Creating Spaces for All Identities
Trio! is a consultant, coach, conflict mediator, and instructor at the IIRP. They currently work with the Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) as a Community School Manager. When not with the IIRP or OUSD, they are a conflict mediator, conflict coach, and Restorative Justice Practitioner with Seeds Community Dispute and Seeds Community Resolution Center in Berkeley, CA.
Q: Restorative practitioners unite people through dialogue and community. Please tell us about your experience of creating spaces for community-building conversations.
A: My dedication to nurturing restorative and transformative abolitionist-based futures for Black and Indigenous Queer and Trans People of Color (BIQTPOC) sparks my interest in creating spaces for community-building conversations. In West Oakland, I implemented a restorative justice and human trafficking prevention peer leadership program in which most of the peer leaders identified as Queer and Trans People of Color (QTPOC). In these spaces, we recognize how the impact of traditionally gendering violence as male and/or masculine paints more masculine-identifying people as perpetrators of violence. Here, we dare to imagine how Black, Brown, and Indigenous women and gender non-conforming people who identify as LGBTQI+ resist the impacts of heteronormative, patriarchal, and colonial discourses that mark their bodies as inherently aggressive. For me, these types of conversations in the form of identity circles have been a space where we can uplift supports and interventions for women and gender non-conforming people experiencing bias in traditional support service settings because of a perceived gender expression in relationship to their partner(s).
Q: As restorative practitioners, would you share with us a story about a restorative practice that led to a situation where people became more unified than before on their work together or on a common goal?
A: “Welcome Back” circles have often served as a space where people become more unified. I think specifically about two high school scholars I was working with who were returning from a suspension after getting into a one-time physical altercation with one another. While the “Welcome Back” circle process is not the same as the Restorative Justice Conference process, both allow scholars to have family and other support in the circle. Through this process, we found one of the mothers of one of the girls, and the stepmother of the other girl were close friends in school, but the two girls were not aware of this before the circle; it just never came up. This brought the two girls closer together and unified them in working towards healthier conflict resolution skills (i.e. talking out their problems in general with others before making assumptions about the intentions of other people). Through the “Welcome Back” circle process, the girls realized the power of interconnectedness; we are much closer to one another in terms of who we mutually know and assume a disconnected stance with others in our communities when in conflict. This has been a common observation for participants after experiencing a “Welcome Back” circle.
Q: Restorative practices can serve to elevate the voices of those who can lead us from their own experience and vision. Would you please share about experiences of empowering others through restorative practices?
A: Since my work positions itself in the intersections of restorative justice, transformative justice, and violence prevention, proactive work around community care serves as my way of empowering others through restorative practices. In my current role as a Community School Manager, a great example of establishing collaborative leadership via student engagement is our Restorative Reading Rainbow Alliance club. Part of our mission is empowering others through community and youth leadership development. As one of our club advisors, I witness youth learn to apply de-escalation strategies, create vigils to honor and uplift Trans lives lost over the year (i.e. Nex Benedict), as well as decorate our library with different flags that affirm their identities, cultures, and countries of origin. Our Restorative Reading Rainbow Alliance represents a universal space for relationship building across differences where our youth leaders model the prosocial skills and social-emotional learning competencies they want to see in their larger school community and the world itself.
Q: What is a reflection that you have developed in the work with the LGBTQ+ community that you would like to share?
A: Mia Mingus outlines pods and pod mapping as a “relationship between people who would turn to each other for support around violent, harmful and abusive experiences, whether as survivors, bystanders or people who have harmed” (Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective, 2016). These relationships underlie important projects of care and interdependence for individuals and leaders interested in justice. I can think of the different pods in my life and all of them are made of members of my larger LGBTQ+ community. I think what people often forget is that pods need to be massaged; we can’t keep turning and reaching out to certain people only in times of crisis. So, pods need to be nurtured to flourish. Pods represent the radical potential of reflective spaces for restorative practitioners interested in the important work of transforming relational and institutional harm. In my experience, pod mapping shares many underlying values taught in being a compassionate witness (Safety, Awareness, Empathy).
Q: In your opinion, how can the larger community become engaged in this process of reflection, empowerment, and unity to strengthen community and relationships?
A: I call upon restorative practitioners to rethink how we can amplify LGBTQ+ and all marginalized voices, moving their stories to the center without attempting to normalize or assimilate marginalized experiences. This means addressing the systems of violence underlying why LGBTQ+ communities need and rely on their ability to map pods; public spaces do not offer a feeling of community and belonging to LGBTQ+ people. If we want to empower and unite people across and despite their differences, we need to reflect on how our larger civil society will create spaces where marginalized people can feel safe in coming together to strategize and situate what they need to feel empowered. Allies and accomplices then have the responsibility of uniting around what marginalized communities need. Affinity groups alone will not ameliorate the issue; we need to make public spaces welcoming, accommodating, and supportive for our LGBTQ+ family. Until people feel safe enough to be visibility Queer, Trans, or LGBTQ+ without risking their safety in public spaces, this project of reflection, empowerment and unity is unfinished.