Pride month and work after the SC ruling

[Lovethesparklylights]

Hi
June in the UK is "pride month" and seems very much like a poisoned chalice in light of the SC ruling. I am in charge of sorting arrangements for my workplace and need some advice. I've already gone with the old fashioned rainbow flag but what else?

I’m in the public sector so pride month lady’s forever. Whenever they ask for inspirational stories I always highlight the work of women like Julie Bindel, Kathleen Stock and Alison Bailey.

They can’t really argue not to include them as they are lesbians with impressive careers, and I have to subtly put a case against men like Paris Lees being included as a lesbian.

Dennis Kavanagh is a good one for gay men’s representation.

My advice wouldn be to be careful.
The ruling was about the definition of a woman and therefore their right to single sex spaces. It's not free reign to discriminate against / ignore trans people for pride month events.

It won't reflect on you well if you use pride month to make a point adding gender idiology and you could get into trouble at work.

Could you include some transmen playing, thriving and succeeding in women's sports?

If I was in your shoes I would be looking to celebrate the most ordinary, friendly, popular, down-to-earth LGB people in the company with a 'just quietly getting on with my life inside an inclusive enviroment' message.
Absolutely ignore all the attention-seeking, fake-titted, drag-sporting loud mouths who are jumping up and down shouting 'pick me, look at me, centre me in the company's existence'

Nope, I'd be more interested in hearing from Debbie, the quiet lesbian in accounts who makes excellent jam, and has 3 cats...

We’ll wait while you find some….

I would include some lesbians, gay men and trans people but only ones who have achieved something that is nothing to do with gender identity. Trans woman wins Nobel prize/wins journalism award, yes. Trans woman who is the first 'woman' in space, no. wins woman's book prize/sports medal, no.

If you can slip some GC people among them all the better, double points for including GC transmen/woman. Who could argue with that?!

I'm sure we can think of some. Must be some older trans aid workers, or nurse retiring after 50 years or discovering the secret of the universe. Genuinely impressive feats that have nothing to do with their identity.

Just had a quick phone Google and most recent achievement for trans seems to be in gender related things. Sports, trans campaigning etc, first 'woman', first trans woman etc. There is a trans representative in the US government now but British examples are harder to find.

There must be some good examples in the sciences but I imagine any trans people in stem are busy ya know, getting on with important work and aren't making a big deal about their identity, unfortunately that makes them hard to find. Could be a lovely thing to celebrate 'ordinary' trans achievements but now I'm thinking about it, could it be problematic to 'out' people. Hmm.

How about celebrating lgbt people in the company, asking about their work but not mentioning their sexuality etc,?

Wendy Carlos has an impressive career in music, including some big movie soundtracks, transitioned back in the 70s if you want to celebrate someone who has done impressive things and happens to be transgender as well.

Make it all about foregrounding and centring lesbians - make the point that there are years of invisibility to make up for. Plus gay men - but with an unusual angle if you can think of one. And of course something about bisexuals. You've opted for the rainbow flag already, follow through. There is no need to include T specially - some of the lesbians you feature might be TiFs anyway, and some of the gay men might be TiMs.
You could feature some of the lesbians who have been involved in gaining lesbian rights back, especially if there is some sort of connection with your company. I also love the idea of a pp of showing people just doing their thing.
Good luck with it.

Good ideas, thanks. I like the idea of celebrating normal LGB people in the work place doing their job and what they have achieved.

I think the main points to keep in mind in terms of the SC ruling (and Forstater) is ensuring that none of the messaging around trans rights runs contrary to the EA (e.g. TWAW), and also that it doesn’t create an offensive, intimidating, hostile, etc environment for any gender critical employees (e.g. by criticising them for not believing in gender ideology or suggesting gender identity ideology is the one true faith, etc) or for women (e.g. by denying they share the protected characteristic of sex or by implying they shouldn’t).

I’m not suggesting that you would be putting together any of that kind of messaging, OP, but I can imagine there may well be colleagues who want to help you by suggesting all sorts of campaigns and messaging, especially in light of the SC ruling.

Personally, I would try to make sure I stick to the same number of references for each letter (LGBTQ..) as far as possible, so that if I promote an article on a lesbian, I also promote one about a gay man and one on a bisexual person, and so on. Doing this could help as (1) it will mean that the LGB stories don’t get forgotten about like they usually do, and (2) if anyone accuses you of not focussing enough attention on trans rights, you can point out that you have shared the coverage of each group equally (personally, I would then produce my evidential spreadsheet..), so there are just as many stories about the T as there are about each of the G, the L, the B and so on. So no-one can accuse you of favouring one group above the others.

Pride is for celebrating same-sex attracted people. So I don't think there'll be any equality issues with putting lesbians front and centre within a positive, celebratory programme of events as long as the OP doesn't ignore gay men or bisexuals and she is clear about the reason - redressing the balance.
Just my opinion, IANAL.

It would be great to bring Pride back to its lesbian and gay roots - the bolting on of the unrelated T has caused nothing but trouble for us.

I realise that you have to deal with the realpolitik at work, OP, I'm just saying -
T stands for Trouble in LGBT and there's nothing about it I'd want to celebrate.

Given your username, OP, you obviously have all it takes to organise super celebrations so I'm sure whatever you arrange will be fine🎈🎉🎊🍾

This.

I was asked by our DEI team to do something to celebrate Pride in my department (NHS) so focused specifically on the achievements of gay men and lesbians in the medical and NMAHP professions. I suspect they were hoping for rainbows and glitter, but tough. I also made sure that International Women’s Day was celebrated and only included actual women.

Balance is key, I agree LGB primarily recognised based on the higher % in the population with TQ alphabet recognised in a smaller way.

The SC was clear about how they considered the impact on lesbians/same sex attracted people.

It’s a chance to rebalance and start conversations that will need to be had.