The sudden fall of David Laws, now ex-minister in the UK coalition cabinet for falling foul of expenses regulations in an attempt to keep his sexuality private, has thrown into relief the record of some other politicians. I was struck in particular by two stories from the Guardian, telling of two courageous men of dramatically different generations.
Chris Bryant, an openly gay former minister in the previous government, has written in response to the David Laws story of the difficulties faced by any gay politician, whether fully open or wholly closeted, in a world where heterosexuality is simply assumed. The entire piece is worth reading, but what interests me here, is Bryant’s opening statement:
The 1924 minority Labour government didn’t last very long, but it did at least have the courage of its convictions. On 29 August every member of the cabinet sent a congratulatory 80th birthday message to Edward Carpenter, a pioneering social radical who had lived openly for many years with his companion and lover George Merrill. Considering homosexuality was still punishable by imprisonment and hard labour, and that Carpenter had made no bones about his homosexuality, this was a rare act of political courage.
This was 76 years ago! Carpenter’s courage and honesty then was breathtaking. The birthday congratulations from Labour cabinet members shows that even then, honesty was respected. It is sad that even today, there remain politicians who find similar honesty difficult.
The second story concerns a very different man, of a very different age and order of political significance, who faces an entirely different challenge. In a world which has changed dramatically since Carpenter’s day, where there are now legal protections against discrimination and formal policing strategies to combat homophobic violence, a modern young gay man nevertheless had to deal with outright hostility and rejection - by his own family, who threw him out of his family home. Ian Campbell went on to develop a reputation for his involvement in youth work, especially against homophobia, and went on to be elected as a local councillor in this month’s elections.
He has now been selected as Britain’s youngest mayor - at just 23.
Ian Campbell
As for the future of Labour, who is he backing in the leadership campaign? “Definitely Ed Miliband,” he says. Look out for a youthful MP called Campbell in prime minister Miliband’s cabinet of 2015 then.
UPDATE: In their report of this story, Edge Miami have a useful rundown of the recent emergence of prominent gay mayors in several cities, in the US and in Europe.
Openly gay and lesbian political leaders have become more commonplace in recent years. The mayor of France, Bertrand Delanoë, came out in 1998-but that didn’t stop him from being elected to the office of mayor in 2001. That same year, Klaus Wowereit, the openly gay mayor of Berlin, assumed office.
Last fall, Annise Parker made headlines as the first openly lesbian mayor of Houston, Texas. Parker joined the ranks of openly gay American mayors, including Sam Adams, the mayor of Portland, Oregon, Mark Kleinschmidt of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and David Cicilline, the openly gay mayor of Providence, Rhode Island.
Cambridge, Massachusetts, was an early leader in having a gay mayor, with the 1993 election of Kenneth Reeves, who went on to serve three terms. Earlier this month, Joe Mosca also joined those ranks upon being elected mayor of Sierra Madre, California; in March, openly gay Craig Lowe won the mayor’s office in Gainesville, Florida, despite repeated anti-gay leafleting campaigns that targeted him with various homophobic smears.
