Reflections and Dreams of Liberation
“Our dream world doesn’t just appear. We have to imagine it first.”
For Pride 2024, the Praxis team wanted to take time for reflection on the past and the beauty in our communities as well as imagine a liberated future. We brought together some beloved community members for a panel to dream together.
This full recording is in English with ASL interpretation and English subtitles.
We also have the full transcription in both English and Spanish.
Panelists & Moderator Bios
Jamie Frazier (he/him) is the Executive Pastor of Lighthouse Church of Chicago UCC and Executive Director of the Lighthouse Foundation of Chicagoland--both institutions center Black LGBTQ+ liberation. A graduate of Vanderbilt University, he is a celebrated orator in venues such as the March on Springfield for Marriage Equality and the Creating Change Conference. He's also given keynotes and presentations at research institutions such as Northwestern's Alliance for Research in Chicagoland Communities, the University of Chicago, DePaul University, and Loyola University. Chicago Theological Seminary recognized him as the inaugural recipient of the Bayard Rustin Award for Outstanding Service and Commitment to the Work of Social Justice (2017). His work has been featured on CNN, The Washington Post, and several local Chicago news affiliates.
Pidgeon Pagonis, M.A. has worked for over a decade as an intersex advocate, speaker, consultant, photographer and filmmaker to shed light on the human rights violations endured by intersex people. Their goal is to help end the non-consensual irreversible medical procedures meant to discipline unruly intersex bodies. Pidgeon’s accessible advocacy helps people complicate their preconceived binary notions about “biological differences”. Their work has been essential for those who want to show up for intersex people in their lives, but aren’t sure where to start. Whether advancing the intersex cause as the co-founder of the Intersex Justice Project (IJP), co-producing viral informational videos, creating art that centers intersex voices, appearing on the cover of National Geographic “Gender Revolution” special issue or being honored as a LGBT Champion of Change in by the Obama White House, Pidgeon has staked out a place at the fore of debates on intersexuality. In 2020, IJP’s #EndIntersexSurgery campaign succeeded in getting Lurie Children’s to become the first hospital in the nation to apologize and halt surgeries. Their memoir Nobody Needs to Know was published in 2023 by Little A Press.
Tania Cordova (she/her) is the Program Director of Immigration Legal Services + Housing/Health Educator at Casa Ruby. She is a member of LGTBQ Immigrant Rights Coalition and the Translatin@ Coalition. Additionally, Tania is the Director of The LGTBQ pilot transitional housing at Casa Ruby. Tania is an advocate, community-educator and promotora for human rights, equality, liberation, and universal healthcare, and breaking the cycle of poverty, criminalization, and imprisonment in trans-LGBQ and immigrant communities. Through the TJLP and in collaboration with ACLU, The Chicago House, Greenberg Traurig Law Firm, and Brave Space Alliance, Tania is a part of current efforts in Illinois to reform name change legislation advocating for the public safety of transgender people by making the name change process accessible. In 2020 Tania created The Name Change Policy Coalition. In 2018, Tania formed SER El Cambio, a non-profit organization whose purpose is to help transgender women being released from incarceration by providing access to resources for personal and spiritual growth, transformation, and lifelong wellness. Through SER El Cambio she provides training and case management support to transgender immigrant women being detained and released from the Cibola immigrant prison in New Mexico in collaboration with the Casa Colibrí transformative justice house in Albuquerque. Her long-term vision is to operate a re-entry program and transitional living organization for trans Immigrant women seeking asylum and for trans women of color getting released from prison in the US.
Karari Olvera (she/her/ella and they/them/elle) is the non-binary trans femme first-born of Mexican immigrant parents. As a writer, activist, and public speaker, her art and work has focused on the uplifting of voices living in the intersections of gender, race, and ethnicity through storytelling and workshop facilitation. Karari currently serves as co-chair of United Latinx Pride and Central Co-Director of the National Board of the TransLatin@ Coalition. You can catch her IRL in Chicago dropping trans truth on the Hoodoisie, a live and live-streamed news show disseminating radical perspectives on culture and politics. You can also find Karari working as a certified pharmacy technician in Humboldt Park, working with many patients of marginalized experiences to ensure affirming care and access to medical coverage.
Transcript
Karari Olvera (0:00 - 1:31)
My name is Karari Olvera. My pronouns are she/her and they/them and I am one of the facilitators at Praxis Group. We are a Chicago-based consulting group comprised entirely of people living at the intersections that we speak about. So we are very much dedicated to the liberation of our communities, and when we talk about power and dynamics and privilege, transphobia, homophobia - it is because we are personally impacted by these things.
Today we are joined by three wonderful community members. I will start off by introducing them all with their bios. So today we're joined by Jamie Frazier who uses he/him pronouns and is the Executive Pastor of Lighthouse Church of Chicago UCC and Executive Director of the Lighthouse Foundation of Chicagoland. Both institutions center Black LGBTQ+ liberation. A graduate of Vanderbilt University, he is a celebrated orator in venues such as the March on Springfield for Marriage Equality and the Creating Change Conference. He's also given keynotes and presentations at research institutions such as Northwestern's Alliance for Research in Chicagoland Communities, the University of Chicago, DePaul University, and Loyola University Chicago. Chicago Theological Seminary recognized him as the inaugural recipient of the Bayard Rustin Award for Outstanding Service and Commitment to the Work of Social Justice (2017). His work has been featured on CNN, The Washington Post, and several local Chicago news affiliates. Thank you so much, Jamie, for joining us today.
KO (1:31 - 3:01)
We are also joined by Pidgeon who is currently still off camera but will be on shortly. Pidgeon has worked for over a decade as an intersex advocate, speaker, consultant, photographer and filmmaker to shed light on the human rights violations endured by intersex people. Their goal is to help end the non-consensual irreversible medical procedures meant to discipline unruly intersex bodies. Pidgeon’s accessible advocacy helps people complicate their preconceived binary notions of “biological differences''. Their work has been essential for those who want to show up for intersex people in their lives, but aren’t sure where to start. Whether advancing the intersex cause as the co-founder of the Intersex Justice Project (IJP), co-producing viral informational videos, creating art that centers intersex voices, appearing on the cover of National Geographic “Gender Revolution'' special issue or being honored as a LGBT Champion of Change in by the Obama White House, Pidgeon has staked out a place at the fore of debates on intersexuality. In 2020, IJP’s #EndIntersexSurgery campaign succeeded in getting Lurie Children’s Hospital to become the first hospital in the nation to apologize and halt surgeries. Their memoir Nobody Needs to Know was published in 2023 by Little A Press. Currently they're working on getting their new feature length documentary about intersex healing funded. Thank you so much, Pidgeon, for joining us today.
KO (3:02 - 4:46)
And last but not least, my good friend Tania Cordova, who uses she/her pronouns and she is the Program Director of Immigration Legal Services + Housing/Health Education at Casa Ruby. She is a member of LGTBQ Immigrant Rights Coalition and the Translatina Coalition. Additionally, Tania is the Director of The LGTBQ pilot transitional housing at Casa Ruby. Tania is an advocate, community-educator and promotora for human rights, equality, liberation, and universal healthcare, and breaking the cycle of poverty, criminalization, and imprisonment in trans-LGBQ and immigrant communities.Through the TJLP and in collaboration with ACLU, The Chicago House, Greenberg Traurig Law Firm, and Brave Space Alliance, Tania is a part of current efforts in Illinois to reform name change legislation advocating for the public safety of transgender people by making the name change process accessible. In 2020 Tania created The Name Change Policy Coalition. In 2018, Tania formed SER El Cambio, a non-profit organization whose purpose is to help transgender women being released from incarceration by providing access to resources for personal and spiritual growth, transformation, and lifelong wellness. Through SER El Cambio she provides training and case management support to transgender immigrant women being detained and released from the Cibola immigrant prison in New Mexico in collaboration with the Casa Colibrí transformative justice house in Albuquerque. Her long-term vision is to operate a re-entry program and transitional living organization for trans Immigrant women seeking asylum and for trans women of color getting released from prison in the US. Thank you so much, Tania, for joining us.
KO (4:47 - 5:43)
And obviously y’all can see these are 3 amazing people doing amazing work for our community and we are truly truly honored that you all have joined us today, during Pride, the last week of Pride. Let's get started! Now, we talk a lot about what is wrong with the world, and when we were creating this idea for this panel, we really were trying to think of like - we always talk about what's wrong with the world, or what we have to fix, but we thought like - what about if we focus on dreaming? What if we focus on the good things? What if we focus on - what is the image we have? Because we can’t actually have a world until we imagine it. And so, to start it off, describe your dream world. What does it look like both globally, locally, but also how does it exist? How does it manifest in your everyday life? Jamie, would you like to start us off?
Jamie Frazier (5:44 - 7:43)
Yeah, thank you so much, Karari, and I also want to thank Jes and Tiffany, the whole Praxis team for having me. I feel very honored to be a part of this panel today. I got a piece of my vision of what a real world could look like at a recent Lighthouse Foundation Black Queer Beach Day… Where we basically did a 63rd street takeover. You had 4 to 500 Black queer bodies on the beach in peace and unity and interdependence among our Black kin, of various sexual orientations and gender identities…and I think that's a snapshot of the better world that I see - where Black, queer, and trans bodies are welcomed, accepted, and affirmed within the wider Black community. And I think even when you take a step back, the world that I see looks like interdependence across lines - not just sexual orientation and gender identity but also race. I think back years ago to when I was working with United Latino Pride, and we were doing United Latino Pride every year, it was powerful to see Black and Brown queer folks working together for our mutual liberation and shared struggle. So what I'm dreaming of are the days in which queer people can exist together and also alongside other folks of our racial and ethnic identity. So I'm not looking for any gay or queer ghettos, I’m looking for our liberation in spaces that are at times for us and by us, but also are spaces in which we coexist with other folk. And we’re able to do so from a place of peace, power, wholeness and liberation.
