From its inception, the blossoming of the global LGBTQIA+ community has been a Movement of Compassion.

The Troy Perry Awards are now presented in partnership with the international Charter for Compassion.

Fernando Lopez, San Diego Pride, 2022 Honoree

Edafe Okporo, 2021 Honoree

Troy Perry, 1970, First Parade

Troy Perry Awards

​Begun in 2016, the Troy Perry Awards program is created in honor of one of the founding fathers of the Pride movement, Rev. Troy D. Perry.  The Troy Perry Awards recognize fearless LGBTQIA+ young people, community leaders & Pride organizations making an impact through social & spiritual activism.
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Honoring one of the visionary founders of the global LGBTQIA+ Pride Movement.

San Diego Pride
​2022

model compassionate community
San Diego Pride works year-round to advocate for and empower LGBTQIA+ youth.  From GSA meet-ups to youth-led events, there are many opportunities for LGBTQ youth, faculty and guardians to get involved, including the youth arts show.

Founded in 1974, San Diego Pride has developed a model organization which both supports events and programs, as well as invests back into the local LGBTQ community, making it the most philanthropic Pride in the world, having given over $3 million to LGBTQ-serving organizations locally, nationally, and globally. In 2019, they donated $340,000 to 60 organizations.  

San Diego Pride

Edafe Okporo
​2021

Edafe's Website

Refuge America Website

Edafe's Documentary

artist / writer / organizer / documentarian
Edafe Okporo is a human rights activist from Nigeria, displaced in 2016 due to persecution he faced in his home country based on his sexual orientation and work as an activist. In 2018, Edafe became Director of RDJ Refugee Shelter, New York City's only shelter for refugees.  In 2021, Edafe started a nonprofit organization Refuge America, dedicated to storytelling, community and human connection for LGBTQ+ people emigrating to the USA.  Edafe's vision: Strengthening America as a place of welcome for displaced LGBTQ people.  Edafe is the author of the book ASYLUM, a Memoir & Manifesto by Simon and Schuster.  Edafe is currently in pre-production on a full-length documentary.

August Bernadaciou
​2021

historian / archivist / podcaster
In 2008, when August Bernadaciou was 14 years old, he started recording interviews with LGBTQ activists from the 1950s through the AIDS Crisis. 

In 2019, at 24 years old, he founded the LGBTQ History Project, which celebrates his archival interviews about unknown and untold LGBTQ liberation and civil rights histories.

Pre-pandemic, he hosted “Intergeneration Dialogues,” which were gay elders in conversations August.  Then, in 2020, he launched "The QueerCore Podcast."

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August's Website

Anwesh Kumar Sahoo
​2018

artist  / writer / speaker
Anwesh Sahoo is a passionate Indian LGBTQ activist, artist, blogger, writer, model, actor, and TEDx speaker. His “Fitting Out” media campaign gained widespread acclaim while he has been an outspoken supporter of the legalization of homosexuality in India and addressing the atrocities being committed against LGBTQ people in India. 
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Anwesh is a highly recognized face and a respected voice not just in LGBTQ circles in India but everywhere in the country. He is an accomplished TEDx speaker who is ever willing to speak out, stand up for, and defend the LGBTQ community.  He was crowned Mr. Gay World India 2016, becoming the youngest winner of the crown at the age of 20.  He represented India at the Mr. Gay World 2016 pageant held in Malta and made it to the Top 12.
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He came out as gay to his sister at the age of 16, and by the age of 18 had started writing a blog "The Effeminare," to combat homophobia in his own small way and create awareness related to LGBTIQ issues in India. He went on to write an article for Pink-Pages, a National LGBT Magazine in India, where he came out to the readers and later on, also to his parents through the article. In his article he writes, "There is an underlying sense of security that only the walls of the closet can ensure. But then follows the phase of suffocation. The walls that once protected us begin to make us feel restricted. And what follows is the "end of self denial."  

Anwesh's Wikipedia Page

Wei Tingting
​2017

writer / documentarian
Wei Tingting is a Chinese LGBTI+ and feminist activist, writer and documentary filmmaker.  She is the founder and director of the Guangzhou Gender and Sexuality Education Center. She is one of the "Feminist Five" arrested and detained for 37 days  by the Chinese authorities in March 2015, which received worldwide media attention. She was nominated for the Asia LGBT Milestone Awards by ALMA and was listed as one of the “10 Most Inspiring Feminists of 2015” by MS magazine.   Her film "Bi China," released in 2017, was the first bisexual documentary in China. ​

BI CHINA Documentary

Wei Tinging Wikipedia

Angeline Jackson
​2016

organizer / writer / speaker 
Angeline C. Jackson is an LGBT human rights activist, HIV/AIDS educator, and the co-founder and former Executive Director of Quality of Citizenship Jamaica, the first organization specifically for lesbian, bisexual and transgender women in Jamaica. Angeline has been involved in human rights activism since 2006 and has worked with the noted attorney and human rights activist Maurice Tomlinson and others in Jamaica and the US.

In 2015, President Barack Obama recognized Angeline Jackson as one of Jamaica's remarkable young leaders at the Town Hall for Youth in Kingston, Jamaica.

Over the years, Angeline has presented at various events and panels and has published several writings on the LGBT situation in Jamaica, and has been quoted and interviewed for numerous media outlets and literature.

Angeline is the Intern Minister at Neighborhood Unitarian Universalist Church in Pasadena, CA. She is also an expert witness for LGBTQ asylum cases, a life coach, and the author of "Funny Gyal: My Fight Against Homophobia in Jamaica." She also leads a small church ministry, Communities of Restoration.

In 2022, Angeline received the Advocate of the Year Award from J-FLAG.

Angeline's Website

Troy Perry Awards 2016, W Hotel, Hollywood, California