On Hollyoaks on Monday I noticed Kris wearing a "Some people are gay - get over it" t-shirt. This is a Stonewall campaign. Now, Kris (the character) goes to great pains to remind us that he is a bisexual cross-dresser. He doesn't strike me as the sort of person who would let Ben Summerskill's (Chief Executive of Stonewall) comments and leadership pass. I haven't felt that Stonewall represents me for a long time and now others are starting to notice some of the problems.

Let's take a look at why Kris may be wary of supporting Stonewall:

"but also by lesbians and gay men currently serving" - Summerskill quoted in Stonewall press release

"Lesbian and gay respondents" - Summerskill quoted in Stonewall press release

"YouGov surveyed 1,721 gay and lesbian people across Britain" - Stonewall press release

"Lesbian and gay taxpayers fund" - Summerskill quoted in Stonewall press release

"protect lesbian and gay people" - Summerskill quoted in Stonewall press release

"encouraging gay and lesbian people" - Summerskill quoted in Stonewall press release

Spotting a pattern here? That last quote actually mentioned the bisexual Kris in the release.

This avoidance of trans may be excusable given the mission statement of Stonewall is "Equality & Justice for Lesbians, Gay Men and Bisexuals" (but as has been pointed out - rather odd given that the Stonewall riots the organisation is named after was mostly Trans people fighting for their rights) but leaving out bisexuals constantly in any comment Summerskill makes is not acceptable. It's also interesting to note that the mission statement uses "Gay Men" but not "Lesbian Women" or "Bisexual People".

Summerskill's ignorance doesn't stop there though:

"If 'gay' is a word of abuse when you are nine how does that impact when you decide at 13 or 14 you are gay?" - Summerskill quoted in Guardian article

Decide??? Ben, sweetie, we do not decide that we are queer. We do not decide to be queer. We realise we are queer. We (hopefully) accept that we are queer. WE DO NOT DECIDE!

Summerskill is not the only person in the organisation and most of the press releases above do mention other sexualities but, specifically, Summerskill doesn't. And he's the Chief Exec and most quoted of Stonewall. He sets the atmosphere and direction for Stonewall. And I don't like that atmosphere and direction.

• The regular sidelining of bisexuality
• The rolling over on Gay Marriage focusing solely on "we have similar rights" and completely ignoring other issues of symbolism which are equally important
• The use of Stagecoach (owned by the very homophobic Brian Souter) buses to advertise campaigns

For all these reasons I cannot believe that Stonewall represents me.

Grrrr!

Alex
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Marginally related humourous obligation: The top five searches had, at number 1 with 5% "Enter search term".