KO (7:44 - 8:22)
Thank you, I think that the whole idea of interdependence across lines, like I wrote it down and I knew like ‘yes!’ I think when we talk - when we did ULP, United Latino Pride, I was one of the organizers many years ago and the intention was - right - that feel like they're ours but also they feel like anyone can be a part of it - everyone feels welcome. I was honored to have you always come in and support us and of course we love to support y’all. Tania, would you like to add anything else? What do you imagine your dream world looks like?
Tania Cordova (8:23 - 9:57)
Well, first of all, yanno, hi everyone. Thank you all for inviting me to be a panelist, it’s an honor. My dream world has to be a place where everybody has to feel safe and respected. But also a world with no borders, and ugh, yanno, in the world, all human life should be respected. And we all should have the right to live where and how we choose to live, not how the world is right now. So I think that’s my dream, to be respected, not just as a trans immigrant, you know, trans Latina indigenous woman… an immigrant. I think that after 35 years in the United States, I have…It has been a struggle for trans immigrant women, and especially when it comes to - even with all the immigration laws, and I really think we should have the right to live everywhere, and to build a house everywhere that we want to live.And we should not go through all these processes to even have to buy a house. So that’s how I see my dream.
KO (9:58 - 11:05)
And I think you bring up a point… We were talking earlier for anybody who wasn't on during the panel talk - Tania purchased a house - and the idea of having a purchase a house, you know, on this Earth that doesn't belong to anyone, it seems almost absurd that we have to go through all these loopholes just for us to be able to take a piece, you know, of this free Earth, be able to call our home, it seems absurd to think about it but yet we normalize it to the point that it's just this normal thing that we have to have a lot of money to buy land that is just readily available like because the Earth is the way it is. And so I think, yeah, like the idea of open borders is a challenging image for a lot of people. The idea that there should be no borders. That we should be able to move across this Earth as freely as we are because we’re human. I think that’s a beautiful dream, and I really hope we get there. Right? Where we all can just exist and move about as needed.
TC (11:06 - 11:48)
Yeah, and I’m just gonna add something, especially, you know, when it comes to immigration. I’m a huge advocate for people with Withholding of Removal. And – ‘cause I’m one of the persons who has Witholding of Removal. Now, I’m in United States but United States can’t remove me out of this country. So, that means I’m in United States but I’m in a cage. I cannot move out of the United States. So I really would like to have the dream with everybody can actually be free to fly, to go anywhere that, yanno, everywhere that they want to without borders and all those immigration restrictions.
KO (11:49 - 12:00)
Thank you, Tania. Pidge, would you like to share your personal vision of what your dream world looks like - globally, locally?
Pidgeon Pagonis (12:01 - 13:46)
Yeah, thank you to everyone. Thank you, Praxis.Thank you everyone. Thank you to Jamie and Tania before me. You guys, wow, yeah, really thank you, Karari, for saying the Earth is this resource that’s supposed to be for us. My dream world is, of course, a place where intersex people are free to be intersex, where trans people are free to just be, Black and Brown people are free to exist, disabled folks have access to what they need. That goes without being said for me. And Palestine is free. Congo is free. Sudan is free. Everywhere is free! Okay? Let’s just say that. But I wanted to focus on something that I’ve been thinking about a lot more lately, which is about land, and growing food, and gardening. So my dream world is about New York City, and it was like you know, I got off the train, which is great, I'm glad there's a train, but I’m like ‘it could be so much more beautiful!!’ But it’s just like I come up and there's no greenery, and it's just like the smog from the cars is on everything, and I'm like ‘these buildings could be covered in trees and we could be harnessing the sun's power and like not using fossil fuels’ and so that's what I want to talk about. So my dream is - and I'm going to read:
PP (13:47 - 16:08)
In my dream world, everything is designed with permaculture, emergent strategy, and bio-mimicry at its core. Globally it looks like a network of thriving, self-sustaining ecosystems where communities work in harmony with nature. Imagine cities that mimic the efficiency of termite mounds for cooling and heating like they did with the Eastgate Centre in Zimbabwe. Agricultural practices that draw from indigenous wisdom to regenerate the soil and energy systems inspired by sunflowers tracking of the Sun. Locally, neighborhoods would be lush with community gardens, green roofs and urban forests all designed to support biodiversity and local food production. People would use small incremental changes to continuously adapt and improve their environments, drawing from the principles of emergent strategy. Decisions would be made collaboratively embracing the wisdom of the people and the resilience of decentralized systems. In my day-to-day life, I'd be part of a vibrant community where we grow our own food, harvest rainwater and generate energy sustainably. Our homes would be using materials and designs inspired by nature, ensuring they are efficient and harmonious with the environment. We prioritize small acts of care and connection, knowing that every action, no matter how small, contributes to the larger system. By integrating the principles of permaculture, emergent strategy and biomimicry, we create a world that's not only sustainable but also deeply connected, resilient, and full of life. This dream world is a place where humans and nature coexist and thrive together - consciously learning and evolving in response to each others’ needs. So that's what I wanted to say about my dream world. I think that would be the foundation and then I would add things on top of it, but I think those things would actually come a lot easier if we all had food, shelter, safety AND community and connection.
