GenderSpeaker Live Show Rikki Arundel

Today I will be speaking with Diversity and Inclusion expert, Jackie Handy. From a background in Recruitment, Jackie has learned about diversity and inclusion the hard way, from negative personal experiences. She is a fellow of the Professional Speakers Association and has been sharing her wisdom throughout the global speaking federation during 2020, including a trip to Namibia.

Today I want to talk about her experiences and how they have helped her to change attitudes and practices in the corporate world. We will also be talking about her book "The Little Book of Belonging" and the ways we can make simple positive step to becoming more inclusive.

You can find out more about Jackie at www.JackieHandy.com

Hate incidents and Hate Crime and sadly a part of life and have been increasing over the past few years. So what do you do if you are a victim or witness? Reporting the incident or crime to the police is essential but we k ow that most hate incidents and crimes go unreported, especially in the LGBTQ community. Often what we also need is to be able to just talk to someone about it and that is where Stop Hate UK comes in. Established 25 years ago, the charity provides a 24 hour service where victims and witnesses of hate crimes and incidents can get advice or just talk to a sympathetic ear about what has happened.

Today I am talking with Rose Simkins, the founder and CEO of the service, who is passionate about delivering help to victims and witnesses to hate, about the service, the current challenges and why this service is so important for people in the LGBTQ community.

You can find out more about Stop Hate UK on their website and Facebook page
https://www.stophateuk.org/
https://www.facebook.com/Stop.Hate.UK

Founded in 2005 by Sue Sanders from Schools Out, LGBT+ History is an opportunity every year for schools, colleges, public bodies and private organisations to celebrate and promote LGBT+ History. I have emphasised Schools ad Colleges, because this Month of celebration was inspired by the repeal of Section 28 and has always had a strong focus on schools providing a wealth of resources and materials to enable Teachers to actively promote LGBT History.

Today I am going to talk a little about the celebration and encourage you to think about how you can contribute to the 2021 LGBT+ History Month events and make your organisation more LGBT inclusive.

Every year on November 20th the Transgender community and our allies remember those trans people, mostly trans women, who, in the past year have lost their lives because they were transgender. Sadly the numbers dying is still rising every year and this global issues of violence against trans people continues.

Today I want to spend just a few minutes explaining this issue and encouraging you to do what you can to stop anti-trans behaviour on and off line.

A post on the Professional Speakers Association members FB group drew a lot of activity last week. The issue raised was how MC's and other meeting hosts should introduce men and women. Often men are introduced with a title, but women are not eg Mr John Smith vs plain Jane smith. Of course this can get worse when the women gets added adjectives eg the lovely Jane Smith. It's part of the same issues faced by women leaders and press articles which insist on talking about what they are wearing eg Jane Smith the CEO has arrived, wearing a ....

So today I have invited a few friends from the PSA to talk about the issue of sexism and gender equality for women speakers. How should you introduce a variety of speakers and maintain gender equality, how do you introduce and speak about transgender and non binary speakers and lots of other issues that impact the way people are treated differently due to their gender.

In May 1988 the conservative government passed into law section 28 of the Local Government Act 1988 which made it illegal for any local authority to treat homosexuality and same sex relationships as normal. This law turned back progress towards LGBT equality in a single step, removing funding and support and making the lives of LGBT people, particularly LGBT children very difficult.

Today I am going to be talking about this law, and the huge impact it has had on LGBT rights since. So often what appears to be bad, turns out to be good.

Don't forget that the week of the 13th to 19th November is International Trans Awareness Week and Friday 20th is International Trans Remembrance Day.