Community Spotlight: DIOSSA Squad - Online Kamustahan

written by Tanya Laguing

As transgender people, especially the youth, we face a lot of stigma and discrimination in various forms. We still experience namecallings, misgendering, and in worst cases, violence. And we experience these anywhere; in our workplaces, in schools, and even in our own homes. Believing that there is strength in unity, we decided to formalize our group and be more active in socio-civic and volunteer work.

Our organization, the Decent Image of South Signal Association’s (DIOSSA), represents a group of transgender people residing in Metro Manila, Philippines. Our main strategy is to provide support and work towards advocating a more positive view towards us, to our peers and to the general community of transgender people.

Doing this for several years now, we’ve implemented small projects such as outreach programs to change the community’s negative and discriminatory views towards us. Overall, our activities have slowly developed a more positive view towards trans people but we recognize that there is still a lot of work to be done.

Recently, we launched our Online Kamustahan initiative. This initiative aims to promote interventions to combat anxiety, depression, and dysphoria amidst the pandemic through an online community support. Being able to connect with the transgender community who understands the struggle regarding the resources, service delivery, and postponement of these essential gender affirming medical and surgical care has taken its toll on our mental health especially with the members of the community who has undergone their preliminary stages of their transitioning or surgical care.

The Online Kamustahan was launched on May 16 and we’ve been doing this as a monthly session to promote a safe space for dialogues surrounding mental health for the trans community.

DIOSSA aims to continue its community outreach activities through our network and affiliated youth organizations. Aside from this main activity, we plan to conduct livelihood and capacity-building trainings for trans people to help them become more empowered and contribute significantly to their families and to the society at large. We will also intensify our awareness campaigns about transgderness and the issues surrounding our community not only in our Metro Manila but also in nearby areas. Know more about us and support our cause on Facebook at Diossa Lily.