Kicked Out Anthology

Growing up in rural Oregon, the libraries I had access to didn’t have a ton of books shelved under “homosexuality” but enough to help me to believe that I wasn’t utterly alone. In so many ways libraries were one of the first places that gave me hope that I could make it in the world as a queer person.

Just days after being kicked out the final time I went to the public library and looked for a book on LGBTQ youth homelessness. There wasn’t one. I was devastated. This was the first time that a library had ever truly failed me, I had believed so strongly that libraries had everything not seeing myself or my experience reflected on the shelf was overwhelming. It was there that I promised myself that if I made it I would make a book and that no other queer kid would feel alone.  That was where Kicked Out was born.

For many homeless youth the public library is an essential one of the only places where they can access the internet, find solace from days on the streets with access to clean bathrooms. It’s also a source of ideas, knowledge and stories. Best of all, it’s  free! Libraries quite literally save the lives of queer youth.

I’m really excited that yesterday I learned of a way that we can see what library systems in the United States are carrying Kicked Out!

http://www.worldcat.org/title/kicked-out/oclc/557899298

Does your local library carry Kicked Out? If not, next time you are there please suggest that they do.  All the Kicked Out contributors and I believe that one of the most important things this book can do is get into the hands of the queer youth who need it most and many of those youth are at the library.

Queer Arts Now is a webseries showcasing queer artists Co-Hosted by Ks Stevens and Ashley Brockington who go on location to interview ongoing cultural artists and ongoing live cultural events. In this episode of Queer Arts Now they head to NYC’s Bluestockings bookstore to cover the Kicked Out reading!

I am shocked and angered by the vandalism that occurred at the Ali Forney Center‘s NYC shelter in Queens.  Yesterday morning youth living at the shelter woke up to find the words “”We don’t want gay people here” scrawled on the walls, and “gay shelter” on the door of a place that is intended to provide them safety and security. Take a moment and think about what that must have felt like “we don’t want gay people here” the majority of homeless LGBTQ youth have left home because of their parents and guardian’s reaction to their sexual orientation and/or gender identity, how bitingly cruel to wake to find those same words on the door of a place offering them sanctuary.

This incident must serve as a reminder that we cannot become complacent.  Here in NYC we are lucky in that there are a number of organizations providing shelter services specifically to LGBTQ homeless youth, but even with great programs like MCCNY Homeless Youth Services and the Ali Forney Center there are simply not enough beds to go around, we must as a community step up fight for more resources and speak out to protect the ones we have, not only from budget cuts but from hatred and violence.

If you are in NYC and are concerned about the epidemic of LGBTQ youth homelessness please come out to the rally on Monday (6/14) night at Union Square. The rally is now expected to possibly draw thousands of people will feature celebrities like Sandra Bernhard, but in my opinion most importantly the voices of currently homeless youth speaking about how important this issue is.  The rally has been officially  sponsored and endorsed by dozens of organizations and individuals – including the ‘Kicked Out’ anthology will be a great opportunity to show your support for homeless youth here in NYC.

This afternoon I was linked to a new video by Kaden a great young trans vlogger who uploaded a new video raising awareness about the epidemic of LGBTQ youth homelessness and his frustration that the larger LGBTQ community has ignored the needs of youth.  I’m always excited when I see activists making this observation, not because I don’t support the other issues like marriage equality, but because at the end of the day as a larger community I think we’ve had our priorities wrong.

I spend a lot of time on this blog and elsewhere talking about how important it is for current and former homeless LGBTQ youth to tell our stories, and it is, but we also need allies. I love that Kaden references how his trans youth experience of support and acceptance “isn’t the norm, it’s exceptional.” and how he doesn’t want his viewers to think his experience is the norm, and in response is standing in solidarity with the thousands of LGBTQ youth who have not been nearly so fortunate. I was excited to see that the video was getting so many hits, but was disappointed to see a lot of the comments it was receiving (over 100 over alone) at a pro-gay rights facebook page. People were deploying ageist arguments to dismiss Kaden’s position that queer youth homelessness deserves at least as much attention as these other issues that our community has chosen to put front and center, like marriage and don’t ask don’t tell. Comments said things like “I realize that marriage equality may not seem terribly important to a teenager” and others making what to me seem like dismissive arguments that if marriage were legalized queer youth homelessness would disappear or at a minimum decrease.

This is a complicated issue and one that I interface frequently when I talk publicly about queer youth homelessness. I don’t think it’s necessarily productive to pit queer youth homelessness against marriage. But at the same time, I can’t deny that when I look at the millions of dollars our community has put into marriage battles in different states I see are shelter beds for our kids. GLASS a shelter in LA where one of the contributors to Kicked Out called home was forced to close it’s doors at the same time our community prioritized millions of dollars into California’s Prop 8 campaign.

