We Want the Airwaves – Ignacio Rivera

Nia: Hi.

Ignacio: How are you?

Nia: Good, how are you?

Ignacio: I'm good. I'm with my grandson, hanging out.

Nia: Hi.

Ignacio: Say hi.

Grandson: [baby sounds]

Ignacio: [laughter] He's eating breakfast with me.

Nia: Nice.

Ignacio to Grandson: Okay, are you going to chill? Alright.

Nia: Well, it's nice to meet you, finally.

Ignacio: Nice to meet you too. I'm glad we make it happen. It's been crazy. It's funny. We're at
home and stuff, and I feel like I'm working more; more than I have been in the longest time.

Nia: No, I agree. I'm working from home and when I was at the office I would walk around and
stretch my legs in between things. Now I'm just at my computer for 8 hours a day, barely taking
any breaks, except to go to the bathroom and to eat.

Ignacio: No like, I work from home anyway so I had a good practice of like—I have a yoga mat
and all this. So, I get up and move and stuff, but it's just like now I am on a very regimented
schedule because I've been in the house for like a month. I've only left this house 3 times to go to
the grocery store.

Nia: Oh, wow.

Ignacio: I have not been out. I'll go to the back porch to get sun and kind of kick the ball around
with him and stuff like that. But, we really haven't been outside. I'm like, "Okay, get up. Work
out. Do an art project. Do this." So, it's like really strict movements, "Okay, cook. Do this. Stop
and watch a movie. Meditate." So, it's like every moment is—even if it's like, "Okay, stop and do
nothing. Just contemplate life." [laughter] It's interesting but, actually really good. It's making me
really re-think a lot of things, which is nice.

Grandson: *Baby noises*

Nia: How old is your grandson?

Ignacio: One and a half.

Grandson: *Screams*

Nia: So, I think I first became aware of you through your work with Mangoes with Chili.

Ignacio: Oh, wow! That was a long time ago.

Nia: Yeah, well you've been around for a long time, and doing work for a long time. I was
looking at your website yesterday trying to figure out…I feel like usually with artists there are
some easily identifiable milestones in their careers, in terms of books they've published or
movies they've made. But, with you the body of work is just overwhelming. I don't think we're
going to be able to cover it all.

Ignacio: [laughter] I'm a Libra!

[baby sounds]

Excuse me let me get him a cup.

Ignacio to Grandson: Wait, Papito. Let me get you a cup so that you won’t [inaudible]

[baby sounds]

Esperate. Paciencia. One thing you do not have. [Inaudible.]

Where’s your cup, Papito? [baby sounds]

Ignacio: I guess it’s gone. He throws everything in corners that we find a month later.

Nia: I'm going to start with some really basic questions.

Ignacio: I'm going to turn off my volume…I'm going to mute myself so you don't hear him until
I have to answer because he'll be distracting.

Nia: Okay. The first question is: How do you identify?

Ignacio: That's huge because there's so many ways that I identify. I think I am at the
intersections of a lot of identities. Like many people, its complicated. So, I identify as trans.

[Baby starts laughing hysterically.]

Ignacio to Grandson: You’re just cracking yourself up, huh? Are you all done? I'm going to sit
you right here.

Ignacio: I'll be right back... Okay, sorry about that. I put a little music on and baby-proofed the
living room. Now, he's going to be a little more occupied so we can talk. [music plays in
background] From the onset of identifying as trans, I have never identified as a man. At some
point in my life I've identified as a woman. I identify as a person who has experience as a woman
who was socialized as a girl. That experience is super important to me. Two-Spirit, fluid, very
fluid. So I ride the wave of masculinity and femininity. I am a person of color; Black, Boricua,
Taíno, so Indigenous Latinx. I identify very strongly as a mother. I say that title will never leave
me. I don't care if I have a full-ass beard or anything. I'm a mother. That title is really, really
important.

Nia: Why is that important to you?

Ignacio: Because it holds so much power to me, especially, because its connected to woman-
hood and the socialization that girls and women have been a part of and even though that is
connected very much so to this oppression and sexism and patriarchy and all of that, that is very
much connected to who I am today. It gives me a strength, the person I am today, the way I
raised my child, the person I want to be, the person I want her to be. There's something about
being a mother, and I say this as something about my being a mother, but, "mother" being a very
big word. You don't have to have birthed a child to be a mother. Something about being a mother
and loving someone in that particular way, and caring for someone in that way beyond yourself.
It's just something… I feel nothing greater than that. So, that's why.

