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When a filmmaker came to us in 2012 and said he wanted to make a comedy out of our lives, we were skeptical at first but gave our consent. We were still in personal contact with the people in Wales – but the memory of the 80s solidarity movements, even in left and gay circles, faded with time. At that point most of us were no longer politically active. It was not until 1997 under Tony Blair that state persecution against gays and lesbians ended. Shortly after, the Conservative government passed Section 28, which banned “promoting homosexuality” in schools. The progress in the Labour Party on LGBT rights, which was indeed made possible by the support of miners, had little influence at first. It is hard to describe how fatal this was for the labor movement in Britain. In the end, however, the miners lost the strike. Our success was that we had raised enough money so that none of our miners would be forced back to work by hunger. The film tells a story of success – did you consider yourself successful? During that time, everyone opened up to each other. Of course there were prejudices, but one of the miners in the film sums up the mostly positive attitude towards us: “Why should I believe what the papers write about them if I don’t believe what they write about us?” By the way, during the strike, they also came into contact with Black activists from London and Irish republicans.
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There is a long anarchist tradition in Wales – many traveled from there to fight in the Spanish Civil War, had international connections and were very well read.
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They did live in a secluded area and did not know much about lesbians and gays – but we did not know much about them either. In the film, the villagers appear a lot more hostile than they actually were. We had no idea what to expect – but we were warmly welcomed. You may be interested in Strike With Pride: An Interview with LGSM Were you afraid to for a group of gay and lesbian people to show up in a remote village? When we received an invitation from them to visit, we were quite surprised. We just started collecting money from the pride march or gay pubs, and the most we were expecting was a thank you letter from the village we supported. Shortly after the beginning of the strike, eleven of us came together – mainly from the Trotskyist and communist groups. Was that the case?Ī lot of things in the film are not quite accurate. In the film, the emergence of LGSM is shown as emerging quite spontaneously. Ever since then, I do not accept the idea that workers are particularly homophobic – even though sometimes they say things more bluntly. However, when I came out, it was only the party hacks who had strange reactions, while the working-class people were quite easygoing. “Militant”, the group to which I belonged at the time, considered gay rights a bourgeois concern and imagined that the workers would not be able to handle it. And this group was ok with your homosexuality? By 16, I had already joined a Trotskyist group. So activism was not alien to me – during the miners’ strike in 1972, when there were electricity shortages, I ran through the school and turned on all the lights to pressure the government. As a passionate trade unionist, he often participated in strikes and was blacklisted early. In this regard, my father was a formative figure. All my friends were richer than me and I always felt that snobbery – it was humiliating.
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I had the misfortune of growing up as a working-class child in a middle-class district. My support for the miners actually had very little to do with me being gay, but with my social background. How did you, as a young gay man, become interested in a workers’ struggles? Ray Goodspeed was and is a member of LGSM. The real protagonists were surprised by the film’s commercial success: 30 years later, a tearjerker about the class struggle became an international blockbuster, while telling the true story of Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners. The film Pride (2014) told this story as a comedy. Their support for the strike prompted the National Union of Miners to campaign for the rights of gay people and demand that sexual equality be included in the program of the Labour Party. In 1984, a group of gay and lesbian activists in Britain formed a group to collect money for striking miners.