A hotline is collecting stories of LGBTQ+ mutual aid in Minnesota for podcast, archive
The We Help Us hotline is a phone line collecting stories of LGBTQ+ mutual aid in Minnesota, that will then be turned into a narrative podcast.
Photo courtesy of Eric Best
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Audio transcript
NINA MOINI: A local podcaster is creating an oral history project built on stories from the LGBTQ+ community. It's called We Help Us hotline, and the phone lines are open to collect the stories of LGBTQ+ mutual aid in Minnesota. The stories sent in will then turn into a narrative podcast. And Chris Stedman is behind this project and joins me now. Thank you so much for your time this afternoon, Chris.
CHRIS STEDMAN: Hey, thanks so much for having me.
NINA MOINI: Chris, where did this idea for your podcast come from?
CHRIS STEDMAN: Yeah. It's a long story, but it has to do with a kind of lost family history of queer mutual aid that I learned about as an adult.
And as I learned more about that and just really how much of the organizations and resources we have today as a queer community can be traced back to mutual aid efforts by small groups of people, I found myself wanting to see what all stories were out there that maybe haven't been heard before. So, for example, I serve on the board of PFund Foundation, which is a community foundation here in Minnesota that raises--
NINA MOINI: Yeah! We had them on yesterday.
[LAUGHTER]
CHRIS STEDMAN: Oh, that's awesome. I think I heard that, actually. But yeah. They raise hundreds of thousands of dollars each year for queer Midwesterners. And what a lot of people don't about them is that they actually started as just a small group of LGBT Minnesotans who came together to pool the little money they had during the AIDS crisis and create this emergency fund for those who needed it.
And really, you can look at so many of the organizations we have here from, The Aliveness Project, Open Arms Minnesota, and they all have this kind of history. And so I just found myself wanting to learn more about what kind of stories of queer mutual aid are out there that maybe a lot of us haven't heard yet.
NINA MOINI: Yeah. And that's because people were kind of hiding, right? I mean, when you talk about mutual aid, tell us a little bit more about why people in a community have to show up for one another and throughout history.
CHRIS STEDMAN: Yeah. I mean, this is, I think, really fundamental to the LGBT experience is coming together to support one another when the larger systems or resources that are supposed to support us either fail to do so or are actively hostile to our existence. And again, you can trace a lot of this back to the AIDS crisis of the '80s and '90s.
But this is still true today, particularly for trans folks who have to support one another when navigating systems that are either, again, not easy to navigate, or actively hostile. And for me, my previous podcast series was called Unread, and it was prompted by the death of one of my closest friends to suicide.
NINA MOINI: I'm sorry.
CHRIS STEDMAN: Thank you. And that series, it explored the impacts of minority stress on queer people and how, again, systems that are either hostile or, at best, indifferent to us can be so harmful. And one of the things that really came out of making that podcast for me was I talked with folks at Trans Lifeline who were talking a lot about how as LGBTQIA people, we can be there for one another and show up for one another.
And this really is just so central to our experience as queer people that, again, I felt like especially now, in a time when LGBTQIA Americans-- and again, trans Americans in particular-- are under attack, I just felt like we need to learn these stories and learn from them. And again, fortunately, there's so many amazing resources out there. But again, a lot of people maybe haven't heard all of those stories.
NINA MOINI: Would you just give an example, Chris, of what this looks like in action? Is this, like, someone cannot afford to travel somewhere they need to go, everybody step in? What's the range of things that people are leaning on one another for?
CHRIS STEDMAN: Yeah, it can look like so many things. I'll just give a personal example, which is when my friend died. There were all of these costs associated with his death, things like cremation and all these expenses that you don't necessarily expect until you've navigated an experience like that. And I knew that his family and loved ones couldn't afford those costs.
And so I just put together a GoFundMe and shared it with my community. And I was just blown away by how many people, most of whom had never met this person before, gave what they could and recognized, we as a community, we have to be there for one another. And one of the things that I've been-- as I've been working on this phone story hotline, is I've been reaching out to a lot of local folks who are doing mutual aid.
And there are just so many amazing resources here that we're trying to shine a light on as a part of this project, like Twin Cities Trans Mutual Aid, which is a network that supports and amplifies material needs of local trans folks. You can find them on Instagram. There's TIGERRS, which is a non-hierarchical collective that is dedicated to delivering programs and resources for solidarity and safety among trans, intersex, and gender expansive Minnesotans.
And one resource I have worked with quite a bit on this is Quatrefoil Library. They're here in Minneapolis. They're the second oldest LGBTQIA library in the country, and a community space, and they run entirely by volunteers. And we're going to be having an in-person story collection session in August there. And again, so many of these kinds of resources are just people recognizing a need in the community and stepping up to be there for one another.
Like the library, maybe that's not the first thing that comes to mind when someone thinks of mutual aid. Mutual aid is often about meeting immediate material needs. But as queer people, we also need stories, and we need to be able to feel connected to broader movements and communities. And Quatrefoil Library does an amazing job of connecting folks with those kinds of resources.
