The Alternative Queen's Christmas Speech

Photo taken July 5th 2008 at the start of London Pride. Boris Johnson (left) was the newly elected Conservative Mayor of London who had unexpectedly arrived to lead the parade. Peter Tatchell (right) is a Socialist civil and gay rights campaigner.

As a Tory MP, Boris Johnson's mixed voting record placed him as one who was not fully in favour of the equalisation of gay rights in British law. Peter Tatchell has long campaigned for the abolition of laws which discriminate on grounds of sexuality. The two are, on many ideological scales, polls apart. To the best of my understanding, this was an unplanned meeting and one of the more unlikely confrontations in an event organised "to raise awareness of discrimination and the issues and difficulties affecting the lives of LGBT people around the world".

The event took place just over three years after the execution of two Iranian teenagers for, according to most coverage in the UK, homosexuality. The Iranian government disputed this claim, declaring that their crime was the rape of a thirteen year old boy. Nonetheless, the perception of the Iranian leadership is one of extreme hostility towards its gay citizens and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's public comments on homosexuality are amongst those which some human rights campaigners highlight as an indication of murderous prejudice amongst the leadership.

References:

http://www.publicwhip.org.uk/mp.php?mpid=1629&dmp=826

http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Execution_of_two_gay_teens_in_Iran_spurs_controversy

http://www.petertatchell.net/international/iranstatemurder.htm

http://www.pridelondon.org/