Rainbow Club (RWC)
Advisor Billie Miracle
bmiracle@roguecc.edu

President
Jessie
rainbowclubrcc@gmail.com

Vice President
Patti

Secretary
Juliet

Treasurer
Sam

Senior Advising Member
Amiko-Gabriel Stocking
Kino_amiko379@yahoo.com

Our Purpose:
“The purpose of this club shall be to promote a safe environment for individuals of all sex and gender orientations and/or identities, and their allies, on campus and in the community, through “Education, Support, Advocacy, and Community Building.”

Meetings:
Every Thursday from 3-4pm and social meetings on weekends. For location, please email rainbowclubrcc@gmail.com

Events:
The Rainbow Club officially chartered on Monday, May 23rd, 2007 on the Redwood campus, but even before RCC officially sponsored them, they were meeting and having fun, working on ways to honor the traditional purpose of their club:
For fun, they had a carpool that carried members to the Erotic Ball (April 21st), an annual dance hosted by SOU’s Queer Resource Center. For awareness, several members observed The Day of Silence, which took place on Wednesday, April 18th this year.
For awareness and community building, they are planning to uphold tradition and meet in town to participate in the ‘Out and About for 1st Friday Night Artwalk.’ Along with this event, The Rainbow Club is currently planning an on-campus, short story and Poetry reading.

History:
The Rainbow Club began as The Rainbow Group, a not-officially-sponsored gathering of folks back in 2005 headed up by Joy, Amiko-Gabriel, and a few other anonymously dedicated folks. They would meet, play board games, and discuss important social justice issues concerning their lives and the local communit.  Since then, members have chartered The Rainbow Club three times now (Each year a new charter), twice on the Redwood Campus (RWC) in Grants Pass, and once on the Riverside Campus (RVC) in Medford.
Last year, The Rainbow Club Co-Sponsored a Pride event at RWC and supported the Medford Pride with a lavishly decorated and superbly staffed Club booth shared with the SOU Queer Resource Center. At the end of the year, RCC honored them as one of the most active clubs on campus.

Along with the June Pride and many other events, The Rainbow Club set up an information booth for the Day of Silence (www.dayofsilence.org) and many members and non-member students took a vow of silence for the day to remember their loved ones and shed light on violence and discrimination against gender and sexual minorities.

Members also participated in the Yom Hashoah Remembrance, Sponsored by the RWC Diversity Center, by speaking about the meaning behind the Pink Triangle. The Pink Triangle was a patch Nazi’s forced those people, who were accused of being homosexuals, to wear.

Every first Friday of the month, members would meet to visit the gallaries and enjoy the festivities of the First Friday Night Art walk, they dubbed this gathering of club members the ‘Out and About for 1st Friday Night Artwalk.’ This tradition began before The Rainbow Club ever officially chartered, when their current Senior Advising Member, sought a way to bring the local, scattered queer community together in a visual show of support for those who were still keeping silent for fear of having no safe refuge and no largely visible community on which to lean. Last year, this monthly event grew to include the regular attendance of nearly 30 people, and sometimes more.

Resources & Dates to Remember:

Day of Silence – April 18th
http://www.dayofsilence.org/

Pride Month — June (May 21st, RVC Rainbow Club is Co-Sponsoring a Pride event with other campus organizations.

International Intersex Awareness Day — October 26th Caution: Some people and organizations refer to intersex bodies as having a “condition” or a “disorder” because this viewpoint is socially and medically popular at this time; however, intersexes are people as much as male and female are people. Pathologizing bodies that do not conform the binary preferences is a way to shame bodies and erase them. Educate yourself about your world and the people you’re sharing it with. (Intersex Info) http://groups.myspace.com/intersexes

Transgender Day of Remembrance — November 20th
http://www.cafepress.com/silenceisloud/1384823
(Trans & gender info)
http://groups.myspace.com/genderschmender