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I have found Pride harder to talk about this year.
Not because I feel any less proud, but because Pride seems to be arriving in a louder, uglier and more confident kind of hostility. You can see it everywhere, under brand posts, in comment sections and especially in political rhetoric. In the casual way people now speak about marginalised communities, particularly trans people, as though dignity is up for debate.
That is why I am finding the usual Pride month gestures harder to sit with
Visibility still matters (I know it does). Seeing a rainbow flag, a Pride post or an LGBTQ+ campaign can mean something, especially to someone who does not feel safe or seen elsewhere. But when the backlash is this visible, the response has to be more than a logo change. If a business is willing to use Pride as a brand moment, it also needs to be willing to stand behind LGBTQ+ people when that visibility attracts hate.
This work is personal
Pride is not something we pick up in June and put back in the closet in July. We are an LGBTQ+ owned business, so this work is personal. It shows up in the causes we support, the clients we work with and the way we use our skills as communicators and brand specialists.
Daniel, our Founder and MD (and my husband), is a Board Advisor for LGBT Foundation, helping the charity strengthen its messaging and create a more unified brand. I am an HIV Ambassador for Terrence Higgins Trust, using storytelling to reduce stigma and help people understand that HIV education still matters.
Through Bray St, we have also worked with LGBTQ+ clients, charities and employee networks for years. We have partnered with a global LGBTQ+ ERG for over five years, supporting its brand, helping deliver Pride parade activations in London and Southampton, and, more recently, creating a global chapter pack to help smaller groups around the world run LGBTQ+ initiatives with more confidence. Last year, our pro bono project was the rebrand of Diversity VC, an organisation working to make venture capital more inclusive.
I am proud of that work, but I also know it sits within a much bigger picture.
The backlash is not abstract
This year, we have been supporting a global organisation with the launch of an inclusive culture strategy. It has been some of the most meaningful work I have been part of, but it has also been difficult to do that work against the backdrop of what is happening around us. In the UK and the US, the rhetoric around marginalised communities is becoming more visceral. The rise of far-right politics has made people feel more comfortable saying the quiet part out loud. The comments that appear under Pride posts are not just “debate”; they are often dehumanising, and they create the conditions for real-world exclusion.
What worries me most is how quickly some people in our own community seem willing to separate themselves from the parts of it currently under attack. The attempt to divide the G from the T misses the point entirely. It may start with trans people because they are being treated as the easier target, but history tells us it rarely ends there. Once a society becomes comfortable stripping dignity from one group, it becomes easier to do the same to others.
Solidarity has to be active
Solidarity cannot be sentimental; it has to be active.
We have seen what active solidarity looks like before. During the 1984 to 1985 miners’ strike, Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners was formed in London in July 1984, after activists had collected donations at London Pride that June to support striking miners and their families. A year later, on 29 June 1985, miners marched alongside LGSM at London Pride, a powerful reminder that communities under pressure can become stronger when they stand together.
That same thread of solidarity is still visible today. In 2026, after Durham County Council under Reform UK withdrew funding for Durham Pride, the Durham Miners’ Association and trade unions helped raise replacement funds so the event could go ahead. It shows that progress has never come from communities politely waiting their turn. It comes from people recognising that their struggles are connected, and acting like it.
So, what sits behind the rainbow?
I want to see more than rainbows, and I want to see businesses asking harder questions of themselves.
If you are changing your logo, what are you doing when the comments turn hateful? If your LGBTQ+ employees are expected to be visible in June, how are you protecting them in July? If your brand wants the warmth of Pride, is it also prepared for the responsibility that comes with it?
Pride is joyful, and it should be. It is also political, whether people like that or not. The rights we have were hard won, and they can be chipped away if we get too comfortable.
I’ll keep speaking loudly and proudly, not because it is always easy, but because silence is exactly what hate relies on.