American Public Health Association Program: LGBTQ Health Caucus

Session: Exploring Mental and Psychosocial Health Among LGBTQ+ People

Description:

Although holistic well being (including psychological, emotional, physical, sexual, financial, and spiritual health) is essential for 2SLGBTQIA+ flourishing and thriving, there is a noted theory-to-praxis gap. Concretely, we see that an overwhelming majority of monies allocated for 2SLGBTQIA+ health are spent on clinical and psychiatric intervention for diseases and disorders (e.g. HIV/AIDS and PrEP, suicidality, and substance use). This is, in part, because the majority of research on 2SLGBTQIA+ health focuses on stigma, bias, trauma, violence, and structural/systemic barriers, rather than facilitators, assets, and strengths. While 2SLGBTQIA+ research and clinical interventions offer healing for many, we cannot ignore what is lost, silenced, and/or undone by this approach. Sociologist Angela Jones calls this the “pleasure deficit” in sexual health research (Jones, 2018); while stef shuster and Laurel Westbrook (2022) recognize it as the “trans joy deficit.”

Join a representative of The Sexploration Project–a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Pioneering Ideas grant project working to build a culture of embodiminded health–to discuss how to shift the focus of 2SLGBTQIA+ wellness from deficit/disorder to abundance/flourishing. We will detail how Sexploration community members and partner organizations push the boundaries of what 2SLGBTQIA+ health and health care can and should be. Examples include the work of somatic and body-based therapists (including sex surrogates); BDSM (bondage, discipline, Dominance/submission, and sadomasochism) practitioners and their clients; complementary and integrative efforts in the realms of meditation, yoga, and tantric massage therapy; and the work of intersex, trans, and disability advocates and clinicians.

Special Panel for the 2023 Annual Meeting.

Description:

This kitchen-table style panel is an intergenerational conversation about how to promote bodily autonomy and protect the full sexual rights of all human beings, including vital access to sexual, reproductive, and gender affirming health care. Renegades and rebels from Gen Z to the Silent Gen will share their experiences partnering with non-traditional or unexpected organizations to circumvent state and federal surveillance, developing allied activist networks, and getting creative in their approaches to abolition throughout time. From HIV/AIDS crisis counselors from the 70s, to sex surrogates and somatic/body-based healers and BDSM practitioners from the 90s, to sexuality educators and health care providers working within murky legal waters today, these panelists will facilitate a discussion on how we can continue to protect one another, and ensure our community has access to the sexual and reproductive health care it needs.

Panelists:

• Omisade Burney-Scott, The Black Girls' Guide to Surviving Menopause

• Andrés Cordero, Jr., Independent Sex Educator and and Embodied Life Coach

• Bria Brown-King, InterACT: Advocates for Intersex Youth

• Natalie Malone, University of Kentucky

Moderated by:

• Ethan Coston, Virginia Commonwealth University

Special session for the Sexualities Section of ASA.

Session Description:

Sex and the erotic are complicated, unstable, ephemeral, and messy. Scholars of sexuality know this and often embrace the paradoxes of sexual and erotic life. And yet, there remain theoretical, methodological, and conceptual terrains of sexuality(ies) unrealized. This panel for the 2023 American Sociological Association’s Sexualities Section seeks contributions that explore the awkward pairings of/with sex (i.e., madness, perversity, spirituality, healing, affect, panics, war, etc.) that sociologists of sexuality have yet to contend with. We especially desire contributions that center Black, brown, Indigenous, diasporic, immigrant, queer, trans, asexual, disabled, and/or neurodivergent perspectives, narratives, commentaries, and reflections on the field’s moments, methods, and modes of stickiness. What are the tense, frictional, competing and awkward remains of the study of sex? How should or can we reorient sociology to the geographic, historical, affective, subjective, experiential, embodied, queer, trans and racialized aspects of sexualities that have been left behind, rejected, and framed as dangerous, deviant, and abject?

