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Pride Month Charity Raffle!

It’s starting now! The three charities for our pride raffle are Equality Texas, Out Youth, and The Kind Clinic. Choose whichever one you’d like to support, or donate to more than one if you choose. 🙂

When you make a donation to any of these organizations please DM us the proof of your donation. (DMs accepted through our Twitter account or via Discord to the user AssJ#7378)

For every $5 you donate, you will be entered in the raffle one time. Of course you can be entered multiple times if you donate more 🙂

Each raffle winner (to be drawn by random number generator at random.org) can choose anything off the prize list that has not already been taken by another winner.

Note: for logistics purposes, most of the prizes can only be delivered to Austin and the surrounding area (e.g. Kyle, Round Rock, Pflugerville, etc.) However, some prizes can be sent out without restriction!

Here are the currently available raffle prizes:

  • “Pride For All” Bumper sticker with many different pride flags on it (Can be shipped pretty much anywhere, no requirement to live in the Austin area.)
  • Slightly smaller stickers similar to the above (2 people can win) (Can be shipped pretty much anywhere, no requirement to live in the Austin area.)
  • 5 varied stickers (Several people can win) (Can be shipped pretty much anywhere, no requirement to live in the Austin area.)
  • Zippered fabric pouch with several different pride flags on it
  • Artisan crafted soaps, your choice of fragrance (13 people can win)
  • Pride hand flags (“Progress Pride” design, 3 people can win)
  • Notepad with subtle rainbow motif (2 people can win)
  • Small USA rainbow flag pin
  • Small round “Pride For All” pins with several different pride flags on it (4 people can win)
  • Small round “Being Straight Was My Phase” pins (4 people can win)
  • Original English manga Music of My Heart volume 1.
  • Your choice of pride button/pronoun pin I will buy you off Etsy. Any pronoun/flag/name on it that you want. If you can’t find something you like I will help you. For some ideas of what is out there, check out https://www.etsy.com/shop/cpikoart, https://www.etsy.com/shop/TigersEyeAdventureCo, https://www.etsy.com/shop/MarginalDoodles, https://www.etsy.com/shop/Doodlepeople?section_id=28637351, https://www.etsy.com/shop/PiratitoGB, https://www.etsy.com/shop/Schlady?§ion_id=26424742 etc. (Can be shipped pretty much anywhere, no requirement to live in the Austin area.)
  • $25 gift card to The Little Gay Shop (Gift card delivered by email, no requirement to live in the Austin area.)

Raffle is open for entries until midnight on Saturday July 31 (Central Time).

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Fact/Flag of the Day for May 12 2021

Neutrois is a gender identity under the nonbinary umbrella. The term was coined in 1995 by a neutrois person named H. A. Burnham. It is generally defined as a “neutral” or “neuter” gender; neutrois people may seek surgical transition to appear gender-neutral. Some use the word neutrois as a synonym of agender or genderless, whereas others say these words mean completely different things.

In the commonly-used neutrois flag, white is for neutral, unidentified, or questioning gender, dark chartreuse green (the inverse of lavender, the mix of pink and blue) is for nonbinary gender that isn’t female or male, and black is for agender or genderless.

Neutrois pride flag.

Further reading:

https://nonbinary.wiki/wiki/Neutrois

http://neutrois.com/

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Fact/Flag of the Day for May 11 2021

Queer is an identity that can be claimed by anyone who falls on the LGBTQIA+ spectrum. The word queer appeared in the English language around the year 1500, meaning “strange, peculiar, odd, eccentric.” Starting in the 1700s it began to mean “suspicious, doubtful, counterfeit”, such as in the phrase “shove the queer” meaning “to circulate counterfeit money”. By 1922, queer was being used to mean homosexual, but nowadays the meaning is much broader.

