brontomerus asked:

any chance of ladyfest bellingham following olympia's lead and moving toward a more inclusive name? as a genderqueer kid i was super-excited to feel like i was actually welcome at genderjam last year (at least, until a wall fell on my head and in the panic people started fucking up my pronouns). i'd love to be a part of organizational stuff but as much as i've worked on dealing with it, i can't help but feeling excluded at events whose names don't include me... even if their missions do.

not trying to be a troll, just wonderin'.

at any rate, however it goes i hope it goes awesome!

Thanks for asking!  We re-evaluate the name situation every year, with each new crop of organizers, but have decided to stick with Ladyfest again this year.  We definitely appreciate and acknowledge the issues you’ve discussed.  We chose to keep the name for a few reasons, but mainly because it follows in the footsteps of Ladyfests past.  We have been struggling with some serious backlash in our community and trying to prove ourselves as a legitimate organization, and having that strength and history from the global community of Ladyfests helps to make a case for us and gives us confidence as individual organizers.  We hope to get to a point where we don’t have to worry as much about this backlash and have enough freedom to try something a little different, but we’re not that comfortable yet.

As in years past, attendance at ALL of our events is 100% open - we want anyone and everyone to attend.  We hope to see you there even if you don’t feel comfortable volunteering or submitting!

- Katie