Researching hate crime with LGBTQ+ individuals

Conducting social research with lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and queer (LGBTQ+) people is a particularly complex process. LGBTQ+ people have always been located within a troublesome legal framework that has (and continues in many nations in the world) criminalised, persecuted, and oppressed them. Crimes aggravated by specific identities, in this case, sexuality and gender, are a legislative construct that responds to the violence experienced by LGBTQ+ communities. Accessing LGBTQ+ communities is therefore particularly difficult, and the researcher has a delicate task in sensitively and empathically gathering the stories and experiences of anti-LGBTQ+ hate crime from victimised participants. Hate crime is an adult-centric concept that has excluded young people from its remit. Tips and strategies are offered to recruit and make space for young LGBTQ+ people. Considerable care, emotional literacy, empathy and reflection are required of the researcher to avoid retraumatising victims and create a secure space that is emotionally safe for both researcher and participant. LGBTQ+ researchers may experience the harms of hate, vicariously, through their shared identity with their participants. It is, therefore, vitally important that researchers remain introspective when researching their own community to prevent taking on the trauma of participants.