KO (16:09 - 17:51)
That’s like definitely, like, I closed my eyes and I’m kinda imagining it as you were talking and it would be so beautiful! Chicago’s a beautiful city and if there was more greenery, it would be a much more beautiful city. Like truly. There’s just some places - there’s not enough greenery. And there's also this notion that somehow we have to control nature, right? And a lot it comes from this idea that if you can control nature then you can control people, right? All those things just kind of compound on it and if you let nature exist and in unison, then I think it becomes easier to understand how people can exist in unison. If you can have a conversation with nature and yet still exist in unison, then you can probably have a conversation with people and exist in unison. Much easier than it is with nature. And so like, how do we get there? Why is it so difficult sometimes for us to even dream of these possibilities? Because when I was drafting these questions, I was trying to answer them myself, right? And I was struggling a little bit. I knew the talking points. We know the talking points: no racism, no this, no that - and it’s a very ‘no’ based idea of what the dream world is - it’s just ‘no, no, no, no, no’ - but where are the ‘yeses?’ What does it actually look like? And it felt very difficult for me to even start getting past the ‘no’s’ and starting the ‘yes.’ And so why do y’all think it is such a difficult thing for many of us to imagine better worlds?
JF (17:52 - 20:55)
I would really like to thank Pidgeon for writing and sharing that… I’m like ‘when are you writing the book and recording it so I can listen to it on Audible at night to reawaken some new possibilities after I watch MSNBC all day?’ And I think in your articulation you gave the first step to co-creating this world which is to commit it to paper. I think there's something powerful about writing the vision of the world that we want to see and being able to expand to that document as you continue to live, grow, thrive. I also think that when we talk about co-creating a new world, often the reason we start with ‘not this, not that, not that’ is because when you’re on the margins you’re quite clear about what you don’t want, and what you don’t want to face but it becomes a little bit more difficult to think about: ‘Where are the seeds of newness being planted right now?’ Not just this huge ‘pie in the sky’ vision, but where are these things unfolding right now and how do we tap into things in their nascent stage? How do we feed those things? Also how do we connect those things? Chicago is an exciting city and there’s revitalization efforts happening in Englewood and in Humboldt Park and in Pilsen. How do you connect these silos of revitalization into an ecosystem? How do we learn what folks are doing in different parts of the city as well as different parts of the globe? It’s about, I think, writing down the vision, it’s about looking for the seeds, the infancy of revolution of newness in other spaces. Thirdly, it's about connecting transformation as it's happening across the city, across the state, the nation, the globe. And the last thing that I wanted to say is as someone who is very committed to therapy, one thing that my therapist often will ask is ‘the magic question’ - what would your life be like without limitations? Imagine for an example you didn't have any of the stressors that are confronting you right now: How would you live? How would you love? How would you exist? And that is the question that I think we need to ask ourselves as queer people of color every morning that we wake up… so that it gives us the ability to not merely be confined to the way life is, but to the way we want to co-create the world to be. What does a life without limits look like - and write that s*** down. And find other people who share that vision… And connect those visions. Because it's that web of mutuality, that web of revolution, that has the opportunity to really remake the world into the way we want it to be.
KO (20:56 - 21:16)
I am literally writing this s*** down. I was like ‘oooh, commit to paper, write that s*** down’ - now it’s going to be on my wall now, Jamie, thank you, thank you for that. What about y’all? What makes it so difficult for us to dream?
TC (21:17 - 24:51)
Well, I actually had the opportunity to meet Pidgeon 6 years ago when I was doing work for TJLP [Transformative Justice Law Project]. Yeah, you know, I think right now, just lead by example. And I think, yes, go with the flow and I believe in fulfilling my destiny. I’m a farmer you know? I grew up on a farm, I was raised on a farm - and for many years I was disconnected because, you know, I had been living in a city. But now that I went to buy my house and I’m farming and I’m planting and I have my seeds, my tomatoes, my chiles, and all this stuff, you know? And also right here in Baltimore there’s other non profits organizations that do farming and they're actually educating citizens who live in the city to actually farm. We cannot live without food and food comes from the ground. We are not going to be just surviving in fields and water that is toxic. So when we actually reconnect with nature - respect nature - and respect our Mother Earth, then we are going to create this magical world that we need to preserve, right? So I have to be very grateful. I’m right here right by the ocean, the rivers, and it’s green. In December I was actually thinking to move back to Chicago and then when I went to Chicago and I was going through the whole process of meeting with a realtor and then I was like ‘Am I going to go back to the city?’ ‘Am I really wanting to live in the city?” and then all of a sudden destiny shift me to a different way and I ended up being in this area, in Baltimore, which is very green. So you know, for me, being in the mountains and the river and being able to be connected with farmers… that they have to be sustainable by people who actually donate their time to go and farm and harvest. But people in the city - we don't want to do that - we don’t want to farm. We don’t want to dirty our hands. We don’t want to do anything. We want someone to actually go and do the work and bring those vegetables to our table, those food to our table. But we don’t want to contribute, right? So yeah, I think that even in Chicago and some cities - people from other countries like Asian people, they’re trying to have a plot, to have a little piece of land. And they grow beans and cucumbers. So what is wrong with humankind that we don’t want to farm? Or we don’t want to plant those seeds? So we just want to go and harvest and we want to eat, but don’t want to plant the seeds.
