November 2012

Trevor Project Working for a Better Future for All Youth

The Trevor Project was founded in 1998 by the creators of the film “Trevor“: James Lecense, Peggy Rajeskim and Randy Stone. The Academy Award-winning film is about a young boy dealing with being bullied while undergoing self-discovery about his sexual identity. The three creators soon found out that there was little (if any) support for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, and questioning (LGBTQ) youth facing the same types of crisis as Trevor. In response to this, the filmmakers founded The Trevor Project., now a leader  in providing crises intervention and suicide prevention services to LGBT youth.

TREVORSPACE is the largest online network of LGTBQ youth with over 45,000 members in 138 countries. The community continues to grow with  over 1,000 new people joining every month. AskTrevor is a non-emergency Q&A platform which receives about 200 letters per month. Trevor also offers online counseling and the suicide prevention hotline, Trevor Lifeline, which has received 200,000 calls since its’ inception. Lifeline handles on average 100 calls a day, 2,900 calls a month, 35,000 calls per year. Trevorchat is a live chat geared towards depressed or suicidal youth and it serves 6000 youths a year.  If you feel depressed or suicidal (or know a friend or family member who is) please do not hesitate to call the Lifeline at 866-488-7386. Trevor Project’s Senior Education Manager Nathan Belyeu took time recently to talk to VenusPlusX.            

Why do you think there is so little political discourse on LGBTQ youth?

Belyeu: This is a really interesting question. Current research has shown that LGBTQ people are starting to come out younger than they once did. Organizations such as The Trevor Project are working hard along with our partners to increase awareness and understanding regarding the LGBTQ youth community and make sure that our youth’s voices are heard by our elected representatives.

Why is suicide among LGBTQ youth increasing?

Belyeu: Suicide is a very complex issue. Only 60% of all youth in the U.S. who need mental health care actually get it. When we talk specifically about LGBTQ youth, they often face additional stressors which place them at increased risk for suicide including issues related to coming out, bias, and victimization on the basis of their sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression, and a lack of supportive communities.

When you add the influence of stressors like prejudice, fear, and hate to things that affect all youth, such as lack of access to appropriate mental health care and resources, LGBTQ youth are at an increased risk for suicide attempts. This is why The Trevor Project offers crisis intervention services that are accessible 24/7 (The Trevor Lifeline at 1-866-488-7386); instant messaging with a counselor through TrevorChat; a social networking community for LGBTQ youth (TrevorSpace.org); education programs that teach both students and adults how to help recognize warning signs and help a person get the help they need (Trevor Lifeguard and CARE workshops); and, so much more.

How are the public schools systems dealing with LGBTQ youth Are they even equipped to handle the subject?

Belyeu: Many schools across the country are providing support to LGBTQ youth through staff education and training, education for students regarding LGBTQ issues, and by creating supportive spaces and groups for LGBTQ students and their allies. A large percentage of our schools across the country, however, still have a lot of work to do to create spaces that are supportive and safe for all students to learn and reach their educational goals. The Trevor Project provides a variety of resources for school administrators and staff including direct education for staff and students, the Trevor Lifeguard and CARE workshops, as well as resources which can be requested from our website http://ww.thetrevorproject.org/

Have popular shows such as Glee and United States of Tara been effective in bringing LGBTQ issues into the mainstream?

Belyeu: We know from research that having positive role models and positive media representations of LGBTQ people and allies helps create a broader awareness and understanding of LGBTQ people and the community as a whole.

There are so many youths that end up homeless once they come out to their parents. What programs are there for these youths?

Belyeu: Homelessness is most certainly a problem for many LGBTQ young people. Many cities across the country are starting to understand the special needs of LGBTQ youth and are responding by providing resources for shelters that are inclusive and supportive of LGBTQ young people. Organizations like Trevor: Parents, Families & Friends of Lesbians & Gays (PFLAG) and the Family Acceptance Project  are working hard to assist families in the process of being accepting and supportive of their LGBTQ youth, hopefully decreasing the amount of LGBTQ young people who end up homeless nationwide.

