CARIBBEAN EQUALITY PROJECT
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Mission Statement
The Caribbean Equality Project (CEP) is an NYC-based organization that empowers, advocates for and represents Afro and Indo-Caribbean LGBTQ+ immigrants in New York City. Through public education, community organizing, civic engagement, storytelling, and cultural and social programming, the organization focuses on advocacy for LGBTQ+ and immigrant rights, gender equity, racial justice, immigration, mental health services, and ending hate violence in the Caribbean diaspora.
About This Cause
The Caribbean Equality Project was launched in 2015 in response to anti-LGBTQ hate violence in Richmond Hill, Queens. Since then, the organization has been hosting bi-monthly healing community spaces through its Unchained support groups in Queens and Brooklyn, facilitates immigration legal services for LGBTQ+ asylum seekers, curates oral history and storytelling interdisciplinary art exhibitions, combats food insecurity, organizes culture-shifting programming and builds political power through civic engagement, Census outreach, redistricting, voter registration, and legislative advocacy to advance LGBTQ+ and voting rights in New York State. The Caribbean Equality Project’s transnational work centers on cross-border relationship development with Caribbean regional partners whose organizing focuses on decriminalizing same-sex intimacy and postcolonial laws. In the face of anti-immigrant sentiment, homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, gender, and racial discrimination, lack of access to health services, and hate violence at the hands of their families, friends, employers, medical professionals, and law enforcement officers (even in New York City). Caribbean Equality Project is creating sustainable and progressive Caribbean diaspora communities, free of violence and all forms of discrimination. Year-round, Caribbean Equality Project conducts street outreach and hosts educational workshops and programming that provide an authentic, intergenerational safe space for shared experiences by building support networks through pioneering programs and services. The CEP programs, services, and initiatives are intersectional, with an emphasis on, but not limited to, family acceptance, awareness, HIV/AIDS prevention and care, education, cultural performing arts, visibility at citywide LGBTQ+ pride parades and cultural festivals, all aiming to promote acceptance and reducing stigma and eliminate all forms of discrimination in NYC. Caribbean Equality Project's main programs are as follows: ● Unchained: Caribbean LGBTQ+ Support Group: Unchained, the first of its kind in New York City, is the Caribbean Equality Project's eight-years running peer-to-peer immigrant support group that anchors the organization's Healing Justice work. Unchained creates an empowering space to affirm the unique cultural experiences and identities of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer (LGBTQ) Caribbean immigrants, HIV-impacted people, and survivors of family rejection, discrimination, intimate partner violence, and sexual assault to heal and build community in NYC. ● Trans Justice Unit: After six years of advocacy, visibility campaigns, and support for New York's Caribbean LGBTQ+ population, the Caribbean Equality Project (CEP) launched its Trans Justice Unit in 2021. The mission of the Trans Justice Unit (TJU) is to unite and empower diverse groups of trans-identified and non-binary people of Caribbean descent in solidarity. This is done as an act of preservation – of our respective cultures' legacies of resistance against oppression in all its forms. The TJU mobilizes and supports Caribbean trans people through advocacy, trans-affirming healthcare, HIV care, housing and economic justice, workforce development, and immigration resources for asylum seekers. ● My Truth, My Story: The Caribbean Equality Project’s multimedia oral history and storytelling campaign series documents stories of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer (LGBTQ) immigrants of Caribbean heritage living in New York City. Launched in 2015, the project curates and shares the experiences of Caribbean LGBTQ+ immigrants, asylum seekers, activists, community organizers, performing artists, and refugees in their own words. The narratives and themes include experiences of escaping oppression rooted in the British colonial-era anti-LGBTQ laws in their country of origin, racism, lack of access to affirming housing, employment & healthcare, and navigating cultural barriers on sexuality, gender identity, marriage, and love. The stories reveal struggles with suicide, mental health, sexual violence, the intersection of religion and sexual orientation, and HIV/AIDS represent the driving force behind these storytellers’ pride-filled personal growth and immigration experience. ● Knowing Matters: Launched in 2015, Knowing Matters is the Caribbean Equality Project's Sexual Health and Wellness program, breaking the silence about HIV/AIDS through education, films, performing arts, and promoting prevention while offering support to the Caribbean LGBTQ+ community living with HIV in New York City. The Knowing Matters community educational programming and direct services center on culturally-competent mental health, healing, storytelling, and sharing vital government resources available for those impacted by HIV in Caribbean-centric neighborhoods in New York City. The program creates intergenerational dialogue surrounding LGBTQ+ immigrant sexual health, emphasizing critical, culturally relevant gender-sensitive education, FREE HIV and Hepatitis C testing, full STI screening, PEP/PrEP information, and linkage to health insurance. ● Living Our Values Equally (LOVE) – is an interdisciplinary program that celebrates queer and trans Caribbean resilience through a racial justice lens while fostering critical conversations related to pride, migration, surviving colliding pandemics, and coming out narratives. Grounded in celebrating Queer Caribbean LOVE, this annual community event creates a healing space of dialogue, unity, and togetherness through educational presentations, cultural performing arts, storytelling, films, and panel discussions. ● Queeribbean Crossings: Established in 2022, Queeribbean Crossings is the Caribbean Equality Project's annual conference, which brings together international LGBTQ activists, researchers, academics, sex workers, and community leaders of Caribbean descent to discuss issues affecting LGBTQ communities across the Caribbean diaspora, including cross-racial solidarity, immigration, mental health, HIV/AIDS, faith and family acceptance. ● Food Justice: In 2020, the Caribbean Equality Project launched its pop-up culturally-responsive pantry service in partnership with other grassroots organizations to respond to food insecurity in predominantly Caribbean neighborhoods. The COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately affected the Black and Brown immigrant communities. Many Caribbean (Indo- and Afro-Caribbean) families, including documented and undocumented LGBTQ immigrants and asylum seekers, are experiencing unprecedented food insecurity in New York City. These pop-up food pantries typically serve 250-300 families bi-monthly, approximately 1,200 people in Queens, Brooklyn, and The Bronx per pantry location. ● Civic Engagement: The Caribbean Equality Project builds political power through non-partisan civic engagement, voter registration, public education, redistricting, candidate forums, and legislative advocacy. To encourage civic participation in the 2021 primary and general elections and promote voter education, the organization launched "Mash-up De Vote," a Black and Brown Caribbean immigrant-focused civic engagement campaign. This culturally-responsive initiative mobilizes Caribbean immigrants, Caribbean Americans, and LGBTQ+ people to VOTE to create a future in which we are all safe, have economic sustainability, and are free to live and breathe with equity. ● Leadership Capacity Building Summit: Each year, the Caribbean Equality Project brings together its staff, leadership team, board members, and volunteers for a weekend of learning, visioning, and strategizing. The weekend encompasses cross-organizational leadership training and workshops centering on racial justice, trans equity, legislative advocacy, and volunteer development. Historically, the weekend facilitates an opportunity for CEP leadership and volunteers to learn new skills, deepen their relationship with each other, and create healing through storytelling and art. ● New York State and City Redistricting: Caribbean Equality Project is a leading coalition member of the Asian Pacific American Voting and Organizing to Increase Civic Engagement's (APA VOICE) Redistricting Task Force. The Caribbean Equality Project joined the APA VOICE coalition to ensure that the interests of Indo and Afro-Caribbean immigrants were centered in legislative districts. 2021 marked New York's first independent advisory commission for redistricting neighborhoods. In 2022, our redistricting work continued for equity and demanded fair maps at the city council level.