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LGBT Voices SHARING OUR PAST, SHAPING OUR FUTURE

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LGBT Voices SHARING OUR PAST, SHAPING OUR FUTURE LGBT Voices SHARING OUR PAST, SHAPING OUR FUTURE. Stonewall was founded in 1989 by a small group of dedicated people who wanted to put equality for lesbian, gay and bisexual people on the mainstream political agenda. The charity has since transformed the lives of Britain’s 3.7m lesbian, gay and bisexual people by securing full legal equality – including equal marriage in 2013. Now we face the even tougher challenge of changing hearts and minds around the world. We strive for full equality for lesbian, gay and bisexual people in all areas of their lives, with our key focus areas being: Communities, Schools, Workplaces, Public services, Sport and International. Even after a quarter century of remarkable progress, we won’t stop until every lesbian, gay and bisexual person – from every background, every neighbourhood and every parish – can live their life without fear of discrimination. Find out how you can support our work at www.stonewall.org.uk/what_you_can_do Foreword Lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans communities are communities like no other. Within three generations, we’ve seen significant change in our rights, status and profile in Great Britain and abroad. We’ve therefore become accustomed to fighting for our right to exist. Those men who were persecuted through the fifties and sixties - afraid that they would be punished for being gay - sit alongside a generation who went to school under the shadow of the pernicious Section 28, while both generations received a barrage of messages that ‘homosexuals’ spread disease and danger. The young people of today serve in our armed forces next to sergeants and majors who’ve only felt able to be open about their sexuality in the last few years. Today, we see more couples marrying – those who’ve been together thirty years or three years. We’re starting families, being open about our sexuality and gender identity with our family, our community, our workplace, our place of worship, ourselves. We all share a sense of the part we have played in creating the Britain we live in now and have strong experiences that unite us. But the experiences of older LGBT people are often lost and we forget to reflect on where we’ve come from and how those experiences shape who we are today. We must take time to listen to all those from the LGBT community, not just those who have the highest profile or the loudest voices. This book shares 25 stories from LGBT people who have lived through inequalities and experiences that are rarely reflected on television, in books, in films or in our schools. Read the stories and share them, take copies to your local school and find older LGBT people and ask them their stories. Our history is important to all of us. We must make the time to listen. Ruth Hunt Chief Executive, Stonewall 3 LGBT Voices “ I would have loved to have been the first female admiral in the Royal Navy, but I couldn't because of being gay, I was not prepared to lie.” “ e law’s changed and society's changed, but I think the important thing that's changed is the role models that are out there, when I was growing up there was Larry Grayson and Danny La Rue” Oh that's not the press, that's“ e Special Branch. ey photographed every single person on that Pride march.” “ ere was an announcement over the radio that homosexuality had been decriminalised, up until that time there was no such thing as an age of consent. Whether you were nine or ninety, it was criminal.” 4 “ Back then the sense I have is that there was terrible fear, terrible shame, awful isolation, dreadful misuse of language, superstition, horror about being gay or trans.” “ I came back fully intending to go into school in a female gender role. I talked to my senior staff about this. I was suspended.” Listen Ruby, you have a faith, “ you've always had a faith, you have had some very happy relationships with women I thought I've really got to try and reconcile these two.” “ I marched against Section 28. Irrespective of whether it applied to schools, it became almost like a code of best practice. Suddenly teachers had to retreat into the closet and slam the door behind them.” 5 LGBT Voices Wendy Benson Wendy Benson s a young woman, back in the late '70s, being prepared to be part of an organisation where I have to lie. It's gay was not spoken about at all. It particularly not fair for them, and it's not fair for me." So I think that was Awasn't spoken about in the service that I when I said "No, I'm going to have to leave." My value system joined in 1976, the Women's Royal Naval Service is "If those are the rules, I play within the rules." Looking back, (Wrens). I was seventeen and three quarters. My it makes me feel quite sad actually and for something that father was in the army, my brother joined the army, so happened such a long time ago, actually quite emotional. I'd spent my whole childhood growing up with uniform I left the Wrens on one day, and joined the Metropolitan Police and the military. But I didn't have a clue that I was gay. the next day. By then I had several different lives running. I had I had loads of boyfriends, lots of really nice my life with my friends, who all knew I was gay, and I had my relationships with men, and then I met this woman life with my family who pretended I wasn't gay and didn't want that I became really close with and thought it was a to know about it, but are actually speaking to me now. Then I ‘bessie-mate’ type scenario. Then one night she kissed had my work life. So I had three distinctly different lives running me, and all of a sudden I realised what it was that I was at that time. When I look back now I can see the energy that missing with my relationships with men. that takes up, and the negativity around it. But back in the '80s But I was in a uniformed service where it was against the I would never have thought of coming out. It was just too risky rules to be gay. So I spent the first year or so thinking was this a decision to make if you wanted to aspire to be anything. a one-off? and what I was going to do? I It's meeting the right person in your life at knew that this was something I was going to “I would have loved to have the right time that makes you strong enough have to work through, because someone, been the first female admiral to say "Well, actually I'm gay." When I met somewhere was going to ask me "Was I in the Royal Navy, but I Melanie in the '90s I was a temporary Chief gay?" It was one of the questions in the couldn't because of being gay, Inspector in the M.O.D. It took me until I vetting. In the Wrens there was what they was forty, the year I met Mel, to be actually used to call the SIB, the Special Investigations I was not prepared to lie.” comfortable with myself because I'd taken a Bureau, and the SIB used to actively look for bit of a battering really. My Mum and Dad didn't want to speak gay individuals in the service. If you wanted to remain in the to me, my brother shouted at me and swore, one of my sisters service, you would have to lie and, I have to say, I'm not proud wasn't too happy either. If the people you think are going to to say it, but I did lie at my first reassessment because I didn't support you don't, you sort of draw in don't you? So I don't really know what else to do. think I was truly, truly happy until I met Mel. Coming out was When I think back, I would have loved to have been the first like throwing off this awful weight. You know those old divers female admiral in the Royal Navy, but I couldn't because I am have those big divers suits? It was like throwing that off! Going gay, I was not prepared to break the rules and not prepared to "Wow, this is so much nicer just to be me, and just to be happy lie about something like that. So I joined in '76 and left in '81. I and not to be worrying about you asking me something I'm think the breaking-point may have been when my defence going to have to lie about, or evade answering." vetting was re-assessed, and me saying to myself "I'm not 7 LGBT Voices Ted Brown Ted Brown was born in New York. My parents got divorced and also untrue. I knew that we weren't doing any harm. my mother was deported from the United States I think it was at the third meeting of Gay Liberation Front with me and my youngest sister. My mother had I (GLF) in 1970 or '71, that Noel says he remembers when he gone to America on a student visa when she got first saw me (this is my partner now) and he said it was love at involved with the National Association for the first sight.
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