The Many Voices of Pride: Dale’s story

The LGBT+ community is made of many different identities, all of which are as valid and important as the others, and every single one deserves to fly their flag with pride.

For Pride 2019, PinkNews has teamed with Uber to tell stories that show how important visibility is to a diverse rainbow of sexual and gender identities.

This is Dale’s story…

Were you always aware that you were non-binary?

Ever since I was a child, I neither identified with male or female pronouns. I probably questioned if I was transgender at one point, then had a realisation that I’m very comfortable in my physical self. I don’t want to change physically, but I do identify on the inside, spiritually and mentally, as female.

Non-binary is quite new to my vocabulary. The power in the word non-binary for me is that it doesn’t describe one or another, it’s very open to interpretation by the person who identifies as non-binary. It wasn’t until i heard the word non-binary and met other people identifying as non-binary that I was like “Wow this is me, this is how I identify.”

How do you feel about people asking you questions?

I am absolutely fine with people asking me questions about my sexuality and gender. This is quite an uncomfortable conversation for a lot of people.

It’s about consent and respect when we are asking people about their identity. If someone looks uncomfortable when you ask them a question like that, you need to know when to step back and go “Ok that’s not an issue”.

How do you feel about Pride?

The history of Pride is something that’s really important to me because I feel like we are rewriting it.

I think it’s really important for queer history to be told and for brands who want to use the queer agenda to show their openness to employees and those who are buying their products.

I think they have a huge responsibility to be teaching our history and that we never forget the struggles that they’ve been through.

What flag do you identify with?

I feel like the sense of community is being fractured by putting ourselves in different boxes by having a lesbian flag, a gay flag, a non-binary flag, a trans flag.

Within us, we have shade, colour, we have everything, we are all infinite creatures and I think it’s really important to not take something like our gender and sexuality and allow that to identify us as a full being.

Read all the personal stories from the Many Voices of Pride campaign here.