological characteristics acquired at birth) and “gender” (the social construction of femininity and masculinity and their attendant expectations and roles; Zucker & Bradley, 1995).

“Trans” identity refers to gender identities and expressions that go beyond biological sex as is assigned at birth. It is an inclusive term that embraces a broad range of identity categories and includes individuals who consider themselves transgender (those whose lifestyles appear to be in conflict with gender norms—for example, by dressing or presenting themselves in their preferred gender role); those who consider themselves not cisgender ⁶ in any other way, rejecting binary categories—for example, genderfluid, nonbinary, genderfuck, genderless, agender, nongendered, third gender, two spirit, bigender, and trans man and trans woman (see, Jones, 2013; Turner et al., 2009); and transsexuals (those who experience a disjuncture between their gender identity and physical bodies, many of whom will wish to undergo surgery or hormone therapy to realign their bodies with their gender identity). ⁷ More recently, the term “trans*” had been used to extend the inclusiveness of the term, the asterisk being a place holder for all suffixes of “trans” (Jones, 2013). However, the use of the asterisk has also come under some criticism for inferring that “trans” without the asterisk refers to a binary form of gender (e.g., trans man and trans woman) and has therefore fallen out of use by many lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning, and intersex (LGBTQI) groups. ⁸

Relevant to the theorization of trans identities is Butler’s (1990) work on gender as performative and distinct from physical bodies and binary classifications. ⁹ Butler argues that gender roles and expectations surrounding gender expression are partly, or mostly, socially constructed and reconstructed through iterations of gender “performance” (Butler, 1990). West and Fenstermaker (1995) build upon this understanding of gender identity by arguing that the performance and re-performance of gender norms are reinforced through social and structural hierarchies that place masculinity as the “ideal” and femininity as “inferior” (see also Perry, 2001, chapter 4). Those who transgress the various socially prescribed versions of gender are perceived to be provoking disorder. In doing so, they can “challenge the ontology of gender and sex as norms . . . render[ing] the norms of sexual desire unintelligible” (Perry & Dyck, 2014b, p. 52).

It should be noted that the terms and definitions discussed here are constantly changing and thus are historically contingent. Authors have variously noted the fraught and contested nature of categories (e.g., Kuper, Nussbaum, & Mustanski, 2012; Levitt & Ippolito, 2014; Norton & Herek, 2013) such as medicine, social science, psychology, feminism, queer theory, and a more political trans community converge to theorize “trans.” In addition, inter-sectioning identities (see Warner, 2008) such as class, ethnicity, and sexuality can play an important role in trans people’s lives (Sevelius, 2013) as well as their experience of transphobia (Lombardi, 2009; Moran & Sharpe, 2004). ¹⁰

Transphobia

Turner and colleagues (2009) define transphobia as “an irrational reaction to those who do not conform to the socio-cultural ideology of gender conformity” (p. 7). Perry and Dyck (2014b) explain that these “reactions” occur where people’s gender status directly challenges that of masculinity and of male sex (p. 52). In their “act” of transgressing binary gender identity, some individuals can threaten to eliminate socially prescribed gender norms entirely. This can give rise to negative attitudes such as hatred, loathing, rage, disgust, or moral indignations toward trans people on the basis of their gender enactments (Bettcher, 2007). Key here is the perception of threat that transgressing prescribed gender identities gives rise to. Social psychologists explain that those who challenge identity-based norms give rise to what is labeled “realistic” and “symbolic” threats toward entire groups of people (known as integrated threat theory, Stephan & Stephan, 2000). Realistic threats consist of tangible conflicts of interest—such as perceived competition over jobs, housing, and other resources between the ingroup and outgroups, whereas symbolic threats relate to people’s social identities, such as the ingroup’s “way of life,” including culturally important values and norms (see Brown, 2010, chapters 6 and 8).

