The event is being held in the Black Box, and begins at 7pm. There are no age restrictions!

Don't Stand for Homophobic Bullying!!!

Stand Up! is encouraging all young people to show their support for their LGBT Friends!

Visit www.belongto.org for further information, and become a fan on the Stand Up! page on Facebook.

The week runs from 9th-18th April.

Below is the email we received from Youthnet asking us to compile a response. It is going to out to all members, and this will inevitably have impacts across all youth organisations currently in receipt of funding from the Department or other Govt branches.

GLYNI’s regional youth officer is funded by DENI through Youthnet, along with several other projects. This budget is constrained enough without further cuts being made to it. GLYNI also is in recepit of Youth Council of Northern Ireland monies which are paid to Cara-Friend to cover running costs for the rooms we use, as well as rent etc.

If we lose these, or have them reduced, GLYNI’s services to LGBT young people across NI, including supporting our new groups, will be severely affected, and disrupted. Please support us by telling us your views on how you believe GLYNI has helped you or someone you know, and how it is a vital service that needs to be kept at it’s current funding level, or indeed increased. PLEASE!! Thank you, Liamx

Dear Youthnet Member

We are writing to update you on the current funding situation.  We are also urgently seeking information in relation to the impact of proposed cuts or potential cuts on respective staffing positions within your organisation.

At this point, none of the Northern Ireland Departmental Budgets for the period 2010 – 2011 have been agreed by the Northern Ireland Executive and in light of the Easter break, the Executive has now gone into recess until 16 April 2010.

The Department of Education along with all other Government Departments in Northern Ireland is unable at this stage to give any guidance on its budget allocation until the global budget has been confirmed.

Please provide the following information:

• Staff positions potentially under threat or already threatened to include role and responsibilities (provide brief description).
• Relevant Funding Stream(s).
• Relevant Department/ Government Agent from which funding is received.

Please treat this as a matter of priority.  Thank you

We look forward to hearing from you.

Linda Gordon on behalf of Denis Palmer, Director, Youthnet

We have everything, from the special screening of Stonewall’s new FIT film, to creating an effective Anti-Homophobic Bullying Campaign for NI, from meeting with the NIABF Coordinator to meetings with Family Ties and Brook Clinic, as well as inviting the Children’s Commissioner to meet the members on May 17th, to mark International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia.

Over the next couple months, GLYNI will also be planning our participation in Belfast Pride, as well as continuing to update our website and create a fabulous newsletter.

Our drop-in continues to run on Friday nights, with our Peer Educators in training on Friday nights.

It’s all a buzz at GLYNI. So if you’re young (aged 14-25) and L G B or T, or somewhere in between but not quite ‘straight’, feel free to come along. You can join GLYNI through our website!!

Hey and welcome everyone to our newly designed website! We hope you like it, there are still a few things to be tweaked here and there but it’s about time it was unveiled!

You can still get access to all the information from before using the links across the top of the page. This information will soon be undergoing a major refresh and update – so keep coming back! You can also still get the most up-to-date GLYNI event schedule, it is now over on the right of your screen, and PinkNews is still shown on the right too.
New features are aplenty – now, anyone can register for our blog, we want everyone to be able to submit their content and have it displayed proudly on our website. We will have members only discussion pages on various issues, with commenting enabled across all the posts you can leave your feedback on any of our articles as well as submit your own in a simple to use web interface – it’s just as easy as Facebook!

We hope these new features will make up for the temporary suspension of new registrations on our GLYNI Message Board / Forum. Unfortunately, it has been deluged by Russian spambots since this time last year… :( so I have taken the step of preventing new sign-ups. Current users can still access, and all the posts are intact – I removed all the spam (I think!). I will keep it this way until we make a decision on where to go from here with the forums. In the meantime, you have plenty of ways to make your voice heard!

Contribute!

“So Matt, how do I contribute?” I hear you ask? Couldn’t be easier! Firstly, comments are enabled on all pages and posts, meaning you can leave your feedback either anonymously or, if you want people to know who you are ;), you can register for a GLYNI account by using the link *on the right*!

What does registering get you? Well it means that no-one can pose as you in discussions of course :P! If you also have a Gravatar account associated with your email address, your avatar will be shown on comments you make and, in the future, posts you make.
Speaking of posts, did I mention that registered members can submit their own articles, reviews, posts, thoughts, announcements and much more, AND have it displayed right on our homepage? Not only that, but as the website grows, members will gain access to the members only discussion pages, where we could discuss anything and everything?

