Timeline is a regular feature in each issue looking back to events and milestones that have helped us evolve into the community we are today.

Early August, 1995

Bringing Home Diversity

Two well-known Hartford community leaders/activists were on the cover of this issue of Metroline dated August 10, 1995. Regina Dyton, a lesbian and Mel Thomas, gay, were being profiled as the co-founders of Hartford’s Kwanzaa Project. The pair became quick friends after being asked to collaborate on a workshop that addressed what it was like to be both African-American and gay. From that experience, the Kwanzaa Project was born. From its inception, the Kwanzaa Project was designed to provide education as well as insight into the impact of internalized racism and homophobia. The Kwanzaa Project also served as an advocacy center and an informative resource on HIV prevention.
The project proved challenging—just what Dyton and Thomas had wanted. What they stumbled on was a concept not only demanding but also interesting to their community. “We wanted to created something that people had a good time at, and we had a good time doing. Thus was birthed the Kwanzaa Project,” Dyton said in the 1995 interview.The audience served by the Kwanzaa Project were primarily gay and lesbian, and although not exclusively, mostly white. Dyton and Thomas would speak before professional groups—mostly heterosexual, gay-friendly educators. At the root of their desire, however, was to do more work within a community of color.

Both Dyton and Thomas shared an expressed goal to educate and help gay and lesbian youth that might be having difficulty with their coming out process or their sexual identity.

“Black people who are aware of their sexual orientation, be it a 2 (years-old) or 22, don’t up and leave home. We don’t leave the neighborhoods; we don’t run off to find a community. What I see for white people (is that) unless they grew up in a heavily ethnically-defined community, probably the first time they identified with an oppressed group was upon their awareness of being gay or bisexual. And then they went in search of their safe place. We’re (African-American community) born with that place,” Dyton told a Metroline interviewer.

Thomas shared his thoughts as to how he, as an African-American, identifies first with being black. “My sexuality…is a very small part of who I am,” Thomas said.

With the collaboration of another Hartford activist, Dyton and Thomas helped to create the summer Gay and Lesbian Youth Project. (GLYP) Through GLYP, a series of talent shows, dances and activities were planned every weekend for queer youth. The goal was to create a model for youth to follow and a socialization outlet where young people could meet one another.

“We want gay and lesbian kids to know by example, rather than by lecture, healthy forms of recreating in a place where they can be themselves, Dyton said.

The Kwanzza Project focused on dealing with kids in the city supported by elders and family members within their ethnic community. The project also dealt with adults who were not of same ethnicity and who were both homosexual and straight.

“We want to get parents involved because it’s different when the parent gets involved with the friends and associates of the child. It’s more than just the kid. When you do get involved, you find out that we’re really not all that different,” Thomas said.

By uniting both gay and straight allies, Dyton and Thomas sent a message to kids. That message was that they did not have to “go away” and that there were plenty of adults from various communities that supported queer youth and invited them to discover their whole self.

Tags: 2010, 37-07, EARLY APRIL