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Author: Craig Hanlon-Smith

In defence of Priti Patel MP

Posted on by Craig Hanlon-Smith

Government briefings concerning Covid-19 have been now been the daily 5pm staple for more than four weeks, most of those in lockdown. Until Easter Saturday we had seen neither hide nor hair of a woman from the government at the central lectern. There had been guest spots from the medical world but the women in cabinet were silent. This had not gone unnoticed, with articles appearing in national newspapers not unreasonably asking: where are the women? And so yesterday we got one. Home secretary Priti Patel.

Patel is a controversial figure and I shall not waste time here examining why. Look it up. She is, however, no more controversial than a host of government representatives, most of them men, who, despite their racist, sexist, classist and minority-phobic nonsense, were resoundingly elected into government in December. Let me be clear, I do not much care for Priti Patel, much in the same way that I have little care for Raab, Hancock, Cummings, Johnson and their latest trumped-up puppet Rishi Sunak.

The response to Patel’s appearance on Saturday night has been vitriolic and smacks once again of misogyny. The comments I have read late on Saturday and early on this Easter Sunday consume me with levels of despair I do not feel faced with imminent sickness from a rampaging virus. Men and women, people from the LGBT community calling upon Patel to be killed, assaulted and at the very least silenced. Violent language I have not seen referencing her male counterparts. Of particular note are the women and gay men laying into the home secretary, the latter on social media platforms posting ‘KILL HER’ and drawing male genitals on pictures of her face. Graffiti accoutrements we consider too base for the male occupants of the cabinet office.

Patel’s sin is that she has been born a woman and now dares to hold high office, as such: who does she think she is? As a woman she is expected to be smarter, sharper, more knowledgeable across a range of complex subjects, sweeter, kinder and clearer than any of the men who have presented to this country during the past month. I did not like what came out of Patel’s mouth on Saturday night but, compared to current de facto prime minister Dominic Raab, she was clear, confident, resolute, determined and in charge at that moment in time. She also strikes me as an individual who is significantly more intelligent than the prime minister and I mean him no ill while he recovers from a disease that could kill us all. Priti Patel clearly does not need to worry about Covid-19 while there are people living in our friendship groups who want her to die because she opened her mouth.

I am not usually in the business of quoting my own articles but I am about to. In the March edition of GScene I wrote an piece on misogyny and its effects upon all of us – please read, it you might learn something. If you are short of time here is an extract for you:

Our collective inability to identify, challenge and tackle misogyny is possibly our greatest social ill and one we all, across whatever gender we wish to align ourselves with fail to address. The majority of our contemporary social phobias can be linked directly to misogyny and our continued enthusiastic tendencies to revel in it.

By all means despise the politics of any particular political agenda and do call them out for untruths, twisted facts or outright lies but treat them all as equals. Patel should not get a kicking, death threat or a penis drawn on her face merely because she doesn’t have one.

A Bright Light for the LGBTQ Community.

Posted on by Craig Hanlon-Smith

A Bright Light for the LGBTQ Community.

Gay pop sensation Bright Light Bright Light has released a video online for his new track This Was My House and it could not have come at a more welcome moment. Featuring legendary Madonna Backing singers Donna De Lory and Niki Harris the new single was already whipping up high expectations following its release on digital platforms last week but the new video seals the deal.

 

Filmed in New York before much of the world went into lockdown, the video kicks off with Bright Light (x2) otherwise known as Rod Thomas stuck in his shoebox apartment with nothing but his phone and a glitterball stuffed between his legs for company. Sound familiar? It should. The song itself is an ode to disappearing gay venues and a sense that we don’t know what we’ve got ‘til it is gone. Hot on the heels of the announcement this week of the permanent closure of Legends, ‘This Was My House’ should strike a local chord with the Brighton and Hove LGBTQ community:

‘This was my house and I was not supposed to worry about it
This was the place that I was not supposed to fear’ Welsh born Thomas sings across a familiar 90s style house vibe, and in the video whilst locked inside he reflects upon fre-er times as we cut to visions of nights out surrounded by the colourful characters we will recognise so well from our own scene.

 

Thomas, who last year supported Cher on tour and before that Erasure, has always cited Madonna’s tour documentary In Bed With Madonna/Truth or Dare as his introduction to gay culture, it is then fitting that the Queen of Pop’s long-term singers Niki and Donna should accompany him on this track. Were our Pride events to be running – this would be a dance tent favourite, were our bars open this would be blaring our onto their spring terraces. And although written as an homage to the LGBTQ nightlife, the song itself will strike a sharper note during our current lockdown in response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

‘It’s cold outside but in here I am freezing
I cannot explain how I feel (how I feel)
It’s your life but I just can’t believe it
Every time I hear you talk I can’t believe that it’s real’

But this is not an opportunity to wallow in our collective sadness; This Was My House is a total banger and the video an uplifting shot in the disco ass just when we needed it most. Rod Thomas we salute you.

When this is done…. We’ll see you on that dancefloor:

‘I hope that you remember where you came from
I hope that you remember what you knew
I hope that with some time you let your heart out….