And even this story hotline was kind of inspired by this rich history we have of queer call in helplines, which, back before the internet, was one way that queer people could find one another and connect with one another. And so we wanted to find a way to make it easy for people to share stories that maybe otherwise aren't being documented, and that's why we decided to do the phone line.
NINA MOINI: Yeah. And I love that you're shouting out all these other resources and organizations. Because to your point, some resources are dwindling, and some resources are just coming to be.
Just last week, I'm sure you know, the Trump administration instructed the National Suicide Prevention Hotline to stop offering specialized support to LGBTQ callers. Do you feel like right now, there are more efforts you're seeing to step in for mutual aid and other resources out of fear that it might be disappearing from other levels and areas of funding?
CHRIS STEDMAN: Absolutely. I mean, this is a big reason why I reached out to Trans Lifeline when I was making my last podcast series, because Trans Lifeline is run for and by trans folks, and it's really the trans community taking care of one another. And I reached out to them, in part because they also have a policy that not all help hotlines do, which is they have a nonconsensual intervention policy, so they won't call the police on if you don't want them to, which is not the case for every helpline.
And I think that awareness of, we're not going to have this nonconsensual intervention policy, comes from the fact that the phone line is run by the community, for the community. So we know, as an LGBTQIA community, what we need more than outsiders might. And I think in this moment, a big part of why I love being part of PFund and redistributing all the money that we do is it's a community foundation, so the organization doesn't decide where the money goes.
Volunteers from the community help decide where that money is distributed to, which has allowed PFund to really make sure that all this money that's being raised goes to places that really, really need it. Minnesota as a trans refuge state, we have a lot of trans folks either already living here or coming here. And trans folks know what they need more than someone else might.
And so in 2023, I got started getting really involved in the work of PFund. And part of why I did that was because I believe that one of the best things that we can do to support people who need support is to give them the resources so that they can do what they need to for themselves--
NINA MOINI: Absolutely.
CHRIS STEDMAN: --rather than deciding what they need.
NINA MOINI: Centering community in what was going to help them instead of people from the outside trying to prescribe something or tell people. I really love that.
CHRIS STEDMAN: Absolutely.
NINA MOINI: We have only about 40 seconds left, Chris, but tell us how people could get involved still with this. Can people still submit their stories, or what's next for you?
CHRIS STEDMAN: Yeah. Anyone who wants to call in and share a story, all you have to do is call 1-844-WE-HLP-US. That's 1-844-934-5787. Just record a story of a time that you have either offered queer mutual aid to someone, you've received it, or both. And these stories will be incorporated into a project, as well as archived with the Tretter collection at the University of Minnesota.
NINA MOINI: Amazing. Congratulations, and thank you so much, Chris.
CHRIS STEDMAN: Yeah. Thank you.
NINA MOINI: Chris Stedman is the founder of Good Judy Productions and creator of the We Help Us hotline. We'll have information again on how you can call and be involved and tell your story at mprnews.org.
CHRIS STEDMAN: Hey, thanks so much for having me.
NINA MOINI: Chris, where did this idea for your podcast come from?
CHRIS STEDMAN: Yeah. It's a long story, but it has to do with a kind of lost family history of queer mutual aid that I learned about as an adult.
And as I learned more about that and just really how much of the organizations and resources we have today as a queer community can be traced back to mutual aid efforts by small groups of people, I found myself wanting to see what all stories were out there that maybe haven't been heard before. So, for example, I serve on the board of PFund Foundation, which is a community foundation here in Minnesota that raises--
NINA MOINI: Yeah! We had them on yesterday.
[LAUGHTER]
CHRIS STEDMAN: Oh, that's awesome. I think I heard that, actually. But yeah. They raise hundreds of thousands of dollars each year for queer Midwesterners. And what a lot of people don't about them is that they actually started as just a small group of LGBT Minnesotans who came together to pool the little money they had during the AIDS crisis and create this emergency fund for those who needed it.
And really, you can look at so many of the organizations we have here from, The Aliveness Project, Open Arms Minnesota, and they all have this kind of history. And so I just found myself wanting to learn more about what kind of stories of queer mutual aid are out there that maybe a lot of us haven't heard yet.
NINA MOINI: Yeah. And that's because people were kind of hiding, right? I mean, when you talk about mutual aid, tell us a little bit more about why people in a community have to show up for one another and throughout history.
CHRIS STEDMAN: Yeah. I mean, this is, I think, really fundamental to the LGBT experience is coming together to support one another when the larger systems or resources that are supposed to support us either fail to do so or are actively hostile to our existence. And again, you can trace a lot of this back to the AIDS crisis of the '80s and '90s.
But this is still true today, particularly for trans folks who have to support one another when navigating systems that are either, again, not easy to navigate, or actively hostile. And for me, my previous podcast series was called Unread, and it was prompted by the death of one of my closest friends to suicide.
NINA MOINI: I'm sorry.
CHRIS STEDMAN: Thank you. And that series, it explored the impacts of minority stress on queer people and how, again, systems that are either hostile or, at best, indifferent to us can be so harmful. And one of the things that really came out of making that podcast for me was I talked with folks at Trans Lifeline who were talking a lot about how as LGBTQIA people, we can be there for one another and show up for one another.