KO (24:52 - 25:50)
I think it’s almost a metaphor, Tania, right? This idea... Our resistance to cultivating our own food and cultivating the Earth is very much our resistance to cultivating change. Like we love… I’m sure there’s many of us in the community once ‘gay marriage’ was legal they planned their wedding and they went out. But they weren’t there to fight for it. I think so many of us have this same resistance. We don’t want to cultivate change because it’s hard. You have to get dirty. You have to stick your hands into the Earth and sometimes you fail and sometimes you succeed. And I think it is this resistance that we have in many, many ways. And that resistance is keeping us from even dreaming because if you don’t even start, or like Jamie said, right, if you don't commit to actually writing it down, commit to actually doing it you can’t actually get anywhere.
PP (25:51 - 27:54)
Thank you. My answer is that I think it’s really hard by design. I think going off of what Tania said, I think for me personally I had resistance to it and I I hated it until I actually started doing it so I think a lot of us don't even know how good it feels to be in the dirt - and to use that metaphor - to be in community fighting for change with each other because a lot of us by design have not had access to growing our own food, or literally nurturing or growing our own communities - So I think it's hard by design and I think part of growing up in our society is the process of ‘getting the child beat out of us’ and the child is who has the imagination so that our imagination is also ‘beat out of us.’ I think imagination is a key and central part of anyone's art making process - and art is a threat to the state. The state and the status quo that props it up relies on the smothering of our inner children and our imagination - without a flourishing [video lags] of many people’s… without many people’s imagination within a society [video lags] Ideas that are firmly rooted in our imagination. So I think our schools and the jobs that usually come after, they require us to replace our imagination and our childlike sense of wonder because those are exactly the tools that artists and other people use to challenge the state and the status quo.
KO (27:55 - 29:01)
So I think that's one reason why it's so hard for us to dream of other possibilities. Thank you so much. I really wrote that down. Because one of my questions is like ‘what recalibrates us?’ Like y’all have been doing this work; y’all have been tireless in for advocacy for the many communities that you represent, but also the communities that you don’t represent - because a lot of work, as Jamie has said earlier, right, about fostering interdependence across lines - And so my question to y’all is like - what grounds your work? What has centered your work? To keep the land metaphor: What grounds your work? What recenters it? But also adding this component that Pidgeon introduced: What brings you back to your child, your creative, to that childlike wonder? The cultivation. How do you get there again? Whoever wants to start first - How do you recalibrate? How do you recenter when sometimes the world just knocks us down.
TC (29:02 - 31:25)
I can go first. I work all the time… I have to be grounded. Work, life can knock me down, but I cannot stay on the floor and I cannot wait for somebody to actually come and pick me up. And then you know, I can self care, I’ve been practicing self care when it’s time for me to say, ‘you know what? This is about Tania’ and reconnecting with my inner child and my inner self. As Karari knows and many people actually know - I’m a practitioner of the Yoruba culture, which they call santería. Being spiritual has helped me to actually get re-grounded and recalibrated. It hasn’t been easy to be honest, especially for the work that we do. Especially with direct services. When you do direct services and you see the struggle of different communities and different families, and the LGBTQ family which is our family, we need to be there to support them… But we also have to understand that we should all come together, ‘cause what I have seen in the LGBTQ community - just like “L'' goes this direction, “B” goes this direction - and we're not really together and we are not showing the support and the love with that… that we all deserve. If we don’t actually come together as an LGBTQ community and family, we’re not going to be able to be sustainable, right? We’re going to… ‘Tania now doesn’t want to talk to nobody. Tania’s going to do what Tania wants to do and she don’t want to respect the other person or love the other person.’ So then that’s family separation. So in order for me to recalibrate and to be grounded I have to feel the love and the support as an LGBTQ family.
KO (31:25 - 31:35)
Thank you.
JF (31:36 - 34:30)
Karari, you asked such an interesting question - How do we remain grounded, and in many respects, I think the question that I find myself asking is: ‘How do I remain lifted?’ Like I feel like forces of oppression are constantly grounding me and keeping my feet tethered to the Earth and so when it's time for me to actively dream, my question is ‘How am I lifted?’ And I think there are a lot of ways that that happens: I'm lifted through unabashed joy. You know, I'm lifted through a good blunt at the end of the day. I’m lifted through afrocentrism and afrofuturism. Like, I think of the book Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements - and one of the writers says this: Because all organizing is science fiction, we are dreaming new worlds, every time we think about the changes we want to make in the world.’ One of the ways I remain lifted and high is by dreaming and creating something new… and one of the things I love about the organization where I serve, Lighthouse Foundation, is that we're constantly dreaming of new ways of being, of living, of loving. We're looking at events like the Black LGBTQ+ prom, which is all about reclaiming prom, being able to wear the clothes that you want to wear and go with the person or people that you want to go with. I think about Black Queer Beach Day - taking up space on the southside among our wider Black kin. I think about our Workforce Development Conference where we ask the question in a workshop: “What do you need to learn about business?” And the title of the workshop answers it: “Everything I Needed to Learn about Business I Learned from Drag.” We have to find new and creative ways to lift ourselves from the complacency and also from the averageness that the world will try to call us to. It takes a little extra to be queer. It takes a little extra to be free. It takes a little extra to be lifted. And that's what I need from community. That's what I need from programming. That's what I need also from community-led participatory research. Asking those on the margins to create solutions that of course will work for us but also will work for everyone. Like, these are the ways that I keep dreaming and remain lifted and keep my feet off the ground when I live in a world that is constantly trying to put my feet in the muck and mire because a sedentary person has trouble dreaming.