…..This was my house and I was not supposed to worry about it’.

 

 

 

 

It Starts With Me : Fiona Sharpe talks to Gscene’s Craig Hanlon-Smith

Posted on by Craig Hanlon-Smith

It Starts With Me

Fiona Sharpe is a rare breed among us; a Brighton native. Born, bred and now living among us all who have adopted this fair city as our own: “I did move away for 17 years but I came back,” she tells me when we chat about her inclusion in this magazine because, not only a native, Fiona is also an LGBTQ ally.

Is Fiona pleased to be back in Brighton where it all began? “Of cours.! Brighton and Hove does a really GREAT job of trying to bring communities together and to stand up for one another. It is a great place to be – to live and to work”. Fiona is a Community Consultant working abreast a wide range of minority communities across the city. An active member of the Jewish community in Brighton, Hove and Sussex, her allied approach takes her work across a range of communities and organisations to include “anyone who wants advocacy. I work with a lot of women from minority groups, particularly migrant and refugee women but I work across a wide range of causes that I believe in”.

While away from Brighton, Fiona worked in Israel and New York in a range of roles, from VIP guest relations to a Jewish umbrella organisation, representing Jewish communities from the United States and all over the world. Both in the US congress and the White House. It is this eclectic work background that she describes as ‘all kinds of everything’ which is standing her in such good stead today. She has now worked in the hate crime arena for over a year across all factions of the challenge whether, race, gender, sexual orientation or migration driven.

I ask why allies from outside a particular community are important to our stories and struggles: “No one minority community can fight against the hate themselves – nor should they try to. If we can’t stand up for one another then we have no right to expect others to stand up for us”. She tells me that she genuinely finds it difficult when people don’t work together: “Sometimes in minority communities we try to suggest there is a hierarchy of hate: is racism worse that homophobia. Is Islamophobia more damaging than anti-Semitism is one somehow more objectionable than the other. There is no hierarchy of hate. All hate and discrimination has to be challenged in whatever form it takes and however it starts.”

Hate is a strong descriptor for the ‘anti’ and may manifest itself in aggression or violence. In some ways isn’t hate easier to spot because it is a sizeable and identifiable issue that we can begin to address? I ask Fiona if the greater challenge is the smaller behaviours that are endemic towards some other communities, perhaps a quieter every-day, less obvious form of discrimination:

“Yes. Although they are all part of a similar and bigger picture. There are micro aggressions which are regrettably commonplace. I work with hijab-wearing women who tell me that people choose not to sit next to them on the bus. In same sex relationships there are small reactions to walking into a pub holding hands that we know are there. Micro-aggressions eat away at our individual sense of self and self-worth and in turn these affect our society at large. In many ways these behaviours are more corrosive and much harder to do something about. The attack we know what to do about it. We tell someone, we call the police. What do you tell someone if you feel have been looked at in a strange way?

Fiona is part of the discussion attempting to include the homeless and rough sleepers in hate crime legislation: “Violence and hostility to those sleeping rough is increasing at an alarming rate and we need to speak about this as much as all other aspects of hate”

There are known differences within the LGBTQ+ communities and increasingly there are concerning reports about how differences become divisions and in turn our own communities a microcosm of some of the socially damaging behaviours Fiona has outlined. I ask what advice, as an ally, she has for her LGBTQ neighbours:

“I am an ally and a proud one, but I am not LGBTQ, I am not part of that community. I am an ally who is constantly learning and listening. In a more general way, we are always scared by what appears to us that is outside our comfort zone. We have a tendency to want to ‘other’ people and what happens within all communities and indeed the LGBT community is no different from any other. In religious groups for example there are degrees of fervour and religiosity – these are differences, but it is what we do with them. As an ally part of my responsibility is never to be presumptuous as to why there are divisions and how they have come about.  I wouldn’t welcome someone who isn’t Jewish telling me what antisemitism is”.

“We must all look to ourselves. Ensure that when I have questions of another community that I do not belong to, I ask them in a respectful way. We sometimes have a fear of asking the questions because we don’t have the right language, but questions are important as so much prejudice comes from a lack of understanding and a lack of knowledge”.

“We must be upfront about our own prejudices. We all have an unconscious bias but it is what we do with these. I would ask that someone learn about me, Fiona, learn about me the individual. It then becomes harder to behave in an antisemitic way. If we meet and care about individuals, we are less likely to group people together and make a homogenous judgement. If we all took care of the little corner of the world around us, we would be so much more impactful.

“To be an ally does require upstanding not bystanding. It takes individual responsibility and then as a community we are stronger if we work together and don’t just take care of our own back yard. It starts with me”

 

 

 

Wanna Play? The Life, Loves and Allies of Whitehawk FC with Kevin Miller

Posted on by Craig Hanlon-Smith

Wanna Play? The Life, Loves and Allies of Whitehawk FC.