It’s been a pretty crazy week for ‘Kicked Out’ – three events in Boston, a reading at NYC’s Bluestockings Bookstore, and then tonight when I was sitting down to write about the week’s travels and adventures, my phone rang.  It was my buddy Turner who had a little surprise for me! He was calling LIVE in the middle of his show at the University of Tennessee Knoxville!!!!

In the show he was talking about reaching out to one another and building community, which made him think if ‘Kicked Out’!

The idea that reaching out to others inspires thoughts of the book is perhaps the biggest compliment that I could receive.  For me, and all of the ‘Kicked Out’ contributors who worked so hard to make this book happen, this book is so much more than paper and bindings. It is our promise that never again will a queer kid feel alone for loosing home, community, and family.

The authors whose stories appear in Kicked Out are more family than contributing authors, but our family is not an exclusive one. We are here with open arms welcoming in those who are looking no matter if you were kicked out today, or 40 years ago.

Conversations about creating kicked out family and the idea that no matter what, we as queer people who have survived these experiences are not alone is close to the heart of everything I was speaking about in Boston, New York, and unexpectedly last night in Knoxville.  When I talk with allies about ‘Kicked Out’, they often are looking for answers. They want to know where youth can go, how homelessness can be prevented in the first place, and most of all what to tell a young person who has, or thinks that they will lose their family because of who they are and how they love. At the end of the day, I have very few of the concrete answers that well meaning allies want.  I can give them statistics I can point them in the direction of resources I know of in their local area, but I can’t tell them what to do. Because this is *the * most common question I get let me repeat, I cannot tell them what to do, I cannot tell them what will happen, what will be the safest.

What I can give them, and what I think is the most important thing I can ever tell a current or former homeless LGBTQ youth is that they are not alone, and that there is a community of us out here who are ready to listen to them, love them, and support them. Even if the specific circumstances differ from our own, we are linked together by this very unique shared experience.

I along with so many folks I know survived because we created family. I am here today because of the friends I made, and the families that we built with our hands, stories, and tears on streets, in the back of queer youth centers, and now across the internet stitching together larger multi-generational extended families. In Boston and at Bluestockings I had people come up to me and say that through reading ‘Kicked Out’ and hearing stories similar to their own and their friends reflected back to them they felt less alone. As the editor of this book, there is no greater compliment. Looking back at the week I can’t tell you the number of times my eyes have filled with tears; some tears because there is so much hurt in our community, but more tears because this book is truly doing what I hoped it would, touching individual lives, telling people they are not alone, and encouraging them to come together with us to build family.

Over the past couple of weeks of the news being saturated with stories of prom and like most LGBTQ people I know I’ve been following all of it. As always my brain has been filled with thoughts on the epidemic of LGBTQ youth homelessness and I’d been thinking a about ways to tie these issues together, like how discrimination in schools goes beyond refusal to allow students to attend prom with a queer date. I’m devastated that an explicit connection was made for me.  As you may have already heard, news broke today that Derrick Martin the high school senior in Georgia whose school had ruled students could bring a date of any gender after the conflict in Mississippi was thrown out of his home by his parents and for now is staying with a friend.

I know intimately what Derrick is going through tonight. Eight years ago I was sleeping at a friends house because I had nowhere to go because I’m queer. Every contributor to Kicked Out knows the devastating feeling of loosing your home and family because of who you are.  Overnight Derrick has become part of an epidemic of homelessness that impacts youth in every community across the country stretching across boundaries of race, class, religion, ethnicity, ability, and geographic region. There have been offers from all over the country of LGBT people (and allies) offering to buy limos and tuxes for the prom. My hope is that this community will rally together to offer Derrik the financial and emotional support he’s going to need not just for prom, but in the long term.

It’s fun and easy for our community to come together and throw money on throwing a grand party (and honestly is there a better party than prom?) but putting money towards improving the lives of the nearly 40% of homeless youth who identify as LGBTQ can make the difference between life and death. These are some of our communities most vulnerable members and the need all the help they can get.

Dear Derrick
I’m going to say to you what I open Kicked Out with— “I’m not going to tell you that everything is going to be okay. I am going to tell you that you are not alone.”  Please know that you are part of an extended kicked out family who is here for you as a shoulder to cry on and an ear to listen. We are here to support you today, and for years to come because we all understand that the aftermath of being kicked out extends.

I’m still in awe of how incredible last night’s NYC release at  of Kicked Out at The Center was.  Those of you who plan events know that sometimes all the chaos ahead of time pays off and suddenly things flow seamlessly…. this was one of those nights.  I can honestly say that there isn’t one thing that I wish I could go back and change.

