"None of us are free until all of us are free. And make no mistake about it! The ruling today was just the first step. It continues. The struggle continues."
 
~ Senior Counselor Lisa Shoman who represented plaintiff Caleb Orozco in his complaint that the law criminalizing homosexuality in Belize was unconstitutional. In a landmark ruling, Chief Justice Kenneth Benjamin struck down the law.

"The real reason we haven’t beaten the epidemic boils down to one simple fact: We value some lives more than others. 

We value men more than women. Straight love more than gay love. White skin more than black skin. The rich more than the poor. And adults more than adolescents. I know this because AIDS does not discriminate on its own. It has no biological preference... it doesn't single out the vulnerable, the oppressed or the abused. We single out the vulnerable, the oppressed and the abused. We ignore them, we let them suffer and then we let them die."

~ actress Charlize Theron, addressing the 21st International AIDS Conference in South Africa

"There is nothing more beautiful than looking out into the world and seeing nothing but support and generosity from our community of brothers. And I can tell you one thing, we are not tired, and we are not going to give up."

~Yuli Rustinawati, co-founder of the Indonesian LGBTIQ rights group Arus Pelangi, accepting an award for her work at an OutRight International gala.

“There was a time in our history when we turned thousands of ordinary young men into criminals. And it was profoundly and unimaginably wrong."
~ Victorian State Premier, Daniel Andrews MP in a formal apology to Australians who suffered under the criminalization of homosexuality in the country.

…[R]eaching the counseling room I found a lady seated there and she asked for my history and I told them how I love and sleep with boys and the lady looked at me and she said, “we don't offer services to such people.”

And I was like “I’m a human being who is dying soon, can you please give me drugs and I go?” She told me to move out of the center and go somewhere else. Meanwhile she started calling people to come and see “this rotten person,” so I had to walk out the center and went back home.

I felt like committing suicide — so lost and confused.

~Adroa, a 26 year-old Ugandan who was denied access to HIV treatment because of his sexual orientation.  via 'And That's How I Survived Being Killed'

“Ke nako ya gore re amogele gore re na le batho ba mohuta oo mo Botswana. Go thola re ganetsa selo se re se itseng kgotsana re se bone ga gona go re thusa ka sepe.

[It is time we accept that we have these people in our lives. To continuously deny these facts would not help us in any way. We live with these people in our societies, we need to embrace them and create enabling and welcoming environment in our society and health facilities]"

~ City councillor Sesupo Jacobs from Bostwana  as the Gaborone City Council urged the national government to decriminalise same-sex sexual relationships

“It is absolutely sickening and ridiculous that in the 21st century a homosexual act gets a person in Cameroon six months to five years imprisonment.” 
Barrister Walter Atoh

‘We can’t have one group benefitting while another is suffering. We [The Ministry] do not share the view that the rights of citizens are good for one but not the others.’
~ Guyana Minister of Social Protection, Hon. Volda Lawrence

"I've become disillusioned and even passive since the Supreme Court's 2013 ruling on Section 377. I'm just tired of speaking up. People don't realise how the law fuels social prejudice." 
~ Onir, Indian filmmaker as the Supreme Court reconsiders Section 377 of the penal code that criminalizes homosexuality.

“I have been going to the mountain to pray about [how to stop being gay], fasting and I came to the point that I was just starving myself…it’s something that I have tried and I have come to the point where I am saying: this is me and if I try to run away from myself, then who am I going to be?”  
~ Eric Sambisa, from Malawi

If God wanted just another heterosexual, God could have created one, but instead God created me fabulous. My sexual orientation is something I cannot change.” 

~ Johann De Joodt, after his years spent engaged in ‘conversion therapy’ in Australia

"While the criminal laws exist, people will feel shame, and the hypocrisy will continue. Hypocrites often look at gay men purely in terms of a sex act, not human beings who love, who work, who pay taxes."
~Eric Gitari, Kenyan lawyer who was outed by tabloids

“Homosexuals are around us, like it or not, this is a fact that has been true since long ago and it is still true today. They might be those closest to us, our children, our siblings, our grandchildren, or our best friends, but sometimes we have no empathy for this issue. They are not people who have invaded from the West but rather they are part of us."

~ Hartoyo, an LGBT activist from Jakarta in an open letter to a newly-elected politician

"We were seen, we were counted...and in the end we were valued."
  ~ Jensen Byrne, UN volunteer on the importance of Ireland's National Referendum on marriage equality.

Will I prioritize [rights] over finding money for food? Labor issues, issues of the workforce are issues of LGBT people. And the sooner we recognize that, then the sooner we can provide responses to the needs of members of our community who need proper attention”
~ Claire, a transgender woman, on the striking workforce at Tanduay Distillers Inc in the Philippines

I respect culture, tradition and religion, but they can never justify the denial of basic rights. My promise to the lesbian, homosexual, bisexual and transgender members of the human family is this: I’m with you. I promise that as Secretary-General of the United Nations I will denounce attacks against you and I will keep pressing leaders for progress.
~ UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon to the International Conference on Human Rights, Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity