- Immigrant Times
- 6 days ago
- 11 min read
LGBTQ migrants who became pioneers
A review of LGBTQ migrants who, in the face of adversity, achieved distinction and success away from home. They are artists, athletes, activists and entrepreneurs who built their lives and careers in a foreign country. Many also became campaigners against discrimination and injustice
By The Immigrant Times
Freddie Mercury’s flamboyant stage presence challenged rigid ideas of masculinity. In 2014, Geena Rocero came out as a transgender woman. Through his foundation, Peter Tatchell campaigns against the criminalisation of homosexuality worldwide.
Introduction
For many LGBTQ migrants, leaving home is driven not by a quest for a better life, but by the search for safety, freedom and the right to live openly. They face a double challenge: discrimination linked to sexual or gender identity, and the barriers that accompany migration itself.
This feature examines LGBTQ migrants who became pioneers in their adopted countries. The individuals profiled here, artists, activists, athletes and cultural figures, achieved public recognition and influence in their new homes and internationally. Their visibility and success offered protection and opportunity that many ordinary LGBTQ migrants never receive. It is important to recognise this distinction.
From Rudolf Nureyev’s Cold War defection and Freddie Mercury’s reinvention in Britain to contemporary activists and advocates working across borders today, these stories span generations and continents. Together, they show how migration, identity and creativity can intersect in extraordinary ways.
As noted above, this feature only tells the stories of public figures. In future articles, The Immigrant Times plans to recount the experiences of largely unknown LGBTQ migrants and invites readers to introduce us to individuals whose courage and resilience deserve to be heard.
Art & Culture
Rudolf Nureyev
Defector, refugee and revolutionary of modern ballet
Rudolf Nureyev was born in 1938 on a train crossing Siberia, the son of a Tatar military officer in the Soviet Union. From modest beginnings, he rose to become one of the most electrifying dancers of the twentieth century. But his global fame was forged not only through artistic brilliance but through an extraordinary act of political and personal courage.
In 1961, while touring Paris with the Kirov Ballet, Nureyev was ordered by Soviet authorities to return immediately to Moscow after concerns were raised about his behaviour and growing independence. Fearing punishment, artistic repression and possible imprisonment, and already under suspicion because of his sexuality, Nureyev made a split-second decision at Le Bourget Airport. He broke away from his minders and asked French police for asylum.
The defection stunned the Cold War world. At just 23 years old, Nureyev became both a cultural sensation and a political symbol. Granted asylum in France, he was suddenly free to shape his career without state control. The Soviet Union responded by banning him and cutting off contact with his family for many years.
In the West, Nureyev transformed ballet. His explosive athleticism redefined the male dancer’s role, moving it from supporting figure to commanding presence. As principal dancer with The Royal Ballet in London and later as director of the Paris Opera Ballet, he pushed technical boundaries and brought classical dance to mainstream audiences.
Nureyev was also one of the first globally famous male artists to live openly as a gay man during an era of widespread stigma. Though private by nature, he never concealed his relationships, including his long partnership with Danish dancer Erik Bruhn. At a time when homosexuality remained taboo in many countries, his visibility challenged cultural norms within elite artistic institutions and beyond.
In the 1980s, Nureyev was diagnosed with AIDS, a reality he continued to keep largely private while maintaining an intense performance and choreography schedule. He returned briefly to Russia in 1989, near the end of the Cold War, to perform one final time in his homeland, a symbolic moment of reconciliation after nearly three decades of enforced exile.
When he died in Paris in 1993, Nureyev was buried in the Russian Cemetery in Paris, which overlooks the city that had given him refuge. His grave, marked by a mosaic carpet inspired by traditional Central Asian designs, reflects both his origins and his adopted home.
Reinaldo Arenas
Writer, dissident and refugee voice of queer exile
Reinaldo Arenas was born in rural eastern Cuba in 1943 and rose to literary prominence during the early years of the Cuban Revolution. But as Fidel Castro’s government tightened its control over culture and sexuality, Arenas, openly gay and fiercely independent, became a target of state persecution.
By the late 1960s and 1970s, homosexuals in Cuba were subjected to surveillance, censorship and detention. Arenas’ novels were banned, his manuscripts confiscated, and his movements restricted. After repeated arrests and periods of hiding, he attempted to flee the island multiple times before finally escaping during the 1980 Mariel boatlift, when more than 125,000 Cubans left for the United States.
Arriving in New York as a refugee, Arenas rebuilt his life in exile. Though struggling financially and living with the long-term effects of imprisonment and illness, he continued to write prolifically. In the US, he completed much of his celebrated ‘Pentagonía’ novel cycle, which explored repression, sexuality and survival under authoritarian rule.
His memoir, Before Night Falls, published shortly before he died in 1990, became one of the most powerful testimonies of queer exile in modern literature. The book detailed not only political persecution but also the emotional cost of displacement, the loneliness of exile, the pain of separation from his homeland, and the fragile freedom found abroad.
