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Oral Histories
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California State University San Marcos University Library
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<p>Rights to oral histories vary depending on the history. The library owns the copyright to some histories, and has license to reproduce for nonprofit purposes for others. Please contact CSUSM University Library Special Collections at <a href="mailto:%20archives@csusm.edu">archives@csusm.edu</a> with any questions about use.</p>
Oral History
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Interviewer
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Madison Teater
Interviewee
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Max Disposti
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https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=DispostiMax_MadisonTeater-2022-04-26.xml
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LGBT
resource center
nonprofit management leadership
presence
Stonewall
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5.4 2022-04-26 Oral history of Max Disposti, April 26, 2022 SC027-14 00:54:20 SC027 California State University San Marcos University Library Special Collections Oral History Collection CSUSM This oral history was made possible with the generous funding of the Ellie Johns Scholarship Fund at Rancho Santa Fe Foundation and the Library Guild of Rancho Santa Fe. LGBTQ+ activism LGBTQ+ rights North County LGBT Resource Center -- California -- Oceanside North County (San Diego County, Calif.) Rome (Italy) LGBT resource center nonprofit management leadership presence Stonewall Max Disposti MJ Teater m4a DispostiMax_MadisonTeater-2022-04-26.m4a 1:|21(7)|43(6)|53(15)|65(3)|75(4)|85(4)|101(11)|113(17)|124(11)|142(11)|153(5)|165(15)|177(13)|188(7)|205(7)|215(10)|227(2)|237(6)|247(10)|259(12)|272(1)|283(4)|293(11)|303(7)|321(3)|333(3)|344(14)|356(3)|367(14)|379(6)|393(13)|406(1)|417(11)|428(6)|439(1)|450(5)|467(10)|479(2)|489(2)|500(3)|514(7)|526(8)|537(11)|550(5)|568(9)|585(13)|597(4)|607(10)|624(5)|634(2)|645(8)|668(1)|681(2)|702(9) 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/90bdb0d7c052243dc1d6c76100bad70a.m4a Other audio English 97 Growing up and education in Rome Sure. When I grew up in Rome, you know, I came from a family that was poor, but you know not too poor not to provide for me in terms of, you know, food and a good safe environment, you know healthcare and education in Italy and Europe are still free. Definitely having access to a higher education was not a challenge, at least not from the standpoint of view of affordability. I grew up in a very safe environment, even though, you know, we were struggling every month to make ends meet. I would say my childhood has been affected by the activism of both of my parents. I only have one siblings that's five years older than me also lives in Rome right now, my brother. And so throughout my life I was always exposed to diversity and others in Italy at the time. And still nowadays, there was a big migration from Africa and our country and Middle East or Eastern Europe. It depends on the time at the time, it was mostly from North Africa and my family was hosting people and greeting them and making sure that they were safe. I grew up in an environment where we always care about others, even though we had little for ourselves. Our table was always with more people and usually people from different cultures as well. My family exposed me to all of this, even though my own mom and my own dad didn't have any academic education, so to speak, they couldn't pursue a higher education, but also they were during the war at the time < ; affirmative> ; even going to high school was a privilege that just few wealthy families could afford. I consider myself lucky, of course, when I came out at the age of thirteen there's always that struggle of homophobia, transphobia in a city, in a country that's dominated by Catholic Church. Even though my parents were not religious whatsoever it infiltrates into the patriarchal narratives. When I came out as a gay man at the time it definitely was a surprise and an issue at first to a point I needed to detach from my family. They never pushed me outside so they were not against me but I needed my own space. I was thirteen, fourteen and I was already an activist in the community. But it was never a traumatic experience. I went through my time of self-affirmation and then I came back to them with more-- I knew I could conquer their hearts and mind around this because there were people I could talk to. I was definitely in a privileged position versus other friends of mine. They just end up on the street. < ; affirmative> ; . So that's my childhood. That's who I am. For me early on, on my sense of social justice, that activism around issues that they were not just LGBT related you know, human rights, immigration rights and against the war all the time. And at the time America, I was definitely not a place where I was aiming to live. It was this big monster imperialistic country that goes around to conquer spaces and lifestyles. We were not a fan of it, but love brought me to California and my first love, I would say serious enough to drag me there. And then one thing led to another, I end up staying in California. Again, though I overstay my visa. I became undocumented for about five, six years of my first time. I had to experience all of that fear because now I'm in love with someone. I didn't want to lose them. < ; affirmative> ; so that's a little bit my story, even though I always recognized my privilege to come from a place that was definitely not devastated by war and crime or violence. I still felt that I couldn't go back to it just because if I did at the time, I could never return to the U.S. I did my best and my education helped me to go through all the application process and so forth to become a citizen and live the best of both world[s] pretty much, back at home and here in California. So, yeah, I hope I didn't share too much. Max Disposti recounts his childhood and educational experiences in Rome, Italy. He also goes into detail about his parents and their education. Disposti explores the social climate in Rome during his childhood and starts connecting to different movements such as the LGBT, immigration, and human rights. activism ; affordability ; Catholic Church ; higher education ; LGBT ; Rome ; safe environment ; working class activism in Rome, Italy ; Childhood ; Education ; Family education ; Growing up in Rome, Italy 41.9028° N, 12.4964° E 17 Coordinates for Rome, Italy which is where Max Disposti was born and raised. 397 More on education / Early careers Disposti: When I was in Italy I was really driven by social studies since day one. But my high school years were troubled by a lot of strikes that I organized. I can’t even blame anybody, I was always striking for better schools, better conditions against discrimination. At the time being openly gay was a threat. It was a threat to myself. I think people never touched me or attacked me physically because I was so out that would have exposed them as well. Right. < ; affirmative> ; It was one of those I realized the more vocal out I was, the more protection I was bringing to myself because the people there to be that kinda person, especially in a religious country like that, there's always that fade. I mean, that face that you had to keep, you know, in order decency. High school was problematic. I did finish high school and then I went to the university, high school was just-- in Europe, you already pick in high school what you think you're gonna do in the future. It was graphic design related, a fashion design. Then I look around me, you're in Italy with amazing talented artists. And I look at me and say, “oh my gosh, I would never make it.” These people are just-- each one of them is an artist. I realize it wasn't really for me as well. I went into university and developed more social sociology and social studies. I graduated from-- I got my bachelor[s] over there, but didn't do much with it after a few years-- I mean when I was 30 years old, then I decided to move to the U.S. And here I started over my study and I took my bachelor[s] in political science. And then I went back to get a master [in] nonprofit management in leaderships, which I graduated from in 2016. Not really long ago. Recent, because it was a means for me, I didn't need the academic title. I really needed to know more about the work I was doing, particularly in nonprofit. I had to tell you it was money well invested, even though I'm still paying for it, < ; laugh> ; after so many years. And it really helped me to understand more about nonprofit governments and leadership as well. In addition to what I already knew. So yeah, that's my academic background pretty much. Max Disposti talks more about the education he received in Italy and then receiving his bachelors and masters in the United States. He further talks about his experience as an immigrant in America and undergoing the process to become a citizen. Meanwhile he was working different jobs and then touches on his goal to start an LGBT center. He leads into talking about the origins of the resource center. academic background ; bachelors ; LGBT center ; military ; nonprofit management ; Oceanside ; organized ; political science ; social sociology ; social studies ; strikes ; transplant Early jobs and career goals ; education in America and Italy ; Job opportunities in California ; Max Disposti's education and career background 33.1959° N, 117.3795° W 17 Oceanside, CA 843 The LGBT Experience in North County San Diego Disposti: It was not easy. I had to fight internally and externally, it was opening the door of the center in a military town. I knew it was going to be difficult because it was at the time all North County was extremely conservative. We received threat. We had our windows smashed several times. We elected people that didn't wanna meet us in person. This was obviously 2008 and 2009. Also 2008 was the year of the campaign for marriage equality. The center at this point was not open because we opened 2011, but we were active as a group. It was called North County LGBT coalition. So we were meeting weekly. We were an organizations with all we were grassroot at the same time. We had a board of directors. I mean we were an organization, but not yet with a space because we were saving money to open one. And yeah, North County was quite brutal, but also interesting enough because we were the only organized entity in North County, we received a lot of support and a lot of love from a lot of people from family and youth and so forth. We connected right away with preexisting grassroot groups in North County, in particular, with Link Lesbian in North County, there is a lot of history around what they've done here in North County for 20 years since women met under cover every Friday to create a support system for themselves, even the gay guys were cruising and the whole spots Oceanside had, the Marines were here. There was a lot of LGBT presence in Oceanside. We used to have two gay bars up to 2002, then they closed down just because the owners got old. But there was a lot of LGBT happening. It reminds me what it used to be in San Diego prior to the seventies when the Marines were there. And it became an LGBT Hillcrest [?] in particular place to go because there were a lot of Navy and Marines coming to town and finally they could be true to themself, right? Oceanside, North County was brewing with Marines that they were gay and Navy officers as well, but it was always-- the community was always in denial. Oceanside was a place where there were a lot of street workers, a lot of LGBT people, a lot of trans women, that had to, not by choice, in that case, to become strict workers because they didn't have opportunity for jobs. So quite a rough place, when we came in people couldn't believe that there [were] enough to put ourself out there and call ourself an LGBT center and having the rainbow flag outside. At first we had people just walking into the door. I remember the seniors in particular, literally were emotionally taken by the fact that we were just there. And at first I saw we're not doing anything special. We're just here with a flag outside, running some support groups, but we didn't realize at first the impact we're having soon, so many lives and people that came and dropped their life story on us, seniors and youth. And then all of a sudden we started seeing more and more, our amazing trans kiddos < ; laugh> ; . And that was when we started advocating within our own community with our old generation of gay male to the fact that this is the time for us to give back to those of us that are still struggling and understanding how, not only embrace our trans identities, not as a plus or a sign of solidarity, but as a full part of the community, that's always been there, but always been hidden, not by their choice. It was the constitutions of our mission statement at the center. We were fortunate enough that since day one, when no one was talking about trans rights, other than trans people, of course, by meaning the mainstream of the LGBT community. < ; affirmative> ; Our board was composed by trans folks, the support groups. We started hiring therapists, everybody was volunteering at the time to work with our folks. And we had hundreds, hundreds of kids coming at the center during a week basis. And we learned so much from them, their struggle, their pain, one of this kids became my son because he decided to adopt me. Now he's 22, so he's already grown up and he's a trans male, lives with his girlfriend now and everything else. But so it was a overall real experience. That was never a job for me, never just a job or never just a phase. Right. And I think at that time already, we realized that we needed to educate those old leaderships that they were popping up. And they were excited that we were there, but they started warning us. Hey, this place is becoming, you guys always only care about transcripts. It seems like, what about gay people? Or what about, I say, we don't exclude anyone, but now we need to be together to enhance the voices. So those that haven't been, that have been left out for so many years, because when I grew up in Rome at the age of thirteen, fourteen, I was always surrounded by trans people. They were my friends < ; affirmative> ; . When people tell me, “Oh, I dunno, what's going on now? All of a sudden, everybody is trans or whatever,” say, “no, it's always been like that.” We always been around. I say, we, even though I'm a cisgender gay guy, because I've been blessed to be educated through the experience for many years when I was thirteen, fourteen. For me to hear an older white male that tells me that I say “You haven't looked around too much. You have been focused on yourself for too long.” I would say that was a journey that allowed me to create a center with a culture and a vision where people, when they joined, they needed to know the old that were on board with the whole spectrum, LGTQI or that wasn't the place for them. And we lost some people in the process. We lost some donors, no regrets. We earned again so much more. And now that people are finally recollecting the necessity to bring home what we’ve started thirty, forty years ago, or fifty years ago with Stonewall to bring it back home with everyone, or just some of us, I think, now people are looking at us and say, “Oh wow, you guys were right. You were always there.” And yeah, we were, we are, and we will. And now we're embracing the intersex identities and struggle because again, they're being ask[ed] to be part of our community because many of them are, and that we've been