The Gay Men’s Alliance and Lesbians Rising have been working together for decades as the “Queer Student Union” to provide a safe space for those students who are gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender.
Both clubs started as publications at Hunter in the 1970s, and now have space for LGBT groups in the CUNY system, said Donna Chin. “We literally fought to keep our room in which original students had layed across the hall to protest,” said Chin who is a double major in anthropology and history and President of the Gay Men’s Alliance.
“I joined because I wanted to meet other people within the LGBT community. There weren’t that many LGBT people at my high school, and there really wasn’t a GSA there until a few friends and I started one freshmen year in high school,” she said. “It was in reaction to a friend’s suicide, and we wanted to prevent more LGBT students from hurting themselves. My high school, John Adams High School in Ozone, Queens, was originally and still is very homophobic.”
Sam Scholl, treasurer of Gay Men’s Alliance and a major in creative writing, said, “I think I joined about two years ago, finding out about the club through a friend. It seemed like a really nice place to spend my time, fun people, etcetera. Since then, I’ve gotten much more involved in the club, and it’s been very fulfilling for me.” Scholl is planning to run for president next year.
Vanessa Lorenzo, treasurer of Lesbians Rising, and currently a sophomore with intentions of majoring in media studies and minoring in English, found out about the club during her freshman year after looking up available queer clubs at Hunter. “I left the first time I came because throughout high school I had been closeted. My community has always been very homophobic,” said Lorenzo. “I was hesitant to meet lots of new people and I didn’t know what to expect.” Later on she joined with a friend. Like any other club, the “Queer Student Union” hosts several social events throughout the year, like parties and movie nights. Thus far, it has hosted a Halloween party, a tea party, a holiday party and a Valentine’s Date auctionand the money was donated to research for Histiocytosis, a rare blood disease. At the time of the interview an upcoming event was a charity project called Relay for life.
“We are attempting to get eight other clubs to co-sponsor with us, or collaborate with us so we can get the entire third floor of Thomas Hunter to get in the spirit of raising money for cancer research,” said Chin. “We wanted to unify the clubs in working together because we feel that we lack in support of each other as a system at Hunter and there are conflicts preventing the cooperation.”
“My goal for this event is to minimize that barrier and allow all of us to unite under one banner for that night in a way we can expose ourselves to the student body and show them we care,” she said.
The club also holds weekly discussions to bring about awareness on the issues that conern the members of their community. “One of our concerns in our clubs this semester is transphobia. We actually are having a workshop and discussion led by transgenders next week [Tuesday, March 6] to address the issue,” said Chin.
“Personally, I would like the club to be a little bit more active politically, but we’ll see,” said Scholl.
Holding discussions and planning events are always an all inclusive input between both Lesbians Rising and Gay Men’s Alliance. “Lesbians Rising began at our school over thirty years ago, as a publication, which is one of the reasons the clubs remain separate,” said Lorenzo. “We want to honor the traditions of our predecessors by honoring the names of the clubs that have such a rich history at Hunter.”
The club room’s aura is quite inviting. At the time of the interview, Lorenzo was joking and conversing with fellow club members. “Everyone one is welcomed to the club,” she said. “You can come by to say hello and use our microwave.”
The club room is a common “hang out” spot for members. “I’m pretty much in the club room all the time when I am not in class or working,” said Sarah Lyev, secretary of Lesbians Rising who is Sophomore majoring in Studio Art. She found out about the club in Freshmen year by a flyer that promoted a movie night event at the club.
“I am usually at the club everyday for a couple of hours. About three to four hours,” said Lorenzo.
The “Student Queer Alliance” club is located on the third floor of Thomas Hunter Hall in Room 309. The alliance has a group profile on facebook called “Queer Student Union@Hunter College.” Meetings are held on the first Wednesday of every month.
The WORD’s Melissa F. Garay can be reached at Mgaray@hunter.cuny.edu