On their twitter profile, Whitehawk Football Club describe themselves as “having more fun than you since 1945”. The club was originally founded just at the end of the Second World War as Whitehawk & Manor Farm Old Boys. The original name rerefers to the Brighton Boys’ club Whitehawk, and the adjoining Manor Farm estate and was set up for those that wished to play football but were too old to play in a youth league. 75 years later the club is a shining example not only to other football clubs, but to any community or commercial organisation of how to get the ‘ally’ thing just right. Head of commercial at the club, Kevin Miller, talks with such dedication, passion and enthusiasm of their social mission and purpose that even though this Gscene writer has little interest in football at the start of the conversation, he leaves it wanting to surrender his life savings to the club and play for the team, in goal.

“The key is our fan base is eclectic” he says “so why would our approach not reflect that? We have everyone supporting the club from local residents who have lived in the area for decades, students, University Professors, anarchists, people from the LGBTQ community so their support breeds a culture of inclusiveness”. On match days, Whitehawk average a supporters’ crowd of some 300 whereas the Premier League Club average 30,000 and Kevin sees it as his job to grow that support by establishing real and lasting community links:

“25 years ago, Whitehawk was one of the most deprived estates in Europe but it has turned a corner with its amazing local community. Yes there are problems but it is inspiring to see these low-income families doing their best and most importantly doing it together…. And for the record, Whitehawk is one of the cleanest areas in the city that I have seen.” 

Whitehawk United also play in an away kit that is emblazoned with the rainbow colours and is one of only a handful of clubs ever to do so. I ask Kevin how the association with the local LGBTQ community came about: “There was certainly a disconnect between the club and the LGBTQ community and when we reached out to people their feedback was that because of the long associations between homophobia and sport there was an assumed lack of welcome. But there is a freedom in non-league football of which we are a part, that no longer exists in the Premier league. We can ask people to be a real part of who we are and what we do, get involved have fun and in reflecting the community of Brighton and Hove, of course we reflect the LGBTQ nature of our unique city.

Kevin talks with passion not only for the club but for the city at large. He is clearly genuinely thrilled at the huge majorities our three MPs continue to secure in General Elections which bucks the Surrey, Sussex, Kent and Hampshire trend towards the conservative. “Let’s build a wall!” he jests “and lets make Surrey pay for the wall!”

In summer 2019, Whitehawk FC stepped into the Pride arena in arranging a charity fundraising match for the much-loved Rainbow Fund. “We were approached by local trans activist, writer and broadcaster Sophie Cook to create an event that included a high-profile mixed gender football match. The event was called Football United and the match was between an ex-Premier League all-star line up and Rainbow Rovers, player managed by Sophie. The Rovers won 4-2.

“The whole ethos behind the event was a celebration of togetherness. We wanted to embrace diversity, inclusion and challenge outdated perceptions of who football is for and we’re running the event again the weekend before Pride this year. But you know – there’s an abundance of rainbow flags and audible LGBTQ support at all our matches.  We recently played in Guernsey in the away kit with the rainbow on it and 25% of our supporters came out there with us. It’s an opportunity to build a name for us all over the UK as an inclusive club” The return leg of the Guernsey match takes place in Whitehawk on March 28 and it is being dubbed Community Day.

 

Kevin goes on to speak positively about the allied work some of the big league clubs are undertaking: “Football clubs are doing a lot of good work. Most football clubs have LGBT teams. Arsenal, West-Ham, Charlton, Aston Villa. But what’s different between them and us, besides the money, is that their efforts, as well-intentioned and supportive as they are, just don’t seem to dig into the LGBTQ community itself”.  I ask Kevin why he thinks that might be.

“We’re local and we work with local people, people like Sophie [Cook]. They [Premier and Championship clubs) can only do so much without gay players. It is different in the women’s game and it always has been. There are openly gay female players, but male football is an old-school, working class male sport and we still carry those attitudes. Football is the only sport left that has the difficulty in accepting this. There must be gay players – we seem to be accepting it in rugby, why not football?”

 

“We are all targeted by our age, race etc and we are all compartmentalised. Football is a great conduit to deal with these differences and start the inclusion conversation. We don’t have many things in life where we all share the same experience. Sport is unusual like that and football in particular. All of these things chip away at the old and reinvent to a new, bigger audience in the future”.

Our conversation comes to a close with Kevin offering an open invitation to us all to engage with Whitehawk FC and their work. “Come and help build these foundations – create a community. Come to the club and make new friends, have new conversations. This is where non-league football scores over premier league where you’re frisked by security, restrictive health and safety in the stadiums and of course the expense. We do what the Albion do – we play 90-minute football. But as a lower league or non-league club we can challenge the norm.

“This is what makes the club so special and we want to open the doors to everyone. Football should not be a barrier”.

The Whitehawk Community Day is on March 28. Football United 2 will take place the weekend before Pride.

