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Pride Life looks back at 2009
Clockwise from top left: Obama, Turing, Gately and Tatchelll
Pride Life takes a look at the gay news stories of 2009.
2009. Has it been a case of two steps forward, one step back in the continued fight for gay rights, not only in the UK but across the globe?
In the all important gay entertainment world, we’ve suffered heartache, pain and some pretty huge belly laughs – from the usual suspects, but from some unexpected corners too.
This is the gay year that was, through Pride Life eyes…
It was expected that January's inauguration of Barack Obama as US president would bring progress in gay rights, so has he walked the talk?
Well, we've seen him nominate lesbians for important federal jobs. He has lifted the ban on HIV-positive people entering the US. He has also made the first moves to repeal the 'don't ask, don't tell' rule in the US military.
A welcome gesture was the award of the Presidential Medal of Freedom to lesbian tennis player Billie Jean King and, posthumously, to assassinated gay rights campaigner Harvey Milk, who was also inducted into the California Hall of Fame, a consolation prize following Governor Arnie's vetoing of a Harvey Milk Day in the state.
And the gay marriage debate was taken up, hilariously in parts, by Britney Spears (for!) and Miss California (against!).
However, Obama has to deal with the new president of the United Nations General Assembly, who said that homosexuality is not really acceptable.
Elsewhere in the US, the American Psychological Association rejected 'gay to straight' therapy. The US Senate approved the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Bill and a leading film director left the Scientologists in protest at their homophobia - but the New York senate voted down a bill allowing gay marriage in the state, as did the electorate in Maine, and a Mormon leader said Satan makes you gay.
.In US showbiz news, Cher's son Chaz Bono talked about transitioning, Star Trek's Mr Sulu appeared with his husband on television in The Newlywed Game, and Oprah's close friend denied that they were lesbian lovers.
Over here, spring sprung the agreeable surprises of Carol Ann Duffy's appointment as Poet Laureate, the first woman, let alone lesbian, to hold the post, and the banning by the Home Office of any visit to these shores by the 'God hates fags' Westboro Baptist Church.
But as life deals joy, it also deals tragedy in equal measure, and 2009 saw the loss of one of our brightest out and proud gay pop stars, Stephen Gately , the Boyzone member who died of natural causes whilst on holiday with his husband in Mallorca.
The world mourned, Daily Mail journalist Jan Moir took it as an excuse for vile anti-gay bile. Some measure of retribution came when Moir was voted the joint winner of Stonewall's Bigot of the Year.
2009 also saw the death of Brittanny Murphy , star of Clueless, the genius LA-based update of Jane Austen’s Emma, and a huge favourite amongst gay men the world over – with echoes of the circumstances surrounding Michael Jackson’s death in June, with fingers pointing to prescription drugs, and lots of them.
And let’s not forget Bea Arthur, gay icon, comedy genius and Golden Girl, who died in April, leaving a huge part of her estate to a New York LGBT homeless charity.
Boy George was released early from Pentonville Prison – where he was serving time for false imprisonment of a male escort at his London home in July, 2007 – and subsequently embarked on a critically acclaimed stint at London’s Leicester Square Theatre. Unfortunately his plea to appear in the last ever Celebrity Big Brother was rebuffed, owing to the fact he’s still on probation.
Gay actor Rupert Everett unleashed some of his (in)famous rhetoric over the summer, saying that gay actors should stay in the closet , a refrain he was to return to in December, while dragging up for the St Trinian's sequel.
This would have been a disappointment to Oscar Wilde, who the Pope decided was not so bad after all , but not to the Bishop of Rochester, who told gays to repent, or to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who told off the US Episcopal church for ordaining gay bishops . But the Quakers voted in favour of gay marriage and the Vatican rebuked a cardinal for his claim that gays couldn't get to heaven.
And Sacha Baron Cohen tested the morals of the world once again, this time with his screaming Austrian homosexual, Brüno. The nation was split – was it or wasn’t it homophobic? – but the Royal Family, it would seem, were keen to form their own opinion.
In an apparent move to endear themselves to the gay community – following a tradition of, well, doing quite the opposite – Conservative leader David Cameron apologised for Section 28 , the Tory policy that banned the “promotion of homosexuality in schools” .
The Conservative leader – and PM-in-waiting, in many people’s books – said “yes, we (the Tories) may have made mistakes.” Stonewall leader Ben Summerskill called it an “historic” move. Peter Tatchell said Cameron was "all talk, no action" on LGBT issues.
But this was rather spoiled a few days later when Cameron allied his party in the European Parliament to noted homophobe Michal Kaminski’s European Conservatives and Reformists group
The opinion of the British Army seems to have been made up however: with an openly gay soldier on the cover of its in-house magazine for the first time and another gay soldier appeared in the press fresh from Afghanistan to tell how he had come out to his comrades and had no problems to report.
In legal developments, a Christian relationship counsellor lost his job for refusing to advise gay couples, a Christian registrar lost her appeal after being disciplined for refusing to conduct civil ceremonies and the House of Lords voted to retain the free speech clause in the offence of homophobic hatred.
Positive developments for British gays came when the law changed to allow lesbian partners to become legal parents and two policemen were revealed to be the country's first gay couple to father a baby.
More good news came when Gordon Brown issued an official apology for the treatment of Alan Turing , but this was overshadowed by the death of a gay man in London, and the near death of another in Liverpool , at the hands of homophobes.
On a similar note, we learned that Peter Tatchell will not now be contesting the general election, as a result of brain injuries sustained in his years of confronting homophobia worldwide.
In Europe, a senior German politician said he didn't want a gay foreign minister and Lithuania said it wanted to "ban the propagation of homosexual relations", but Austria legalised civil unions , and the Church of Sweden announced it would marry gay couples.
Gay rights group Stonewall's Politician of the Year became the EU's foreign minister, a homophobic Polish footballer was sacked by his Danish club,, Iceland voted in a lesbian Prime Minister and even Albania announced that it may legalise gay marriage.
In the rest of the world, we discovered that 39% of New Zealanders consider homosexuality immoral and 46% of Israelis regard homosexuals as deviants, neither of which statistic would satisfy the Jamaican Prime Minister, who said that there would be no same-sex unions while he was in charge, an unsurprising declaration following the homophobic murder of the British Consul there
The Middle East contributed more than its share of misery when it was revealed that three Iranian men were on death row following charges of homosexual conduct and that Iraqi gays were being tortured and killed by militiamen, crimes echoed in Honduras with the assassination of an gay rights activist there. Back on home turf, research found that UK Muslims had absolutely no tolerance of homosexuality.
But the most important story should be left till last. After widespread condemnation and much fear for those in peril we learned that Uganda's president would refuse to sign into law his country's proposed Anti-Homosexuality Bill.
