Mind your language: Rainbow Youth takes new campaign to the streets

Off the back of a viral television advert, Rainbow Youth is set to launch a new campaign at tonight's Auckland Pride Parade.

Members of Rainbow Youth will take to Ponsonby Rd as part of the annual parade, wearing t-shirts with their preferred gender pronouns and waving signs that highlight why language matters to them.

The Language Matters campaign hoped to show Kiwis that the way we use language can have a powerful and sometimes harmful effect on the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Intersex and Queer (LGBTIQ+) community.

Rainbow Youth communications manager Toni Duder said something as small as asking which gender pronouns a person uses, instead of assuming based on their physical identity, would help young people in our LGBTIQ+ community feel "safe" and "accepted".

"When a young person comes out as gender diverse, one of the first things they contend with is how they feel and how the world sees them. [Being asked about your pronouns] shows people are making space for you in the world."

"[The Pride Festival] isn't all about celebration. It's also about having the hard conversations" Duder said.

The campaign follows Rainbow Youth's first ever national ad "If it's not gay, it's not gay", which appealed for people to stop giving the word "gay" a negative connotation.

The ad showed two farmers talking about a pie one of them has just dropped on the ground.

Nigel, reacts to dropping his pie by saying "gay". The other farmer tells him that, actually, it's "deeply disappointing" that he's dropped his pie, but "it's not gay".

It ends with Steve - another farmer - making the very matter-of-fact admission that he is "quite gay".

The video has racked up 1.2 million views online since it was released in October 2017.