Kansas Queer Youth Network

Kansas Queer Youth network Is a youth led & run organization in Kansas providing support to GSA's & working in the Trans and Queer Movement

[glsen]

And Still We Thrive: A Love Letter to LGBTQ Youth

Dear LGBTQ Youth,

I’m 33 years old, and my mother still tells me to “be safe” when I walk out of her house. In that moment, it’s like she’s seeing all the parts of me that add higher threat levels to my existence: queer, brown, deemed masculine presenting on sight, tattooed chubby dyke.

How many parents and guardians say the same words to their children as they walk out the door? How many of them see all the things they can’t protect us from as we exit the safety of their homes and are consumed by a vibrant but utterly chaotic world?

And that’s for those of us who have that type of love and support from our parents or guardians. That type of love and support is not a given for our LGBTQ community; it’s a luxury, just like the idea of safety.

Pulse. Orlando. 49 humans. LGBTQ. Allies. Puerto Ricans. Lovers. Sons. Siblings. Humans. Celebrating pride.

Celebrating because we as LGBTQ people have always been here, shining brightly, living out loud and in Technicolor, and we will continue to thrive.

Celebrating because what else can you do but find the glory and beauty in all the people who are blessed to be queer and brown? Because it’s Latinx night and all the world in this moment is yours.

Celebrating because our defiance is miraculous.

Because no matter what laws they pass or how many times the bigoted, violent forces come for us, we rally and push back with every ounce of our universe-given right to live free and out loud.

LGBTQ youth, know that we, LGBTQ adults and allies, strive to create safer schools and communities for you and with you.

Know that as hard as we try, we cannot 100% eradicate the recklessness and cruelty found in an often homophobic, racist, transphobic, anti-Black, anti-immigrant and pro-violence society.

Know that we use our spirits, our bodies and our work in every way possible to build hope and community for all of you.

The forces attempting to suppress and eliminate the LGBTQ community are strong and you should know this.

You probably already know this.

It probably already lives on your skin.

We learn about the world off the blood of our family members.

We are here with 49 people to mourn, and thousands of our community members grieving, mourning and afraid to go out and dance into the night.

So what do we do? How do we move forward in bravery when our lives are at risk?

How do we reclaim our community?

We must reach for each other.

We cannot shield you from the often harsh realities of this world, but we can hold tremendous healing spaces for each other.

We rally our GSAs and organize vigils in our schools.

We embrace the grief process. Let ourselves cry.

We find solace in each other so that our wounds can begin to heal.

We gather our friends and offer home-cooked meals.

We work on those zines about radical queerness, intersectionality and summer love.

We put on Pariah and find strength in Alike.

We write articles and blogs about ourselves, in our words because others cannot tell our stories for us.

We dive deep into our studies and our passions because no one can stop us from excelling.

We name our fears, our oppressors and all that must be changed.

We put pressure on school officials, city council people, senators and other folks in positions of power.

We take over bridges as we march for justice.

Together.

We must continue to do the work and strengthen our communities because they belong to us.

We must engage in all of this work while loving on each other and forcing the world to stretch with us, with our queer, trans, non-binary, asexual, bisexual, Latinx, Black, Muslim, Asian-Pacific Islander, Buddhist, Atheist, neurodivergent, totally glorious human selves.

So, let’s hold each other by the hand and say, “I love you”.

I love you because you’re my chosen family.

I love you because we just met on this dance floor, and I never knew my heart could feel so whole.

I love you because you’re brave enough to cry. And vote. And rally. And rest.

I love you because you are vibrant, visible and glowing with pride.

I love you enough to keep fighting and thriving.

I cannot make the world safer, but I can walk with you.

I will dance with you.

We will dance together.

Because we are Pulse, we are Orlando, and we will never forget our fallen siblings in the struggle.

Love, Gabby Rivera Youth Programs Manager

Read more on the GLSEN Blog.

[whtonrice]

ASIAN AMERICAN LGBTQ VISIBILITY

“In August 2015, a homophobic San Gabriel Valley Chinese church announced a march to protest marriage equality. This was met by a huge counter protest led by API Equality-LA, Asian Americans Advancing Justice-LA, and other LGBT rights affirming groups. While the counterprotest was successful, one realizes the disconnect between queer APIs from the SGV and a community that may not completely understand who we are. This documentary and project seeks to share the unique stories of LGBTQIA+ Asian Pacific Islanders from the San Gabriel Valley and greater 626 area code.”

WATCH THE INTERVIEWS HERE: https://vimeo.com/album/3789841/video/154809108

[ellenfromnowon]

Working on badge designs

[kansasqueers]

MOVIE NIGHT: Rent This Friday, (May 27) 6 pm at Pennhouse!!

