Peter Tatchell

 ( Official Website ) 

Prompted by the impending hanging of Ronald Ryan in 1967, a 15-year old Tatchell protested against the use of the death sentence, writing to the press and spraying graffiti to raise awareness of the issue."Bermondsey ten years on", Gay Times, February 1993. Ryan was convicted of killing a prison warder while escaping from Pentridge Prison in Coburg, Victoria. Tatchell wrote that the trajectory of the bullet through the warder's body made it unlikely that Ryan could have fired the fatal shot, casting doubt on the conviction. His protests were unsuccessful.

In 1968, Tatchell began campaigning against the American and Australian involvement in the Vietnam War, in his view a war of aggression in support of a "brutal and corrupt dictatorship" responsible for torture and executions. The Victoria state government and Melbourne city council attempted to suppress the anti-Vietnam War campaign by banning street leafleting and taking police action against anti-war demonstrations. New Statesman: Volume 137, Issues 4891–4903, 2008.

In 2004, he proposed the renaming of Australian capital cities with their Aboriginal place names.

In 1973, he attended the 10th World Youth Festival in East Berlin on GLF's behalf. His plans to protest at the festival were not well received by either the British delegation or the GDR hosts, but he was eventually allowed to give a speech at Humboldt University. His lecture was subject to various disruptions; it ended in his denunciation as a "troublemaker" by a member of the audience. The following day, Tatchell attempted to hand out leaflets at a concert, an official of the Free German Youth objected and encouraged fellow concert-goers to destroy the leaflets. Tatchell intended to carry a placard advocating gay rights at the closing rally of the festival. The British delegation incorrectly translated the placard to read "East Germany persecutes homosexuals"; this was put to a vote and the majority decided the placard was not acceptable. Yet, in defiance of the collective decision, Tatchell carried the placard anyway and was then beaten. The placard was torn in half.

Tatchell later claimed that this was the first time gay liberation politics were publicly disseminated and discussed in a Communist state, although he noted that, in terms of decriminalisation and the age of consent, gay men had greater rights in East Germany at the time than much of the Western world.Peter Tatchell, "GLF at the World Youth Festival, GDR 1973", Gay Marxist No. 3 (October 1973).

Describing his time in the Gay Liberation Front, he wrote in The Guardian that:

Tatchell collaborated with public artist Martin Firrell to mark the 50th anniversary of the GLF in 2020. The artist's "Still Revolting" series drew on Tatchell's personal recollections of the GLF, quoting Tatchell's 1973 placard "Homosexuals Are Revolting" created by Tatchell for London Gay Pride. The artist's addition of the word 'still' reflects the truth that homosexuality is still regarded as intolerable by some and many LGBT+ people around the world are still struggling for acceptance, security and equality.

At PNL he was a member of the National Union of Students Gay Rights Campaign. On graduating he became a Freelancer journalist specialising in foreign stories, during which he publicised the Indonesian annexation of West Papua and child labour on British-owned tea farms in Malawi."Britain's profitable brew", New Statesman, 20 July 1979, pp. 88–89

In an article for a left-wing magazine, Tatchell urged the Labour Party to support direct action campaigning to challenge the Margaret Thatcher-led Tory government, stating "we must look to new more militant forms of extra-parliamentary opposition which involve mass popular participation and challenge the government's right to rule". London Labour Briefing, November 1981. Social Democratic Party MP James Wellbeloved, arguing the article was anti-Parliamentary, quoted it at Prime Minister's Questions in November 1981. Foot denounced Tatchell, stating that he would not be endorsed as a candidate and a vote at the Labour Party National Executive Committee denied Tatchell's endorsement. However, the Bermondsey Labour Party continued to support him and it was eventually agreed that when the selection was rerun, Tatchell would be eligible, and he duly won. When Mellish resigned from Parliament and triggered a by-election, Tatchell's candidacy was endorsed, and the ensuing campaign was regarded as one of the most homophobic in modern British history.

Tatchell was assaulted in the street, had his flat attacked, and had a death threat and a live bullet put through his letterbox in the night. Although the Bermondsey seat had long been a Labour stronghold, the Liberal candidate, Simon Hughes, won the election. During the campaign, Liberal canvassers were accused of stirring up homophobia on the doorsteps. Male Liberal workers campaigned wearing lapel badges with the words, "I've been kissed by Peter Tatchell" following the suggestion that he was attempting to hide his sexuality; this campaign was criticised by Roy Hattersley at a Labour news conference. One of Hughes' campaign leaflets claimed the election was "a straight choice" between Liberal and Labour. Hughes has since apologised for what may have been seen as an inadvertent slur and later came out as bisexual in 2006.

