Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) history in Belgium has evolved through the centuries. According to LGBTQ scholars Bart Eeckhout and David Paternotte, Belgium, which is considered a conservative nation, has developed into one of the world's most progressive and LGBTQ-friendly states. From the 16th century, Roman Catholic values influenced attitudes towards LGBTQ rights. Homosexuality was decriminalised in the 18th century, but sodomy remained punishable until the 19th century. Belgium developed into a more LGBTQ friendly state in the 21st century; Belgium's anti-discrimination law ensures that discrimination based on sexual orientation is illegal and introduced new transgender legal rights. In 2003, Belgium became the second country, after the Netherlands, to open civil union to same-sex couples, and granted same-sex couples the right to adopt in 2006. Belgium continues to provide asylum for individuals who may be persecuted for their sexual inclinations. The country has also implemented new education policies to combat school discrimination against LGBTQ people and has allowed IVF and artificial insemination to be available for same-sex couples.
Social and political changes from the 19th - 20th century, such as the rise of secularisation and the sexual revolution, contributed to the development of LGBTQ movements, gay liberation groups and uncensored media, all of which were important in influencing change and acceptance of the LGBTQ population. Additionally, the debate around the importance of marriage and the fluctuating nature of the political system, and the transfer of power from conservative Christian Democrats to the more progressive six-party coalition resulted in new changes to legislation. However, setbacks such as the AIDS epidemic and discrimination during LGBTQ events has furthered fear and sentiment against certain LGBTQ members of the community.
16th century
From the 16th century, Roman Catholicism dominated Belgium. European Catholicism depended heavily on an individual's unwavering obedience to Catholic beliefs, resulting in Roman Catholicism having strong "historic ties'' and influence on Belgian leadership and surrounding powers. The dominance of Catholicism in the social and political landscape contributed to the societal views on homosexuality. Religion has been used to justify anti-gay sentiment.
1500s Sodomy of any kind, including same-sex sodomy, was heavily repressed in Belgium during the 1500s. Sodomy was considered an 'unnatural crime' and was punished with death by burning.
1558 On 26 January, two boys, 19-year-old François van Daele and the 14-year-old Willem de Clerck, were sent to the scaffold to be punished for their same sex relationship with a priest. Both boys were given heavy sentences including being flogged with rods until they bleed and having their hair burned off with a glowing hot iron. The boys were later banned from Flanders after their tortures.
1565 There were a high number of sodomy prosecutions in Belgium. Between 1400 and 1700, there were 204 trials for sodomy charges, involving 406 individuals, in Antwerp, Bruges, Brugse Vrije (the Franc of Bruges), Brussels, Ghent, Ypres, Louvain and Mechelen. 252 of those charged were put to the stake, more than half of the defendants who were accused of sodomy in Belgium were put to death.
1578 On June 28th, homosexual monks were purged via execution in Ghent.
17th century The criminalisation of homosexuality in Belgium fell under laws related to debauchery and public indecency.
Medical doctors tried to cure homosexuality. Gay men were sent to psychiatrists and treated with female hormones. Many gay men or 'patients' would lie saying they were 'cured' to get rid of their psychiatrists. When the treatment stopped, doctors and psychiatrists would describe the treatment as 'successful' in magazines and conferences. Treatments took time, were expensive and non-effective.
1620 -- Jacob Jordaens paints "The Flight of Lot and his family from Sodom."
18th century Homosexuality in Belgium was decriminalised in 1795.
Same-sex sodomy was still considered an issue by this time. In 1776, Henricus Masso was interrogated in Antwerp by magistrates regarding an accusation of sodomy. They asked several valid legal questions including where he stayed, with whom he shared a bed with and what he and his companion had done together. Despite providing adequate information about his sexual encounters, Masso was asked further questions. These questions included, "What his partner had given or promised him for his sexual cooperation, whether other boys frequented the same house, whether his partner 'associated with any women,' and whether he himself had committed sodomy with others." The magistrates not only wanted Masso's confession, but wanted to record everything about this event and its context. The interrogation questions Masso was subjected to were commonly used in sodomy cases in Belgium during the 18th century.
Peter Stocker, in 1780, was also asked multiple detailed questions about his sexual encounters with two young men. The inquiry into Stocker revealed that he had sexual relations with many men, but the magistrates were primarily interested in why he had many relationships with men. Both Stocker and his partners were interrogated by the magistrates, who asked questions about the actual occurrence of sodomy. About Stocker's other partners, how Stocker had "seduced" his younger partners and whether Stocker had "moral awareness of the graveness of their actions." Whether Stocker understood that what he did was 'wrong.' The reason why magistrates asked such questions, some of which were not legally relevant as evidence, was to find ways to limit or eliminate the problem of sodomy.
