Location: New York

Meet the Activists: Intersex Human Rights

In 2015, the Astraea Foundation launched the world’s first Intersex Human Rights Fund.

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Join us at the Astraea office in New York City to connect with international advisors and grantee partners of the Astraea Intersex Fund! We’ll highlight the work that intersex activists are doing around the world, as an incredible year for intersex human rights comes to a close.

In 2015, the Astraea Foundation launched the world’s first Intersex Human Rights Fund with the generous support of seed donors Kobi Conaway and Andrew Owen and a leadership gift from the Arcus Foundation. In our inaugural 2015 grants cohort, we are proud to support 29 intersex-led grantee partners in 21 countries working to ensure the human rights, bodily autonomy, physical integrity and self-determination of intersex people worldwide.

Read more about each of the panelists below!

HIKER CHIU
Based in Taiwan
Advisor and Grantee Partner
Hiker Chiu is the founder of OII-Chinese since 2008. Oii-Chinese is a platform for Chinese-speaking intersex people to get information, awareness, connection and peer support, and an intersex human rights advocacy organization. Hiker Chiu was the first person to come out as intersex in Taiwan, initiating the “Global Free Hugs with Intersex Movement” in the 8th Taipei Pride Parade 2010. Hiker is devoted to work building intersex connections in Asia. Hiker is a PhD. candidate of the Graduate school of Human Sexuality Shu-Te University in Taiwan.

NATASHA JIMENEZ
Based in Costa Rica
Advisor and Grantee Partner
Natasha Jiménez is from Costa Rica and has been a trans and intersex activist for over 20 years. She is currently the General Coordinator for Mulabi in Costa Rica, which hosts the Intersex Secretariat for ILGA (the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association). She has been active at the LGBTTTI Coalition of the OAS and has done advocacy work at the UN denouncing violations of the rights of trans and intersex people in Latin America. She started her activism doing HIV/AIDS and STI prevention and care, and has been active in feminist, women’s and LGBT movements in Latin America.

MORGAN CARPENTER
Based in Australia
Advisor and Grantee Partner
Morgan Carpenter is a social policy and technology policy researcher, intersex activist, and president of OII Australia, a national organization that promotes human rights and bodily autonomy for intersex people. Morgan engages in advocacy work at local, national and international levels, and has helped to secure intersex-inclusive national anti-discrimination legislation and a world-first Parliamentary report into intersex health and human rights. Morgan has been widely published and speaks internationally on intersex issues.

MIRIAM J. VAN DER HAVE
Based in the Netherlands
Grantee Partner
Miriam van der Have is President and founder of the Stichting Nederlands Netwerk Intersekse/DSD (NNID) and Co-Chair of OII Europe. NNID, founded in 2013, works on advocacy, equality and empowerment of people with an intersex variations in the Netherlands.

ARISLEYDA DILONE
Based in the United States
Grantee Partner
Arisleyda Dilone is an emergent screenwriter and filmmaker based in New York City. She holds an MA degree in International Relations and Government from St. John’s University and a BA degree in Italian: Language and Civilization from Southern Connecticut State University. Arisleyda just finished her short film Mami, Y Yo Y mi Gallito, which revolves on a feature length film conversation with her mom about her body. She is currently working on a feature length film that will include the voices of outside forces as she seeks to understand her identity as an intersex woman and a Dominican-American.

MAURO CABRAL
Based in Argentina
Advisor
Mauro Cabral is an intersex and trans activist from Argentina. At this moment he serves as the Co-Director of GATE (Global Action for Trans* Equality). Previously, he coordinated the project “Intersex and Human Rights” at Mulabi – Espacio Latinoamericano de Sexualidades y Derechos (2007-2009) and, before that, the Latin America and Caribbean Trans and Intersex Area at IGHLRC (2005-2007). In 2006 he participated in the production of the Yogyakarta Principles and in 2009 he edited the book Interdicciones. Escrituras de la Intersexualidad en castellano. He lives in Buenos Aires.

