2023-07-02 19:02:54
Influencer and model, Sofia Salomon, aspires to accept her candidacy to participate in this year’s Miss Venezuela contest, making her the first transgender woman to participate in that competition.
“I think it will be a great platform to highlight my community, spread positivity, and show the reality of transgender women,” Salomon says of her participation in the event, which has a large following in the country.
In light of the severe economic crisis the country is going through, which has pushed millions of Venezuelans to the threshold of poverty, the “Associated Press” indicates that the issues of the “Mim Ain Plus” community and their rights remain far from the local public debate.
The agency indicated that the “pride march” planned for Sunday in the capital, Caracas, may witness the participation of hundreds of people, but in return, there is “almost no acceptance of the LGBTQ + community throughout the country, unlike some other Latin American countries.”
Although large segments of them adopt a European lifestyle, the Associated Press highlights that Venezuelans largely resist the incorporation of homophobic and transphobic concepts into everyday culture.
Last May, Venezuela’s Supreme Court overturned a law punishing consensual same-sex conduct between the military, but it has been delaying for seven years the decision on a case aimed at giving gays the right to marry.
Nor did it rule in the case of transgender woman Tamara Adrian, who went to court in 2004, requesting that her name and gender be legally changed on her birth certificate and in public records.
The government argues that the law already allows this, but Adrian and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, which monitors human rights violations on the continent, reject the authorities’ claims, as Adrian submitted requests for hearings, in addition to more than 30 summaries of her case, without any response.
Nevertheless, Adrian became the country’s first transgender female legislator in 2015, and in June of this year, she entered the opposition’s presidential primary race, hoping to oust President Nicolás Maduro.
And last year, Salomon ranked sixth in the world’s largest Miss contest for transgender women, and during her participation she referred to the laws of her country, which Adrienne is fighting to change.
“I would like this law to change so that transgender women can be accepted by the name they feel safer with,” she said.
And last February, a transgender woman was chosen to participate in the Miss Universe contest, which boosted Salomon’s hopes of entering the local pageant in Venezuela.
Sofia Salomon says that her parents, siblings and boyfriend support her decision to run for participation, adding that “the comments on her Instagram posts are also very positive.”
The Miss Venezuela Organization did not respond to a request for comment from the Associated Press.
The global transgender contest was launched in 2012, and this decision prompted Osmil Souza, Miss Venezuela at the time, to declare that “the simple Christian Venezuelan public will never accept this position.”
And in 2018, Angela Ponce, from Spain, became the first transgender woman to participate in the Miss Universe contest.
Last year, a Thai businessman and a transgender woman bought the Miss Universe Organization – which was partly owned by former US President Donald Trump – for $20 million.
The winners of the Miss Venezuela competition achieve instant fame that can lead them to reach major political positions, as the winner of Miss Universe in 1981, Irene Saez, was able to take over the mayor of Caracas, and ran for the presidency in 1998, and lost to Hugo Chavez.
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