It really is an exciting new chapter for our website, one which we hope that you will help us create – so sign up now!

Peace out!
-Matt

Friday 13th November marks the tenth anniversary of Cara-Friend’s Gay & Lesbian Youth Northern Ireland – a peer-led group supporting Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender young people in Northern Ireland.

Over the years, GLYNI has supported hundreds of young LGBT people through our message boards and resource-based websites, weekly workshops and social events such as our popular drop-in on Friday nights in Belfast’s city centre – an alternative to the commercial scene for many, offering internet, games, music and a bit of craic for those just wanting to hang out with friends.

We have also taken part in campaigns and projects designed to affect change for young people in Northern Ireland, including the Bill of Rights for Northern Ireland that is due out for consultation soon. Two of the most significant of these projects are the development of our own What’s In Your Closet? resource in 2007, designed to support young LGBT people and their parents when dealing with coming out, and this year the OUTstanding Youth Work Training Programme (along with members of the LGBT Consortium coordinated by Youthnet), a two day training programme aimed at youth workers wishing to explore the issues affecting young LGBT people they may work with.

Recently, to mark our tenth anniversary, we have lowered the minimum age of our group to 14 years of age. Recognising that young LGBT people at this age are in need of support and friendship from their peers, and whilst society has moved on with greater legislative protections for LGBT people, many young LGBT people are still disadvantaged in the areas of education and youth services, and accessing youth groups such as GLYNI may be the only source of support they receive at such an early age.

Through the appointment of a fulltime youth worker, funded by Youthnet/DENI’s Section 75 Outreach Initiative, we have also been developing a new group in Enniskillen, called The Voice, supporting LGBT young people aged 14-18 – this group forms part of GLYNI Fermanagh, and we hope it will be the first of many new GLYNI groups around Northern Ireland.

We’d like to take this opportunity to extend our gratitude to all those individuals and organisations who have supported us over the years, from our own parent organisation, Cara-Friend and its staff and volunteers, to staff at Youthnet and others from across the statutory and voluntary sectors including our past/current funders at DENI and YCNI.

We’d especially like to thank our friends and colleagues in the LGBT Sector across NI, from all the various organisations and groups who have supported our ethos, referred a young person to us or promoted us in their own areas. We are grateful for your support, and look forward to a bright future with you all. Today, there are more groups providing support to young LGBT people than there were ten years ago. This is testament to the strength and resilience of our community, to the hard work of staff and volunteers, and is evidence of the continuous need for resources and commitment to providing lifelines to the youth of today.

Lastly, we’d like to thank all our members, past and present, for all their blood, sweat, tears, love, hard work, commitment and dedication to making GLYNI into the youth service that we are today. We would not have made it to our tenth anniversary without your love, support and friendship. You may have been in the group only once, or like me, for nearly ten years, but your contribution has enabled us to build a strong support base for all our members, and has strengthened our reputation amongst young people, their parents and professionals across the board.

From those early days in 1999 in the dingy old rooms of Cathedral Buildings (for many of us, a second home) to 2009 and the bright new surroundings of the First Floor in Waring Street, here’s to ten more successful years of doing what we do best – supporting young LGBT people!!

For further information on our services in Belfast and Enniskillen, please contact me (Liam Larmour, Regional Development Youth Officer) at Cara-Friend, on 028 9089 0202 or by email liam.larmour@glyni.org.uk (website www.glyni.org.uk)

But remember, if you want to start coming along to the group you have to email us first on befriending@glyni.org.uk

Remember, GLYNI is taking a break for the month of January! Monday nights are not on until February.

Friday nights may still run occasionally, please check this with Liam prior to coming all the way down!

Peace, out!

(Image from http://cakehead.com)

Since 1999 GLYNI has been working towards creating a better Northern Ireland for LGBT young people by providing a safe space for us to come to and talk about the issues that affect us!

Today its a fast growing safe space for LGBT young people to come along, hang out, learn cool new stuff and enjoy a cup of tea!

Last Friday GLYNI members celebrated with a fairy cake and a Futurama DVD.

This coming Monday GLYNI will be holding a workshop about Bullying and Homophobia facilitated by our very own Drop-in Co-ordinator Adam.

If you fancy coming along to GLYNI and haven’t yet contacted us, why not get in touch by contacting us using the links above!

Anyway, hope y’all have an awesome week!

~Sean’sfirstblogposthiphiphorray…