I am debating how I can make a living doing community work going forward. I’m burnt out on the typical nonprofit, and most of those doing lgbtq community organizing are being gutted and limited on so many fronts. And government jobs are also being cut left and right, from federal to local levels. I am damn good at community organizing and service work, but how the hell do I pay rent with that? If I have to do something else with the majority of my spoons, then how could I muster the energy to do that during free time? And mutual aid, while it is the mode I want to do more organizing under, seems unlikely to be able to meet my material needs in the next year or two. So the only idea I’m kicking around now is maybe going back to doing some form of community consulting work. Maybe I can offer my services running workshops and helping people build the beginnings of their own mutual aid networks and groups? I could provide training in the skills people need, education on important concepts and frameworks, and such? Either that, or find some magical way to make enough money writing or creating content of some sort. Which seems foolhardy. Ugh

One of the ways I know transphobes have never actually known a trans person in real life is that they think we make lots of demands on others, insist on taking up space, and don’t care about inconveniencing others. Like, anyone who has known or cared about a trans person knows it is like pulling teeth to get them to reach out or allow others in for support. Almost all of us are all carrying the trauma of having internalized the message that asking to exist as ourselves is such an imposition on others we have been afraid to do it most of our lives. Like, is there a single trans person on the fedi who has not said at least once that they feel like a burden if they express any of their needs or desires, much less even ask others to use the correct pronouns for them? Meanwhile, most transphobes think that it’s discrimination against them for other people to exist.

Oh lord, it’s happening…can some cutie actually come over and show me how to install Linux? 😅

Feeling grief over losing my job today finally. And it hit me because they took away my kids…the trans kiddos I was auntie too, nurtured and mentored every day….i loved those kids so much and it feels like part of myself was carved out of me. And to make matters worse, the kids are going to lose programming and support because these knobheads had no real plan in place before they got rid of me. Fuck those cis women for being so callous and cruel.

I’m so fucking tired of how queer people and allies love trans women when we’re dead and hate us when we’re alive. We are always the problem. We are always the one who is to blame. And we cannot be wronged. There’s a reason why so many of us can’t get or stay employed. There’s a reason so many of us only have sex work as an option left to turn to. There’s a reason why so many of us are either dead or on the street. Also, let’s be clear, the people who have done this to me AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN are middle-class, white cis women.