Sowing Seeds of Change: Roy's Fundraiser!
my seeding change cohort at an environmental justice protest in Richmond, CA hosted by APEN (Asian Pacific Environmental Network) <3
my coworkers at AARW <3
Hi! My name is Roy (they/he) and I am a Chinese American young adult from the Greater Boston area (born in Somerville, raised in Braintree). I am currently a student at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, and I have spent this summer developing my leadership skills as a community organizer through a fellowship with Seeding Change!
My personal journey with community organizing began with my individual desire to seek refuge from suffering and to find a community of people who could help me survive in the world. Growing up as a Chinese kid in a predominantly White suburb of Boston, I was surrounded by harmful stereotypes and divisive rhetoric. My mom was part of a wave of upwardly mobile Chinese immigrants who bought their first home in the suburbs in the early 2000s, seeking to assimilate their children into affluent and well-educated White communities. I was encouraged to erase my identity and to do whatever it took to succeed in ways that would benefit myself over my community.
It was only during 2020, the year of mass action against anti-Black and anti-Asian violence, did I realize that I truly had a stake in the community around me. This was when I began to reckon with my own anti-Blackness and internalized racism/homophobia that ultimately led me towards community organizing and challenging the structures that I thought had an absolute grip on my destiny. During this time, I discovered AARW (AARW stands for Asian American Resource Workshop and the only reason I am able to work with them this summer is through the Seeding Change fellowship!).
AARW led a march and a banner-raising through Boston's Chinatown in the wake of the Atlanta spa shootings, and I remember this action for several reasons. First, it was the first time that I learned about the history of gentrification and urban renewal policies in Boston and how it affected the familiar landmarks of my childhood. I learned about how much land was taken from Chinatown residents and how much redlining and racism directly contributed to the suffering of my people and the erasure of my community's history. I also saw for the first time an openly trans-femme Asian person speaking through a megaphone, which as a 16-year-old high school student who had just begun coming out to their friends, was an incredible inspiration. I am so lucky to have bore witness to resistance and a beautiful memorial that day. I didn't realize it yet, but this experience would help me understand that there are alternatives to erasure and displacement for Asian American people.
Through my work with AARW last year and this summer, I have helped sustain programming focusing on queer and trans Asian folks, including holding a Queer Asian StoryTable exhibit that highlighted Boston's long history of queer Asian organizing and solidarity movements. This summer during my Seeding Change fellowship, I helped facilitate a letter-writing session for one of our queer Asian community members who was unjustly incarcerated and facing deportation by ICE. With the support of Seeding Change, I have been able to continue working with a community organization that has meant so much for me and has played such a big role in developing my political awareness and my personal strength as an organizer.
The vision behind this fundraiser is to support grassroots, self-sufficient Asian American organizing. Small donations from community members and friends like you help to ensure that Seeding Change can continue to help make an impact on the lives of young Asian American organizers like me without needing to rely on institutional sources of funding. It takes $50,000 a year to run this program, and your donation can help continue building up programming and leadership development for future cohorts of Seeding Change alumni! Please help us sow the seeds of a future generation of change-makers and community healers! I am asking you to donate at least $15 to help Seeding Change continue its amazing work, and I hope that you can help me create a better world together!
queer story table, an exhibit I designed with AARW through my internship with them last summer!
With gratitude,
Roy
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