Resources

This webinar was organized by From Borders to Belonging and took place on November 2nd, 2023. 

The webinar begins with a cross-country check in. Advocates will share what they are witnessing in their cities and its impacts. We see that the current wave of Anti-2SLGBTQI hate is well organized and well funded. Similar strategies are being deployed in Canada and internationally. Locally, we see that newcomer communities are being targeted with misinformation. We raise the question of how to address the current rise of Anti-2SLGBTQI hate without further entrenching harmful xenophobic and colonial discourses of racialized communities as “backwards” and threats to a presumed progressive Canada.

Our panelists will then share strategies for organizations and invite discussion of how we can organize collaborations and coalitions that promote respect and safety and counter hate.

This infographics summarizes the key points of 3 articles on supporting 2SLGBTQIA+ Muslims authored by Rahim Thawer and published in Medium in 2022 & 2023. It is created by Seyhan Kogukoglu from Riverdale Immigrant Women's Centre in collaboration with the OCASI-PSI team. While it is meant to complement the 2SLGBTQIA+ Muslims and Mental Health webinar by Rahim Thawer, it can be used as a stand alone resource as well. The infographics includes publicly accessible articles and videos on 2SLGBTQIA+ Muslims. 

In this webinar organized by OCASI-PSI in December 2023, psychotherapist, writer, public speaker, and community organizer Rahim Thawer (he/him) explores the tensions that affect the mental health of 2SLGBTQIA+ Muslims, including managing homophobia and coming out, reconciling sexuality and faith-based identities, both being critical of Islam and fighting Islamophobia, seeking and creating affirming spaces, acculturating as asylum seekers and Canadian-born 2SLGBTQIA+ Muslims, and religious-cultural factors affecting access/understanding of mental health services. Rahim's talk draws on academic literature, personal lived experience, and community organizing work with two queer Muslim groups based in Canada. 

In this interactive webinar, Anya, and Stephanie discuss gender identity and autism, and talk about ways to support your queer and gender-diverse autistic children.

Stephanie is a cis-gender social worker who has years of experience working with autistic youth, teens and adults, and their families.

Anya is a non-binary person, consultant, and educator who has years of experience supporting queer and gender-diverse youth, adults, and families in the 2-SLGBTQIA+ community. Anya brings a genuine and authentic voice to this discussion to further support families along their journey to understand and affirm their children.

Together, they provide with the language and skills to help service providers build strategies for supporting, children to live their authentic selves.  

This webinar is appropriate for parents and caregivers of autistic youth as well as professionals working with autistic youth.

In 2023, the City of Toronto collaborated with Social Planning Toronto to initiate a capacity-building project. Through this collaboration, Social Planning Toronto developed a "Community Playbook" designed to assist community leaders with concrete knowledge and tools they could use in their local community engagement work across the city. The Community Playbook is an interactive guide with more than 100 pages of resources for residents involved in community engagement projects within their respective networks and neighborhoods to help them in their planning, engagement, funding applications, project coordination, and more. It also incorporates intersectional lens on queerness, gender, race, and class for community engagement projects.

The Community Playbook is not intended to be an exhaustive document but rather a dynamic and interactive resource that supports and motivates community leaders in delivering and monitoring community engagement activities, projects, and events. It helps create engagement strategies and reinforces connections among leaders and community members. 

This joint OCASI-PSI and ACAS (Asian Community AIDS Services) was held on February 1st 2024 and invited four local experts to discuss and address concerns and disinformation among newcomer and diaspora communities around trans and nonbinary curriculum, policy, and practice in Ontario schools. 

The attached recorded includes presentations from three out of four of the event's speakers, responding to questions, such as: 

How has recent legislation in Saskatchewan and New Brunswick around parental consent impacted Ontario?

What are common myths circulating within newcomer communities around LGBTQIA+ content in schools?

How can we support queer/trans youth in schools as parents/community members?

Why are some parents uncomfortable with gender neutral facilities in schools?

Where does fear/ resistance to inclusive school policies come from?