In the times that we live in, every brand wants to be a queer-friendly brand. But to truly be an ally, it’s time they reconsider how they think about representation. Especially when it involves communities that continue to lack infrastructural support and basic rights.
"Only a letter got added to your name…”
That’s how Starbucks tells us that Arpita’s father has accepted her for who she really is. We meet Arpita in the #ItStartsWithYourName ad campaign that Starbucks India released prior to Pride Month last year. The two-minute ad, which had then become the subject of much mainstream discourse, follows a family meeting at Starbucks that culminates in the father ordering three coffees for his daughter, Arpita. Through the ad, we come to know that Arpita and her father had a tense relationship ever since she came out as a trans woman and it is at this coffee shop family reunion that her parents meet her for the first time after her transition.
Although Starbucks received flak from Indian conservatives that denounced the ad for “hurting Indian sentiments” and for being “too woke”; its portrayal of acceptance and inclusivity gave hope to the country’s queer community.
Reflecting on this campaign an entire year later, could we say that much has changed for queer representation in mainstream Indian media?
Despite India decriminalising homosexuality in 2018, India’s queer population continues to live on the margins; their fundamental rights remain out of their reach. In a piece on The Swaddle, Rajvi Desai notes how the queer community struggles for equality and acceptance in a queer-phobic society, the responses ranging from “absolute antipathy to conditional or unwitting acceptance to a loving and welcoming embrace.”
Vikrant (he/they), a 32-year-old Mumbai-based artist and diversity trainer, echoes that sentiment:
“I’m wary about people knowing whether I’m queer or not because you never know how your response is going to be taken and how they’re going to be treating you.”
Jo (she/they), a 20-year-old Kochi resident, on the other hand, rues about not being accepted by her immediate family but being able to find a community among people her own age.
This often leads to queer people being forced to live a double life — one in which they can freely express themselves in one space while simultaneously having to monitor themselves in another setting.
As Desai puts it, what follows is a “daily, unrelenting negotiation asking for complete freedom and understanding — one which often defines familial relationships for life.”
In such a reality, it’s no surprise that ad campaigns like #ItStartsWithYourName feel like a long overdue step towards inclusivity. Media representation certainly has the ability to demand a perception shift towards the queer community and brands have the power to showcase their ally-ship in ways that acknowledge the dignity of India’s queer population.
But it’s not often that brands get their ally-ship right. Take, for example, the trend of rainbow washing and pinkwashing, a method that brands employ to promote their queer-friendliness by using rainbow colors on their brand logos, creating products specifically catered to the queer community or even donating to LBTQIA+ organisations to show their support.
While the idea in itself is well-intentioned, brands often exploit this kind of ally-ship for their own corporate convenience to the extent that it becomes more of a marketing ploy than a genuine attempt to foster societal change.
The fact the media has historically portrayed queer lives as a stereotype is well-documented, but what gets left out of the conversation almost entirely is how the demeaning representation affects the psyche of queer people trying to find their identities.
“To me, the word gay and the idea of sexuality weren’t attached,”
– admits 20-year-old Aaradhya Singh (she/her), reflecting on her growing up years in Chandigarh.
“Being gay meant having good choices in clothes, having a girl best friend, and having a more feminine way of looking at life. So when I met my friends in college, they didn’t fit into one typical box that I assumed was queer for a long time in my head.” As a straight, cis-gendered woman, Aaradhya notes that it is only in the last five years that she has started seeing queer characters in media as people beyond the template set out for them.
Baby Latha (she/her), a 48 year-old mother of three kids of different genders, believes that representation in mainstream pop-culture isn’t enough; queer lives should also be portrayed in magazines and newspapers, communication channels that usually reach a person’s home.
“Anything and everything should start from home. I believe my son has reached where he is because my house was very accepting.”
A few years ago, Latha found herself learning about the community when her teenage child came out as trans. She quickly realised the role that family plays in shaping the identity of queer kids — not accepting your children as they are means losing them, effectively leaving them on their own to find a community that will see them for who they are.
To initiate a change from the status-quo, she argues that magazines and newspapers should focus on altering conservative mindsets at home. But mere representation for representation’s sake is rarely enough.
“Representation shouldn’t be about making a statement... we’re just normal people.”
– says Jo, arguing against the blatant fetishisation of the community in mainstream media.
The question then is simple: what should brands keep in mind when attempting to represent the queer community in advertisements and campaigns?
For one, involvement of queer Indians both in front of and behind the camera goes a long way. Vikrant talks about their experience of working for a straight director for a short film about coming out at the workplace:
“It’s his vision, which is great but so much would have been different if he was queer himself.”
The worry is that most straight people making artistic decisions in closed rooms might mistake representation for tokenism in their bid to be "inclusive". To avoid that, it’s imperative that brands and creative heads collaborate with the stakeholders of the queer community who can offer lived experiences to consolidate their creative vision.
It’s the same way big companies often confuse diversity with inclusion — it seems redundant for companies to hire queer folks if they don’t feel comfortable to openly be their queer selves in the workplace. Similarly, any queer representation in media becomes moot if they are othered in the depiction itself.
One way for brands to bypass this kind of performative ally-ship might be thinking of campaigns that aren’t only restricted to Pride Month. Vikrant and Jo agree, stating that they crave to see queer people represented in mainstream media all year round, right from real estate ads to sneaker campaigns.
Vikrant, in particular, voiced his wish to see queer representation in a post-queer world — a space where sexuality and gender identity are not the only defining markers of queer characters on screen:
“If you’re making an ad about a [queer] couple, it’s about two girls or guys instead of a guy or a girl. The ad is not about their identity, the ad is about whatever the product is about."
For brands to make that shift from performative ally-ship to genuine ally-ship, a reassessment of their own understanding of queer lives is the order of the day. That’s only possible if well-intentioned actions are backed by empathetic execution.
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