Nia: Okay, so we got trans, we got Black, Boricua, Taíno. We got mother. Was there anything
else you wanted to add before I, sort of, interrupted your answer?

Ignacio: No, it's fine. I identify as sober. I identify as… I have been identifying as a survivor for
a very long time, and just yesterday I was saying that I am literally going to change that
language; that I'm not going to use the word, "survivor" anymore. That I am going to shift that,
and that I am going to start using language like saying that, "I am a person who is surviving," or
that, "I am a surviving victim." I think that's a better way of describing because, I think for a long
time saying that I was a survivor was something that I needed because I felt like I was drowning.
But, now, I feel like another side of my survivorship… This is a life-long journey, and to say that
I am a survivor indicates that I am done with this journey and I'm not. I am so not. I am on an
intentional healing journey the rest of my life. So, I am a surviving victim, and I need people to
know that because, especially with CSA, it's seen as a childhood trauma, and it's not. It is
something that occurs at childhood and permeates throughout our entire lives. So…

Nia: Yeah, and just quickly, for anyone who is not familiar with that acronym, it's "Childhood
Sexual Abuse." Do you identify as an artist?

Ignacio: Yeah, sometimes I use that word. It's funny, I use different kinds of words. Sometimes
people describe me as an artist, a poet. I often use "performance artist," although I have not been
on the stage for a while and I really, really miss it. I just was thinking about a performance piece
that I want to start writing, while in quarantine. I mean, what better time to write a performance
piece? So, that's what I'm thinking about right now.

Nia: What kind of art do you… Well you, sort of, answered this already. But, I want to make
sure we cover the spectrum of all the different artistic mediums that you work in. So, what kind
of art do you do?

Ignacio: I started out, I would always say, writing my thoughts. That's what I called it for such a
long time. While I did write poetry, I'm like, "I write my thoughts." Because I just didn't think
that what I was writing was poetry. But, people said it was, so, I guess… I never took any
courses or classes or anything like that. So, for many years I never called myself a poet or writer.
But, I guess people decided I was so, alas, I am a poet and a writer, I guess. I did that for a while.
But, I think from poetry and poetry slamming I started doing more one-person shows, theater
stuff and then going back to writing, was writing more anthology pieces and critical analysis
pieces and stuff more for the movement, and now trying to write my book. I've been doing a lot
of just pieces for anthologies and stuff. Like I said, I haven't been on the stage for a while. So,
I'm really looking forward to that and I've been dabbling in little short films. There's a film that I
have not finished. It's been on the backburner for, like, forever. Forever. I'm hoping to, maybe,
while in quarantine, finish that one. That was a fun one.

Nia: Is the book you're working on essays or poetry or…?

Ignacio: Its shifting, actually. It's a memoir… well, it was a memoir told in short stories, poems,
and rituals about my story of childhood sexual abuse to sexual liberation, pretty much. But, it
told an underpinning story of what it means to be socialized a girl and be sexually abused by
another girl, struggle with coming out as a lesbian, and then transitioning into being a fluid
person, and raising a child through that transition, a female child. Really talking about sexism
and gender shit all through that, kind of, sexual awakening through trauma. Through writing this
and through my continued healing, new, of course, shit has come up, as it does. Now I am really
thinking about shifting the way in which I'm writing this book. So, who knows what's going to
come out now. There's like three books I have that started writing and it's like the ideas are there.
Ideas I have aplenty. But, it’s like, time. Time. Money. Time and money. Time and money.

Nia: What do you do for a living? Or how do you support yourself?

Ignacio: Right now, I am the founder and director of the Heal Project and so, that is doing work.
We envision really preventing and ending childhood sexual abuse, and that is through, pretty
much, healing the wounds of childhood sexual abuse through embracing sexual liberation. We do
that through education. Educating parents and advocates around using holistic sexuality
information around raising children with more information about their bodies, consent, and all
these things. I work with survivors and one of the main things that come up is, "I wish I knew
more about my body, growing up. I wish I knew about sex. I had no idea what was happening.
The first time I learned about sex was when I was being raped or molested." So, if we take it
back, we have such stigma around sex and sexuality. If we take away that stigma and we teach
people, because, most parents are so afraid and they are nervous, fearful, ashamed. If we shift the
culture around that, we can really change how… we can change a lot of things. So, this, we do it
on one hand, through there we shift our advocacy doing the work to end child sexual abuse.
Because, we're really regurgitating this idea of how we end child sexual abuse and it's a
pandemic. It continues to happen. So, lets shift how we do it.