What types of support groups would you like to see established in local communities?

Belyeu: The Trevor Project is working hard to provide resources for LGBTQ young people nationwide through our services, but it is very important that resources and support services exist locally, where youth can access them and can feel accepted at home. One form that this often takes is GSAs (Gay Straight Alliances) in schools and universities. In locations where schools are not providing this type of support network, many LGBTQ and allied adults are successfully starting youth support groups to provide safe and affirmative places.

How can our readers support the Trevor Project?

Belyeu: There are a variety of ways, including volunteer opportunities that you can participate in to help LGBTQ youth nationwide and in your local community; events that you can attend to support our mission and goals; as well as various ways to support our work financially. To learn more about how to be engaged visit our website: www.TheTrevorProject.org .

Do you think that campaigns such as “It Gets Better” are effective?

Belyeu: When paired with other resources such as those provided by The Trevor Project and other organizations, programs and campaigns like these can certainly be part of a holistic approach to increase awareness and visibility regarding LGBTQ youth and the unique issues they face. It Gets Better is also an excellent way to showcase the unique strength and resiliency within the LGBTQ community.

What type of future do you hope for in regards to LGBTQ youth? Do you think it is reachable within today’s generation?

Belyeu: I really love The Trevor Project’s Vision Statement, “A future where the possibilities, opportunities, and dreams are the same for all youth, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity.” Every day the staff and volunteers at The Trevor Project are working hard to make sure that vision becomes a reality by saving lives, building community, and changing society and culture so that all youth have a bright future.

 

 

The Sexual Freedom Project: Politics

How do you think sexual freedom gets politicized?  Should sexual freedom be a matter for the individual? or the community?

Let us know what you think. Make a video, write a poem, song, or an essay — or even create an original work of art — and express your thoughts on these topics. If we feature your contribution on the site, we will send you a free VenusPlusX t-shirt to thank you.

Video shot and edited by Fito Moreno

 

 

The Sexual Freedom Project: I have a different view…

(También en español)

There can be many reasons why some people do not understand same-sex relationships, but tolerance for others and acceptance of  same-sex relationships is increasing each year.

Has it become kind of taboo to be downright anti-gay?

Leave a comment and let us know what you think, or make your own video or blog to share. We will send you a free VenusPlusX t-shirt or slap bracelet to thank you.

Video by Tiye Massey.

1.3 Where Do I Fit In?

También en español 

The erotic is the foundation of a universe structured by the will of Love.

Love empowers your actions to vitalize your continued existence, your persistence that equates to immortality.

And this is true, that love is the power of our lives and of every agency that supports the social and administrative structure of the cosmos.

Some universe helpers have specific roles to play in the development of planets and planetary societies, while others support the universal mechanisms of sustaining existence.

We enter a vast and highly organized society as a virtually uninformed newcomer.

A Course in Immortality is an aid to visualizing this new life and reaping the immediate benefits to your personal experience and transphysical existence.

What claim do we have for admission to this amazingly advanced and evolved society?

First, you and I, everyone, are vital beings. All of us share the innate desire to perpetuate our existence as a self-conscious being.

Second, we carry forth the highest ideals of Love, Truth, Goodness, and Beauty, those attributes we make central to our earthly existence.

Third, each of us become the personal embodiment of and unique expression of these four supreme values because each of us has, by nature, our own personal approach to the coordination of these values in our experience.

It is the third of these factors that represents our uniquely personal, potential contribution to the universe.

It is this personal system of action that makes it possible for our own self-identity to remain synchronized with the collective super-consciousness shared by all universe personalities.

Making this connection enables us to see our actions as the result of our personal choices related to Love, Truth, Goodness, and Beauty. This allows us to captain our own way forward through time with originality, creativity, and freedom, the tools we have to imprint our immortal futures.

Every time we make a moral decision, every time we make a supreme choice, our mind functions to coordinate the literal actions of our biohost or avatar with the vitological truth we perceive in our super-consciousness.