While there is no social psychological empirical research on the link between these types of threat and transgender identity, theoretically at least it is likely that trans people give rise to a symbolic threat with regard to gender norms, which in turn elicit feelings of disgust and revulsion in some gender conforming individuals toward nongender conforming people (for a similar theoretical framework in relation to heterosexual people’s emotional reactions to gay people, see Cottrell & Neuberg, 2005). Importantly then, “phobia” in transphobia should not denote a disorder or refer to clinical phobic reactions, but should refer instead to social psychological reactions which are directly linked to cultural norms—at least in part. Perry (2001) claims that it is these cultural norms that foster and sustain social hierarchies that are based on a number of different identities. Dominant ideas about “ways of being” can become entrenched in social structures and processes, which in turn help to perpetuate dominant forms of gender identity (“doing gender”; Perry, 2001; West & Fenstermaker, 1995). Hill and Willoughby (2005) argue that central to explaining the threat of trans identity to society is the role of “genderism”—a cultural ideology “that reinforces the negative evaluation of gender non-conformity or an incongruence between sex and gender” by juxtaposing the gendered “other” (abnormal) with dominant cisgender (“normal”) people (p. 534). It is this social evaluation that fosters individual-level emotional disgust (a social psychological response), which in turn can result in “gender bashing” (i.e., anti-trans hate crime). ¹¹

Anti-Trans Hate Crime

It is only relatively recently that “gender identity” or “transgender identity” has been recognized as deserving of legislative protection under hate crime laws (Woods & Herman, 2014). In the United States, 19 states now cover gender identity within state hate crime laws. However, beyond the United States, few countries protect against anti-trans hate crime. Within the Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe (OSCE) region, only nine member states monitor this type of hate crime (Woods & Herman, 2014). In England and Wales, “transgender” was included as one of the five protected characteristics in hate crime legislation in 2012, ¹² though it was first included under the operational definition of hate crime (i.e., that used by the police when recording hate crimes) in 2001 as part of the definition of homophobic hate crime, and later as a separate type of hate crime (College of Policing, 2014; Giannasi, 2015).

Despite the inclusion of transgender within the hate crime policy domain in parts of the United States and now England and Wales, there is a paucity of research on this type of targeted violence (Chakraborti & Garland, 2015, chapter 5). Even the most recent analysis of hate crime data from the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW), a comprehensive victimization survey of 50,000 households, failed to examine the extent and nature of anti-trans hate crimes due to the fact that “the number of CSEW respondents who were victims of this type of hate crime was too low to provide a robust estimate” (Home Office, Office for National Statistics, and Ministry of Justice, 2013, p. 13). Official statistics on recorded hate crime provide a limited picture of the problem. The police in England and Wales recorded 858 anti-trans hate crimes between 2015-2016 (Corcoran & Smith, 2016), an increase of 272% since 2011-2012, while in the United States, recent FBI statistics revealed that just under 100 gender identity–based hate crimes were recorded by the police (“Latest Hate Crime Statistics Available,” 2015). Of course, these data are limited in that they rely on victims of anti-trans hate crime reporting incidents to the police, a problem we return to later. Indeed, while such figures are already cause for concern, the true extent of anti-trans hate crime is likely to be much greater.

The Nature and Extent of Anti-Trans Hate Crime: What We Know

Disproportionately high levels of targeted violence experienced by trans people has been reported by a number of other surveys. The most recent is the U.S. Transgender Survey of 28,000 transgender people, which found that 46% of respondents had been verbally harassed and one in 10 had been physically attacked during the past year because of being transgender (James et al., 2016; see also, Wilchins, Lombardi, Priesing, & Malouf, 1997). A European-based survey of over 6,500 trans people across Europe by the European Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) similarly found pervasive experiences of targeted abuse. They found that 34% of respondents had experienced violence or were threatened with violence in the 5 years preceding the survey, while 15% had experienced violence or had been threatened with violence in the 12 months preceding the survey (FRA, 2014; see also Turner et al., 2009). ¹³

As with other research on hate crime (see Chakraborti, Garland, & Hardy, 2014), anti-trans abuse is likely to be repetitive in nature. This was illustrated by research conducted in Wales by Williams and Tregidga (2013), ¹⁴ who found that 50% of transgender respondents to their hate crime survey had experienced repeat victimization. This finding was reaffirmed during qualitative interviews, with some participants revealing that they suffered from persistent daily abuse (Williams & Tregidga, 2013; see also Perry & Dyck, 2014b). Repeated verbal abuse can also frequently escalate into more violent incidents, with one survey by the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs (NCAVP) in the United States showing that transgender people were 1.58 times more likely to sustain an injury than non-trans victims of hate crime, suggesting that anti-trans hate crime can be particularly violent (NCAVP, 2012; see also FRA, 2014).

