{"id":795,"date":"2021-07-14T01:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-07-14T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/lgbt\/?p=220"},"modified":"2025-01-23T14:29:42","modified_gmt":"2025-01-23T14:29:42","slug":"did-i-need-the-law-to-be-my-non-binary-self-at-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/did-i-need-the-law-to-be-my-non-binary-self-at-work\/","title":{"rendered":"Did I need the law to be my non-binary self at work?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

To mark International Non-binary Day 2021, David Wilson reflects on their own experiences and where non-binary people find themselves in the UK in 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Can there be a bigger clich\u00e9 in queer circles than \u201cI wasn\u2019t like the other kids at school\u201d?  Maybe not.  But it\u2019s true.  First I grew my hair long, inspired by heavy metal and grunge bands. But I cut it again under social pressure.  A few years later I discovered gender non-conforming musicians like Brian Molko and Stefan Olsdal of Placebo, and Nicky Wire and Richey Edwards of Manic Street Preachers and I started wearing makeup and clothes classed as feminine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Image
Placebo (left) and Manic Street Preachers (right) subverting gender norms in the mid 90s<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I reined it in again when I started university \u2013 worried about alienating the people I\u2019d meet and failing to make friends.  It became a \u201cnights out only\u201d look.  When I started working I wanted to seem grown up and responsible which, particularly for someone read as male, means quite a conservative appearance.  Arists such as David Bowie had been pushing boundaries on stage and screen for decades, but even today there\u2019s not much latitude in \u201cmale\u201d office wear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In their autobiography, \u201cSissy.  A coming of gender story\u201d, Jacob Tobia writes of entering the workplace \u201cA first glance professionalism tries to convince you it\u2019s a neutral word purely meant to signify a collection of behaviours, clothing and norms, appropriate for the workplace.  \u201cWe just ask that everyone be professional\u201d the cis white men will say, smiles on their faces, as if they\u2019re not asking for much. \u201cUh, we try to maintain a professional office environment\u2026\u201d but never has a word been so loaded with racism, sexism, heteronormativity or trans exclusion.  Whenever someone is telling you to \u201cbe professional\u201d they\u2019re really saying \u201cbe more like me\u201d.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI wish I could dress like that at work\u201d I\u2019d think.<\/strong> Every time. For years.<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\n
\n
\"Image
Jacob Tobia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n

Nobody told me I had to dress that way, but that\u2019s not how social norms work.  You just pick them up.  I\u2019d see women coming to work in all sorts of outfits, all sorts of fabrics and colours, some with makeup, some with none.  \u201cI wish I could dress like that at work\u201d I\u2019d think, every time I saw them.  Every time. For years.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Then in 2016 I learned a few key things:
The Equality Act 2010<\/a> protects people from discrimination based on \u201cgender-reassignment\u201d.
Gender re-assignment covers social transition (how we present, changes in names, pronouns etc.) as well as medical transition (e.g. hormones or surgery).
While it hadn\u2019t been tested in court, it was very likely this protection extended identities that fell outside the gender binary \u2013 not just trans men and trans women. (This has since been established in an employment tribunal<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I brought this information to my manager and assertively informed her I\u2019d be coming to work looking different from now on.  She was a little taken aback, but supportive.  I started coming to work in dresses, skirts, heels, makeup, and in the hoop earrings for which I\u2019ve become known.  I wore these things to the office, to meetings, to negotiate with senior university managers on behalf of UCU and I waited for the backlash, the snide comments, the laughter.  They never came.  I asked for IT systems to be changed, and for the University to establish a working group to improve support for trans and non-binary staff and students, and the requests were granted. The irony of working in IT and pushing against binaries was not lost on me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2016 we were riding a wave of interest about transgender people.  The Transgender Tipping Point was declared in 2014 when Laverne Cox, star of Orange Is The New Black, appeared on the cover of Time<\/a> magazine.  Caitlin Jenner had followed in Vanity Fair<\/a> in 2015.  Recognition and acceptance were here.  But from progress comes a backlash and now far too much time and energy is spent on a confected war between the trans community and so-called “gender-critical” women fearful that increased rights for trans women decreases their protections from men.  These groups, natural allies in the face of patriarchy, have been turned against each other in order to maintain the status quo. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\n
\"Image
Laverne Cox on the cover of Time in 2014<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n
\"Image
Caitlyn Jenner on the cover of Vanity Fair in 2015<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Stonewall<\/a>, the LGBT+ charity founded by national treasures such as Ian McKellen, has been vilified by the press and the government for supporting the vulnerable trans community and organisations have come under pressure, including from Equalities Minister Liz Truss<\/a>, to dissociate from them.  At Loughborough however we have made steady progress towards better understanding and inclusion of the trans and non-binary members of our community and we have remained a member of the Stonewall Diversity Champion program. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\n
\"Image<\/a>
My Stonewall poster<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n

This week to celebrate International Non-Binary People\u2019s Day<\/a>, Stonewall have released posters<\/a> for schools and colleges featuring a range of non-binary folk talking about their work and their interests in order to help normalise our existence and increase our visibility for the next generation.\u00a0 I am proud to have been invited to participate<\/a> in this campaign, proud to be a poster child for Stonewall during their rough ride. \u00a0 Just as I\u2019m proud to be seen around campus and in the rest of the world because as much as I still fear the backlash might come at any moment, I am no longer prepared to repress who I am.\u00a0 I want to be seen and make it easier for others to be themselves and be seen.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

The Parliamentary Women and Equalities Committee urged government in 2016 to \u201clook into the need to create a legal category for those people with a gender identity outside that which is binary…\u201d noting several countries had already done so. In 2020 the UK Government decided to shelve plans to reform the Gender Recognition Act, and in May 2021 responded to a petition<\/a> to asking for legal recognition for non-binary gender saying it had no plans for this, and that it would have \u201ccomplex practical consequences\u201d.  Consequences which countries such as New Zealand, Malta and Pakistan and others<\/a> have been able to overcome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Did I need legal protection to be my non-binary self at work?  <\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Did I need legal protection to be my non-binary self at work?  Would anyone have stopped me if I\u2019d just come in dressed how I wanted to years earlier?  We\u2019ll never know.  But I didn\u2019t feel able to do it, so in that sense yes, I needed the legal protection.  In 2016 I thought we were on a one-way street to greater acceptance and legal recognition. Now I fear that progress is stagnating and may even be reversed as we see in Poland<\/a> and Hungary<\/a>.  I hope that I\u2019m wrong. But most of all I hope that whatever happens in law we heal the wounds in public opinion and work together to address gender-based violence and oppression in all its forms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Photo by Delia Giandeini<\/a> on Unsplash<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To mark International Non-binary Day 2021, David Wilson reflects on their own experiences and where non-binary people find themselves in the UK in 2021. Can there be a bigger clich\u00e9 in queer circles than \u201cI wasn\u2019t like the other kids at school\u201d?  Maybe not.  But it\u2019s true.  First I grew my hair long, inspired by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":693,"featured_media":827,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"lboro_blog_alternative_thumbnail_image":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[47,5,49,41,7],"class_list":["post-795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lgbt","tag-equality-act","tag-gender","tag-non-binary","tag-patriarchy","tag-transgender"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/693"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=795"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/795\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":853,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/795\/revisions\/853"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/edi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}