And the manner in which this coordination occurs—the conditions, attributes, and other parameters—will ever remain unique to you.

They are the true pattern of your personality and soul’s character, a unique vitological vision that defines and maintains your distinct individuality and specific identity.

In this way your super-consciousness gains personal control over your future life.

In this way you are becoming a unique personalization of active Love in the universe.

You will, in time, illuminate the final integration of all consciousness by being yourself—who you uniquely and only are, and no one else is, in all finite creation.

Each individual is a potentially priceless, supremely necessary part of the great work of perfecting the finite universe, the here and now.

Though we may have only begun our eternal experience of transphysical life, and have little knowledge or understanding yet of the adventure ahead, each of us are already uniquely valuable in potential to the universe.

Your vitality, your desire for existence, propels you towards your destiny.

With your gaze set on your vision of eternity, you embrace the vast adventure that awaits you right now, filled with its many immediate joys, both literal and vitological.

The erotic is the existential and natural foundation of a universe structured by the will of Love. The experience of pleasure is bestowed nearly universally and our expanding embrace of erotic fellowship amplifies our desires to genuinely love and serve others.

Join me today and forever in the worship of the power of erotic joy.

Click here for 1.4 What are the Neighbors Like?

 

Violence against D.C. prostitutes has gone too far

 

Violence against local D.C. prostitutes has become alarming. A local transgender woman, “Jane,” who wishes to remain anonymous, shared her story with me.

As she describes it,”I was beat an inch from my life.” She said she was going to work as usual,”clocking in” as it’s called — those few moments that you take to get yourself ready for the long dreadful night to come. For some girls it’s a breather, for some it’s a drink or a drug and for others it’s simply a prayer to get them through the night, but this routine is done among co-working prostitutes to kind of put some ease into what will always be a harmful night.

On this night, Jane had just parked her car in her usual spot that on the local stroll. She took a moment to apply some lipstick and perfume before clocking in. Nothing seemed abnormal, “I looked around before getting out and everything looked fine” said Jane.

“The moment I stepped out, before the door could close I felt something hit me on the side on my head. Tthe moment I turned to see what  it was, pow! another one, and before I knew it, I was down on the ground being attacked by multiple people. They beat and kicked me until I was unconscious. The blows were so severe that it was not possible for me to have been beat with only fist and feet.

“I awoke to a homeless man trying to help me. I can only assume he thought I was dead. I suffered a broken jaw, three cracked ribs, a twisted ankle, and more than anything, no understanding. They also took my keys and car. I cannot identify these people because I saw no one and of course no one on the streets will say who it was. I know that prostituting is not legal and in that sense, I’m wrong, but I like sex so I chose this profession and I don’t think it’s fair to just be attacked and robbed because I’m an easy target or easy mark. Everyone in the area knows me and for the most part everyone respects me. I give respect to everyone so this obvious set up attack on my life has wounded me deeply and I want justice,” says Jane. “I deserve it!”

So here we have it, a trans woman prostitute attacked and robbed. There has been a lot of speculation that there is a local gang that is known for committing these kinds of crimes in this part of the city. The police department knows who they are and have been frequenting the area showing pictures trying to pull this together, but it seems as if they’re getting nowhere.

I don’t think it’s fair for anyone to be in this kind of situation, that’s just me. Some people might think that because you choose to be a prostitute that you pretty much choose all that comes with it…How so? At the end of the day we are all human and we should be treated as such. I encourage those who might have witnessed this crime to come forward and help the police find who did this. This could be any one of us at any time of the day, in any part of the city, whether we are a trans person or a sex worked. This is not an isolated incident, just the beginning of me giving voice to it. This has to stop!

To all my local ‘”PROS”: Stay alert, be smart and stay safe.

Editor’s note: VenusPlusX is working with other grassroots organizations to make sex work legal in Washington, DC. We finally got rid of the unconstitutional Prostitution Free Zones (which were nothing more that police trans profiling zones). Now we have to seriously address both the abolition of laws interfering with sex work so that a much needed sexual healing industry can emerge that will foster much needed sex education and sexual healing for all who seek it. 

