CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

"Whether based on sexual orientation, race, religion, or ethnicity, bigotry and the intolerance it inspires pose a grave threat to the peace and harmony of our communities. The need to alert Americans to this threat is great. We need especially to educate our youth about tolerance and about appreciating the benefits that we enjoy as a result of our culture's rich diversity of peoples, beliefs, and ways of living."

All of us have the need to feel safe in our local environment and a right to be comfortable as individuals within society. In response to these human needs and rights, the professions of landscape architecture, urban design, planning, and architecture attempt to provide safe spaces for inhabitants of cities, towns, and houses. Much of the historical reorganization of spaces within cities was a response to the perceived threat of crime and diminished levels of personal safety. Fortified city walls, fences, zoning of land uses and urban renewal or slum clearance were all actions implemented to improve the safety of urban inhabitants, though these measures benefited some residents more than others (Brantingham 1989: 344-345). In the 1970s, the relationship between crime and the physical environment was popularized through the publication of three well known books: The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs (1961), Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design by C. Ray Jeffery (1971), and Defensible Space: Crime Prevention Through Urban Planning by Oscar Newman (1972). All three make a case for designing neighborhoods that empower the residents, giving them the ability to control their environment thereby improving the security of their homes and communities. An aspect of this local social control involves monitoring public space through the private gaze or having eyes on the street. One important aspect of these books is the fact that they popularized the concept of environmental and behavioral interactions and the impact of this relationship on criminal activities. Subsequently, a surge of interest developed in the field of environmental criminology.

Both in the US and Britain, the growing field of environmental criminology laid the foundation for investigations into the relationship between crime and the physical environment. From the late 1970s to the late 1980s, many studies found that the physical features of neighborhoods influence crime rates (Bevis and Nutter, 1977; Waller and Okihiro, 1978; Brantingham and Brantingham 1984; Freeman 1988, and Brantingham 1989). British researcher Richard Davidson summarizes the conclusions best, "There is no way that acts which constitute violent behavior can be separated from the settings in which they occur" (1989: 60). Davidson (1989) provides a thorough review of the literature on situational /environmental criminology studies in Britain/England up to 1986. Davidson also evaluated the relationships between violence and setting in regard to assaults as reported in the second British Crime Survey (1989). His findings show that out of 55% of the incidents that took place in public settings, 42% were -. outside, 34% were in the street (1989: 75). The physical settings of crime locations revealed a further dimension to the gender dichotomy. While males tended to be assaulted in the public space of the street, females tended to be assaulted indoors, in private space (Davidson, 1989: 75). However, three separate reviews of the research in environmental criminology (Mawby 1977; Mayhew 1979; and Taylor, et al. 1980) concluded that pre-1980 studies didn't address or isolate the effects of other important demographic variables, such as culture, race, or sexual orientation. Sexual orientation becomes an important consideration especially when dealing with issues of safety and sexual minorities, as "gay and lesbian respondents were much more likely than heterosexuals to say that their risk [of assault] was increased by their sexual orientation" (Hollander 1997: 194).

As potential targets of violent hate crimes, gays and lesbians must consider the safety of the environments they inhabit. In her dissertation on gender construction and violence title "Discourse of Danger: The Construction of Gender Through Talk about Violence," Jocelyn Hollander studied perceptions of violence, risk, and danger through a survey and dialogue analysis. She found "gay and lesbian respondents were more likely than straight respondents to have considered the safety of their neighborhood before moving in: 92.3% of gay and lesbian participants said they had done this compared with only 43.1% of heterosexual participants" (Hollander 1997: 122). In other studies investigating the physical location of anti-gay violence, there is a similar relationship between public spaces, violent assault and gender that Davidson found in his 1989 study. For example, Gary Comstock's 1991 survey of 157 gay and lesbians throughout the U. S., he found that 59% were victimized in public lesbian/gay areas, 66% of these were men, and 45% were women (51-52). Comstock goes on to say, "a comparison of my findings with national crime statistics shows that both anti-gay/lesbian violence and criminal violence in general occur most frequently in public areas" (1991: 51). Even more specifically, Comstock found that anti-gay violence most often occurs in queer spaces2.

