Rainbow Territory strategy workshop outcome

To keep the community in the loop Rainbow Territory has provided a rough summary of their recent strategy workshop. The strategy will be documented and published in the next month or so.

How did the the workshop go overall?

Well. We worked collaboratively and tackled some really ‘big picture’ questions. Productive. Fun. Plenty of food. Challenging but supportive, invigorating. Everyone was very forthcoming and open – led to productive discussions. Bonding and sharing and deep feelings through ice breaker activity. Very well facilitated, negotiated breaks. Finished on time. Listened. Broke into groups to visually represent Rainbow Territory. Good to play coits during the lunch break!

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What did Rainbow Territory try to tackle?

Basically the big picture. Who do we represent? What do we stand for and where do we see ourselves? What are we doing? What are we going to do? Working out what Rainbow Territory is working to achieve and in what areas of it is going to work in order to help get the community there.

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How did you go about it?

At a really high level we thought about and discussed “Where are we now?”, “Where do we want to be?”, “How do we get there?”.We reviewed the survey results. We looked at statistics on lgbtqi populations, discrimination. We thought about our own experiences. We thought about who was not properly represented in the survey, or at the workshop on the day.

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Some of the insights from survey and discussions included:
Being strategic in law reform – trying to change things that are achievable. Making sure we tell the less common stories for example beat safety, loneliness, social isolation – not just telling the common stories from the survey. We are behind the other states in terms of the law.

Importance of acknowledging difficulties in being representative across the whole Territory and not wanting to speak on behalf of people outside of DarwinDiscussion on the day of our current strengths and weaknesses
Diversity / Access to community / Support activist networks
/ Personal / Public awareness / Inequality and lgbtqi discrimination

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For those who couldn’t attend, what was their input?

The importance of alliance-building. The importance of values for a group or organisation. The importance of changing things for the better in an equitable and not just equal way.

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What is Rainbow Territory’s vision?

A society that is free, equitable, connected

In a society where lgbtqi people can be free to be themselves and fully participate in society.

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How do we get there?

Slowly!
Keep talking to each other to get a plan that we are all happy with.

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What are your main focus areas for the future

Community building

Law reform