Studies have also shown that there are disproportionately high rates of sexual violence committed against trans people (Stotzer, 2009). ¹⁵ One survey of 515 MTF and FTM ¹⁶ trans people found that 59% had reported a history of forced rape or sexual assault (Clements-Nolle, Marx, & Katz, 2006; see also, James et al., 2016). Another study of the 350 trans participants found that 27% had been forced to engage in sexual activity, and 57% of these participants stated that at least one of these incidents was motivated by bias against their gender identity (Xavier, Honnold, & Bradford, 2007; see also Clements-Nolle et al., 2006; FRA, 2014; Xavier, Bobbin, Singer, & Budd, 2005). ¹⁷

The Impacts of Hate Crime

Direct and indirect demonstrations of anti-trans hate are likely to give rise to perceptions of threat (both realistically and symbolically) among trans people. The perception of threat invariably gives rise to certain emotional reactions, an idea that is central to Intergroup Emotions Theory (e.g., Mackie & Smith, 2015). According to this theory, different types of threat provoke specific emotions which, in turn, give rise to certain behavioral intentions and responses (Mackie & Smith, 2015; see also Cottrell & Neuberg, 2005, for a similar analysis). In the case of hate crime directed at one’s group (community), the threat of violence (and other forms of targeted abuse) will most likely give rise to the emotions of anger and fear. These emotional reactions are then linked to pro-active actions (such as joining community groups) and avoidant action tendencies (such as staying indoors), respectively (Brown & Walters, 2016; Mackie & Smith, 2015).

Research conducted in the United Kingdom by Williams and Tregidga (2013) showed that those likely to suffer the most impacts of hate crime were transgender victims, with respondents experiencing heightened levels of anger, fear, depression, and a reduction in confidence. ¹⁸ These negative emotions are likely to have significant behavioral and spatial consequences for trans individuals. For instance, Kenagy and Bostwick (2005) found that 56% of respondents stated that being transgender made them feel unsafe in public, while 43% stated that they felt uncomfortable in public. It is unsurprising, then, that many trans people attempt to conceal or change their gender identity and avoid public spaces to reduce the risk of hate crime victimization (see FRA, 2014; McNeil, Bailey, Ellis, Morton, & Regan, 2012; Perry & Dyck, 2014b; Williams & Tregidga, 2013).

With anti-trans hate crime commonly occurring in both public spaces and within the home by family members (FRA, 2014, p. 59; Kenagy & Bostwick, 2005), many trans people will be without a “safe space” where they can feel secure. Young trans people are especially susceptible to a lack of safe space as their gender is not only policed in public places by strangers but also in the home by their parents and other family members (Perry & Dyck, 2014b). This can lead to what Perry and Dyck (2014b) refer to as “hyper-vigilance” among trans individuals who are constantly aware of their surroundings and the potential for violence (p. 58).

The pervasiveness of transphobia often means that there are few people that victims of anti-trans violence can to turn to for support. The lack of social and emotional support often results in social isolation, leaving many individuals feeling ostracized and rejected by almost everyone in their lives. Perry and Dyck (2014b) note that social rejection can be internalized, resulting in individuals feeling a lack of confidence and love for oneself and worse still to hostility and self-loathing (see also Perez-Brumer, Hatzenbuehler, Oldenburg, & Bockting, 2015). So severe are these emotional impacts, that trans victims are at a much greater risk of suicidal ideation and/or attempted suicide than non-trans victims (Williams & Tregidga, 2013). ¹⁹