The communities created by sexual minorities are perceived as safe havens from the prejudice, discrimination, and threats of violence that surround the daily life of queers within heterosexist and homophobic society (Myslik 1996). However, this perception of the queer district as a safe haven doesn't correspond to survey data of actual hate crime locations. Comstock found the largest percentage of verbal harassment (41%) occurred outside of a queer bar, disco, or bathhouse ( 1991: 142). Antigay crime is a constant threat in public areas. Between the years of 1983 and 1993, the number of nationally reported incidents rose, most occurring within recognized queer spaces (National Gay and Lesbian Task Force 1994). In Seattle, the largest percentage of anti-gay hate crimes occurs within the East Precinct (65%) which includes the nationally known "gay-identified district" of Capitol Hill (Seattle Commission for Lesbians and Gays 1995: 2-3). Spaces in which gays and lesbians are visible, gather, and live, often are the settings for anti-gay violence. According to Wayne. D. Myslik, "the congregation of people which provides an emotional and psychological safety itself undermines physical safety by advertising the existence and location of a target group" (1996: 168). Myslik's study of Dupont Circle in Washington D.C. asks the question, "Why do gay men continue to identify queer spaces as safe spaces?" (1996:157). His study provides the following answer:

As sites of resistance to the oppressions of a heterosexist and homophobic society ... queer spaces create the strong sense of empowerment that allows men to look past the dangers of being gay in the city and to feel safe and at home. Overwhelmingly, they consider the psychological and social benefits of open association worth the physical risk taken in queer spaces. For gay men, coping with the presence of violence is an act of negotiating power in society. (Myslik 1996:169)

Many studies have addressed "violence against gay men, issues of crime, safety, fear, and vulnerability, and heterosexism as a cultural system and its enforcement" (Myslik 1996: 157). Few studies have examined, "gay men's perceptions of straight places and queer places, and power, politics, and territory as expressed in the landscape" (Myslik 1996:157).

To date, I've found no study of gay men's perceptions of safety in the physical landscape of queer spaces, especially in regard to the way the threat of anti-gay violence affects their perceptions. This is precisely the issue I wish to address with my inquiry. What physical localities within queer spaces are perceived by gay men as unsafe in the context of anti-gay violence? Are there physical elements of queer landscapes that are commonly perceived as unsafe? Not only can the answers to these questions help us to understand how we perceive the urban environments in which we live, they also give clues about how to design and construct places that promote feelings of safety in minority communities. It is hoped that the results of this research will provide insight to the perceptions of gay men in queer spaces, to the perceptions of safety in urban communities, and to reveal elements in designed spaces that reduce the perception and existence of unsafe spaces.

METHODOLOGY:

In order to fully elucidate the topic of perception of safety in queer, urban spaces, a conceptual foundation is provided in Chapter 2. The conceptual foundation is divided into three areas: (1) the sociocultural context in which anti-gay violence occurs; (2) the nature of queer spaces in the social, cultural, and physical landscape; and (3) the relationship between perceptions of the urban landscape, physical geography, and violent crime. Having understood the conceptual foundation, the main questions are then investigated: "What physical localities within queer spaces are perceived as unsafe? Are there physical elements of queer landscapes that are commonly perceived as unsafe?" A cognitive mapping survey was conducted to determine if "hot spots" or geographic areas of commonality appear within Seattle's perceived queer geography. The survey included demographic information. Geographic patterns within the maps were examined for elements of commonality in physical design and setting. Chapter 3 provides a detailed description of the survey, the surveying technique employed, and the tools used to analyze the data. Survey results are reviewed in Chapter 4. Chapter 5 discusses the cross-tabulations and analysis of the cognitive mapping surveys. The analysis addresses five factors that may influence the perception of unsafe areas: 1) gender identity versus sexual orientation, 2) pedestrian volume, 3) environmental neglect, and 5) street continuity and integrity. In Chapter 6, the conclusion discusses observations drawn from this study. Finally, the afterword addresses various techniques used to design safe queer spaces within the urban landscape.

1. He is responsible for introducing the Hate Crimes Statistics Act into Congress.

2. Queer space is defined as any space in which non-heteronormative behavior can and does occur.