Along the Rainbow:
2024 Pride Month Newsletter
Compiled and Edited by Steven Goings, aka Quazar (to subscribe send your email to sgoings@csumb.edu with the subject: Subscribe Rainbow)
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Welcome to Our First Edition!
Hi. I'm Quazar, the 2024 Grand Marshal for Monterey Peninsula Pride's parade and celebration.
The Purpose of the Along the Rainbow newsletter is to highlight the people, organizations and activities of LGBTQ+ Monterey Bay Communities.
This includes the goings on of our four local Pride organizations, (Santa Cruz, Monterey Peninsula, Salinas Valley and Pajaro Valley) as well as various online groups such as the Monterey Bay LGBTQ+ Network, the LGBTQ+ History Project Monterey County and Monterey LGBTQ & Friends Meetup.
Our various pride websites and online communities do a good job of posting LGBTQ+ related info and activities on their pages, but you have to go to each of those websites and socials to get a comprehensive view of what's going on in our community.
The ultimate purpose of this newsletter is to be a central hub of timely information for the LGBTQ+ communities of Monterey Bay that comes directly to you (please subscribe). There will be weekly editions in the months of June and October (LGBTQ+ Pride & History months), with biweekly or monthly editions otherwise.
Future editions will include profiles of local queer activists and a gathering of LGBTQ+ resources including a listing of local LGBTQ+ owned businesses.
Please spread the word....(wait for it...)
ALONG THE RAINBOW!
-- Quazar
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Along the Rainbow Land Acknowledgement by Quazar | |
Photo by Ohlone Coastanoan Esselen Tribal Chairwoman Louise J. Miranda Ramirez | |
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Along the Rainbow acknowledges that our local LGBTQ+ communities live and thrive on the traditional, ancestral territories and homelands of the Esselen, Rumsen, Costanoan and Ohlone people. As an oppressed community ourselves, we must acknowledge that we reside on land stolen from indigenous people through physical and cultural violence. That cultural violence included the transmission of colonial Christian homophobia and transphobia to indigenous communities through boarding schools and missions with the express purpose of suppressing Two-Spirit people who went from being regarded as holy by their own indigenous communities to being regarded as deviants by European, Mexican and American settlers. To support and learn more about the surviving indigenous communities of Monterey, we encourage you to visit any of their websites:
www.esselentribe.org
www.ohlonecostanoanesselennation.org
www.costanoanrumsen.org
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LOCAL Pride Celebrations
49th Santa Cruz Pride Festival Information:
- Date: Sunday June 2, 2024
- Time: 11 am (parade); 12- 4pm (festival)
- Place: Downtown Santa Cruz
- Stage One: Abbott Square
- Stage Two: Intersection of Pacific Ave. and Locus St.
- Theme: Beacon of Pride
- Contact: Logan at logan.kwalker@gmail with questions or concerns
- Website: https://santacruzpride.org/
Monterey Peninsula Pride Parade & Celebration Information:
- Date: Saturday June 29, 2024
- Time: 11 am (parade); 12-3pm (celebration)
- Place: Downtown Monterey
- Parade: Hartnell & Polk Street
- Celebration: Custom House Plaza
- Theme: Be Queer Here
- Contact: Beth at bethwalker@peninsulapride.org
- Website: https://www.peninsulapride.org/
Pararo Valley Pride Info:
- Date: Sunday Aug 18, 2024
- Time: 11 to 4 pm
- Place: 340 East Beach Street, Watsonville
- Contact: Info@pajarovalleypride.org
- Website: https://pajarovalleypride.org/
Salinas Valley Pride Celebrations Info:
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49th Annual Santa Cruz Pride Parade
Cheer on our Grand Marshals, watch cheerleaders, listen to bands and view a wide variety of contingents making up the largest LGBTQ+ Pride parade on the Central Coast. The Santa Cruz Pride parade and fesival celebrates the LGBTQ+ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, transgender, Queer/Questioning Plus) community in Santa Cruz County. The parade and festival is a safe and inclusive space for the queer community and their allies. You are welcome to be who you are and join the organizations, allies, supportive groups, churches, candidates, ensembles, performers, parents, children to show your pride, activism, enthusiasm and love.
Parade Route and Festival Following
The parade travels along Pacific from Cathcart to Locust. Following the parade, join us at the Festival on Cooper Street, Abbott Square and in the MAH (free admission, art project for youth and the young at heart).
The Festival will take place along Cooper Street and Pacific Avenue.
Where to Park? restrooms?
See this map of parking lot and restroom locations in downtown Santa Cruz.