Panelists:

• Jack Jin Gary Lee, New School for Social Research: “Minor Articulations: Racialized Emotions and the “Malayan ‘Sexual Perversion’ Cases,” 1938-1940”

• Alan Santinele Martino, Carleton University; Eleni Moumos, University of Calgary; and Ann Fudge Schormans, McMaster University: “‘Cripping’ Intellectual Disability and Sexuality in Media Representations: Conundrums and Possibilities”

• George Sanders and Heidi Lyons, Oakland University: “Intensive Intimacy Machines”

• Endia L. Hayes, Rutgers University: “Sweaty Sexualities: Unpacking Emily West/Morgan’s Stickiness to Violence and Pleasure”

Moderated by:

• Ethan Coston, Virginia Commonwealth University

• Jessie Laljer, University of Oklahoma

• Kyle Lamoin Callen, University of Oklahoma

In-person workshop/training for faculty and staff of Sweet Briar College.

Virtual training for Richmond and Henrico Health District.

Participants:
(Chair) Steven Ruszczycky, Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, sruszczy@calpoly.edu
(Comment) Steven Ruszczycky, Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, sruszczy@calpoly.edu;

Papers:
Crip Liberalism, “Right of Conscience,” & Medical Refusal
Logan Smilges, University of British Columbia, Logan.smilges@ubc.edu

Everybody Was Kung Flu Fighting: Cripistemic Harm and Injustice during
a Pandemic
Hyoseol Ha, University at Buffalo, State University of New York,
hyoseolh@buffalo.edu

My Neurotype Is Pervert: An Autoethnographic Queercrip Account of
Precarity and Power
B Ethan Coston, Virginia Commonwealth University, bmcoston@vcu.edu

Shy Undergrounds: Shyness, the Introvert Revolution, and the Futures
of Neurodiversity
Leon J Hilton, Brown University, leon.hilton@gmail.com

VCU specific. Panelist.

Private/closed training.

To request your own DEI workshop/training email bmcoston(at)vcu.edu.

Invitation only.

For additional details contact us at Sexploration.Project@Gmail.Com

Register in advance for this meeting:

https://vcu.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJ0ud-uppzoqE9d2AMOLsEZhXq2APGtEo9VN

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

Register in advance for this meeting:

https://vcu.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJ0udeyvrzouGdL4kChkwJ7kZ7g4zqx1y_gG

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

Presentation at AltSex Con 2021

ABSTRACT

Somatics and vagal toning are two known ways of reducing anxiety and regulating the nervous system. Somatics is, very basically, gentle movement and/or intentional bodily engagement, while vagal toning refers to the act of stimulating the vagus nerve, the 10th cranial nerve and a fundamental component of the parasympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system. Many BDSM (bondage and discipline, “sadomasochism” and/or dominance and submission) practices, including aftercare practices, focus explicitly on sensation play, ritualization, routinization, and other experiences that directly and creatively engage the body somatically and work to tone the vagus nerve. This presentation reviews what we know so far about somatic practices, vagal toning, and BDSM/kink play, and focuses on first-person narratives and auto-ethnographic accounts of the intersection of mental health, neurodiversity, disability, trauma recovery, and the kinky bodymind.

REGISTRATION

Registration opens December 15 at https://altsexnycconference.org/about/

Presentation in Session 13: Sexualities, Masculinities and Power

Sociologists for Women in Society Winter 2021 Meeting

More information can be found here.

Panel discussion on Teaching LGBTQ Health for the Mid-South Sociological Association Virtual 2020 Conference.

Panelists include:

• J. Erica Sumerau, University of Tampa

• Brittany Harder, University of Tampa

• B. Ethan M. Coston, Virginia Commonwealth University

• Pina Holway, University of Tampa

Register for as little as $35 at https://www.meetingsavvy.org/mssa/

The Burnside Watstein LGBTQ Awards are given annually to recognize individuals who enrich the sense of community at Virginia Commonwealth University and make a significant difference in the lives of LGBTQ faculty, staff and students.

This year's award recipients are Gabriel Arrington, Brooke Taylor, and B. Ethan (bee) Coston.

Please share your congratulations for the winners and nominees by commenting on the October 6 post on The Commons social media or reaching out to them.

On October 6, 2020 at 3:30 pm, join us here for the premiere of the 2020 Burnside Watstein awards video.

Brown Bag presented to California State University at Northridge’s Psychology Department.

