The role of authentic allyship in achieving equality

Hope Cable, Junior Project Manager at CGI, spoke to myGwork about the role allyship plays towards LGBTQ+ equality. She also suggests advice for organizations who wish to attract more allies to their workplace.

Why are allies important? Even as awareness and acceptance of LGBT+ individuals improves and the number of people who are “out” increases, we remain a minority. The protection of the rights we’ve gained and the further progression of equality through culture and policy will rely on the support of allies. Allies can advocate with us, support our movements, and check ignorant and insensitive behaviour that could have the potential to cause offence where they see it. Widespread allyship shows the improvement of equality is not an opinion held by a minority but a universally understood necessity. This is especially important in a country where over half of people giving any response to surveys convey respect or admiration for all LGBT+ identities, yet our existence, particularly for transgender individuals, is not always supportive.

Do you think allies play an important part towards equality for all? How?

Of course! The solidarity provided by allies is essential to developing mutual support between disadvantaged groups. From 1984-1985 the actions of Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners during the miner’s strikes supporting the village of Onllwyn encouraged the National Union of Mineworkers to both oppose Section 28 legislation (prohibiting discussion of LGBT+ people in schools and government funded institutions) and push for LGBT+ rights in the Trades Union Congress and Labour Party policies. Almost everyone will suffer some kind of inequality at some point in their life, whether it be racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, classism, or religious discrimination. Almost everyone needs allies. Almost everyone would happily support others if they felt safe and welcome to do so. Encouraging reciprocal allyship through your own actions is taking a step toward a world where people within and without each of these groups look out for the lives and rights of all the other groups. 

What would be your advice to organizations wishing to attract more allies?

Pride is not just for June, and equality is not just for mandatory training. To attract more allies, organisations need to publicly display actions supporting LGBT+ causes. Something as small as promotional materials (for example, rainbow lanyards) can let LGBT+ people and allies know you take such things seriously. Fundraisers for LGBT+ charities and causes as well as attending pride events can have a similar effect of making you stand out in a world where, as recently as 2018, a third of LGBT+ staff hid or disguised their identity for fear of discrimination and one in eight trans people had been physically attacked for being trans.

That said, the ideals of openness and integrity are more important than a checklist from an article. Be clear and open, with consistent messaging on what you are doing to support LGBT+ causes, avoiding platitudes or generalisms in favour of specific goals and activities for your support.

What is your advice to someone who wants to become an ally?

First, be proactive and do your research. Do not wait for someone to specifically ask you to do something supportive. Find your organisation’s LGBT+ network if they have one or join a local community group that welcomes allies. Attend their events and actively listen to the members when they speak about the issues they face. In the meantime, find educational resources made by LGBT+ people. I can whole-heartedly recommend be the gender dysphoria bible (https://genderdysphoria.fyi/) for information on transgender people, and my own professional network has been kind enough to share some resources on the other identities under the LGBT+ umbrella.

Second, be ready to check your assumptions with new people. There is no one true LGBT+ narrative, take the time to establish the specific issues faced by a person. See the person themselves, not just the group they identify with.

Finally, recognise your privileges and be mindful of how you can use them responsibly. If you’re in a position to identify or give feedback on limiting policies in your organisation, that could have a positive impact for change, for any number of individuals.

Although you might not be in position of responsibility, you can use your knowledge or research you’ve done to challenge in ignorant and insensitive behaviour (“Why is everyone gay these days?”, “They need to stop shoving it in our faces.”) and take some of the weight off LGBT+ people who have heard it 5 times today already.

What is one of the best allyship moments you have witnessed?

A line manager of mine had a conversation with me about why I hadn’t changed my name on teams and emails to match my chosen identity. On learning our internal processes required a legal name change, they successfully worked with our internal team to accommodate a person’s preferred name before they commit to a deed poll. That manager not only helped me get support that made my life considerably easier, but they went further, by highlighting a change that could be made to the overall process. They were proactive, kept me in the loop to make sure they weren’t overstepping, and went above and beyond to make my experience, and the experience of people like me, easier.

Resources:

Myths about coming out at work: https://hbr.org/2018/10/7-myths-about-coming-out-at-work

Bisexual myths in the workplace: https://www.theguardian.com/careers/careers-blog/busting-myths-bisexuals-in-the-workplace

Bisexuality and sexual assault: https://www.tuc.org.uk/blogs/1-5-bisexual-people-have-been-sexually-assaulted-work

Living as Trans: https://lgbt.foundation/who-we-help/trans-people