Annotation Three

to learn how I can assist the GBLT population and improve my awareness of the issues faced by GBLT youth.

Activities

-read and research specific GBLT issues

-listen to the youth talk about their experiences

-provide emotional, physical and social support to the youth

-serve as a friendly, supportive confident

-socially interact with the youth so they know and trust me

-attend groups that talk about specific issues

Evidence

Include a journal entry that I keep of what I learned each week listening to the youth and attending groups. Include a reference list of materials read and a description of groups attended. Include in the same entry what I have accomplished each week toward helping the youth.

List of Materials Read

HIV+: working the medical system /Robert Rimer and Michael Connolly

The HIV Test /Marc Vargo

 We collectively viewed a film called "Long Time Companion", about the early impact and history of HIV in America

A straight ally is a person who identifies as heterosexual but who is open in their support of the GBLT community. That's my role, my identity in the spectrum. I am in no way short of gay pride; pride in my alliance and pride in the courage and fortitude of anyone who identifies outside of the cultural box. This internship spawned from a strong sense of camaraderie and a desire to be more active in my support and connection to GBLT people. I wanted to do something more then put a GBLT friendly bumper sticker on my car, I wanted to do something hands on. I decided that an internship would be an excellent way to both get some hands on experience in the professional world and get some more needed class credits. I went down to the University of Rhode Island's internship department and asked specifically if they had a placement site specific to GBLT. Youth Pride popped right up in the files; a URI student had done an internship there the previous summer.

One of the things that I particularly enjoy about working with Youth Pride is that I see people that identify everywhere on the GBLT spectrum, and there is quite a variety of cultures and social and ethnic backgrounds. It gives me an opportunity to get to know people with backgrounds very different from my own, which both helps me understand where people are coming from but also the many dimensions of the GBLT identity. We as humans have a tendency to make people we do not know as simple, as categorized and as one dimensional as possible. Working with and getting to know people is the best cure I have ever found for this tendency.

Perhaps the best knowledge expansion was with the Transgender community. I had never previously met anyone who identified as transgender and I was able to meet and get to know two transgender individuals who attend the center regularly.There are many processes that one must go through to change gender, including a legal name change, which carries a fee of about $120 and hormone therapy which is rarely covered by insurance. Hormone therapy involves taking the sex hormones of the opposite sex, which results in the appearance of opposite secondary sex characteristics. A sex change surgery may or may not be performed according to the client's wishes. It is a common misconception that all transgender people are homosexual, which is not necessarily the case. People who identify as transgender are on the spectrum of gender identity, which means they feel that the sex they were born with is not the sex they feel at all. This spectrum includes cross dressers at one end, who are one gender but dress in the clothes representing the other gender; and transsexuals at the other end who have transferred into the other sex completely. People can fall anywhere between these two definitions. This is a different matter from being homosexual, which is a romantic and sexual attraction to the same sex. Some transsexuals do identify as homosexual, but the identities are not perpendicular. Both of the adolescents I now know from the center have had mixed reactions to their gender identities; some people being accepting and others not so much. Many transgender people do not tell even those closest to them, or only a few highly trusted individuals. Gender identity, like homosexuality, has been the basis for violence and discrimination.

 June 18th was the Pride Festival in Providence. Youth Pride had a booth at the festival among a number of gay friendly organizations including the Human Rights Campaign and PFlag. We also had a section in the Gay Pride Parade which took place that night. Hundreds of GBLT and GBLT friendly people crowded on either side of us as we walked through the city. I handed out rainbow hats and light sticks to fellow paraders. It was really an amazing feeling to be out there with all these supportive people, it was pride in the best sense of the word. 

The coursework I found most valuable for this objective was the Applications of Psychology course I took on gender, culture and sexuality. It was an exercise in being comfortable talking about sexuality and being able to share things and listen in a confidential manner.