Neighborhood Life

Pride Celebration Speak Out on Saturday in Response to Anti-LGBTQIA+ Graffiti on First Baptist Church

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The community is invited to a pride celebration and speak out in response to anti-LGBTQIA+ graffiti that was spray painted on the outside of the First Baptist Jamaica Plain church that was discovered on Thursday morning. First Baptist Jamaica Plain is one of the most inclusive churches and prides itself on "standing up for the rights of our LGBTQIA community, hosting a [monthly] vigil in support of Black Lives Matters, offering educational events about Israel/Palestine, marching for our immigrant neighbors, speaking up for the incarcerated, advocating in the state house, working for affordable housing and and end to homelessness..." The church also run a food justice program, hosts community meals, is affiliated with the Welcoming & Affirming Baptists, which seeks full inclusion and leadership within its church for the LGBTQIA+ community. "We have received so much support from our community in response to the hate speech written on our building this week. We want to show our thanks for your love and as a show of public solidarity with our queer community in and around our church - with a celebration of queer love and joy!"

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39 Bus

Boston Day of Reparations to African People

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The Days of Reparations to African People is an annual, international speaking tour to raise white reparations to African (black) people and discuss how we as white people can be in genuine solidarity with African liberation. It is a campaign by the African Peoples Solidarity Committee and its mass organization, the Uhuru Solidarity Movement, both founded and led by the African People’s Socialist Party. WHERE: First Church in Jamaica Plain, Unitarian Universalist (6 Eliot St, Jamaica Plain)
WHEN: Thursday, November 8th, 2018, 7-9pm
Suggested Donation $5 - No one turned away for lack of funds
REGISTER: BostonDayOfReparations2018.eventbrite.com

Keynote Speaker: Omali Yeshitela, Chairman of the African People’s Socialist Party
Also speaking:
Penny Hess, Chairwoman of the African People's Solidarity Committee
Jesse Nevel, Chair of the Uhuru Solidarity Movement

A Call to Build the Days of Reparations to African People

A Call to Build the Days of Reparations to African People

For more info on the Boston event: usmboston@riseup.net or call 781-214-8131

Follow the Boston branch of the Uhuru Solidarity Movement at facebook.com/usmboston

For more info on the Days of Reparations to African People campaign, visit uhurusolidarity.org

Opinion

Opinion: It’s Time to Champion True Justice for All

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I am marching in the Boston Pride Parade, and I’m both excited and sobered. I’m excited because the celebration of our LGBTQ+ communities is full of joy, laughter, and camaraderie. I'm sobered because in the face of anti-LGBTQ+ court decisions, slow-moving local LGBTQ+ legislation, and a state ballot initiative that’s only necessary because so many people want to reverse much-needed protection for transgender rights, I’m reminded that we have so far to go. What’s more, as we approach Pride, we also approach the anniversary of the Pulse Club shootings in Orlando. On June 12, 2016, 49 people’s lives were lost at the hand of hate.

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From the Community

Seven JP Residents Sworn in During State LGBTQ Youth Commission’s 25th Anniversary

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Seven Jamaica Plain residents were sworn in for new terms on the Massachusetts Commission on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Questioning (LGBTQ) Youth on June 20 at the Massachusetts State House, in a ceremony with state Senate President Stan Rosenberg and Health and Human Services Secretary Marylou Sudders to recognize the Commission’s 25th anniversary. “Contrary to perceptions of Massachusetts as a safe haven for LGBTQ youth, we know that queer young people continue to experience bullying, homelessness, criminalization, and lack of access to sexual health information,” said Tanekwah Hinds, Jamaica Plain resident and chair of the Commission’s Community Relations Committee. “We have a responsibility, as a community and as a state, to ensure that LGBTQ youth can thrive across the Commonwealth and right here in JP.”

Governor William Weld swore in the first members of what was then the Governor’s Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth in June of 1992, in response to high suicide rates among LGBTQ young people. Today, the Commission remains the first and only entity of its kind in the country. “For 25 years, the LGBTQ Youth Commission has played a critical role in the continued struggle for equal rights and protections for our young LGBTQ people all across the Commonwealth,” said state Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz, D-2nd Suffolk.

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