Hey everyone! We’ve missed you, and we’re excited to return from our break with an episode we’ve had cooking for a while!
CW: general discussion of suicide
Taim is a student from Syria in Cologne, Germany, and one of the organizers of the organization Pride for Sarah Hegazi. Taim discusses the organization’s second demonstration that took place in the summer of 2023, dedicated to the Egyptian activist Sarah Hegazi and the Saudi trans woman Eden Knight, both of whom died by suicide in conditions of structural queerphobia.
The protest took place in an Arab neighborhood and involved 50 participants chanting queer slogans in Arabic, with the goal of creating both visibility and discomfort. Taim discusses the importance of putting queer Arabic lingo in the streets—not just in academic settings—and maintaining Sarah’s revolutionary communist ethics in protest organizing. They also discuss future hopes that the organization can work to help queer people still living in the SWANA region. Taim’s fellow organizers are Fadi, Ahmed and Salman.
We were joined by the wonderful Bijhan Agha, a Persian-American author and creator living in Uruguay.