And this really is just so central to our experience as queer people that, again, I felt like especially now, in a time when LGBTQIA Americans-- and again, trans Americans in particular-- are under attack, I just felt like we need to learn these stories and learn from them. And again, fortunately, there's so many amazing resources out there. But again, a lot of people maybe haven't heard all of those stories.
NINA MOINI: Would you just give an example, Chris, of what this looks like in action? Is this, like, someone cannot afford to travel somewhere they need to go, everybody step in? What's the range of things that people are leaning on one another for?
CHRIS STEDMAN: Yeah, it can look like so many things. I'll just give a personal example, which is when my friend died. There were all of these costs associated with his death, things like cremation and all these expenses that you don't necessarily expect until you've navigated an experience like that. And I knew that his family and loved ones couldn't afford those costs.
And so I just put together a GoFundMe and shared it with my community. And I was just blown away by how many people, most of whom had never met this person before, gave what they could and recognized, we as a community, we have to be there for one another. And one of the things that I've been-- as I've been working on this phone story hotline, is I've been reaching out to a lot of local folks who are doing mutual aid.
And there are just so many amazing resources here that we're trying to shine a light on as a part of this project, like Twin Cities Trans Mutual Aid, which is a network that supports and amplifies material needs of local trans folks. You can find them on Instagram. There's TIGERRS, which is a non-hierarchical collective that is dedicated to delivering programs and resources for solidarity and safety among trans, intersex, and gender expansive Minnesotans.
And one resource I have worked with quite a bit on this is Quatrefoil Library. They're here in Minneapolis. They're the second oldest LGBTQIA library in the country, and a community space, and they run entirely by volunteers. And we're going to be having an in-person story collection session in August there. And again, so many of these kinds of resources are just people recognizing a need in the community and stepping up to be there for one another.
Like the library, maybe that's not the first thing that comes to mind when someone thinks of mutual aid. Mutual aid is often about meeting immediate material needs. But as queer people, we also need stories, and we need to be able to feel connected to broader movements and communities. And Quatrefoil Library does an amazing job of connecting folks with those kinds of resources.
And even this story hotline was kind of inspired by this rich history we have of queer call in helplines, which, back before the internet, was one way that queer people could find one another and connect with one another. And so we wanted to find a way to make it easy for people to share stories that maybe otherwise aren't being documented, and that's why we decided to do the phone line.
NINA MOINI: Yeah. And I love that you're shouting out all these other resources and organizations. Because to your point, some resources are dwindling, and some resources are just coming to be.
Just last week, I'm sure you know, the Trump administration instructed the National Suicide Prevention Hotline to stop offering specialized support to LGBTQ callers. Do you feel like right now, there are more efforts you're seeing to step in for mutual aid and other resources out of fear that it might be disappearing from other levels and areas of funding?
CHRIS STEDMAN: Absolutely. I mean, this is a big reason why I reached out to Trans Lifeline when I was making my last podcast series, because Trans Lifeline is run for and by trans folks, and it's really the trans community taking care of one another. And I reached out to them, in part because they also have a policy that not all help hotlines do, which is they have a nonconsensual intervention policy, so they won't call the police on if you don't want them to, which is not the case for every helpline.
And I think that awareness of, we're not going to have this nonconsensual intervention policy, comes from the fact that the phone line is run by the community, for the community. So we know, as an LGBTQIA community, what we need more than outsiders might. And I think in this moment, a big part of why I love being part of PFund and redistributing all the money that we do is it's a community foundation, so the organization doesn't decide where the money goes.
Volunteers from the community help decide where that money is distributed to, which has allowed PFund to really make sure that all this money that's being raised goes to places that really, really need it. Minnesota as a trans refuge state, we have a lot of trans folks either already living here or coming here. And trans folks know what they need more than someone else might.
And so in 2023, I got started getting really involved in the work of PFund. And part of why I did that was because I believe that one of the best things that we can do to support people who need support is to give them the resources so that they can do what they need to for themselves--
NINA MOINI: Absolutely.
CHRIS STEDMAN: --rather than deciding what they need.
NINA MOINI: Centering community in what was going to help them instead of people from the outside trying to prescribe something or tell people. I really love that.
CHRIS STEDMAN: Absolutely.
NINA MOINI: We have only about 40 seconds left, Chris, but tell us how people could get involved still with this. Can people still submit their stories, or what's next for you?
CHRIS STEDMAN: Yeah. Anyone who wants to call in and share a story, all you have to do is call 1-844-WE-HLP-US. That's 1-844-934-5787. Just record a story of a time that you have either offered queer mutual aid to someone, you've received it, or both. And these stories will be incorporated into a project, as well as archived with the Tretter collection at the University of Minnesota.
NINA MOINI: Amazing. Congratulations, and thank you so much, Chris.
CHRIS STEDMAN: Yeah. Thank you.
NINA MOINI: Chris Stedman is the founder of Good Judy Productions and creator of the We Help Us hotline. We'll have information again on how you can call and be involved and tell your story at mprnews.org.
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