Shaneel Lal

Lal was born in Nausori, Fiji to a mixed iTaukei and Girmitiya family on 22 January 2000.[10] In 2014, they moved to New Zealand in the search of a safer home. Lal joined Otahuhu College and was named dux in 2018.[11] Lal is transgender non-binary, and uses they/them pronouns.[12][11][5]

In 2020, Lal became a finalist for Mr Gay New Zealand, a competition run by Express Magazine. However, Lal's relationship with the Mr Gay NZ franchise and Express was short-lived. During the competition, Lal was attacked by a group for being outspoken about the racism in the New Zealand queer community.[13] Whilst Lal won most of the challenges in the competition, Lal was not awarded the title of Mr Gay NZ.[14] Following a Green Party event on 35 Years of Homosexual Law Reform, Express magazine attacked Lal's character and supported a petition calling on Rainbow Youth to expel them from Rainbow Youth's board.[15] The petition called Lal a "BIPOC Supremacist". Lal called the article by Express a racist and transphobic attempt at deplatforming trans people of colour. Soon after Express' article, Lal was elected to the board of Rainbow Youth for their third term.[7]

At the 2021 Auckland Pride March, Lal confronted anti-queer Christian protestors and told them that "God will never forgive you," leading to a national outrage at the protestors.[16]

Lal is calling the Pacific Islands to decriminalise homosexuality.[11] Lal was featured in a VICE world documentary called The New Resistance. The documentary covered young activists around the world creating transformative change.[17]

Lal has been criticised by right wing politicians and academics for being too radical and left wing.[18][19]

In the summer of 2017, Lal was volunteering at the Middlemore Hospital when a church leader walked up to them and offered to pray their gay away. When Lal refused, the church leader wished hell upon them.[20][21] Lal considers that a defining moment of their life, being the moment they decided that they were going to end conversion therapy in New Zealand. While living in Fiji, Lal was put into conversion therapy to rid them of their queerness.[22]

Lal's speech at Youth Parliament to ban conversion therapy received a standing ovation.[23] However following this Lal was targeted with homophobic abuse.[24] In an interview with 1 News Breakfast in 2020, Lal labelled conversion therapy, "state sanctioned torture." Lal told interviewer Jenny-May Clarkson that numerous queer people pray to God to "heal them, or kill them."[2] Following this interview, Massey University lecturer Steve Elers wrote an opinion piece for the Manawatu Guardian, and republished by The New Zealand Herald, dismissing the issue of conversion therapy and using transphobic language to discuss Lal's pronouns.[18] David Farrier defended Lal in his blog Webworm, and the subsequent media attention led to Eller's opinion column being cancelled.[25][26][27]

Lal founded the Conversion Therapy Action Group (CTAG) in 2019 to work towards ending conversion therapy in New Zealand.[3] During the 2020 New Zealand general election, Lal and CTAG pressured the New Zealand Labour Party to commit to banning conversion therapy in New Zealand.[28] Lal worked with the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand to deliver a petition of over more than 150,000 signatures to ban conversion therapy.[29]

In July, the Minister of Justice, Kris Faafoi, introduced the Conversion Practices Prohibition Legislation Bill. Lal criticised the Bill, calling it an "inadequate bill that fails to ban the practice or compensate the victims." Lal argued that the Conversion Practices Prohibition Legislation Bill would not allow the police to prosecute offenders and allow conversion therapy to continue.[30] The Justice Select Committee hearing submissions on the Conversion Practices Prohibition Legislation Bill received over a 100,000 submissions following Lal's online campaign, breaking the record for number of submissions.[31] During the justice committee submission process, Lal confronted the New Zealand National Party who opposed banning conversion therapy.[32] Lal advocated for the justice committee to ban conversion therapy for people of all ages and provide ACC coverage for mental harm suffered by survivors of conversion therapy.[30]

In February, 2021, Minister of Justice announced a ban on conversion therapy would be enacted at the end of 2021 or in February, 2022, at the latest.[33] Lal claimed that this "was an astounding commitment because at that point, Labour hadn’t done any foundational work that would have helped them achieve their goal."[34] The justice committee’s report is due on February 5, 2022, meaning New Zealand will not ban conversion therapy in 2021.[35] Lal claims the conversion therapy has been delayed because the government put forward an unsatisfactory and flawed Bill that needs to revisited and fixed.[36]

Lal advised the Minister of Education, Chris Hipkins for 3 years as a member of the Minister's advisory group.[37] Lal has sat on Amnesty International's Youth Task Force.[38] Lal has served as a Global Youth Leader for Open Government Partnership.[3] In 2019, Lal was selected by Jenny Salesa to represent Manukau East in the New Zealand Youth Parliament.[24] Outside being an activist, Lal is a model signed with Unique Management.[39]

Lal was awarded the Impact Award for Inclusion for their work to end conversion therapy in New Zealand.[40] They were given a special award by the Pacific Cooperation Foundation for Inclusion, namely their work for equality for queer Pacific peoples.[41] In 2020 review, 1 News named Lal a young leader that inspired New Zealand.[42]