Policing Anti-Trans Hate Crime

The everydayness of anti-trans abuse extends well beyond the familial and community-based prejudices that shape trans’ people’s day-to-day lives, permeating most social structures and institutions throughout society (Perry, 2001). One institution that has been shown to be particularly susceptible to proliferating rigid conceptions of gender identity is the police. Not only have the police represented male officers as traditionally masculine, powerful, and tough, but it has also, as an institution, been active in policing the gender of others. This has historically meant that cisgender women have been treated as “vulnerable” and “weak,” while men who fail to conform to the male masculine type have often been criminalized, brutalized, and violently disposed of (Burke, 1993; Moran & Sharpe, 2004). The gendered nature of policing has meant that most trans people are profoundly suspicious of police officers (FRA, 2014). Perry and Dyck (2014b), citing a participant in their study, state,

[t]here tends to be a general consensus among the women we spoke to that “the law is not a friend to trans women, no part of, no interaction with the law on any level can be considered safe, it’s inherently dangerous.” (p. 56)

The issue here is one of institutionalized violence. Meyer (2014) argues that neither the law, nor hate crime legislation specifically, can protect trans people from violence because legal institutions are still “reinforcing existing power imbalances” (also cited by Perry & Dyck, 2014b, p. 56; see also Vipond, 2015).

The failure of trans people to perform gender “appropriately” has historically been viewed with suspicion by some police officers who have, in turn, questioned their validity as “real victims” (Moran & Sharpe, 2004, p. 408). Perceived transgressions of gender expression challenge the assumptions of some front-line officers about “appropriate conduct.” Moran and Sharpe (2004) argue that, as a consequence, some police officers categorize trans victims as “bad victims” (p. 408), resulting in them being treated disrespectfully and/or without the support they need in the aftermath of targeted victimization (see also Miles-Johnson, 2015a, 2015b). Turner and colleagues’ (2009) study support such an assertion, reporting that the majority of trans respondents in their survey of European countries stated that they were less likely to be confident that they would be treated by the police with dignity and respect as a trans person (see also FRA, 2014). ²⁰ Analysis of their qualitative data corroborated these findings, with interviewees noting that anti-trans violent incidents were not always taken seriously. It was also suggested by some interviewees that the police implicitly or explicitly asserted that the victim was the cause of the incident (see also FRA, 2014).

Further compounding their experiences of hate crime is the fact that trans victims are often misgendered by officers (Miles-Johnson, 2015b; Williams & Tregidga, 2013). Failure to address victims’ gender accurately is likely to result in secondary victimization, thereby compounding their experiences of gender-based subjugation (Miles-Johnson, 2015b). Worse still is the fact the police have, in the past, been accused of perpetrating hate-motivated violence against trans people. Testa and colleagues’ (2012) study in the United States found that eight respondents (out of 271) had been physically assaulted by a police officer, while five respondents stated that they had been the victim of a sexual assault by an officer (see also James et al., 2016; NCAVP, 2015).

Woods and Herman (2014) reflect that there is often little “pay-off” (p. 283) for trans communities in reporting incidents to the police, based on the fact that law enforcement agencies have become implicated in gender hierarchies which ultimately expose trans people to further emotional and social harms (see also Miles-Johnson, 2015b). As a result, the majority of trans victims of hate crime do not report incidents to the police (Testa et al., 2012 ²¹ ; Williams & Tregidga, 2013). ²²

Despite these relatively negative views of the police, Williams and Tregidga’s (2013) survey showed that many trans people would still encourage a victim of hate crime to report it to the police. The reasons given for this was to ensure that incidents are recorded properly by statutory authorities so as to improve awareness of the problem. Furthermore, Williams and Tregidga found that contrary to other studies, transgender victims were more satisfied with police contact than other hate crime victims. Perry and Dyck (2014b) also note that trans people who participated in their study did not uniformly reject hate crime laws but rather they were critical of gender identity being excluded from such laws.

