QueerAfrofuturistik 2019

Last November, we coproduced and cohosted a collaborative event for Black queer & trans people during AfroTech—9,000 Black technologists were in Oakland for the conference. Color Bloq’s role was to help connect the broader Black queer community with this space funded by diversity teams at three tech companies—Unity Technologies, Abstract, and Instrument. One of the first things we did was bring in Dannie, Asha, and Dejuan from Good VBZ—there was no other thought in our minds about who to include. But we also reached out to Imani Sims at RADAR Productions to be our emcee; educator, activist, and organizer Kin Folkz of Spectrum Queer Media to be our keynote speaker; and dozens more people in the local community to come and share space. As a collective of five organizations that normally spend zero time together, we created something great, and a first for AfroTech. 300 people came to our outdoor event. This was important for Color Bloq because it is a core part of our mission: we celebrate our joy. With music, dancing, laughs, smiles, hugs, and nods of validation and understanding, the night was a rousing success. And we will do it again. (Poster by Guerrilla Davis)

When POC Is Not Enough: Anti-Blackness in the LGBTQ+ Community

On October 25, 2019, Color Bloq co-hosted Volume 2 of this community discussion, working with Compton’s Transgender Cultural District, The Commonwealth Club of California, the Michelle Meow Show, and more. We brought this conversation to a bigger audience, featuring even more voices, to talk about the ways anti-Blackness affects Black trans & queer people, the challenge of navigating spaces in the LGBTQ+ community.

Angels At The Front

On September 19, 2019, we brought together staff from the Bay Area chapter of Border Angels, trans women from VisibiliT, poet Flava Mora, host Monica Bocanegro, and more, for a very special discussion about community building and community action for Latinx LGBTQ+ asylum seekers. It was an all-women, trans, and nonbinary event on stage in front of an empowering community audience. Donated goods were collected, DJ La Femme Papi played music throughout the event, and staff members of Strut and SF AIDS Foundation led us in a healing circle to close the night.

QTPoC Assemble

On August 4, 2019, Color Bloq hosted a diverse and intentional group of creators, organizers, and community leaders to discuss collaboration and community building, to find ways to pool our resources and make more room for QTPoC in the increasingly gentrified San Francisco Bay Area. This is part of our mission, to elevate QTPoC community within our organization, and to elevate the community of QTPoC organizations we are part of.

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QT-Con: QTPoC Reflections In Comics

In March, we brought together a packed house of comic book nerds and fandoms to discuss QTPOC representation in comic books, the history of QTPOC comic books characters, the importance and impact of that representation with a full panel of creators from major publishers and independent artists. Tabling, food, and discussions made this event one of our most successful to date. Stay tuned for QT-Con 2! coming March 2020!

When 'POC' is Not Enough: Anti-Blackness in LGBTQ Communities

For a special Black History Month panel, it was standing-room only with an overflow crowd on the second floor, as leaders and activists in the Black queer & trans family carried a 2-hour conversation on anti-Blackness, strategies for overcoming, and building community. Between good food, laughs, and a living-room atmosphere, we held space for a safe and familiar conversation.

Winds, Waves, & Stars: Voices of the Diaspora, A Holiday Kickback Event

In our final Kickback of 2018, we held space for a community conversation featuring guests from the Transgender Law Center and LGBT Asylum Project, as we brought our theme of the month, DIASPORA, from our digital magazine into a community space. These speakers shared stories of migration, provided insight on incorporating asylum seekers into our daily activism, and shared their own struggles as QTPOC immigrants in the LGBTQ community.

Issa Snack, Issa Meal, Issa Vibe!

In October, we featured an online collection of stories around body acceptance in the QTPOC family in our theme of the month, BODY. That month’s Kickback explored the QTPC body experience through visual arts by creatives from around the Bay Area, burlesque and drag performances from three of the Bay’s finest, and community building all night long for our QTPOC family.

The X In Latinx

What does Latinidad and the X in Latinx mean to Black and Indigenous Latinx communities, to women, femmes, trans and non-binary Latinx individuals, and to queers of every background in the Latinx community? We explored these questions in our monthly theme, X, and in our Kickback last September to a packed 3rd floor of Strut in the Castro, San Francisco. This was our first regular event as the organization-in-residence for QTPOC at Strut, in partnership with the SF AIDS Foundation.

Heauxs of Color

Our very first Kickback event coincided with our theme for July 2018, TOUCH, and it was all about intimacy. We assembled a panel of QTPOC favorites to give us a talk on different kinds of intimacy, navigating interpersonal relationships through an intersectional framework, and provided the audience with sex positive frameworks for taking ownership of our bodies, emotions, and sexual health. We had a DJ playing hip-hop and R&B, a table full of Popeye’s, endless bottles of wine, and all the sunshine the top floor and patio balcony of Strut could provide.