We also work with survivors because survivors have the answer. Survivors have the answer
already. We work with survivors to heal and through that healing work we get the information
that we already know because they've already… We've already been doing the work for years
and understanding… learning to understand. Because, when a child is molested or raped, they
don't know what's happening, then the effects are going to come 5, 10, 15, 20, 30, 40, 50, and 60
years down the motherfucking line. That's when you get all of that information and extrapolate
what happens… [baby cries] What happened in your life? How were your relationships? What
did you notice? You get to see a pattern. You get to see a pattern. We can go back and we can see
where we can interrupt and where we can fix and heal and really interrupt intergenerational
trauma. So that's what the Heal Project is trying to do. I forgot the initial question. I said The
Heal Project.

Nia: Oh, I asked how you support yourself?

Ignacio: Oh yes, The Heal Project. That was a lucky thing, actually. Because, I had been doing
work around Childhood Sexual Abuse for so long but, there was no money in it; no money at all.
And I got a fellowship from the Just Beginnings Collaborative. That was another lucky thing that
we got for 4 years, and so that just ended. Interestingly enough, still looking for money. Really,
nobody wants to support… 1.) it’s hard to get money for Child Sexual Abuse, and 2.) nobody
wants to support someone who wants to do child sexual abuse prevention with the platform of
empowering children through sexual liberation. That's a no-no. That is a no-no. So I am not
getting any money from that sector.

I'm, actually, getting support from the sexual liberation movement. I'm going to get money from
queers. I am going to get money from that movement, you know what I'm saying? So, I get
money there and I get money through doing speaking engagements in colleges and universities
talking around trans issues, sexual liberation issues, survivorship issues, and things like that. So,
speaking engagements and then consulting with organizations.

Nia: You said you got “lucky” by getting that money but, clearly, you've been working really
hard for a long time.

Ignacio: I feel lucky in the fact that, in philanthropy, there's no money in that, in terms of money
for, specifically, child sexual abuse prevention or specifically for people who are CSA survivors
who are people of color doing this work. That was a blessing, you know?

Nia: I'm curious why you think that is? I mean racism, obviously. I can imagine why funders of
CSA work might be nervous about the sexual liberation aspect. But, I'm not sure I understand
why CSA work, in general, would be so difficult to find funding for. Who doesn't want to end
CSA?

Ignacio: I think there might be a lot of different reasons. 1.) They might think, "There are tons of
national organizations already doing the work. Why am I going to fund you?" That's number 1,
right? 2.) Sex scares everyone. Anything with sex in it totally scares people. Number 2, maybe
because of who I might be, right? I am out and proud about who I am. I'm an ex-sex worker. I'm
trans. I'm a person of color. I am talking about sex and sexuality in a real and honest way, very
intentionally, and I'm talking about things very raw.

I'm talking about child sexual abuse and people. We have children who are being molested and
raped on a daily motherfucking basis. This is a motherfucking pandemic. We've been talking
about this for decades and we have been regurgitating the same. Exact. Message on prevention.
Hello! Can we talk about something else so that we can figure out how we're going to actually
save, help, our children; and not just our children, our generations. Because, again, it’s not just
the children. It is continuing on generation after generation. Right now, with my own daughter,
I'm actually doing an accountability process with my own child, because of secondary trauma. I
am a surviving victim, but, through my trauma, traumatized my own child. That ripples to her
and how she has relationships and also where will I draw on process of figuring out how I'm held
accountable and how I support her and her process. This is not anything…

When people think it ends there, it just doesn't. So, it really ripples out and it's a much larger
problem and if organizations think it doesn't affect them, they're wrong. Because, we have
victims and survivors and surviving victims who work in those organizations. It also effects how
sexual harassment things happen within organizations. It affects everything. It affects everything.
We need to talk about this on a larger scale. This is why I continually say that every single
movement needs to be incorporating CSA prevention and healing within those movements;
because, it's all connected. There needs to be an amazingly huge shift in how we talk about this
because CSA is not a childhood issue. I just can't say it enough. CSA is not a childhood issue.

Nia: You mentioned that the CSA movement has, historically, has been using the same message
about prevention over and over again, that is not working. What is that message, for folks who
might not be familiar?