A tension clearly exists here between the structural resistance to non-conforming gender identities within institutions (such as the law and law enforcement agencies) and calls for greater recognition of transphobia and anti-trans hate crime by statutory agencies (Moran & Sharpe, 2004). This paradox reveals a complex dynamic within some communities whose members actively seek out protection by the state, but who are simultaneously aware that to do so may expose them to further forms of victimization. It is a dilemma that has beset many targeted minority communities, and it is one that only institutional and cultural transformation can prevent from (re)occurring (Macpherson, 1999; see “Policy Implications” section).

Method

To more fully understand trans people’s experiences of hate crimes, we surveyed 593 LGBT participants who live in United Kingdom. This online sample was recruited opportunistically with the help of several partner organizations who tweeted a link to the survey on Twitter and via advertisements on Facebook. Although not truly representative of the LGBT population in the United Kingdom, the diversity of groups and online sources used to recruit respondents means that it is likely to be a reasonable approximation. Surveys typically took between 15 and 20 min to complete and all survey results were collated over a 4-month period. Both experiences of direct hate crime (i.e., individual experiences of victimization) and indirect hate crime (i.e., knowledge of others known personally to the respondent who have been victimized) were studied.

Out of the 593 respondents surveyed, 59 participants identified as trans. ²³ Individuals included in our study as “trans” self-identified using the following gender identities: trans male, trans female; gender queer trans, gender queer trans male, gender queer trans female; nonbinary trans female; nonbinary trans male. ²⁴ Participant’s ages ranged from 18 to 67 with an average age of 35.45 years. ²⁵

The survey asked people to state whether they had experienced (directly and/or indirectly ²⁶ ) a number of different types of anti-LGBT hate crime and hate incidents (including both verbal and physical abuse). We then asked individuals to state the frequency of their experiences. We used a slightly amended version of the College of Policing’s (England and Wales) operational definition of anti-LGBT hate crime and hate incidents when explaining to respondents:

Any criminal offence, or non-crime incident, which is perceived, by the victim or any other person, to be motivated by a hostility or prejudice based on a person’s sexual orientation or perceived sexual orientation or trans identity or perceived trans identity. (College of Policing, 2014).

The survey then asked respondents to imagine that an anti-LGBT hate crime had been committed against someone in their local town (see “Emotional Reactions” section). This allowed us to ask a number of questions about respondents’ emotional reactions and behavioral intentions toward anti-LGBT hate crimes. ²⁷

Due to the size of the survey, we were able to compare the levels and frequency of (direct and indirect) victimization between lesbian, gay, and bisexual people who did not identify as trans with individuals who did identify as trans. Following on from this analysis, we then examined respondents’ emotional and behavioral intentions toward the imagined hate crime scenario across each group. ²⁸ Mediational analyses were used to assess the extent to which any differences in emotional and behavioral reactions between the two groups could be attributed to their indirect or direct experiences of hate crimes. Finally, the survey measured each groups’ attitudes toward the Government and criminal justice agencies, and how these attitudes were influenced by any prior contact with them. ²⁹

Note that all questions used the term anti-LGBT hate crime as against homophobic or anti-trans hate crime. This was to allow for simplicity in the survey, but it also reflects the fact that anti-LGBT hate crime can be intersectional, with trans people often experiencing homophobic as well as transphobic abuse for their perceived gender-based transgressions (Sevelius, 2013). ³⁰

Level and Frequency of Direct and Indirect Hate Crime Victimization

Table 1 reveals that, compared with non-trans LGB participants, trans people were significantly more likely to have been a direct victim of hate crime involving physical assaults, physical assaults with weapons, verbal abuse, and online abuse. For instance, we found that 29% of trans respondents had experienced a physical assault motivated by anti-LGBT hostility over the previous 3 years; this was more than twice the percentage reported by LGB respondents (12%). Trans people were also more likely to have indirect experiences with these types of hate crimes (Table 2). In other words, they were more likely to personally know other LGBT people who had been targeted because of their sexual orientation and/or transgender identity.

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Table 1.

Percentage of People Who Have Been Direct Victims of Hate Crimes.

