Yogyakarta Principles: How they can help your organization
Hello everyone. I hope you all had a wonderful Halloween. My son dressed up as Ghost Spider from Spidey and His Amazing Friends, which made him so happy (so did all the candy he got while trick or treating!). Of course it was wonderful to see all those kids running around in their costumes.
Last week, when discussing intersex identities, I mentioned the Yogyakarta Principles. Established in 2006 in Yogyakarta, Indonesia by human rights experts from around the globe, and updated with 10 more principles in 2017 (establishing the updated Yogyakarta plus 10), these principles focus on universal human rights around sexual orientation and gender identity and expression. In these principles, they map the complex ways that discrimination impacts LGBTQIA+ people and what can be done at the country level to combat discrimination against sexual orientation and gender identity and expression. These principles can help a nonprofit discuss LGBTQIA+ rights and social services. You can find a pdf of the original principles (2006) and the additional principles (2017) here in English. At the end of this newsletter, I have also added an image of all of the principles so you can get an idea of what is included.
How can nonprofits use the Yogyakarta Principles?
To start, many nonprofits would look at these principles and acknowledge that these are rights which LGBTQIA+ people should have. Advocacy nonprofits were quick to adopt these principles as they worked on fighting for LGBTQIA+ rights. The reason these principles were so popular so quickly, according to Thoreson (2009, p. 331) is:
Indeed, the author of these rights have created specific list of how these rights can be enacted. For example, in Principle 9, the right to treatment with humanity while in detention:
This list gives organizations specific rights to be fighting for and verbiage to use. When your organization is advocating for LGBTQIA+ rights, either for the community at large or when you advocate for LGBTQIA+ individuals, the Yogyakarta Principles provides concrete examples of how these rights should be provided. Furthermore, the Yogyakarta Principles also provide organizations with verbiage when advocating for the rights of LGBTQIA+ individuals or even creating programming which supports LGBTQIA+ communities. As you think about writing grants or writing about the LGBTQIA+ community, use these principles as guidance. Cite them as needed to provide backup to your claims.
Below is a listing of the principles. If any of them connect to your work, I encourage you to look at them in more depth.
Yogyakarta Principles plus 10
Below are the original Yogyakarta Principles:
And here are the Plus 10 which were added in 2017: