Wednesday, November 19, 1997
Conference offers support to Latino/a youths dealing with
sexuality issuesBy Carol McKay
Daily Bruin Staff
After the culmination of a year of collaboration with Stanford,
UCLA students led the first Queer Latino/a Youth Conference
Saturday.
It was the first conference in the nation to focus on lesbian,
gay, bisexual or transgender issues for youth of the Latino/a
community.
Hosted by UCLA’s La Familia, and co-chaired by one former Bruin
and a third-year Cardinal, the conference titled "Reflections of
Leadership" called an estimated 200 young people from across the
country to discuss sexuality issues.
Kicking off with a keynote address and a drag show, the
conference consisted of a dozen workshops in which students Â
the majority from Los Angeles-area high schools  shared
personal experiences and learned from those of others.
Getting students to attend proved to be a difficult task for the
event planners.
The conference was aimed at students ages 15 to 23, and
according to Co-Chair Ramona Ortega, a UCLA alumna, getting young
people to the event was a major issue.
"These are people who aren’t normally involved. They’re people
who go to clubs all the time. We want to get them to do something
else besides partying," Ortega shouted over the booming of a DJ’s
dance mix on the Kerckhoff patio Saturday afternoon.
"Getting young Latino/as involved in these issues is challenging
but essential," Ortega said.
"They’re alienated from the rest of society for being Chicano.
They’re alienated from the Chicano organizations because they’re
queer," she said.
"And they’re usually the most at-risk for HIV, (to be) runaways,
for drop-out rates. And they’re the least accessible to services,"
Ortega added.
And that’s why transportation to the event was such a big deal.
Ortega said that five UCLA vans were rented to gather students from
the east side of Los Angeles, La Puente, Compton and Long Beach.
Students from Chicago, New York, and the Stanford area were also in
attendance.
Miguel Ayala, a first-year political science student at DePaul
University in Chicago, learned about the conference on the
Internet. He travelled hundreds of miles after "managing to
scrounge up the money," and said he was very glad to attend.
"I’m proud of my heritage. The Latino culture is very strong.
It’s harder for (Latinos) to come out about their sexuality," said
Ayala, who attended a workshop called "I’m Queer So Crucify
Me."
"We talked about how people throw the Scriptures at you and how
to work with that. The message was basically, ‘They believe what
they want to believe, we should believe what we want to believe,’"
Ayala said.
Coming-out issues were also popular topics of discussions at the
workshops.
At a bisexuality discussion, students shared their experiences
dealing with when they first came out to their friends. A father
sat in on the group discussion, to learn more about his daughter’s
sexuality.
"The event would not have been possible without donations from
private organizations," Ortega said, adding that $12,000 was raised
to put on the conference.
Because of the enormous task of organizing the event, one of
three main goals at the conference was to pass future
responsibilities over to young people of the community.
"That’s our first goal  organizing next year’s
conference," said Co-Chair Angel Fabian, a third-year human biology
student at Stanford.
"The second one is to start up more La Familias, to begin
building support networks within high schools. We need to give them
a template for building support. And our last goal is one of
reflection," Fabian added.
There are many challenges unique to the Latino/a LGBT community,
Ortega said, because "the language is new to these kids. The gay
scene is new. And they don’t fit in."
At the conference, representatives from Pasadena City College
attempted to help provide solutions for some of these issues,
distributing applications for admission and flyers about LGBT
resources on their campus.
Other support tables were set up including representatives from
QV Magazine, a gay Latino men’s bi-monthly magazine founded by a
former USC journalism student.
Demetrio Roldan, the magazine’s editor in chief, said that it
only took five months to produce the first issue, which came out in
October, and he is very excited about public response.
"There really weren’t any gay Latino magazines out there. So we
decided to create this," he said, adding that the feature-oriented
magazine also has a web site.
"Some people are still coming out to themselves, let alone to
others. The readers can really relate to the stories. We’ve gotten
a really positive response. They say, ‘every story is like
me.’"
"And that’s so important," Roldan continued, "Because when I was
young, it was such an alone feeling. This conference is a positive
reflection in the community. And that adds such a richness to your
culture."
AARON TOUT/Daily Bruin
House of Extravaganza performed at the first Queer Latino/a
Youth Conference at UCLA on Saturday.