LGBT International Aid

Everyone is aware of the current humanitarian plight in Haiti, which has been recently struck by two major earthquakes.

Many organizations are supporting relief efforts to the area. LGBT and allied folks, however, need to be more careful with donations than others. We don't want to support a supposed charity that might provide disaster relief in this situation but then use funds to support antigay initiatives.

Rainbow World Fund is an all-volunteer international humanitarian service agency based in the gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and friends community. Their mission is to promote LGBT philanthropy in the area of world humanitarian relief.

RWF currently supports projects focusing on global HIV/AIDS, water development, landmine eradication, hunger, education, orphans and disaster relief in Africa, Asia, Central America, the Caribbean, and the United States.

RWF also works to raise awareness of the charitable contributions of the LGBT community, and to establish connections with non-LGBT communities.

The Rainbow World Fund works to provide humanitarian aid to communities in need around the world, to create awareness within the LGBT community of the need for these relief efforts, and to change perceptions of the LGBT community by putting our highest beliefs and values into action demonstrating our compassion and caring for the world.

In many cases, the act of helping someone else helps put our own problems and struggles in perspective. And by helping someone else, we affirm our participation in a larger world and emphasize our commonality over our differences.

In the end, that ultimately helps ourselves and the entire LGBT community.

The Elephant in Our Room

There's been a lot of coverage in the LGBT press recently about cutbacks at organizations working for our rights. There's no denying it's scary. There's no denying we've had some worrying moments.

Here at Equality North Carolina, we've been holding our own and created a conservative budget for the coming year. It means we have to wait to create and fill staff positions in the areas of policy and communications. It means the four of us on staff will need to be a bit more creative and stay focused on our priorities: getting our anti-bullying bill passed, holding back a constitutional amendment against marriage equality for the sixth year in a row, showing our power and dignity through Lobby Day on March 24, putting on an even bigger and better Equality Conference & Gala to re-inspire activism next year, making sure everyone feels valued within our glorious statewide movement.

We're ready and we know why. It's because we're fortunate and truly honored to represent the needs of extraordinary people all across our state. People like all of the college and high school students who attended the Equality Conference & Gala this year, or all of the energized young folks who gathered at Prop 8 rallies held across the state. We salute the people involved with local AIDS groups; local PFLAGs; pro-equality churches, campuses, and nonprofits; pro-equality blogs, websites, and publications; and NC Pride and all the local Pride events we attended this year.

We salute our friends at Replacements, Ltd., Food Lion, Haas McNeil & Associates, PA, Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams, IBM, GlaxoSmithKline, and all the other pro-equality companies that so generously sponsored this year's Equality Conference & Gala in the face of an economic meltdown. We salute the 88 individuals who made gifts or pledges at the gala in response to a matching challenge from Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation--the challenge was to raise $5,000 and we raised almost $14,000 in amounts ranging from $5 to $1,200.

We salute our board members, interns, and volunteers who all stepped up this year to help us raise needed money and inspire needed activists. We hosted 750 people at five special events across the state this year. Just think of the ripple effects. Just think of the future. With friends like ours--with the sheer amazing variety of people who have joined us--we're ready. Most of all, we're grateful.

--Kay Flaminio

We're All Members

I'm sometimes asked why we no longer ask people to make a minimum donation to become members of Equality North Carolina. The simple answer is that we don't want to turn anyone away from our vital cause. We consider each and every one of our supporters to be valued members of our great statewide LGBT equality community. We don't think someone should get to be called a member just because he or she is a donor.

First of all, there's the very practical problem of determining that minimum donation amount. The standard amount is usually $35 or sometimes $50, but we have lots of folks who can only give $25 or even $10--should they be denied membership because they can't give more?

And what about all the folks who can only volunteer? Isn't their time also money? Certainly our interns and other volunteers help us stretch our budget, and there's no denying the power of our online activists when they generate tens of thousands of emails and phone calls to legislators. It's because of them that our voice is heard in the halls of the North Carolina General Assembly.

As soon as you set a dollar amount for membership, you're automatically denying a voice to people who can't make the minimum donation, or to people who can only volunteer time. Plus you're getting into territory where endless hairs can be split. If only our donors could be called members, then we'd have 1,000 members. If both our donors and volunteers are members, then we have 12,000 members. And if all these folks bring us new friends because we respect everyone equally regardless of ability to pay, then our membership is probably more like 50,000.

We are a community rather than a membership organization. In a community, everyone is a member because everyone brings something valuable to the table. Some of us are fortunate enough to be able to make donations and receive donor benefits as opposed to member benefits, but this doesn't make us better. On the contrary, I'd argue that part of the reason we give is to help make it possible for all voices to be heard in our glorious movement. I know it's one of the reasons I give.

-Kay Flaminio