Peter Tatchell is one of the foremost human rights campaigners of the last half-century. He has been involved in campaigns against racism, homophobia and police brutality, and is a leading voice in the fight for human rights around the world. In this episode, we talk to Peter about how he came to be a champion of human rights, and how he became a person who stood up for what he believed in.
00:01:34.280What was it about your history, your childhood perhaps,
00:01:38.000that made you into someone who was willing to stand up
00:01:40.860for what you believed in the way that you had?
00:01:42.780I don't think there's any one major event or influence,
00:01:47.560But I do know that growing up in the 1960s, watching the nightly television news bulletins about the black civil rights movement in America was a very, very influential factor.
00:02:03.140um it inspired me to first of all understand about the horrendous uh racial segregation and
00:02:11.820racist persecution and violence that african-americans suffered but also gave me an
00:02:18.100inkling an idea about how to do human rights campaigning so in the last half a century that
00:02:25.640I've been doing this, you know, my model is non-violent direct action, inspired by people
00:02:32.580like Martin Luther King, but also Mahindra Gandhi and others. I think their methods of
00:02:39.920peaceful direct action and, where appropriate, civil disobedience against unjust laws is the
00:02:47.560model by which all successful movements for social change have won through what i'm curious about
00:02:56.840there will be other there will have been other people who would have been watching martin martin
00:03:00.800lutherkin marching and and seeing those movements who would not have had the courage or whatever it
00:03:07.240is that's driven you to risk your life and limb essentially for what you believe in what do you
00:03:12.400think it was that made you prepared to do that to be willing to risk your life essentially for
00:03:18.120that well you're right i mean my school friends uh also saw the same images but didn't act um
00:03:26.000i guess i've just got quite a strong sense of right and wrong um perhaps an overdeveloped
00:03:32.880conscience um i don't like to see other people suffering you know i love freedom equality
00:03:39.420justice I love other people I put myself in their shoes if it was me who was being persecuted
00:03:47.540or unjustly treated I would want someone to help me so when I see others suffering I think well
00:03:54.600if I'd want others to help me in that situation then surely I have some responsibility to do
00:04:01.040something to try and help them and were you always like that were you like that as a kid if you saw
00:04:05.120something some injustice happening as a 10 year old would you try to step in or defend people who
00:04:09.900can yeah yeah and i don't know exactly where it came from i suppose it's partly from my
00:04:14.440very strict quite fundamentalist christian upbringing my parents instilled me in a very
00:04:20.300strong sense of um you know follow your own conscience don't just go along with the mob
00:04:27.680think for yourself stand up for what is right even if it's unpopular and you know from a religious
00:04:35.400point of view um be a good samaritan you know don't walk by another side of the street when
00:04:41.000someone is is suffering so i guess that that that was part of the fact that impelled me to
00:04:46.060take up these human rights causes i mean there must be a part of you peter though that when you
00:04:51.460see and you get involved in these struggles and what's isn't there a part of your brain going
00:04:55.840I mean we could have had it easier if we just like other people did walk on by
00:05:01.640is there a part of you that's like that or is or do you just not entertain that that sense of doubt
00:05:07.140well I guess when I see an injustice I'm aware that I'm not the only person that's concerned
00:05:15.640I mean there are other organizations and individuals who also take up causes
00:05:19.080back in the day you know millions of people worldwide campaigned against apartheid in South
00:05:25.200Africa and supporting the internal struggle by black South Africans and their white allies,
00:05:34.320they did eventually succeed in overturning that horrendous racist system. So for me,
00:05:40.400I've also had a very clear understanding that it's collective action that makes change.
00:05:47.540I've done a few things in a personal, individual way, but mostly real change comes about through
00:05:55.160lots of people getting together and deciding that enough is enough.
00:05:59.620So that was the model of the Chartists
00:06:03.100who fought for working class votes in the 19th century.
00:06:07.260It was the model for the suffragettes who fought for votes women
00:06:10.360in the 20th century. It was the model for the campaign against the poll tax.
00:07:39.760which the world was pretty much ignoring.
00:07:42.460So the thinking behind the attempt at citizens' arrests was firstly to act on that request to support the heroic Zimbabwean people who, far more than me, were taking much, much greater risks to their lives and liberty.
00:07:59.880But through that process, helping to shine a spotlight on the gross human rights abuses perpetrated by the Mugabe regime.
00:08:09.240And I think that although I did not succeed in arresting Mugabe, even though I had a perfectly lawful legal case to have him arrested on charges of torture because I had the evidence that he had condoned and acquiesced in the torture of people in Zimbabwe, even though I didn't succeed, those protests did help highlight the immense human rights abuses.
