In the News: The Brown Boi Project and the Women’s Media Center

Posted on 18. Oct, 2011 by TT Jax in Features, News

The Brown Boi Project in Oakland, CA just finished up it’s third annual leadership retreat. A “community of masculine of center womyn, men, two-spirit people, transmen, and our allies committed to transforming our privilege of masculinity, gender, and race into tools for achieving Racial and Gender Justice,” the Brown Boi Project holds annual leadership retreats for masculine of center people of color aged 35 and under who wish to “work across issues and communities, talk about race, class, culture, gender and sexuality, and explore what a commitment to social justice looks like.”

In addition to its leadership retreats, the BBP also has released a ground breaking health book, Freeing Ourselves: A Guide to Health and Self Love for Brown Bois. Created to fill an essential need otherwise lacking, the book provides holistic healthcare information on a broad range of topics, from mental health to pregnancy to trans surgeries, as well as beautiful pictures, charts, and personal narratives. Freeing Ourselves is available on a sliding scale on the BBP website, and is now being distributed by Third Root Community Health Center in NYC.

The Women’s Media Center, an organization that addresses “a crisis of representation” with the goal of making “women visible and powerful in the media”, has released nominees for it’s 2011 Media Center Social Media Award. The voting for this year’s award is open to the public, and includes, among many other amazing internet-savvy women, 2010 Lambda Fellow Miriam M. Perez (also of RadicalDoula.com).

FORGE Forward, a “Milwaukee-based, progressive organization whose mission is to support, educate and advocate for the rights and lives of transgender individuals and SOFFAs (Significant Others, Friends, Family, and Allies)”, continues its critical work in addressing the needs of transgender survivors of sexual violence. With the assistance of federal funding, Michael Munson and Laurie Cooke-Daniels launched a beautiful new program this October called Writing to Heal. Writing to Heal is offered free of charge to “transgender folks, gender variant individuals, and loved ones whose lives have been touched by sexual abuse or assault”, and uses group phone calls, education, and writing prompts to help survivors towards greater wellness.

The Society of Professional Journalists has joined with many others in pledging to no longer refer to any human as “illegal”. More information on the Drop the I-word campaign can be found at Colorlines.org.

Related posts:

1. ‘Freeing Ourselves: A Guide to Health and Self Love for Brown Bois’ by The Brown Boi Project
2. “The Center Cannot Hold– Things Fall Apart”: Trayvon Martin and Story-Telling
3. The Infection Monologues: A Benefit for Lambda Literary Foundation & The Wall – Las Memorias Project
4. Cleis Press Anthology: Mothers of Trans Children Project
5. The Media Mavens: Diane and Jacob Anderson-Minshall

About TT Jax

TT Jax is a parent, partner, and writer currently living in the Pacific Northwest by way of 28 years in the Deep South. His work has appeared in numerous literary magazines, including Mudluscious, Salacious, HipMama, and Specter, and is forthcoming in The Mom Egg, Prime Number Magazine, Educe, The Anthology of Trans and Genderqueer Poetry, and kill author. Jax is studying the role of ritual in the health and sustainability of Trans and Queer communities, so as to facilitate personal queer rites beyond legalized marriage. When he is not doing this, he's writing a memoir about his personal experiences with the Troubled Teen Industry. Jax blogs at http://ttjax.wordpress.com/.

Tags: Brown Boi Project, FORGE Forward, Laurie Cooke-Daniels, Michael Munson, Miriam M. Perez, The Society of Professional Journalists, Trans, Trans Health, transboys, Women's Media Center, Writing to Heal