The concept is simple enough: nothing about a group of people should be made without the involvement of that same group of people. 

The phrase ‘nothing about us without us’ comes from the disability rights movement, demanding that disabled people be involved in the creation of programmes, healthcare initiatives and policies directly related to the treatment of disabled people. The history of ableism is one of silencing, erasure and ostracism, pushing disabled people out of sight and out of mind, often locking them away in specialist institutions. And so disability activists have learned the importance of being visible and having their voices heard whenever decisions are made about them. 

From here the concept has grown to include other marginalised communities, including refugees, indigenous groups tackling colonialism, sex workers and the LGBTQ+ community. But no matter who the ‘us’ is in the slogan, the concept is always the same: No decisions should be made that will affect a marginalised community without consulting that community. A community should be involved in their representation in media, marketing and communications. And, most importantly, policies, guidance and legislation should be informed by the lived experiences of the communities they’re about. 

Otherwise, there’s a huge risk of getting things wrong. And, despite wanting to support a marginalised community, you’re likely to instead cause harm to them. 

The concept is simple enough, and yet somehow this is still a huge problem. Marginalised communities are continuously left out of important decisions that have a direct influence on their daily lives and their livelihoods. The result is that businesses and organisations are investing their time, resources and budget into creating policies, events and marketing that supposedly seek to support their marginalised staff and customers, but instead only make things worse.  

That’s why, as part of the accreditation process for the All Equals Charter, one of the key areas we assess is whether LGBTQ+ people are included in a variety of decision making opportunities, including reviewing new and revised policies, designing services/ products and whether there are any LGBTQ+ senior leaders within the business/ organisation. Role Model level businesses work hard to connect meaningfully with a diverse, intersectional range of LGBTQ+ people to ensure that anything about (or in any way impacts) LGBTQ+ people is done with LGBTQ+ people. 

Unfortunately, our country’s leaders are not doing the same, especially when it comes to trans rights. The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) and the Tory Government are writing guidance, policies and legislation about trans communities without consulting or working alongside trans people, and the results are proving devastating. 

For example:

• Thanks to EHRC guidance, the definition of sex under the equality act was debated in parliament, which, if the changes had been brought into law, would have risked trans people losing access to life-saving services. 
• EHRC provided guidance to exclude trans people from public toilets, and now the Minister of Equalities has proposed to make gendered toilets mandatory in all new buildings, which will severely limit trans people’s access to a wide range of public spaces. 
• The Health Secretary has announced plans to ban trans people from single-sex hospital wards, despite there being no complaints against trans people in these wards, which will lead to serious health risks for the trans community.  

The above are only a few reasons trans people need to be consulted on all EHRC and government guidance, policies and legislation. As such, Manchester Pride is calling on our communities to help us Stop the Hate!

We are asking for you to write to your MP asking for the implementation of ‘Nothing About Us Without Us’ independent panels of marginalised people to consult on all EHRC and government guidance, policies and legislation pertaining to that community, especially for the trans community. We have created a template letter for you. All you need to do is fill in this form, and you will receive an email with everything you need. 

With your help, we can Stop the Hate and make sure that anything about us is done with us!