Ignacio: Well, let me back that up. I should say, because I'm generalizing, there are new
messages, of course, from online stuff. Because we have the interwebs and stuff, lots of new
things, of course, have been developed around cyber stuff, which, I know nothing about, and that
is not my expertise. I'm talking about what we tell our children. What do we tell our kids and
how do we know this? So, it’s like, are we watching? Talk to your kids. Talk to them about
strangers or… Kind of like those "5 little pointers" type things; and that stays the same.

Nia: Sorry, clearly, those are things that you're very familiar with but, I'm not; and I don't know
if my audience is.

Ignacio: It's kind of like, talk to your kids about strangers or "good touch or bad touch." Tell
your kids about proper body parts. Don't make your kids sit on people's laps. Tell your kids not to
go away with strangers, like have a safe word or something. Those basic things like that and if
you look up any kind of website, they'll have those things. I keep saying to myself, when are we
going to go deeper. Those are good. Not to say those are not good, because any tip is good to
save a child. All tips are good, right? Well, not all. Most tips are good and, when is there going to
be some real deep strategical thinking about why this is a national problem.
Nia: Yeah, international, I would think.

Ignacio: Thank you! An international problem. I mean, Jesus Christ! This is a huge problem and
I'm not even talking about trafficking. These are other things that people are experts in and I am
not. There's a whole thing about cyber stuff, trafficking. I have no clue about these things and I'm
simply talking about what we tell our children. This is about information.

Nia: It sounds like one of the problems with the old ways is that it really focuses on this external
threat from strangers, which is still the problem with the way we talk about rape when it happens
to adults. This idea that it's going to be someone you don't know, when, statistically, we know it’s
most likely to be someone you do know and know very well.

Ignacio: It does happen with strangers, yes, and… like what is it? 80-something percent or
something like that. It’s familial. It's really scary for adults to talk to a kid… how do you tell a
kid that it might be somebody you know, and then when you try to talk to them about how to be
safe, how do you talk to a kid about being safe, knowing 80 percent, that it's 80 percent chance
that it's someone they do know. I think adults don't know how to even process that shit and so we
almost disassociate with that information, and we hope. We just hope. We really have to get to a
place where we are really talking openly, but not fear-based. It's hard to get there. How do we
talk honestly, not being too scary, with our kids? I think, for me, the answer is we talk every
single day in tiny doses. We're honest. We're vulnerable, and that's how we do it. Because, if we
ball everything up into one thing, we are going to be scary people. It really is a way of
relationship building with our children. It really is about a new way of talking with our kids
because we are just sharing our life, our lives and life with our children.

This is information that I often talk about it as momma birds and baby birds. Momma birds go,
they fly away. They get a cricket. They get a worm, whatever they're doing. They smash it on the
wall. They chew it up. They crunch it up real good and they get it in there. They fly back to their
baby and they regurgitate it, right? They know how much they can give to their baby. Their baby
takes it in. Their baby stops when they've had enough. That's what families do, whether you
pushed that baby out, whether you adopted that baby, whether you're the grandparent or auntie,
whatever. You are condensing that information and you're giving it and you're nourishing that
child until that child is ready enough to get the fuck out of that house and make the decisions that
they can make for themselves. That's all you can do. If you shield them. The only thing you're
doing is doing a disservice because when they leave they have no information. They have no idea
how to do it for themselves and they cannot protect themselves. If you see it that way then it’s a
different… you're seeing it in a different way.

You would never say to your child… you're in a car with your child every day. You're driving,
your kid is next to you and you're telling them, "One day you'll drive." And then one day you say,
"Okay, get in the driver's seat. You've seen me drive for years now, you can get in and drive."
Would you ever do that to your kid? Absolutely not. Why would you do that about relationships,
life, the thing that they're supposed to do for their rest of their life. Pick a partner for the rest of
their life. Have communication skills to keep that partner for the rest of their life. Have skills to
love, have passion, and desire with the person for the rest of their life, supposedly. Raise children
and impart this knowledge onto their children, to grow these children. How the fuck are they
supposed to do that?

Really, when you think about it, we have no skill to do that with our children, because we have
been taught a fantasy. We've been taught a fairytale of family and we're supposed to
automatically know this thing in our heads. No, we have to work at this shit and we have to
actually talk to our children and we have to really think about these things and we struggle and
we fuck up and we get back up and we do it again and we learn and when we don't know
something, we figure it out and we talk to other parents and we cry and we get frustrated and
that's how it happens.

