dr. maxwell anderson, a mentor and advocate for the trans community of georgia and abroad, passed away january 14th. his tireless efforts as a therapist and activist will not soon be overlooked.

maxwell was featured in the film southern comfort along with his best friend robert eads. over the past few years, maxwell had worked to complete a follow-up film entitled southern comforted: lives touched by the documentary.

his memorial service will be held this evening at 7pm at first christian church of decatur at 601 w. ponce de leon ave.

please keep dr. anderson’s loved ones in your thoughts.

The Sparrow Community House was formed in the face of incredible need. As a group of people, we needed to feel like part of a community and we wanted that community to thrive on service. But before that thirst was placed the need of those alienated by a culture that sees homeless people, poor people as the enfleshed fear that the American Dream, in its most superficial sense, fails.

So six young people, worn out on liberal individualism and the highly-touted prosperity gospel came together and formed a home with a vision. Some of us had worked for and with folks experiencing homelessness. Others of us knew the statistics (Atlanta is the fourth “meanest” city for homeless people, Atlanta is the poorest city for children, on average 68,000 people a year will experience homeless in this city alone) and had felt paralyzed by the gravity of the situation. A few of us have been homeless. But we all had ideas about what a redistribution of resources meant for creating community and meeting unmet needs in the midst of economic hardship and hunger.

We decided to do our work in phases. As of November, we find ourselves at the onset of the first: serving meals. The money and resources to make these weekly meals possible are quickly being made available to us. And now we are searching for an accessible place within the Decatur community to make what we’re calling a potluck (to avoid the widely used term “feeding”) available to folks missing meals.

The second portion acknowledges that dignity and personhood are pulled from poor people along with other tangible resources. Focusing on emotional and physical wounds incurred through that disenfranchisement via counseling, massage therapy, and yoga is more than healing, it is empowering. We have the space and the volunteers to make that service available to those who have been denied access.

Lastly, we will open our doors to homeless friends without any other option in the state of Georgia. Transgender women who are negative for HIV and are over the age of 21 are left out of Georgia’s shelters due to institutionalized transphobia and sexism. This genocide has to stop and we believe that the work to end it falls squarely on the backs of those who cherish justice and mercy.

To serve those broken by the capitalist system is the very least required of each of us. And it is not long before we see this task as a blessing. For it is by meeting the brokenness in others that we recognize our great distance from wholeness. It is through the cracks that the light of reconciliation and peace finds its way. Our solidarity and service to one another will allow us to see beyond this darkness.

-hillary

akasha harding explains what it’s like to live in a men’s shelter as a transgender woman.

though the house is just starting to become a reality, the idea for it sprung forth almost 7 months ago. and certainly, the need for a living space that welcomes transgender homeless people has been around for longer than many can imagine.

seven months ago, i was a caseworker at a men’s overflow shelter in atlanta. one morning, a young woman, new to the city, came into my office and asked me to help her find shelter for the night. she handed me her out-of-state id so i could make a copy for her file. when i looked at the information next to her smiling, well-posed  picture, a different name than the one she had given me was printed next to a sex field that read “m”. i spent the rest of the day trying to find a single placement for an HIV negative transgender woman. nothing. not in atlanta. not in decatur. basically, not in georgia.

if this client had been HIV positive or a few years younger, there would have been a placement. but since the situation was what it was, i had to tell her to be safe on the streets of atlanta or go back to the city she left in hopes of something better. the streets are the only real option we’re giving trans women. of course, once this life without shelter or income forces these women into sex work, they will be demonized. but if they contract HIV doing this work or while sitting in jail for this survival crime, then there will be shelter for them. kind of sounds like genocide because it kind of is. force trans women into a dangerous situation that lends to abuse and disease and then, once things are at their worst, offer them a space.

the links posted in addition to this note explain what’s been/is still happening.

isn’t it time to denouce the injustice that kills the poor?