advocating with them now at the children hospital in San Diego to change the horrible practices of mutilation of our organs just to feed the stereotypical expectations [of] what gender or sexes of birth is all about. We always been there in the forefront and when we weren't, we look into ourself to do better. You can imagine how the past three, four years with the Black Lives Matter Movement with adding colors to our flag, how not only we wanted to embrace, but realize that all our identities are not just one identity, right? That we had to be vocal of about the struggle that our own queer people in our own community BIPOC folks are still enduring because of police brutality, institutional violence, and a way to do nonprofits has been whitewashed for many years. And how white supremacists in filtered into our own community. How it shows up? Recognizing how to do that and making yourself vulnerable to it and not defensive on when you might be perpetuating those dynamics. I think it's part of everyday challenges is what I love the most to be honest, because I don't wanna come to a point where I say, “Oh, I think I know everything, and now I got all of my boxes checked.” Nothing else comes through when it's not true. Life is always moving. Right. And so are we, so, yeah. That's how difficult it was in North County, but I focus on the positive, but we lost some kids in the process in 2014 and by loss, I mean, Taylor, Alisana[?], Sage, and Tyler took their own life. There were transcripts that made national news and there were three of them served by our center. And still troubling for me to talk about it. But I always try to honor their lives because they didn't go in pain, even though I wish they were here. But they taught us a bigger lesson. We believed our kids when they were telling us they were struggling to a point they didn't wanna live anymore. There wasn't just a face or a way to drag attention to themselves. It was a real struggle of pain. Some of us didn't have the privilege. Some of us had the privilege not to experience, by being cisgender. We learn a lot in that process. Sorry. < ; laugh> ; Max Disposti talks about the LGBT community in North County San Diego. Specifically areas of Oceanside where there were communities that thrived. Disposti also talks about different groups within the community and where they hung out. He begins to touch on why it was important to him to start the North County Resource Center. community ; gay ; grassroot ; lesbians ; LGBT ; LGBTQI ; Link ; marines ; military ; North County ; Oceanside ; organized ; presence ; San Diego ; support ; trans ; transgender ; youth LGBT in the military ; North County ; The LGBT community in North County 33.1222° N, 117.2911° W 17 North County, San Diego 1471 Resources at the North County Resource Center / How the center has changed over time Disposti: Yeah. You know we started in a way at the beginning, really. We didn't have need assessment. We didn't know really how to do any of it eleven years ago. We just said, “Hey, if more than three people come forward and tell us, can we have a super group? For seniors, for non-binary folks, for trans folks?” they say that means it's needed. So, we'll find a facilitator and create guidelines. We were always very serious around policies and procedures and guidelines and protecting ourselves and others in the process. So, we're never easy about that. The opposite. I think that so many times, because while we were a grassroot organization, we knew exactly the level of liability we could incur by just gathering people. You know, there were people [who] were coming because they were stalking other people, right. They were. So how do we protect folks without introducing our own biases in the conversation? We created a support group model that responded to the need of the community. Definitely our trans and non-binary groups was the most populated resources. I mean, sometimes we have 40 people in one room cramped in there because it was the only big room. And I say, “Oh my God the fire department show[ed] up, now they're gonna shut us down.” Because it was a small space at the time. So super groups, then we started doing behavioral health and in the way we wanted to see happening for our people. So, things have changed and housing, case working-- I would say [in] two years we became more experienced. We know how to navigate the system and cut the BS about advocating for people and how to do it well. Creating more safety for our community. So sometimes we're like, for instance, human trafficking is a real, real problem in our community. And we notice that a lot of LGBT centers and churches and sport clubs were place[s] where people are going to groom. And sometimes these people are just a year or two years older than the kid that you're serving. You have to be careful to provide a safe space where you're not there to over micromanage people and their own identity, their own sexuality, their own affirmation are the same, but at the same time, provide a space where people can come to you and tell you, “Hey, I'm an active fifteen year old person, I’m sexually active with this person. Maybe they're at my age or a year older.” How do we go about-- how can I be safe? And things like that. Our youth were coming to us opening their hearts because they knew we weren’t there to judge them. We learned all of that, how to be safe, right? If I have a teenager or thirteen [years old] [who] tells me that they were having a relationship, a sexual relationship with someone at twenty-two, we have major red flags. And we’re also mandated a reporter, right. We've done that too in the past. Navigating through all of that was quite interesting. And we learned how to do it. Now we know so much that we are the one training others youth providers around or the police, when the police shows up because someone called them because maybe they're dynamic of stress. We tell the police what to do and how to approach other people. If they don't agree with that, we don't let them in. This is not place for additional violence and trauma. We educated a lot of these institutions that have been the cause of a lot trauma for our community. We work with them when we can, and we do training and we sit on the same table so that we can advocate and build the trust too. But at the same time, we make it clear that as a service, a clinical provider, this is not a space where they're invited. We need to find other way, how to collaborate and do prevention in a community, without having them finding the queer spaces in San Diego County. < ; affirmative> ; That's one of the things. Things have changed. And then COVID of course, we moved everything virtually. I have to say, now that we came back, they were coming back in person. We never closed the center. We always been open throughout the pandemic. We just couldn't afford to close. We receive a lot of support from foundations and founders. They realize that we made everything possible to support people. I would say what has changed and now we have support groups, but people prefer the one-on-one because they can't find socialization quite easily nowadays in different spaces, even virtually, but they like the one-on-one, “Hey, help me go through this,” family reification or mental health crisis, or finding a job, or just supporting their ego and the self-esteem. It looks like they will be more successful to do that one by one, instead of putting everyone in a super group, which we do have some people just love that, but they're usually mostly social, like let's come together for an all queer and non-binary or let's come together. And because those spaces are very vital, important. We are not denying that. I would say though, that we are seeing more progress by doing that different kind of intervention. So maybe we're creating a hybrid, whatever the community needs. We'll have to respond to that. Max Disposti explains the services offered at the North County Resource Center. Disposti discusses how the center has changed and became more educated and aware of the needs of those within the community. assessment ; beginning ; church ; community ; family reification ; guidelines ; hybrid ; LGBT ; LGBT centers ; mental health crisis ; procedures ; resources ; safe ; self-esteem ; successful ; trauma ; violence Mental health services ; North County Resource Center ; Support groups ; Support offered at the North County Resource Center 33.1222° N, 117.2911° W 17 North County, San Diego 1802 Challenges and opportunities of the North County Resource Center I would say challenges, but also opportunities. < ; affirmative> ; I do believe that LGBT centers are the Planned Parenthood of United States. And what I mean is we are vital spaces and resources for our queer community that no other institutions will ever provide. And preserving, not only preserving, but supporting those spaces. I think it's a commitment to the government, state, federal, county will have to commit to, because as we know, as it's happening, if you take away resources from a Planned Parenthood, that's why the comparison, I mean, half of the population of women in particular, but not just women will not have access to reproductive rights, a fundamental human rights. And if they're left to the single communities, and this is a conversation I have with our elected official Mike Levin, people that they're being very willing to understand. I said, I realized during COVID that if it wasn't < ; affirmative> ; for the private donors and support people with money that stepped in, we would not be open nowadays. And < ; affirmative> ; the government, you have [to] allow us to close our resources. And now it's eleven years old that has helped thousands of people. And now employs twelve people. And that's just not fair. This is not just a volunteer experience, this is the livelihood, but also the safe space for thousands of people. And that's true in many region[s], right? For the San Diego Center, so forth. < ; affirmative> ; While it's good for us to build our own funding streams so that you can stay independent. You don't want the government to give you everything for everything you do, because then they want to have a say about how you run your business. But definitely it's important that, especially in California, where supposedly we have a more progressive leadership to start supporting LGBT center so they can provide vital care, healthcare services, the others don't provide. [Be]cause when people get sexually assaulted that are queer, they don't go to the police station. They come to us when they are in a mental health crisis given by different reasons. They come to us first, when they're in poverty, they come to us when experiencing certain kind of relationships or a tougher life or because of drugs or substance abuse, they come to us because they know we're not here to judge. I would say that's why we’re the planned parenthood of the community < ; affirmative> ; [be]cause it's an essential vital resource. The challenges are that we're not there yet, so that we are left alone to do this work. And now that we have experienced and seen the highest record of anti-LGBT legislation passing in Congress, a passing or proposed in different states and in Congress, this conversation, as you know, they hit home, our kids, even though they're in California. And we know that we're a little bit more protected here. We still have people at the school district level showing up and addressing and stigmatizing and penalizing our queerness. We still have people in position of power taking advantage of those narratives and bring back the same old recycled anti-LGBT religious based narratives. The trauma continues every time we hear that, even though it's not here geographically speaking. That's the challenges that in a time where communication goes past left and right, that sometimes even news needs to be vetted. The trauma that the previous administration has caused, we're still dealing with it. Or the Trump administration for those in the record that might watch this years to come, or even now with all the anti-LGBT bills from Florida in Texas, in Ohio, South Dakota, I mean, these are thousands, hundreds of thousands LGBT youth in particular trans youth. They are denied their own assistance. And in 2022 I was hoping not to see that again, instead we are (inaudible) < ; affirmative> ; I have hope, I think we have a lot of things going our favor, including a history of resilience, but it's tough. It's tough for a lot of people. < ; affirmative> ; (Unintelligible) will fight because it's value our own existence, but for a lot of people don't have the means the energy < ; affirmative> ; and we will have to fight for them too. < ; affirmative> ; I see a lot of challenges. They are not just political or cultural, or educational and people really go around spreading a lot of misinformation around the (unintelligible) kids, supposedly getting surgery at the age of eight, which is total bullshit < ; affirmative> ; when it's actually through the opposite. I think that's the challenge of nowadays, they still go and the racism, the institutionalized violence that it's part of the North American culture unfortunately. I think we are an extremely violent culture. < ; affirmative> ; I can say that because coming from another-- when a different kind of violence from the European experience in Italy in particular, I can say though, that a lot of people that are born and raised here don't even realize the, the level of competitive individualism that's being created here in North America to a point that now we have a national pandemic and a worldwide pandemic, and people are even struggling to care for their own neighbors by protecting their self and other, right. < ; affirmative> ; I'm really concerned about those dynamics of violence and isolation, individualism that our society has brought us to be < ; affirmative> ; That goes along with building an LGBT center. Max Disposti analyzes the challenged and opportunities that come from running an LGBT resource center relating instances of both to the current political climate in the United States. He includes his experience in Italy compared to America in which things are handled differently, including the COVID-19 pandemic. commitment ; COVID ; institutionalized violence ; LGBT ; Planned Parenthood ; queer community ; trauma The challenges of running an LGBT resource center ; The opportunities of running an LGBT resource center 33.1222° N, 117.2911° W 17 North County, San Diego 2191 LGBT police and sheriff training in San Diego / comparing local police training in Italy Disposti: I'm gonna say that really, even though I train the Escondido police, the Oceanside police, Carlsbad Sheriff Department, we do training with FBI. I met amazing people in those spaces. I mean, here and there < ; affirmative> ; I don't wanna generalize. [Be]cause I met folks with coming from, they shouldn't be there in my opinion. I don't have any trust that the police or any law enforcement will ever, ever represent the interest of those that are working and living. And those of us that are really struggling for a better tomorrow, I mean law enforcement is there to preserve the status quo and we don't like the status quo < ; affirmative> ; of course we like democracy and all of that, but I don't have any confidence in that. You know what I say that to even the officer I train, I tell them I don't dehumanize you because I think people [that] are there are human beings and making their own decisions. Their own sacrifices with their family and many of them risk their life, < ; affirmative> ; for something that [they’re] living. I'm not here to dehumanize individuals and call them and isolate them. I have a lot of relationships with police in the relations to, in a very transparent way, there are