That's real life and that's how we do it. Nobody's perfect but, we have to give information and
not omit it because, if we omit the information all we're doing is putting children, young people,
out there with nothing and all they're doing is going out there and saying, "Okay, now I guess I'll
do this." So, its shifting that thought process. I think it's just shifting relationship building with
families, thinking about sex and sexuality as a very celebratory thing and that it is a life skill that
needs to be taught and not a fear-based thing that we need to keep kids away from. It's a life skill
and a preventative thing. There's a requirement that everyone should, you know?

Nia: Yeah, sorry I'm trying to think where do we go from here. [laughter] I definitely… I don't
want to shy away from talking about CSA and talking about that aspect of your work and I know
that it’s going to continue to come up so I'm not worried that we're… I'm not trying to move
away from it. But, I am really curious about your origin story. Where did you grow up? Are you
from Brooklyn?

Ignacio: Yeah, I was born and raised in Brooklyn.

Nia: Okay, and how long have you been in Baltimore now?

Ignacio: It's going on 6 years now, I think.

Nia: Okay, and how did you end up there?

Ignacio: Funny, I never thought I would be in Baltimore. But, I was in New York, again.
Because I was in New York, then I went to Massachusetts then I came back to New York—

Nia: What were you doing in Massachusetts?

Ignacio: I was there for 8 years. I was born and raised in New York and then when I was 18 or
19, I left New York. So, I was in shelter systems at that point and I left New York and I went to
Massachusetts because I couldn't afford to live in New York and I wanted to get out of the shelter
systems. I had an aunt that lived in Massachusetts, she said it was cheap out there so I just left.

Nia: I'm from Massachusetts. Can I ask what part you're living in? Because Boston is not cheap.

Ignacio: I lived in the Merrimack Valley. I was in Haverhill for a while and then I lived in
Lawrence.

Nia: Okay

Ignacio: So, I was there for a total of 8 years and when my daughter was 8, I came back to New
York and I was in New York for many years and then I had a job in Michigan for a year, which I
hated.

Nia: Doing?

Ignacio: I don't want to even talk about it.

Nia: Okay, okay that's fine.

Ignacio: So, I was there for one year and then when I was leaving I didn't want to come back to
New York and I was trying to figure out where to go. I had a bunch of friends in Baltimore and
they said, "Come here, it's cheap and its close enough to New York." I figured it's a pit stop. I
was like, "Fine, I'll come here." It was just like that, and it's been 6 years. That's it.

Nia: I actually lived in Baltimore very briefly. I was at MICA [Maryland Institute College of Art]
for one semester before I dropped out. But, it's treating you well, it sounds like?

Ignacio: Yeah, it's a good resting place. Because, you travel and stuff. I'm always traveling. It
really is not expensive and it's quiet. I like my neighborhood.

Nia: This is a very broad question. But, I'm curious how you feel like the place you grew up
shaped you?

Ignacio: I grew up in the ‘70s and ‘80s. Really the 80s for me. I was born in ‘71.

Nia: You look so much younger than you are. [laughter]

Ignacio: I don't even know how to describe my life. My life is so weird, I think. I think because
of my CSA my life, a lot of it is in patches. I don't remember a lot of it. So, sometimes my life
feels like flashes of a movie and so I remember… the things that I do remember as a kid, of
course, the abuse. Throw that aside. But, definitely, the things that I loved about my childhood
were my cousins.

I have to say, the one thing I was so happy about, growing up, was that my mom, the projects
that we lived in, were these projects that were facing each other. So, my mom lived on the fourth
floor in one project and my aunt lived on the third floor right under us and later on moved right
next to us. Then in the other building my aunt lived on the second floor and the other one on the
third floor. So, all my cousins were right there. It was like 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 or 15 of us.
We would all play together. So, we actually didn't really need any friends. But, we did have
friends. But, it was all of us and my cousin Maira was my homegirl. So, growing up it was great
to have all my cousins because I felt safe with them. You know, we always had somebody.
It felt like a freer time. It feels funny because an article just came out about my generation being
the generation that was the least taken care of and it's so true. [laughter] Because they say that
this generation are the most whiny generation and my generation, we're the ones that nobody
gave a fuck about. They really didn't take care of us and I said, "That is so true!" Because me and
my cousins, even though my mother was a very watchful woman, I remember those moments
with my cousins. They were just precious. In the summertime, under the johnny pump, going to
the public pool. Like all those movies about the ‘70s and stuff. The Spike Lee movies and stuff.
That reminds me of growing up. That really did.