The word was widely used as a slur, and still sometimes is today, but also has a long history of being used as a positive self-identifier, especially by people who:

  • have a complicated identity that is difficult to explain with a single term
  • have an orientation that cannot be explained with common terms like gay, lesbian, bisexual, pansexual, asexual, etc.
  • are unsure of their identity, but know they aren’t straight/cisgender.
  • are not straight/cisgender but do not want to label themselves with a more specific term.
  • reject labels altogether
  • are more politically-minded
  • seek to stand out/be flamboyant rather than conform closely to cisheteronormativity

One of the first flags created specifically as the “queer flag” was created by tumblr user pastelmemer/pastelroswell on or before August 17, 2015. The shades of pink next to each other and shades of blue next to each other represent same-gender attraction, the orange and green are for nonbinary people, while black and white are for asexual, aromantic, and agender spectrum people.

Queer pride flag created by pastelmemer/pastelroswell.

Sources/Further Reading:
– https://lgbta.wikia.org/wiki/Queer
– https://www.etymonline.com/word/queer#etymonline_v_3174

A Queer Power poster.
Flyers from the activist group Queer Nation, founded in 1990.
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Fact/Flag of the Day for April 28 2021

“Sapphic” is an umbrella term for any women or female-aligned nonbinaries who are attracted to women/female-aligned nonbinaries. For example, lesbians, bi women, and demigirls attracted to other demigirls could all consider themselves sapphic. The term is derived from the Greek poet Sappho; her sexuality is highly debated, but from her poems it is clear that she liked women. Here is a sample verse from her Hymn to Venus.

O Venus, beauty of the skies,
To whom a thousand temples rise,
Gayly false in gentle smiles,
Full of love-perplexing wiles, 
O goddess! from my heart remove
The wasting cares and pains of love.
Sapphic pride flag.
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Fact/Flag of the Day for April 27 2021

Abrosexual and abroromantic are terms meaning that the individual’s sexual and/or romantic orientation is often changing. For example, an abrosexual person could be pansexual, then later lesbian, then later asexual. This is not the same as a change in preference.

The abrosexual pride flag.
The abroromantic flag.

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Fact of the Day/Flag of the Day for April 26 2021

Fact of the day/Flag of the Day is a new thing we are doing to help educate our members! Feedback is welcome via email, Twitter, or Discord!

“Achillean” is an umbrella term for any men or male-aligned nonbinaries who are attracted to men/male-aligned nonbinaries. For example, gay men, pansexual men, and demiboys attracted to other demiboys could all be considered achillean. The term is derived from the mythical character Achilles who had a relationship with Patroclus.

Some alternate terms for achillean are “vincian” (derived from Leonardo da Vinci), “wildean” (derived from Oscar Wilde), and “hyacique” from the Hyacinth flower and minor Greek deity.

The achillean pride flag incorporates blue as the color of maleness, and a green carnation which is a historical symbol of gayness.

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Happy Holidays!

We hope everyone is staying warm and safe and healthy. As always, don’t hesitate to reach out to a group admin if you need support or have questions.

Online Anime Night and Virtual Coffee Shop are still ongoing every Wednesday. Let us know if you have ideas for new types of meetup!

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Mental Wellbeing

Times are hard for everyone. Our group admins care about your health, both mental and physical. If you are experiencing suicidal thoughts or just need to vent your feelings, please reach out to a friend or health care professional.

In our Discord chat you can vent your feelings in #personal-support. Note that our meetup members and admins are not professionally qualified in mental health but we will do our best to support you.

Here are some ways you can reach someone trained in mental crisis:

In Travis County you can always call the Integral Care Help Hotline at 512-472-4357.

Contact Crisis Text Line from anywhere in the USA by texting HOME to 741-741.

A counselor from The Trevor Project (services specifically for LGBTQ+ people) can be reached by phone 1-866-488-7386 or by texting START to 678-678.

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Update to our Coronavirus response

this is a follow up post to our last virus post on march 14.

Coronavirus.

Hello everyone,

We are still not holding IRL meetups. We discussed this and decided it was still too soon to be social in a physical meetup space.

once I have a more firm idea, of when we go back to IRL meetups i will let everyone know.

thanks,

Faye