Saving & Changing Lives: Scarleteen’s Activism

Posted on November 15, 2010 in activism | 1 Comment

So this month, Scarleteen has had a Fund Raiser and Blog Carnival coordinated by AAG going ’round the sex blogs. Dozens of writers and bloggers and sex-positive forward thinking folks took part, just take a look at the list here

You probably already know about Scarleteen. I certainly mention that site frequently here. Here’s the description:

Scarleteen has been the premier online sexuality resource for young people worldwide since 1998, and has the longest tenure of any sex education resource for young people online. We have consistently provided free, inclusive, comprehensive and positive sex education, information and one-on-one support to millions, and have never shied away from discussing sexuality as more than merely posing potential risks, but as posing potential benefits, something rarely seen in young adult sex education. We built the online model for teen and young adult sex education and have never stopped working hard to sustain, refine and expand it.

Sometimes I feel like I’m preaching to the choir when I say that teen sex education is important, and that beyond that reliable information about sex available for anyone and everyone on the internet is also important. I go there frequently when I need to look up the details of STIs, for example. It’s a great resource for all kinds of things, and the testimonials from teens and folks who have been users and contributors to the site for years are very moving. They have a whole community, people talking to each other and taking care of each other and sending love and information to each other honestly and openly. That kind of interaction and information is invaluable.

In 2009 and 2010, Scarleteen has had around 1 million overall hits to the site each day from an average of 25,000 unique users daily. And you know, I don’t think it’s that much of a stretch to say that sites like this, with frank and real and honest and non-judgmental resources about sexuality, kink, sexual orientation, gender identity, and relationships, can and have had real impact on the complicated and sometimes life-threatening teenage years of folks with marginalized genders and sexualities. Sex education saves lives, at best, and absolutely changes lives.

I’m closing out the blog carnival today, along with pieces by Violet Blue on Tiny Nibbles and Heather Corinna on Scarleteen, with the end of the call for financial support for Scarleteen.

Scarleteen is very undersupported financially. We always need more financial support and I would very much appreciate having yours. I think we do a fantastic, important job, think we have for many years, and I intend to do all I can for us to keep doing that job for many more to come so we can remain a place young people know they can come back to, and don’t have to worry about passing in the night when a media or cultural tide shifts. I think Scarleteen and all that happens at Scarleteen is very worthy of being supported and sustained. To make that happen, we need more than just my own stubborn and dogged commitment and that of our volunteers: it also takes some dollars. (Quoted from Heather’s post on Scarleteen.)

Thanks to some generous donors, up to $2,000 in donations will now be matched for donations made from today until Saturday the 20th. If you’ve got an extra few bucks, now’s the time to toss ‘em toward an organization that does some important work.

1 Comment | Category: activism | Tags: donations, heather corinna is one of my heroes & mentors, preaching to the choir, scarleteen, support, things to do with extra money, want to do something about the teen suicides? donate to scarleteen

Scarleteen: Help Lift Sex Ed to a Higher Plane

Posted on November 17, 2009 in activism | 2 Comments

I’ve written about the sex education network Scarleteen before, calling for support and donations to help keep this invaluable resource going strong.

I’ve been following Scarleteen and the work of its Executive Director, Heather Corinna, since probably around 1997 or ’98, and have been enamored especially of her photography and her work on her site femmerotic.com. Seems she’s not doing quite as much photography these days as she used to, though perhaps that’s partially because she’s working full-time AND running Scarleteen. (Yeah, sounds like something I would do, I know.)

Scarleteen’s had a big year – it’s now part of The Center for Sex and Culture out of San Francisco. But it still needs support, by which I mean DONATIONS.

Corinna also released her book S.E.X. in 2007 – “the in-depth and inclusive sexuality guide! Covering everything from STIs to sexual orientation, body image to birth control, masturbation to misogyny, the anatomy of the clitoris to considering cohabitation, and written for you whether you’re male, female or genderqueer; straight, gay or somewhere in between, this is THE everything-you-need, comprehensive, progressive sexuality handbook to get you through high school, college and the rest of your life.” Donate more than $75 and get a copy of the book.