Nia: Wait, what is a johnny pump?

Ignacio: Fire hydrant. Johnny pump. When everybody would go under the water and spray.
Going to the public schools for the free lunch. We would hit like three schools for three free
lunches, you know. [laughter] Oh my goodness. That was fun, like running around with my
cousins, doing all that fun stuff before my mother yelled at me to come inside. I think that
togetherness actually did shape that. Because, that's something that I always think about,
friendship, unity, connection. That's something that is a constant theme in my life in terms of
chosen family and friendship, it’s really important to me.

Nia: Yeah and were you always creative from a very young age? Do you remember what your
first creative outlet or artistic expression was?

Ignacio: I thought I was going to be a scientist when I was younger. [laughter] I told my mother
to get me the little microscope set. She got it for me, I was all about it and I said… like in my
mind I thought everybody was stupid because I was like… I was like, "just get me the chemistry
set. I'm going to cure cancer. It's going to be super fun and easy! It’s going to be super fun, and
so fucking easy. Just get it for me." I was going to be like, "Boom boom boom. I cured it." For
high school I even applied for this school in… I lived in Bedstuy and the school that I wanted to
go to was in Coney Island, which was an hour and 15 minutes away, for this science program. I
got in and I went for the first year and I didn't want it and I ended up still going to the school
because I did not want to be a scientist because it had too much math involved. That was the first
thing I wanted, was to be a scientist then quickly realized that sociology… when I went to
college, that sociology was my love.

Nia: So, what was your first creative outlet? It sounds like maybe it might have been poetry or
writing your thoughts, as you called it.

Ignacio: Writing my thoughts, yes. Contemplating, I always say that I am a deep contemplator. I
contemplate life quite often. I just sit around and think.

Nia: When did you start writing? Was that high school or earlier?

Ignacio: I started writing these things when I was in elementary school. I used to have this book
and I think it was in the 80s when they used to do the milk carton things for when kids were
being abducted. So, when I was young, at that time, there was a mass thing of kids being
abducted. It felt like kids were just being taken a lot when I was young. I guess, because kids
were… I mean, nobody gave a shit about kids around that time. Nobody was being watched.
There were no laws… That's when things were not being developed. After us, I think things were
really being developed after that. It was a scary time. Milk carton stuff was out and so I started
writing in this book every day when I got up to go to school, I would write what I wore, every bit
of clothes. It was my "In case I get abducted" book. So, in case I get abducted, I wore this shirt,
these jeans, what backpack, blah blah blah. But, the funny thing was in my mind I was like, "Do
I want to get abducted?" Or is it that just in case so that they can find me quick. It was staying in
my mind because I didn't want to be in my house so badly. In my young mind, I didn't know if it
was a good thing that they were out of their homes or if it was a bad thing. So, those things were
the things I started writing and then after that, little poems, then short stories.

Nia: Is that because the abuse you experienced was in the home?

Ignacio: Yeah.

Nia: --that you felt like it might be safer if you were taken away? At what age do you feel like
you became politicized and around what issues, initially?

Ignacio: I started thinking politically way earlier but, I didn't think about it as politics. So, I was
thinking politically for a long time but, intentionally like saying, "Oh this is political," because I
didn't know until I was like 20-21. I was adding words to it, big words. I was like, "Oh, the
ghetto girl has the words now! Okay, I got it." I was like, "Oh, I knew this shit." But, I had the
big words now. First it was around abuse, CSA, and stuff… and sex. I was obsessed with stuff
around sex. I was listening to Doctor Ruth every night. Every night on the radio, as a kid, I was
just listening to her because I felt something was wrong with me? I don't know. I was just
listening to Doctor Ruth every single night; listening to people's problems, listening to the advice
she would give them and stuff. Then I would listen to…

Nia: You are saying you initially became politicized around abuse and sex, that you were
fascinated with sex.

