Youth
SAY! Stonewall Alliance Youth (Youth Services)
The Stonewall Alliance Youth Program began in 1994 as an effort to provide Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Questioning (G/L/B/Q) youth (14-23) with a safe space to meet other youth like themselves and to self-identify according to their own feelings. In 2006, the program became SAY! Stonewall Young Adults for young men and women 18 to 29 years of age and in 2007 SAY! Teens began to provide services to youth under the age of 20.
Through weekly discussions, dances and other recreational activities, the program has helped many G/L/B/Q youth break the feeling of social isolation almost all G/L/B/Q youth experience. Weekly sessions are non clinical and discussion oriented. They provide a vehicle for discussing issues such as "coming out," "accepting oneself," "safe sex" and HIV/STD transmission. The groups allow young men and women to talk amongst themselves about everyday issues in an atmosphere in which they are free to be themselves. Other activities emerge from the expressed needs of the youth themselves. All activities are carried out with the needs of participating youth in mind.
Youth are encouraged to take a leading role in making these activities happen. Leadership and responsibility are essential to making young people feel confident about their abilities and value to their community. Studies show that the efforts G/L/B/Q youth make in "passing" as "straight" detract from the normal processes of development faced by all youth. The result is often low self-esteem and crisis over ones sexual identity. Young people often turn to high-risk sexual activity, substance abuse and suicide as a means of dealing with these conflicts. A 1989 report on gay and lesbian youth suicide (published by the United States Department of Health and Human Services) found that G/L/B/Q youth are two to three times more likely to attempt suicide than other young people and may comprise up to 30% of completed youth suicides annually. Also, G/L/B/Q youth are at risk of running away. The fear of rejection on the basis of their sexuality has lead many youth to seek acceptance "elsewhere." They often turn to narcotics and prostitution to survive. The life faced by street youth includes heightened risk of HIV infection, substance abuse, physical violence and suicide.
SAY! Teens
Weekly social group for young adults aged 14 to 19.
SAY! Twenties
Weekly social group for young adults aged 20 to 29.
SAY offers activities, excursions, and education, including workshops and seminars, training of local counselors and educators, and information and referral to youth, parents and family.
SAY! hosts the annual “National Coming Out Day” Dinner Benefit on October 11th.