ReportOUT Launches Empty Shoes Campaign - Lets Break the Silence

Article By Thushara S. Chandrasiri

First introduced in 2004, The International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia And Biphobia will always be regarded as a highly significant date in the international calendar. For anyone who may not be familiar with the background, this is much more than a worldwide celebration of sexual and gender identities, but also a time for us all as a global community to acknowledge the significant steps taken which led to the World Health Organisation in 1990 no longer including homosexuality in the International Classification of Diseases.

For an organisation such as ReportOUT the 17th May 2020 is one of the most important dates in the year. In order to observe this day, the charity’s founder and chair, Drew Dalton (the Chair of ReportOUT) has announced that the team will be launching the 'Empty Shoe Campaign' across our website and social media at 18:00 GMT on Sunday May 17th.

Wanting to find out more about the campaign we were delighted to have the opportunity to speak to Drew in greater detail.

Tell us more about the theme you chose to as you observe this year’s IDAHOTB?

This is our first IDAHOTB event for ReportOUT as a new global SOGI (sexual orientation and gender identity) human rights charity and we had planned to hold a number of physical events to celebrate and raise awareness of the day, but COVID-19 changed all that. However, we were not to be defeated and so we have launched our ‘Empty Shoes Campaign’ online via our website and social media.