A manifesto of the sore thumb in the room
“Do you know why we have the sunflowers? It’s not because Vincent van Gogh suffered. It’s because Vincent van Gogh had a brother who loved him. Through all the pain, he had a tether, a connection to the world. And that is the focus of the story we need – connection.”
There is something glamorous about the hallways of corporate officers—with the flowers that get delivered to the reception desk every day, with training that makes you feel prepared and overwhelmed all at the same time, like your fear is mixed somewhere between awe and a desire to prove yourself in the world.
I remember the glamour and feeling so out of place. It has never been an unfamiliar feeling, being the sore thumb that sticks out. All-girls schooling does that, where phrases like I’d rather be dead than gay ring out in the school yard. That feeling doesn’t go away. We were sat down to talk about diversity in the corporate sector, to discuss targets of female partners and ways to reduce environmental footprints. These are all noble causes, ones that I support and align with what I believe in. But, then the presenter moves to LGBTIQ+ diversity in the workforce, and the first words to come out of their mouth are: Women, gay women, are under represented in the corporate law sector, and it’s never spoken about. Progress towards a more progressive, diverse, representative workforce has come leaps and bounds. However, in 2019 we are having conversations that indicate lesbians are less likely to come out in the workforce than gay men—and all I could do was sit there and consider the ten reasons I wasn’t comfortable telling the very peers who surrounded me in that room.
I am a proud lesbian, and a proud law student interested in a legal career. I have never thought that those two things needed to be mutually exclusive.
There is something deeply uncomfortable about correcting people when you talk about your partner, about finding the correct point in a conversation to slide in the pronouns to prevent later awkward conversations, about hearing phrases like that’s so gay dropped as if we do not know better now.
This is not behaviour that is exclusive to the school yard or the corporate offices. It happens each time that you make a joke towards your friend and excuse it as banter—think before you talk, before you create a culture that causes discomfort or reminds people of their struggles for being different. Sometimes, they might laugh and not want to—I certainly have, for the sake of getting along and not creating tension, to not be the angry, left-wing lesbian in a room. The feeling of a ‘boys club’ in the legal industry, and even law school, can make you feel out of place, like you are the irrational one in the room. It isn’t true, but we spend our entire lives reminding ourselves that the things people say aren’t true, when media campaigns attempt to tear us down for the people that we love. For others, it can be difficult to understand the kind of challenge that comes with being different, with fitting into the bubble of being ‘diverse.’ I worked on the phones in a mental health service during the postal vote; and can vividly recall the calls of a distressed and scared community. When you say that diversity is not important, you minimise these struggles and the need for representatives of our community to benefit a once disenfranchised minority.
There can be hard conversations to have when you don’t understand because the issue isn’t personal, because you haven’t experienced these challenges, or you don’t understand what it is like to stick out like that sore thumb. Listen to your friends, have a conversation, and complete some research on how to be a good ally. Take productive steps to ensure that the struggles of those you love do not fall upon deaf ears.
My greatest experience of love and absolute support came from my best friend, when we watched Nanette by Hannah Gadsby together. She sat with me and cried and expressed for the first time that she was starting to understand the difficulties and the stigma that has historically been placed upon the gay community. For me, that was one of the most important moments in my identity—give that feeling to your friends, of full support and love. I can only hope that this journal on diversity of thought and community starts these conversations. Connect with your friends, they can’t do it alone.
And the next time that someone tells you Women, gay women, are under represented in the corporate law sector… – Tell them: not yet, but they will be.
Article written by Anonymous
This article appeared in the Torts Illustrated Diversity (2019) Publication