We will be taking donations of ~$3 for pizza and would appreciate people bringing snacks or drinks if you are able.

This is a YOUTH ONLY (under 18) event.

We will follow the screening with a discussion on HIV/AIDS and queer respectability politics.

[gc2b-deactivated20260123]

🌞 Summer is nearly here! To celebrate fun in the sun, gc2b has you covered with our new line of skin tone binders. The line features five different color tones in the tank and the half binder styles and will be available at gc2b.co soon!!! 💕👌🎯

[scum2000]

Incredible. Look at the diversity.

[ablueplace]

Nice.

[nuevayor]

LGBT+ MASTERLIST PROJECT BY ROCIO @nuevayor​

Week One: TELEVISION Week Two: MOVIES Week Three: BOOKS Week Four: POETRY Week Five: MUSIC Week Six: COMICS Week Seven: DOCUMENTARIES Week Eight: PODCASTS

Week Nine: Hello again and welcome back to the LGBT+ Masterlist Project!

I had originally named this post ‘BLOGS + VLOGS’ but after the overwhelming amount of suggestions specific to YouTube channels, I figured to dedicate this week’s post entirely to YouTubers. Voilà, here we are!

The genres vary this week, as always. We’ve got beauty vlogs, lifestyle vlogs, cooking vlogs, music vlogs, talk show set ups, and a bunch of other types of content! One thing is for sure, and the whole point of this entire project: these are all LGBT+ YouTubers. A lot of them are here on Tumblr too! So I added their @’s for you as well. 

If you think I’ve mislabeled someone (as in, if I have put them in this list or in the gifs above when they aren’t LGBT+), please tell me immediately as there’s nothing I value more than accuracy - I will be sure to follow up. In addition! If you’ve got recs, don’t hesitate to send them my way (particularly LGBT+ YouTubers who are people of color - I was underwhelmed to see the vast yet not so diverse YouTube vlogging landscape when it came to popularity.)

Next week: LGBT+ HISTORY - a compilation of academic journals, articles, autobiographies, YouTube videos, and other types of media that cover the long and too often glossed over history of the vast and diverse LGBT+ community. If you have any recommendations, send them my way!

Enjoy: LGBT+ YOUTUBERS

Pero Like - “Pero, like… You know what we mean. Weekly videos of tu vida.” A Latinx-oriented vlog in which one of the YouTubers is Salvadoran and gay, but LGBT topics are not the main thing they vlog about

Shannon @now-this-is-living​ & Cammie @the-2nd-star-to-the-right on their channel nowthisisliving - A lesbian couple who are “just sharing [their] story/love/life with anyone who wants to listen”

Claudia Boleyn - A bisexual YouTuber who makes videos about mental health and social justice issues

Miles Jai  (giffed above) - Posts improv sketches, parodies, “beauty tutorials”, as well as vlogs

Kat Blaque @katblaque​ (giffed above) - “Opinion Vlogger, Children’s Illustrator and Thrift Store Addict”

Sara @rnashallah​ (giffed above) - Totally not putting her up here because we’ve been mutuals on Tumblr for like mad long and I’m just very fond of Sara as a person. She vlogs about her life and tbh that alone is worth a sub in my book!

Eileen W. @peeves​ (giffed above) - Another good friend of mine (let me live). HILARIOUS, sarcastic, honest, and is pretty much always there to Validate You, so support her and subscribe!

Marina Watanabe @marinashutup​ (giffed above) - “Part time feminist vlogger, full time sass machine. Biracial, bisexual, bipedal.”

Kid Fury @signedfury​ - “Born in Miami and raising hell in New York City, Kid Fury is a media mouthpiece with a whole lot of nerve. This channel is one of many avenues Fury uses to cover life, pop culture and more with a unique and sharp flare of truth, shade, and fuckery.”

AriFitz @itsarifitz - Lifestyle + style vlog

Keep reading

[homojabi]

LGBTQ Muslims have and always will exist—we aren’t haram and we aren’t alone.

[transfluff]

Hey transmasculine and gender-variant folx! If you wear a chest binder, I made an Android app that you can use! It reminds you to take off your binder at the end of the day and also to stretch out your back during the day. You can find it in the Google Play store here. 

If you’re having issues with it, or have any feedback for me, I’d love if you could email me at [email protected]. And if you like it, feel free to rate and review it!

[transfluff]

@transbutts @scumbugg @superheromaking @transboys @transgayinfo @transmasculineproblems @hollifo @jamesbuttwhy @lgbtlaughs @lbgtlove @notacanadiandyke @queercuts @skellydun @un-gendered

Help me get the word out?