Please consider passing on $5, $10, $100, $500 to this fantastic resource. You can also follow Scarleteen’s blog to keep up with some of the discussion.

More information about the site and its activism follows.

You probably know Scarleteen has been the premier online sexuality resource for young people worldwide since 1998. We have consistently provided free inclusive, comprehensive and positive sex education, information and support to millions for longer than anyone else online. We built the online model for teen and young adult sex education and have remained online for nearly eleven years to sustain, refine and expand it.

What you might not know is that Scarleteen is the highest ranked online young adult sexuality resource but also the least funded and that the youth who need us most are also the least able to donate. You might not know that we have done all we have with a budget lower than the median annual household income in the U.S. You might not know we have provided the services we have to millions without any federal, state or local funding and that we are fully independent media which depends on public support to survive and grow.

You also might not know Scarleteen is primarily funded by people who care deeply about teens having this kind of vital and valuable service; individuals like you who want better for young people than what they get in schools, on the street or from initiatives whose aim is to intentionally use fearmongering, bias and misinformation about sexuality to try to scare or intimidate young people into serving their own personal, political or religious agendas.

To try and reach our goal, we’re asking supporters to consider a donation of $100 or greater. If that isn’t possible for you, whatever you give will still help and will still be strongly appreciated. To donate now (or to view or link to the rest of this email online), click here. If you’d first like more information on why we’re setting the goal we are, what Scarleteen has done in the last year and during the whole of our tenure, our plans for 2010, and what the scoop is with our budget and expenses, keep reading.

2 Comments | Category: activism | Tags: activism, calls for support, donations, heather corinna, invaluable resources, not just for teens, scarleteen, sustain our community, teenaged sexuality, things to do with extra money

Important Calls for Support: Home Alive & Scarleteen

Posted on February 18, 2009 in activism | 4 Comments

Two great organizations are in need of support.

I know there are dozens – hundreds – more organizations that also need support, but these two in particular are very dear and important to my heart, they’re community organizations that have provided so much help and support and information to underserved, underrepresented groups.

SAVE HOME ALIVE is a grassroots effort to save a grassroots organization, Home Alive, out of Seattle. They offer self-defense classes to anyone, regardless of their ability to pay, in response to issues of violence and safety in communities. They are particularly aware of those marginalized groups who tend to be more often the victims of street violence, and actively work to call attention to homophobia, transphobia, heterosexism, racism, sexism, ableism, and classism. I’d love to see Home Alive classes in cities all over the country. Home Alive needs $25,000 to keep its doors open.

Scarleteen, which I’ve linked to here often and hopefully you already know about, is a sex education and resource center aimed at teens (though I go there – and refer friends there – all the time there to find information on STIs and sexual health). They have some exciting news – they’re now part of the Center for Sex and Culture in San Francisco! And rom February 14th through March 15th, one of their regular donors has agreed match the donations they receive up to $350 per donor, and/or up to $3,000 total. Just ten bucks helps, people! Do what you can, please.

If you don’t have money, you can help in other ways: steal these banners and reprint them on your own websites. Write a post about it. Send an email to all your friends (especially those with money). I’m taking out a blogads ad, and if you’ve got blogads on your site and want to donate to the cause by sending me your free ad code, I’d love to put the banner on your site.

More information on both of these amazing organizations follows.

Home Alive’s Mission:

Home Alive considers all forms of oppression as acts of violence against individuals.Through our self-defense classes, we call attention to homophobia, transphobia, heterosexism, racism, sexism, ableism, and classism. We challenge participants to defend themselves and our communities from these forms of institutional oppression.

By standing up against these types of violence-both individually and collectively we an create social change. Home Alive believes that safety is a basic human right. Every member of our community has the right to a life free from violence and hate. We know that, working together, we can create safe families, safe relationships and safe communities.

About Save Home Alive:

Hi there. My name is Jen and I’ve lived in Seattle since 2000. A few weeks ago I found my way to a class at Home Alive and honestly, it changed my life. Read my story here. When I heard this organization was closing their doors I decided to do whatever I could to help. This is my grassroots effort to help save an amazing grassroots org.

