Few figures are as synonymous with LGBT+ rights as is Peter Tatchell. He was integral to the organisation of Britain’s first Pride march, in 1972. “I’ve been to every London Pride march since then,” says the 73-year-old. “This year will be my 54th.”
In his six decades of activism and protest, which began as an “instinctive reaction against injustice” when he was a young teenager, he’s been arrested 103 times (at time of writing) and received too many hate letters and threatening phone calls to count. He’s been subjected to more than 300 violent assaults and 50 attacks on his flat. Horrifyingly, these vicious acts have included bottles and bricks being thrown through his windows, arson, and even a bullet through his front door. He’s previously been under armed police protection, and was even listed as a target for assassination in a foiled plot in the Nineties. He describes these experiences as akin to “living through a low-level civil war”.
