Hello everyone. Thank you for coming.

First for those that don’t know what the Transgender Social Center is I will give a quick explanation. It is a safe non-sexual place in Utherverse for people using transgender avatars, our friends and allies.

It is somewhere to talk Utherverse or Real World with others from around the world. Somewhere to get support and give support or just get away from it all for a while.

What started as small coffee shop venue and office has grown into a full virtual world with its own nine pod transport, Trans World Square, Ipanema Beach, fashion boutiques, Garden of Remembrance, roller disco and of course at its centre the TGSC.

But it’s not the places that make our world, it’s you the visitors and regulars and friends.

I think it is important to say now that it is not just me running this. AG_TALI_ASHBY plays a vital role constantly promoting the events, the venues and our branded patcher and client. We also bounce ideas, she is always brutally honest with her opinions which is very helpful..

Thank you Tali :)

 

Parties, Passion, Progress and POSE! Let’s start with parties...

We never set out to be a big party venue. Not that we think we are above parties, definitely not, we love parties. For quite some time we were running “Reach Out” on Sunday afternoon/evening, unsuccessfully advertising it with bulletins and on Discord. The problem was that the Utherverse Events Calendar is an entertainment calendar so sitting around talking didn’t meet the criteria.

After Vcon last year I discussed this with DAQU33N and Southern_Charm. Then we changed things. The gathering would start with an hour of live streaming music with a DJ and end with an hour of sitting talking.

This started with DJ_Brianna and was soon complement with Kaydee_SUNV making a rotating DJ rota. It didn’t take long for these one hour sets to become the full two hours.

You will now find Reach Out on the events calendar. We have regular visitors, passers by and those that pop in when they can. They are relaxed events where you are free to discuss anything.

They are also an informal way to meet me if you are looking for personal support. I will come back to this in a moment.

So we got into having parties. You can’t be fabulous fashion queens without having Carnival! I mentioned we have a venue called Ipanema, it’s actually Ipanema Postos 8 e 9, perfect for Mardis Gras and that is exactly what we did.

Last year, as we have done since we started, we continued the tradition started years ago by Chibi_Sky of marking Transgender Day of Remembrance in the Utherverse. The TGSC does this by having a VWW of the Day at our Garden of Remembrance and holding a Celebration of Lives party.

This year Kaydee_SUNV will be the DJ for the celebration on Monday 20th November.

There was one more huge party we held. This time in Pride Crossing and we gave 1000 rays of cash prizes; Pride Ball. This was very special to the regulars of the TGSC and ties to things I will talk about later.

We would like to thank Southern_Charm and the Ambassadors for coming along and supporting this event. I also thank Brianna for DJing and Kaydee and Tali for helping me on the judging panel. Also thank you BBaby for encouraging me to do it and kicking me every time I had doubts :)

A massive thank you goes out to everyone that came to this event, especially the two fab guys that “walked” and did a great show!

The new Sunday “parties” have been our progress. They have given us a larger audience and exposure on the Events Calendar. This can only be a positive. An Ambassador supported event in a Utherverse owned venue was also a feather in our cap.

 

Going back to the Reach Out events. The support there is mostly public group support and discussion. We are all there to discuss issues openly and I am also there for confidential support.

Without pointing fingers or identifying people I can say that in the last year the counselling has included real world physical sexual abuse, gender identity, isolation and chem-sex issues. I have also dealt with in world issues often ending recommending speaking to Tech Support, WOPS or which ever department best suits.

We also try to provide links to real world organisations for help and support. This is where we need input from the online community around the world. We don’t know everything, please tell us about groups and organisations you know.

Helping is our “passion” and so is being a community and fun virtual world. I’m not one for giving numbers but I will say when I look at the stats for TGSC Virtual World each month I am surprised and pleased at the numbers we get.

This is not just event days, people visit every day. They use our Transport, visit the Social Center, the Garden of Remembrance and the Fashion Boutiques. We would love more visitors of course!

 

Back at the end of winter I binged watched all three seasons of POSE. I sort of insisted some of the regulars at TGSC watch it.

It really made an impact on us. Brought back memories of things we maybe chose to forget. Stirred up anger and grief. Most importantly in inspired us.

For those that don’t know the show, it’s a drama series set in New York at the start of a world with AIDS. It follows the lives of gay, transgender and cross-dressing Black and Latino people initially living off prostitution or low wage jobs whilst striving for a better life.

Each weekend they escape to the Ball Room and “walk” competing with rival families for trophies. The families are groups of people sharing accommodation with an older mother (or father).

he series continues into the 1980s following the politics and medical situations around AIDS and the oppression faced by transgender people as they try to improve their lives. It is powerful stuff!

This is not fantasy, it’s true life. It was from this ballroom culture Madonna stole the concept of vogue.

In the US Ballroom culture developed due to Black and Latino drag queens being subject to prejudice in the then predominantly white drag beauty pageants.

Transgender and cross-dressing people are also often sidelined or rejected in the gay community. This left a group of non-white people oppressed by society as a whole and by the subcultures they turned to. From this group grew the amazing ballroom culture.

How does this relate to Utherverse?

The virtual world is populated with the same mix of people as the real world, they have the same prejudices and ideas.

What’s more is Utherverse is very adult orientated with most “TG” venues being porn theatres or brothels. We do feel sidelined, we do feel like sex objects and we don’t want to!

We looked at the TSGC and saw direct parallels between the New York ballroom culture and our little community coming together in safety once a week.

This is why we threw the Pride Ball in Pride Crossing. To bring the pride and passion of our little community to the wider virtual world.

A new project that is almost complete is our POSE night club modelled on the club in the show. We plan to have monthly events starting there soon in the new year.

I personally hope they will be crazy chaotic events with loads of love and just enough drama to make them “interesting” :)

 

That’s it for the past year and a hint of what’s to come next year.

I want to end the same as last year with our statement of understanding purpose and commitment to you all.

The importance of Utherverse to many TG avatars users should not be under estimated. For some people Utherverse is their transition. For others it is their safe place to explore themselves. For others it is their kinky play ground. All this is OK, it is what it needs to be.

As long as there is an Utherverse and I am here there will be a TGSC. That is my promise to you all.

Thank you to everyone behind the scenes at Uthervese and the staff and volunteers in world that keep it all running so that we can have this amazing place we call home.

Thank you for listening (reading). I will answer questions now.

Our booth at Virtual Con 2023