Project outline
For International Women’s Day 2024 the Scottish LGBTI Police Association, Scottish Women’s Development Forum and National LGBT+ Police Network have joined forces to create ‘A Mile in my shoes: An Exploration of Identity, Resilience and Expression’.
​
This project has been designed to ensure LGBTQ+ women and non-binary people are represented in our annual celebration of women.
​
We hope this collection of photographs and accompanying content showcases the diversity within UK policing. As police services, we are striving to better reflect the communities we serve. It is our hope that this project might fall into the hands of a prospective applicant; if that’s you, our wish is that you might recognise yourself in these pages and realise that you too can belong in policing.
Through these pages we seek to debunk stereotypes – relating to both gender and sexuality. We will explore identity, resilience and expression through an intersectional lens and present elements of cherished queer culture to raise awareness and understanding of our amazing community.
​
The admonition to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes means before judging someone, you must understand their experiences and challenges. The full idiom is: Before you judge someone, walk a mile in their shoes. In effect, it is a reminder to practice empathy.
​
We invite you to walk a mile in our shoes. In the coming pages, we will discuss how our chosen footwear reflects our identities and explore how we have embraced our identities as LGBTQ+ women and non-binary people.
The Task
We asked lots of LGBTQ+ women, non-binary people and our allies to contribute to this project. The final document will contain submissions from officers and staff from all over the UK.
We asked them to take a picture of a pair of their shoes; a pair which reflects their allyship or LGBTQ+ identity in some way.
​
We then asked:
How do these shoes represent your identity?
How have you embraced your identity?
If someone was to walk a mile in your shoes, what might they learn?​