LGBT Rights "On Warp Drive"

Honk to Chris Turner over at DH Blog for making note of Sir Adrian Fulford's speech at the recent opening of the Pink Law Legal Advice Center in London.

According to PinkNews, "Mr Justice Fulford's appointment as a High Court judge in 2002 was the first time that an openly homosexual QC had been appointed to the court. Mr Justice Fulford, known outside court as Sir Adrian, was subsequently elected at the United Nations in 2003 to serve as a judge on the International Criminal Court."

Here's an excerpt of the speech:

To be out as a practitioner in the year 1978, which is the year I was called, was something of a rollercoaster of a ride. Some of my colleagues were fantastic, others were simply gross in their rudeness and prejudices.

People lost jobs, families were destroyed, lives were broken by the large number of prosecutions of men for such absurdities as allegedly chatting up other men in places such as Old Brompton Rd, thereby 'persistently importuning for an immoral purpose.'

It sounds quite ludicrous to think of those court cases now. Policemen in supposedly provocative tight t-shirts and jeans, acting effectively as agent-provocateurs along that stretch of road between the Colherne pub and the Brompton cemetery in Earls Court.

And that was something that was repeated in every town and city, the length and breadth of the country. What a waste of time and money. What warped morality and how unbelievably destructive it was.

The workplace could be an equal nightmare for the LGBT community. Men and women losing their jobs and facing real discrimination because of their private life. And as for adopting children, you were practically branded a paedophile for even suggesting the idea. And few lawyers were prepared to assist in any attempt to redress those sorts of discriminatory practice.

And inheritance arrangements, what actually happened in respect to the true legal position, when one partner died in a relationship, could be dire. So many men and women suddenly found themselves homeless and without anything, when the relatives of the person who had been ostracised by his or her family for years suddenly descended out of thin air, having not been seen for years, on the day they departed to take every last stick of furniture. No 'civil partnerships' back then and the law did not smile sympathetically on claims that were akin to spouses or wives.

Now why am I visiting the past? It's not just the autumnal reminiscences of an aging judge. But rather, I seek to highlight that we have suddenly travelled a long way in a very short period of time. To use the language of 'Star-Trek', it's as if the warp-drive has suddenly been attached to LGBT rights.

In truth, I cannot conceive that we will in the predictable future return to the ghastliness of thirty-plus years ago. But that said, when you scratch the surface, particularly in times of difficulty when people feel threatened, prejudice, misunderstanding, fear and conservatism with a small 'c' can be found on occasion lurking surprisingly close to the surface.

While we have every reason to be confident about the future, we should also strive to ensure that we do not become blasé about the present. We should not take these fundamental advances for granted. And the more deeply rooted the projects like this become, providing an invaluable service and benefit to both the legal advisers and to clients alike, the more certain we can be that Pink Law will not be an anomaly but rather the shape of things to come.