	Trans (n = 59)	Non-Trans (n = 534)	χ2 Difference a
Direct verbal abuse	85	62.5	11.47***
Direct online abuse	52.5	27	16.12***
Direct vandalism	12	9	0.60
Direct assault	29	12	13.18***
Direct assault with weapon	12	5	4.19*

a

The χ² statistic denotes whether the frequencies in the trans group significantly differed from those in the non-trans group.

*

p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

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Table 2.

Percentage of People With Indirect Experiences of Hate Crimes.

	Trans (n = 59)	Non-Trans (n = 534)	χ2 Difference
Indirect verbal abuse	91.5	81.5	3.72 †
Indirect online abuse	83	55	16.66***
Indirect vandalism	34	25	2.14
Indirect assault	73	49	12.44***
Indirect assault with weapon	34	19	7.57**

†

p = .054. *p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

Not only were trans people more likely to experience verbal and physical hate crime (both directly and indirectly) overall, but they were also likely to experience incidents more frequently. The figures below show the frequency of verbal abuse and physical assaults experienced both directly and indirectly by trans participants and non-trans LGB participants.

Figures 1 to 3 show that, on average, trans people experienced direct and indirect anti-LGBT crimes more frequently than non-trans participants. For example, 54% of trans people reported more than three instances of direct verbal abuse in the past 3 years (Figure 3) and 13.5% reported more than three direct physical assaults (Figure 1). By comparison, 19.5% and 1.5% of non-trans participants experienced more than three instances of direct verbal abuse and direct physical assaults during the same period. Similarly, 71% of trans participants reported knowing more than three victims of verbal abuse and 17% knew more than three victims of physical assault, compared with 32% and 9% of non-trans participants, respectively. ³¹

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Figure 1.

Frequency of direct experiences of physical abuse in the past 3 years by percentage of trans and non-trans samples.

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Figure 2.

Frequency of indirect experiences of physical abuse in the past 3 years by percentage of trans and non-trans samples.

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Figure 3.

Frequency of direct and indirect verbal abuse in the past 3 years by percentage of trans and non-trans samples.

Reactions to Hate Crime

Emotional Reactions

As noted earlier, studies have shown that trans people’s experiences of hate crime are often marked by high levels of psychological trauma. To examine respondents’ emotional reactions of hate crime, we asked participants to “imagine that you find out that a LGBT person, who you did not personally know, was physically assaulted in an anti-LGBT hate crime in the town where you live.” Such a scenario ensured no extraneous variables concerning the hate crime (e.g., severity of crime, closeness to victim, etc.) could account for the difference in emotional reactions across participants. The scenario also allowed participants without any previous experience to be included in the sample. Both emotional reactions and behavioral intentions were measured using 1 to 7 scales (1 = do not agree at all, 7 = strongly agree).

As shown in Figure 4, we found that trans people experienced high levels of threat, vulnerability, and anxiety, which were slightly at higher levels than non-trans LGB people (though these differences were not statistically significant). ³² Trans people also experienced high levels of anger; however, this was less than non-trans people (p < .05), ³³ though note that trans people still reported a great deal of anger toward hate crime (M = 5.86 vs. 6.14 on a 7-point scale). Finally, the results also showed that trans people experienced marginally less shame (p < .07) toward hate crimes than other LGB participants.

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Figure 4.

Emotional reactions toward hate crimes.

The impacts of anti-LGBT hate crimes could be linked to trans people’s broader experiences of prejudice and “othering” in the society and within their family. Concurring with other studies outlined above, we found that trans respondents were less likely to report that they received family approval for being LGBT (trans = 3.83 vs. non-trans = 4.86, p < .001) and they were also less likely to feel supported by friends for being LGBT (trans = 5.71 vs. non-trans = 6.12 p < .05). More broadly, trans respondents felt that they received less societal approval for being LGBT (trans = 3.22 vs. non-trans = 4.13, p < .001). Further correlational analyses ³⁴ revealed that this perceived lack of support was, in part, associated with trans people’s greater number of prior experiences of anti-LGBT verbal abuse compared with non-trans participants (p < .01). This finding suggests that it is the persistence with which trans people experience hate-motivated verbal abuse that results in them feeling less supported by almost everyone around them (see also Perry & Dyck, 2014a). As we will see below, the lack of confidence in the police and the Government may further compound trans people’s feelings of isolation and societal rejection.