Share Your Photos
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Introducing Our 2024 Santa Cruz Grand Marshal:
We are thrilled to introduce you to Elaine Johnson, a driving force within our community. As President of the Santa Cruz NAACP and Executive Director of Housing Santa Cruz County, Elaine embodies the spirit of diverse and compassionate leadership. Her unwavering dedication to uplifting the queer community of color through her exceptional community service is nothing short of inspiring.
Elaine's journey from overcoming adversity to becoming a beacon of hope and empowerment touches the lives of everyone around her. Her groundbreaking work at Housing Santa Cruz County has brought forth numerous affordable housing projects, making housing more accessible for everyone in our county. As the leader of the NAACP, she has infused a renewed sense of diversity and compassion, empowering the local black community.
Let's join together in celebrating Elaine Johnson, a true role model and leader. Stay tuned for an equally inspiring announcement of our second Grand Marshal tomorrow! And don’t forget to join us at the Santa Cruz Pride Parade and Festival on June 2nd in Downtown Santa Cruz.
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Introducing Our 2024 Santa Cruz Grand Marshal:
Introducing Pat Dellin, a dedicated leader within our community. As a Community Organizer and Former Diversity Center Board Member, Pat’s commitment to preserving LGBTQ+ history and creating meaningful exhibits has left an indelible mark on our community.
Pat organized and collected all the LGBTQ+ archive materials from individuals around Santa Cruz, ensuring their preservation at the MAH and playing a key role in the creation of the Queerstory online and in-person exhibit.
Pat’s impact extends beyond preservation, having contributed significantly to pride events and notably spearheading the organization of the virtual pride event in 2020. The founding of the Trailblazers program at the Diversity Center and years of advocacy and organization since the first pride in 1975 stand as a testament to Pat’s unwavering commitment to the LGBTQ+ community.
Let’s come together to celebrate Pat Dellin, a true trailblazer and community advocate. And don’t forget to join us at the Santa Cruz Pride Parade and Festival on June 2nd in Downtown Santa Cruz.
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Quazar (they-them-their) currently identifies as a bigender androsexual. Quazar is a founding organizer for Monterey Peninsula Pride, is a former president of the organization, and now serves as an emeritus board member. Quazar’s roots in activism lay in their struggle to integrate intersectional identities whose communities were often at odds with one another; specifically, African American, Christian and LGBTQ+ identities and communities.
Seeking a spiritual community where they could be openly gay, they moved from Seaside to San Francisco in 1987 and got involved with an LGBTQ+ serving new age / omnifaith church called Radiant Light Ministries. Radiant Light taught that our spiritual potential is activated by serving our communities.
At 43, they enrolled at Cal State Monterey Bay as an undergraduate where they discovered their inner activist. Quazar’s graduating capstone project was Queer Spirit: Queer Navigations of Christian Cultural Terrain. They were a co-founder of the LGBTQ+ student club Out and About (now the Pride Club), and was among the first group of CSUMB’s Rainbow Graduates in 2010. In 2014, they were recognized for their HIV/AIDS activism by Central Coast HIV/AIDS Services.
Over the years, Quazar has co-designed LGBTQ+ Safe Zone training for CSUMB, Hartnell and Interim, Inc. Quazar is among the original organizers of Monterey Peninsula Pride’s first parade and program in 2017. Each non-COVID year they have organized the MPP’s interfaith welcome and pride panel.
Last summer, they facilitated a transgender mental health panel for The Village Project, Inc. This summer at the Village Project, they will be facilitating a celebration of local LGBTQ+ activist a week before Monterey Pride's parade and celebration.
Quazar currently works at CSUMB, where they co-facilitate the LGBTQ+ counseling and support group for students and co-facilitate the CSUMB LGBTQ+ Employees Affinity Group which was instrumental in developing CSUMB's Rainbow Raft Pride Center which opened in May 2024. They are honored to serve as Monterey Peninsula Pride’s Grand Marshal for its 2024 Parade and Celebration.
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Save the Date!
Monterey Peninsula Pride's Parade & Celebration
Sat June 29th, from 11 am to 3 pm
Monterey Custom House Plaza
Look for our flier in next week's edition of Along the Rainbow
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In the Spotlight:
The Rainbow Raft Pride Center
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Excerpts from March 29, 2024 KAZU article by Janelle Salanga from https://www.kazu.org/kazu-news/2024-03-29/finding-trans-community-around-the-monterey-bay
Long-time CSU Monterey Bay professor David Reichard teaches history and legal studies. He was one of the advisors to the campus’s first LGBTQ+ student group after arriving on campus in 1999.
“The activism of those students has been very responsive to the specifics of the time — for example, in 2000, when California was considering an anti-gay marriage proposition on the ballot, the students here really organized around that,” he said. “I remember tabling with them in the front of the post office. We had events on campus.”
Still, he recalled, not every LGBTQ+ student was gung-ho about public organizing.