00:08:33.480you know, through particularly the image of me being beaten unconscious by his bodyguards in
00:08:38.500Brussels in front of the world's media in broad daylight. I mean, most people concluded if he's
00:08:44.580prepared to have his minders beat up a peaceful protester in the heart of a European capital city
00:08:51.960in broad daylight in front of the world's media, just imagine what he's doing to his own people
00:08:57.660when no one is watching so in that sense it was very effective of course i never wanted to or
00:09:05.160intended to get beaten unconscious and i'm living with the consequences with some brain damage
00:09:09.920ever since but by comparison to the suffering of human rights defenders in zimbabwe i've got off
00:09:18.980quite lightly you know i know activists in zimbabwe who've been detained for months even years
00:09:26.120without charge, who've been tortured and raped in prison, and some who've sadly been killed
00:09:33.900by the Central Intelligence Organization, the Zimbabwean secret police. So putting it in that
00:09:41.500context and perspective, you know, I've made some sacrifices and taken some risks, but nothing,
00:09:47.200Nothing by comparison to the risks taken by and the devastating suffering endured by literally thousands of human rights defenders inside Zimbabwe itself.
00:10:01.280Did Mugabe recognize you the second time when you tried to do a citizen's arrest on him?
00:10:13.060because he must have had a look in his eye like oh i'm not here well see i ambushed him in the
00:10:21.380lobby of the hilton hotel in brussels um but but but my ploy was i just walked into the middle of
00:10:27.120his entourage um but i was smiling and held up my hand to shake his and of course that uh led the
00:10:36.420security staff to lower their guard because they thought i was a well-wisher and i think initially
00:10:42.080So did he, because he made half a smile and then he suddenly had this horrified look on his face, which I think was the moment of recognition.
00:10:53.640So it's nice. It was like a kind of like ethical, candid camera.
00:11:00.860Well, it was obviously, as you say, very effective.
00:11:02.680Another example of where this kind of attempt was effective.
00:11:06.800Actually, I find very interesting hearing you talk about confronting Mike Tyson, where you ambushed him.
00:11:12.180And actually, the way that you told it, essentially, you were able to reason with Mike Tyson and get him to say to camera that he is not homophobic.
00:11:22.920Can you tell us a little bit about that story that I find fascinating?
00:11:25.960Yeah, this was in Memphis, Tennessee, in the United States, just before his world title fight, Lennox Lewis, Mike Tyson's world title fight against Lennox Lewis.
00:11:36.800you know I thought well he was you know on record as making all these homophobic slurs against
00:11:45.800Lennox Lewis and previous against other boxers I thought someone needs to change this and there's
00:11:51.020also misogyny as well you know the allegations or the conviction for rape which he served prison
00:11:57.120time and you know his misogynistic slurs so I wanted to do something and again it was inspired
00:19:48.220Do you think it's, I'll put this question in a more concise way,
00:19:52.320do you think it was wrong for someone like Twitter
00:19:54.200to ban Tommy Robinson and to remove his account
00:19:57.560or would you say that ultimately he has the right
00:20:00.200and he should be allowed to say what he thinks,
00:20:03.160even if you disagree with it or I disagree with it?
00:20:06.400Well, of course, I strongly disagree with Tommy Robertson
00:20:09.720and the movements he's involved and associated with.
00:20:13.500But my understanding was that he was banned from Twitter
00:20:17.600for simply making criticisms of Islam.
00:20:23.920They are criticisms that I wouldn't make
00:20:26.820or not make in that way, but I do think it's valid that all ideas,
00:20:31.680including religious ideas, should be open to criticism.
00:20:35.580When it crosses the line to abuse and insults,
00:20:40.440when it engages in threats, menaces, or harassment,
00:20:45.180and certainly if it involves any element of encouraging violence,
00:20:48.880then that is obviously clearly wrong, a step too far,
00:20:52.360and that should not be tolerated because that's not about free speech.
00:20:56.120That's a violation of free speech, because when you have that kind of toxic atmosphere, which Tommy Robinson has often been associated with, I'm going to say, you actually close down debate because the targets, you know, Muslims, immigrants, refugees, don't feel able to speak out and engage in the debate because they're intimidated.
00:21:19.160So for you, the line on free speech is essentially, I mean, you kind of put from what I took out of that is you put insults and incitement to violence into one category.
00:21:30.400Is that where you are? Or would you say you should be allowed to call someone names, but you should definitely not be allowed to incite violence against them in a free society?
