Abertay to recognise Tatchell with honorary degree

Human rights and LGBT+ activist Peter Tatchell is to receive an honorary degree at Abertay University’s Winter Graduation next week.

He will be among more than 200 graduates attending Dundee’s Caird Hall on Friday 23 November.

Co-founder of the queer rights group OutRage!, Mr Tatchell began campaigning in 1967 as he fought for Aboriginal rights in his home country, Australia.

In the decades following he launched campaigns focussing on a range of issues including democracy, civil liberties, social equality and LGBT+ rights.

In 1973, he staged the first LGBT+ rights protest in a communist country, East Germany, which resulted in his detention and interrogation by the Stasi (secret police).

In 1987, he established the world’s first organisation dedicated to the human rights of people with HIV and wrote the world’s first HIV Human Rights Charter. He would later help persuade the World Health Ministers Summit to declare against discrimination.

More recently, Mr Tatchell successfully lobbied the UK Government to allow same-sex marriage and helped win royal pardons for gay and bisexual men convicted of consenting adult same-sex acts under historic anti-gay laws.

Abertay University principal Nigel Seaton commented: "Peter Tatchell has campaigned tirelessly for human rights, and for LGBT+ rights in particular, often doing so at great personal cost. Peter is an inspiration to the Abertay community."