NHS rainbow badges

[YesIWorkForTheNHS]

As per (shiny new) user name, I work for the NHS. They're bringing in rainbow badges and lanyards at my trust (Google NHS rainbow badges if you want).

Anyone want to help me disentagle / articulate what I think about this?

On the one hand, I want to be inclusive (in the sense that I want everyone to have equal access to healthcare, and remove barriers - real or perceived - to people accessing what we offer). But biological sex matters, particularly in healthcare, and I think we should be held to high standards wrt equality of access for everyone (including women and girls) whether or not we are wearing stripy accessories.

I'm ignoring it for now. But I've had plenty of people tell me how great it is. I have friends at work who know what I believe wrt sex and gender, but I'm not sure I want to have an all-out discussion about my decision not to signal "my tribe" with a badge. The rainbow does not (any longer) represent my beliefs.

Sexuality absolutely matters in healthcare - as the receiver of the care not so much the giver. But to see the rainbow and think ‘hey up - so woke than I can’t object to a male person saying they are female giving me my mammogram’ isn’t inclusive is it?

Excellent post Michelle you have stated what I have tried to say for months at work and to DH who thinks I have moved over to the DFail with my parents

We were given rainbow lanyards at work about a year ago. I wore it for a while but then I 'peaked' and worked it all out. I handed it back and asked for my old one back. The receptionist gave me a look as if to say she knows. I suspect she has been peaked.

I don't give a fuck if this outs me (and I know at least one colleague who is an old timer on here ) but the main reception of our building now has a massive rainbow leading through the floor of the lobby. Fucking massive. It puts me in a shit mood every day. I hate what it now represents. I used to be proud to be inclusive. I wanted my kids to go to Pride a few years ago. Now there isn't a cat in hell's chance of me exposing them to the hatred by those who choose to dictate to women.

Just had a brief glance at the stonewall bit.

So if my family 4 our of the 5 siblings have been prescribes depressing medication. So that’s a whopping 80% of Fekkos experiencing depression and 100% of Felkosoblongs... (I see that there could be a consistent contributing cause here...)

Their stats appear to be very one dimensional and doesn’t seem investigate cause or factors. I’d need to have a proper look at the study to see how it was conducted, who/what/when etc but I wouldn’t believe rhatblot if they told me it was Tuesday.

Viva - I got out on the naughty step here for bitching about my local bank that had just the same same entrance recently!

If people knew how many obnoxious drs and consultants have offended both individuals with autism and their parents about their child's autism, they'd be falling over themselves to grab an asd lanyard to be inclusive, sensitive and aware of people with autism and their needs in a hospital environment.

I'd start a campaign for that if I were you.

Stick a rainbow or unicorn on it and I’m sure they will.

Pisses me off that the word inclusion seems to be banded about with regards to lgbt more than people with disabilities or neurodiversity. Which is what it has more necessary impact for in terms of day to day practical and logistical living.

They’ve brought them in at my trust too. I’d normally be supportive but it has absolutely been attached to transgender activism, with a talk from a transwoman about their life, and a policy summary which states that anyone can chose what ward they go on and that it’s a ‘myth’ that someone has to have started medical transition or have a grc to be treated as the gender they claim. So I can’t sign up as I don’t agree, and it has made me very uncomfortable. I don’t know how it can be challenged when it’s gone this far.

Find a nice purple and green one 😈

'Pisses me off that the word inclusion seems to be banded about with regards to lgbt more than people with disabilities or neurodiversity.'

In hospitals!

I'm really interested to hear from people who work on children's wards where the children are this sort of age (12 to 18 or similar) how much support is given around the more pressing issue of, you're staying long enough on a children's ward to talk to people about stuff, your illness or disability, what it means for your future etc etc. Is that standard now? How about a talk to me if you're feeling worried, depressed, fucked up... ?

I have an NHS rainbow badge and from what I was told it was so patients can see that they can have an open/inclusive conversation with me if they want to. It could be about sexuality or any other "taboo" subject such as mental health etc. Basically it's a badge which means "you can talk to me and I won't judge you".

Sorry to hear that lordfekko I will gladly join you on that naughty step

How often are men placed in women only wards I wonder.?do any of you working in the NHS have examples? I cannot imagine I can imagine how ghastly this is for women...is it actually happening ?

Tried to strike through without success

Surely the lanyards shouldn't be used in clinical areas due to infection control issues?

My feeling is that these kinds of badges are making a political statement in a setting that is actually supposed to be very, very neutral.

This.

I only know two people who think TWAW. One is an uberwoke, pride attending Lesbian who utterly supports Stonewall et al.

She refuses to wear a rainbow lanyard at work because she says public services are no place for politics. She's dead right.

At this point it's less a naughty step we need than a naughty stadium full of tiers of naughty benches. I wonder if Wembley Stadium is available.

joyfullittlehippo Did you actually read any of the posts above? Where did any of us express a desire to see anyone suffer?

I honestly don’t understand why MN is so anti anything that’s supportive of gay and lesbian people?

We are not anti-LGB, or for that matter anti-most-T. We are pro-woman and pro-child. We are 100% pro-lesbian. Did you read Michele's post? She wrote:
As a lesbian, where I see the 'Stonewall Champion' and symbols I immediately go on my guard as I know these people are signed up to a political lobby that seeks to deny women the freedom to be homosexual and rejects their right to exclude males from their bodies if those males say the right words. This is also the symbol of removing single sex spaces and same sex hcps from women, and just plain rejecting those women whose religion, faith, disability, trauma, fear and embarrassment or just plain choice precludes this.

Until the rainbow is no longer appropriated by a movement that seeks to remove rights and protections for women, I'll not be engaging with it never mind wearing it. Normalising this stuff helps promote the idea that "everyone else is on board" and that's strategic. It's a no from me.

Basically it's a badge which means "you can talk to me and I won't judge you

Presumably unless you are of certain faiths or GC, or just plain homophobic then it means “I am judging you and will possibly negatively impactyour treatment if I disagree with your views, I certainly won’t go out of my way for you”

A good proportion of the women on this board ARE lesbians.

or just plain homophobicEven homophobes, racists, and misogynists should get the same high standard of health care as the rest of us. Believing otherwise is right in Knight Templar territory.

Does not wearing the rainbow lanyard unintentionally expose these people as bigots?