Pride

UK Pride groups unite against anti-trans LGB Alliance being granted charity status

Pride in London, 2019. (Niklas Halle’n/AFP via Getty)

Dozens of UK LGBT+ Pride organisations have united against the LGB Alliance being recognised as a charity.

Last week, rage ripped through the queer community after the government’s charity regulator, the Charity Commission for England and Wales, officially granted charity status to the anti-trans group.

The decision was quickly condemned by LGBT+ groups including Stonewall and Mermaids , bewildered by how an organisation that so loudly seeks to divide could be granted charity status.

In the latest wave of backlash, the UK Pride Organisers Network released a letter signed by more than 50 Pride and queer event organisers opposing the move Thursday afternoon (29 April).

Signatories range from Pride in London and Bristol Pride to Trans Pride Brighton and Trans Pride Northern Ireland, as well as queer radio stations and sexual health service providers.

Pride organisers in Exmouth, Warickshire, Oxford, Cornwall, Coventry and Portsmouth also signed, as did Northern Pride, the largest Pride event in north-east England, among other municipal and county-wide groups.

“Our member Prides have always stood with the trans communities and always will,” the joint statement reads.

“We will continue our ongoing fight for visibility, unity and equality for all.

“Trans rights are human rights. Together as one.”

The LGB Alliance’s charity status needs to be revoked immediately

Co-chairs, Jenny Dewsnap and Lee Bowditch, wrote that the network’s members are “calling upon the Charity Commission to reverse their decision to award the organisation its charity status”.

“We know the LGB Alliance does not promote equality, diversity and human rights as stipulated in the purposes of the organisation,” they wrote.

“LGB Alliance is seen as a political campaign organisation with their main aim to remove trans people from our LGBT+ community and block trans rights,” the association said, quoting a statement from one of its signatories, Pride in London.

“LGB Alliance has campaigned against the Gender Recognition Act and called for the Equality Act to be reviewed around ‘same-sex’ rights.”

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Transgender people and their supporters march during London’s second Trans Pride in September, 2020. (WIktor Szymanowicz/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

The letter also urged its members to reach out to local lawmakers and the Charity Commission, whether through social media or online forms, to “ensure they are aware of your views and concerns”.

Among the countless signatories was Drag Queen Story Time UK, which organises children’s events hosted by drag queens.

“We oppose this decision by the Charity Commission vehemently” Sab Samuel, who runs the group, said in a statement to the press.

“The LGB Alliance have been on numerous occasions the evil witch behind the frayed curtain of countless hate campaigns towards trans people and trans activists.

“The LGB Alliance charity status needs to be revoked immediately.”

Since its launch in October 2019, the LGB Alliance has been branded a “hate group” by Pride in London, queer MPs, the LGBT+ wings of major political parties and activists. It denies that it is transphobic.

The lobbying group has been grilled by the very community it claims to represent for refusing to denounce its neo-Nazi and homophobe supporters.

Moreover, LGB Alliance’s leadership has come under fire for its ties with the anti-LGBT+ Heritage Foundation and for saying schools should not have queer clubs because of “predatory gay teachers“.

Not only have some 30,000 people called for the press to “stop uncritically platforming” the LGB Alliance, but bosses at Ofcom, the media watchdog, have told MPs it’s “entirely inappropriate” to quote them.

PinkNews has contacted the LGB Alliance for comment.

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