Current anti-LGBTIQA+ hate crime prevention initiatives, and how they can be strengthened.
As Victoria’s dedicated agency for primary prevention, Respect Victoria would like to highlight the important work of the prevention sector in preventing violence against LGBTIQA+ people and communities.
The overlap in drivers of gendered violence and violence against LGBTIQA+ communities presents a clear opportunity to strengthen and extend existing primary prevention approaches to better address heteronormativity and cisnormativity supportive attitudes that drive homophobia, biphobia and transphobia – and, in turn, hate crimes against LGBTIQA+ communities.
Violence against women and LGBTIQA+ communities is deeply interconnected, rooted in many of the same harmful beliefs, attitudes and behaviours that drive gender inequality. Primary prevention offers a shared solution – by challenging and improving the underlying attitudes that enable all forms gendered violence. This focus can also prevent ongoing discrimination and hate crimes against LGBTIQA+ communities.
Increased support and investment in primary prevention that has a deep understanding of these shared drivers is critical to building a safe, respectful and equal Victoria.
Case Study: Love You Queerly
Love You Queerly is a collaboration between Zoe Belle Gender Collective and Respect Victoria, a seven part video series featuring trans and gender diverse Victorians reflecting on messages of love and support collected at Midsumma Carnival 2026.
Trans and gender diverse people have the right to enjoy safe and respectful relationships, and live free from discrimination and violence. Transphobia, transmisogyny and harmful beliefs about gender that can lead to hate crimes and other forms of violence often go unchallenged, and can be reinforced in the media and upheld in systems and policies. The project aims to share positive messaging that celebrates connection and collective care, highlighting that love, hope, community, safety and allyship are the path to change.
Primary prevention of gendered violence
Victoria has a well-established primary prevention system and workforce with significant expertise and experience in addressing the drivers of gendered violence, including violence against LGBTIQA+ communities (17).
A number of specialist organisations and professionals design and deliver evidence-based primary prevention programs aimed at addressing underlying drivers of violence to prevent it from occurring in the first place (18). This work takes a whole of population approach, including a targeted approach to support children and young people to strengthen understandings of equality, respect and healthy relationships.
The primary focus of the prevention workforce has been to address cisgender men’s violence against cisgender women. However, following many years of advocacy and support by LGBTIQA+ led organisations and communities, the Victorian primary prevention and women’s health sector has taken steps to expand the focus to preventing gendered violence more broadly in recognition of how harmful gender norms also impact LGBTIQA+ communities, particularly trans and gender diverse people (19).
Ongoing work is needed to ensure that mainstream primary prevention activity is inclusive of LGBTIQA+ people and communities.
Case Study: National framework to prevent gender-based violence against LGBTIQA+ people and communities
In 2024, Our Watch and Rainbow Health Australia established a three-year partnership to develop a national, evidence-based framework to prevent gender-based violence against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer and asexual (LGBTIQA+) people and communities, due for completion in 2027. Rainbow Health Australia has been funded by the Victorian Government since 2019 to deliver the LGBTIQA+ Family Violence Prevention Project, developing the Pride in Prevention framework and resources that led the way in incorporating the drivers of violence for LGBTIQ+ communities into mainstream prevention work.
The new framework aims to advance understanding of the drivers of gender-based violence against LGBTIQA+ people and communities and equip more individuals and organisations to take meaningful preventative action.
It is important that the forthcoming framework is supported and resourced so that it is embedded across primary prevention work. Importantly, this includes supporting holistic workforce capacity building for the sector, led by LGBTIQA+ community organisations.
Key Consideration 2:
Dedicated and sustained investment in primary prevention of all forms of gendered violence. Including for:
(a) initiatives that address the drivers of violence against LGBTIQA+ communities
(b)embedding intersectional and gender-transformative approaches in mainstream organisations and programs
(c)partnerships between mainstream primary prevention organisations and LGBTIQA+ community organisations
(d) increased meaningful visibility of LGBTIQA+ people who are representative of the diversity of communities in all state and national strategies and action plans, including reportable, defined actions and goals to normalise and embed inclusive practice design and resourcing.
Key Consideration 3:
Support workforce development and capacity building to ensure that prevention efforts include effective and evidence-informed, strategies and programs that address the drivers and impacts of violence against LGBTIQA+ communities, particularly trans and gender diverse people, across justice, community, health and mainstream family, sexual violence and prevention organisations.
Primary prevention and young people
The Royal Commission into Family Violence and Change the Story highlight education settings as a critical site for primary prevention, supporting children and young people to strengthen understandings of equality, respectful and healthy relationships. A central initiative is the Victorian Government’s Respectful Relationships initiative, which operates across all government schools and participating Catholic and independent schools, to build a culture of respect and gender equality, tackling attitudes and behaviours that can lead to gendered violence.
The proliferation of misogynistic and homophobic messaging through the manosphere are having harmful impacts on young people, educators and wider school communities. Female teachers and students are increasingly reporting experiences of misogyny and sexual harassment in classrooms, in some cases, causing teachers to leave the profession (33).
