Dear QTP Cutie,

Happy Pride! 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈⚧️

Every year when June arrives, I find myself thinking about what Pride actually means. Major corporations slap rainbows on their logos, roll out Pride-themed merchandise, and profit off of us for the next few weeks and then throw us away until it’s convenient for them again. 

Meanwhile, our transgender siblings are still trying to access basic healthcare, LGBTQ+ organizations are still fighting for funding, and our LGBTQ+ community as a whole are still navigating a world that often tells us we don't belong.

Pride deserves to be more than a marketing campaign.

For me, Pride has always been about people.

It's about the generations of queer and trans people who came before us and fought for the rights many of us have today. It's about the activists, organizers, and everyday community members who refused to stay silent when the world told them they didn't belong.

We often hear the phrase, "Pride was a riot."

And it was.

The Stonewall uprising became a defining moment in the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement, and Black and Brown trans women, drag performers, gender-nonconforming people, and queer people of color were among those who helped push that movement forward. They didn't fight for rainbow logos. They fought for the right to exist, to be safe, and to live authentically. We cannot forget that history…because it sure as heck didn’t start with corporations.

As a Black trans-led organization, that legacy is something I think about often.

Long before institutions recognized our collective power, queer and trans people practiced mutual aid, shared resources, pooled money together, shared homes, and cared for each other because we understood something simple: If we wanted to survive, we had to show up for one another.

That spirit of mutual aid is why I founded The Queer Trans Project.

When I started QTP, I wasn't thinking about building an organization. I was thinking about the trans person just like myself who couldn't afford a binder. The nonbinary person searching for gender-affirming care. The young person who needed a reminder that they weren't alone. Today, because of this incredible community, we've helped more than ten thousand of transgender and nonbinary people access free gender-affirming care through our Build-A-Queer Kit program.

And every package we send is proof that mutual aid is still alive.

Throughout June, we'll be sharing a special Pride blog series exploring the history of Pride, transgender and nonbinary experiences, mutual aid, community resources, and ways we can continue supporting one another throughout the year.

We recently kicked off the series with one of my favorite pieces: a guide to more than 25 trans-owned and queer-owned businesses that are making a real difference in our community.

Supporting trans-owned businesses is mutual aid in action. It's one of the most direct ways we can invest in the people building products, services, art, opportunities, and resources for our community all year long.

Read: 25+ Favorite Trans-Owned Businesses to Support This Pride Month

If you'd like to support our work this month, we're also raising funds to help restock gender-affirming care items and continue providing free Build-A-Queer Kits to trans people across the country. You can donate, start a fundraiser, or simply share our campaign with your community.

And if you're someone currently in need of support, our next Build-A-Queer Kit restock opens on June 13.

Thank you for being part of this community, believing in trans futures, and helping us continue a tradition that has carried queer and trans people forward for generations: taking care of each other.

Happy Pride.

With gratitude,

Cielo Sunsarae (they/he)
Founder & Executive Director of The Queer Trans Project