Harri's day of being all involved in and excited by the Equailty Bill.

On Tuesday I attended a meeting at the EHRC (Equality and Human Rights Commission) about the Trans parts of the proposed Equality Bill and what lobbying and amendment-submitting the Trans community wanted to do. Thanks to Ruth Pearce (NUS Women's Campaign Trans Students' Rep.) for alerting me to the meeting. After that, I went along to Portcullis House with a number of the other representatives of Trans organisations to watch Steven Whittle (president of Press for Change) present to the Parliamentary Scrutiny Committee which is working on the Equality Bill. Ben Summerskill, head of Stonewall, was also at the Committee.

Stay tuned for a full report once I've gathered together all the transcripts and written proposals and such.

Interview for North West LGBT'ers...

'ello:)

Just thought I'd let y'all know about a little interview thing I did the other week. A very friendly queer in the North West was conducting interviews, to collect info/rantage from LGBT people in the area, for the North West Development Agency. The Development Agency want to hear about our experiences with employment/education/health-care in the North West, and as someone who is involved in all three (and likes to have a good rant) I figured I should go along!

I had to do the interview twice, as the first time round-the recorder only picked up 36 seconds of me. Lol. But the second attempt went well, and I think I discussed some important things. Regarding health-care, I talked about things related to trans people- directly and indirectly. Like, I talked about GIC's, waiting times, 'jumping hoops' and issues for gay/bi/generally queer trans people who access GIC services (coz obviously we all transition in order to marry someone of a different gender and have kids and a dog called Bruno. Obviously.)
I also talked about accessing health-care services which ain't so clued up on trans stuffs. For example, when you go to your GP because you have tonsillitis, and end up having to explain that, 'Yes I want to medically transition, No I'm not insane- just give me the damn amoxicillin!

Regarding education, I had a rant about the amount of lecturers I have, who cannot seem to divide the class up for activities, by anything other than gender. And the admin staff who bellow across the hall 'are you that one who used to be a girl?'. And the security guard who frowns each time I use the disabled toilet. I talked about the incredibly gender-stereotypical posters/booklets I see around each department-aeronautical engineering; it's not for girls. Apparently.

I also spoke about wider issues, such as the application process for university, issues with university accommodation for trans people and access to student finance under the estrangement policy. I discussed other things which can affect trans students, such as time off for surgeries, protection from transphobia on campus and confidentiality issues.

There were some questions asked regarding education, which made me look back at my schooling and think 'that was kinda crap'. During the interview, we started to talk about subjects where LGBT people may feel excluded, and I can very much remember sitting in sex ed and thinking 'there is no way in hell I'm ever gonna do that!', and being hushed/frowned at by teachers when I would shout out, 'but what if you're gay!'. Yeah, I was that kid...

We spoke about employment, and the issues trans people can have. I'll never forget the HR person at one of my previous jobs, who, when I told her that others who worked there were harassing me/following me to the toilet etc, said "Well, you do look very androgynous, there's nothing I can do because you're bringing it on yourself' and concluded our conversation with, "It's not anyone's fault that they're confused by you-people need to know if you're a boy or a girl, don't they?" No, they don't. So I talked about the lack of training that HR peoples get on gender stuffs, and GNT'S and things that would make trans employees much happier :).

Anyhow, I just thought I'd post on here to let y'all know about this-I'll post an update when the results of the study are available.


Here's a couple links to sound out the organisations involved:

http://ecotec.com/theme/equality--diversity/lesbian,-gay--bisexual-communities-experiences-of-learning.aspx

http://www.nwda.co.uk/


Peace,

Frank.

ooohhh... looky!

http://nuslgbtblackstudents.blogspot.com/

Keep up to date with what 2009-10's Black Students' Rep (jobshare), Patrick 'Poggy' Murray and Colby Crook are doing at the blog above (I'm aware of the poor grammar in that sentence). It'll also appear in the 'blogs we read' section on the right hand side of this page every time it's updated. :-)

guest post: becoming an LGBT activist.

Colby Crook is one half of the jobshare that's been elected as Black Students' Rep on the NUS LGBT Committee this coming year; he's also an FE student, from the NUS LGBT Award-winning St Brendan's XIth Form College, and part of the large Trans caucus on committee.
When he announced on Facebook the other day that he 'wanted to do something' I suggested he wrote a blog entry for us about conference and how he came to be involved in the NUS and in activism. And (slightly to my surprise, cos i soon realised it sounded like a school assignment and felt a bit bad for asking) he said he'd like to, and last week he sent me this:

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It never crossed my mind before I entered the NUS LGBT Conference that I would be a student activist, let alone a student, at the end of the college year. I went in with delegate card and no idea how anything worked, and came out with not just a place on the committee, but a new sense of hope, a boost of confidence and a bunch of new friends.
It all began in one of our Human Rights groups in St Brendan's College, where a small group of students began discussing LGBT rights and wondered where that fit into our college. A few of us questioned the fact there was no group to support us, even though we all wanted one. This was of particular importance to some of us who had faced homophobic and transphobic abuse in the past, and wanted somewhere in college where we felt we could discuss and support those kind of issues in a safe environment. The subject was brought up with our Student Liaison Officer, who then said we could have a group and although it couldn't be specifically for LGBT students, it could welcome us. It was a start.
From there I went on to become a Bristol Youth Select Committee member, where one of our city wide aims, which was voted in, is reducing LGBT bullying. This is a first for the city, and the BYSC and Bristol UK Youth Parliament have recognised this is an issue that needs to be addressed. It began to feel like things were changing, and I got a thirst to do more.
When I first found out about the NUS LGBT conference in college, it sounded really interesting, but I really didn't know much about it. (Although anything with LGBT or queer in the title usually gets my attention pretty quickly!) I put myself up for it and once the delegates were chosen, it was just a matter of waiting for a nice weekend in Nottingham.
Entering conference was rather daunting, most of what I can remember is trying to register unsuccessfully and missing delegate training- not a good start! But soon, after meeting Sarah (the new FE rep) and getting a bit of guidance it felt like I was right at home there. By the evening, I was absolutely shattered but still managed to get up and dance in the 'Love Music, Hate Homophobia' gig.
As the next day dawned, I couldn't wait to get my socks on and get moving. The first thing that really got me was the workshops. In the first workshop we were asked to name all the Black LGBT famous people we could. It was pretty shocking to find that when you really think about it, there aren't many at all. After that was the Trans 102 Workshop, and the monumental amount of things that were brought up to discuss got me thinking even more.
And so, when a vacancy for LGBT Black Students Rep came up, Poggy and I jumped at the opportunity. It gave us the chance to make a change to the things we feel very passionate about. To me, getting this position represents all I've had to fight for, and all that I will have to fight for in the future.
Before I started conference, I had almost given up on college. I was fully prepared to leave, get a job, and just try to survive. Yet I realised in conference that not only is this an amazing environment to grow, develop and learn in, but it's also opened doors to me that I could only dream about before. If I met that amount of amazing, inspirational people, and saw that amount of passion and fire in just that weekend, imagine what else there is to see and do.