Law for Black Lives

Born out of the Black Lives Matter movement uprisings in 2015, Law for Black Lives (L4BL) is a Black femme-led organization of more than 3,400 radical lawyers, law students, and legal workers committed to creating a community of legal advocates that share the values and aspirations of the growing Black Lives Matter movement.

Born out of the Black Lives Matter movement uprisings in 2015, Law for Black Lives (L4BL) is a Black femme-led organization of more than 3,400 radical lawyers, law students, and legal workers committed to creating a community of legal advocates that share the values and aspirations of the growing Black Lives Matter movement. Although law has been an instrumental tool of white supremacy, queerphobia, misogyny, capitalism, and heteropatriarchy, L4BL recognizes that peoples’ lawyers, movement lawyers who take direction from community leaders and base-building organizations, have made vital contributions in progressive social movements of the past and around the world by using law as a valuable tool in struggles for liberation. They believe that a robust, responsive local legal infrastructure grounded in intersectional, feminist, and anti-racist values can support organizers, activists, and communities to develop defensive and offensive tactics to address the issues Black communities face. Collaborating with research and policy groups, activist organizations, and community organizers, L4BL uses a multi-layered approach of strategic advocacy, training and leadership development, and support for base-building organizations to focus on bail reform, decriminalization, and invest/divest reparations.

Astraea & FRIDA Reception for LGBTQI and Young Feminist Activism

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Join the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice and FRIDA | The Young Feminist Fund in celebrating LGBTQI and young feminist activism around the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW)!

Come to the Astraea office on Tuesday, March 10th to meet and connect with Astraea and FRIDA’s grantee partners, allies and communities.

Join us from 6:30 – 8:30 for an informal reception, with a short program at 7:30 pm.

Meet the Activist: Trans, Gender Variant, and Intersex Justice Project

Please join us at Astraea on Friday, January 6 from 12:00-1:00pm for a discussion with San Francisco based grantee partner Trans, Gender Variant, and Intersex Justice Project (TGIJP.) We will hear updates from Wazi Maret, Development and Administration Coordinator at TGIJP about their prison abolition organizing strategies, and some reflections about what it means for TGI movements to organize in the current political moment.

TGI Justice Project is a group of transgender, gender variant and intersex people—inside and outside of prisons, jails and detention centers—organizing for liberation from systemic violence and oppression, for prison abolition, and for racial and economic justice.

Friday, January 6th, 12:00-1:00pm
Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice
116 East 16th Street, 7th Floor, NY, NY 10003
Event is wheelchair accessible. Lunch will be provided.

RSVP by email: [email protected]

Click here to read more about TGIJP.

Held as intimate gatherings at our office, Astraea’s Meet the Activist series provides a unique opportunity to learn about the work of LGBTQI activists and movements around the world.

This Body, Too

This Body, Too is a feature-length documentary written, directed by and starring Arisleyda Dilone, a young intersex woman living in the U.S. The film aims to capture Aris’s experience growing up intersex in a Dominican-American family. Aris focuses on the influences of outside forces (her partner, her friends, the medical field and, most importantly, her family) as she seeks to understand her identity as an intersex-woman and a Dominican-American. Her journey takes her back to the Dominican Republic, where there is a long history of medical research of intersex bodies. This Body, Too will tackle issues of sex identity, gender identity, surgical interventions and mainstream perceptions of feminine identity.

Funding enabled her to shoot an interview with her former doctor that operated on her body as a teen (this interview will form part of the feature film This Body, Too) and complete a short film, Mami y Yo y mi Gallito (16mins, 2015), which revolves around her first conversation with her mother about her body.

Streetwise and Safe (SAS)

Streetwise and Safe: LGBTQQ Youth of Color Standing Up to Police Abuse and Criminalization (SAS) is a collaborative multi-strategy initiative to develop leadership, knowledge, and skills among LGBTQQ youth of color who have experienced gender-and-sexuality-specific forms of race and class based policing, particularly in the context “quality of life” policing and the policing of sex work and trafficking in persons.