The Sexual Freedom Project: How Can You Say That You Support Love?

Are you frustrated with the hypocrisy in society, politics, and the media when it comes to sex and love? Are you going to do anything about it?

Leave a comment and let us know what you think, or make your own video or blog to share. We will send you a free VenusPlusX t-shirt or slap bracelet to thank you.

Video by Tiye Massey.

Hairy Politics

Happy No Shave November, everyone! (not sure who came up with this…)

Since when is body hair gendered? Doesn’t it just seem logical that people are hairy? Warmth for winter, right?

Apparently if you live in mainstream America, the answer is no.

From a young age, girls are expected to shave their body hair – it’s been turned into a coming-of-age ritual, a tradition passed on from generation to generation. From armpits, to legs, to toes, to stomachs, to pubic hair – what’s left untouched by the razor?

And speaking of the razor, if you shave, do you buy Gillette? Venus? Disposable? Safety guards? Men’s, Women’s? Four blades vs. two? And what abut Nair? Or threading?

I started cutting my actual arm hair with scissors at age 8, when I thought no one was looking. I began shaving my armpits when I was 9. They were hairy, and I just remember feeling that it was unacceptable. My mom taught me how to shave in her bathroom. We lived in Utah.

A year later, I asked my mom if I could shave my legs? She told me no. Why was it acceptable to shave my armpits and not my legs? I threw a fit. Everyone else was shaving their legs. She let me begin shaving shortly afterward.

Hair became disgusting to me – absolutely repulsive. I felt that it was a growth that hampered my life.

I had stopped cutting my arm hair at this point, and at 13 I bought bleach. It was bleach that is made for body hair. I bleached my arms and was thrilled with the results, shocked if no one else noticed the improvement I had made to my body. My dark black arm hair was now a whitish blonde. I had made it disappear, like a magic trick, I thought.

It wasn’t long before the magic trick became dull. My arm hair wasn’t enough. Plus, had you seen how dark my stomach hair had become? Unacceptable, I thought. I had to get rid of it. It was a need, a thirst. I began including my stomach in my ritual-bleaching extravaganza.

After I’d been bleaching for a few months, a friend told me that when she bleached her arm hair and went to a school dance, the hair glowed under a black light. I couldn’t imagine. I had nightmares about this happening to me. How embarrassing, I’d thought.

I stopped bleaching, but couldn’t give up my hair’s mask. I couldn’t allow my hair autonomy and visibility. I began shaving my arm hair and stomach hair, in addition to my armpits, legs, and pussy. I even started shaving those few hairs that grow on each big toe.

My body hated me; she screamed. She cried out with screaming little red bumps. I tried to use creams to satisfy the uncomfortable razor burn; nothing worked, but I refused to stop shaving. Hair was gross, or so I thought. I even waxed my bikini line and thought the fiery bumps, like anthills sprouting across my skin, were better than hair could ever be.

Hair. Everyone has it. Hair has a purpose.

At 18, I went to college. I began attending F-word meetings, the feminist group on Florida State University’s campus. People started talking about No Shave November. They were pledging which body part they were going to stop shaving. I couldn’t imagine. Stop shaving? But then what…? Did these people still wear shorts? Tank tops? We lived in Florida! I was appalled…and intrigued.

It took a few years but gradually I stopped shaving my legs every single time I showered. I shaved my armpits less frequently. I even began arguing the gender politics of hair and choice. My pussy? Meh, the hair was a helluva lot better than those screaming red bumps, and the only Bush I trusted was my own anyway, right?

Five years later, I sit here with trimmed hairy armpits, the occasional shaved leg, a black-haired stomach, a bush, and believe it or not, toe hairs. I realized that I don’t care. I shave when I want to, and most of the time, I don’t. If I appall someone because of my body hair, then I don’t care to have them in my life anyway.

