QSA works toward awareness, tolerance
LCC group honors those killed by hate crimes

By Peggy Green of The Torch

[photo: The Queer Strait Alliance has built an alter to the transsexual victims of murder. Each month two people are killed and many more victimized for being transsexual.]

Raising awareness for the Queer/Straight Alliance on campus is not just for the queer population. Building alliances with the straight community is one of the goals the QSA actively pursues.

The president of the student group is Jessica Williams, a self-described activist in the queer community.

"Primarily, we're focused on social justice for queer issues building the queer community at Lane. [It is] a place where people can come and have dialog about queer issues and most of the projects we work on and activities that we do are about raising awareness. Our group is completely open to straight allies," Williams said.

Their mission statement says that they are "dedicated to creating alliances between the local queer population and straight allies."

Although there have been various groups of people at LCC coming together around similar needs for several years, this version of the QSA started about 5 years ago as the Lesbian, Bisexual, Gay, Transsexual Alliance. The group had an office in the Center Building where it remained untill the 2002-03 school year, which is when it moved into its present location.

As the LGBTA, the advisor was Susan Matthews.

"It took a lot of work and [we] definitately had to do a lot of work to get the office in the Center Building. It was not an easy thing. We had to work hard to get that office," Matthews said.

As the LGBTA became the QSA, it moved from being less of a social group and more into the activist arena.

This is not to say that QSA is not the place to go when feeling marginalized by society and needing suport.

It is just that, but it is also creating awareness of the need for social justice and of the existance of hate crimes in our communities.

On Monday, the group made an alter dedicated to those who have been killed because they were perceived to be transsexual, whether they were or not. They displayed a book with the names of the dead, in a few cases their picture, the location where the victims were murdered and a brief description of how.

In some cases there was torture that led up to the killing, in others, so much violence led up to the actual murder it was as though the person or persons doing the killing wanted to kill the victim many times over.

Thursday there will be a panel discussion as part of the Transgender Day of Remembrance. It willbe in the Student Life and Leadership office from noon to 1 p.m.and will be followed by the film "Toilet Training".

The panel discussion will feature Michael Samano, coordinator of ethnic studies, and Dr. Suzanne Williams, professor of sociology. 

Susan Williams and Michael Samano will lead the discussion to help people understand how all these different types of oppression intersect.

"We wanted to do something that would help people think of it on a broader level than just the LCC community," Williams said.

The panel discussion will include a discussion about intersecting oppressions and how they relate to hate crimes. Intersecting oppressions refers to the fact that oppressed peopel are often from overlapping groups.

"Many of the people being killed are people of color, they're women, they're poor," Williams said.

The QSA has been supported by student fees. When they need money for projects, such as the Transgender Day of Remembrance, it is requested from the Council of Clubs. Future activities will include a retreat at one of LCC's cabins.

The QSA is located in Building 1, Room 206, and is part of the Student Life and Leadership Development office where they meet on Fridays from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m.