Everything to know about rainbow washing and ways to run a more LGBTQ+ friendly language business
June is the LGBTQ+ [1] community Pride Month when we celebrate diversity and remind of the continuous fight for equal rights regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. In many countries, it is a period of increased visibility of LGBTQ+ folks but unfortunately also – an opportunity for various businesses to exploit queer symbols (such as rainbow, for instance) and make profits by presenting themselves as more progressive than they really are.
In this article, we’re going to explore what rainbow washing is, how to avoid it as a language business owner, and how to REALLY make your language school more inclusive for all. Pride Month is a great moment for you to rethink the values you follow in your business and whether you contribute to creating safe spaces for the LGBTQ+ community, or not.
Let’s dig into it! 🏳🌈
[1] It’s an acronym for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer as an umbrella term for other sexual orientations and gender identities. In this article, we’re going to use “Queer” as a synonym to LGBTQ+.
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Why should you care about LGBTQ+ people as a language business owner
In fact, we believe that everyone should care about the Queer community and fight for equal rights for them, just like everyone should care about equality, inclusion and safety of other members of society.
However, as a language business owner or a language teacher, you need to be even more sensible to these issues. By the nature of language courses and the group dynamics they create, you are providing circumstances in which communities are being created and it’s up to you to ensure everyone’s safety and a welcoming atmosphere.
What is rainbow washing
Rainbow washing (or pinkwashing) is a strategy used by some businesses, political organizations, and even countries to present themselves as inclusive, Queer-friendly, and striving for equality. In reality, in the case of businesses, it’s a way of making more profits by attracting new audiences (LGBTQ+ people and Allies) and in the case of countries, it’s a means of distracting the global audience from oppression towards other communities.
At the first glance, there might be nothing wrong with a brand trying to fix its image in a certain way but the problem of rainbow washing stems from the fact that it’s done only for the sake of profit (financial, political, etc.).
The Queer community has been fighting for decades for its freedom, visibility, and absence of oppression and violence. Obviously, the fight is not complete even in the most liberal, progressive, and democratic places in the world. The rainbow or other LGBTQ+ symbols has been fought for by generations of activists and it’s simply unethical (to say the least) when a business uses it without ACTUALLY supporting the Queer community. In fact, it’s often quite the opposite – a business pretends to support LGBTQ+ rights in one region and exploits local communities in other parts of the world.
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How to avoid rainbow washing in your marketing actions
Trust us, it’s not so complicated to avoid unintentional rainbow washing and to make your school a Queer-friendly place.
The easiest thing you can do to avoid rainbow washing is simply not using LGBTQ+ symbols without being able to present a proper stance your business has towards equality, diversity and inclusion.
Also, make sure there are no queerphopic people among your staff before you label yourself as a LGBTQ+ friendly school. Your students will easily find out that using the rainbow is only a marketing move and not a real allyship.
As easy as that: if you don’t do anything for equality throughout the year, don’t use the rainbow in your marketing only to show how cool you are during the Pride Month.
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Ways to make your language business more inclusive
There are several ways to transform your language business into a Queer-friendly one. Our list of suggestions is not a finished one but could be a good start for you to rethink whether there are areas of improvement in your business.
Remember, you don’t have to implement everything at once, but even small changes can make a big difference for some of your students. Also, creating more inclusive spaces doesn’t benefit only specific groups of people – it’s an improvement for people of all backgrounds! Essentially, it’s about creating a better learning environment and facilitating people’s adaptation to living in a new country – so we bet you’d like to offer the best experience possible to your students!
Here are some suggestions for your actions:
Organize LGBTQ+ inclusiveness training for your staff. Just look around, there might be an NGO in your area that does it and if not, you can look for legitimate sources that publish brochures and handbooks on diversity and inclusion.
Rethink your curriculum. You might want to ask yourself a question about whether the teaching materials you use represent a diversity of experiences and identities. It might sound like a daunting task but no worries, you can start by reading this UCL’s toolkit on recognizing and including LGBTQ+ identities in language teaching. It will surely help you out, especially at the beginning of this journey.
You might want to go down the way of establishing an Equality and Diversity Policy at your school, for instance. If you do it, you have to make sure that all your employees agree and follow it and are properly trained to interact with your clients (and each other) according to the Policy. You might also pay attention to a person’s attitude towards such a Policy while recruiting a new teacher. At the end of the day, these people are the faces of your school. They interact with your students the most, so you have to be sure they use inclusive language, don’t refer to stereotypes, and make the learning space a safe one.
Talking about safe learning space, you can introduce Safer Space Rules (have a look at some examples here, here, here, or here) to be used both among your staff and in the classrooms. Before introducing them, make sure you understand them properly, explain them to everyone at the beginning of the course/ meeting, and be ready to remind them from time to time. You can even hang the Safer Space Rules in a visible spot so that everyone can refer to them when needed. Trust us, it will not only make your place more inclusive but also will make your communication run more smoothly and openly.
A clear way of communicating that you’re a Queer-friendly school with Queer-friendly staff is by approaching people in a specific way and using proper language. There are plenty of guides to using more LGBTQ+ inclusive language, and you might have a look at this guide as a starting point. Also, use pronouns while introducing yourselves and ask people about their pronouns before assuming their gender identity. If you use badges with your names, make sure to add pronouns next to them (e.g. she/her, they/them, he/they). The same applies to zoom meetings, email communication, your personal social media account (especially if you use it for your business’ marketing), etc. It’s not a big change but it will show your trans and non-binary clients and staff that you recognize their rights and care about how they feel at your school.
Make sure you always address situations when someone’s attacked due to their sexual orientation/ gender identity or presentation, or on any other grounds. You cannot turn a blind eye to discrimination if you want to run an LGBTQ+ friendly language business.
Lastly, make sure you communicate that you’re an LGBTQ+ friendly place – have a rainbow flag displayed, add it to your Google Business Profile or communicate it on social media. But remember, you can do it only if you’re running a truly LGBTQ+ friendly business, not only if you want to be perceived as more cool or progressive (that would be rainbow washing!).
For every article, we create a marketing to-do list with actionable steps for you to follow in the upcoming two weeks. Created specifically for language schools!
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Summary – let’s celebrate!
The fight for equality continues every day and isn’t finished when the Pride Month ends. We believe everyone should contribute to it and we hope you’ll find your ways to become a more LGBTQ+ inclusive language business and a true Ally to your Queer students and staff.
Making your language school more inclusive isn’t only a just thing to do but also a rewarding one. Once you realize you created a space where everyone feels welcome, you’ll see that a truly inclusive, open and supporting community was created. And sooner or later, you’ll see this community is willing to support YOU in return.
So, don’t waste your time, become a LGBTQ+ friendly language school and let’s celebrate the Pride together! 💗🧡💛💚💙💜
About the author
Hi! I’m Natalia Styrnol, a sociology graduate and a young social researcher interested especially in migration studies, trying to incorporate a critical and feminist perspective in all the research I do. Here at ELC, I’m Karolina’s right-hand (operations manager), an executive manager of her too many ideas and, from time to time, a copywriter.
