National LGBT Center Awareness Day takes place each year on October 19 to help spotlight the vital services offered by LGBT community centers across the country and the central roles they play in local communities. As the largest LGBT center in the world, the Los Angeles LGBT Center offers social services, mental health counseling, cultural programs, recreational activities, educational programs, support groups, youth support, senior support, computer access, medical care and treatment, and more. “It’s been 50 years and the Los Angeles LGBT Center is the biggest, most successful, most service-oriented LGBT group in the country—in the world really,” longtime…
Author: Kelly Freter
Spirit Day, on October 17, takes place during National Bullying Prevention Month. It’s a day when people wear purple clothing to stand proudly with LGBTQ youth and speak out against bullying. The facts are staggering: 70 percent of LGBTQ students report being verbally harassed at school; more than 50 percent of LGBTQ students do not feel safe at school because of their sexual orientation, and 71 percent of LGBTQ students report of hearing homophobic remarks from staff members at school. This is the reality many of our youth face every day, and it reminds us of the work our communities…
Many of us don’t realize the privilege we experience being able to navigate the world without being misgendered on a regular basis. In the same way that we can (and should) be asking folks how they would like us as LGBTQ people to show solidarity, we can also be taking proactive steps to shift a culture of assumptions based on how we perceive gender. Asking for and asserting pronouns in various spaces is one of the many ways we can accomplish it. Some of the easiest ways to incorporate this change in action is by including pronouns in our email…
National Coming Out Day is an annual celebration of the power of coming out as LGBTQ to yourself and others. At the recent Los Angeles LGBT Center Hearts of Gold 50th Anniversary concert and multi-media extravaganza, some celebrity LGBT guests and allies shared their thoughts about the deeply personal process of coming out. “I think once you hear how other people did it and went through it, it kind of gives you a little peace and a little confidence,” says CNBC television personality Yawar Charlie. “Look to people and organizations who support you, get some advice, hear other people’s stories.…
Today, October 8, is a significant day for the LGBTQ community, one in which our rights hang in the balance before the U.S. Supreme Court. The Court will hear a series of three cases that will seek to answer whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that prohibits sex discrimination in employment covers discrimination on the basis of someone’s sexual orientation or their gender identity. This decision, obviously, hold huge implications for our community. The employment rights of countless LGBTQ people in America are at risk. For a number of years, the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission…
Singer-songwriter Tom Goss has timed the release of his latest song, La Bufadora, to coincide with October’s National Domestic Violence Awareness Month. The video for the song, starring Goss and Daniel Franzese (Mean Girls, Looking) follows two men as they struggle through a violent and explosive relationship. Goss hopes to shed light on how prevalent domestic violence can be in the LGBT community. The video has received more than 23,000 views in its first week. Goss is donating some of the proceeds to support the Los Angeles LGBT Center’s Intimate Partner/Domestic Violence Program. Goss spoke with LGBT News Now about the personal inspiration…
I’m someone who experienced homelessness as a queer youth, touched the foster care system, and eventually parenthood. The opportunity to do this work is a perfect melding of my own experiences and continuing to support my community. No matter what role you have at the Center, you are surrounded by people who are passionate about the LGBTQ+ community. My favorite part of working here is knowing that there are so many unique perspectives among people who bring lived expertise to the work that they do. Working at the Center has given me a space to find community and to constantly…
By Greg Hernandez Jacob Tobia is tired of being asked where non-binary stops and trans starts. “At a certain point I want to say, ‘Can you stop dissecting me? I’m a person,’” the author of Sissy: A Coming-of-Gender Story said. “I don’t want to dissect my community like that. I don’t want to dissect my chosen family like that. I just know what feels like home when it feels like home.” Tobia, who identifies as genderqueer, made their comments during a panel discussion at the Los Angeles LGBT Center’s Renberg Theatre on the emergence of non-binary and gender non-conforming individuals…
The Los Angeles LGBT Center participated in a roundtable discussion hosted by U.S. Congressman Ted W. Lieu (D-Los Angeles County), who is introducing legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives to federally ban conversion therapy. “If we are truly, as a community, going to thrive as healthy, equal, and complete, conversion therapy needs to stop—and it needs to stop now,” the Center’s Terra Russell-Slavin said at the roundtable, held at UCLA School of Law on June 6. Russell-Slavin, director of policy and community building at the Center, described the practice as “barbaric and inhumane.” “The trauma is not being LGBT,…
I was desperate to find something to give my life meaning when I was hired as an Activities Coordinator for the Center’s Senior Services Department. I embraced being part of the LGBTQ community for the first time in my life. There have been many memorable moments at the Center that will be with me forever. When one of my clients at Triangle Square passed away, I was holding his hand as he left this Earth. Our services enabled him to remain at home instead of being placed into a care facility that may not have been LGBTQ-friendly. I became part…