KO (34:31 - 35:02)
Okay! Thank you Jamie for taking us to church on this fine day. That definitely like… that’s making me think. Like, I’m gonna change the idea of like why do I need to be grounded? You’re right! Like why do we have to be tethered? I should be lifted. I’m gonna start definitely thinking in terms of that, Jamie, thank you so much for all of that. Pidge, anything you'd like to share? What centers you? What brings you back to that child? What elevates you?
PP (35:03 - 35:05)
Jamie, I heard you were called a pastor, right? Are you a pastor?
JF (35:06-35:09)
I am, I am! I'm a pastor and an executive director.
PP (35:10 - 37:41)
Alright, please drop the location for the church in the chat - because I wanna go to your church! So my answer to that question: What has centered my community work and how do I recenter when the world knocks me off my feet? I got in to the community work by just being intersex and having the experience of what happens to a person whose body dares to imagine what a body can be outside of the binary, and how the world - or the society, the status quo that we have right now in this country - how it reacted to my body by trying to destroy those most intimate parts of my body to keep the binary intact, to squash that imagination of something else. So I started speaking out. I started sharing my story with this youth-like belief - which is a beautiful belief - that if I just share my story then the surgeries against intersex people would surely end and everything would be good because everyone would hear how bad it is. Um, and that didn't happen. So I had to keep sharing my story, and sharing my story, and sharing my story, and I used to sign off my YouTube videos with the saying that says “Intersex Stories Not Surgeries” and I have been thinking about that [video lags] in the past 15 plus years, what sharing my story has actually done - It has taken a huge toll on me mentally and physically, emotionally, etcetera, and I look back and I'm kind of sad that I ushered in a generation of people in a way where I was trying to encourage them to share their stories because I wasn't aware yet of how draining it can be to be in story-based activism sharing your story, your trauma, over and over and over again. This is why, recently, I kind of wanted to quit activism and the whole intersex thing for a while. I was burnt out. But I realized that I just want to approach it differently moving forward. And the way that I want to approach it differently is to center healing in everything that I do moving forward. So, for instance, one of the ways I’m doing that is I’m working on a new documentary that is all about intersex and healing.
PP (37:42 - 41:31)
And as you said in my bio, I’m trying to get that funded. So if anybody wants to help fund that documentary, please let me know. The link is in my Instagram bio or hit me up. But this documentary is going to be different than any other intersex documentary or piece that’s ever been put out because I will not be asking anybody in the film about their surgeries, their trauma, their pain, at all. In fact, if they speak about it on their own - which I had happen recently - I’ll probably just mute that part out. For too long, intersex people have felt they have to spill their blood, their pain, to be worth being in front of someone and telling their story. Myself included. And so I want to ask different questions in this documentary. I want to ask about ‘How are you finding joy? How are you able to still laugh? And how are you attempting to heal?’ And this is all because [video lags] I want to know how to do it myself - so I’m going to go on a journey doing it [video lags]. And so how do I recenter? Like I said, I wanted to drop out of this work, and I was burnt out, especially when I was writing my book… alone. That was really, really hard. But one of the biggest places for me to recenter right now is my garden, which is why I was talking about permaculture earlier. I’m born and raised in Chicago - know nothing about farms, Tania, like you, and I just started gardening this year - and I was picking weeds and bending over and I was sweating and I hated it! I was like, my back hurt, everything hurt, I hated it. I was like ‘Everyone wants to garden until they garden.’ That’s like what I was saying to myself.And then slowly I started to actually love it and miss it when I wasn’t home picking weeds or gardening and growing food and learning about these things. So one of the biggest places for me to recenter now is with my hands in the Earth, with plants. The lake in Chicago is one of my favorite places... I love water as a healing place for me. I I love healing modalities like sound healing, meditations, reiki, acupuncture. All of those things.I love trying all those things. Like Jamie, I love a good drug, you know? Weed doesn’t work well for me, sadly, anymore. But I have gotten into different drugs like psychedelics, MDMA, and ketamine has been very helpful for on my healing journey. By the way, a lot of insurance covers ketamine. Mine did. And it was great. I went to Rush in Chicago for that. And I love dancing, and just movement with good music. And being in community. I’ve seen a lot of talk about self care lately, and Audre Lorde’s quotes around self-care. And how she talked about it - self care - as a revolutionary act so you can still show up for community. And also doing work within the community is self care because it revitalizes us, it refuels us. So being in community is also really healing for me as well. And I forgot to say earlier, a lot of things I was talking about in my dream world were inspired by people like adrienne maree brown who I know was also part of Octavia’s Brood - the writing of that book. So her concepts - well, not just her concepts, because she gathered them from other people as she notes, but the biomimicry I spoke about, the permaculture, and other things I spoke about were from other people. I was not coming up with those things. I forgot to mention the name of the book that I’m really inspired by lately which is Emergent Strategy by adrienne maree brown.