Respectful Relationships education and other school based programs, such as the eSmart program, have been updated and established to provide digital literacy and online safety for students. There are opportunities to expand existing programs to more comprehensively address digital radicalisation, homophobia, transphobia and anti-LGBTIQA+ prejudice. To support this, there is a need to provide capability building support for educators to safely navigate conversations about social media and the manosphere with young people (34).
Experience and expertise of LGBTIQA+ communities
There is significant experience and expertise across LGBTIQA+ community-led organisations in delivering primary prevention programs and initiatives. However, organisations and programs, particularly trans and gender diverse organisations, often face funding insecurity or are not adequately resourced to do this work to the extent that is needed (19).
Community-led approaches and LGBTIQA+ leadership in both specialist and mainstream prevention activities are critical to ensuring the work is inclusive, relevant, meaningful and effective. Increasingly, LGBTIQA+ community-led organisations and the primary prevention workforce are partnering to prevent and respond to violence, with specialist expertise and experience in preventing violence against their communities.
Case Study: Allyship in action - Zoe Belle Gender Collective and Women's Health in the North.
In April 2024, Zoe Belle Gender Collective, a trans and gender-diverse led advocacy organisation, partnered with Women's Health in the North to deliver the Allyship in Action forum. In 2026, the partnership published a framework for trans and gender diverse inclusion in prevention of gender-based violence initiatives.
Allyship in Action demonstrates meaningful interest within the violence prevention sector in developing transformative frameworks that are responsive to both the shared and unique drivers of violence against women and trans and gender diverse people. This highlights that equitable partnerships between mainstream organisations and trans and gender diverse-led groups are essential - amplifying impact, sharing power and building mutual capacity.
To strengthen and expand primary prevention of gendered violence, including against LGBTIQA+ communities, sustained investment and targeted prevention initiatives that are relevant to different communities is essential. This includes adequately funding organisations to ensure they are properly resourced and remunerated so that they have a seat at formative policy and legislative discussion. This is critical to embed the perspectives, priorities, and leadership of marginalised and underrepresented communities in the design and delivery of government-funded prevention policies and programs.
Key Consideration 4:
Targeted resourcing and support for LGBTIQA+ community-led organisations that work with and support the diversity of communities experience harm to enable sustainability and long-term planning and create pathways into the prevention workforce for LGBTIQA+ people.
Key Consideration 5:
Require and resource inclusion of the perspectives and priorities of LGBTIQA+ communities in relevant government-funded prevention policy and program design.
Focus on men and masculinities
In recent years, there has been increased focus on the attitudes, beliefs and messages in society that convey that a ‘real man’ should be tough, dominant and comply with hetero and cisnormativity. These social pressures can lead to a culture of violence by men against themselves and those around them, including women and LGBTIQA+ people (20).
Stereotypical masculine norms emphasise homophobia and transphobia, which can condone and encourage violence against gender diverse people and more broadly members of the LGBTQIA+ communities, including men who do not align or conform to stereotypical forms of masculinity. Young men’s levels of homophobia have been largely consistent over the last 5 years, with data from The Man Box 2024 report finding that one quarter of young men agree that it is not okay for heterosexual men to be friends with gay men or gender diverse people (23% and 22% respectively), and 39% agreeing that ‘a transgender man is not a real man’.
Man Box data in 2018 and in 2024 shows that while a significant minority of Australian men condone and perpetrate violence against women, and are homophobic or transphobic, the majority of men reject these ideals. Respect Victoria’s 2024 report, Willing Capable and Confident further interrogates these findings, outlining that men’s behaviours are shaped not only by personally-held beliefs, but also by feeling social pressure to be seen to align with these beliefs in order to maintain their social networks.
Case Study: Respect Victoria 'What Kind of Man' campaign
Respect Victoria's 'What Kind of Man Do You Want to Be? campaign invites men to reflect on and interrogate the social pressures associated with masculinities and their role in building safer and more respectful relationships, families and communities.
The campaign features real Victorian men sharing honest stories about navigating harmful gender norms and taking accountability for their actions. The campaign was informed by the findings of the Man Box study, expert and sector consultation and community testing. It was designed to be embedded in and support primary prevention work with men and boys that focuses on healthy forms of masculinities.
Since June 2025, the campaign has reached over 3.1 million Victorians. It has resulted in more than 22.5 million video views and 22,000 website visits. Future campaigns will deepen men's understanding of the link between rigid gender stereotypes and violence and how to safely and meaningfully challenge these stereotypes.
Primary prevention efforts play a vital role in engaging with men as individuals, while also addressing the social systems, structures, organisations and communities that create and enable these masculine norms. This includes opening conversations about the many forms of masculinities and how they can challenge gender roles and stereotypes safely. Meaningful engagement with men and boys, requires a commitment to a gender transformative approach that examines, challenges and transforms the causes of gender inequality and strengthens actions that support gender equality (21). This is crucial in addressing the drivers that lead to hate crimes against LGBTIQA+ people and communities.