Fear of hate crimes has been on the rise for people in the LGBTQ+ community. There is no true way to know when an incident will occur, whether that is walking home late at night from the club, coming out of the light rail station, or simply going to the grocery store. When it comes down to any given moment that could potentially lead to a harmful outcome, one question does arise: How can a person defend themselves and navigate their body to respond in a way of protection?

In September 2024, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) released information from the FBI's 2023 [report on crime in the nation]. The statistics revealed [that that year] there were 2,403 reported incidents of hate crimes related to the victim's sexual orientation. According to the HRC, "1 in 5 of any type of hate crime is motivated by anti-LGBTQ+ bias."

When face-to-face with fears of being a target of hate, people in the community have always supported each other. Seattle has a rich history of protecting one another. The common factor of hate and fear throughout the years has led to the rise of self-defense through the Queer lens.

A community targeted

During the late 1970s, Capitol Hill started to become a hub for Seattle's LGBTQ+ community, with many dubbing it the city's "gayborhood."

However, visibility came with its fair share of opposition. On May 12, 1990, a trio of neo-Nazis had their plans uncovered by FBI agents. Their target had been the Capitol Hill Gay nightclub Neighbours, on Broadway and East Pike Street. The three men — Robert John Winslow, Stephen E. Nelson and James P. Baker — were convicted of conspiring to bomb the nightclub.

While left physically unharmed, the Queer community was shaken by the planned attack — but ready to mobilize. "We were all pretty shocked by it," said Michael Ross, a Neighbours employee interviewed by the Seattle Times at the time. "It's enough to make me think about joining the Northwest Coalition Against Malicious Harassment."

The coalition was a local effort, as stated on the National Archives website, to "end harassment and violence by stopping individual and organized bigotry ... in the Northwest." The NCAMH was created in 1987 in response to an annual Aryan Nation meeting being held in Idaho. The nonprofit entity had over 200 affiliated private and public organizations and operated until 2003.

Self-made community defense

In 1991, a year after the plot to bomb Neighbours, a [subgroup of Queer Nation Seattle] — along with some allies —formed the safety patrol group Q-Patrol, short for "Queer Patrol," according to a 1993 study on Gay and Lesbian street patrols by Kirstin Dodge. The formation of the group came in reaction to the perceived lack of efforts from the city and specifically the Seattle Police Department (SPD) to keep the community safe.

Q-Patrol donned berets similar to the Guardian Angels, a New York City-based group that influenced and even trained members of Q-Patrol. Q-Patrol was never armed, but members could be seen walking Capitol Hill six nights a week, carrying flashlights and radios, from the evening hours to early mornings. In lieu of being armed, members were taught self-defense and de-escalation tactics to navigate incidents.

According to Dodge, the group's "statement of purpose" was similar to that of other activists around the country. It clearly stated who the group was and what its goals were: "Q-Patrol is a group dedicated to stopping the violence against us, commonly known as Gay-bashing. To end the harassment, threats and physical assaults, we will visibly walk the streets of Capitol Hill." It also specifically [mentioned] members not arming themselves, but [reminded] them to be "prepared to intervene to prevent bashing and malicious harassment."

Q-Patrol's statement ended by calling out the system: "We can no longer wait. While the bureaucracy collects statistics and talks about the problem, Q-Patrol takes action!"

A contemporaneous article by the Seattle Times reported that, by 1996, Q-Patrol had grown to a team of six full-time and about 30 part-time volunteers coming from a variety of occupations, including lawyers, students, a scientist, and a computer programmer. Initially, the SPD doubted the group, but in 1996, it partly attributed a reduction of crime in Capitol Hill to Q-Patrol's efforts. Between 1993 and 1995, violent crime fell 41% in Capitol Hill, compared to 34% citywide.

Due to the group's effectiveness in crime prevention, Q-Patrol's operations expanded into other neighborhoods, including Pioneer Square and the University District.

Eventually the group disbanded in 2005, according to a 2016 post on the group's official Facebook page.

In 2017, an entirely new Q-Patrol was begun, with a focus on harm reduction efforts, as a response to a spike in hate crimes reported in the neighborhood. This iteration was ignited by a rising concern [over] gentrification and the results of the 2016 presidential election. The original Q-Patrol did not have any direct link to the new group.

Q-Patrol was not the only community safety organization that emerged in Seattle; 1993 saw the rise of Home Alive, a self-defense class that promoted the benefits of people being able to protect themselves from potential attacks. Home Alive was a direct reaction to the July 7, 1993, Capitol Hill-area rape and murder of Mia Zapata, lead singer of the popular local punk band The Gits. Zapata was attacked while walking home in the early morning after playing a show at the Comet Tavern, on East Pike Street and 10th Avenue.