Occasionally, I find myself becoming self-conscious of my body hair, checking myself in relation to who’s around me. I blame the patriarchy. I blame American society. Those razor ads, those derogatory statements. What’s with the equation to body hair and being “clean?” The self-consciousness is only occasionally, and each time it catches me off guard. It’s hard to shake off the ingrained societal standards.

This morning, when I realized it was No Shave November, and the hashtag (#NoShaveNovember) was trending on Twitter, I wasn’t uncomfortable. I was proud, and angry. Angry at the comments that were trending:

Not only are the comments sexist, but they’re heterosexist, and there’s sure a lot of internalized sexism going on. A lot of people assume that heterosexual women cannot have sex if they have body hair. Why are people made to feel so disgusted? And what about the racist remarks? Hairy people are not terrorists. It’s important to not be Islamaphobic.

Maybe people should start using Twitter to begin educating folks. I tweeted out to #NoShaveNovember that I don’t shave my armpits and encountered an empowering exchange that I wasn’t expecting:

I will retaliate against the patriarch’s beauty standards. I will shave nothing this month. I will embrace my hair, love my hair, and love me.

And as Alix Olson says…

 

The Sexual Freedom Project: Gender Definition

Do you think that gender is a social construct to support the binary point of view? As gender lines blur, will binary objectification fade?

Leave a comment and let us know what you think, or make your own video or blog to share. We will send you a free VenusPlusX t-shirt or slap bracelet to thank you.

Video by Tiye Massey.

A Second Chance

No one encouraged me to be productive, to make something of my life. Hell, I thought selling drugs and prostituting were careers so naturally when I grew up I followed in those footsteps. I became a prostitute which led to drug addiction and then the cycle began.

Nothing good became of my life, each day got harder and harder. The more I lived the more I hated myself. I just didn’t understand what I had done to deserve such a horrible life. On a daily basis I would wonder how was it possible for someone to have a child and leave them to feel like this? I thought of suicide many times, but I was too afraid to do it so I knew I wanted to live, I just didn’t know how to live.

One day a friend said to me,”Brandi, you ain’t nothing but a dressed up trash can!” I got angry. I knew she was telling the truth — I just didn’t know how to take it. It hurt my feelings, but it made me self-reflect. And the way I treated myself since has been drastically different.

About a month ago I signed up for a program called Project Empowerment. And I got a chance to get to know the real me without all the hurt, pain, and resentment. This program has inspired me above anything I could’ve ever imagined. I went into that class of 30 students as the only transgender person and I thought for sure it would not work. I was mistaken. The program focused on me, it challenged me to be better, to fight harder, to not give up and take my place in life as a professional woman. No more drug-addicted prostitute. No, today I am working as a hair stylist assistant and I feel good about myself. When I look in the mirror, I see hope! Those days of wanting to kill myself are over. A second chance has come and I’ve taken full advantage of it.

The director of Project Empowerment recognized the change and growth within me. I must tell you it feels good when other people start to see things in you that you never thought were possible. It does something to your soul and it gives you an immediate sense of confidence, wow! Somebody believes in me. Unexpectedly, he called me up at the  graduation as a surprise speaker. Now that’s growth, and I spoke from the heart. When I was done everyone was on their feet giving me applause. That’s never happened in my life and I didn’t know how to process it, but I knew it felt good so I took it in as my moment of celebration. Being celebrated for doing something good.

Your life doesn’t have to be what it was yesterday. If you find yourself looking in the mirror and hating your inner self, take a moment, reflect, and then let life present itself. A second chance came to me and I took it. I’ve never been more happy. Make yourself available,  be ready, asecond chance will come.

If you walk away from this story with one thing, let it be this: If you allow your past to define you, you’ve lost and it will most certainly confine you. The past is what it is. Embrace the future and step into your second chance.

The Sexual Freedom Project: Being Human

How is sexual freedom part of the human experience? Do you agree that to be human is to be sexually free?

Leave a comment and let us know what you think, or make your own video or blog to share. We will send you a free VenusPlusX t-shirt or slap bracelet to thank you.

Video by Fito Moreno