[gecsplaining]

@transgenderteensurvivalguide @nonbinaryresource @transselfies

[oshun67]

Love is Love, and in many cases same sex Black Love. ️ No conspiracy theories, no brain washing, no self denial, no domineering mother, or lack of a father, just people falling in love.

We Exist!

[saito-91]

Reblogging this for both the body positivity and the tags

[shaethebanana]

Yesssssss I’ve been waiting to see this

[vii-10]

I love this so much

[wvrthy]

️️️️️️️️

[unhistorical]

Gran Fury was an artistic collective active in New York between 1988 to 1995 that operated in tandem with ACT UP, the AIDS advocacy group founded in the city in 1987. The organizations’ graphical material, in particular its iconic SILENCE=DEATH design, eventually disseminated beyond the city and beyond activist circles into national discourse and popular culture. Named for a line of Plymouth cars used by the police department, Gran Fury’s tactics embraced advertising techniques - bold aesthetics and graphic design, the exploitation of public spaces, emphasis on wide distribution. At the same time, its members remained wary of the branding of its art as trendy “convenient product” and consistently emphasized the limitations of art and importance of direct action, exemplified by the recurring slogan “Art is not enough”.

Our first projects were poster sniping (illegal wheat-pasting of posters on vacant signage), and Xeroxed flyers, a working method which grew out of an ACT UP aesthetic and our limited funds. After about a year, our tactics changed as we questioned whether postering was the most effective means of reaching a large general audience. 

As Gran Fury received increasing art world support, we did so with the condition that we receive the greatest possible public access to our work, in most cases exhibiting outside the art space itself. We decided not to produce work for the gallery market. Art institutions provided us with access to public spaces a group such as ours would otherwise never have had the resources to acquire; they profited through supporting AIDS work by an activist group which met their aesthetic standards and which was willing to observe certain boundaries of wheat was and was not allowable-explicit obscenity or critique of their sponsors.

…At the same time, our work began to feel like a signature style, a convenient product for the art world to use to fulfill its’ desire to “do something” about the AIDS crisis. Gran Fury’s status as flavor of the month in the American art world was over; interest in our work had shifted to Europe where we consistently felt handicapped by attempting to understand their specific issues, as well as by our inability to use colloquial slogans. In 1992 we designed a campaign for Montreal which utilized the symbols of Quebecois sovereignty to draw attention to AIDS issues – specifically a warning to conduct research and design programs that would apply to the Canadian situation. The project backfired because the icon we chose to use was too potent – some did not recognize it as an AIDS campaign. In general, we found that we could only produce the most general messages, otherwise we ran the risk of misreading a local situation or creating something that would fail in translation.

Good Luck…Miss You ~ Gran Fury

We want the art world to recognize that collective direct action will bring an end to the AIDS crisis. And that collective direct action can mean a whole lot of things across a whole lot of communities: we have already been co-opted, we are complicit with the art world’s institutions in what we hope are strategic ways. We do not only act as an irritant, we also point to what’s going on in society at large. 

Whenever we can, we steer the art world projects into public spaces so that we can address audiences other than museum-going audiences or the readership of art magazines…

Our main beat isn’t with the art world, it’s with the United States government’s lack of response and the political crisis that underlies the medical crisis of AIDS. If we can use the art world as a tool to broadly articulate concerns, then we are glad for that support. My fear is that the heavy emphasis on the cultural analysis of AIDS distances us from the fact that this is a living, breathing crisis in which lives are at stake right at this moment.

BOMB: Gran Fury by Robert Gober

NYPL

[plannedparenthood]

Sex education should include all genders and sexual orientations. We’re partnering with Advocates for Youth, Answer, GLSEN, HRC & SIECUS to call for sex ed that’s LGBTQ-inclusive.

 Re-blog if you support equal sex ed!

[andreii-tarkovsky]

Gaycation - “USA”

[princesspenelliotthebrave]

Gc2b (the chest binder company) has a 15% off discount code for orders until April 2nd. The code is gc2bOnTheMove make sure you type it into the discount code box when you checkout.

[kara-danvxrs-deactivated2023010]

[micdotcom]

Gay men of color call for representation with #GayMediaSoWhite

Monday evening, gay men on Twitter took the media — especially gay-centric media like Out and The Advocate — to task for what they deemed a lack of inclusion and diversity regarding representation. The conversation began when black queer rapper Mykki Blanco retweeted Sony music songwriter Jesse Saint John. Many users called out the gay media for its criminal and tragic depiction of gay men of color.

[newcontinent]

love and support trans people and communities

[meshugenist]

Two new bills introduced during the Kansas legislation session aim to ban transgender students from using restrooms that match their gender, and to pay other students $2,500 if they encounter someone transgender in their school’s restroom.

fuck this

[decadent-trans-girl]

literally putting a fucking bounty on our heads