Pride Month — We need far more than Rainbows and Glitter

While Pride month is a great opportunity to celebrate LGBT+ identities and raise visibility we need more than ever to bring pride back to its origins as a protest movement.

We see business and governmental organizations all rainbow up their social media logos in support of pride, quite often some of these organizations fail to adequately support LGBT+ employees or challenge casual homophobia, biphobia and transphobia in their workplaces. 40% of LGB and 55% of trans employees report experiencing discrimination in the workplace.

Many people seem to assume that the struggles of the LGBT+ community are over and have been won through equal marriage, adoption rights, gender recognition, protected characteristics in the equality act and others. This could not be further from the truth. Rights can be fought for, campaigned for and won. Rights can also be taken back from us by those who seed and propagate hate and bigotry, who attack that which they don’t or won’t try to understand.

Right now we need much more than rainbows. Right now we live in a UK where the government completely ignored the results of a public consultation on the rights of the trans community and decided to continue a gender recognition system where a persons identity was only judged as valid if a group of strangers decided that a trans person fit their standards of gender.

We live in a UK where although LGBT+ inclusive Relationship and sex education is becoming statutory in our schools, anti LGBT+ groups campaign against it and challenge schools and local authorities who use quality guidance to support their LGBT+ students.

We live in a UK where anti trans groups are actively campaigning to have gender recognition for trans people scrapped, to exclude trans people from public toilets and single sex spaces that match their gender identity. Where these same groups also want the characteristic of gender reassignment removed from the equality act 2010.

Some people including elements in UK government are listening to these voices and supporting their views.

So when you visit a pride this summer, whether virtual or real and you look at those rainbows, remember where they come from and that pride is a protest.

Pride is an oppressed group of people fighting tooth and nail for basic human rights and we need every ally we can get. Please be that ally because right now we need so much more than rainbows and glitter.