Streetwise and Safe: LGBTQQ Youth of Color Standing Up to Police Abuse and Criminalization (SAS) is a collaborative multi-strategy initiative to develop leadership, knowledge, and skills among LGBTQQ youth of color who have experienced gender-and-sexuality-specific forms of race and class based policing, particularly in the context “quality of life” policing and the policing of sex work and trafficking in persons. SAS has been very active in the Communities United for Police Reform (CPR) campaign, and is the only LGBTQ youth of color organization part of CPR’s steering committee. Their critical participation highlights the ways in which “Stop and Frisk” practices not only affect black and brown men, but LGBTQI youth of color in particular. SAS, along other NY-based grantee partners, contributed to the passing of the Community Safety Act. More recently, they pushed the passing of a partial “No Condoms as Evidence” policy and are now part of the decision making table evaluating policy implementation. SAS and BreakOUT! are leading the Get Yr Rights National Network.

eThreads—exciting videos, updates and galleries online now

Welcome to eThreads, Astraea’s online newsletter spotlighting LGBTI activism around the world.

Welcome to eThreads, Astraea’s online newsletter spotlighting LGBTI activism around the world. Each quarter, we’ll bring you exciting videos, updates and galleries highlighting Astraea’s inspiring community of grantees and donors. Connecting communities is at the core of our work and we hope that eThreads will strengthen—even further—our connection with you!

Click here to go to ethreads.

NYC & SF—South Asians Here and There: A Dialogue about LGBT & Human Rights

South Asians Here and There: A Dialogue about LGBT & Human Rights

Astraea is proud to co-sponsor the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission’s (IGLHRC) panel discussions on the LGBT rights situation in South Asia. The panels, in New York and San Francisco, will feature Astraea Grantee Partner Sunil Pant, the founder and director of Blue Diamond Society, Nepal’s only LGBT rights organization and the recipient of IGLHRC’s 2007 Felipa de Souza Award.

NEW YORK: Monday, April 30, 2007

6:00 pm to 8:00 pm
LGBT Community Center (208 West 13th Street)

Panelists
Sunil Pant, Founder and President of Blue Diamond Society
Trishala Deb, Program Coordinator at Audre Lorde Project
Paula Ettelbrick, IGLHRC Executive Director, Moderator

SAN FRANCISCO: Wednesday, May 2, 2007

6:00 pm to 8:00 pm
Asian and Pacific Islander Wellness Center (730 Polk Street)
Admission is free.

Panelists
Sunil Pant, President of Blue Diamond Society
Dechen Tsering, Program Officer, Asia and Oceania,
Global Fund for Women
Sandip Roy, New America Media, former editor
Trikone Magazine
Paula Ettelbrick, IGLHRC Executive Director, Moderator

FIERCE

FIERCE! is a community organizing project for Transgender, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Two Spirit, Queer, and Questioning (TLGBTSQQ) youth of color in New York City.

FIERCE! is a community organizing project for Transgender, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Two Spirit, Queer, and Questioning (TLGBTSQQ) youth of color in New York City. FIERCE is dedicated to exploring and building power in these communities through a mix of leadership development, artistic and cultural activism, political education, and campaign development. FIERCE challenges the institutions that perpetuate transphobia, homophobia, racism, ethnic conflict, gender bias, economic injustice, ageism, and the spread of HIV, STIs, STDs, and other mental and physical health crises, and organizes against the injustices of the criminal “justice” system, housing, employment, education, and healthcare systems.

Audre Lorde Project (ALP)

Audre Lorde Project (ALP) is a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Two Spirit, Trans and Gender Non Conforming (LGBTSTGNC) People of Color (POC) center for community organizing, focusing on the NYC area.

Audre Lorde Project (ALP) is a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Two Spirit, Trans and Gender Non Conforming (LGBTSTGNC) People of Color (POC) center for community organizing, focusing on the NYC area. ALP’s programs include: Safe Outside the System which builds community-led models of safety in response to increased violence targeting LGBTSTGNC POC; 3rd Space Program which provides resources and referrals for members, centering survival, wellness and resiliency strategies; Membership which builds ALP’s base by developing leadership among its membership; and TransJustice which builds leadership and political strategies for the visibility and livelihood of TGNC POC.