Arenas died in New York after complications related to AIDS, leaving behind a literary legacy that continues to influence writers and LGBTQ activists around the world. His work is studied internationally and was later adapted into an award-winning film, introducing his story to a new generation.
More than three decades after his death, Reinaldo Arenas remains a symbol of artistic defiance and refugee resilience, a reminder that migration is often not a choice, but a necessity for survival, dignity and freedom.
Freddie Mercury
Immigrant outsider who became a global music icon
Freddie Mercury was born Farrokh Bulsara in 1946 on the island of Zanzibar, then a British protectorate. Raised in a Parsi family with roots in India, he spent his early years moving between East Africa and South Asia before political upheaval forced a decisive change. In 1964, following the Zanzibar Revolution and rising instability, his family relocated permanently to Britain.
Arriving in a new country as a teenager, Mercury carried multiple layers of otherness, cultural, racial and personal. Britain became his adopted home, but he was never simply assimilated. Instead, he reinvented himself, transforming Farrokh Bulsara into Freddie Mercury and forging an artistic identity that drew on theatricality, opera, rock and camp performance.
It was in London that Mercury co-founded Queen and built one of the most successful music careers in modern history. His flamboyant stage presence challenged rigid ideas of masculinity at a time when homosexuality was still criminalised in parts of the United Kingdom. Although he avoided public labels during much of his life, Mercury’s performances and later openness about same-sex relationships made him a symbol of queer visibility long before mainstream acceptance.
Migration shaped both his ambition and his art. As an outsider, Mercury created a persona that refused easy categorisation, blending cultures, styles and influences into something entirely new. His vocal range, theatrical instincts and genre-defying compositions helped Queen become a global phenomenon. His best-known songs include Bohemian Rhapsody, Killer Queen, We Are the Champions, and Don’t Stop Me Now.
In the final years of his life, Mercury lived privately with AIDS-related illness, at a time when stigma around the disease was widespread and brutal. He died in 1991 at the age of 45, just one day after publicly confirming his diagnosis.
Wajdi Mouawad
Playwright shaped by war, exile and queer visibility
Wajdi Mouawad was born in Beirut in 1968, just as Lebanon was descending into civil war. When he was ten years old, his family fled the violence, first seeking refuge in France before eventually settling in Canada. Like many child refugees, Mouawad grew up carrying memories of conflict alongside the disorientation of exile.
In Montreal, he discovered theatre as a space where displacement, identity and trauma could be transformed into art. He trained as an actor and playwright before emerging as one of the most influential voices in contemporary Francophone theatre. His plays, including Incendies, Scorched and Littoral, explore war, family rupture, migration and the long shadows of political violence.
Openly gay, Mouawad has spoken about the double experience of navigating both cultural displacement and sexual identity. His work often reflects this layered sense of belonging and unbelonging, portraying characters who move between languages, countries and emotional worlds.
After building his reputation in Canada, Mouawad returned to Europe to lead major cultural institutions. In 2016, he was appointed artistic director of the Théâtre National de la Colline in Paris, one of France’s most prestigious public theatres. His appointment marked a rare moment in which a former refugee became a central figure within Europe’s cultural establishment.
Wajdi Mouawad has written 19 stage plays, three novels and two film scripts, in addition to several radio plays.
His career reflects the long arc of migration: from childhood flight to professional recognition, from marginalisation to institutional leadership. Yet his work continues to centre the voices of those caught between borders, refusing to let displacement become invisible.
Today, Mouawad remains an important cultural bridge between the Middle East, Europe and North America. His plays are staged internationally and studied in universities, while his public interventions often challenge simplistic narratives about refugees and identity.
Politics & Activism
Peter Tatchell
Immigrant activist who reshaped Britain’s LGBTQ rights movement
Peter Tatchell was born in Melbourne in 1952 and moved to Britain in the early 1970s as a young political activist. Arriving in London during a period of social unrest and cultural change, he quickly became involved in left-wing politics and emerging gay rights campaigns.
As an immigrant, Tatchell brought an outsider’s perspective to British political culture. He became known for his confrontational but highly visible style of activism, using public protest and direct action to force LGBTQ rights into the national conversation at a time when homosexuality remained stigmatised.
During the 1980s, Tatchell was one of the most prominent opponents of Section 28, the law that prohibited the ‘promotion’ of homosexuality by local authorities and schools. He also campaigned relentlessly on issues including age-of-consent equality, police discrimination and media stereotyping. His work contributed to a broader shift in public attitudes that eventually led to major legal reforms.
Beyond domestic politics, Tatchell expanded his activism to the international stage. Through the Peter Tatchell Foundation, he has campaigned against the criminalisation of homosexuality worldwide, often confronting political leaders directly over human rights abuses. His work has taken him into conflict zones and authoritarian states, resulting in arrests, assaults and travel bans.
Despite controversy and criticism, including debates over tactics and political alignment, Tatchell remains one of the most recognisable figures in British LGBTQ activism. His decades-long presence reflects the persistence required to translate protest into policy change.