not. For instance, we have meetings that we sit at the table I'm always very clear about: I don't think that policing belongs to queer spaces. I don't think that policing, and even though I know that police gets, especially LGBT law enforcement feel like betrayed by the fact that “I'm a police LGBT officer, I [want to] be in this space because I earn it.” But the problem that they can't forget or separate themselves from the uniform they're wearing and what has represented for our, it's still percent for our queer and people of color in North American particular. Any region is different, but-- < ; affirmative> ; . What I would say is I believe that training reduce the impact of policing in our community. I believe that building relationships can build trust. That something happens. I can go to the police advocate for my people, and I want answers and vice versa, I think will help the police to understand why there is fear in our community of reporting to the police. Because when you have been called faggot by a police officer, when nobody is watching, it's your word against theirs. So that happens a lot of time < ; affirmative> ; on watch. But then there is no way we can prove it. That happens everywhere all the time. And so personally speaking, and this is, I wouldn't say it's a statement to my organization, even though I would say it's a common vision. I think collaborations with police, it's important to, in terms of creating relationships, reducing the impact of policing in our community. But I think the institution of policing is to be completely reinvented from zero. If we wanted to be the force that serves the community, it doesn't protect status quo. I know some people might say radical views, but I met police in different countries, just in North America and they were never on our side. Teater: Yeah. How does local policing here compare to in Italy per se or places in Europe? [Be]cause I'm not too familiar with their policing practices. Disposti: America is anomaly. The whole integration of LGBT experiences into the normalcy of the everyday life has a good outcome, but also has developed contradictions. The fact that the police needs to show up in our places and parade with us as a-- in North American seen as a progress, when in Italy it’[s] like, “Okay, we don't need to hate each other, but my job is policing. It's not to lead the LGBT movements into pro-policing know against policing.” Right? It's a different experience with police when I was, even though it was a different time policing in our LGBT experience in Italy was always a (unintelligible) < ; affirmative> ; . There were never-- nobody will ever think that we need policing in our streets with us. It's a different comparison. Of course, I don't live in Italy now, even though I go back every year and my family's there and they're still active. I definitely have a sense of what's going on, but < ; affirmative> ; , it's just a different thing. People look at us and say, why you need the whole military marching with you, why you need the whole-- and I understand the sense of the fact that LGBT people are everywhere. We [want to] show the normalcy, that being queer is not anything that's out there, but you know, you can be a police officer queer, a doctor, and I do like that. I do marry the cost that every price should be open to everyone that marches. But we got in a point here in Northern America, where now police is telling us how they [want to] show up. They are in San Diego in particular, they are dictating almost the way they should be representing themselves when maybe they have only three, four LGBT police officer. And they're using them as a token to show that the whole force is pro-LGBT. Then they run surveys through the UCSD [University of California San Diego] or through the service for the Sheriff department that you realize how much homophobic and transphobic and racist the force still is. To me, they haven't earned that spot. I'm just gonna be frank. And I told this to chief of police from Oceanside to San Diego to Chula Vista. I tell that in a very not threatening way, they trust me actually. And they like to talk to me because I'm truthful. I don't beat the bush around. I'm just gonna tell I'm gonna work with you and everything else. But I think you were invited at the table and now you think you own the table and that's okay with me, but the police has an incredible force in America. The lobby of policing, the elected officials get money from policing < ; affirmative> ; San Diego Police Departments extremely powerful, and they impose their will on, or social organizations and organizing. < ; affirmative> ; To ask, for instance, going back in the merit, I will have been happy to see the police marching maybe with their own t-shirts and shorts, you know, so that you can tell everybody you are the San Diego Police Department. And so that your department can be proud of you. And I think that should be alright. But the whole presence of uniform and weapons in a inclusive parade is meant to be inclusive of everyone. Includes those that are now super patriotic, or nationalistic, nationalist and so forth. I think it's very not conducive of a good relationship. It's just a parade. < ; affirmative> ; I don't feel it's very-- so I'm sorry if I took you a little bit off, but this is-- Max Disposti recounts his experience training police in North County. Disposti also shares his thoughts on police in queer spaces. Further he talks about what policing looks like in Italy for the LGBT and BIPOC communities. fear ; inclusive ; LGBT ; policing ; queer spaces LGBT police trainings ; local police ; Police and LGBT interations ; Police in Italy 33.1222° N, 117.2911° W 17 North County, San Diego 2929 The North County Resource Center eleven years later / Joy as an activist Teater < ; affirmative> ; I love that. I have a couple more questions. I'm [going to] switch gears a little bit. What does it mean to you that the resource center has been open for eleven years now? Disposti: < ; laugh> ; It means a lot. I can't believe it. And I don't look back too many times, when I do I get emotional. We had our first staff meeting after a while. I mean, in person and in the past six months alone, we hire[d] six people. So now we're[employees] twelve. < ; affirmative> ; And just look around the table with beautiful queer diversity around us, people with incredible (unintelligible). And I just couldn't even envision this years ago, I knew it was coming, but now seeing these people around me, each one of them gives so much, it brings so much to the center. I get really emotional, but I tend to look ahead of me in terms of, there's so much we [want to] do. Just to give you an idea, this center is really small. Now we really need that center is four or five times bigger, so we can grow and serve really serve North County. I don't feel, we are able to say we are the North County LGBT center because we serve everyone, but truly serving everyone from Escondido to--, it’s just not, at this moment, practically possible. It takes resources. < ; affirmative> ; Not just volunteers and time and resources and money. I can't imagine a queer person in Escondido, in order to be served they have to come to Oceanside. That alone is a barrier. We encourage, even though we like to serve the whole region, that there are new experiences that we can support them and share with them what we did so they can learn it. We're not in competition with other spaces growing and coming up, but it's not an easy thing to do. I would say I'm proud of what we did, of what we accomplished, but before I finish with the center experience, whenever that is, I [want to] see a huge building, thriving with a lot of people in it. And mostly with a lot of brand-new leaderships that can take that, toward and moving forward. That would make me happy in so many different ways. So, yeah. Teater: Oh, that's so nice. During your time as an activist, and this'll be my final question, during your time as an activist, what has brought you the most joy? Disposti: Oh gosh. I don't think I can single out one. Teater: What were some of the experiences? Disposti: Opening the center, the grand opening of the center. Definitely. People showed up for that dream. Really so many, I've been so fortunate to have so many memories, but definitely the opening the center. The meeting that we had two weeks ago, I told you looking around and see, oh my gosh, these are my people and the staff, and the center is growing. The people coming forward after a few years of months that visit us, and we help them and thanking us for truly-- And when I say save the life, I don't mean in such a-- these were people struggling with their own existence. When I say save the life, I mean, it physically not--I mean, taught them the way. Right. I don't [want to] be so pretentious of presumptions or, we are not telling people what to do, but many people really couldn't survive without our support that has to do with mostly believing in them. When stories like that are coming back to you, you know, you're on the right path, are doing the right work. So many, I can't pin it down, but mostly had to do with my community being there for my community and here at the center. So-- Teater: Yeah. Awesome. Well, thank you for sharing with me. Is there anything else you wanted to mention before we sign off? Disposti: No, it's hard to recollect now, but I'm sorry for getting through the emotions. Teater: Oh no, I love it all. It's perfect. Disposti: You know, me? Yeah. I don't shy away from that. No, thank you. Thank you for doing this work. That's what I [want to] say that I know how important it's because we're doing an archive here at the center as well, and we are doing the same interviews to the people that were here, the key leaders in the communities, even prior to the opening of the center, it's a very tedious, slow process that takes years in the making. I appreciate you and your team for even thinking about this. And for creating this record that one day will be so helpful for people, or maybe not for people to watch. And I wish I had that when I started the center, looking back to the stories and the voices of those that came before us, because we always stand on the shoulder. Those that came became before us, even though there was not an LGBT center, but, you know, yeah. That's what we got. Thank you. Thank you. Max Disposti reflects on his time at the resource center and the important contributions it has made to North County. Disposti recounts the grand opening of the resource center as a highlight of his time as an activist. barrier ; encourage ; LGBT ; North County ; queer diversity Accomplishments ; Activism ; Growing and serving North County ; LGBT advocate ; Reflecting on the resource center 33.1222° N, 117.2911° W 17 North County, San Diego Oral history Max Disposti is the founder and Executive Director of the North County LGBTQ Resource Center. In this interview, Max discusses his upbringing in Rome, Italy as a queer male and his experience coming to the U.S. and his quest to open the Resource Center. Max Disposti also talks about the parallels in how the LGBTQ+ community is treated in Italy in comparison to America. MJ Teater: Hello. My name is MJ Teeter. Today is Tuesday, April 26th, 2022, and it is 3:00 PM. I' ; m here with Max Disposti. Thank you for joining me, Max. How are you today? Max Disposti: I' ; m honored to be here. Absolutely good. It' ; s a beautiful day out there. Even though I haven' ; t been able to go and see the light < ; laugh> ; < ; affirmative> ; I mean, at the center working, but we' ; re all very excited. Yes. Teater: Yeah. Great. For the recording, can you introduce yourself what your name is? Your pronouns, when you were born, and what you do for work? Disposti: Okay. My name is Max Disposti, pronouns he/him. I' ; m a cisgender gay male and I was born in Rome in 1968, long time ago. And I am the executive director and founder of the North County LGBTQ Resource Center. Teater: Awesome. And what did your parents do for work? Disposti: Oh, my parents now are retired because they' ; re 85 years old. They' ; re still alive and they live in Rome, Italy, but they were both working class individuals, actually my mom stayed at home even though she was an activist all her life, very active feminist in the city of Rome and my father as well. Teater: Well, that' ; s awesome. < ; affirmative> ; Can you tell me about, maybe a little bit about your childhood and some of your educational experience? Disposti: Sure. When I grew up in Rome, you know, I came from a family that was poor, but you know not too poor not to provide for me in terms of, you know, food and a good safe environment, you know healthcare and education in Italy and Europe are still free. Definitely having access to a higher education was not a challenge, at least not from the standpoint of view of affordability. I grew up in a very safe environment, even though, you know, we were struggling every month to make ends meet. I would say my childhood has been affected by the activism of both of my parents. I only have one siblings that' ; s five years older than me also lives in Rome right now, my brother. And so throughout my life I was always exposed to diversity and others in Italy at the time. And still nowadays, there was a big migration from Africa and our country and Middle East or Eastern Europe. It depends on the time at the time, it was mostly from North Africa and my family was hosting people and greeting them and making sure that they were safe. I grew up in an environment where we always care about others, even though we had little for ourselves. Our table was always with more people and usually people from different cultures as well. My family exposed me to all of this, even though my own mom and my own dad didn' ; t have any academic education, so to speak, they couldn' ; t pursue a higher education, but also they were during the war at the time < ; affirmative> ; even going to high school was a privilege that just few wealthy families could afford. I consider myself lucky, of course, when I came out at the age of thirteen there' ; s always that struggle of homophobia, transphobia in a city, in a country that' ; s dominated by Catholic Church. Even though my parents were not religious whatsoever it infiltrates into the patriarchal narratives. When I came out as a gay man at the time it definitely was a surprise and an issue at first to a point I needed to detach from my family. They never pushed me outside so they were not against me but I needed my own space. I was thirteen, fourteen and I was already an activist in the community. But it was never a traumatic experience. I went through my time of self-affirmation and then I came back to them with more-- I knew I could conquer their hearts and mind around this because there were people I could talk to. I was definitely in a privileged position versus other friends of mine. They just end up on the street. < ; affirmative> ; . So that' ; s my childhood. That' ; s who I am. For me early on, on my sense of social justice, that activism around issues that they were not just LGBT related you know, human rights, immigration rights and against the war all the time. And at the time America, I was definitely not a place where I was aiming to live. It was this big monster imperialistic country that goes around to conquer spaces and lifestyles. We were not a fan of it, but love brought me to California and my first love, I would say serious enough to drag me there. And then one thing led to another, I end up staying in California. Again, though I overstay my visa. I became undocumented for about five, six years of my first time. I had to experience all of that fear because now I' ; m in love with someone. I didn' ; t want to lose