CREATING SAFER SPACE FOR EVERYONE
Creating Safer Space Creating Change is committed to creating a safer and positive space for the LGBTQ community and our allies. We want everyone here to learn a lot, meet fabulous new people from all over the country, and feel good about talking and connecting with each other as we build a stronger movement. To that end, we want to remind everyone of guiding principles that are essential to maintaining respectful and safer space for each other. There are two fundamental principles to the Creating Change Conference: human rights and solidarity. Sexual harassment and other forms of violence strike at the heart of both. Harassment, violence and bigotry create feelings of fear, uneasiness, humiliation and discomfort. They are expressions of perceived power and superiority by the harasser over another person. Sometimes, even when our actions are not intentionally hurtful, what we say and do can hurt others or make them feel uncomfortable. Sexual harassment is a form of sexual violence. Sexual harassment is any unwanted attention of a sexual nature. Examples may include: • Remarks about appearance or personal life • Unwanted flirtations or advances • Offensive written or visual depictions like graffiti or degrading pictures • Touching someone without their permission (grabbing, hugging, petting, biting) • Unwanted sexual demands, pressure, propositions, or requests for sexual activities • Graphic comments about an individual’s body or dress • Verbal abuse, including sexual insults and name calling • Rewards for granting sexual favors or the withholding of rewards for refusing to grant sexual favors Creating Change is proud to host a beautiful and 18
NATIONAL LGBTQ TASK FORCE • CREATING CHANGE 2016
diverse LGBTQ and allied community where vibrant diversity in sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression is welcome. It is all of our responsibility to ensure that each member of our LGBTQ and ally family feels welcome and affirmed. In addition to movement building, many Creating Change attendees create and build social relationships while at the Conference. We want to remind you that, if you are thinking about hooking up, consent is essential. Please be sure that all involved have similar expectations. And please play safe! Thank you for your help in ensuring that Creating Change is an environment where all participants feel safe, comfortable and celebrated as members of the Creating Change family. If you feel harassed or threatened, please ask to speak with the Conference Director who can be contacted in the registration area located in “8th Street Registration” on the Lobby Level of the Hilton Chicago.
A Guide to Bisexual/Pansexual/Fluid Etiquette In 1990, “The Bisexual Manifesto” was published in Bay Area Bisexual Network’s national magazine, Anything That Moves. It reads in part: “Bisexuality is a whole, fluid identity. Do not assume that bisexuality is binary or duogamous in nature: that we have “two” sides or that we must be involved simultaneously with both genders to be fulfilled human beings. In fact, don’t assume that there are only two genders. Do not mistake our fluidity for confusion, irresponsibility, or an inability to commit. Do not equate promiscuity, infidelity, or unsafe sexual behavior with bisexuality. Those are human traits that cross all sexual orientations. Nothing should be assumed about anyone’s sexuality, including your own.” In 1991, black bisexual theorist and poet June Jordan called the bisexual movement a “mandate for revolutionary Americans planning to make it into the twenty-first century on the basis of the heart, on the basis of an honest human body, consecrated to every struggle for justice, every struggle for equality, every struggle for freedom.”