Location: India
20.593684, 78.96288
LesBiT
Point of View
Humjinsi
New Alipore Praajak Development Society
Point of View
Point of View is a 20-year-strong feminist media advocacy organization based in Mumbai, working to amplify women’s voices and remove barriers to voice, speech and expression.
Point of View is a 20-year-strong feminist media advocacy organization based in Mumbai, working to amplify women’s voices and remove barriers to voice, speech and expression. Starting from the premise that ideas change lives, Point of View exists to change ideas and norms around gender and sexuality, to create a world in which people of all genders and sexualities have rights and freedoms that are recognized, protected and exercised. In recent years, they have also expanded work in the area of feminist capacity building and rights assertion in digital arenas, integrating gender and sexuality with efforts to protect freedom of expression, sexual expression, internet democracy and protection from surveillance.
Centre for Law and Policy Research (CLPR)
CLPR is a progressive organization founded to reimagine and reshape public interest lawyering in India.
CLPR is a progressive organization founded to reimagine and reshape public interest lawyering in India. Their work aims to develop a lawyering practice rooted in constitutional and human rights values, develop new approaches to strategic impact litigation that go beyond securing legal outcomes and instead employs rigorous empirical research to ensure substantive implementation and progressive social change, and develop a method of research-based public advocacy, pedagogy and communication that deepen constitutional and civic citizenship in India. Their work with trans communities has focused on three pressing issues: criminalization and resulting police and state violence, access to public services and securing legal gender recognition.
Meet the Activist: Vikalp
Join Astraea Tuesday for a conversation on community building and organizing in the LBTI community in Gujarat, India, with Maya Sharma and Indira Pathak of Vikalp.
Meet the Activist: Vikalp
Tuesday, May 27, 2014, 6:00-7:30pm
Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice
116 East 16th Street, 7th Floor, NY, NY 10003
Event is wheelchair accessible.
Held as intimate gatherings at our office, Astraeas Meet the Activist series provides a unique opportunity to learn about the work of LGBTQI activists and movements around the world.
MORE ABOUT THE ACTIVISTS
Indira Pathak is an activist with a long history of grassroots work with marginalized communities, from forming a successful co-operative amongst the Dalit community in Dhandhuka, Ahmedabad, to taking up court battles in support of workers whose health conditions were deliberately misdiagnosed by the government. Vikalp emerged as a womens group when Pathak and her colleagues came together to address the marginalization of womens issues. Under her leadership, Vikalp has since become a critical space for LBTI people in Gujarat.
Maya Sharma identifies as a feminist grassroots activist. She has worked on labor and womens rights issues. Her activism finds expression in her writings on single women, labor rights and stories of women loving women. She also currently works with Vikalp.
Vikalp was established in 1996 and is based in Baroda. Vikalps programs prevent violence against women and the marginalization of womens issues in the right wing state of Gujarat. Their programs include coordinating a community-run womens court in Padra, where rural women serve as juries and independently settle cases of rape, widow compensation, domestic violence, property, child custody and other disputes. In 2003, they created Parma, a project that works to protect and promote the human rights of people with non-normative genders and sexualities, particularly working class queer women and trans men from urban, rural and tribal regions. Parma engages in base-building and organizing, provides crisis support and counseling to LBTI people leaving situations of family violence & forced marriage, and runs training and consultancy programs for the community and broader society. They are the only organization in the conservative state that takes up LBTI issues and one of the very few organizations in India that reaches queer women and trans men from rural & tribal communities.
10 LGBTQI Activist Moments of 2013
At Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice, the last days of the year are a time to honor brave leaps forward and take stock of political set backs for LGBTQI rights activism in 2013. By no means comprehensive, we offer a brief survey of ten moments of LGBTQI activism around the globe in 2013. Join the conversation online and share more moments with us on facebook and twitter using #LGBTQIActivistMoments!
At Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice, the last days of the year are a time to honor brave leaps forward and take stock of political set backs for LGBTQI rights activism in 2013. By no means comprehensive, we offer a brief survey of ten moments of LGBTQI activism around the globe in 2013. Join the conversation online and share more moments with us on facebook and twitter using #LGBTQIActivistMoments!
1. Edith Windsors win for Marriage Equality: the Defense of Marriage Act is declared unconstitutional by U.S. Supreme Court. Federal recognition is afforded to same-sex marriages performed under state law. The U.S. becomes one of a handful of countries pushing same-sex marriage forward.
2. In a set back in Colombia, the nations same-sex marriage bill failed to pass the Senate and bypass coalition opposition led by the Attorney General. Legal ambiguity remains, however, with constitutional recognition of legal registry in effect. Couples can approach notaries or judges to marry, but their requests remain in the hands of officials who can deny them.
3. Years of policy advocacy, movement building, and direct action by LGBTQI activists of color produced hard-fought victories for immigration rights in California. The city of San Francisco passed an ordinance limiting the Secure Communities program (S-Comm), effectively reducing the threat of deportation to anyone arrested by local police. And the state of California passed the Trust Act, prohibiting local law enforcement agencies from detaining people for deportation if arrested for a minor or non-violent crime and are otherwise eligible to be released from custody.
