Oh, Paul

Coming back again to the annual "Stonewall 100" employers index, I see the official line from Manchester City Council is the quote:

Manchester City Council's lead Councillor on gay men's issues, Councillor Paul Fairweather, said: "I am delighted that our hard work has been praised again this year, and we are consistently recognised as one of the best employers of gay, lesbian and transgender employees."

This is the same chappie who last summer stated at a conference where we were both speakers that in the past the city council had only engaged with the lesbian and gay communities but that it had to recognise that our politics had moved on and they needed to work actively with the trans and bi communities too. Is he back to the old bi-erasure tricks or being frank about the council's relative track records on the four strands of LGBT?

So who are the bisexuality bloggers now?

I've found a nice little widget to add to BiMedia which merges in rss feeds from other sites. It's something I've been wanting to have there since BiCon 2007 where a bi blog syndication site analagous to my favourite lefty blog site got talked about, but hadn't come across the right, free, tool to do the job.

However, now I have found the tech, I'm lacking in good UK (or UK-relevant) bi blogs to add there. Petra seems to have gone quiet and I'd rather it wasn't just me and Sue! Talky ones rather than "oh my look at these sexeh photos" ones preferred.

Nominations welcome. I don't promise to take them all up, of course.

It's nice to be quoted

Stonewall's "Top 100 LGB Employers" list for the year is out and it's entertaining to see myself indirectly quoted in a Stonewall publication.

Manchester City Council’s Equal Opportunities in
Employment policy contains a paragraph on why bisexual
men and women may face unique issues in the workplace:
“The council recognises that bisexual people may be the
target of specific discrimination and that their experiences
often differ from those of lesbians and gay men. The council
recognises that fear of discrimination is the major factor
which forces bisexual people to conceal their sexuality
and to present themselves as heterosexual, lesbian or gay
depending on the situation.”
As well as consulting with their LGBT network group on
employment policies, Manchester City Council hold an
annual LGBT Discussion Day, inviting volunteers and
individuals who advocate on behalf of LGBT citizens. One
outcome of the day was the suggestion that bisexuality
should be referenced explicitly in organisational literature.

Ah. That would be from the presentations I did. Sweet.

Though isn't it most remarkable that "actually mentioning bis exist" is still considered a daring suggestion in a publication on LGB inclusion?

And you know, I still can't find this alleged new bi-inclusive stance anywhere on the City Council website. It seems to be a policy that Stonewall know about but Manchester council doesn't!

Arse-ential

Essential, one of the Manchester gay venues that have drawn attention to themselves by running "no bisexuals" door policies down the years, is closing. We won't miss them.

Snow room for bisexuals here

As BiMedia reports, we've had to skip a meeting of the local bi group due to the ice and snow. It's frustrating but to be honest few people would have been able to make it in, and getting home later in the evening would have been troublesome for many. I gather that our regular haunt for post-group socialising is shut due to the weather too.

I always expect there to be a rush of new people at bi group with the new year - the "I will finally do something about meeting other bi people" thing. Is it actually the case though? This year's snow may mean a quick bit of empirical evidence gathering from the local groups around the UK would be misleading. Perhaps the BiPhoria archives will reveal a pattern?

There'd be some kind of jousting, clearly...

I keep an eye on LGBT and bi references in Hansard through the magic of Google alerts. One that only made it in through my general LGBT filter was this response to a question tabled recently:

"Baroness Royall of Blaisdon (Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, House of Lords; Labour)

The Permanent Secretary and other members of the Northern Ireland Office's departmental board volunteered to be diversity champions for underrepresented groups in the NIO. This supports the NIO's strategic approach to improving diversity and equality in the department. There are board-level champions for lesbian, gay and transgender staff; black and ethnic-minority staff; disabled staff and staff with caring responsibilities. Two members of the board also co-chair the NIO's Diversity Steering Group."

Now, is that an inadvertently missing "b" word there, or has the NIO had problems recruiting a bisexual champion? I think we should be told - and that a champion bisexual for Northern Ireland clearly needs to be found!

Strictly Homo Heroes?

Local LGB project Lesbian & Gay Foundation this summer launched an eyecatching (they have lots of money and people for image work) campaign to nominate "Homo Heroes" this summer. Despite the brandname we're invited to name our L,G,B,&/T hero and pose holding a sign with their name on for a photo gallery. After considering a range of possible nominees I joined in, waving a placard with Paddy Ashdown's name on it: straight, cis people can be LGBT community heroes too.

The project reaches its next stage today with a push for donations. It cites support from
"Beth Ditto, lead singer with The Gossip; Sir Ian McKellen, actor Lord of the Rings; Russell T Davies, producer and chief writer of Doctor Who".

So far as I'm aware that's two gay men and a lesbian: sadly this is not so surprising, but the lesbian voice is Beth Ditto. Beyond being a minor-league popster, Beth is probably most notable in LGBT politics for her biphobic comments about Angelina Jolie (to the effect that if you're not in a same-sex relationship, even if you have been so in the past, you're straight).

Come out, come out, and admire the guidance of this biphobic person as you do so? No thanks.

Quizzed

I'm skipping the bisexual activism weekend in Leicester this weekend as I'm a bit worn down and burned out still; so naturally I take time off by being interviewed for a documentary on being bisexual in Britain today. Funny the definitions of relaxation activism gives you :o) It helps that my interviewer is rather gorgeous, though I don't know that til they show up, so I really am doing it as a peculiar way to unwind.

Most of the questions are the usual kinds of things: how bi do you have to be to be bi, do you get more prejudice from the gay or straight worlds, and such. I start well and then become more waffly in the later questions: I need to do this stuff more often. One iussue which I hadn't pondered in a while was about it being harder for people to accept being bi - the situation of straight people saying "well, it'd be easier to understand if they were gay". I don't have a simple, sane answer for this one figured out yet and will have to work on it!

An hour of chatter and it's over, so naturally I'm bubbling with ideas for who else documentary makers ought to talk to for angles on bisexual life. Talking about this stuff from the basics up is actually a great way of stimulating your own interest and ideas too: I should line up an interviewer to quiz me ahead of each new BCN deadline to help with the creativity.