Behavioral Intentions

Still imagining the hate crime scenario, we asked participants how they thought they would react to hearing about the hate crime (Figure 5). It should be noted that behavioral intentions have been shown to be a significant predictor of actual behaviors (e.g., Theory of Planned Behavior, Ajzen, 1985; Armitage & Conner, 2001).

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Figure 5.

Intended behavioral responses to hate crimes.

The study found that both trans and non-trans people were likely to engage in pro-action behaviors (e.g., join LGBT support groups and charities). Importantly, we found that both trans and non-trans individuals were unlikely to want to seek (violent) retaliation. Trans people, however, were marginally more likely to engage in avoidant behaviors, such as seeing friends less often and changing their appearance, than other LGBT participants (p < .06). Interestingly, correlational analyses revealed that this intention to avoid was a consequence of their greater number of direct experiences of both verbal and online hate crimes (p < .005 and p < .05, respectively).

Perceptions of the Criminal Justice System

As outlined at the start of this article, emotional and behavioral responses to hate crime are frequently compounded by those statutory agencies that are tasked with mitigating against these impacts. As such, this study explored the experiences and attitudinal responses of trans people toward the police, the CPS, and the Government in relation to anti-LGBT hate crime.

Police Effectiveness and Perceptions of Policies and Procedures

Proportionately, slightly more trans people (32%; n = 19) had contacted the police regarding a hate crime than non-trans people (27%; n = 140), though this difference was not significant. This is somewhat surprising, considering the distinct lack of confidence that trans people generally have in the police. One possible reason for this is that there were higher rates of more serious types of hate crime reported by trans people, which are more likely to come to the attention of the police via self-reporting or by witnesses reporting incidents.

In line with other studies reviewed above, we found that trans people were more likely to believe that the police are less effective at dealing with anti-LGBT hate crimes compared with non-trans participants (Figure 6, p < .005). Further analyses ³⁵ revealed that trans people who had contact with the police officers thought the police were less effective than non-trans people who had contact with them (M = 3.13 vs. 4.24, p < .001); there was little difference between the two groups when they had not had any contact with the police (3.8 vs. 4.1). This suggests that trans people have more negative experiences with the police compared with other victims of anti-LGB hate crime.

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Figure 6.

Attitudes toward the criminal justice system.

Trans participants were slightly (and nonsignificantly) more likely to state that the police should have special policies and procedures for anti-LGBT hate crimes than non-trans participants. Again, this was qualified by the amount of contact they had had with the police, but this time, trans people who had had no contact with the police were more likely to believe that the police should have special policies and procedures (such as having specialist police officers) than non-trans participants who also had not had contact with the police (M = 5.52 vs. 4.98, p < .01). For those who had had contact with the police, the difference between the two groups was smaller, in the opposite direction, and nonsignificant (M = 5.2 and 5.5 for trans and non-trans, respectively). This provides further evidence (though by no means conclusive) that trans people are still not being provided with the support that they need from law enforcement agencies.

Contact and Attitudes Toward the CPS

A significantly higher proportion of trans people (15%; n = 9) had had experience with the prosecution service in England and Wales (CPS) in regard to a hate crime than had non-trans participants (7%; n = 36, p < .05). ³⁶ This again may indicate that trans people experience more serious/violent offenses than non-trans victims; that is, they experience those offenses which are more likely to result in a criminal prosecution.