I have a longer and more coherant post planned for in a few days, but for now I just wanted to offer a huge thankyou to all of the contributors who were part of the festivites, The Center for hosting us, and the nearly 70 people who came out to support the release of this anthology, and the importance of current and former homeless LGBTQ youth telling our stories.

Tenzin

1. What has being kicked out meant for you?

Living on the streets has altered me as a person.  The fear of being homeless again persists, as does a sense of otherness.  Because I have seen things that others have difficulty imagining, I have difficulty relating to other people and anticipate violence in even benign environments.  Being visibly discarded and living as a member of the most disposable group of people marked me and made me more empathetic towards others.  I doubt I would be a Buddhist monk now if it wasn’t for seeing people beaten, raped, shot, and stabbed.  I think I gravitated towards a spiritual vocation that was antithetical to what I lived on the streets because of a deep understanding of personal and vicarious suffering.

2. What role has art & writing played in your life, and how do you see that as part of community building?
Writing helped me explore salient topics from my life and those I care about such as PTSD, LGBTQ issues, the AIDS epidemic, hate crimes, and the psychology of neo-nazis.  Creating disturbing (and untalented) art depicting dismembered organs with eyes and faces, skeletal parts, and ghosts was cathartic and symbolized the ways in which the bodies and psyches of those I grew up with were eviscerated, pulverized and rearranged into interesting new configurations.  Both creating and consuming works of art and literature helped me feel a sense of community with people who had also seen a different side of existence.  It was comforting to know others were out there even if they were deceased. I recognized survivors of trauma by what they created.  The works of Dickens, Palahniuk, and Bosch resonated deeply.

3. What has being part of the Kicked Out anthology meant to you?

Being part of the Kicked Out anthology has been an invaluable experience because it provided the opportunity to write about experiences that I normally expend much energy suppressing.  I felt a sense of solidarity and affinity with the other queer people involved in Kicked Out even though I never met them. I was heartened by their strength and courage to come out in such a public way as both queer and former homeless people.  Knowing that others also survived was inspiring.  The plight of homeless youth had largely left the public consciousness and I am grateful that I participated in such a wonderful project that tells our stories and raises awareness of homelessness among queer youth.

4. What are three things people don’t realize about being kicked out?

1)  If you are young, queer and homeless, you are frequently invisible to others or blamed for being where you are.  Those who do see you often want to exploit, assault, or kill you.  You are the ultimate disposable person if your parents didn’t even care enough to safeguard your life and society denies civil rights to even affluent queer people.

2)  You have to change who you are to survive on the street. My heroes were Gandhi, St. Francis of Assisi, and Martin Luther King, Jr. before I was on the streets.  I considered myself a pacifist until I encountered neo-nazi skinheads and others who would harm us just for being alive and different.  Certain ideals become luxuries in volatile environments. I relinquished my pacifism and much of my faith in people to survive. Engaging even in justified violence changed who I am.

3)  You always remember the kindness of those who took the time to show they cared about you when you were in a desperate situation.  I always remember the food, love, and shelter provided by friends and strangers.

5. What is one message about homeless LGBTQ youth you hope people take away from reading Kicked Out?

While much of the public discussion of LGBTQ rights is focused on the debate around gay marriage, other issues that profoundly affect LGBTQ people are often ignored.  The elevated rate of homelessness, suicide, homicide and hate crimes against LGBTQ people is still largely unknown. The Kicked Out Anthology will illuminate the ways in which LGBTQ youth are often discarded, disenfranchised, and literally disposed of by their parents and the larger dominant culture.  Many of these LGBTQ kids never even get the chance to grow up, fall in love, and be deprived of their right to marry and adopt children.

It is strange that the right of LGBTQ people to fully participate as equal citizens is challenged in a democratic nation founded on the principles of equality, liberty, freedom of religion, and separation of church and state.  It is even stranger that so much antipathy is directed towards queer people based on religious beliefs derived from a tradition that tells its followers to “love your neighbor as yourself.”

One thing I would like people to remember is that the same forces who seek to deprive LGBTQ citizens of their right to marry and be protected from discrimination also foment an antipathy towards queer people so profound that parents often literally throw their kids away when they come out as queer.  This same antipathy encourages hate crimes directed against those even perceived to be queer.  The intersection of queer identity and homelessness can be a psyche-shattering experience and a death sentence.  Queer kids are still out there on the streets.  Please don’t forget to include them in the struggle for equality.

Readings by Kicked Out Editor Sassafras Lowrey & Contributors Lucky Michaels,
Ksen Pallegedara, Kestryl Cael, and Kay Barrett

Friday March 19th 7pm @

The Center 208 West 13th Street

Room 310

For the next couple of months we will be featuring a weekly post by different Kicked Out Anthology contributors. Each will be answering five questions about their experiences around being forced to leave their parents homes, involvement with the anthology, and what they hope the LGBT community, and the world will take away from reading this book.