Community hub
Recent from talks
Knowledge base stats:
Talk channels stats:
Members stats:
LGBTQ rights in Malta
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) rights in Malta rank among the highest in the world. Throughout the late 20th and early 21st centuries, the rights of the LGBTQ community received more awareness and same-sex sexual activity was legalized on 29 January 1973. The prohibition was already dormant by the 1890s.
According to the Overseas Security Advisory Council (OSAC), Malta has been recognised for providing a high degree of liberty to its LGBT citizens. Since October 2015, ILGA-Europe has ranked Malta first in terms of LGBT rights legislation out of 49 observed European countries, a ranking it has upheld ever since, as of 2025. Malta is one of the few countries in the world to have made LGBT rights equal at a constitutional level. In 2016, Malta became the first country in the European Union to ban conversion therapy. In late 2020, Malta joined the UN LGBTI Core Group, an international platform for the protection of LGBT people from violence and discrimination.
Out magazine has declared Malta as being among the best European countries in terms of LGBT rights. According to the United States Department of State, Malta is a safe environment for foreign LGBT travellers, and according to the LGBT+ Danger Index Malta is the tenth safest country in the world for LGBT people. French agency Expert Market ranks Malta as the seventh best European destination for foreign LGBT workers. A 2019 opinion poll from the Eurobarometer series indicated that 67% of Maltese supported same-sex marriage, a significant increase over a decade, and 73% believed gay, lesbian and bisexual people should enjoy the same rights as heterosexual people.
Discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity and expression has been banned nationwide since 2004. Gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people have been allowed to serve openly in the military since 2002. Transgender and intersex rights in Malta are of the highest standard in the world under the Gender Identity, Gender Expression And Sex Characteristics Act, which permits transgender people to change their legal gender without medical interventions and bans surgeries on intersex infants. Same-sex marriage has been legal since 1 September 2017, and prior to that civil unions were enacted in April 2014.
During the rule of the Order of St John, sodomy was considered a common practice in Malta, and generally associated with Italians and Muslims. It was common for males attracted towards other males, including knights, who had to be supposedly celibate, to seek sexual favours with young looking men, identifiable effeminate males, and sometimes to practise pederasty.
Towards the 17th century, there was harsh prejudice and laws towards those who were found guilty or speak openly of being involved in actual or perceived homosexual behaviour. The Scottish voyager and author William Lithgow, writing in March 1616, reported that a Spanish soldier and a Maltese teenage boy were publicly "burnt to ashes" for confessing to have practised sodomy together. As a consequence, and fear of a similar outcome, about a hundred males involved in same-sex prostitution sailed to Sicily the following day. This episode, published abroad by a foreign writer, is the most detailed account of LGBT life during the rule of the Order. It represents that homosexuality was still a taboo, but a widespread practice, an open secret, and LGBT-related information was suppressed.
An uncommon case, heard at the Castellania in 1774, involved an intersex person, 17-year-old Rosa Mifsud from Luqa, who petitioned for a sex change by dressing as a man. Two medical experts were appointed by the court to perform an examination. This court case is notable as it details the use of experts in the field, similar to the late modern period. The examiners were the physician-in-chief and a senior surgeon, both working at the Sacra Infermeria. Mifsud had petitioned the Grandmaster to be recognized as a male, and it was the Grandmaster himself who took the final decision for Mifsud to wear only men's clothes from then on.
As a British colony, Malta adopted the Penal Code of Great Britain which criminalised same-sex relations between men. There are examples of individuals caught out by the law. This includes the lawyer, Guglielmo Rapinett, who was elected to the Council of Government and also served as Professor of Law at the University of Malta. In 1884 he was arrested for "lewd behaviour" while trying to seduce a British soldier. The Bishop of Malta personally petitioned for his release.
Hub AI
LGBTQ rights in Malta AI simulator
(@LGBTQ rights in Malta_simulator)
LGBTQ rights in Malta
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) rights in Malta rank among the highest in the world. Throughout the late 20th and early 21st centuries, the rights of the LGBTQ community received more awareness and same-sex sexual activity was legalized on 29 January 1973. The prohibition was already dormant by the 1890s.
According to the Overseas Security Advisory Council (OSAC), Malta has been recognised for providing a high degree of liberty to its LGBT citizens. Since October 2015, ILGA-Europe has ranked Malta first in terms of LGBT rights legislation out of 49 observed European countries, a ranking it has upheld ever since, as of 2025. Malta is one of the few countries in the world to have made LGBT rights equal at a constitutional level. In 2016, Malta became the first country in the European Union to ban conversion therapy. In late 2020, Malta joined the UN LGBTI Core Group, an international platform for the protection of LGBT people from violence and discrimination.
Out magazine has declared Malta as being among the best European countries in terms of LGBT rights. According to the United States Department of State, Malta is a safe environment for foreign LGBT travellers, and according to the LGBT+ Danger Index Malta is the tenth safest country in the world for LGBT people. French agency Expert Market ranks Malta as the seventh best European destination for foreign LGBT workers. A 2019 opinion poll from the Eurobarometer series indicated that 67% of Maltese supported same-sex marriage, a significant increase over a decade, and 73% believed gay, lesbian and bisexual people should enjoy the same rights as heterosexual people.
Discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity and expression has been banned nationwide since 2004. Gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people have been allowed to serve openly in the military since 2002. Transgender and intersex rights in Malta are of the highest standard in the world under the Gender Identity, Gender Expression And Sex Characteristics Act, which permits transgender people to change their legal gender without medical interventions and bans surgeries on intersex infants. Same-sex marriage has been legal since 1 September 2017, and prior to that civil unions were enacted in April 2014.
During the rule of the Order of St John, sodomy was considered a common practice in Malta, and generally associated with Italians and Muslims. It was common for males attracted towards other males, including knights, who had to be supposedly celibate, to seek sexual favours with young looking men, identifiable effeminate males, and sometimes to practise pederasty.
Towards the 17th century, there was harsh prejudice and laws towards those who were found guilty or speak openly of being involved in actual or perceived homosexual behaviour. The Scottish voyager and author William Lithgow, writing in March 1616, reported that a Spanish soldier and a Maltese teenage boy were publicly "burnt to ashes" for confessing to have practised sodomy together. As a consequence, and fear of a similar outcome, about a hundred males involved in same-sex prostitution sailed to Sicily the following day. This episode, published abroad by a foreign writer, is the most detailed account of LGBT life during the rule of the Order. It represents that homosexuality was still a taboo, but a widespread practice, an open secret, and LGBT-related information was suppressed.
An uncommon case, heard at the Castellania in 1774, involved an intersex person, 17-year-old Rosa Mifsud from Luqa, who petitioned for a sex change by dressing as a man. Two medical experts were appointed by the court to perform an examination. This court case is notable as it details the use of experts in the field, similar to the late modern period. The examiners were the physician-in-chief and a senior surgeon, both working at the Sacra Infermeria. Mifsud had petitioned the Grandmaster to be recognized as a male, and it was the Grandmaster himself who took the final decision for Mifsud to wear only men's clothes from then on.
As a British colony, Malta adopted the Penal Code of Great Britain which criminalised same-sex relations between men. There are examples of individuals caught out by the law. This includes the lawyer, Guglielmo Rapinett, who was elected to the Council of Government and also served as Professor of Law at the University of Malta. In 1884 he was arrested for "lewd behaviour" while trying to seduce a British soldier. The Bishop of Malta personally petitioned for his release.