Details will be shared on www.whitehawkfc.com

The Rainbow Seagulls

Posted on by Craig Hanlon-Smith

Members of Brighton and Hove Albion tell Craig Hanlon-Smith why inclusion is so important to them and how they are making sure they continue to promote diversity and equality

Brighton and Hove Albion (BHAFC) have increasingly embraced the LGBTQ communities in our city over many years and more recently publicly challenged homophobia. The stadium at Falmer often referred to as the Amex, is actually called The American Express COMMUNITY Stadium and BHAFC put the community of Brighton and Hove at the heart of what they do. The club celebrated Stonewall’s Rainbow Laces Campaign and made a clear statement in its support of not only the campaign, but the LGBTQ community, which is as synonymous with Brighton and Hove as the club itself. The stadium is regularly awash with LGBTQ rainbow flags and its match day programmes feature interviews with management, staff and players, outlining the importance of the diversity and inclusion initiatives including celebrating the LGBTQ communities.

Rose Read, head of people and culture at the Albion, has said: “We were so overwhelmed with the reception we received from the community in having a presence at Brighton Pride, as a club we are delighted to be supporting again this year and to be part of such a key event in the city’s calendar.”

Player and Captain Lewis Dunk, of the club’s involvement in the Rainbow Laces campaign, says: “We are proud to get behind such an important campaign and we know that football has the power to bring everyone together. We stand strongly alongside the club, the Premier League and Stonewall in promoting equality and diversity.”

But it’s not just the football players of both the men’s and women’s teams who are LGBTQ allies. The whole organisation has embraced a number of initiatives to promote inclusion and to celebrate diversity. We asked some Brighton and Hove Albion staff members their views on what it means for the club to be an ally of the LGBTQ+ Community and this is what they said.

Chief Operating Officer, Paul Mullen: “I believe that, as a club, we are a positive ally to the LGBTQ community and have demonstrated our commitment to this in a number of ways.  For example, we have been a very active supporter of and participant in Brighton Pride and have used this to showcase how we aim to treat everyone with respect and dignity and seek to provide a positive environment for all of our stakeholders, free from discrimination, harassment, victimisation or abuse.  Actively supporting the Rainbow Laces campaign is another example of our commitment to promote equality and diversity with our women’s first team adorned in rainbow coloured numbers on the back of players’ shirts, being a first in professional football in this country.

“We also work hard to ensure that all visitors to the Amex, training ground and any events we undertake feel comfortable and respected and ensure that our staff are provided with the skills and knowledge through training to be confident in challenging those individuals who may wish to not behave in the way we expect them to do.  However, clearly we can do more and we are working to identify meaningful opportunities to demonstrate how best we can meet the needs of a diverse population within a multi-cultural society.”

Supporter Services Manager, Sarah Gould: “I feel passionate about being an ally to my fellow colleagues & supporters and am extremely proud to have been heavily involved in the club’s equality, diversity and inclusion work in recent seasons. Making positive change is incredibly important to me and I am delighted to play in Brighton & Hove Albion’s journey.”

Marc Dring, Marketing Manager: “We know that football has the power to bring everyone together and it is vital that everyone feels welcome at football matches. As an ally who feels strongly that sport should be for everyone, I feel fortunate that my role at Brighton & Hove Albion means I can realise this belief.

“Our active presence at Brighton Pride, coupled with our zero-tolerance approach to homophobic abuse at the American Express Community Stadium, illustrate our commitment to football being a sport for all.”

Adrian Morris, Head of Safety and Security: “While the focus of the club’s work is on promoting inclusivity and raising awareness, we also take action when witness to homophobic abuse. Our zero-tolerance stance to homophobia has resulted in perpetrators being ejected from matches, with some also arrested and receiving lifetime bans and police sanctions. We aim to make the Amex the most inclusive stadium for both home and travelling fans to watch football.”

Lewis Dunk, First Team Captain: “We are proud to welcome LGBT + groups and fans to our stadium, ­­ and want to ensure they feel as welcome as anyone else when they come to watch us play.

“Homophobia and transphobia, just like racism, have no place in football, and anyone with those prejudiced views is not welcome in our game. I know the club does a lot of work to make football a more inclusive game for everyone, and as players, we are proud to help in any way we can.” ­

Chief Executive Officer and Vice Chairman, Paul Barber: “The world of football spans the globe and we are fortunate to be playing at the highest level and in the biggest league in terms of global reach. This has given the club the opportunity to support the concepts of inclusion, equality and diversity from a large platform and we do this with great pride. We represent the city that we call home and are playing our part supporting local LGBT+ groups and encouraging more LGBT+ people to join our football community whether that be as a fan, a staff member or indeed as a player. “

Further information here: 

 

REVIEW:”Masculinties: Liberation Through Photography” @ Barbican Art Gallery

Posted on by Craig Hanlon-Smith

You Think You’re A Man: “Masculinties: Liberation Through Photography” Barbican Art Gallery, London.

At a time in popular culture when we appear to be riding a wave of men disregarding conforming perceptions of masculinity, see any red-carpet appearance by Billy Porter as one striking example, this Barbican exhibition reminds us that disregarding the binary is not a new fashion, we’ve always done it.

Curator Alona Pardo says of the collection: “We live in a moment where, on one level, we’ve never been more inclusive… never been so appreciative and accepting of other lifestyles” and if that feels like a statemen with a ‘but’ on the horizon, the hesitation is that Masculinties is an international exhibition showcasing diverse images of male lives from the 1950s to the present. That’s 70 years of non-conforming. It’s not a new idea.  

