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AQWA (Asian/Pacific Islander Queer Women/Transgender Activists)

AQWA’s mission is to promote the visibility and empowerment of Asian and Pacific Islander queer, lesbian women and transgender individuals and to build a supportive, progressive community through social, political and educational activism.  We are a network of Asian and Pacific Islander queer, lesbian and transgender individuals in the greater Los Angeles area. Our purpose is to create a sense of community, to increase our visibility and to build power within the API LGBTIQ community for social justice and equal treatment of our community through political organizing and conducting public education to combat racism, homophobia/heterosexism, sexism and all forms of oppression.

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Freedom, Inc

Freedom, Inc is a grassroots organization with a vision of creating and building a world we want to live in. Starting as the Asian Freedom Project in 2000, it created youth-led collective learning groups to organize and mobilize on issues that affected their daily lives.

In 2003, Freedom, Inc became an official non-profit organization. Since then, our work has grown to include people from other communities. Our mission is to engage low- to no-income communities of color to end violence against women folks, gender non-conforming folks, and young folks, which bring about deep social, political, cultural, and economic change. We organize around the root causes of violence, creating new definitions and solutions, and empowering all community members as agents of change to inspire and restore power of those most affected. We do this through leadership development and community organizing, in ways that are language-gender-generation and culture-specific to women, gender non-conforming, and youth, in African American and Southeast Asian families.

Website
Contact: kabzuagvaj (at) gmail (dot) com

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Gay Asian Pacific Support Network (GAPSN)

The goal of GAPSN is to provide a supportive environment for Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender API Men on issues of significance to the Gay API Community.

Website
Contact: gapsn@gapsn.org

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SMYAL

SMYAL supports and empowers lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ) youth in the Washington, DC metropolitan region. Through youth leadership, SMYAL creates opportunities for LGBTQ youth to build self-confidence, develop critical life skills, and engage their peers and community through service and advocacy. Committed to social change, SMYAL builds, sustains and advocates for programs, policies and services that LGBTQ youth need as they grow into adulthood.

Website: http://www.smyal.org/

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transAPI Voices

“I’ve struggled with gender my entire life but I always pushed it to the back of my mind in fear of the backlash from my family and friends; last year I began to address my struggles. I embarked on the journey to discover who I am, I yearned for a role model or just someone that understood my personal struggles, which were very specific. I was negotiating gender identity combined with a Vietnamese family and cultural background. Because I was born and raised in Kentucky, it was challenging to find people or resources in my community. Even searching online with an abundance of resources for trans folks, it was challenging to find information on being Asian and trans.  I felt very isolated.

As I started meeting more trans and gender diverse Asians and Pacific Islanders (APIs), I began hearing similar narratives to my own. We felt lonely and isolated. I realized that I could continue looking for a role model or I can be that role model just by putting myself out there.  What better way than through YouTube.  So, I asked a few of friends that I knew felt similarly, and transAPIvoices was created.”

transAPIvoices is a collaboration channel of trans and gender diverse Asians and Pacific Islanders from all over the U.S.  This channel is for to us share narratives and experiences navigating and negotiating our identities. We created this online space because of the difficulty finding narratives similar to our specific experiences being trans/gender diverse and API.  We hope this channel can be used as a tool, to create a support system and community, and to show other trans and gender diverse APIs that you are not alone.”

— Jayden Thai // Founder transAPI Voices + Visibility Project Participant in 2012

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BROWN BOI PROJECT

The Brown Boi Project is a community of masculine of center womyn, men, two-spirit people, transmen, and our allies committed to transforming our privilege of masculinity, gender, and race into tools for achieving Racial and Gender Justice.

Website: http://www.brownboiproject.org/ 

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