Ian Dunn

From Philosopedia

Dunn, Ian (1 May 1943 - 10 March 1998)

Once described as “the best known Scottish gay person,” Ian Campbell Dunn was active in Scottish politics and was a long-standing member of GALHA, the Gay and Lesbian Humanist Association. An early pioneer of gay activism, he was one of the founders of Gay News in the 1970s and also the International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA).

Dunn was an active Humanist minister and celebrated ceremonies of affirmation for lesbian and gay couples.

Ian Dunn died at the age of 54 of a suspected heart attack. Following is an obituary by Peter Tatchell that appeared in the Sunday Independent:

IAN DUNN was a pioneer for lesbian and gay human rights, remaining a central figure in the battle for homosexual equality - in Scotland and internationally - for 30 years.

In the 1970s he took a leading part in the campaign to end the total ban on gay sex in Scotland (the 1967 law reform applied only to England and Wales). With two other gay activists, he appealed to the European Court of Human Rights. This appeal forced the issue on to the public agenda, but was allowed to lapse when Robin Cook successfully amended the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 1980, extending the 1967 reforms north of the border.

Dunn was a co-founder in 1969 of the Scottish Minorities Group, one of Britain's earliest gay rights organisations. SMG held its inaugural meeting in the front room of his parents' home in Glasgow. At the time of his death, from a heart attack, Dunn was the convenor of its successor organisation, Outright Scotland. His most recent campaign was to amend the current Bill setting out the powers of the Scottish Parliament, to ensure that its equal opportunities remit included non-discrimination based on "sexual orientation and gender identity".

Born into a staunch Scottish Conservative and Unionist family in Glasgow, and educated at Hillhead High School, Dunn went on to become first a meteorologist, and later a town planner. But he soon rebelled against his respectable pedigree.

In 1974, he and Derek Ogg convened the International Gay Rights Congress in Edinburgh - the first post-war conference of homosexual emancipation movements from around the world. This congress led to the formation of the International Lesbian & Gay Association (Ilga). Now a global federation of 400 gay rights groups in 60 countries, Ilga has played a pivotal role in getting gay equality recognised as a human rights issue in international forums such as the United Nations and the Council of Europe.

Dunn also played an important role in launching Britain's first national gay newspaper, Gay News, in 1972, and was for many years editor of Gay Scotland magazine. He co-founded the Edinburgh Gay & Lesbian Community Centre in 1974, the oldest centre of its kind in Britain.

Ian Dunn was a long-time Labour Party and trade union activist (in Nalgo and Unison), who hoped to win selection as a Labour candidate for the Scottish Parliament. A planning officer with Edinburgh Council until he took early retirement, he was also a keen conservationist, helping save from demolition Mansfield Place Church in Edinburgh, with its magnificent murals by Phoebe Traquair Wilson.

Ian Campbell Dunn, campaigner: born Glasgow 1 May 1943; died Edinburgh 10 March 1998.

Daily Circa's obituary mentions that first Dunn was a meterologist and then a town planner:

Life Span: Born 1st May 1943, in Glasgow; died 10th March 1998, in Edinburgh.

Star Sign: Pisces

Famous As: British gay rights campaigner.

Background: Ian Dunn lived and worked all his life in Scotland. His family were well-off, middle class and had links to shipping, steel, and engineering on his father's side, and property and manufacturing on his mother's side. He went to school at Hillhead High School. In his working life he was first a meterologist and then a town planner.

Career: In the 1950s he was disturbed to hear about Montagu, Pitt-Rivers, Wildeblood and similar cases, but he was stung into action when the 1967 Sexual Offences Act did not apply in Scotland. On 29th July 1967 he wrote to Antony Grey who was the director of the Albany Trust in London and secretary of the Homosexual Law Reform Society (HLRS) and in September of that year they met at a coffee house in Shaftesbury Avenue. Dunn wanted to set up a Scottish branch of the HLRS but Antony Grey was not interested because he had found the group set up in the North West of England by Allan Horsfall troublesome.

Dunn found the address of the Mattachine Society in Donald West's, Homosexuality and he wrote to Frank Kameny, a gay activist in Washington D. C. Dunn was inspired by the correspondence that they exchanged in 1968 and 1969. Dunn also found contact with Allan Horsfall of the North-Western Homosexual Law Reform Committee useful.

In January 1969 Dunn organised the first meeting which led to the foundation of the Scottish Minorities Group. It later became the Scottish Homosexual Rights Group, and then Outright Scotland. Dunn worked for lesbian and gay rights both through gay groups but also through Edinburgh City Labour Party and through the local government union NALGO, later called UNISON.

In January 1971 he help found SMG News, (later to be called Gay Scotland) and he was its editor for many years. To find out how activism was organised elsewhere, he visited the United States and Canada in the summer of 1971, and then in 1974 he visited five northern European countries. At a conference in Edinburgh in 1974 he was involved the setting up of what was later to become the International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA).

Also in 1974 he helped to establish the Edinburgh Gay and Lesbian Community Centre, which the first such centre in Britain.

He joined the Labour Party in 1977. Also in 1977 he became involved in the Edinburgh Books Collective. They opened a bookshop in the Old Town of Edinburgh called the First of May. It sold alternative left-wing political thought and lifestyle books for ten years until the mainstream book shops caught up.

Friends & Relationships: Dunn was an active Humanist minister and celebrated ceremonies of affirmation for lesbian and gay couples. His partner for several years wa s Ross Watt. Ian Dunn died at the age of 54 with a suspected heart attack.

Greatest Achievement: The setting up of gay rights in Scotland.