“Some of the first group of students that I worked with in that [first iteration of the] club really didn't want to be public,” he said. “So we met in my office, because it had no windows.”
But he’s seen the campus shift over the past 25 years, citing drag shows in the fall and CSU Monterey Bay’s Rainbow Graduation ceremony, which Reichard said hosted “a record number of students this year.”
“That’s a very public, visible event,” he said. “I mean, it’s amazing.”
The Rainbow Raft Pride Center, which formalizes resources and creates a dedicated space for LGBTQ+ students, is set to open in May, and Reichard is working with students and staff to get the center going.
Part of its work creating visibility will be connecting students to the legacy of trans and queer organizing on the CSU Monterey Bay campus.
“We have a plan to put a wall of CSUMB queer history here in the center, with images and photographs and documents,” Reichard said. “So students who come into the center know that they're standing on the shoulders of a whole generation of students who organized before them.”
-- Janelle Salanga
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In the Spotlight:
Here Are My People:
LGBT College Student Organizing in California
A Book By CSUMB Professor David A. Reichard
Uploaded from: https://ugapress.org/book/9780820366760/here-are-my-people/
How a trailblazing group of college student activists made their mark on the history of the modern LGBTQ movement
Beginning in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s, a new generation of LGBT students in California began to organize publicly on college and university campuses, inspired by contemporaneous social movements and informed by California’s rich history of LGBT community formation and political engagement. Here Are My People documents how a trailblazing group of queer student activists in California made their mark on the history of the modern LGBTQ movement and paved the way for generations of organizers who followed.
Rooted in extensive archival research and original oral histories, Here Are My People explores how this organizing unfolded, comparing different regions, types of campuses, and diverse student populations. Through campus-based organizations and within women’s studies programs, and despite various forms of reactionary resistance, student organizers promoted LGBT-themed educational programming and changes to curriculum, provided peer support like counseling and hotlines, and sponsored events showcasing queer creative practices including poetry, theater, and film. Collaborating across various campuses, they formed regional and statewide alliances. And, importantly, LGBT student organizers engaged California’s vibrant gay liberation and lesbian feminist political communities, forging new and important relationships in the movement which enhanced both on and off-campus LGBT organizing.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR/EDITOR
DAVID A. REICHARD is Professor of History and Legal Studies at California State University - Monterey Bay. He has written extensively on oral history and student activism in California.
TITLE DETAILS
Pages: 255
Illustrations: 14 b&w photos
Trim size: 6.000in x 9.000in
FORMATS
Paperback
Pub Date: 06/01/2024
ISBN: 9-780-8203-6676-0
List Price: $29.95
PRE-ORDER
Hardcover
Pub Date: 06/01/2024
ISBN: 9-780-8203-6633-3
List Price: $114.95
PRE-ORDER
eBook
Pub Date: 06/01/2024
ISBN: 9-780-8203-6688-3
List Price: $29.95
eBook
Pub Date: 06/01/2024
ISBN: 9-780-8203-6689-0
List Price: $29.95
Paperback Pre-Order Link
Hardback Pre-Order Link
Per the author, use the code 08SALE for a 50% discount; good through June 21st
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In the Spotlight:
Local LGBTQ+ Progressive Flag Raisings
- City of Carmel: Mon June 3rd - Point of Contact: nromero@cbts.us
- City of Del Rey Oaks: Sat June 1st - Noon - City Hall / 650 Canyon Del Rey Blvd - Point of Contact: John Uy; juy@delreyoaks.org
- City of Marina: Sat June 1st - 11 am - Vince Di Maggio Park / 3200 Del Monte Blvd - Point of Contact: Brian McCarthy, bmccarthy@cityofmarina.org
- City of Monterey:
- City of Pacific Grove:
- City of Salinas: Fri May 31 - 9 am - City Hall / 200 Lincoln Ave. - Point of Contact: City Clerk; cclerk@ci.salinas.ca.us
- City of Sand City:
- City of Seaside: Thu June 6 - 4 pm - City Hall, 440 Harcourt Ave. - Point of Contact: Alexis Garcia Arrazola; agarcia@ci.seaside.ca.us
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The Laramie Project article from Monterey County NOW published on May 30, 2024 at...
A local church is kicking off Pride Month with a powerful reading on the tragedy of hate.
by Agata Popeda
Matthew Shepard was a gay student at the University of Wyoming who was beaten, tortured, and left to die near the Wyoming town of Laramie on Oct. 6, 1998. He died in a hospital several days later. Shepard’s story inspired films and TV shows, but also a stage play, The Laramie Project, that you can see as a dramatic reading at Epiphany Lutheran & Episcopal Church in Marina.
