- [Mark Horvath] Hi everybody, here I am at Trans Thrive.
And I'm going to try not to cry, I cried in the last one.
And you guys, I really, see, there I go.
You guys really touched my heart, one, allowing me in here
and the stories that I heard meeting you all.
So Erin is the Program Coordinator and this is a day center
that works primarily with transgender homeless people.
And she's also a YouTuber, a YouTube partner,
and that's awesome.
First tell me about your work that you're doing here
and then tell me about your advocacy because it wasn't
easy for you to roll a camera.
You know what I mean?
And YouTubers can be vicious, you know what I mean.
- Well thank you first off for having me on.
So a little bit about the work that we do here.
Like Mark mentioned, we're a day drop-in center
mostly for homeless people, but specifically for people
who are transgender.
This is something that is really important to me
to be able to work here.
It's something that I'm so glad I'm able to work
in the trans community.
Growing up transgender in the middle of the country,
I really didn't have anyone else who was going through
the same things I was for the longest time,
I really thought I must be the only person who is having
these struggles with gender, just because I had no way
of reaching out to anyone who had experienced
those same things.
And so being here in San Francisco and being able
to actually work with the trans community,
especially parts of the trans community
that have so many needs, is just something
that is really special to me.
So a lot of the work that I do here right now I'm mostly
coordinating a lot of our programs but I started here
as one of our program specialist.
And basically what that means is that I'm doing
the case management which is working one on one with clients
trying to get them off the street, trying to get them
into shelters or into work or dealing with the issues
that they're dealing with, whether that's drug abuse
or discrimination or anything like that.
So there's a lot of one on one work,
which is really important to me
and especially to the client.
But then there was also a lot of support groups
and facilitation and things like that.
So I really got a chance to sit down with the community
and talk about what's going on in their lives,
what are the issues that they're facing every single day,
and how can we address them.
So if it's homelessness, what are the things that we can do,
how can we get them to a place where they are off the street
and one of the things with Trans Thrive that's really unique
is we are funded to HIV prevention.
And HIV is a really big concern for the trans community.
HIV prevalency rate is through the roof compared
to other populations.
But we've tried to take a step back from HIV
and really looked at what's the whole needs of the person?
So HIV may not be the first thing somebody thinks about
if they're on the street, if they're doing survival sex
work, if they're on drugs.
- Which survival sex, is really because you can't
go into Macy's and apply for a job.
Well you can you just get booted out.
- You wouldn't get it.
- You know what I mean.
So what's left, you're hungry, you've got no place
to turn, survival sex becomes an option.
- Becomes an only option.
- Only option exactly.
And then you have all the other, whether it be crime
of being beat up and harassed, and the street, and HIV,
and it's just not a way to live.
- Exactly, and so if we're able to get one person
off the streets and into a stable living situation
and maybe get them into a job or something like that,
it takes that need to do survival sex work or engage
in things that might make them a higher risk for HIV.
So I think that's one of the brilliant things about
the Trans Thrive program is that we're able to take
a step back, see what all the needs are of the person,
how we can address them, and by doing that we're able
to reduce the risk for HIV.
- Wow, and now your own advocacy work.
- So like you mentioned, I do a lot of online advocacy work.
This is something that I started six years ago.
It was just after YouTube was out and I remember-
- Wow you've been doing it for a while.
- Long time.
- Yeah because YouTube is only six years old.
- Yep and I started just before it's first anniversary.
And I remember one day I was sitting at work and I was
watching cat videos on YouTube and I came across
this video, and it's silly,
but it was people falling asleep.
And it was a collaboration video where people were falling
asleep in front of their cameras, and they were saying
good night or different things like that.
It really struck me because this was, I mean falling asleep
is you're vulnerable, that's a spot, you're closing
your eyes you're not looking at what's around you.
It's this thing where not a lot of people see.
You don't watch people fall asleep.
And so to be able to see people at this vulnerable part,
and sharing that really inspired me.
I was like, wow, if they can do it,
why can't I share about myself.
And so-
- It took a lot of courage.
- It really did.
I went down I grabbed a camera, I went to the sub basement
of this place where I was working and I put it on this shelf
and I stood there.
I was in New York City so you could hear the subway
going by behind the walls and stuff.
And I was shaking because it was something that was so
intense to be able to actually talk about being trans
or feeling like I was alone in it, there are all these
different things.
And to be able to share that it was something
that was really hard.
And I really struggled with putting that first video up.
And I put it up and I got maybe like five comments
and 50 views, and to me that was amazing.
All of a sudden 50 people out there saw me talking about
being trans and who I was, and five comments saying
you go girl or really awesome of you to share this,
thanks so much, I'm going through the same thing.
And I was like, wow, this is amazing.
It wasn't that much, but it really inspired me
to keep going.
So through that I've been able to document six years
of my transition.
- And YouTube made you a partner.
- Yeah YouTube made me a partner.
- So that's very cool, very cool.
- Yeah it's really great.
- We didn't really know what was going to go on.
They got an e-mail Mark Horvath is coming
and ended up to be this real gorgeous
kinda like moment of sharing.
Both me being a straight ally and just a bunch of just
wonderful people, just wonderful people,
I fell in love with the people in that room.
Because they, they're themselves.
I know Bevin who's holding the camera, who was the director
of Hope, you know why I love him?
It's because he's himself and I just, it takes so much
courage to be yourself in this world.
And here's people that all they're doing is being
themselves, and they get kicked to the curb time
and time again, and what goes on in that.
The one girl talking about how she was told
she was worthless and then the other girl
talking about creatures, no you're people,
you're humans.
You're humans, they're humans.
You're a human, I'm a human.
(scream)
Now I'm going to get mad.
I cried in the other interview,
now I'm going to punch something.
Well thank you very much for having me.
This is a huge issue with the LGBT and the homeless issue
as many of you know, that I've really tried to learn
as I go because I think through education,
and your work which is basically activism and education,
we're going to find understanding.
I'm sorry, it's discrimination and whether it's color
discrimination or sexual discrimination, it all sucks
and it's all ignorant, and it's all got to stop, okay.
So it doesn't matter, you see a homeless person
you help them, end of story.
- [Cameraman] And Erin where do we find you on YouTube?
- You can find me on YouTube at YouTube.com/grishno,
that's G R I S H N O.
- He's producing.
Thank you everybody.