them. < ; affirmative> ; so that' ; s a little bit my story, even though I always recognized my privilege to come from a place that was definitely not devastated by war and crime or violence. I still felt that I couldn' ; t go back to it just because if I did at the time, I could never return to the U.S. I did my best and my education helped me to go through all the application process and so forth to become a citizen and live the best of both world[s] pretty much, back at home and here in California. So, yeah, I hope I didn' ; t share too much. Teater: No, that' ; s great. I love this. Can you tell me a bit more about your education? What did you study? Disposti: When I was in Italy I was really driven by social studies since day one. But my high school years were troubled by a lot of strikes that I organized. I can' ; t even blame anybody, I was always striking for better schools, better conditions against discrimination. At the time being openly gay was a threat. It was a threat to myself. I think people never touched me or attacked me physically because I was so out that would have exposed them as well. Right. < ; affirmative> ; It was one of those I realized the more vocal out I was, the more protection I was bringing to myself because the people there to be that kinda person, especially in a religious country like that, there' ; s always that fade. I mean, that face that you had to keep, you know, in order decency. High school was problematic. I did finish high school and then I went to the university, high school was just-- in Europe, you already pick in high school what you think you' ; re gonna do in the future. It was graphic design related, a fashion design. Then I look around me, you' ; re in Italy with amazing talented artists. And I look at me and say, " ; oh my gosh, I would never make it." ; These people are just-- each one of them is an artist. I realize it wasn' ; t really for me as well. I went into university and developed more social sociology and social studies. I graduated from-- I got my bachelor[s] over there, but didn' ; t do much with it after a few years-- I mean when I was 30 years old, then I decided to move to the U.S. And here I started over my study and I took my bachelor[s] in political science. And then I went back to get a master [in] nonprofit management in leaderships, which I graduated from in 2016. Not really long ago. Recent, because it was a means for me, I didn' ; t need the academic title. I really needed to know more about the work I was doing, particularly in nonprofit. I had to tell you it was money well invested, even though I' ; m still paying for it, < ; laugh> ; after so many years. And it really helped me to understand more about nonprofit governments and leadership as well. In addition to what I already knew. So yeah, that' ; s my academic background pretty much. Teater: Man, you' ; ve lived such a fascinating life. < ; laugh> ; So you touched on it a little bit, but what was your career like before the North County Resource Center? Disposti: The north county resource center, I would say around 2007 or 2008 is when I made that decision to do what I do, even though at first was not a paid position. I needed to save as much as I could, reserve anything, because I didn' ; t know where this was going to take me. < ; affirmative> ; . Prior to that, when I came in the U.S. even though I was very active and volunteering for different things, I was fortunate enough-- at the beginning I was working in hotel, the hotel industry, I used to be in San Francisco for four years. Then it was a little bit of dot com, I was doing a lot of translating because I speak Spanish and Italian. I was doing a lot of translating from one and to another with platforms, Yahoo platform and so forth. That was a very well-paid job. < ; affirmative> ; Even at the time that helped me out a little bit uplift my resources, but I wasn' ; t documented at the time. I couldn' ; t really invest into school or nothing because I knew I just couldn' ; t do that to that point. And so I married my previous husband at the time in San Francisco, we decided to come down here because he had family members in the military. And when we moved to Oceanside was the place where it was cheaper and affordable. I did like the beach. I liked the fact it was Southern California. I bought at first into the life okay. Once I finish with my own immigration status, which lasted 10 years struggle. So that' ; s why I' ; m very, not only sympathetic, but not many people understand about what it means to be an immigrant in this place where I had at that point, the money and the lawyers to fight the system and an education, but if it was running away from any other country from famine, war, or violence, there is no way that the U.S. will have offered me an alternative there is just no one, legally speaking. There is not an alternative if you become undocumented to fix your record, really not even if you marry someone. It' ; s just not the way it is anymore. It took me 10 years. Yes. I feel privileged because I was able to go through all of that. In the process, I started working to make some money because my dream was always to open a community center. < ; affirmative> ; And as I was making the money, I joined some real estate firms. I was a broker and I became very successful because I was this guy that was very realistic. I didn' ; t have dreams of screwing people over to make money. My dream was building LGBT center. I think people saw that in me, that was honest that sometimes I told people, don' ; t buy this house because really too big for you, is not gonna be a good choice, because then you' ; re gonna have this huge mortgage. I was having this conversation with folks, and I think the more I was honest with them, the more business was coming to me. I was doing really well at a certain point, I needed to make the decision to pull the plug and go into unemployment. Mind you I didn' ; t say thousands of thousands of dollars, just enough to go by that unemployment lasted. I mean, I was unemployed for two years because the center couldn' ; t pay me. I mean, it was me < ; affirmative> ; and starting a center I needed full-time dedications on everything from gathering resources, putting people together, dynamics of power that you encounter, opening the door and having someone there eight hours a day, it was a huge, huge undertaking. But I never felt alone. I always felt fortunate that people trusted me in the process. And also my leadership style has always been very sharing. The resources was never about me, my name and putting my name in top of the things I did, even though at the beginning, it shows a lot me and the center. My name is very linked to it, but mostly I started the center, but I always bring the honor, the credit to the many people, many, many people that made the center what it is today. So that' ; s how it brought to me. I brought those corporate leaderships into this business. I brought my nonprofit academic research. I brought my life experience as an activist. And I think everything just worked together. I was there for the right reason and not to rush things through. And I just had hope in my community here that things will have become like they are today or even more. Yeah, the dream' ; s still on and we still have a lot of things we want to accomplish. < ; affirmative> ; Teater: In terms of the LGBT community, what was that like in North County? Because I know North County doesn' ; t really have much of a presence as far as LGBT representation, as much as say Downtown or Hillcrest has. Disposti: < ; affirmative> ; It was not easy. I had to fight internally and externally, it was opening the door of the center in a military town. I knew it was going to be difficult because it was at the time all North County was extremely conservative. We received threat. We had our windows smashed several times. We elected people that didn' ; t wanna meet us in person. This was obviously 2008 and 2009. Also 2008 was the year of the campaign for marriage equality. The center at this point was not open because we opened 2011, but we were active as a group. It was called North County LGBT coalition. So we were meeting weekly. We were an organizations with all we were grassroot at the same time. We had a board of directors. I mean we were an organization, but not yet with a space because we were saving money to open one. And yeah, North County was quite brutal, but also interesting enough because we were the only organized entity in North County, we received a lot of support and a lot of love from a lot of people from family and youth and so forth. We connected right away with preexisting grassroot groups in North County, in particular, with Link Lesbian in North County, there is a lot of history around what they' ; ve done here in North County for 20 years since women met under cover every Friday to create a support system for themselves, even the gay guys were cruising and the whole spots Oceanside had, the Marines were here. There was a lot of LGBT presence in Oceanside. We used to have two gay bars up to 2002, then they closed down just because the owners got old. But there was a lot of LGBT happening. It reminds me what it used to be in San Diego prior to the seventies when the Marines were there. And it became an LGBT Hillcrest [?] in particular place to go because there were a lot of Navy and Marines coming to town and finally they could be true to themself, right? Oceanside, North County was brewing with Marines that they were gay and Navy officers as well, but it was always-- the community was always in denial. Oceanside was a place where there were a lot of street workers, a lot of LGBT people, a lot of trans women, that had to, not by choice, in that case, to become strict workers because they didn' ; t have opportunity for jobs. So quite a rough place, when we came in people couldn' ; t believe that there [were] enough to put ourself out there and call ourself an LGBT center and having the rainbow flag outside. At first we had people just walking into the door. I remember the seniors in particular, literally were emotionally taken by the fact that we were just there. And at first I saw we' ; re not doing anything special. We' ; re just here with a flag outside, running some support groups, but we didn' ; t realize at first the impact we' ; re having soon, so many lives and people that came and dropped their life story on us, seniors and youth. And then all of a sudden we started seeing more and more, our amazing trans kiddos < ; laugh> ; . And that was when we started advocating within our own community with our old generation of gay male to the fact that this is the time for us to give back to those of us that are still struggling and understanding how, not only embrace our trans identities, not as a plus or a sign of solidarity, but as a full part of the community, that' ; s always been there, but always been hidden, not by their choice. It was the constitutions of our mission statement at the center. We were fortunate enough that since day one, when no one was talking about trans rights, other than trans people, of course, by meaning the mainstream of the LGBT community. < ; affirmative> ; Our board was composed by trans folks, the support groups. We started hiring therapists, everybody was volunteering at the time to work with our folks. And we had hundreds, hundreds of kids coming at the center during a week basis. And we learned so much from them, their struggle, their pain, one of this kids became my son because he decided to adopt me. Now he' ; s 22, so he' ; s already grown up and he' ; s a trans male, lives with his girlfriend now and everything else. But so it was a overall real experience. That was never a job for me, never just a job or never just a phase. Right. And I think at that time already, we realized that we needed to educate those old leaderships that they were popping up. And they were excited that we were there, but they started warning us. Hey, this place is becoming, you guys always only care about transcripts. It seems like, what about gay people? Or what about, I say, we don' ; t exclude anyone, but now we need to be together to enhance the voices. So those that haven' ; t been, that have been left out for so many years, because when I grew up in Rome at the age of thirteen, fourteen, I was always surrounded by trans people. They were my friends < ; affirmative> ; . When people tell me, " ; Oh, I dunno, what' ; s going on now? All of a sudden, everybody is trans or whatever," ; say, " ; no, it' ; s always been like that." ; We always been around. I say, we, even though I' ; m a cisgender gay guy, because I' ; ve been blessed to be educated through the experience for many years when I was thirteen, fourteen. For me to hear an older white male that tells me that I say " ; You haven' ; t looked around too much. You have been focused on yourself for too long." ; I would say that was a journey that allowed me to create a center with a culture and a vision where people, when they joined, they needed to know the old that were on board with the whole spectrum, LGTQI or that wasn' ; t the place for them. And we lost some people in the process. We lost some donors, no regrets. We earned again so much more. And now that people are finally recollecting the necessity to bring home what we' ; ve started thirty, forty years ago, or fifty years ago with Stonewall to bring it back home with everyone, or just some of us, I think, now people are looking at us and say, " ; Oh wow, you guys were right. You were always there." ; And yeah, we were, we are, and we will. And now we' ; re embracing the intersex identities and struggle because again, they' ; re being ask[ed] to be part of our community because many of them are, and that we' ; ve been advocating with them now at the children hospital in San Diego to change the horrible practices of mutilation of our organs just to feed the stereotypical expectations [of] what gender or sexes of birth is all about. We always been there in the forefront and when we weren' ; t, we look into ourself to do better. You can imagine how the past three, four years with the Black Lives Matter Movement with adding colors to our flag, how not only we wanted to embrace, but realize that all our identities are not just one identity, right? That we had to be vocal of about the struggle that our own queer people in our own community BIPOC folks are still enduring because of police brutality, institutional violence, and a way to do nonprofits has been whitewashed for many years. And how white supremacists in filtered into our own community. How it shows up? Recognizing how to do that and making yourself vulnerable to it and not defensive on when you might be perpetuating those dynamics. I think it' ; s part of everyday challenges is what I love the most to be honest, because I don' ; t wanna come to a point where I say, " ; Oh, I think I know everything, and now I got all of my boxes checked." ; Nothing else comes through when it' ; s not true. Life is always moving. Right. And so are we, so, yeah. That' ; s how difficult it was in North County, but I focus on the positive, but we lost some kids in the process in 2014 and by loss, I mean, Taylor, Alisana[?], Sage, and Tyler took their own life. There were transcripts that made national news and there were three of them served by our center. And still troubling for me to talk about it. But I always try to honor their lives because they didn' ; t go in pain, even though I wish they were here. But they taught us a bigger lesson. We believed our kids when they were telling us they were struggling to a point they didn' ; t wanna live anymore. There wasn' ; t just a face or a way to drag attention to themselves. It was a real struggle of pain. Some of us didn' ; t have