Featuring the work of more than 50 artists, including Andy Warhol, Robert Mapplethorpe and Herb Ritts, the exhibition explores how masculinity has been defined both within and without the mainstream of ‘man’.

Pardo said she felt that something was missing from the conversation despite discussion of gender roles and ‘toxic masculinity’ in the mainstream; “It struck me that when you look at shows that are looking at the experience of identity and it’s always measured against something… and that benchmark is masculinity. But we never really examined or scrutinized what this status quo was”

 

The presentation here examines marginalised communities and perhaps their influence upon, but certainly challenge to, historically conservative ideas of masculinity whether it is toxic or not.

At its most fascinating the collection marries images of the Taliban in an effeminate and glamorous juxtaposition with their contemporary reputation, alongside video of an American college fraternity and its ‘shouting competition’, their sought after prize a keg of beer. All equally fascinating, frightening and alarmingly arousing. An illuminating combination.

The exhibition features images from inside private and exclusive gentlemen’s clubs of London in the 1980s alongside flamboyant football players and teenage cowboys. The latter staring at the exhibition visitors through eyes that have clearly seen more life than they perhaps dare to speak of. So much here is as instantly recognisable as it is unsettling. And Masculinties does at times unsettle.

That said, the presentation does not quite live up to the space into which it sits and throughout there is a gentle sense of something missing, an element unexplained. Curator Pardo:  “The show isn’t setting out to answer what masculinity is. It’s about opening up the discussion to start thinking about the subject. Men do need to be liberated from this very narrow definition of what it means to be a successful male.” 

 

I’m not at all convinced that Masculinties takes a leap towards such an achievement, but it is certainly an engaging part of a broader and definitely live conversation.

“Masculinities: Liberation through photography” is at London’s Barbican Art Gallery now and until May 20, 2020.

 

Nobody’s Scapegoat – The life and achievements of Michael James.

Posted on by Craig Hanlon-Smith

Nobody’s Scapegoat.

The life and achievements of Michael James.

 

Michael James has lived the kind of life that would be a screenwriter’s dream plot. An active member of the Gay Liberation Front in the 1970s he was regularly under surveillance by special branch. A former London department store window dresser, he has lived through every social and legal development for our LGBT communities. He has been arrested and served time in prison twice once for some considerable time, and now aged 79 he is published author. As GScene celebrates LGBT History Month with its literary focused theme in 2020, Craig Hanlon-Smith spent some time with Michael discussing his colourful past and how now with the publication of his first novel The Triple Goddess, approaching his ninth decade on the planet he continues to make history.

 

I visit Michael in his almost top floor apartment in a Kemptown tower-block. From the living room terrace looking west, I note it is possible to survey the entirety of Brighton and Hove, the city Michael made his home some 25 years ago. I comment on the view and he tells me of a dream he had “standing on the terrace edge and being taken away by two seagulls” this dream inspired his interest in writing fantasy, the predominant genre for his fascinating first novel. Knowing something of Michael’s life story already, I am surprised to learn his book is not about his own journey.

 

“I never wanted to write a book” he tells me. “Four years ago I fell into a deep clinical depression but initially didn’t recognise it as such. When I did, I felt that it was my dealing with world events and not coping with them. I made a list of concerns, religious doctrine, radicalisation, child abuse amongst many more and decided to write short stories on them. Eventually I thought there could be a book of this collection and began to put them in some sort of order. As a read them I thought to myself ‘you’ve started a novel’. They all were linked somehow. I had no conception, no plan. I started on the first went through each story and developed the themes. Once I added characters I felt as though my fingers were like magic. I finished one sentence on to the next and the story beginning to tell itself”.

 

Reviewed in the December edition of GScene, The Triple Goddess is a fantasy extravaganza that mixes magic, legend, love and humour into a utopian/dystopian future world. We are introduced to a seemingly ordinary world of cosy domestic bliss of boy meets boy and holidays in Italy when strange coincidences make profound changes to the lives of almost everyone else in the book. The plot explores sexual abuse, suffering, greed, religious extremists of all creeds and cruelty, but serves up retribution to protagonists offering salve and safety to the harmed. It is a page turner and tears through an ever nearing global apocalypse which plays compulsive background to the domestic developments of the chosen few.

Although the novel is not specifically about Michael’s life, his own life experience and view of the world have been a solid influence.

“I forget things in my life until I talk about them or read something I’ve written and then realise where it may have come from. I wanted to write about children in their honour and especially those who have suffered. Those who are suffering now terrible abuse but also in my youth I knew kids who had TB and were away from school, lives and friends for up to six months. And yet kids can change the world, they have the power. Look at the publicity Greta Thunberg has achieved in a short space of time. She has a shelf life though. Like all of us she is vulnerable to those in power. If they don’t destroy her one way they’ll do what they can to destroy her another”.