After Stocker's case for example, the mayor of Antwerp wrote "they have declared that the crime of sodomy strictly speaking reigns in Antwerp, and that it is to be hoped that an exemplary punishment will be made to make the enormity of the crime known and to inspire more horror." Punishments for those convicted of sodomy did become stricter. Up to 1789, sex between men, under the official name 'sodomy,' had become a serious offence. Sodomy became associated, through religious teachings and law, with bestiality, masturbation, sinning and the apocalypse.
However, the true extremity of sodomy charges and punishments, and whether they were enforced equally in Belgium is debated. Despite the high-profile cases of Masso and Stocker, from the 1600s onwards sodomy trials became rare in Belgium. It was believed that if sodomy occurred, there was less inclination to prosecute those committing the act to avoid public scandal. Although in the 16th century sodomites were publicly executed as a form of public deterrence, most of the recorded sodomy court cases in the 1600s were dismissed based on lack of evidence.
During the 18th century, other same-sex acts also became minor concerns. The harsher punishments surrounding sodomy also seemed to have little effect on same-sex sexual behaviour. Many individuals continued to involve themselves in sodomy.
Changing political and social landscape of Belgium
19th century In the 19th century sodomy ceased to be a crime and a legitimate legal concept. This was a legal improvement for those engaged in same-sex sexual activities. Different sexual relationships and practices continued, but motivations to engage in such events or why individuals chose to perform same-sex sexual activities were no longer recorded by legal institutions.
20th century Secularisation began to appear in Belgium in areas such as Francophone Belgium and some Flemish urban centres including Antwerp and Ghent. Secularism was adopted by Belgian freethinkers, socialist and liberalist politicians, who aimed to liberate Belgium from the influence of the Church. Dechristianisation was the product of the joint activism between the free-thinking movement and the working-class socialist movement in the Francophone south of Belgium.
1940s
1945 Many university hospitals, like the Flemish and Francophone Free University of Brussels, ideologically aligned with secularisation. Hence, they enacted strong humanist policies, including surgery for transgender individuals and in-vitro fertilisation for lesbian couples, going against and systematically diminishing the social and moral power of Roman Catholicism in Belgium. The secularisation of institutions meant surgery and reproductive technologies are available and affordable for the LGBT community.
Secularisation saw the widespread resistance and de-idealisation of marriage as a social institution, with many heterosexual Belgians choosing to not get married. Hence, legislation had to reduce discrimination between married and unmarried couples; for example, reducing financial privileges for married individuals. As the importance of marriage diminished and the ideological and material differences between the married and unmarried reduced, Belgians were unlikely to disapprove of attempts to open civil marriage to the LGBT community.
1950s The Dutch Centre for Leisure and Culture (COC) influenced gay liberation Flemish movements in Flanders and Belgium's Dutch speaking north. Suzanne de Pues, a Belgian woman, experienced the COC and the International Committee for Sexual Equality (ICSE). And in 1953, she worked to found a gay liberation group in Belgium. de Pues established the association Centre Culturel Belge—Cultuurcentrum België (CCB; Culture Center Belgium), under her pseudonym Suzan Daniel.
In 1954, the first public activity of the CCB took place in Brussels, a second activity occurred in October 1954. At the second meeting a man humiliated Daniel by interrupting the event and stating he would not be taking 'orders' from a woman. Soon after, Daniel left the association and informed the ICSE that the CCB would be dissolved. Many issues arose leading to the termination of the CCB, the primary cause being disrespect from the male members and the conflicting views regarding the purpose of CCB; Daniel wanted to focus on the cultural and social importance of the association, potentially using it influence change in relation to LGBT laws and social acceptance of the community. Whilst many men saw the group as a place of meeting, relaxation and enjoyment.
In the 1950s, the LGBT community had to be as concealed as possible, not drawing too much attention to themselves. They had to "disappear" into the wider community and effeminate men and masculine women were not accepted in society.
Gay individuals were called "homophiles" or "homophily" which was considered a less offensive term because it referred to an individual who loved someone of the same sex, 'homosexuality' was a less used term because of its common association with sexual intercourse. In both the Netherlands and Belgium, the LGBT community received assistance from humanist organisations and sex-reform movements. The Flemish Humanist League was created in 1951.
The age of consent In 1912 Belgium set their age of consent to 16 years, this unanimously applied to all Belgians regardless of sexuality. However, in the second half of the 1950s multiple authors wrote in Belgian legal magazines to raise the age of consent for same-sex relationships. The authors relied on so-called seduction theory; that older gay men in Belgium try to seduce and convert young individuals into becoming gay.
Belgian Parliament adopted seduction theory in 1965, and passed Article 372bis of the Criminal Code which raised the age of consent for gay and lesbian contacts to 18 years. Ultimately, discrimination against gay and lesbian individuals in the Criminal Code became a reality.