I’m not sure what the T status is there; I’ve heard conflicting reports of people having difficulty getting surgery through the health care system, though.

The US is somewhere in the middle on the queer quality-of-life scale. Cuba is lower-middle. The Arab World, Africa and some parts of Eastern Europe are the lower. Most of Western Europe, Canada and increasingly South America are upper.

PS… I LOVE the States,,I really do,,well, I guess I should say I love what I have seen. I have been to 37 States and probably know more American History than most Americans. I have graced Hermosa Beach in California and sat in a hot tub under the stars in the Smokey Mountains of Tennessee and marvelled at the mountains in Utah, a place that is breathtaking. I can’t wait for the day when you have the same rights I do. I wont stop emailing your government(s) until that day happens. Even though we are of two nationalities everyone WITH full rights cannot stop fighting for the rights of all.

Cheers!

jax

On the LGB side, homosexuality was de jure illegal in Cuba until 1979, but is still de facto illegal in some parts of the country even today. Though technically not a crime, “public decency” laws can and do lead to gay people being arrested for no reason at all. There are no discrimination protections. There are no hate crimes protections. There is no legal recognition of same-sex relationships. Gays cannot serve in the military either.

In the United States, homosexuality is completely legal throughout the country since 2003, and was legal in most of the country even before that. More than half of US states include sexual orientation as a category in their hate crimes laws and almost half protect gay people from discrimination in employment. Several states allow same-sex marriage and a quarter offer at least some form of legal recognition of same-sex relationships. Gays cannot serve in the military, though.

On the T side, sex-reassignment surgery was illegal in Cuba for thirty years. It is only now that it is being decriminalized and Cuba is joining most other parts of the world in that regard. The standards of what procedures will constitute a legal change of sex in Cuba (if such is even allowed) are unknown.

In the US, I’m not certain sex-reassignment surgery was ever illegal per se. The vast majority of states legally recognize post-op transsexuals as members of their target sex, and the procedures required for that recognition are fairly lenient. Surgery isn’t free in the US because the US does not have universal health care; it’s not a result of purposeful discrimination.

A fair look at the situation forces me to conclude that, either as LGB or T, I’d certainly prefer to live in the US than Cuba strictly in terms of how the law affects these two minority groups. Let’s not even get into the severe economic devastation and endemic poverty present in Cuba stemming from state ownership of capital and dire lack of human rights in general.