By Joelle Wood/OHL
The Ontario Hockey League is proud to join communities across the Canadian Hockey League in celebrating and recognizing Pride Month. I sat down with Mitzi Brown of the Saginaw Spirit to learn more about her background with the Spirit, being an advocate and ally for the LGBTQ2S+ community and the significance of Pride Month to her. Mitzi serves as the Group Sales and Corporate Sponsorships Manager for the Spirit.
JW: What sparked your interest in joining the Saginaw Spirit’s front office staff?
MB: I had applied for the position prior to joining the team but it didn’t work out, I later reapplied and here I am now. I had never worked in the hockey industry before, but I consider myself a people person and I love that part of it. For me hockey is this big event, it’s about creating an experience for everybody which is something I greatly enjoy doing. It’s a perfect fit for me and I love being a part of the team.
JW: You currently serve on a non-profit, what vision and goals does that non-profit hold?
MB: We are currently called the Great Lakes Pride. We’re the Great Lakes Bay region, so we encompass four different cities; Saginaw, Bay City, Midland and Mount Pleasant. Our mission is to provide inclusive sexual orientation and gender identity/expression (SOGIE) education, advocacy, networking, and resources to individuals and organizations in the Great Lakes Bay Region. It’s really a pride, sexual orientation and gender identity expression inclusive, we cover a big area.
As a board member, one responsibility is to be fiscal responsible, another is to push and to continue the advocacy and education to the community such as businesses, families, schools, churches, all of the above to understand that pride isn’t just about putting up a rainbow flag and saying, “I support pride,” but actually educating yourself on what pride truly embodies.
We want to help people and guide them into being more inclusive. We don’t have an office/or space and want a place for us to call home as we’re currently trying to figure out what that looks like for us. The community wants a place to go and I personally think that it’s very important for the region to know that we have a presence here. We want to create a space for our LGBTQ2S+ community, as well as make it known that we are present, that’s our next goal.
JW: The Spirit hosted their inaugural pride night this season. What did that entail?
MB: We started out wanting to bring in our partners and make it a game day exclusive for the night. Dow was the sponsor for the night and they’re also the naming rights of our arena. It’s a great company and they rank as one of the top leaders of diversity and inclusive across the globe. There’s an LGBTQ2S+ resource group within the Dow organization called GLAD and they were a big part of our inaugural event with Great Lakes Bay Pride and the OHL’s Director of Diversity and Inclusion, Rico Phillips. We created a video with three sponsor organizations introducing them to our fans and what they do in our community and region. The night began with a ceremonial puck drop, and we had really fun giveaways, t-shirts and the players used pride tape on their sticks. We also had signs that were designed within the team regarding allyship, and how love is for everyone. It was amazing.
I always say this cycle of being uncomfortable is okay because nobody is going to make you be something you’re not, but sometimes when you’re unfamiliar, the unknown can be scary. If we can educate, get rid of some of that discomfort, and create a better understanding then I believe that some good advocacy has been achieved. The game was essentially sold out and it was extremely fun. It was good representation and a good educational event that provided people with the opportunity to ask questions. It was so well received, it was truly perfect.
JW: Why is it important to be an advocate towards the LGBTQ2S+ community?
MB: I’ll tell you for myself. I have a niece that went through a gender transition. I had always seen myself as an ally, but in terms of knowing someone who was transgender, that was a concept that I was not familiar with.
When she transitioned it rocked my world because of how much I loved her as my nephew and I struggled with letting go and adjusting. Not because I did not accept her, but I was just in shock. Though I had heard about transgender stories and read about it, I didn’t really understand it. I had a lot of unanswered questions as someone who was unfamiliar. It was eye opening for me to see how hard it was for her and how hard it still is for the community. Being around that community, it really shifts your mentality and opens up your eyes to how un-inclusive we still are. At the time I thought I was a great ally, but going through that experience further educated me into taking the proper steps. For example, putting my pronouns on my signature. There’s always more work to be done and I think the best way is to just keep educating yourself and getting comfortable with the unknown.
JW: If you could give one piece of advice on how people across the League can be a good ally, what would it be?
MB: I would say just be kind. The LGBTQ2S+ community includes our brothers, sisters, friends, peers, parents, and why would we treat anybody differently? It’s normal to be uncomfortable and uneasy with the unknown, but the more you know and the more you continue to educate yourself and start to understand different perspectives, the more comfortable and normal it becomes. I went to a fundraiser this year where for the first time someone asked for my pronouns before addressing me. It made me feel like an actual individual because no one assumed that I was just a mom or just heterosexual. It was very empowering.
Asking questions to better understand someone is never wrong. Having the proper intentions show that you want to be supportive, genuine and kind. I think having conversations like this is the first step to finding comfort to lead to better inclusion and understanding.