the privilege. Some of us had the privilege not to experience, by being cisgender. We learn a lot in that process. Sorry. < ; laugh> ; Teater: No, it' ; s okay. I appreciate you sharing with me. I' ; ll shift to maybe a lighter subject < ; laugh> ; for a quick second. What are some of the resources and services that are offered at the North County Resource Center and how have they changed over time? Disposti: Yeah. You know we started in a way at the beginning, really. We didn' ; t have need assessment. We didn' ; t know really how to do any of it eleven years ago. We just said, " ; Hey, if more than three people come forward and tell us, can we have a super group? For seniors, for non-binary folks, for trans folks?" ; they say that means it' ; s needed. So, we' ; ll find a facilitator and create guidelines. We were always very serious around policies and procedures and guidelines and protecting ourselves and others in the process. So, we' ; re never easy about that. The opposite. I think that so many times, because while we were a grassroot organization, we knew exactly the level of liability we could incur by just gathering people. You know, there were people [who] were coming because they were stalking other people, right. They were. So how do we protect folks without introducing our own biases in the conversation? We created a support group model that responded to the need of the community. Definitely our trans and non-binary groups was the most populated resources. I mean, sometimes we have 40 people in one room cramped in there because it was the only big room. And I say, " ; Oh my God the fire department show[ed] up, now they' ; re gonna shut us down." ; Because it was a small space at the time. So super groups, then we started doing behavioral health and in the way we wanted to see happening for our people. So, things have changed and housing, case working-- I would say [in] two years we became more experienced. We know how to navigate the system and cut the BS about advocating for people and how to do it well. Creating more safety for our community. So sometimes we' ; re like, for instance, human trafficking is a real, real problem in our community. And we notice that a lot of LGBT centers and churches and sport clubs were place[s] where people are going to groom. And sometimes these people are just a year or two years older than the kid that you' ; re serving. You have to be careful to provide a safe space where you' ; re not there to over micromanage people and their own identity, their own sexuality, their own affirmation are the same, but at the same time, provide a space where people can come to you and tell you, " ; Hey, I' ; m an active fifteen year old person, I' ; m sexually active with this person. Maybe they' ; re at my age or a year older." ; How do we go about-- how can I be safe? And things like that. Our youth were coming to us opening their hearts because they knew we weren' ; t there to judge them. We learned all of that, how to be safe, right? If I have a teenager or thirteen [years old] [who] tells me that they were having a relationship, a sexual relationship with someone at twenty-two, we have major red flags. And we' ; re also mandated a reporter, right. We' ; ve done that too in the past. Navigating through all of that was quite interesting. And we learned how to do it. Now we know so much that we are the one training others youth providers around or the police, when the police shows up because someone called them because maybe they' ; re dynamic of stress. We tell the police what to do and how to approach other people. If they don' ; t agree with that, we don' ; t let them in. This is not place for additional violence and trauma. We educated a lot of these institutions that have been the cause of a lot trauma for our community. We work with them when we can, and we do training and we sit on the same table so that we can advocate and build the trust too. But at the same time, we make it clear that as a service, a clinical provider, this is not a space where they' ; re invited. We need to find other way, how to collaborate and do prevention in a community, without having them finding the queer spaces in San Diego County. < ; affirmative> ; That' ; s one of the things. Things have changed. And then COVID of course, we moved everything virtually. I have to say, now that we came back, they were coming back in person. We never closed the center. We always been open throughout the pandemic. We just couldn' ; t afford to close. We receive a lot of support from foundations and founders. They realize that we made everything possible to support people. I would say what has changed and now we have support groups, but people prefer the one-on-one because they can' ; t find socialization quite easily nowadays in different spaces, even virtually, but they like the one-on-one, " ; Hey, help me go through this," ; family reification or mental health crisis, or finding a job, or just supporting their ego and the self-esteem. It looks like they will be more successful to do that one by one, instead of putting everyone in a super group, which we do have some people just love that, but they' ; re usually mostly social, like let' ; s come together for an all queer and non-binary or let' ; s come together. And because those spaces are very vital, important. We are not denying that. I would say though, that we are seeing more progress by doing that different kind of intervention. So maybe we' ; re creating a hybrid, whatever the community needs. We' ; ll have to respond to that. Teater: Oh, I love that. What are some of the challenges that you and the center face today? Disposti: I would say challenges, but also opportunities. < ; affirmative> ; I do believe that LGBT centers are the Planned Parenthood of United States. And what I mean is we are vital spaces and resources for our queer community that no other institutions will ever provide. And preserving, not only preserving, but supporting those spaces. I think it' ; s a commitment to the government, state, federal, county will have to commit to, because as we know, as it' ; s happening, if you take away resources from a Planned Parenthood, that' ; s why the comparison, I mean, half of the population of women in particular, but not just women will not have access to reproductive rights, a fundamental human rights. And if they' ; re left to the single communities, and this is a conversation I have with our elected official Mike Levin, people that they' ; re being very willing to understand. I said, I realized during COVID that if it wasn' ; t < ; affirmative> ; for the private donors and support people with money that stepped in, we would not be open nowadays. And < ; affirmative> ; the government, you have [to] allow us to close our resources. And now it' ; s eleven years old that has helped thousands of people. And now employs twelve people. And that' ; s just not fair. This is not just a volunteer experience, this is the livelihood, but also the safe space for thousands of people. And that' ; s true in many region[s], right? For the San Diego Center, so forth. < ; affirmative> ; While it' ; s good for us to build our own funding streams so that you can stay independent. You don' ; t want the government to give you everything for everything you do, because then they want to have a say about how you run your business. But definitely it' ; s important that, especially in California, where supposedly we have a more progressive leadership to start supporting LGBT center so they can provide vital care, healthcare services, the others don' ; t provide. [Be]cause when people get sexually assaulted that are queer, they don' ; t go to the police station. They come to us when they are in a mental health crisis given by different reasons. They come to us first, when they' ; re in poverty, they come to us when experiencing certain kind of relationships or a tougher life or because of drugs or substance abuse, they come to us because they know we' ; re not here to judge. I would say that' ; s why we' ; re the planned parenthood of the community < ; affirmative> ; [be]cause it' ; s an essential vital resource. The challenges are that we' ; re not there yet, so that we are left alone to do this work. And now that we have experienced and seen the highest record of anti-LGBT legislation passing in Congress, a passing or proposed in different states and in Congress, this conversation, as you know, they hit home, our kids, even though they' ; re in California. And we know that we' ; re a little bit more protected here. We still have people at the school district level showing up and addressing and stigmatizing and penalizing our queerness. We still have people in position of power taking advantage of those narratives and bring back the same old recycled anti-LGBT religious based narratives. The trauma continues every time we hear that, even though it' ; s not here geographically speaking. That' ; s the challenges that in a time where communication goes past left and right, that sometimes even news needs to be vetted. The trauma that the previous administration has caused, we' ; re still dealing with it. Or the Trump administration for those in the record that might watch this years to come, or even now with all the anti-LGBT bills from Florida in Texas, in Ohio, South Dakota, I mean, these are thousands, hundreds of thousands LGBT youth in particular trans youth. They are denied their own assistance. And in 2022 I was hoping not to see that again, instead we are (inaudible) < ; affirmative> ; I have hope, I think we have a lot of things going our favor, including a history of resilience, but it' ; s tough. It' ; s tough for a lot of people. < ; affirmative> ; (Unintelligible) will fight because it' ; s value our own existence, but for a lot of people don' ; t have the means the energy < ; affirmative> ; and we will have to fight for them too. < ; affirmative> ; I see a lot of challenges. They are not just political or cultural, or educational and people really go around spreading a lot of misinformation around the (unintelligible) kids, supposedly getting surgery at the age of eight, which is total bullshit < ; affirmative> ; when it' ; s actually through the opposite. I think that' ; s the challenge of nowadays, they still go and the racism, the institutionalized violence that it' ; s part of the North American culture unfortunately. I think we are an extremely violent culture. < ; affirmative> ; I can say that because coming from another-- when a different kind of violence from the European experience in Italy in particular, I can say though, that a lot of people that are born and raised here don' ; t even realize the, the level of competitive individualism that' ; s being created here in North America to a point that now we have a national pandemic and a worldwide pandemic, and people are even struggling to care for their own neighbors by protecting their self and other, right. < ; affirmative> ; I' ; m really concerned about those dynamics of violence and isolation, individualism that our society has brought us to be < ; affirmative> ; That goes along with building an LGBT center. Teater: Yeah. You touched on this a little bit earlier, but given the history of policing with the LGBTQ+ community even in San Diego, how do you feel that police and sheriff trainings are received? Disposti: I' ; m gonna say that really, even though I train the Escondido police, the Oceanside police, Carlsbad Sheriff Department, we do training with FBI. I met amazing people in those spaces. I mean, here and there < ; affirmative> ; I don' ; t wanna generalize. [Be]cause I met folks with coming from, they shouldn' ; t be there in my opinion. I don' ; t have any trust that the police or any law enforcement will ever, ever represent the interest of those that are working and living. And those of us that are really struggling for a better tomorrow, I mean law enforcement is there to preserve the status quo and we don' ; t like the status quo < ; affirmative> ; of course we like democracy and all of that, but I don' ; t have any confidence in that. You know what I say that to even the officer I train, I tell them I don' ; t dehumanize you because I think people [that] are there are human beings and making their own decisions. Their own sacrifices with their family and many of them risk their life, < ; affirmative> ; for something that [they' ; re] living. I' ; m not here to dehumanize individuals and call them and isolate them. I have a lot of relationships with police in the relations to, in a very transparent way, there are not. For instance, we have meetings that we sit at the table I' ; m always very clear about: I don' ; t think that policing belongs to queer spaces. I don' ; t think that policing, and even though I know that police gets, especially LGBT law enforcement feel like betrayed by the fact that " ; I' ; m a police LGBT officer, I [want to] be in this space because I earn it." ; But the problem that they can' ; t forget or separate themselves from the uniform they' ; re wearing and what has represented for our, it' ; s still percent for our queer and people of color in North American particular. Any region is different, but-- < ; affirmative> ; . What I would say is I believe that training reduce the impact of policing in our community. I believe that building relationships can build trust. That something happens. I can go to the police advocate for my people, and I want answers and vice versa, I think will help the police to understand why there is fear in our community of reporting to the police. Because when you have been called faggot by a police officer, when nobody is watching, it' ; s your word against theirs. So that happens a lot of time < ; affirmative> ; on watch. But then there is no way we can prove it. That happens everywhere all the time. And so personally speaking, and this is, I wouldn' ; t say it' ; s a statement to my organization, even though I would say it' ; s a common vision. I think collaborations with police, it' ; s important to, in terms of creating relationships, reducing the impact of policing in our community. But I think the institution of policing is to be completely reinvented from zero. If we wanted to be the force that serves the community, it doesn' ; t protect status quo. I know some people might say radical views, but I met police in different countries, just in North America and they were never on our side. Teater: Yeah. How does local policing here compare to in Italy per se or places in Europe? [Be]cause I' ; m not too familiar with their policing practices. Disposti: America is anomaly. The whole integration of LGBT experiences into the normalcy of the everyday life has a good outcome, but also has developed contradictions. The fact that the police needs to show up in our places and parade with us as a-- in North American seen as a progress, when in Italy it' ; [s] like, " ; Okay, we don' ; t need to hate each other, but my job is policing. It' ; s not to lead the LGBT movements into pro-policing know against policing." ; Right? It' ; s a different experience with police when I was, even though it was a different time policing in our LGBT experience in Italy was always a (unintelligible) < ; affirmative> ; . There were never-- nobody will ever think that we need policing in our streets with us. It' ; s a different comparison. Of course, I don' ; t live in Italy now, even though I go back every year and my family' ; s there and they' ; re still active. I definitely have a sense of what' ; s going on, but < ; affirmative> ; , it' ; s just a different thing. People look at us and say, why you need the whole military marching with you, why you need the whole-- and I understand the sense of the fact that LGBT people are everywhere. We [want to] show the normalcy, that