 

Book two of his trilogy is complete and he is busy working on the third. Michael has many fascinating stories of his own battles with those in power. He is quick to remind me that the decriminalisation of homosexuality in 1969 was ‘partial’: “people forget that” he says. “You were only allowed sex with a consenting partner over the age of 21 in the privacy of your own home and if you lived in a flat, that was not considered your own home as it was in a building shared by others”. He tells me stories of friends and friends of friends dragged out of their own flats by homophobic police officers who “behaved like thugs”. It was whilst visiting a friend’s flat in the early 1970s that Michael was arrested for importuning. “no one had a phone in those days. I turned up at my friends and he wasn’t in so I had to wait for him to come back. A well-dressed gentleman appeared and we struck up a conversation, two coppers jumped out from behind a bush and arrested me. It was a total set up. So many gay men were trapped in this way and we weren’t actually doing anything wrong”. The police witnesses in court lied and Michael was issued with a criminal conviction and fined ten pounds, equivalent to about £175 today. The sentence was sympathetic but Michael refused to pay “I was not guilty I don’t care what the police said in court”. Michael was returned to court and continuing to protest his innocence he was sent to Brixton prison for one week.  

It was this experience which drove Michael’s commitment to the Gay Liberation Front (GLF). At the time the GLF were treated much as a subversive political movement in much the same way as a terrorist organisation. Suspected members were often followed and had files held by special branch police units. “We used to meet in empty warehouses in Covent Garden at all hours of the night, it was risky but we were determined”,

 

During a trip to Bangkok, Michael noted stories in local newspapers of five British men having committed suicide whilst visiting the city. During his stay he was asked to take a shipment of drugs back to the UK hidden in canteens of cutlery. When he refused, he was told that others would soon read of his suicide in the local press. Reluctantly he boarded a plane for London with packets of heroin hidden in his baggage. “I went straight to the ‘something to declare’ line at customs and told them what I was carrying and how it had come about. I was arrested and during questioning they brought up my GLF special branch file and previous convictions. In court there was no mention that I had offered up the drugs and self-declared”. Michael was found guilty and in 1976 sentenced to eight years, the first two of which were served in a high security prison on the Isle of Wight along with some of the country’s most dangerous prisoners. “There are many ways to survive prison” he says and over tea and cakes two days before Christmas, tells me about two of them.

“I have no fear” he says proudly. I’ve been in and out of STD clinics since 1959 dear, what’s the worst that can happen? We are a nation of thieves and pirates. We were always good at robbing resources from elsewhere in the world. I do love this country but the biggest criminals are the richest and the best educated people on this planet. They created these systems and know how to work their way around them whilst the rest of us are pushed around”.

       It was upon his release from prison in 1982 that Michael first noticed a story in the gay press “in a column no bigger than a couple of postage stamps” about a ‘gay plague’. It is when I ask him what his greatest achievement in life has been so far he says:“not the words I would use, the thing that has given me the most spiritual satisfaction was volunteer work with body positive in the 1980s. Working with so very many beautiful gay men most of whom are dead. Seeing how their parents acted and reacted to the situation their children were in. To see how families became single minded and greedy. Families came in and threw partners out of their homes and claimed everything material. Seeing the best and worst of families. Seeing the whole spectrum. Seeing how friends through fear left their friends to die alone – they couldn’t bear to see what would in turn happen to them. And there was a tidal wave dumped on the gay community by the heterosexual press. It was horrific but those early men to me are saints”.

 

“They were not easy times, even without the arrival of AIDS and HIV. Gay pubs were run by straight landlords who hated us” Michael tells me of The Champion Pub in London where the landlord refused to serve a trans woman. The following week all the male members of the GLF in London went into the pub wearing dresses and refused to leave until they were served a drink. I ask Michael to share any remembered disappointments: “the misogyny of gay men. Gay men who refer to women as inferior. Young men too. This was the case in my youth, it is the same now. Let me tell you if it wasn’t for the lesbians within the gay community – we would not be here now. Not just everything they did in the AIDS crisis but as activists. I am proud to have stood side by side with these women in the 1970s.

Our first meeting ends with Michael sharing his excitement over his impending book launch at the LSE in London. “That’s where the GLF started. It’s like coming full circle. When I pop my clogs they will inherit all my writings and books whether they want them or not”

Once his Goddess trilogy is complete, he promises to write a memoir with these stories and so many more laid bare.

The Triple Goddess by Michael James is available now from all online retailers, published by Fantastic Books. www.fantasticbooks.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

REVIEW: TV – AJ and The Queen

Posted on by Craig Hanlon-Smith

RuPaul is a force for good. His DragRace brand has not only brought sequins and lashes to the party but wider discussions around individuality, acceptance and courage to a much broader audience. The US series has now 15 seasons under its belt, if you include AllStars, and the UK production breathed life not only into the show but also its long-time presenters RuPaul Charles and Michelle Visage, who were more relaxed and candid than we have seen for a long time. And as for the lady Visage herself, all hail: her Madonna-week on Strictly Come Dancing may have sent her packing, but twice on prime-time UK weekend television, she broadcast her support for the LGBTQ communities in a way that was heartfelt, moving and insightful. Respect.

