Wear It Purple Day 2021: What You Need To Know
This Friday, the 27th of August, is the annual Wear It Purple Day in Australia. This grassroots campaign against homophobic and transphobic bullying began in 2010 and has only grown from there. In this post, we’ll give you all the details you need to have a great Wear It Purple Day!
Trigger warning: This post contains brief mention of bullying and teen suicide.
What is Wear It Purple Day?
Wear It Purple Day is an annual event in Australia held on the last Friday of August to raise awareness of LGBTQIA+ issues for young people, and to celebrate diversity. Individual schools, businesses, and clubs run their own events, which usually involve fundraising for the Wear It Purple organisation and wearing a lot of purple!
The principles of the Wear It Purple organisation are:
- Advocate for and empower rainbow young people
- Celebrate and promote the value of diversity and inclusion in all communities
- Raise awareness about sexuality, sex and gender identity.
- Challenge harmful social cultures
- Champion role-models to support young rainbow people establish the confidence to be who they are.
How Can I Get Involved?
If you are running an event for Wear It Purple Day, you can register your event on their website here. It’s not mandatory, but it helps them see how the campaign is going, and what is and isn’t effective.
You can find lots of resources on the Wear It Purple website for how to run an event at your school or workplace, either in-person or remotely.
Some of their remote suggestions include a purple outfit selfie competition, streaming a queer film, or changing your zoom background to something purple for the day.
What Is The 2021 Theme?
Most years, Wear It Purple Day has a theme to base the events around. This year it’s “Start The Conversation… Keep It Going.” The idea is to remind people that Wear It Purple Day is a good place to start talking about the issues that affect LGBTQIA+ youth, but these conversations need to be had all year round. Young people need to be supported every day, not just once a year.
How Did Wear It Purple Day Start?
Wear It Purple Day was started in 2010 in response to several teenagers taking their own lives in response to queerphobic bullying and harassment, including being outed against their will. It was founded by Katherine Hudson and Scott Williams. The first Wear It Purple Day asked students to wear a purple arm band to show solidarity with queer victims of bullying, but it has since grown into a larger event including celebration of queer identities as well as the self-harm prevention aspect.
What Has Wear It Purple Day Achieved?
- Delivered over 400 free school packs to support over 600000 students celebrate Wear It Purple Day
- Events in over 750 places in 2019
- Won the 2019 Australian LGBTI Award for Charity Of The Year
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Also, check out our new podcast Never Would’ve Guest, now available wherever you get your podcasts! In episode one, we discuss what happens when butchness and disability intersect. You can listen to Episode 1 and read the transcript here.