being queer is not anything that' ; s out there, but you know, you can be a police officer queer, a doctor, and I do like that. I do marry the cost that every price should be open to everyone that marches. But we got in a point here in Northern America, where now police is telling us how they [want to] show up. They are in San Diego in particular, they are dictating almost the way they should be representing themselves when maybe they have only three, four LGBT police officer. And they' ; re using them as a token to show that the whole force is pro-LGBT. Then they run surveys through the UCSD [University of California San Diego] or through the service for the Sheriff department that you realize how much homophobic and transphobic and racist the force still is. To me, they haven' ; t earned that spot. I' ; m just gonna be frank. And I told this to chief of police from Oceanside to San Diego to Chula Vista. I tell that in a very not threatening way, they trust me actually. And they like to talk to me because I' ; m truthful. I don' ; t beat the bush around. I' ; m just gonna tell I' ; m gonna work with you and everything else. But I think you were invited at the table and now you think you own the table and that' ; s okay with me, but the police has an incredible force in America. The lobby of policing, the elected officials get money from policing < ; affirmative> ; San Diego Police Departments extremely powerful, and they impose their will on, or social organizations and organizing. < ; affirmative> ; To ask, for instance, going back in the merit, I will have been happy to see the police marching maybe with their own t-shirts and shorts, you know, so that you can tell everybody you are the San Diego Police Department. And so that your department can be proud of you. And I think that should be alright. But the whole presence of uniform and weapons in a inclusive parade is meant to be inclusive of everyone. Includes those that are now super patriotic, or nationalistic, nationalist and so forth. I think it' ; s very not conducive of a good relationship. It' ; s just a parade. < ; affirmative> ; I don' ; t feel it' ; s very-- so I' ; m sorry if I took you a little bit off, but this is-- Teater: No, you' ; re good. I' ; m right there with you. Disposti: It' ; s such a current happening. Maybe people watching this many years from now, I wonder what they will think of it, but right now I feel that we' ; re not there. They have to earn their space. And also let' ; s remember talking about our region when you have a pride parade, you have people coming from all over the county, you have people coming from LA Mesa, Fallbrook in places where policing, the impact of policing on the streets is not as kind of transparent as it could be in any other spaces where we earn that. Right. Like in Hillcrest < ; affirmative> ; right. We need to be mindful of the experience of our queer people of policing in Chula Vista or other places, not just San Diego proper. What you see the police marching, is not everyone has the same reaction, and you cannot normalize policing by just marching an parade. You need to work every single day. So that' ; s my-- Teater: Yeah, exactly. So, what is the center' ; s relationship with military members of the community then? [Be]cause I know they sort of have a kinship, but like they' ; re different, but they' ; re not, but they are. Disposti: Well. Because we cannot, I mean, I can tell you my personal stance about < ; affirmative> ; worth' ; s, and army, and the military. I think we spend too much money into it when this country struggle to support its own people that live here. Obviously, I' ; m not sympathetic about any choice of military that' ; s military related, but when it comes to LGBT experience, I have to say the immediate impact of let' ; s say the Marines here, the Navy on our immediate community is incomparable with policing. And what I mean, they' ; re not doing racial profiling here in San Diego. They' ; re not doing-- There is not a direct impact and < ; affirmative> ; for a city like Oceanside, which every family member has someone in the military. I would say that also understanding the importance of what they give and how they feel it. That is their dedication, their passion. We need to respect that. We serve a lot of veterans, a lot of military folks, but many of these folks, LGBT usually we serve them because they struggle through the military services. They went through < ; affirmative> ; health, sexual assault abuses that could never report from their commanders, < ; affirmative> ; transphobia, homophobia, punishments of any kind. We support folks because these are our people. < ; affirmative> ; It' ; s not my place to tell them where they should go. We meet them where they are. < ; affirmative> ; But definitely it' ; s a different experience. I would say I met amazing folks that actually have been a resource for the center and helping others from the army, from some of the Marines or the many, many veterans that they are a part of our volunteer team. I' ; m sure some of them might not share my views. These are personal view, again, not the center view, but definitely we did think about building a center in a military community. You could completely subject to it and be dictated on how to express your sentiment around military actions. You can be who you are and supporting the queer people around the world. That' ; s my goal as a human rights and civil rights activist that I-- doesn' ; t believe in any borders, or in any particular nationality, I focus on the help that my folks need in the entire world. If the America gets in the middle of that, then I will definitely denounce it but it' ; s beyond the scope of the center. It' ; s more my personal perspective. < ; affirmative> ; I think we are all connected in so many different ways. Teater < ; affirmative> ; I love that. I have a couple more questions. I' ; m [going to] switch gears a little bit. What does it mean to you that the resource center has been open for eleven years now? Disposti: < ; laugh> ; It means a lot. I can' ; t believe it. And I don' ; t look back too many times, when I do I get emotional. We had our first staff meeting after a while. I mean, in person and in the past six months alone, we hire[d] six people. So now we' ; re[employees] twelve. < ; affirmative> ; And just look around the table with beautiful queer diversity around us, people with incredible (unintelligible). And I just couldn' ; t even envision this years ago, I knew it was coming, but now seeing these people around me, each one of them gives so much, it brings so much to the center. I get really emotional, but I tend to look ahead of me in terms of, there' ; s so much we [want to] do. Just to give you an idea, this center is really small. Now we really need that center is four or five times bigger, so we can grow and serve really serve North County. I don' ; t feel, we are able to say we are the North County LGBT center because we serve everyone, but truly serving everyone from Escondido to--, it' ; s just not, at this moment, practically possible. It takes resources. < ; affirmative> ; Not just volunteers and time and resources and money. I can' ; t imagine a queer person in Escondido, in order to be served they have to come to Oceanside. That alone is a barrier. We encourage, even though we like to serve the whole region, that there are new experiences that we can support them and share with them what we did so they can learn it. We' ; re not in competition with other spaces growing and coming up, but it' ; s not an easy thing to do. I would say I' ; m proud of what we did, of what we accomplished, but before I finish with the center experience, whenever that is, I [want to] see a huge building, thriving with a lot of people in it. And mostly with a lot of brand-new leaderships that can take that, toward and moving forward. That would make me happy in so many different ways. So, yeah. Teater: Oh, that' ; s so nice. During your time as an activist, and this' ; ll be my final question, during your time as an activist, what has brought you the most joy? Disposti: Oh gosh. I don' ; t think I can single out one. Teater: What were some of the experiences? Disposti: Opening the center, the grand opening of the center. Definitely. People showed up for that dream. Really so many, I' ; ve been so fortunate to have so many memories, but definitely the opening the center. The meeting that we had two weeks ago, I told you looking around and see, oh my gosh, these are my people and the staff, and the center is growing. The people coming forward after a few years of months that visit us, and we help them and thanking us for truly-- And when I say save the life, I don' ; t mean in such a-- these were people struggling with their own existence. When I say save the life, I mean, it physically not--I mean, taught them the way. Right. I don' ; t [want to] be so pretentious of presumptions or, we are not telling people what to do, but many people really couldn' ; t survive without our support that has to do with mostly believing in them. When stories like that are coming back to you, you know, you' ; re on the right path, are doing the right work. So many, I can' ; t pin it down, but mostly had to do with my community being there for my community and here at the center. So-- Teater: Yeah. Awesome. Well, thank you for sharing with me. Is there anything else you wanted to mention before we sign off? Disposti: No, it' ; s hard to recollect now, but I' ; m sorry for getting through the emotions. Teater: Oh no, I love it all. It' ; s perfect. Disposti: You know, me? Yeah. I don' ; t shy away from that. No, thank you. Thank you for doing this work. That' ; s what I [want to] say that I know how important it' ; s because we' ; re doing an archive here at the center as well, and we are doing the same interviews to the people that were here, the key leaders in the communities, even prior to the opening of the center, it' ; s a very tedious, slow process that takes years in the making. I appreciate you and your team for even thinking about this. And for creating this record that one day will be so helpful for people, or maybe not for people to watch. And I wish I had that when I started the center, looking back to the stories and the voices of those that came before us, because we always stand on the shoulder. Those that came became before us, even though there was not an LGBT center, but, you know, yeah. That' ; s what we got. Thank you. Thank you. Teater: Thank you. Well, I' ; m [going to] stop the recording now. Disposti: Perfect. https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en audio Property rights reside with the university. Copyrights are retained by the creators of the records and their heirs. This resource is licensed for noncommercial educational use using CC NC-BY 4.0. Please contact Special Collections at archives
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Title
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Disposti, Max. Interview April 26, 2022
Description
An account of the resource
Max Disposti is the founder and Executive Director of the North County LGBTQ Resource Center. In this interview, Max discusses his upbringing in Rome, Italy as a queer male and his experience coming to the U.S. and his quest to open the Resource Center. Max Disposti also talks about the parallels in how the LGBTQ+ community is treated in Italy in comparison to America.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
SC027-14
Subject
The topic of the resource
LGBTQ+ activism
LGBTQ+ rights
North County LGBT Resource Center -- California -- Oceanside
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2022-04-26
Format
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audio
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Rome (Italy)
North County (San Diego County, Calif.)
Publisher
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California State University San Marcos University Library
Language
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English
Rights Holder
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Max Disposti
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Max Disposti
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Madison Teater
Activists and activism
Community history
History Department internship
Immigrant experience
LGBTQIA+ experience
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https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/e24d158796639884e608761a96307eb3.pdf
2610199d500af06717da987ed89ee24d
PDF Text
Text
MAX DISPOSTI
TRANSCRIPT INTERVIEW,
2022-04-26
MJ Teater:
Hello. My name is MJ Teeter. Today is Tuesday, April 26th, 2022, and it is 3:00 PM. I'm here with Max
Disposti. Thank you for joining me, Max. How are you today?
Max Disposti:
I'm honored to be here. Absolutely good. It's a beautiful day out there. Even though I haven't been able
to go and see the light <laugh> <affirmative> I mean, at the center working, but we're all very excited.
Yes.
Teater:
Yeah. Great. For the recording, can you introduce yourself what your name is? Your pronouns, when you
were born, and what you do for work?
Disposti:
Okay. My name is Max Disposti, pronouns he/him. I'm a cisgender gay male and I was born in Rome in
1968, long time ago. And I am the executive director and founder of the North County LGBTQ Resource
Center.
Teater:
Awesome. And what did your parents do for work?
Disposti:
Oh, my parents now are retired because they're 85 years old. They're still alive and they live in Rome,
Italy, but they were both working class individuals, actually my mom stayed at home even though she
was an activist all her life, very active feminist in the city of Rome and my father as well.
Teater:
Well, that's awesome. <affirmative> Can you tell me about, maybe a little bit about your childhood and
some of your educational experience?
Disposti:
Sure. When I grew up in Rome, you know, I came from a family that was poor, but you know not too
poor not to provide for me in terms of, you know, food and a good safe environment, you know
healthcare and education in Italy and Europe are still free. Definitely having access to a higher education
was not a challenge, at least not from the standpoint of view of affordability. I grew up in a very safe
environment, even though, you know, we were struggling every month to make ends meet. I would say
my childhood has been affected by the activism of both of my parents. I only have one siblings that's five
years older than me also lives in Rome right now, my brother. And so throughout my life I was always
exposed to diversity and others in Italy at the time. And still nowadays, there was a big migration from
Africa and our country and Middle East or Eastern Europe. It depends on the time at the time, it was
mostly from North Africa and my family was hosting people and greeting them and making sure that
they were safe. I grew up in an environment where we always care about others, even though we had
little for ourselves. Our table was always with more people and usually people from different cultures as
well. My family exposed me to all of this, even though my own mom and my own dad didn't have any
academic education, so to speak, they couldn't pursue a higher education, but also they were during the
Transcribed By
Sierra Jenkins
1
2022-10-21
�MAX DISPOSTI
TRANSCRIPT INTERVIEW,
2022-04-26
war at the time <affirmative> even going to high school was a privilege that just few wealthy families
could afford. I consider myself lucky, of course, when I came out at the age of thirteen there's always
that struggle of homophobia, transphobia in a city, in a country that's dominated by Catholic Church.
Even though my parents were not religious whatsoever it infiltrates into the patriarchal narratives.
