Over 300 homophobic incidents reported in Catalonia last year, triple the 2015 figure

The Observatory against Homophobia reported 318 episodes of discrimination against gay, lesbian and trans communities in 2024, according to their annual report published this week. This number is 5% higher than the previous year, and triple the figure in 2015 – indeed, 2024 has seen the record-high number of homophobic events reported since the data started to be gathered a decade ago.

The data shows that half of the discrimination events were against the gay community (51%, while 26.8% of the cases were attacks on trans people and 4.4% on lesbians –while gay men are still those facing more discrimination, incidents against trans are especially on the rise.

This year could also see a new all-time high, since the same organization has already reported 260 cases with over a trimester until the end of 2025.

According to the same study, Barcelona is the province with more cases (50.8%), followed by Girona (18.2%), Tarragona (17.3%) and Lleida (13.7%).

As for where the incidents were carried out, the public space is the most popular area, followed by nightlife venues –indeed, weekends accounted for 53.1% of the episodes, and 46.9% happened on weekdays.

The numbers "suggest that homophobia is not only linked to social or leisure activities happening on weekends, because it also arises in everyday contexts such as work, education or other spaces of everyday life," reads the report.

However, activists also call for more resources to immediately take care of victims on weekends, when services are scarcer.

In terms of ages, the range between 18 and 35 is by far the most typical one for the people who report such incidents, with 55.9% of all cases. Individuals between 36 and 50 account for 29% of the incidents, followed by those between 51 and 65 (8.9%), minors (4.5%) and people over 65 (1.7%).

During the presentation of the figures, the Observatory coordinator, Cristian Carrer, said that the uphill trend may be down to several factors, including better mechanisms to communicate incidents. Yet, he also warned that "some hatred speeches are being normalized" by certain platforms, which may lead to some people legitimizing aggressions.