Abstract: When you Google "neurodivergent Domme (Dom)", you won't get many hits. If the lack of conversation around the intersection of disability, mental health, neurodiversity and topping has left you feeling confused, isolated, or frustrated, then this workshop is for you. In it, we'll cover some of the key aspects of topping (from diverse perspectives), the ways in which neurodiversity (among others: autism, anxiety disorders, depression, and other cognitive/intellectual disabilities and mental health experiences) impacts topping, and suggestions for identifying your boundaries, discovering your needs, and making sure you're taking care of yourself and your bottoms/subs in and out of play.

Register for the Sex Down South Conference here.

Electronic Poster Abstract:

While acceptance of LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and otherwise non-heterosexual, non-cisgender) people has increased over time, concerns about LGBTQ+ mental health are still pressing. A growing body of literature on LGBTQ+ youth and emerging adults has revealed the negative impacts of interpersonal, community, social, and structural biases on LGBTQ+ young peoples’ rates of anxiety, depression (c)PTSD, suicidality, and maladaptive coping behaviors (such as tobacco and alcohol use). While research on risk factors abounds, there is a lack of understanding of the full range of protective factors involved. One promising emerging field is that of complementary health practices and resilience; a majority of this work focuses on integrating traditional modalities with CAM (Complementary and Alternative Medicine). These interventions aim to foster greater awareness of present moment experience and help people to better manage their life experiences and responsibilities. 

Through relationship with an LGBTQ+ community organization dedicated to youth services this project piloted a six-session summer program series that integrated the feminist relational advocacy model of healing with nature-based therapeutic modalities and the built environment. These sessions, which were called “Queer Mondays in the Garden”, consisted of guided gardening activities (such as planting wildflowers, harvesting crops, and pruning), a shared dinner, and an expert facilitated resilience activity based on predetermined themes (e.g., teamwork/community-building, self-efficacy/leadership, self-awareness/attunement, and growth/transformation). Resilience activities included mind-body movement, meditation and mindfulness, wild food foraging, creative writing, and community-building. These interventions are an innovative and new extension of previous complementary and integrative health research, as almost no work has examined the healing and thriving benefits of urban and community agricultural spaces. Though most LGBTQ+ health promotion research to date has focused on increasing cultural competency in traditional health care venues such to increase utilization rates among LGBTQ+ individuals, CAM approaches are a valuable alternative avenue of study. 

Using the 14-item Mental Health Continuum Short Form (MHC-SF; Keyes, 2005)), the results show average wellbeing scores increased for each individual item and for the 14 items in total (statistically significant with a moderate effect size). However, not a single youth/emerging adult who came to Queer Mondays in the Garden was “flourishing” based on the minimum thresholds established by the MHC-SF. Qualitative feedback highlights multiple benefits to participants, such as a greater sense of self-efficacy through skill building, and increased somatosensation through movement and meditation practices. These findings show a clear need for regular resilience programming, continued intentional use of public green spaces, and attention to the specific mechanisms that might increase the likelihood of flourishing for LGBTQ+ youth and emerging adults.

In sum, this proposed project is not simply innovative, it also directly: aims to improve care for hard-to-manage symptoms, such as anxiety, depression, and PTSD using real world evidence-based methodologies; fosters health promotion and health resilience for diverse, marginalized populations; focuses on health systems integration by examining healthcare-based, community-based, employer-based, and school-based application sites; and utilizes interdisciplinary collaborations, through multiple programs, schools, centers, and community organizations, to enhance complementary health research.

You can register to view this poster, and other workshops, on demand (virtually) now through August 1, 2021. 

Panel: Gender and Sexual Orientation: Understanding Power Dynamics in Intimate Partner Violence

Abstract of Contribution: Transgender individuals in the U.S. are at heightened risk for experiencing intimate partner violence, with some recent convenience samples finding lifetime prevalence rates of up to 77%. Unfortunately, many post-victimization services are inaccessible and can be dangerous for transgender and gender nonconforming individuals (such as shelters, which are sex-segregated). Using data from the 2015 National Transgender Discrimination Survey, this chapter explores the post-victimization health care seeking behaviors of a diverse group of transgender adults (over 18) in the U.S. Findings indicate that while 54% of adults have faced intimate partner violence, rates are much higher for people of color (73%), undocumented immigrants (68%), disabled people (61%) and those living in economically unstable conditions (72%) or who engage in sex work (77%). What's more, while nearly half of all survivors reported being denied services in the last year because of their gender identity, survivors of color, immigrant survivors, and disabled survivors reporting this treatment up to 80% of the time. Findings suggest that there is significant room for improvement in post-victimization health care services for trans and gender nonconforming survivors. Suggestions include: increasing cultural humility, conducting systematic basic and advanced trainings, and generating trans-specific programming and policies.