When I came out as a gay man at the time it definitely was a surprise and an issue at first to a point I
needed to detach from my family. They never pushed me outside so they were not against me but I
needed my own space. I was thirteen, fourteen and I was already an activist in the community. But it
was never a traumatic experience. I went through my time of self-affirmation and then I came back to
them with more-- I knew I could conquer their hearts and mind around this because there were people I
could talk to. I was definitely in a privileged position versus other friends of mine. They just end up on
the street. <affirmative>. So that's my childhood. That's who I am. For me early on, on my sense of social
justice, that activism around issues that they were not just LGBT related you know, human rights,
immigration rights and against the war all the time. And at the time America, I was definitely not a place
where I was aiming to live. It was this big monster imperialistic country that goes around to conquer
spaces and lifestyles. We were not a fan of it, but love brought me to California and my first love, I
would say serious enough to drag me there. And then one thing led to another, I end up staying in
California. Again, though I overstay my visa. I became undocumented for about five, six years of my first
time. I had to experience all of that fear because now I'm in love with someone. I didn't want to lose
them. <affirmative> so that's a little bit my story, even though I always recognized my privilege to come
from a place that was definitely not devastated by war and crime or violence. I still felt that I couldn't go
back to it just because if I did at the time, I could never return to the U.S. I did my best and my education
helped me to go through all the application process and so forth to become a citizen and live the best of
both world[s] pretty much, back at home and here in California. So, yeah, I hope I didn't share too much.
Teater:
No, that's great. I love this. Can you tell me a bit more about your education? What did you study?
Disposti:
When I was in Italy I was really driven by social studies since day one. But my high school years were
troubled by a lot of strikes that I organized. I can’t even blame anybody, I was always striking for better
schools, better conditions against discrimination. At the time being openly gay was a threat. It was a
threat to myself. I think people never touched me or attacked me physically because I was so out that
would have exposed them as well. Right. <affirmative> It was one of those I realized the more vocal out I
was, the more protection I was bringing to myself because the people there to be that kinda person,
especially in a religious country like that, there's always that fade. I mean, that face that you had to
keep, you know, in order decency. High school was problematic. I did finish high school and then I went
to the university, high school was just-- in Europe, you already pick in high school what you think you're
gonna do in the future. It was graphic design related, a fashion design. Then I look around me, you're in
Italy with amazing talented artists. And I look at me and say, “oh my gosh, I would never make it.” These
people are just-- each one of them is an artist. I realize it wasn't really for me as well. I went into
university and developed more social sociology and social studies. I graduated from-- I got my
bachelor[s] over there, but didn't do much with it after a few years-- I mean when I was 30 years old,
then I decided to move to the U.S. And here I started over my study and I took my bachelor[s] in political
science. And then I went back to get a master [in] nonprofit management in leaderships, which I
graduated from in 2016. Not really long ago. Recent, because it was a means for me, I didn't need the
academic title. I really needed to know more about the work I was doing, particularly in nonprofit. I had
to tell you it was money well invested, even though I'm still paying for it, <laugh> after so many years.
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And it really helped me to understand more about nonprofit governments and leadership as well. In
addition to what I already knew. So yeah, that's my academic background pretty much.
Teater:
Man, you've lived such a fascinating life. <laugh> So you touched on it a little bit, but what was your
career like before the North County Resource Center?
Disposti:
The north county resource center, I would say around 2007 or 2008 is when I made that decision to do
what I do, even though at first was not a paid position. I needed to save as much as I could, reserve
anything, because I didn't know where this was going to take me. <affirmative>. Prior to that, when I
came in the U.S. even though I was very active and volunteering for different things, I was fortunate
enough-- at the beginning I was working in hotel, the hotel industry, I used to be in San Francisco for
four years. Then it was a little bit of dot com, I was doing a lot of translating because I speak Spanish and
Italian. I was doing a lot of translating from one and to another with platforms, Yahoo platform and so
forth. That was a very well-paid job. <affirmative> Even at the time that helped me out a little bit uplift
my resources, but I wasn't documented at the time. I couldn't really invest into school or nothing
because I knew I just couldn't do that to that point. And so I married my previous husband at the time in
San Francisco, we decided to come down here because he had family members in the military. And
when we moved to Oceanside was the place where it was cheaper and affordable. I did like the beach. I
liked the fact it was Southern California. I bought at first into the life okay. Once I finish with my own
immigration status, which lasted 10 years struggle. So that's why I'm very, not only sympathetic, but not
many people understand about what it means to be an immigrant in this place where I had at that point,
the money and the lawyers to fight the system and an education, but if it was running away from any
other country from famine, war, or violence, there is no way that the U.S. will have offered me an
alternative there is just no one, legally speaking. There is not an alternative if you become
undocumented to fix your record, really not even if you marry someone. It's just not the way it is
anymore. It took me 10 years. Yes. I feel privileged because I was able to go through all of that. In the
process, I started working to make some money because my dream was always to open a community
center. <affirmative> And as I was making the money, I joined some real estate firms. I was a broker and
I became very successful because I was this guy that was very realistic. I didn't have dreams of screwing
people over to make money. My dream was building LGBT center. I think people saw that in me, that
was honest that sometimes I told people, don't buy this house because really too big for you, is not
gonna be a good choice, because then you're gonna have this huge mortgage. I was having this
conversation with folks, and I think the more I was honest with them, the more business was coming to
me. I was doing really well at a certain point, I needed to make the decision to pull the plug and go into
unemployment. Mind you I didn't say thousands of thousands of dollars, just enough to go by that
unemployment lasted. I mean, I was unemployed for two years because the center couldn't pay me. I
mean, it was me <affirmative> and starting a center I needed full-time dedications on everything from
gathering resources, putting people together, dynamics of power that you encounter, opening the door
and having someone there eight hours a day, it was a huge, huge undertaking. But I never felt alone. I
always felt fortunate that people trusted me in the process. And also my leadership style has always
been very sharing. The resources was never about me, my name and putting my name in top of the
things I did, even though at the beginning, it shows a lot me and the center. My name is very linked to it,
but mostly I started the center, but I always bring the honor, the credit to the many people, many, many
people that made the center what it is today. So that's how it brought to me. I brought those corporate
leaderships into this business. I brought my nonprofit academic research. I brought my life experience as
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an activist. And I think everything just worked together. I was there for the right reason and not to rush
things through. And I just had hope in my community here that things will have become like they are
today or even more. Yeah, the dream's still on and we still have a lot of things we want to accomplish.
<affirmative>
Teater:
In terms of the LGBT community, what was that like in North County? Because I know North County
doesn't really have much of a presence as far as LGBT representation, as much as say Downtown or
Hillcrest has.
Disposti:
<affirmative> It was not easy. I had to fight internally and externally, it was opening the door of the
center in a military town. I knew it was going to be difficult because it was at the time all North County
was extremely conservative. We received threat. We had our windows smashed several times. We
elected people that didn't wanna meet us in person. This was obviously 2008 and 2009. Also 2008 was
the year of the campaign for marriage equality. The center at this point was not open because we
opened 2011, but we were active as a group. It was called North County LGBT coalition. So we were
meeting weekly. We were an organizations with all we were grassroot at the same time. We had a board
of directors. I mean we were an organization, but not yet with a space because we were saving money
to open one. And yeah, North County was quite brutal, but also interesting enough because we were the
only organized entity in North County, we received a lot of support and a lot of love from a lot of people
from family and youth and so forth. We connected right away with preexisting grassroot groups in North
County, in particular, with Link Lesbian in North County, there is a lot of history around what they've
done here in North County for 20 years since women met under cover every Friday to create a support
system for themselves, even the gay guys were cruising and the whole spots Oceanside had, the
Marines were here. There was a lot of LGBT presence in Oceanside. We used to have two gay bars up to
2002, then they closed down just because the owners got old. But there was a lot of LGBT happening. It
reminds me what it used to be in San Diego prior to the seventies when the Marines were there. And it
became an LGBT Hillcrest [?] in particular place to go because there were a lot of Navy and Marines
coming to town and finally they could be true to themself, right? Oceanside, North County was brewing
with Marines that they were gay and Navy officers as well, but it was always-- the community was
always in denial. Oceanside was a place where there were a lot of street workers, a lot of LGBT people, a
lot of trans women, that had to, not by choice, in that case, to become strict workers because they
didn't have opportunity for jobs. So quite a rough place, when we came in people couldn't believe that
there [were] enough to put ourself out there and call ourself an LGBT center and having the rainbow flag
outside. At first we had people just walking into the door. I remember the seniors in particular, literally
were emotionally taken by the fact that we were just there. And at first I saw we're not doing anything
special. We're just here with a flag outside, running some support groups, but we didn't realize at first
the impact we're having soon, so many lives and people that came and dropped their life story on us,
seniors and youth. And then all of a sudden we started seeing more and more, our amazing trans kiddos
<laugh>. And that was when we started advocating within our own community with our old generation
of gay male to the fact that this is the time for us to give back to those of us that are still struggling and
understanding how, not only embrace our trans identities, not as a plus or a sign of solidarity, but as a
full part of the community, that's always been there, but always been hidden, not by their choice. It was
the constitutions of our mission statement at the center. We were fortunate enough that since day one,
when no one was talking about trans rights, other than trans people, of course, by meaning the
mainstream of the LGBT community. <affirmative> Our board was composed by trans folks, the support
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groups. We started hiring therapists, everybody was volunteering at the time to work with our folks.
And we had hundreds, hundreds of kids coming at the center during a week basis. And we learned so
much from them, their struggle, their pain, one of this kids became my son because he decided to adopt
me. Now he's 22, so he's already grown up and he's a trans male, lives with his girlfriend now and
everything else. But so it was a overall real experience. That was never a job for me, never just a job or
never just a phase. Right. And I think at that time already, we realized that we needed to educate those
old leaderships that they were popping up. And they were excited that we were there, but they started
warning us. Hey, this place is becoming, you guys always only care about transcripts. It seems like, what
about gay people? Or what about, I say, we don't exclude anyone, but now we need to be together to
enhance the voices. So those that haven't been, that have been left out for so many years, because
when I grew up in Rome at the age of thirteen, fourteen, I was always surrounded by trans people. They
were my friends <affirmative>. When people tell me, “Oh, I dunno, what's going on now? All of a
sudden, everybody is trans or whatever,” say, “no, it's always been like that.” We always been around. I
say, we, even though I'm a cisgender gay guy, because I've been blessed to be educated through the
experience for many years when I was thirteen, fourteen. For me to hear an older white male that tells
me that I say “You haven't looked around too much. You have been focused on yourself for too long.” I
would say that was a journey that allowed me to create a center with a culture and a vision where
people, when they joined, they needed to know the old that were on board with the whole spectrum,
LGTQI or that wasn't the place for them. And we lost some people in the process. We lost some donors,
no regrets. We earned again so much more. And now that people are finally recollecting the necessity to
bring home what we’ve started thirty, forty years ago, or fifty years ago with Stonewall to bring it back
home with everyone, or just some of us, I think, now people are looking at us and say, “Oh wow, you
guys were right. You were always there.” And yeah, we were, we are, and we will. And now we're
embracing the intersex identities and struggle because again, they're being ask[ed] to be part of our
community because many of them are, and that we've been advocating with them now at the children
hospital in San Diego to change the horrible practices of mutilation of our organs just to feed the
stereotypical expectations [of] what gender or sexes of birth is all about. We always been there in the
forefront and when we weren't, we look into ourself to do better. You can imagine how the past three,
four years with the Black Lives Matter Movement with adding colors to our flag, how not only we
wanted to embrace, but realize that all our identities are not just one identity, right? That we had to be
vocal of about the struggle that our own queer people in our own community BIPOC folks are still
enduring because of police brutality, institutional violence, and a way to do nonprofits has been
whitewashed for many years. And how white supremacists in filtered into our own community. How it
shows up? Recognizing how to do that and making yourself vulnerable to it and not defensive on when
you might be perpetuating those dynamics. I think it's part of everyday challenges is what I love the
most to be honest, because I don't wanna come to a point where I say, “Oh, I think I know everything,
and now I got all of my boxes checked.” Nothing else comes through when it's not true. Life is always
moving. Right. And so are we, so, yeah. That's how difficult it was in North County, but I focus on the
positive, but we lost some kids in the process in 2014 and by loss, I mean, Taylor, Alisana[?], Sage, and
Tyler took their own life. There were transcripts that made national news and there were three of them
served by our center. And still troubling for me to talk about it. But I always try to honor their lives
because they didn't go in pain, even though I wish they were here. But they taught us a bigger lesson.
