Hidden Voices: Colombia ReportOUT: Hidden Voices

“My father said I’m not okay with it but that is my job as a father to educate myself, you and me, we are fine and I love you”

In this episode we speak to Germán (He/Him) a gay man from Columbia. Germán discusses with us today his own personal story as well as the barriers and resistance he found in Columbia around religion. Germán moved to Hungary in 2012 where he took part in the love is love Coca Cola campaign with his partner. Read below to hear more about him:

‘I was working in Mexico for work which was a time where I was finding myself, I was meeting gay people and exploring that side of me. So, when I came back from Mexico to Columbia it was hard for me to go back inside the closet, so I started by coming out to some friends, they were very supportive but hurt that I did not tell them sooner. Although my parents dragged me out of the closet when I was 22 in a nice way, my father was not okay about it at first, but he loves me regardless and my mother was great, but she had concerns surrounding HIV and Aids. In Columbia although it’s a religious country it isn’t an issue being gay and people are open about their sexuality. However, there is different regions in Columbia which are very driven by masculinity, but people are still open their, there is some issues surrounding religion but not the Columbia’s culture itself. Before I moved to Hungary in 2012 it was a friendly state for the LGBTQ community however since the coco cola campaign it seems LGBTQ are the government’s target for hate speech’