August Newsletter

ID: On a black chalkboard background the text reads "august newsletter" with the link "freedomoklahoma.org/news" - its surrounded by a collage of back to school chalk symbols, stacks of paper, and supplies.

I first joined the Freedom Oklahoma team four years ago. It feels both like just yesterday and the longest four years of my life (but maybe the last four years have felt a little like that for everyone). In that time, we’ve ushered in monumental changes to the work and the way we approach what it means to be a 2SLGBTQ+ organization, one now staffed entirely by 2STGNC+ folks, with a focus on how we shift closer to collective liberation, grounded in values-driven work. Which together might sound like nothing more than a nice string of buzzwords, so let me try to tell you what that means.

We’re Talking to an Audience of 2SLGBTQ+ Folks

When our work was started and through the initial years of the organization, so much of what was produced spoke to an audience of very few folks in positions of power who might be compelled to stand up for 2SLGBTQ+ folks on occasion. But what does it look like for 2SLGBTQ+ folks to talk to 2SLGBTQ+ folks first? To not always shift the lens away from the language we use for ourselves, from the reality of our grief or devastation, from the ability to laugh and share space even through the toughest moments? It looks like the narrative work you’ve seen grow over the last few years, and really shift in this last year in particular under the leadership of our inaugural Director of Digital Organizing and Communications, Mauree Turner. What does it look like for this to be work for 2STGNC+ liberation by 2STGNC+ folks? In a pool of people looking to repeat the harms of the past and silence the voices of 2STGNC+ folks, especially those unwilling to perform passing or to make ourselves small, we’re working to lift up the voices of 2STGNC+, unapologetic in our queerness, madness, Blackness, Indigineity…we’re here and we’re talking about it.

Borders Are Arbitrary

We live in a time where we can be more connected and aware of more happening the world over, and where some folks still try to use borders as a boundary for harm, even the harm of silence. While our work has always stretched to reach folks across Oklahoma and across the 39 tribes that call this land home, we’ve also expanded our work to actively collaborate with partners across state lines. We saw our penpal program grow to international reach. And we’re vocal about our support for our immigrant community members no matter what paperwork they do or don’t have. We’re loud about the fact that 2SLGBTQ+ liberation is bound together with the liberation of Palestinians and the end of settler colonialism in Palestine and beyond. Not because those are issues outside of our work, but because they’re integral to how we show up every day. It also means we’re still putting intention around where we show up and how we use our resources, including our time. This year, that’s included more intentional collaboration with the Cherokee Nation, where myself and Taylor Raye, our Director of Programming and Engagement, have gotten to build relationships, be present, and offer questions and feedback towards services that better serve all 2SLGBTQ+ Cherokee citizens.

We Build Skills Internally and Externally

After our annual gathering at Equality Federation’s Leadership Conference, sharing ideas and struggles and space with folks across the 2SLGBTQ+ movement, our Director of Operations, Organizing, and Support, Solas, included in his reflection the nugget that if we’re not operating sustainably, in abundance, in the practice of community as organizations or coalitions, internally, than we’re going to struggle to do it externally. That means whether we’re presenting frameworks like The Solidarity Sessions at The Freedom Sessions Lunch & Learns or at EQ Fed’s Leadership Conference, we’re working to reflect on where we can better practice the same sort of fundamental community skills we’re sharing out, that so deeply resonate with folks in this work for how we think about needs in and beyond this current moment. It means we’re trying things together, as a team. And that we’re calling in community experts and resources, like our friends at RJIOK, to help us fill in gaps, continue to learn, and find spaces to practice as we hone new tools that allow us to be better community members and organizers.

We Invest in Our Community As Often As We Can

That skill building internally and externally means we’re also working to invest resources into our community as often as possible. That includes paying our presenters at events like The Freedom Sessions, offering scholarships to help with the financial barriers of filing fees when filing name change paperwork as our Director of Systems and Access Taia supports folks with the steps of figuring out what they need to get their documents corrected, paying our interns, and working to extend invitations to skill building and learning spaces in and beyond our team. We know that to really build the communities where we all have the safety, resources, and community we need to thrive, we’ll all need skills that help us be collaborative, and able to support within your means and capacity, for work that is ultimately unending. It means we’re working to expand our mutual aid capacity, learning from folks like our friends at Trans Ohio and Campaign for Southern Equality, thinking how we blend security and ease of access in this current timeline, knowing that our resources are limited.

Four (More?) Years

I won’t pretend like four years in this role hasn’t taken a toll on me. I’m tired. The work is heavy and unrelenting. Yet, there has been so much joy and community throughout it. I know so much more about 2SLGBTQ+ history and the legacy in which I work than I could have imagined. I’ve seen ideas, tactics, and strategies from right here in Oklahoma pop up and get used all across the country and the movement, as we create more space for more folks to put down the respectability politics, and pick up the fight for collective liberation.

When we kicked off the year, I reflected, "It feels fitting, not only on a personal note, but also as we look to 2025 as an organization. It's a year that marks our 10th official anniversary as Freedom Oklahoma, and more than 30 years of organizing from the organizations and organizers who came together to create this org. We're grounding ourselves in our history as we work intentionally to plan how we best create the future where we all have the safety to thrive. 2025 marks another term of what we expect to be an especially hostile presidency, and a new session of what we can unfortunately anticipate to be an even more hostile state legislature. It's a time that is going to try to wear us down through the overwhelming amount of harm targeted at our communities. And a time that demands we strengthen our commitment to one another, our collective liberation, and the work of dreaming and crafting our future together. We're doing 2025 intentionally."

And it’s that intention I’ve tried to bring to this role, this team, this org, and this work since day 1. So as we reflect on what we've done and what's still ahead, we're rallying our energy in intentionally true. Because there is no middle ground in the fight for the autonomy, dignity, and safety of trans people. We're not interested in hobnobbing with fascists while they continue to roll out fascist policies and actions that are costing our community members their lives, safety, and well being. We don't compromise on behalf of the folks most excluded and harmed. We're in this for liberation. Seven months in, we know this year will have challenges and heartache still to come. And joy and opportunity to gather together. So what do you say? Are you ready to wake up and fight? We've got futures to dream and liberation to win. And I, we can't do it alone.

I don’t know if it will serve me or the work to be here another four years. But as I mark this anniversary, I can promise you that I will keep showing up, I will keep fighting, and I will stay committed to navigating us away from the traps of despair or conformity, keeping our focus on collective liberation.

With Love, Gratitude, and Solidarity,