35-year-old Scottish creative director/photographer/model Matthew Hyndman was a recent contestant on the UK version of The Traitors TV Show. He’s also actually a major activist who co-founded a national campaign to end conversion practices in the UK. The reason is quite personal. Back in 2015, while working as a 24-year-old missionary, Matthew’s life was turned upside down when private online conversations about his sexuality were accidentally leaked in an email to his entire congregation in Northern Ireland.
The email reached 100 people, including his family, friends, and pastor. Matthew was pressured to undergo conversion “therapy” in front of 400 fellow missionaries. Despite all the pressure he stood his ground and refused the “cure”, leading his former church to formally cancel his membership because of his “lifestyle choices”. It was a tough call as he later described the impossible pressure he faced, saying: “For many, refusing conversion therapy means losing your family, faith, community, career, friends, your entire life. You do not have free will with a loaded gun to your head.”
Fast forward five years, and alongside his friend Harry Hitchens, he launched Ban Conversion Practices, a massive coalition supported by legends like Stonewall. They’ve been relentlessly lobbying the UK government to finally outlaw these “degrading and discriminatory” treatments, which have been stuck in legislative limbo since 2018.
However, neither this nor his appearance on The Traitors was why he appeared on Queerguru’s radar. We have just discovered he has founded and runs THE WEE GAY HIKE CLUB , which organizes nature-led events for “gays, theys, and friends”. On his SM Matthew wrote that he shared a reel of the first gathering last month: “The absolute highlight of my year,” he said, and is already planning the next ones
You can follow him on https://www.instagram.com/yermatty/
BUT WAIT, there is more. The not-unattractive Matthew has another passion. He also takes photographs of himself in the great outdoors, doing headstands completely naked. He told us that there is a deep and meaningful reason why he is usually naked in his art. “I have been playing with self-portraiture since I came out and I found clothes always added a layer of identity or time. I don’t want them to be about me. I want you to see through that and see deeper.”
We have to admit. We’re speechless
Leave a Reply