Press Release: Award-winning gay journalist to speak in Croydon

26 March 2012

Patrick Strudwick, award-winning gay journalist, will be the speaker at a meeting organised by Croydon Area Gay Society (CAGS). The meeting, at 8pm on Tuesday 3rd April, upstairs at the Spread Eagle, Katharine Street, Croydon, is free of charge and open to all.

Patrick Strudwick is a contributing editor and political columnist for Gay Times, he’s appeared on radio and TV programmes, and he writes about gay issues, health and music for newspapers and magazines, including The Observer, The Times, The Guardian, and The Independent.

In February 2010, his article “The Ex-Gay Files: The Bizarre World of Gay-to-Straight Conversion” was published in The Independent; Strudwick had spent a year under cover investigating therapists – some operating within the NHS – who claimed to “cure” gays and lesbians. The outrage following the publication of the article prompted him to set up the Stop Conversion Therapy Taskforce (SCOTT), which aims to eradicate attempts by therapists, psychiatrists and religious groups to turn gay people straight.

Following Patrick’s investigation the British Medical Association has condemned attempts by psychotherapists and psychiatrists to change a patient’s sexual orientation, and called on the NHS to investigate instances where they may have inadvertently paid for such “treatment”.

Patrick Strudwick was named as one of the most influential gay people in Britain in The Independent on Sunday’s annual Pink List.

The meeting is one of a series of talks organised by CAGS under the title "The Brief Encounter". Future speakers in this series include the poet Ivor Treby (5th June) and the black gay activist Ted Brown (2nd October, for Black History Month).

For more information about CAGS, see www.cags.org.uk.

For more about The Brief Encounter, CAGS' programmme of bi-monthly open meetings, see www.cags.org.uk/brief.shtml.

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This press release is also available at www.cags.org.uk/pressrel-2012-03.htm.