Kimahli Powell
Migrant activist building global escape routes for LGBTQ refugees
Kimahli Powell was born in Jamaica, where homosexuality remains heavily stigmatised and where LGBTQ people continue to face violence and discrimination. After migrating to Canada, he became increasingly involved in community organising and international advocacy, drawing on his own experience of cultural displacement and identity negotiation.
Powell rose to international prominence as Executive Director of Rainbow Railroad, a Canadian-based organisation that helps LGBTQ people escape persecution and resettle safely. Under his leadership, Rainbow Railroad expanded its operations dramatically, assisting thousands of individuals fleeing countries where same-sex relationships are criminalised or socially dangerous.
Working with governments, humanitarian agencies and grassroots networks, Powell has helped build emergency evacuation routes for LGBTQ refugees from regions including the Middle East, Africa, the Caribbean and Eastern Europe. His work often involves navigating complex asylum systems while responding to urgent safety threats.
As an openly gay Black migrant leading a global human rights organisation, Powell has also challenged the lack of representation within international humanitarian leadership. He has spoken publicly about the emotional toll of refugee advocacy, including balancing emergency rescues with the long-term psychological impact of hearing repeated stories of violence and displacement.
Powell’s activism reflects a new generation of migrant leadership: not only seeking safety for themselves, but creating pathways for others. Through institutional advocacy and quiet emergency work, he has helped transform individual survival into organised global solidarity.
Sport
Gus Kenworthy
Immigrant Olympian and advocate for refugee inclusion
Gus Kenworthy was born in Chelmsford, England, in 1991 and moved to the United States as a child after his mother remarried. Growing up in Colorado, he became immersed in American ski culture and eventually represented the United States on the international stage.
Kenworthy rose to global prominence at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi (Russia), where he won a silver medal in freestyle skiing. Shortly after the Games, he publicly came out as gay, becoming one of the first openly LGBTQ athletes competing at the highest level of winter sports. In a sporting culture still shaped by rigid ideas of masculinity, his visibility marked an important shift.
Beyond competition, Kenworthy has used his platform to advocate for refugee rights. During the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea, he spoke out against restrictive immigration policies and drew attention to the treatment of asylum seekers. He later travelled to the Greek island of Lesbos, working with humanitarian organisations to support refugees arriving by sea.
His advocacy has linked personal migration experience with broader political engagement. As an immigrant who built his sporting career in a new country, Kenworthy has repeatedly highlighted the role that migration plays in opportunity and social contribution.
In 2019, he announced a symbolic switch to represent Great Britain in competition, reconnecting with his country of birth while maintaining his base in the United States.
Business & Fashion
Geena Rocero
Transgender immigrant who turned visibility into global advocacy
Geena Rocero was born in 1983 in the Philippines and migrated to the United States as a teenager. Growing up trans in a conservative environment, she experienced early marginalisation, poverty and instability. After settling in America, she began modelling and eventually built a successful international fashion career.
For many years, Rocero lived privately as a transgender woman while working in a highly gender-policed industry. In 2014, she publicly came out during a TED Talk, delivering one of the most widely viewed speeches on transgender identity and migration. Her decision marked a turning point, transforming personal visibility into political action.
Following her public disclosure, Rocero founded Gender Proud, an organisation dedicated to improving media representation of transgender people and supporting trans communities worldwide. She has since worked with international institutions, governments and human rights organisations to promote legal recognition and social inclusion.
As an immigrant and a trans woman of colour, Rocero’s advocacy sits at the intersection of multiple forms of marginalisation. She has spoken openly about the vulnerability of trans migrants, including barriers to employment, healthcare and legal documentation.
Prabal Gurung
Immigrant designer who brought activism to the fashion world
Prabal Gurung was born in 1974 in Singapore to Nepali parents and raised primarily in Kathmandu, Nepal. As a young man with ambitions in fashion, he left South Asia to study design in New York, a move that would permanently reshape both his career and public identity.
Arriving in the United States as an immigrant student, Gurung entered one of the most competitive creative industries in the world. After training at Parsons School of Design and working for established fashion houses, he launched his own label in 2009. His designs quickly gained international attention and were worn by prominent political figures, entertainers and public leaders, including Michelle Obama, Kamala Harris and Kate Middleton, the present Princess of Wales.
Openly gay, Gurung has used his visibility to challenge narrow ideas of who belongs in elite creative spaces. He has spoken openly about racism, homophobia and immigrant exclusion within the fashion industry, pushing back against its traditionally Eurocentric power structures.
Beyond aesthetics, Gurung has made political engagement part of his public identity. His runway shows have featured slogans addressing women’s rights, racial justice and immigration policy. He has also been vocal in defending migrants in the United States, arguing that immigrant labour and creativity remain central to the country’s cultural economy. In his native Nepal, Gurung established the Shikshya Foundation, a non-profit programme to benefit underprivileged children.
Further reading from The Immigrant Times: In search for safety: How countries handle LGBTQ asylum claims ||
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