Just in case you’re ticking down the hours of 2007 and want to make a donation, don’t forget about these extremely worthy places to put your scratch:
* Scarleteen. No one has done more for under 18 sex-positive, all-gender, all-orientation sex ed, and no one had suffered financially this year the most. In the time of abstinence-only education in public schools here in the US, they are a lifeline. Also, they suffer from discrimination by so-called “adult” money processing sites simply for talking about non-adults and sex in the same breath. They need our help.
* Teenwire. Sponsored by Planned Parenthood, and they are much like Scarleteen.
* San Francisco Sex Information. The org I lecture at, which trains educators from help hotline workers to certified therapists about real sex, not just the nuts and bolts in university sex programs. The students work the literal front lines and come from all walks of life. They’re like superheroes in training, and SFSI is a nonprofit.
* OutProud. They’re the National Coalition for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual & Transgender Youth. I wish kids like Matthew Sheppard had been able to access resources like this.
* The San Francisco AIDS Foundation and the STOP AIDS Project (I give to STOP every year, and volunteer when I have the time). They help nationally, not just locally.
* The Transgender Law Center. A resource we need more and more. Let me just say, I never get more virulent and violent hate mail than when I write about trans issues in my column — and my closest family is trans. Give to people who can protect and make a difference for a community that is only going to become more visible, yet attacked.
* Non-sex: Alive in Baghdad (Blip.tv, thank you for making this possible). They are the only indy journalists telling the story of Iraqis with no bias — they are video bloggers. This month, 22-year-old correspondent Ali Shafeya took 31 bullets between the chest and the head from Iraqi National Guard forces, and died immediately. Please do call the Committee to Protect Journalists and ask why they did not list Ali Shafeya in their annual list of Journalists killed in 2007. Call and ask them why, 212-465-1004, or leave them a love note about it.
* Non-sex: The EFF. Sure, maybe you think they get a lot of donations already but think of bloggers like me — I fought for two months of constant threats and harassment against Tyra and her lawyers, simply to keep my own content (and vlog, and blog) online with the help of an EFF lawyer and the incredible, brilliant, fierce and sex-positive Julie Turner. I have no resources, no family to spot me cash — just what I earn as a writer. Give to the EFF, in thanks that I was able to stand on my First Amendment rights to tell my own story in the face of more money, influence and power than one lone girl can stand up to. (It was all during my friend’s accident, which was harrowing, to say the least.)
