Camping this bank holiday weekend might have been slightly optimistic as five of us huddled close around the open camp fire trying to stay warm once the sun went down, leaving frosty sub zero temperatures.
Conversation turns to what we've been up to, plans ahead; next Sunday is the Stonewall Equality Walk which takes place annually during May bank holiday in Brighton. We discuss who's planning on taking part.
“The thing is, I just don't like ramming it down people's throats; raising money for gay things” says one of the women, there are nods of agreement from the others.
As someone who has been active in the Brighton LGBT community, both working and volunteering for its' many charities and groups as well as my current employment being with a fundraising organisation, I find this viewpoint disappointing, but not unfamiliar. Just ask any of your friends who they are running, abseiling, swimming for, or some other fundraising challenge and you’re unlikely to hear it’s for an LGBT organisation, with the view expressed around the campfire shared by many of the LGBT community.
Yet this leaves our LGBT organisations vulnerable. MindOut, Switchboard and Sussex Beacon nearly closed in 2012, and Pride changed from being a charity to a business in the same year in order to remain operational. The small charity sector which includes nearly all of Brighton's LGBT organisations, is still heavily reliant on statutory and grant funders; but this has increasingly become a smaller pot of money available and the competition for it, ever higher.
For sustainability, small charities need to diversify their income through fundraising, but this seems to be an even bigger challenge for LGBT charities. It’s a sad fact that as LGBT individuals the majority of us do not seem to be as loyal to LGBT services, don’t seem to care in fact if they exist at all and general apathy prevails. May be, because we fail to see the value of these services if we are not using them ourselves and do not know those who are or how we, are benefiting from them?
LGBT organisations need to get better at engaging with their LGBT communities, so they see the value of their services and understand who and how they are helping, but LGBT individuals also need to recognise that we should all be more pro-active in raising awareness of 'gay things' and being a voice for LGBT rights and equality, the organisations enabling this and the fundraising money that is needed by them.