KO (41:32 - 42:14)
Yeah, we always in our our workshops at Praxis, we always start off with #CiteBlackWomen so definitely, so much of the work in just dreaming this world is often based on the work of Black women and definitely mentioning it is important. You mentioned your book, Pidge, and so my question, because you said sharing your story just became exhausting. So then what is the role of the artist in creating this new world? If we want to also not drain the artist of their blood entirely as you said in your metaphor of draining and bleeding. Then what is the role of the artist in shaping new worlds?
PP (42:15 - 44:16)
I think artists - any type - I think dancers, I think musicians, I think they have a direct connection - or they’re tapped into other things that's always present, but some of us have lost touch with. Me myself, I'm trying to get more tapped in to it cuz I look at artists around me and I'm like ‘god damn I wish I had that communication with whatever you call it’ - something spiritual, some thing, source, god, something… there is this direct communication. And I think the role of the artist - I mean I don't think they have to do anything that they don't want to do - but I think it would be nice - the role of the artist could be helping people find their inner children and their imaginations…Because I think this is a powerful tool against the status quo that thrives upon the suppression of these things that I talked about earlier. I think artists have power… Oh! And this is again from social media, I found this on social media thanks to Monica Trinidad sharing this recently - who is a local artist and cultural worker in Chicago - That the ruling class understands the artists have power and there is a person named Alex Arrelia - they said on social media that ‘they cut funding for the arts so that you could never imagine a way out of capitalism.’ And so I think the role of the artist is to always inspire us, to push us to help us remember our children and our imaginations because that is how we help others imagine our way out of the status quo - which is what I was - a word I was using for things like capitalism, racism, sexism, transphobia, etcetera. I think that’s the role of the artist… is to help us all remember who we are… like to help us get us back to our Peter Pan, to remember who we were as children.
KO (44:17 - 44:22)
Thank you. And the name of your book so anybody who wants to Google it…?
PP (44:23 - 44:35)
The name of my book is funny because it’s called Nobody Needs to Know. And it’s by me, Pidgeon Pagonis. And it’s about my story growing up intersex. It’s a memoir.
KO (44:36 - 45:25)
Thank you Pidgeon for sharing. And thank you so much for sharing your story. Because honestly I remember, like, yeah, I’m an elder millennial so I was chronically online on like YouTube and all those things and I remember running across your videos and just - for a while you were really everywhere sharing your story to whoever would listen. It was - I think it helped people understand things that we didn’t always know and so I thank you for that work and I thank you for everything you’ve done and continue to do. Because we still see your videos on Instagram and I still I always make sure to watch everything you post because I do - I learn as somebody who is not intersex, as a trans person, you know, our struggles are tied to each other but also are very, very different and need to be acknowledged as such, so thank you for that work.
KO (45:26 - 45:47)
Jamie, since you’ve been taking us to church all day. I’m gonna come to you since are a pastor. You are a pastor of Lighthouse Church and you’re executive director of the Lighthouse Foundation, and so how does your faith inform your advocacy and your work to create this ideal world.
JF (45:48 - 49:24)
Let me first say that I recognize Christianity and the church and scripture have been weaponized in some really heinous ways against Black bodies, Brown bodies, birthing bodies, trans bodies, queer bodies - and so I begin with that first - acknowledgement. The second thing I will say is: I really have been able to embrace Christianity even more - as I, too, am an elder millennial - because of the core concepts that ground me in my faith. I think one of those core concepts is the transness of god. Yanno, I have a trinitarian understanding of god, you know, god and as creator, god as sustainer, and also god as savior. And so when I look at god I see a god - when we talk about the holy spirit in Hebrew, ‘ruach’ (ר֫וּחַ) is feminine. And so when we think of the holy spirit, I think of a Black grandma, you know - when I think of God as savior I see Jesus as a man. When I think of god and as creator I think of God as father, God as mother and also god as divine other that exists outside of the binary. One of the ways that we might think of transness is when one’s identification does not match other people’s observation or other people's description and I think that's very true of God. I think often we think of God as this white man in the sky, but when we think of god as spirit, as woman - When we think of god as divine other, divine parent existing outside of the binary, it opens up a lot of possibilities. And one of the reasons I talk often about the transness of god is because often the people who are killing trans bodies are those that are operating from a very limited myopic death-dealing view of God. And when we can see the transness of God, we can also see the God in trans people Another thing I'll say that grounds me in my Christian faith is that I'm a part of a community that is unabashedly Black, queer, and we have a hell of a lot of accomplices - other queer people of color that have found spiritual community there, white folks that have found spiritual community there because, s***, they tired of their white supremacy and so they want to come be free. It has been beautiful to be challenged by community because often in the trappings of church there is authority that's given to the pastor by virtue of their position. I can assure you that that is not the case at Lighthouse Church - that authority is derived not by position but by relationship, by trust, by relational investment, and that is a constant check on my own ego. I don't get any credibility by the title that I wear or the degree that I hold or the credential that I possess, I gain credibility and authority from my community to the extent that they trust in me and to the extent that I serve them well - And that is a mentality that I think would serve us well in the world at large - giving us a place of humility.