Ignacio: Also, with Oprah. That's when I found out that Oprah, later on, was an abuse survivor;
and then LGBT stuff. So, then it was LGBT stuff and then around welfare and environmental
stuff. So, everything just kind of spiraled from there and I started really thinking about how
things were intersecting so early on, again, didn't have language around intersectionality and
stuff. Later on that language came, but, I was doing intersectional work in the ‘90s and stuff.
Really thinking about economic justice, LGBT rights, and environmental rights, doing that stuff
in Massachusetts, grassroots organizing stuff up there. So, that's where I really started doing
some political work when I moved to Massachusetts when I was about 19; because I came out
started doing LGBT organizing and environmental justice organizing and then economic justice.

Nia: How did you become politicized around environmental justice? Was there something
specific that triggered it?

Ignacio: Yeah, because I met my mentor, John. *is tending to grandson* So the question was?
Nia: Environmental justice.

Ignacio: So, John. This is the funniest thing, most unlikely best friend, one of my best friends.
While I was in Massachusetts there was this bookstore I kept on passing called Bernstein
Bookstore and I thought that Bernstein Bookstore was like Berenstain Bears bookstore.

Nia: Totally.

Ignacio: I would pass it with my daughter all the time and at that time she was 3. So, I was like,
"Oh, lets go in there one day." So we got off the bus, go in there. As I'm walking into the
bookstore I see all these… up the stairs I see all these writings on the wall. It looks kind of
bohemian type thing. I'm walking up and I see this white bald guy with like flannel shirt. He
looks dusty, dirty-ass jeans, and he's like, "Hey." He's pretty muscular. He kind of looks like
Bruce Willis.

Nia: Okay. [laughter]

Ignacio: And he's like, "Hey," and I'm like, "Hey. I thought this was a kid's bookstore," and he's
like, "No. It’s like [Leonard] Bernstein. He was a composer here in Lawrence, Massachusetts."
So, he starts talking politically and as soon as he starts talking I'm like, "Oh, this guy's smart. I
like the way he's talking," and I'm like, "Oh, so what goes on here?" He's telling me about what
goes on. It's like a grassroots hub. They have poetry readings. They have this, it's like a coffee
shop type thing. I'm like, "Oh, this is cool." He says… I guess he read me as this fresh-out dyke
at the time. He goes, "Yeah, we have an LGBT group, but the person just left."

Nia: Like the facilitator?

Ignacio: He goes, "Do you facilitate?" I had never facilitated anything ever. So, I was like, "No."
He goes, "Oh, I could teach you. I could totally teach you." I was like, "You just met me." He
was like, "No, it's no problem. I could show you. Why don't you come by?" Instantly, he just
took me under his wing and he met my daughter and they clicked and that was that. After that I
came in and that was right around the time of welfare reform again. So, I'm on welfare and I
needed to work-release. So, he gave me a work-release thing there and I started working. I was
working with him all the time.

We became really good friends and he… this thing came up and he says, "Hey, somebody's
asking me to do this speaking engagement for this environmental justice thing and everybody on
the panel is white," and he goes, "I don't think I should be speaking up there and it's
environmental justice. Why don't you speak? I was like, "What the fuck am I going to say? I
don't know what to say." He says, "You can do this." I was like, "I don't know anything about
environmental justice." He goes, "Yes you do." I was like, "No, I don't." He goes, "Let’s have a
conversation."

We start talking, he goes, "You know this. You just need some words." He goes, "We can sit
down. We can write this together. We can practice it." We did that. He got me on the stage. He
says, "Read this." He coached me through the whole thing. We went to the thing. I did the
speech. I was nervous. That was the first time I ever did a speech. I was nervous as hell. I did it
and afterwards people were like, "Oh, you were so great!" and blah blah blah. He mentored me
and he's been my friend since my daughter was three years old. My daughter's going to be 30 in a
couple of days.

Nia: Oh wow!

Ignacio: I love that white man. Heterosexual white man that he is. He is a very good friend.

Nia: That's really awesome that he saw you as a potential leader from the very beginning and
had no doubts about your ability to do things that even you had doubts about your ability to do.

Ignacio: He's a wonderful, wonderful man and a beautiful leader too. Because, he is very smart
and he's literally been my fucking awesome friend for many, many years.

Nia: Unfortunately, we only have two minutes left. Thank you so much for your time and for
talking to me. I really enjoyed our conversation, and if you're down I would love to do a part two
at some point. Because, I know there's so much of your career that we haven't covered.

Ignacio: Yeah, absolutely.

Nia: Awesome. Alright, well, have a great rest of your day and I will be in touch soon.

Ignacio: Alright, bye.

Nia: Take care.