Conference theme: Spirituality & Health

Abstract: While acceptance of LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and otherwise non-heterosexual, non-cisgender) people has increased over time, concerns about LGBTQ+ mental health are still pressing. Since the 1980s, a growing body of literature on LGBTQ+ youth and emerging adults has revealed the negative impacts of interpersonal, community, social, and structural biases on LGBTQ+ young peoples’ rates of anxiety, depression (c)PTSD, suicidality, and maladaptive coping behaviors (such as tobacco use and alcohol consumption). While research on risk factors abounds, there is a lack of understanding of the full range of protective factors involved. One promising emerging field is that of complementary health practices and resilience. A majority of this work focuses on integrating traditional modalities with mind/body practices--e.g., deep breathing, yoga, chiropractic manipulation, massage, and meditation. Collectively, we often name these practices “mindfulness interventions”, and they aim to foster greater awareness of present moment experience and help people to better manage their life experiences and responsibilities. Embedded but often unnamed within the research on mindfulness, though, is the explicit link that it has to spiritual practices and ritual(s). Spirituality is also regarded as a practical tool to achieve self-growth; a way to facilitate movement away from the purely analytical functioning and cognitive processing of the mind to make room for other experiences, such as empathy, curiosity, self-attunement, boundlessness, ultimacy, and interconnectedness. This presentation will discuss the process of planning and implementing a mindfulness and spirituality-based traumatic healing summer program for LGBTQ+ youth and emerging adults. Findings indicate that facilitating mind-body connection and fostering a deeper sense of boundlessness and interconnectedness (e.g. spirituality) improves LGBTQ+ young peoples’ overall wellbeing and serves as a protective mechanism for resilience. Plans for programming sustainability and suggestions for other institutions/organizations will be discussed.

Lunch presentation on Diversity, Inclusion and Equity.

Presentation on preliminary findings from the pilot summer of “Queer Mondays in the Garden.”

Panel: Whose Space? Who Belongs?: Intersectional, Social Justice Approaches to Understanding Power, Place, Accountability, and Change

Title of Contribution: Queering and Cripping the Classroom - Student Visions for Social Justice Accessibility

Abstract: As a disabled activist-teacher, I am constantly struggling to find meaningful, critical ways for students to plan and/or engage in social justice praxis that is accessible. For the students at one large, public research institution in the mid-Atlantic and former capital of the Confederacy there are many barriers to participation in collective movements: they often work full-time or multiple part-time jobs to afford their classes and materials; many of them have families, both parents and children, that they care for and/or the events don’t provide childcare; they fear putting their bodies on the line as black, brown, indigenous, queer, trans, and disabled people; the events aren’t near or off public transportation or require lengthy walking and/or standing; no one thinks to list mobility aid or language access/accommodations; or they are neurodivergent in ways that make participation unlikely (crowds, noises, smells, lights, etc.). As Eli Clare writes (2015): “Gender reaches into disability; disability wraps around class; class strains against abuse; abuse snarls into sexuality; sexuality folds on top of race… everything finally piling into a single human body. To write about any aspect of identity, any aspect of the body, means writing about this entire maze.”

Knowing this, I developed a course entitled “Resistant Bodies: Queer/Crip”, focusing on the use of queer and crip theories to highlight the interconnectedness of systems of domination and how they are implicated and informed by discourses of sexuality, disability, and the body. A key learning objective for this upper-level course was for students to develop and articulate their own visions for the future of improving social justice accessibility (broadly defined). They were asked to, initially, document places, spaces, interactions, or moments of inaccessibility that they encountered using a Photovoice technique. As the semester progressed, we used these photovoice entries to determine key policies, practices, and stakeholders to target for change. Students worked alone and in small teams to create artwork, poetry, research papers, policy drafts, performance pieces, experiential learning workshops, and guided dialogue sessions for a half day “Accessibility Symposium” at the end of the semester.