Citing the difficulties that the British Army was facing in Northern Ireland during the Troubles, he argued that their current methods had proven ineffective against guerrilla warfare, along with arguing for UK military personnel to be allowed to join trade unions and political parties, and to end strict adherence to "petty regulations". He praised the Second World War-era British Home Guard as an example of a "citizens' army", as well as the armed forces of Sweden, Switzerland and Yugoslavia as positive examples for the UK military to emulate.

In the book, Tatchell also argued for a British withdrawal from NATO and for the establishment of a European Self-Defence Organisation, independent of both the United States, as he felt that Europe had become too dependent on their military protection, and the Soviet Union, which he condemned for their invasions of Czechoslovakia and of Afghanistan, as well its internal repression. He quoted with approval Enoch Powell's argument that the threat from the Soviet Union to Britain was greatly exaggerated. The book was reviewed by the Times Literary Supplement in May 1985.

On 7 April 2004, he joined the Green Party of England and Wales but did not envisage standing for election. However, in 2007, he became the party's parliamentary candidate for Oxford East. On 16 December 2009, he withdrew as a candidate claiming brain damage he says was caused by a bus accident as well as damage inflicted by Mugabe's bodyguards when Tatchell attempted to arrest him in 2001 in Brussels, and by neo-Nazis in Moscow.

Tatchell opposes nuclear power; instead he advocates concentrated solar power.Peter Tatchell, "Economic Democracy" – How The Light Gets In, 5 June 2012

In Tribune, he pointed out the adverse effects of climate change: "By 2050, if climate change proceeds unchecked, England will no longer be a green and pleasant land. In between periods of prolonged scorching drought, we are likely to suffer widespread flooding."

For many years, he supported a green–red alliance. More recently, he helped launch the Green Left grouping within the Green Party. He urged links between and the Greens. On 27 April 2010, he urged Green Party supporters to vote for Liberal Democrats in constituencies where they had an incumbent MP or a strong chance of winning. BBC News: Live coverage – General Election 2010 , 27 April 2010, 16:03

In August 2021, Tatchell endorsed Tamsin Omond and Amelia Womack in the 2021 Green Party of England and Wales leadership election.

In 2003, Tatchell said he supported giving "massive material aid" to Iraqi opposition groups, including the "Shi'ite Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq" (SCIRI), to bring down Saddam. But in 2006 Tatchell noted that SCIRI had become markedly more fundamentalist and was endorsing violent attacks on anyone who did not conform to its increasingly harsh interpretation of Islam. He claimed that SCIRI, the leading force in Baghdad's ruling coalition, wanted to establish an Iranian-style religious dictatorship, with a goal of clerical fascism, and had engaged in "terrorisation of gay Iraqis", as well as terrorising Sunni Islam, left-wingers, unveiled women and people who listen to western pop music or wear jeans or shorts.Peter Tatchell, "Iraq – Ayatollah Sistani Says Death to Gays; Sistani fatwa encourages terror against queers. Shia Badr Corps execute sodomites, Sunnis and others. UK fetes Sistani and hosts Badr's political wing, despite anti-gay murders." , 15 March 2006.; News story about protest- Marc Shoffman, "Iraqi Ayatollah sparks outrage after decreeing death to gays", Pink News, 17 March 2006.

In September 2014, Tatchell advocated arming the Kurdistan Workers' Party to fight against ISIS, and argued that the US and EU had been wrong to designate it as a terrorist organisation.

On 14 February 2015, Tatchell was one of a number of signatories to a letter criticising the trend in the National Union of Students to apply a No Platform policy to activists who criticised the sex industry or challenged demands made by certain groups of trans people. In particular, the letter cited the denial of a platform to Kate Smurthwaite at Goldsmiths College and to Germaine Greer at the University of Cambridge.

Tatchell received death threats after signing the letter. He later stated that he would have worded the letter differently to clarify that he supported the human rights of trans people and sex workers, but that he had signed the letter nonetheless because he believed in the message of free speech on campuses. He said that the initial draft that he signed contained the sentence "Some of us have disagreements with the views expressed by", and that he was "not happy" that this was cut out of the final letter.

On 13 February 2016, Fran Cowling, the national LGBT representative for the NUS, refused to share a platform with Tatchell at Canterbury Christ Church University to discuss the topic of "re-radicalising queers". Cowling said that Tatchell supported speakers who are "openly transphobic and incite violence" against transgender people, and also that Tatchell had used "racist language". Tatchell responded that no evidence could be produced to support either claim, and that Cowling had never consulted the NUS membership before deciding to make pronouncements on their behalf, and said, "This sorry, sad saga is symptomatic of the decline of free and open debate on some university campuses. There is a witch-hunting, accusatory atmosphere. Allegations are made without evidence to back them—or worse, they are made citing false, trumped-up evidence."