4. New York City Council passed the Community Safety Act, winning New Yorkers protection from the New York Police Departments stop-and-frisk policy. Simultaneously, Federal Judge Shira Scheindlin issued a decision declaring stop-and-frisk as practiced by the NYPD unconstitutional. While this ruling was appealed by Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s administration, Mayor-Elect Bill DeBlasio has pledged to drop this appeal and it remains to be seen exactly how these new protections against police abuse will be enacted.
5. Ugandan LGBTI advocacy groups made collective strides pinpointing American evangelist involvement in anti-gay persecution in Uganda. The U.S. court case “Sexual Minorities Uganda vs. Scott Lively” moved forward while the Ugandan parliament unexpectedly passed its Kill the Gays bill.
6. Cuban lawmakers approve a proposal to ban employment discrimination based on sexual orientation.
7. LGBTQI activism swelled after Indias Supreme Court upheld a colonial-era law, Section 377 of Indias penal code, and recriminalized same-sex relations. The Courts decision overruled a previous ruling of 377 as unconstitutional by the Delhi High Court, and severely set back LGBTQI human rights protections in India.
8. LGBTQI human rights activists in Russia witnessed a show of support around the winter Olympic games in Sochi. Activists called for action, reporting heightened LGBTQI violence since the Russian government passed an anti-gay propaganda law and conducted nationwide raids of nongovernmental organizations to identify “foreign agents” earlier in the year. International advocacy efforts include Billie Jean King, Brian Boitano, and other gay athletes joining a U.S. delegation to the Olympics.
9. In a unanimous 9-0 ruling, Canada’s Supreme Court decriminalized sex work offering constitutional protections to sex workers’ health and safety.
10. Guyana courts upheld a partial ban on cross-dressing deeming it illegal if done for “improper purposes.” LGBTQI rights groups in Guyana including Society Against Sexual Orientation Discrimination rallied to appeal the judgment to protect transgender people from being persecuted by 120-year-old law.
In Memory
Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice mourns the lives and celebrates the legacies of three activists and colleagues who have recently passed.
Sunila Abeysekera, a courageous human rights defender, pioneer feminist, lesbian, scholar, and artist, passed away after a long battle with cancer on September 9th at the age of 61.
Sunila was a visionary activist with a 40 year legacy fighting for justice in Sri Lanka and regionally in South Asia, and coalition-building globally. In her career, Sunila addressed violence against women, peace building and conflict transformation, sexual and reproductive rights, and the rights of marginalized communities such as sex workers, ethnic minorities, people living with HIV/AIDS, and lesbian, gay, and transgender people. Sunilas dedication to liberation and justice often put her at great risk. A fearless outspoken advocate, Sunila faced threats to her safety with boundless courage throughout her activist career. According to WHRD IC, she met particular danger with bravery during the period of terror in Sri Lanka where large-scale violence and enforced disappearances took place in the country.
Sunila was a founding member of the Women Human Rights Defenders International Coalition (WHRD IC) and supported the development of Womens Support Group, the first queer womens organization in Sri Lanka. She also founded the Women and Media Collective, the INFORM Human Rights Documentation Center, and the Movement for Interracial Justice and Equality. She worked internationally with the Global Campaign for Womens Human Rights, lobbying at the 1993 United Nations World Conference and the 1995 Beijing World Conference on Women. She received the UN Secretary Generals Award for Human Rights from Kofi Annan in 1998, was nominated as one of the One Thousand Women for the Nobel Peace in 2005, and was honored with the Human Rights Defender Award in 2007 by Human Rights Watch.
Astraea mourns the loss of international trans rights activist Melenie Mahinamalamalama Eleneke. Known to many as Auntie Mel,Melenie passed away at the age of 53 on September 9th after visiting the hospital with chest pain and being sent home without due care.
A core leader at TGI Justice Project, Melenie fought for the rights of trans, gender variant, and intersex people of color within and outside of the prison system. She was an editor of TGI Justices prison newsletter, Stiletto, and served as Director of Development and Administration at the organization. In 2008, Melenie brought the rights of trans women of color to the forefront with an historic address to the United Nation during its review of U.S. compliance with the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD).
An activist in the Polynesian community and a spiritual healer, Melenie gave vibrant force to the movement to preserve the culture, language, and spiritual practices of the Hawaiian people. She was member of many Hula groups including The Ladies of Keolalaulani Halau and the House of Valenciaga, and founded a hula group for trans woman of color. Family, friends, and colleagues celebrate Melenie with tributes of her loving and generous spirit at meleniepresente.
Pioneer lesbian, bisexual, and trans rights activist in India, Betu Singh passed away on October 4th. Betu established Sangini Trust in New Dehli in 1997, the first lesbian crisis hotline and one of the oldest community support programs for lesbian and bisexual women, and trans people in India. Betu ran Sangini Trust without funding for its first two years. Against great odds, Sangini Trust grew from a hotline to a multiservice organization offering weekly group meetings and workshops, working with educational institutions and prisons, and providing crucial educational resources and legal support to the LBT community. Betu spoke to the evolution of her activist work and her personal history in a video interview as part of PROJECT BOLO (Project Speak Up).
In the wake of Betu’s passing, outpourings of commemoration from friends and community pay respect to Betu’s unwavering support to LBT communities in Delhi.
