Hundreds of international LGBTQ+ activists will converge on Long Beach next week for the ILGA World conference. Approximately 600 human rights defenders, United Nations and government representatives, scholars, and funders, will meet to discuss and learn about the state of LGBTQ+ rights around the world. “People around the world still face violence and discrimination because of whom they love, how they look and present, or because their bodies are seen as different,” Co-Secretaries General Luz Elena Aranda and Tuisina Ymania Brown said in a release. “Often, laws and legislation do not protect our communities, but exclude and deprive them of their human rights.”