The difference between the trans and non-trans group in their confidence in the CPS depended on whether or not they had had any contact with the CPS: those trans people who had had some contact with the CPS expressed higher confidence levels than the non-trans people who had had contact (3.7 vs. 3.1), though it is worth noting that this confidence level is still below the midpoint (4) and thus may still indicate a negative perception of the CPS. Conversely, when trans people did not have contact with the CPS, their attitudes toward the CPS were less favorable than non-trans people (who also had no contact with the CPS: M = 3.0 vs. 3.7; see Figure 7). ³⁷ This may indicate that direct engagement with the CPS improved trans people’s confidence in this institution and provided some evidence that this state agency may have slightly enhanced its responses to anti-trans hate crime.

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Figure 7.

Confidence in the CPS depends on amount of contact with it.

Discussion

Our investigation into trans people’s experiences with hate crimes suggest that they are significantly more likely than non-trans LGB people to be direct victims of hate crime that involve physical assaults, physical assaults with weapons, verbal abuse, and online abuse. Most stark is the finding that trans respondents were more than twice as likely to have experienced a hate-motivated physical assault over the past 3 years than LGB respondents. Trans respondents were also more than twice as likely to have experienced more than three incidents of hate-motivated verbal abuse over the past 3 years, and 9 times as likely to have experienced three or more hate-motivated physical assaults over the past 3 years, compared with non-trans respondents.

Building on the current knowledge base on impacts of hate crime, we found that trans people are also likely to have extensive experience of indirect victimization. Indeed, respondents were significantly more likely than non-trans LGB people to have been an indirect victim of hate crime involving physical assaults, physical assaults with weapons, verbal abuse, and online abuse. This is the first quantitative study to reveal the extent to which trans people are affected, not only by direct victimization, but by incidents which occur across trans communities.

Compounding trans people’s experiences of hate crime was the fact that individuals did not feel as supported by family, friends, and society for being LGBT as non-trans individuals (see also Perry & Dyck, 2014b). Notably, respondents’ sense of lack of support was correlated with the frequency of the direct (verbal) abuse they had previously endured. This finding illustrates how trans people can become trapped within a pernicious cycle of persistent (verbal) anti-trans abuse, which in turn exacerbates their sense of cultural and societal isolation. Such a finding speaks to our earlier reference to Butler’s work, illustrating how trans people’s experiences of the world is shaped by their performance of gender, an enactment of identity that is verbally rejected and persistently vilified by other cisgender and/or non-trans people. This ongoing process of “othering” constructs trans identity as deviant, and in turn results in pervasive forms of abuse that ultimately leads to the social and structural rejection of trans people.

Trans people’s common experiences of hate crime, combined with their feelings of social rejection, means that most individuals are implicated in what can been termed an ongoing process of victimization. In addressing this problem, statutory agencies must do more to protect against anti-trans abuse if the state is to play a credible role in supporting the needs of trans communities. Of particular concern then was that within this study, trans peoples’ attitudes toward the criminal justice system were profoundly negative (see similarly, Miles-Johnson, 2015b; Moran & Sharpe, 2004; Williams & Tregidga, 2013). In general, respondents felt that the police are not effective at policing anti-LGBT hate crime, and they are not respectful toward them as victims; this was especially true where individuals had previous contact with the police. Respondents were also less confident in the CPS to prosecute anti-LGBT hate crimes, though the level of confidence was lower where respondents had not had direct experience with the CPS. Finally, respondents believed the Government should do more to combat anti-LGBT hate crimes.

Collectively, our findings support the assertion that trans people are faced with pervasive individual and systemic forms of genderism. The data provide cogent evidence of the various direct and indirect forms of victimization that are experienced as part of a continuum of individual, social, and structural prejudice. Hate incidents against trans people should, therefore, not be viewed as one-off or isolated incidents of prejudice that are committed by hardened bigots operating at the edge of society, but as part of a process of abuse that is symptomatic of a corrupted social milieu, that which sustains a cultural resistance against individuals who transgress gender norms. We see evidence of this, not just in the commonality of targeted anti-trans hatred but in the lack of familial and societal support experienced by trans people, as well as their distinct lack of confidence in the Government and its criminal justice apparatus to protect them. The result is that hate crime, and more broadly transphobia, continues to actively restrict trans people’s equal participation in a society where they are free from discrimination and targeted violence.