Natalie's Pride Story

About me

I’ve been working at the University since November 2021. My job involves helping to design and run equality, diversity, and inclusion projects in the Medical Sciences Division. At the moment, I’m working on helping our central committees be more accessible and inclusive. I also had lots of organizing and planning to do in the run-up to Pride month!

I’m a member of the University’s LGBT+ Staff Network and the LGBT+ Advisory Group. I’m proud to belong to these spaces and I’m always keen to talk about how best to use our resources to support LGBTQ+ people. I’m also a trained LGBT+ Role Model and soon I hope to be able to deliver the training myself.

My LGBTQ identity

When I was about twelve or thirteen, I tentatively confessed to a few friends that I was bisexual. Some were fairly accepting, but others were dismissive and even cruel, citing their religious views as justification. This is one of the reasons I ended up reading Philosophy & Theology at Oxford: I wanted to understand those friends’ ideas and be ready to respond to similar comments in the future. I’m sad to say I have needed those skills on occasion during my life so far; however, I’ve encountered many more people of all faiths and none who are not merely tolerant, but extremely welcoming of LGBTQ+ people.

I now identify as pansexual or queer. I am AFAB (assigned female at birth) and I’m in a long-term relationship with a straight cisgender man, so it often feels like my sexual identity is invisible or even hidden. This makes queer social connections especially important to me. I didn’t stop being pan when I started dating my partner! I also live at the intersection between LGBTQ+ and neurodivergent identities, and I love meeting others who do too.

I started asking people to use they/them pronouns for me in October 2023, but I’m still figuring out the details of my non-binary identity. All I can say for sure is that when I let go of certain gendered language and ideas, I felt freer and happier in a completely new way. It was like drawing back a curtain on a part of myself that had been waiting to be found.

My experience of coming out has mostly been wonderful. My trans friends have been especially celebratory and welcoming, and have reassured me that non-binary people ‘count’ as trans (if they want to!). The hardest thing has been that, as I have come to understand my identity within the trans community, I am even more alarmed by how the press, politicians, and society treat trans people. We are often spoken of as if we were endangering the very fabric of civil society just by existing. When people in positions of power repeat these inflammatory ideas, our safety, rights, health, and wellbeing come under attack. As a white, cis-passing non-binary person, I feel I’m the least at risk, and even I feel afraid. For many of my trans siblings, and especially trans women and trans people of colour, the threat is existential.

My experience of Oxford Pride 2024

LGBTQ+ people don’t come out just once; it’s a choice you make almost every day. Nevertheless, your first Pride under a newly discovered identity is its own special experience. A University colleague spontaneously lent me a non-binary flag, and I am inexpressibly grateful to them. It hadn’t occurred to me that I would be so overjoyed to wear those colours proudly during the march.

The parade was a glorious display of diversity and individuality. People of all ages and backgrounds had come along covered in rainbows and glitter. Several dogs were in attendance, including a pastel-spotted dalmatian, and there was even one unusually tolerant cat sporting a rainbow bandana. As the parade processed down Queen Street, a beaming crowd of children and their families waved at us from behind a big HAPPY PRIDE sign in the library window. My friends and I found the sight both uplifting and reassuring, and we agreed what a positive difference that kind of experience would have made to us when we were of that age.

I love how the LGBTQ+ community wraps its arms around its most vulnerable members. Hearteningly, many people carried posters and placards in solidarity with trans folk. I spotted someone toting a Blåhaj, and had the opportunity to explain to my friends that the famous IKEA cuddly shark has become an unofficial mascot for the trans community. In southern England, we aren’t always the best at being friendly to strangers – but at Pride, we are exuberant and generous. We cheer and sing together. We compliment people we’ve never met. We keep an eye out for one another and have each other’s backs. Pride always makes me feel part of an enormous family.

I was among several volunteers who staffed the LGBT+ Network stall after the parade. We had a wide selection of pronoun badges to give away, which gave us a great opening to start conversations with fellow revellers. Everyone loves free stuff! I chatted with a grandmother about which badge to choose for her grandchild, and enjoyed sharing moments of solidarity with the many folks who went for the they/them option. I’m enormously grateful to everyone who organized our stall and banner this year. In future, I’d love to see the University get more even more involved to show colleagues, students, and the city our commitment to supporting the LGBTQ+ community.