ABOVE: Chilean Constitutional Convention Vice President Gaspar Domínguez. Photo courtesy of Domínguez.
Gaspar Domínguez, the vice president of Chile’s Constitutional Convention that will rewrite the country’s constitution, is a 33-year-old openly gay man. Domínguez last week spoke with the Washington Blade about the historic process through which Chile is going and what it will mean for LGBTQ rights in the country and around the world.
Chileans last May elected 155 people to the Constitutional Convention. Domínguez was one of eight openly LGBTQ people chosen, and he became the constituent body’s vice president in January.
“In this process of deep political transformation that Chile is going through, I think that many doors that were there, that we knew existed, were opened and one of those was to recognize that people of sexual diversity are citizens, that we need to participate and represent ourselves in politics and that was how in the convention we came to at least eight people openly belonging to sexual diversity,” Domínguez told the Blade from his office in the former National Congress building in Santiago, the Chilean capital. “I have had to lead this process, give it an administrative management in terms of deadlines, to organize the processes and also political management because the things we say, the way we say things also help to build certain realities and certain opinion in terms of the consequences that will have for Chile.”
Dominguez noted “Chile is one of the most conservative countries in Latin America.” He acknowledged, however, the country over the last decade has seen many LGBTQ rights advances.
A law that allows same-sex couples to marry and adopt took effect in March.
Domínguez said a draft of the new constitution on which Chileans will vote on Sept. 4 has four “fundamental aspects for the LGBTQ+ population.”
“The most relevant one is that it establishes non-discrimination,” he said. “The constitution will prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.”
“Second, it establishes the State’s recognition of the existence of diverse types of families in plural, and that, by the way, will have a consequence in terms of public policies in the future,” added Domínguez.
He pointed out to Blade the State would have to guarantee the LGBTQ community is politically represented. The fourth provision would ensure each person has the right to decide their gender identity.
Domínguez highlighted the work of LGBTQ organizations that have been fighting for years for their rights.
“There are organizations and movements of the LGBTQ+ community that think one way and others that think another way and that I think is very good,” he said. “(The first goal was) to make visible that the LGBTQ+ community is not a homogeneous community. That is good, especially today that we are in this constituent process, opening the possibility that these differences have agreements.”
Finally, Domínguez said that “it is a tremendous opportunity for the LGBTQ+ community in Chile and certainly in the world, because today, when we talk about a constitutional reform of political representation in other laws of other countries, they will be able to put that the example of Chile constitutionally ensures the political representation of women in parity terms and the political representation of the different sexual and gender dissidences. So I think there is a tremendous opportunity.”
“I believe that the right to identity, the recognition of equal marriage, the recognition of the different types of families puts us at the forefront in this matter and, by the way, it should become an example for the discussions that other countries will have on similar issues,” he said.
