Storytelling as Social Protest

Over the weekend I spoke to graduating LGBTQ (and allies) high schoolers at a Rainbow Graduation Celebration in Riverside, CA. I spoke to the graduates about the importance of sharing their stories and experiences. I drew on my own experiences and how I've used my own story in the work that I do as an advocate for social justice.

I have been having a lot of discussion around this topic of 'storytelling' for quite some time now. I believe that stories are absolutely powerful tools and critically instructive because they challenge and expand our thinking about the world around us. Every individual has a story. Whether those stories be about traumatic experiences, triumphs, achievements, or whatnot, they're stories and they are valuable. Stories have the power to instigate change.


Lately I have been exploring a new language to talk about the importance of storytelling and to engage in the idea of using storytelling as an act of social protest. By sharing our stories, our personal experiences become a springboard for critical engagement and social change. Over the years, I have taken time to talk about my experiences with 'ex-gay' therapy in order to raise awareness around the harm and trauma that is born out such experiences. Through my story, I label the practices of reparative therapy (including gay exorcisms) as spiritually violent. My hope has been that through telling my story someone will be listening; hopefully someone that needs to hear that it is okay to be gay and that they don't need to try to change who they are, because they are loved and affirmed without reservation. I hope to put an end to the spiritual violence.

If our stories of violence (or of whatever they may be) are untold, they remain unheard, and a defining part of our lives unknown. Our stories provide a critically urgent space that mentors those that listen. Stories incite a response on the part of the listener. In my discussions around the topic of storytelling I've encountered the term critical witnessing, introduced by Dr. Tiffany López, to describe the process of being so moved or struck by the experience of encountering a story as to embrace a specific course of action avowedly intended to forge a path toward change.

We need to think about the ways we position ourselves as social justice activists and as critical witnesses, sharing stories of survival and healing, explicitly inviting others into a shared circle of critical witnessing and insistently offering our stories as a vehicle toward personal and social change. I close with a quote from Maggie Kuhn as sort of a 'food for thought': "Stand before the people you fear and speak your mind -- even if your voice shakes."

Photo Credit: Penelope Poppers