Tag: gay uk

India’s attorney-general blames Victorian Britain for anti-gay laws

In an apparent change of heart from the position it adopted three years ago, the Indian government has said that homosexuality was tolerated in pre-colonial India, and it was only the British who imposed their Victorian values of morality on what was a largely liberal land. India’s chielf law officer GE Vahanvati told the Supreme… Read more »

First UK conference on gay China begins this week

A dozen leading figures from the Chinese gay and lesbian community will speak at The University of Manchester this week in the first event of its kind in the UK. From 22 to 24 March, activists, academics, and filmmakers will share their experience with European counterparts to correct misconceptions about being gay in China. Europe-China… Read more »

Gay Prisoners to Marry Inside Some of Britain’s Toughest Jails

London – Gay prisoners will be allowed to tie the knot inside some of the country’s toughest jails, as long as they pay for the ceremonies themselves Top security lock-ups like will have to host civil partnership ceremonies, provided the inmates fund the nuptials themselves. The green light for killers, rapists, drug dealers and terrorists… Read more »

Poll: 65 percent of British agree gays should have equal right to marry

The latest in a line of polls gauging public opinion on the proposed right of gay couples to marry in Britain has found two thirds of the public support it. Over the weekend, the Populus poll asked a thousand voters in Scotland, England and Wales what they thought of such a move, proposals for which… Read more »

Gay couples make wedding plans amid angry Catholic sermons

‘It’s not like we are all going to be marching into Catholic churches in bridal dresses,’ says one gay man at Designer Civil Partnership show “Let me not to the marriage of true minds/ Admit impediments,” declared the bard of Stratford in his 116th sonnet. And at the Globe theatre in central London on Sunday… Read more »

Pope Benedict warns against gay marriage

Pope Benedict XVI has denounced gay marriage in a speech to US bishops visiting Vatican City. The Pope warned of “powerful political and cultural currents seeking to alter the legal definition of marriage”. He also urged the bishops to emphasise to their Church that premarital sex and cohabitation was “gravely sinful” and “damaging to the… Read more »

Gay online encyclopaedia debuts

WikiQueer, a gay, bi and trans online encyclopaedia has launched publicly this week. The wiki site began collating content after its soft-launch last year and has now gone live. Unlike Wikipedia, WikiQueer says it will allow dynamic content from existing online LGBT and wiki projects, content geared towards activism around issues, and in-depth information on… Read more »

Graduate hands back Oxford degree over Christian Concern conference

An Oxford graduate has handed back his degree over a college’s arrangement to host conferences in association with a religious group which has regularly opposed advances in gay rights and backed ‘gay cure’. Michael Amherst returned his Exeter College English degree yesterday, saying he no longer wished “to be associated” with the institution. Exeter’s administrators… Read more »

Elton John & David Furnish interview Peter Tatchell

Attitude magazine – March 2012 Celebration of 60th birthday & 45 years of human rights campaigning London, UK – Elton John & David Furnish interview Peter Tatchell in celebration of his 60th birthday, 45 years of human rights campaigning and 10 years of his Peter Tatchell Foundation. The interview is published in the March 2012… Read more »

Free HIV treatment for asylum seekers and non-UK citizens

Experts believe cost will be far less than possible costs of treating someone in hospital for Aids Asylum seekers and other non-British citizens are set to be given free HIV treatment after the government indicated it was willing to accept an amendment from Lord Fowler to the health bill. Doctors working with people who have… Read more »

‘Real Men Get Raped’ Campaign Comes To London Tube Stations

A new rape awareness campaign aimed at men in London is hoping to challenge the way that people think about the crime and its victims. Posters for the campaign, launched by Survivors UK, an organization that deals with sexual violence against men, read “Real men get raped and talking about it takes real strength” and… Read more »

No posthumous pardon for Alan Turing; gay computing pioneer still a criminal

An online petition signed by over 23,000 people which called on the UK government to grant a posthumous pardon to Alan Turing has been rejected. “A posthumous pardon was not considered appropriate as Alan Turing was properly convicted of what at the time was a criminal offence,” the BBC reported Justice Minister Lord McNally as… Read more »

Muslims posted ‘nasty and frightening’ anti-gay leaflets demanding homosexuals ‘turn or burn’

Five Muslim men distributed “threatening, frightening and nasty” leaflets depicting gay men being executed in an attempt to encourage hatred against homosexuals, a court has heard. The men posted leaflets, with titles including “Turn or Burn”, “God abhors you” and “The Death Penalty?”, through doors and handed them out at a mosque, calling for the… Read more »

PinkNews to celebrate 25 January as Peter Tatchell Day – legendary campaigner turns 60

To mark the 60th birthday of our most iconic human rights campaigner, PinkNews.co.uk will be naming Wednesday 25 January Peter Tatchell Day. To celebrate the day, we will look back at the enormous contribution Peter Tatchell has made to the fight for equal gay rights and human rights in general across the UK and abroad… Read more »

‘Visionary’ Jamaican rights activist announced as recipient of inaugural David Kato Award

Global award honouring murdered human rights activist to be presented to Jamaican lawyer, Maurice Tomlinson in London David Kato, the human rights activist murdered in his home in Kampala, Uganda on 26 January 2011, is representative of the millions of individuals worldwide who daily struggle against hostility and persecution simply because of their sexuality. Inspired… Read more »

The Future of HIV Prevention Among MSM in Europe

Towards better sex with less harm for gay and bisexual men in Europe Good Morning The title of our conference asks us to consider the future, and I hope over the next two days we will all be looking forward. The future is inevitable. But what it looks like is not. The evidence base for… Read more »