00:21:39.300Yeah, I think insults are OK. But again, it depends on what kind of insult.
00:21:44.520So when it comes to free speech, I've got three red lines.
00:21:49.580The first is, I don't think someone should be able to make false damaging allegations against another person.
00:21:56.700For example, to falsely accuse them of being a pedophile or a tax fraudster.
00:22:03.160Equally, I don't think it's right that a person should be able to engage in threats, menaces or harassment.
00:22:10.300And finally, I think another red line is incitements or encouragements to violence and murder.
00:22:19.940Those are criminal offenses and quite rightly are not part of what constitutes free speech.
00:22:26.640So outside of those three red lines, I think people have a right to speak,
00:22:34.000but equally people have a right to protest against that point of view.
00:22:38.260I think it's really important that there is no free pass
00:22:43.120given to people who promote hatred and bigotry.
00:30:57.960We're still going to come back until you agree to serve gay people.
00:31:03.320And eventually, most of those landlords and managers realized that they were on to a loser,
00:31:09.920that we weren't going to go away, that in fact our repeated sit-ins were actually driving away their traditional customers.
00:31:18.160So they were losing money, and of course money talks.
00:31:22.680And so eventually they gave in and agreed to serve us.
00:31:26.260So why did the Iraq war campaign fail? I mentioned this at the beginning that for our generation, it was a defining moment. Certainly for me, it was a moment when for the first time I realized, even if millions and millions of people around the world come out onto the streets and protest about something, it's not going to make the slightest bit of difference.
00:31:47.560And the Iraq war has been something that's defined the years since.
00:31:52.420I mean, everything that's happened has been, what, 15 years now?
00:31:55.900ISIS, all of the stuff we're still dealing with, Syria, Iraq,
00:32:08.880I think we had in this country an arrogant, smug, self-satisfied,
00:32:14.380an unresponsive government led by Tony Blair.
00:32:17.560And, you know, most democratic governments do have a sensitivity towards public opinion.
00:32:28.080And when public opinion is so overwhelmingly against an action, most governments and democracies tend to, you know, withdraw or revise their policy, but not Tony Blair.
00:32:43.560The problem was that we didn't have any leverage
00:32:47.640other than the mass protests, which he was able to ignore.
00:34:26.860The level of public homophobia is much less than it was two or three decades ago.
00:34:32.820But globally, that's where the real battle is, because still we have today 72 countries where homosexuality is totally illegal, punishable up to life imprisonment in some countries, and facing the prospect of even the death penalty in 10 Muslim-majority countries.
00:34:57.680that's definitely something that to fight for what do you um make of uh you know i come from
00:35:06.120russia as i said uh what do you make of the situation because you've been to russia and
00:35:09.900you've in fact uh you think you've been assaulted in russia i welcome what do you make of the
00:35:14.660situation there because that's one country that seems to be actually getting worse doesn't it
00:35:20.160yeah um although homosexuality was decriminalized in the early 1990s under boris yeltsin
00:35:53.280are portrayed effectively as the enemy within
00:35:56.600Which, of course, distracts Russian people from the massive theft of public assets by oligarchs, the huge corruption of Putin and other Russian officials, and the widespread human rights abuses in that country.
00:36:12.560so it's a good diversionary tactic in the same way that or similar to the fact you know that
00:36:18.400in the 1930s in germany jewish people were used by the nazis as a as a way of deflecting
00:36:24.960given public's attention from the crimes of the nazis and their own failings so that that is
00:36:31.560definitely a a backward step and we have seen actually the legislation passed in 2013
00:36:38.140which criminalized the so-called propagation of homosexuality,
00:36:45.200which in effect means anything positive or informative about gay issues
00:37:59.740And on top of that, of course, you've got the rise of a social media in Russia,
00:38:05.620which is being exploited by far-right extremists to target gay people.
00:38:11.700So far-right extremists will pose as gay, lure gay men to rendezvous,
00:38:17.240and then beat them up, humiliate them by shaving their head
00:38:23.100or pouring ink over them, a whole host of humiliations.
00:38:29.740But, you know, that is going on with, I wouldn't say state sanction, but certainly de facto state sanction.
00:38:39.140You know, there's no action being taken by the Russian state to close down those direct manipulations of social media to perpetrate criminal acts of violence.
00:38:52.320Do you ever find yourself Peter, I mean you come across as a wonderfully tolerant man and very very very gentle for want of a better word, do you ever find yourself though getting frustrated and angered by certain aspects of organised religion which seem to condone homophobic behaviour and even encourage it in certain instances?
