From the outside, the spat between Britain’s biggest Pride festival and the country’s main LGBT organisation may look a bit Queer Front of Judea. Earlier this year, Stonewall pulled out of this Saturday’s Pride in London festival, citing a lack of diversity and committing to back Black Pride instead. UK Pride has hit back with a survey showing that Pride organisers rate Stonewall poorly. Ouch.

Without wishing to intervene too much in this internecine grief, Stonewall does not deserve to be disparaged. Until relatively recently, the organisation seemed as though it catered for white, gay, middle-class, cis men, who dominate the LGBT world. Its focus was on securing legal rights, often via a softly-softly, “cups of tea with powerful people” approach. Even then, it refused for a long time to support equal marriage. One of its biggest letdowns was to fail to include trans people in its campaign for equality.

This has changed radically under Ruth Hunt, who has run the organisation for four years. There are still clear limits to Stonewall’s radicalism – it is, after all, dependent on corporate donations – but Hunt has addressed many of its failings. It apologised for “harm that we have caused” for failing to campaign for trans rights and has proved an invaluable ally to trans people, not least during the recent anti-trans media moral panic. Hunt has been inundated with abuse for taking a brave stance, including from anti-trans activists infuriated that a cis, self-described “butch lesbian” is a leading trans ally (their narrative has been that trans rights is brocialist and anti-women).

It has also been prepared to tell the LGBT world some disturbing home truths: a recent report exposed rampant racism in LGBT communities, with more than half of LGBT people of colour saying that they had experienced discrimination. Its backing for Black Pride – so critical in challenging the white, middle-class, gay, male dominance of the LGBT world – shows it understands the need to link the struggle against homophobia and transphobia to anti-racism, too.

There is still a need for more radical voices, such as Lesbians and Gays Support the Migrants, which is running a campaign targeting airlines that sponsor Pride while assisting forced deportations of gay migrants to homophobic countries. But, from trans rights to racism, Stonewall’s shift under Hunt has been courageous. The struggle for LGBT rights was never only about legal rights, of course: this week’s publication of the national survey of LGBT people, which showed that most (68%) are afraid to hold hands in the streets and 40% have been subjected to hate crimes, proves how far there is to go. A more assertive Stonewall will undoubtedly play a key role in the struggle for genuine LGBT equality and liberation.