“Extremely powerful,” says Pastor Jon Perez, the church vicar who made it happen. “The church would always be involved in a theatrical project one year before the pandemic,” he adds. “It’s time to bring it back. It’s a great way to kick off Pride Month.”
It may be shocking to certain people who claim the stamp of religion that such a tribute takes place in a church, but the Epiphany Church is certainly not the only temple that showed such compassion. In fact, Shepard’s remains found their resting place in one of the most beautiful churches in the U.S., the neo-Gothic Washington National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.
“We are a progressive church,” Perez says. “At the same time, we are a very diverse church, also politically.” None of the church members had anything against the idea, according to Perez, and many of them will participate in The Laramie Project.
The core of the project – created originally in 2000 by Moisés Kaufman, a Venezuelan American playwright and the founder of Tectonic Theater Project in New York City – are multiple stories told by people who knew Shepard, who participated in the event and in a trial after his death. In other words, we meet indirect witnesses of Shepard’s story.
Thirteen local actors will do the reading. It is directed by Karen Cusson and Tiffany Torez is in charge of stage management. Both are church members.
“People share their view of the tragic event, which makes a great impact,” Perez says about the underlying advocacy. The murder was denounced as a hate crime and brought attention to the lack of hate crime laws in various states.
But Perez also observes that while the LGBTQ+ community seems to have more rights than ever, hate crimes are on the rise. “There are more rights but also more violence,” he says.
THE LARAMIE PROJECT runs at 7pm Friday, May 31 and Saturday, June 1. Epiphany Lutheran & Episcopal Church, 424 Carmel Ave., Marina. Free; reservations required. 384-6323, epiphanymarina.org.
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Saturday, June 8
STRYKER FORCE
By Flex Party @ FlexPartyPride
8-9:30 PM
Bulldog Sport Club; 611 Lighthouse Ave., Monterey
General Admission: $15.00
Click Here for Tickets
JOIN US FOR A NIGHT OF INCREDIBLE MUSIC, HOT GO-GO DANCERS, SINGERS, AND A STAR STUDED-DRAG SHOW. THIS IS A NIGHT YOU WON'T WANT TO MISS!!
Come join us at BULLDOGS SPORTS PUB for an epic night of fun and incredible music by DJ ATMOS, hot go-go dancers, singers, and a star-studded drag show to start off PRIDE month. THIS IS A NIGHT YOU WON'T WANT TO MISS!! Experience the pleasure and excitement of our very own SOCCER HOTTIES and don't miss out on the action - mark your calendars and you might just SCORE.......A GOAL!!
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Sunday, June 9
XYZ COMEDY
Featuring (Lesbian) Comic Lulu Vee
7:30 PM
Sunset Center; Saint Carlos Street at 9th Ave., Carmel
General Admission: $35.00
Click Here for Tickets
Irene Tu is an LA-based stand-up comedian, actor and writer who honed her chops in San Francisco. Her first comedy album WE’RE DONE NOW debuted in March of this year at #1 on the iTunes comedy charts. Irene has performed at Netflix Is A Joke comedy festival in the highly coveted “INTRODUCING” showcase. Her STAND-UP FEATURING set is the most watched reel on Comedy Central’s Stand-Up’s Instagram page, with over 2.7 million views. Paste Magazine praised Irene’s “quick wit, relaxed stage presence, and hilariously off-the-wall observations” in this album that “ticks all the boxes of a winning introduction, and then some.” She was named one of Vulture’s “Comedians You Should and Will Know” and singled out in The SF Chronicle as an “artist on the brink of fame.” She’s a regular at festivals and clubs around the country and opens for comics like Taylor Tomlinson and Patton Oswalt.
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Sunday, June 16
MONTEREY BAE PRIDE BRUNCH
Hosted By Lulu Vee
8-9:30 PM
Paperwing Theatre Supper Club; 711 Cannery Row, Suite 1, Monterey
General Admission: $40.00
Click Here for Tickets
Join LuLu Vee and her collection of dazzling queens and celebrate PRIDE month in style. Ticket includes entry to show and a delicious brunch buffet. Indulge in Bottomless Mimosas for an additional charge. It is an experience you will not want to miss!!
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Monthly (2nd Thursdays)
LGBTQ+ GAME NIGHT
Monterey LGBTQ+ Network
7 - 9 PM
Springhill Suites Marina, the Dunes on Monterey Bay / 215 10th Street, Marina
Free Event by "Cole"
Join us for our monthly social game night (2nd Thursday of each month). We will be playing Cards Against Humanity or something similar so people can pick it up easily and jump in and out as needed. There is a bar that serves sodas and alcohol (whatever your pleasure), and they have some appetizers as well. Feel free to bring a friend or partner along, allies are very welcome . **Adults only**
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