Home Alive filled a gap by providing training relevant to attacks that occurred in the city. It shut down the common message from other classes of the time telling women to dress more conservatively and never walk alone at night.

Home Alive closed down its nonprofit operations in 2010 due to constant financial ups and downs, but it continues to function on a smaller, volunteer basis.

The city's response to continued violence

In recent years, the City of Seattle has taken some strides to improve safety for its Queer community. In 2015, Seattle's then-Mayor Ed Murray, who was also the city's first openly Gay mayor, put together a 30-person task force composed of social workers, community organizers, and members of the SPD to address a rise in "reported bias crimes and verbal attacks perpetrated against LGBTQ people," according to the action plan's release document.

Additional citywide initiatives became more visible, such as installing rainbow crosswalks and beginning Safe Place campaigns. As to whether that program has been effective, folks in the Queer community have [expressed that] they still feel unsafe when engaging with local law enforcement.

Murray also signed an executive order in 2015 that required city staff to "be trained in the rights of Transgender people," as well as [designating] single-occupant restrooms in city-operated facilities and private places ... "all gender" by March 2016.

Queer self-defense today

Echoes of the past continue to put those in the LGBTQ+ community up against uncertain circumstances. A day after the 2024 presidential election, a Gay man was assaulted in Capitol Hill by a Trump supporter.

Although the SPD is investigating the crime for "bias elements," no matter what the department determines, Queer people still sense a threat facing their safety, even in places and neighborhoods that are supposed to feel welcoming.

When it comes to going to local law enforcement, Queer people have had a long history of instead protecting one another from threats. The slogan "We keep each other safe" is used by many groups, including among LGBTQ+ folks, as a reminder that community members are each others' best support.

Patterns of mistrust in law enforcement have shaped major movements in Queer history, from the Stonewall riots of 1969 to ACT UP demonstrations during the AIDS epidemic, [among others]. In April, the ACLU released statistics highlighting the poor relationships between LGBTQ+ people and the police. Among that data, the ACLU reported that 26.8% of Trans people "reported experiencing physical force by police," while Black Trans people were the most likely to experience physical force from the police compared to LGBTQ+ people of other races.

Additionally, the ACLU found that Trans and Nonbinary respondents "were significantly more likely than LGBTQ+ cisgender men to have experienced insulting language by the police."

As the community braces for the incoming second Trump administration, which has built its platform on attacking the wellbeing and rights of Queer people, some feel the need to be able to learn to protect themselves from an incident.
While legacy self-defense groups like Q-Patrol and Home Alive are not currently active, community members continue to equip others with resources and knowledge about different types of self-defense.

The group Queer Trans Combat Arts Seattle, on Instagram as @qt.combatarts206, provides resources [so] people can locate Queer- and Trans-specific combat classes. Some of these events are held at Ballard Jiu Jitsu (BJJ).

Gwen Roote, a jiu-jitsu instructor who leads a class focused on welcoming LGBTQ+ folks at BJJ every other Sunday, said martial arts offers a way for everyone to feel more in touch with what their body can do.

"A lot of people like finding [that] their limits for movement are more expansive than they had thought," Roote said.

"You don't have to be super athletic to defend yourself," Roote continued. "I think that's one of the coolest things about jiu-jitsu — that you can just learn a couple of mental skills, and then it's, wow, your body is a weapon."

At Peer Seattle, a Queer community center in Capitol Hill, Kylie Ylenia shares that attitude of empowerment. They help teach Queer self-defense and movement classes every Tuesday at the community center. Ylenia's main focus is on movement, the body, and how to develop an intentional philosophy around how the two coexist.

"So it's not just about the way you physically defend yourself," Ylenia said of the classes, "but also how you carry yourself and how you think about your body in relationship to the conflict you're engaging with."

They said having a safe space where everybody is eager to learn and engage with each other can inspire confidence. That means people feel able to respond to a harmful situation, even one self-directed.

Ylenia acknowledged a shift in classes since the presidential election, as well as the recent attacks on Capitol Hill.

"Everybody just definitely has their ... safety on their mind a lot more right now," Ylenia said. "I also think that a lot of us are looking for a community.

"I think we really just wanted to have a space where we can provide for each other in some way."

This piece originally ran in Real Change (https://www.realchangenews.org/news/2024/11/27/legacy-seattle-s-queer-self-defense-scene)