And so to AJ & The Queen, the latest superstar/Netflix collaboration to drop an entire season all in one go into our drag hungry pantiliners. Conceived by Mr. Charles and Sex & The City creator Michael Patrick King, AJ tells the tale of a drag queen (RuPaul playing the RuPaul lookalike Ruby Red) down on her luck following a love and dosh scam by the exceedingly handsome fraudster played by Josh Segarra (Segarra alone is worth the subscription fee).

She embarks on a nationwide drag tour whereupon a homeless young girl who looks like a boy, AJ, stows away in Ruby’s campervan and an unlikely friendship is forced upon them.  AJ & The Queen certainly has its heart in the right place and at times is genuinely funny. The casting of Tia Carrere is spot on as the cheap botox administering, eye patch wearing villain side-kick, and the series is spot-a-star with a cast list that includes not only dozens of RPDR alumni, but a host of all but forgotten US TV legends.

As is the way with some Netflix commissions, in trying to be all things to all people it sometime is not clear who the show is aimed at or indeed who will like it. It is part road-trip, part lip-synch for your life, part kids adventure drama and the pick’n’mix approach means that some of the gags just do not land which is not surprising when it is repeated two, three and four times just to make sure we get it. Three episodes in I thought the acting might be terrible but then realised it is very much in style of part drama/part comedy caper that at times works and at others just seems odd.

This is not bad television. There are some beautiful kind and careful moments that are genuinely sweet. When Ruby and AJ happen across Lloyd, a Tennessee resident older man who has turned his B&B into a costume museum, Ruby and Lloyd lip synch Diana and Lionel style to Endless Love. When Lloyd’s excitable advances are spurned by his Diana he replies “but I’m lonely” and we believe him. There are affectionate nods to decades of LGBTQ friendly movies from Priscilla to Desperately Seeking Susan which run alongside sparks to ignite many a dinner table debate. When AJ says “I don’t want to be a boy but I don’t want to be a girl” there is more clarity in that one non-binary statement than in all of the objectional debates on any given chat show or social media platform.

It just feels a little clunky and that it may be trying too hard. I happily committed to the season as there’s something in there that means once you’re in there’s an investment in the story and characters that needs to be seen through. It is just that by the end I couldn’t help thinking that what RuPaul has said in ten episodes, could have been more powerfully shared in four.

AJ & The Queen is available now on Netflix.

RuPaul’s Drag Race both US and UK seasons return this year.

Hold On, Pain Ends. The necessity of hope.

Posted on by Craig Hanlon-Smith

Craig Hanlon-Smith shines a light on the HOPE charity project.

The HOPE charity project, aims to be a support and therapeutic opportunity for families and individuals struggling to manage the complexities around mental health challenges and their impact upon all those involved. It is also the main charity this year receiving support from Worthing Pride.

With a young person focus, and with failing mental health disproportionately affecting LGBTQ youth, HOPE seems a fitting partner for this growing Pride event.

The HOPE Charity Project evolved from personal experience by its founder Claire Sparrow. Not able to access any help, support or having anywhere to turn during Claire’s own family’s cry for help, she felt that something was desperately needed for them and all the other thousands of families out there going through a similar experience and the project was born.

Claire said: “Finding your child attempting suicide by finding them hanging in their bedroom is not a sight I wish on any parent to experience. And all because the system failed us as a family”.

Founders and partners Claire Sparrow and Paul Mant
Founders and partners Claire Sparrow and Paul Mant

In 2016 after months of trying to get support and help for Claire’s 12-year old’s anxiety and depression it took almost an unimaginable tragedy to get professional attention and help. Even then the help offered had the opposite effect to the one needed. Claire’s child was as a last resort admitted to a Mental Health hospital and it was here that she began to appreciate how damaged the system was:

 “The standards and lack of sufficiently trained agency staff in these units were a cause for the condition to worsen rather than improve. Eight months of our child being in hospital was more like watching her in a prison. 12 years old, severely depressed, away from her family, being subjected to additional traumatic experiences she should never have had to see or go through. All because there was nowhere for us to turn to get the help and support when she originally needed it”.

It was during this traumatic experience that as a family they became aware of just how many families are struggling behind closed doors with nowhere to turn. Complex mental health cases in young people as young as eight are rising dramatically.

Anxiety, panic attacks, self-harm, depression, eating disorders, gender/body dysphoria to name a few. These can in turn lead to withdrawal, violent outbursts, school refusal, disruption in the home, breakdowns, and now all too regularly, suicide or in the case of Claire’s daughter attempted suicide.

“There wasn’t a place to go that had the therapeutic nurturing impact that’s needed for this serious area of health for our adolescent generation. So we created one”.

Sophie Cook is an Ambassador for the HOPE Charity Project
Sophie Cook is an Ambassador for the HOPE Charity Project

The HOPE Charity Project provides a space where those that need to be heard can get some support and have somewhere to go to meet others that understand and will care.