JF (49:25 - 50:43
And the last thing that I would say about my community that grounds me is we're constantly thinking about ‘how do we show up and serve outside of the 4 walls of the church?’ Too often in Christianity I think the message is ‘lets get people into a building’ rather than ‘let's get out of the building and love creation, be in solidarity with those who are oppressed, seek liberation, clothe folk, feed folk.’ And so that’s why all of Lighthouse Foundation's events that we do in the public are free. Even our annual fundraising Ungala, everyone can get one free ticket to that. [video lags] We can live out our faith in the public square through the work of the foundation without even talking about Jesus, but instead trying to live out Jesus tenets of generosity and kindness and f****** up the power structure - those are all kind of principles that I take with me. So it's not just that I believe in Jesus, but there is a particular expression of Christianity that I have found at Lighthouse Church UCC that is Black, that is queer, that is liberatory that resonates with me.
KO (50:44 - 51:18)
Thank you so much Jamie. And also I want to give a shout out to Nestor who's been interpreting this entire time. Thank you, Nestor, so much. Also if you have any questions for our panelists, please submit. I do have one final question for Tania, just as like a balance, right because you also are informed by your faith, right, by your spirituality, Tania, so how does your spiritual connection to the traditions that you have and you hold and you practice, how does that inform your work also?
TC (51:19 - 54:36)
You know, I was raised Catholic. I’m Christian. I believe in Jesus Christ. I’m a believer. I believe in God - and the God that I know is not a white man, you know, like Jamie was saying. For me, is the spirit that is a father, a mother, a brother, a sister, and is full of love, not of revenge, not of oppression, and you know that's not what I believe. And I do, I had the opportunity to be initiated into the Yoruba religion by Miss Ketty Teanga, you know, and Janet Namer … they passed the legacy - so now I have to continue with my legacy as a Yoruba priest. Everything is about spirituality and everything is about love and understanding. And liberation. I think, for me, just like Pidgeon, I became an activist. For many years. I was living under the sheriff… And as a kid, it was more “Don’t do it. Don't do it. Don't do it” that I was suppressed to be actually the adult that I am. Right? So now the future g- , the second generations, like my nieces and nephews, they allow the kids to express themselves. And for me, when it comes to my family, I know that I did the right thing by being able to break the chains and shackles and be able to change, you know, not only in my family when it comes to accept a portion of the LGBTQ community in my family, but, you know, in the world. And when it comes to prison abolition, you know, I thoroughly believe that that’s a lot of work I still have to do as a prison abolitionist because all those who want …had break me into many pieces and shame and it’s just like a puzzle, you know, and I have to come together and try to find all those pieces in order for me to continue creating change and every single person that comes to me seeking for spirituality, seeking for guidance, seeking for a word of acceptance.
KO (54:37 - 55:22)
Thank you, Tania, yeah, absolutely. I’m glad you mention Miss Ketty and Janet Namer because they’re two trans women who were really an important part of the santería Yoruba community in Chicago - and the idea that we’re not always excluded, right, sometimes we are very much a part of the spiritual communities and we want to change that narrative that that spirituality and religion is not for us because really like in many ways, it was created by us, right? So thank you so much for lifting up those two Latina women who are no longer with us but their impact is obviously still present through the work that you're doing both community-wise and spiritually, so thank you, Tania.
TC (55:23 - 56:27)
And even … To add to it. Even in the Yoruba religion, trans women … gay people, they were accepted and it was okay. But for a trans woman to be initiated into the religion, it wasn’t accepted. So Janet Namer actually came and changed the dynamic of acceptance, and Ketty Teanga who was the first trans woman living as a trans woman to be initiated into the Yoruba religion. I think now, for me, I have to continue the legacy and to advocate for the LGBTQ community. And any kind of culture or religion - I think gender, sexual orientation and race should not be ever, ever, an obstacle to be part of a religious culture.
KO (56:28 - 57:41)
Thank you, Tania. Thank you all so much for sharing with us your wonderful existence. Thank you so much for your wonderful words. We want to make sure that everyone knows that we will be emailing everybody who came [registered] to our panel to watch - you'll be getting a recording via your email, so if you want to spread the word and pass on the words of these wonderful panelists, please do so. Also we want to encourage you all in the chat or through email to send us what your liberatory dreams look like. What do they feel like for you? And if you like via our social media pages. Again, I am Karari Olvera, joined today by Tania Cordova, Jamie Frazier and Pidgeon Pagonis. And this has been a Pride Panel by Praxis, if you’d like to follow us we are @praxischi on every social media platform. Once again, everyone, thank you so much. And thank you once again to my good friend Nestor who interpreted this entire panel. Thank you all once again and finally, I'm so happy to have you in community. Happy Pride everyone.
JF (57:42 - 57:49)
Happy Pride. Happy Pride everyone.
PP (57:50 -57:51)
Bye everybody.