This presentation will discuss the logistics of planning the symposium--including describing student’s interactions with Photovoice, their conversations around what to showcase on the day of, and their decisions of which stakeholders to engage; the students’ visions for the future of improving accessibility at/in college spaces and how they see that as integrally linked to social justice praxis; and the students’ final reflections on their involvement in accessible collective action. This presentation will also show images from the symposium and include samples of student work, with consent.

Lunch panel: Strategies for Faculty Success.

Covering strategies to incorporate inclusion and diversity in curriculum design and delivery, with a focus on accessibility as it pertains to disability and LGBTQIA+ identity.

Panel: The Impact of Wording Choice, Measurement Construct, and Expanded Response Options on Sexual Orientation & Gender Identity (SOGI) Measurement 

With: Liz Coston, PhD, Assistant Professor of Sociology at VCU

Description of contribution: For the college-aged population, the inclusion of sound, reliable, valid, and meaningful questions that assess sexual orientation and gender identity on college surveys are not only necessary for accurately measuring the size of the LGBTQIA+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual and otherwise not-heterosexual, not-cisgender) population, but are also an important first step in informing college-wide policies, programming, initiatives, and human/social services. Using data from a large, ongoing longitudinal study of the behavioral and emotional health of college students at a public university in the mid-Atlantic states (N = 10,310), this project examines not only the change in sexual orientation identification for students over time (data is collected each fall and spring, following a student’s first semester; data collection began in 2011), but also the impact of altering the sexual orientation question to be more expansive, inclusive, and diverse (e.g. moving from three singular categories to best practices-based seven check-all that apply categories). Findings indicate that students’ sexual orientation not only shifts during the course of their time in college due to changing understandings of their own identities, but also shifts dramatically when there are more diverse and nuanced options to check off (e.g. from “bisexual” to “pansexual” and “queer”). What’s more, including a comprehensive gender identity question (as opposed to a binary sex assigned at birth question) allows for the necessary collection of information on trans, gender nonconforming, and non-binary student outcomes and needs, which were previously rendered invisible.

Title: Invisibility is Not Invincibility: The Impact of Intimate Partner Violence on Gay, Bisexual, and Straight Men's Mental Health

First/Co-Author: Natasha M. Dickerson-Amaya, Graduate Student in Department of Rehabilitation and Mental Health Counseling, School of Allied Health

Abstract: Intimate partner violence is a critical public health problem. However, there is limited research conducted on and about men who are survivors. This project extends previous research by examining the post-traumatic impact of diverse forms of intimate partner violence (sexual, physical, emotional, control, and stalking) on the internalized and externalized mental health of gay, bisexual, and straight men. Using data from the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey (2011; N = 18,957), we find that all men are equally likely to report emotional victimization and controlling tactics (with between 50-70% doing so), while bisexual men are significantly more likely to report physical and sexual violence and gay men are significantly more likely to report intimate stalking. Due to these experiences, gay men are significantly more likely to report missing school or work, but bisexual men are significantly more likely to rate their current overall mental health as poor. Around 10% of all men, regardless of sexual orientation, report post-traumatic stress disorder symptomology; and 30% of all men report difficulty sleeping. This research suggests that sexual orientation is a critical area of focus in the study of violence and mental health for men, and that we can no longer ignore the voices and needs of men survivors: invisibility is not invincibility.

Invited Talk: “Disability and Intersectionality: Transforming our Movement”

Description: This session will focus on the role of disability as an axis of identity too often left out of discussions on diversity, equity, and inclusion. Disabled people are routinely excluded from key conversations that directly impact their lives. From high level policy discussions, to social justice and disability rights activism, disability awareness campaigns, and everyday conversations on accessibility, disabled people are often erased, silenced, and derailed. These exclusionary tactics reinforce stigma around disability and often perpetuate structural and interpersonal barriers to equity. This presentation will discuss the role of disability as an identity category as well as how it operates within axes of inequality. Together, we will explore the possibilities for intentionally including and centering disabled perspectives in conversations and decisions about advocacy and social justice at VCU and beyond.

The Accessible Campus – Faculty and Student Panel Discussion

This panel will feature five individuals, two students with disabilities, two faculty members, and one disability supports professional. The focus of the conversation will be on their experiences, both positive and negative, with regards to attitudes towards individuals with disabilities on campus, the accommodation process, and access in the educational setting. They will be sharing stories and advice and attendees will have an opportunity to ask questions and learn from those individuals who are involved in this work and world every day.