The HOPE project converted a donated shipping container into a support and therapy centre, constructed all from donated and recycled materials and the kindness of skilled tradesmen helping out for free. They connect families in the local community with each other so they know they are not alone and not the only ones struggling with these worries. They work with one another to provide emotional support. “The HOPE Charity Project is the place where these young people can come to meet others with similar worries, fears, sadness, frustration. So again, they too can realise, they are not alone and will not be judged, rejected or ignored. Early Intervention and Prevention is our aim”.

The Hope Charity Project is run by families and the professionals that want to make a difference to help as many as they can and quickly. The need for such initiatives to provide such services to the UK public has never been greater.

“We are always looking out for venues and rural areas for us to be able to expand our services/facilities, to enable us to help more young people and their families covering a greater area. If you could help or would like to get onboard, involved in any way, we would love to hear from you. We need your help & support to keep this going.

“We are so grateful to Worthing Pride for having chosen us as their Charity this year, we are honoured and very proud to have been part of such an important brilliant event.”

To get in touch with Claire and those involved in the project via the website, click here:

Twitter: @hopecharityproj

Instagram: @hope_charity_project

Facebook: HOPE Charity Project

Drawn That Way- The progressive pencil etchings of Nikita Ryan.

Posted on by Craig Hanlon-Smith

Drawn That Way: The progressive pencil etchings of Nikita Ryan.

Nikita (Nicky) Ryan is an artist and writer causing quite the stir on Instagram with her gay male erotica pencil drawings, an interesting and welcome change on the seemingly selfie obsessed medium. A committed life-long artist, Nicky trained in graphic design and multimedia but in her words, it is drawing and painting that remain her number one passion. Having run into Nicky at Pride in Brighton and Hove this summer, Craig Hanlon-Smith caught up with her to discuss why this art form and why this subject.

“I have always drawn the male body but I started this project properly a couple of years ago”

Your current Instagram account is clearly focused upon gay male erotica. Why this particular genre? “mainly because of my writing, which is a more recent venture.  I have discovered a love of writing erotic gay romance and fantasy and have several books in various stages of completion which I hope to get finished and published.

The drawings started alongside my writing, with the idea of providing a visual record of my characters but have since evolved into their own entity.  And I love doing them”.

How does your own sexuality inform this work? “I am a straight woman, which surprises a lot of people who look at my art, as they assume I must be a gay man.  But I find the male body exciting, and male bodies together extremely sensual and beautiful.  And so far, I haven’t found any other woman drawing gay male erotic art, which is maybe surprising considering that there are many male artists who draw female erotic art”

How would you describe your own relationship with the LGBTQ communities? “I am an ally and fully support LGBTQ rights.  It does not sit right with me that certain people have an issue with others just because of who they love and want to be with, and it is something I feel very strongly about. I have several gay friends and through socialising with them regularly on the gay scene in London and attending Prides with them, I have met many more people and am really interested in their stories.  I will never know how it feels to be in the position that our society has made a lot of the LGBTQ community feel, but I feel privileged to be accepted into their world. I hope that my art in some small way can help with the acceptance of same sex relationships”.

Talk us through how you approach your models or indeed how they approach you? “The main platform to showcase my art is Instagram and I also use Twitter.  Most of my models are guys that have approached me, generally through Instagram and offered me their services!  They then send me photos to work from. I have also approached people myself through social media (and some in real life) and asked I could draw them. No-one has turned me down yet! I also use images from the internet that I find sensual and interesting, but one goal is to have a space where I can invite models to and work them in real time.

I have been surprised at how well it has been received, as the subject matter is obviously evocative.  But I like to think that, rather than full-on explicit images (although some of them are) I try to show the softer side of relationships, the passion and the desire, and maybe people appreciate that. As an artist, you put yourself out there and leave yourself open to criticism, especially with a subject such as mine.  But I also think that is what art is for, which is to push boundaries and open people’s eyes.

I might add that I do tend to get sent a lot of interesting pictures from men, which you can imagine, and it never fails to surprise me how free some people are with sending nudes to, let’s face it, a complete stranger.  And I’m sure some confuse it [Instagram] with Grindr!”

This style feels like a step into an older form of twentieth century art and illustration. Would you agree? Is that your intention? “I find that really interesting because, to be honest, I have never really thought about it, but I can see what you mean.  It wasn’t my intention, as I just started drawing and my style has evolved in this way.

What are your hopes for your work and do you have any plans to exhibit in the more traditional sense?  “My main hope is that people with continue to like and appreciate my drawings. I am extremely interested in mythology and folklore and want to explore the gay theme within them, which I am in the process of doing now. I had five of my drawings accepted into the Erotic Art London exhibition, at the Oxo Tower on the South Bank, from in October this year which was exciting, and ultimately I would love to exhibit a larger collection somewhere.  I would also love to meet other artists who produce gay male erotica and collaborate with them. 

I think there are such hang-ups with sex and sexuality in general, and even more so with same sex relationships, and I would love for my art to help end the stigma surrounding this.  In my opinion it should be seen as a natural and beautiful thing.

And I am always looking to hear from potential models!”

You can see the full range of Nicky’s work on Instagram & Twitter on online here. 

 

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