00:39:11.440Well, I'd say that organized religion is probably the single greatest global threat to women's rights and LGBT rights.
00:39:21.320All over the world where LGBT rights and women's equality is under attack, it is motivated primarily by religious establishment.
00:39:32.380Not necessarily people at the grassroots of the faith, but the religious leaders.
00:39:38.060So here in Britain, we have the Church of England,
00:39:40.700the official established state church,
00:40:01.820and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby.
00:40:05.200um all over the world um you know everywhere from russia to uganda jamaica uh iran saudi arabia
00:40:17.640it is religious motivation that is orchestrating the systemic persecution of lgbt people and why
00:40:26.720do you think that is i mean you must have some theories of it why do you think that they're so
00:40:31.440homophobic because i mean i was raised as a catholic my mother like i said before is latin
00:40:35.780american and latin american culture i mean is deeply homophobic i mean like for instance to
00:40:42.000tell you a story um my cousin uh when i was very young in the early 90s he passed away from an
00:40:47.700age-related illness and he was a gay man and in that time david didn't bless him he didn't no one
00:40:54.900could admit that he died of an age-related illness he died of throat cancer because nobody wanted to
00:41:00.180admit that he was gay and died of AIDS why why is it do you think that these organizations are
00:41:05.520homophobic because to be honest with you I mean I'm I'm straight but it still makes me incredibly
00:41:11.300angry I think all the major faiths are deeply patriarchal you know very much based upon male
00:41:20.420power and privilege we see that you know across the world most faiths still have male only clergy
00:41:29.000You know, women are not allowed to be imams in orthodox Islam.
00:41:35.360It's only recently that Judaism has opened up to women.
00:41:39.740And apart from the Church of England, the Episcopal Church in America and a few others,
00:41:46.040most Christian denominations are overwhelmingly led by and ruled by men.
00:41:53.140And I think for a lot of men, regardless of faith, a lot of men, not so much in this country now, but a lot of men traditionally, have been very threatened and insecure about their own sexuality and have therefore targeted other gay and bisexual men.
00:42:12.700Well, this is what I was going to ask you, and it's a bit of a weird question, so please understand that it's meant as a genuine curiosity.
00:42:20.680Growing up in Russia, Russians generally are very homophobic.
00:42:24.400And I heard all this stuff about how the reason that people discriminate against gay people is it's not natural.
00:42:32.720And one of the things that actually, if you look at the facts, homosexuality is as prevalent in animals, in many animals, as it is in humans, right?
00:42:40.800Do you have any idea of any evolutionary theory that explains why that is and the kind of evolutionary rationale for homosexuality?
00:51:34.100Yeah, but you're right. Most people think politics in terms of issues that directly affect them and their lives. So taxation, Social Security benefits, the NHS, education, transport, the environment. These are the meaty issues that preoccupy people. But we're never going to get those issues right until we fix the voting system.
00:51:58.520That's the point I was going to make. So how do we convince people to get on board with that idea? Because I've been thinking that PI is a much better system for decades now, really. Ever since I discovered how the parliamentary system in Britain works. I mean, it works, right? It's better than certainly a lot of the countries that we come from, absolutely. But it's not necessarily a healthy comparison if you're trying to create a good democracy.
00:52:21.420How do you get ordinary people to get that link that you've just exposed there,
00:52:26.420which is that if you want to fix a lot of the social issues that we keep talking about
00:52:30.660and a lot of the practical issues, we need a better representative system.
00:52:35.260How do you convince ordinary people who live busy lives,
00:52:38.400they've got kids to bring up and lives to live and work to go to and whatever,
00:52:42.360to go, ah, without this, we don't have this.
00:52:46.120How do you convince ordinary people of that?
00:52:47.960But I think just as you put it, you know, we need to explain and argue that unless we have a fair voting system, we're not going to be able to address the issues that you care about because a majority of people in this country are broadly left of center, do support social programs and public services.
00:53:11.480but their voice is not being heard in government
00:53:16.200because the voting system keeps on delivering
00:53:19.380governing parties with minority support.
00:53:23.620So when it comes to how we move forward,
00:53:29.400I think it's a combination of education and persuasion,
00:53:32.540direct action and protest, online petitions,
00:53:37.300But at the end of the day, what is going to convince people is if they can see and understand that without PR, the things that they want to see happen won't happen.
01:02:06.200And in the 1970s, under the Labour government of Jim Callaghan, there was a report produced by Lord Bullock, which proposed a very similar system.
01:02:17.560Sadly, sadly, the left and the trade unions shut it down.