David Tennant’s trans Tardis badge helps raise thousands for LGBTQ+ charity
David Tennant’s trans TARDIS badge has helped raise thousands for AKT. (BBC)
Doctor Who star David Tennant has managed to inadvertently raise thousands of pounds for LGBTQ+ charity the Albert Kennedy Trust (AKT) by wearing a TARDIS pin in the colours of the trans Pride flag.
Tennant appeared on sketch show The Last Leg on Friday (17 November) and The One Show last night (20 November), to discuss his return as the Doctor for the upcoming Doctor Who 60th anniversary specials.
On both programmes, he donned a small pin badge shaped like the Doctor’s spacecraft, the TARDIS, in blue, white and pink – the trans Pride flag colours.
The creator of the badge, Dr Jamie Gallagher, has since shared on social media that all profits raised from purchases of it will be donated to charity AKT, which supports homeless LGBTQ+ people in the UK.
Hours before Tennant’s appearance on The One Show, Gallagher updated their followers to announce that more than £18,000 had been raised for the charity.
“Thank you beautiful humans. That will make a huge difference to LGBTQ+ people living with homelessness this winter,” Gallagher shared, adding that their website was “blowing up” with people trying to order the TARDIS Pride pins.
Tennant’s wife, actress Georgia Tennant, has also promoted the badges on her social media.
In recent months, the Tennants have become staunch trans allies, as one of their children is reportedly non-binary.
David Tennant has been spotted on TV numerous time wearing a range of trans and non-binary pin badges, including one which read: “You are safe with me”.
In July, he was spotted wearing a “leave trans kids alone” t-shirt while promoting his Prime Video series, Good Omens.
The t-shirt drew fierce backlash from anti-trans campaigners, most notably from The IT Crowd creator Graham Lineham – who suggested that Tennant was an “abusive groomer” for his support of trans children. Lineham was later reportedly dropped by his TV agent, who also represented Tennant, over his comments.
To mark Pride month in June, Tennant appeared on the Reasons To Be Cheerful podcast, urging that while the community can’t “expect that we will always travel in the right direction towards acceptance,” everyone should be “fighting that fight every day”.
David Tennant will make his much-anticipated Doctor Who return this Saturday, 25 November, as part of the queerest series yet, with LGBTQ+ icons Ncuti Gatwa, Yasmin Finney, Miriam Margoyles and Neil Patrick Harris also starring.