“You are worth defending. I am worth defending. In my heels and in my running shoes, in my skirt and cleavage and in my drag king drag. We are all always worth defending.” (Home Alive)

Home alive is worth defending! This is a call for help.

Home Alive, the self-defense organization started by friends outraged at the rape and murder of Mia Zapata, has been deeply rooted in the Seattle community for the last 16 years. They offer sliding scale self defense and boundary setting classes to anyone that wants to learn, regardless of whether or not they can pay. Because of this the organization is dependent on community donations. Read more about the organization here.

Right now, Home Alive is 25k in debt and being forced to close their doors. Realistically they need more than that to recover and rebuild but this website’s goal is to get them back to zero, at least.

Sooooooooo, I’m calling on 25 thousand people to give $1 dollar or for 5,000 folks to give $5 or for 2,083.333 folks to give $12 or for 862 people to give $29… or any creative combination of this really.

C’mon people. Don’t you want to help Save Home Alive?

Double Dollar Valentines for Scarleteen!

From February 14th through March 15th, one of our regular donors has agreed match the donations we receive up to $350 per donor, and/or up to $3,000 total.

This is a great opportunity to amplify your support! You can play a part in sustaining Scarleteen and all of the young adults who need and are helped with our unique brand of inclusive, progressive, holistic and accurate sexuality education. As we finish one decade of delivering the goods we so strongly feel have nurtured and continue to nurture the development of a healthy, happy sexuality for young people, I’m asking for your help as we enter another.

Scarleteen is now affiliated with the Center for Sex and Culture in San Francisco. The CSC was founded and is directed by Dr. Carol Queen and Dr. Robert Lawrence. Their mission is to provide judgment-free education, cultural events, a library/media archive, and other resources to audiences across the sexual and gender spectrum; and to research and disseminate factual information, framing and informing issues of public policy and public health. We’re thrilled to be the first young adult sex education project they have worked with and are very glad for this partnership. Robert and Carol, as well as other members of the CSC, have been incredibly supportive of Scarleteen and sex education as a whole over the years.

If you haven’t kept up, here are a few pieces we added to the site in 2008 and 2009 to give you an idea of what we’ve been up to:

- Genderpalooza! A Sex & Gender Primer
- How You Guys — that’s right, you GUYS — Can Prevent Rape
- Birth Control Bingo
- Shown Actual Size: A Penis Shape & Size Lowdown
- Give’em Some Lip: Labia That Clearly Ain’t Minor
- Blinders Off: Getting a Good Look at Abuse and Assault
- I, Being Born Woman and Suppressed
- Be a Blabbermouth! The Whys, Whats and Hows of Talking About Sex With a Partner
- Let’s Get Metaphysical: The Etiquette of Entry

We have also had a handful of great first-person pieces added from users or volunteers in our In Your Own Words section. Our voting guide last year helped many users of voting age to find clear, balanced information about the Presidential candidates to best inform (and motivate!) their vote. Our archive of direct, in-depth advice to users who write in with questions is extensive. Lastly, our message boards, which we rolled out in the year 2000, continue to be busy, actively moderated and a place of bustling, supportive conversation (as well as a way to help users manage crises quickly) at a level many teens do not have other opportunities to engage in when it comes to such loaded subjects.

- We rank in the upper 25,000 of all sites online internationally
- We consistently rank in the top 11,000 – 12,000 of all sites in the United States
- 65 million page loads have occurred at the site from users since 2006
- We now have over 40,000 active message board users

Support Scarleteen now! Visit www.scarleteen.com or take a look at more information (and the rest of this letter that I’ve reprinted excerpts from here) at Double Dollar Valentines for Scarleteen.

4 Comments | Category: activism | Tags: come on people don't let these great organizations disappear, community, donations, home alive, put your money where your mouth is, save home alive!, scarleteen, Seattle, self-defense, sex education, things to do with extra money, violence, ways to help the community

this shit ain’t free, folks

Posted on July 3, 2008 in colophon | 12 Comments

Maintaining Sugarbutch Chronicles has become my part-time job. I spend 10-30 hours on it every week, at least, and I spend many more hours working on it in indirect ways – reading books about sex, watching porn, processing relationships with friends, discussing relationships, listening to podcasts, reading blogs, participating in sex & gender & queer cultural events, going on dates, and hey, even fucking.

