In 2024, we deepened our commitment to organizing for crisis response by listening closely to affected communities and investing in local organizations equipped to lead rapid interventions
Insights from our Work: Organizing Is Survival - Why LGBTQI+ Movements Deserve Crisis-Level Support
We're sharing key insights from our work last year. Read more about crisis response in our 2024 Annual Report: Understanding the State of Global LGBTQI+ Persecution
As the nature of global crises continues to shift, so too must our strategies for response. In the past year, we have deepened our commitment to organizing for crisis response by listening closely to affected communities and investing in local organizations equipped to lead rapid interventions. Our data reflects accelerating LGBTQI+ forced displacement crises. In 2024, we monitored and responded to crisis situations in Afghanistan, Uganda, Lebanon, and Egypt, and expanded crisis-specific partner investments to support 244 people directly.
Homophobia, biphobia, and transphobia seek to expel or eliminate LGBTQI+ persons from the family, community, and country. Crackdowns, often brought-on by the introduction of new criminalization legislation, ignite hate at the family and community levels, creating forced displacement crises specifically for LGBTQI+ communities.
Specific requests for services also informed our targeted investments in partner organizations last year. After international relocation, the next two most requested services were shelter and housing assistance, and mental health support. The high number of requests for mental health support, combined with similar requests from partner organizations, led us to strategically prioritize partnerships with organizations that specialize in trauma-informed care.
These requests underscored the growing humanitarian crises affecting LGBTQI+ individuals in regions where systemic discrimination and violence persist. In South Sudan and Uganda, this data highlighted the imminent need for shelter and health assistance, with many community members reporting dire living conditions and urgent needs for essential services.
We have also made progress in adapting our services to better meet demand, and proactively responsive to emergent crisis situations around the world. Beyond requests for help, we also use our communications with local partners to map global needs and prioritize services.
In this landscape, innovative, flexible crisis response funding is vital in global LGBTQI+ rights protection work at scale. Rapid response funding is for groups, activists and human rights defenders who are the first line of defense to provide emergency care to locally affected populations, and also to mobilize in defending democracy. They launch injunctions to prevent new homophobic legislation from being implemented, and provide emergency shelter to individuals who are first affected by waves of queerphobia. As human rights work continues to be defined by international crisis response for the foreseeable future, building allyship and investing in local organizations will be vital to sustaining the queer liberation movement.
Crisis Response Fund: A New Way to Reach Underground LGBTQI+ Organizing
The state of LGBTQI+ persecution around the world has made crisis response a critical element of the global queer liberation movement. In response to this, in 2024 we launched the Crisis Response Fund as part of the Queer Forced Displacement Initiative. This fund provides accessible, flexible micro-funding to grassroots organizations to respond to crisis emergencies, ensuring LGBTQI+ people facing displacement have access to vital protection and services.
Critically, organizations do not need to be registered to access this funding. In many global contexts, LGBTQI+ organizing is explicitly criminalized. Additionally, the U.S. government’s cancellation of international funding is targeting and restricting LGBTQI+ global funding. Despite this reality, LGBTQI+ organizers are first responders to crises. In state-sponsored crackdowns against the LGBTQI+ community, they are often on their own.
The Fund will invest in initiatives aimed at supporting people at high risk of displacement, and those who are already displaced through three core streams:
- Crisis & Emergency Response Services Grant
- Crisis Capacity Building Grant
- Crisis Advocacy Grant
You can read more about crisis response in our 2024 Annual Report: Understanding the State of Global LGBTQI+ Persecution