The rainbows are becoming a little too much. We have them for everything, and I see so many people from other companies with their rainbow lanyards and pins and mugs, where will it stop? One of the panelists yesterday was proud that they'd handed out 7000 rainbow lanyards within their organisation, but then joked that the people trying to promote the Mental Health lanyards were put out! Ridiculous.
With regards to the job ads, I had a quick search for an ad for the charity that Vocal Rep worked for and found this at the bottom:
Redacted is an equal opportunities organisation and applications are welcome from all sections of the community, particularly LGBT communities and/or people with disabilities who are under-represented.
Redacted is a Trans Positive employer, Stonewall Diversity Champion, a Mindful Employer, has been granted the Positive about Disabled People mark and Investors in People Platinum.
Basically, if you're straight and white, don't bother.
I have mocked up an email to the LGBT committee rep:
Hi,
Thanks for getting back to me.
I am very concerned about women’s rights and have been reading a lot about that issue and the ongoing problem of lesbian erasure, so it just jumped out at me yesterday as it’s something I’m particularly interested in.
I was disturbed that the guides provided by redacted only covered the GBT, no L. Upon reading the Gay Awareness Guide, it was confirmed that it was specifically regarding gay men so it’s not like lesbians had been contained within in that. It does seem that redacted has a guide for Lesbian Awareness but it was not included yesterday, whilst is fairly typical lesbian erasure.
I found Vocal Woke Rep from Charity to be quite offensive. TERF is a slur terfisaslur.com/ and has connotations with violence towards women and to be so glib about it was quite jarring. This poster that she referenced was not a ‘mistake’, nor was it ‘ just a funny picture’. There is no way that a woman who works so closely with LGBT people is not aware of the meaning and use of TERF.
insert picture of very outing poster that I can't share which features a photo of a sign saying 'CHER H8S TERFS'
I had a look at the Tweets she mentioned from Resisters and other women and this what I found. I don’t think that these Tweets are violent or rude, they are expecting some accountability for a charity using anti-female language.
Screenshots of tweets asking why this charity thinks it's acceptable to call women TERFS
I do not doubt that there is a real threat of violence towards trans and non-binary people, but that violence is not a one-way street and must be acknowledged. Using threatening language intended to shut women up is simply not acceptable.
This article about the silencing of lesbians blogs.spectator.co.uk/2018/05/the-silencing-of-the-lesbians/ is an interesting read, as is this stats page users.ox.ac.uk/~sfos0060/LGBT_figures.shtml showing the clear decline in the use of lesbian focused language from LGBT organisations. The LGB Alliance also raise good points regarding the protection of Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual people.
I’m sure that there was no specific intention to not represent lesbians (and bisexuals) in the panel, but that ‘not thinking’ about it is part of the problem. By leaving them out of the discussion, it is easy to forget that they exist, and any ‘dispute’ within the community can be blamed on the missing parties.
Our company is very supportive of women, which I appreciate greatly, I would hate for that to change in the quest to be ‘inclusive’, as women tend to lose rights whilst others gain.
Kind regards,
Disgruntled TERF
Is that OK do you think?