All of those things contribute to the work that I do here.

And I feel incredibly blessed that what I do is well received. The daily traffic here continues to grow, and I’m trying to keep up with all the requests, ideas, product reviews, features, articles, and topics, but sometimes I just can’t – I have a dayjob, after all, and friends that I do like to see sometimes – it takes a lot of work to keep this site going.

I’m sure you’ve noticed that I’ve added some actual ads in my sidebar, some web-based merchant affiliates, and, now, a donation button if you feel like becoming a benefactor. I’m also adding some “Sugarbutch Swag” merchandise in the (near!) future.

Here’s some ways you can support this site:

1. Support my advertisers

I don’t get a lot of these coming through, but when I do (upper left sidebar), click through them and look around. Show your support of the folks who choose to advertise here, perhaps they’ll decide it was useful to them and they’ll advertise again.

2. Support my affiliates

If you shop at Eden Fantasys, Babeland, or JT’s Stockroom, consider using the links in my posts or sidebar to access the site. It won’t change anything in your transaction, but a small part of the sales will go to me, and that helps keep this site in business. If you belong to any web-based porn sites like the Crash Pad Series, Good Dyke Porn, or I Feel Myself, consider going through the links in my sidebar as well. I get a few (teeny tiny) kickbacks through renewals and sign-ups, and it supports what I do here.

3. Personal donations

Donors will be rewarded with Sugarbutch swag, custom smut, autographed photos of me (just kidding), a kiss, or lots of gratitude (to be determined at my discretion).

Here’s one way to think of it: I charge more than $50 an hour for my freelance work in writing, web design and web development. So, donating:

$2 pays for a new pen
$12 pays for a new notebook (I go through 1-2 a month)
$25 pays for me to respond to one comment and answer one email
$50 pays for a average-length post that is simply my personal opinion ramblings (one hour)
$100 pays for a full-length post with links and resources, which requires research (two hours)
$200 pays for the hosting costs of this domain for one year
$1000 pays for my time writing, editing, researching, designing, coding, and maintaining this website for one week

Or, if you’d like to think about it another way, you can support my romps through New York City with pretty girls, which inspires my smut writing, which, in turn, gets you off:

$2 buys a pretty girl a daisy
$12 buys a pretty girl some roses
$25 buys drinks for me & a date
$50 buys dinner for me & a date
$100 buys drinks, dinner … and brunch the morning after
$200 buys a night on the town and a trip to the sex store
$1000 buys a weekend getaway to a cabin in the woods where there’s no Internet, only a pretty girl to play with, which will renew my spirits and enable me to manage my full-time job (which pays the bills) in addition to this unpaid part-time job (which I love).

(I can see it now … dating with sponsors! I show up on the date and hand the girl a flower (“this flower was sponsored by”), go to drinks and dinner (“this glass of wine was sponsored by”), give her a good night kiss (“this kiss was paid for by”) … hah! I’m joking, of course. That’s not exactly the kind of sponsorship I’m looking for here.)

Just some ideas … of course I’ll gladly accept donations in any amount. Special benefactors will absolutely be rewarded above and beyond just their access to this site.

Use the donation button in the left sidebar.

4. Merchandise …

… to be announced, but rest assured, it is forthcoming. I’ve had some requests and I think you’ll like what I’m coming up with. I’m going to need some models for the Sugarbutch Swag eventually.

So, that’s it, for now.

I’m very open to suggestions. If you have particular things you want to see here, ideas, requests, input, feedback, I’ll always listen. I won’t promise I’ll take your advice, but hey, I’ll listen. Email me anytime at aspiringstud(at)gmail.com or leave a comment anywhere.

As always, you can subscribe to Sugarbutch in a RSS reader to follow along with my sex, gender, and relationship adventures in the future. That supports me, too.