The Many Voices of Pride: Tiffany’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 Tiffany’s story…
What do you do at Uber?
I work for Uber as an expert down in Brighton.
The role of an expert is basically to assist our partner drivers, get them on the road, help them with any issues they’ve got going, keep traffic moving, keep Brighton and the world moving!
Have you ever had any issues with drivers over people’s sexuality or religion?
I think if there’s lack of understanding between partner drivers and the queer community, it could just be a cultural thing or something they’re not exposed to. I don’t think it comes from a place of malice on the whole, I just think it’s something that needs to be educated about and can hopefully change.
What steps to Uber have in place to increase understanding and awareness?
I think Uber do a really good job of supporting the LGBTQIA team internally.
I there’s lots of communities and groups within Uber internally, there’s Uber Pride and other communities. I think as a corporation they could be doing more to be more inclusive, but I think they’re doing a good job.
In terms of improvement Uber can keep doing what they’re doing, keep supporting Pride, help their partner drivers become more aware of the cultural differences.
Do you support Pride as it is today?
I do support Pride as it is today. It’s great that people are coming out, showing themselves who they are, and it’s kind of spreading the message to the wider community that look, we’re here, we’re queer.
It is a shame that obviously it’s more corporate and less of a protest, we obviously still need to protest and stick up for our rights.
The things happening, even a couple of weeks ago in London, on the London bus [a lesbian couple was attacked for refusing to kiss] shows that we still need to fight and to tell people that it’s not cool to be homophobic.
I think Pride to me means, being yourself, telling the world that you don’t give a shit what they think, and you have every right to exist, you’re here, you take up space, you’re valid.
Read all the personal stories from the Many Voices of Pride campaign here.