We believed our kids when they were telling us they were struggling to a point they didn't wanna live
anymore. There wasn't just a face or a way to drag attention to themselves. It was a real struggle of
pain. Some of us didn't have the privilege. Some of us had the privilege not to experience, by being
cisgender. We learn a lot in that process. Sorry. <laugh>
Teater:
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No, it's okay. I appreciate you sharing with me. I'll shift to maybe a lighter subject <laugh> for a quick
second. What are some of the resources and services that are offered at the North County Resource
Center and how have they changed over time?
Disposti:
Yeah. You know we started in a way at the beginning, really. We didn't have need assessment. We didn't
know really how to do any of it eleven years ago. We just said, “Hey, if more than three people come
forward and tell us, can we have a super group? For seniors, for non-binary folks, for trans folks?” they
say that means it's needed. So, we'll find a facilitator and create guidelines. We were always very serious
around policies and procedures and guidelines and protecting ourselves and others in the process. So,
we're never easy about that. The opposite. I think that so many times, because while we were a
grassroot organization, we knew exactly the level of liability we could incur by just gathering people. You
know, there were people [who] were coming because they were stalking other people, right. They were.
So how do we protect folks without introducing our own biases in the conversation? We created a
support group model that responded to the need of the community. Definitely our trans and non-binary
groups was the most populated resources. I mean, sometimes we have 40 people in one room cramped
in there because it was the only big room. And I say, “Oh my God the fire department show[ed] up, now
they're gonna shut us down.” Because it was a small space at the time. So super groups, then we started
doing behavioral health and in the way we wanted to see happening for our people. So, things have
changed and housing, case working-- I would say [in] two years we became more experienced. We know
how to navigate the system and cut the BS about advocating for people and how to do it well. Creating
more safety for our community. So sometimes we're like, for instance, human trafficking is a real, real
problem in our community. And we notice that a lot of LGBT centers and churches and sport clubs were
place[s] where people are going to groom. And sometimes these people are just a year or two years
older than the kid that you're serving. You have to be careful to provide a safe space where you're not
there to over micromanage people and their own identity, their own sexuality, their own affirmation are
the same, but at the same time, provide a space where people can come to you and tell you, “Hey, I'm
an active fifteen year old person, I’m sexually active with this person. Maybe they're at my age or a year
older.” How do we go about-- how can I be safe? And things like that. Our youth were coming to us
opening their hearts because they knew we weren’t there to judge them. We learned all of that, how to
be safe, right? If I have a teenager or thirteen [years old] [who] tells me that they were having a
relationship, a sexual relationship with someone at twenty-two, we have major red flags. And we’re also
mandated a reporter, right. We've done that too in the past. Navigating through all of that was quite
interesting. And we learned how to do it. Now we know so much that we are the one training others
youth providers around or the police, when the police shows up because someone called them because
maybe they're dynamic of stress. We tell the police what to do and how to approach other people. If
they don't agree with that, we don't let them in. This is not place for additional violence and trauma. We
educated a lot of these institutions that have been the cause of a lot trauma for our community. We
work with them when we can, and we do training and we sit on the same table so that we can advocate
and build the trust too. But at the same time, we make it clear that as a service, a clinical provider, this is
not a space where they're invited. We need to find other way, how to collaborate and do prevention in a
community, without having them finding the queer spaces in San Diego County. <affirmative> That's one
of the things. Things have changed. And then COVID of course, we moved everything virtually. I have to
say, now that we came back, they were coming back in person. We never closed the center. We always
been open throughout the pandemic. We just couldn't afford to close. We receive a lot of support from
foundations and founders. They realize that we made everything possible to support people. I would say
what has changed and now we have support groups, but people prefer the one-on-one because they
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can't find socialization quite easily nowadays in different spaces, even virtually, but they like the one-onone, “Hey, help me go through this,” family reification or mental health crisis, or finding a job, or just
supporting their ego and the self-esteem. It looks like they will be more successful to do that one by
one, instead of putting everyone in a super group, which we do have some people just love that, but
they're usually mostly social, like let's come together for an all queer and non-binary or let's come
together. And because those spaces are very vital, important. We are not denying that. I would say
though, that we are seeing more progress by doing that different kind of intervention. So maybe we're
creating a hybrid, whatever the community needs. We'll have to respond to that.
Teater:
Oh, I love that. What are some of the challenges that you and the center face today?
Disposti:
I would say challenges, but also opportunities. <affirmative> I do believe that LGBT centers are the
Planned Parenthood of United States. And what I mean is we are vital spaces and resources for our
queer community that no other institutions will ever provide. And preserving, not only preserving, but
supporting those spaces. I think it's a commitment to the government, state, federal, county will have to
commit to, because as we know, as it's happening, if you take away resources from a Planned
Parenthood, that's why the comparison, I mean, half of the population of women in particular, but not
just women will not have access to reproductive rights, a fundamental human rights. And if they're left
to the single communities, and this is a conversation I have with our elected official Mike Levin, people
that they're being very willing to understand. I said, I realized during COVID that if it wasn't
<affirmative> for the private donors and support people with money that stepped in, we would not be
open nowadays. And <affirmative> the government, you have [to] allow us to close our resources. And
now it's eleven years old that has helped thousands of people. And now employs twelve people. And
that's just not fair. This is not just a volunteer experience, this is the livelihood, but also the safe space
for thousands of people. And that's true in many region[s], right? For the San Diego Center, so forth.
<affirmative> While it's good for us to build our own funding streams so that you can stay independent.
You don't want the government to give you everything for everything you do, because then they want to
have a say about how you run your business. But definitely it's important that, especially in California,
where supposedly we have a more progressive leadership to start supporting LGBT center so they can
provide vital care, healthcare services, the others don't provide. [Be]cause when people get sexually
assaulted that are queer, they don't go to the police station. They come to us when they are in a mental
health crisis given by different reasons. They come to us first, when they're in poverty, they come to us
when experiencing certain kind of relationships or a tougher life or because of drugs or substance abuse,
they come to us because they know we're not here to judge. I would say that's why we’re the planned
parenthood of the community <affirmative> [be]cause it's an essential vital resource. The challenges are
that we're not there yet, so that we are left alone to do this work. And now that we have experienced
and seen the highest record of anti-LGBT legislation passing in Congress, a passing or proposed in
different states and in Congress, this conversation, as you know, they hit home, our kids, even though
they're in California. And we know that we're a little bit more protected here. We still have people at
the school district level showing up and addressing and stigmatizing and penalizing our queerness. We
still have people in position of power taking advantage of those narratives and bring back the same old
recycled anti-LGBT religious based narratives. The trauma continues every time we hear that, even
though it's not here geographically speaking. That's the challenges that in a time where communication
goes past left and right, that sometimes even news needs to be vetted. The trauma that the previous
administration has caused, we're still dealing with it. Or the Trump administration for those in the
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record that might watch this years to come, or even now with all the anti-LGBT bills from Florida in
Texas, in Ohio, South Dakota, I mean, these are thousands, hundreds of thousands LGBT youth in
particular trans youth. They are denied their own assistance. And in 2022 I was hoping not to see that
again, instead we are (inaudible) <affirmative> I have hope, I think we have a lot of things going our
favor, including a history of resilience, but it's tough. It's tough for a lot of people. <affirmative>
(Unintelligible) will fight because it's value our own existence, but for a lot of people don't have the
means the energy <affirmative> and we will have to fight for them too. <affirmative> I see a lot of
challenges. They are not just political or cultural, or educational and people really go around spreading a
lot of misinformation around the (unintelligible) kids, supposedly getting surgery at the age of eight,
which is total bullshit <affirmative> when it's actually through the opposite. I think that's the challenge
of nowadays, they still go and the racism, the institutionalized violence that it's part of the North
American culture unfortunately. I think we are an extremely violent culture. <affirmative> I can say that
because coming from another-- when a different kind of violence from the European experience in Italy
in particular, I can say though, that a lot of people that are born and raised here don't even realize the,
the level of competitive individualism that's being created here in North America to a point that now we
have a national pandemic and a worldwide pandemic, and people are even struggling to care for their
own neighbors by protecting their self and other, right. <affirmative> I'm really concerned about those
dynamics of violence and isolation, individualism that our society has brought us to be <affirmative>
That goes along with building an LGBT center.
Teater:
Yeah. You touched on this a little bit earlier, but given the history of policing with the LGBTQ+
community even in San Diego, how do you feel that police and sheriff trainings are received?
Disposti:
I'm gonna say that really, even though I train the Escondido police, the Oceanside police, Carlsbad
Sheriff Department, we do training with FBI. I met amazing people in those spaces. I mean, here and
there <affirmative> I don't wanna generalize. [Be]cause I met folks with coming from, they shouldn't be
there in my opinion. I don't have any trust that the police or any law enforcement will ever, ever
represent the interest of those that are working and living. And those of us that are really struggling for
a better tomorrow, I mean law enforcement is there to preserve the status quo and we don't like the
status quo <affirmative> of course we like democracy and all of that, but I don't have any confidence in
that. You know what I say that to even the officer I train, I tell them I don't dehumanize you because I
think people [that] are there are human beings and making their own decisions. Their own sacrifices
with their family and many of them risk their life, <affirmative> for something that [they’re] living. I'm
not here to dehumanize individuals and call them and isolate them. I have a lot of relationships with
police in the relations to, in a very transparent way, there are not. For instance, we have meetings that
we sit at the table I'm always very clear about: I don't think that policing belongs to queer spaces. I don't
think that policing, and even though I know that police gets, especially LGBT law enforcement feel like
betrayed by the fact that “I'm a police LGBT officer, I [want to] be in this space because I earn it.” But
the problem that they can't forget or separate themselves from the uniform they're wearing and what
has represented for our, it's still percent for our queer and people of color in North American particular.
Any region is different, but-- <affirmative>. What I would say is I believe that training reduce the impact
of policing in our community. I believe that building relationships can build trust. That something
happens. I can go to the police advocate for my people, and I want answers and vice versa, I think will
help the police to understand why there is fear in our community of reporting to the police. Because
when you have been called faggot by a police officer, when nobody is watching, it's your word against
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theirs. So that happens a lot of time <affirmative> on watch. But then there is no way we can prove it.
That happens everywhere all the time. And so personally speaking, and this is, I wouldn't say it's a
statement to my organization, even though I would say it's a common vision. I think collaborations with
police, it's important to, in terms of creating relationships, reducing the impact of policing in our
community. But I think the institution of policing is to be completely reinvented from zero. If we wanted
to be the force that serves the community, it doesn't protect status quo. I know some people might say
radical views, but I met police in different countries, just in North America and they were never on our
side.
Teater:
Yeah. How does local policing here compare to in Italy per se or places in Europe? [Be]cause I'm not too
familiar with their policing practices.
Disposti:
America is anomaly. The whole integration of LGBT experiences into the normalcy of the everyday life
has a good outcome, but also has developed contradictions. The fact that the police needs to show up in
our places and parade with us as a-- in North American seen as a progress, when in Italy it’[s] like, “Okay,
we don't need to hate each other, but my job is policing. It's not to lead the LGBT movements into propolicing know against policing.” Right? It's a different experience with police when I was, even though it
was a different time policing in our LGBT experience in Italy was always a (unintelligible) <affirmative>.
There were never-- nobody will ever think that we need policing in our streets with us. It's a different
comparison. Of course, I don't live in Italy now, even though I go back every year and my family's there
and they're still active. I definitely have a sense of what's going on, but <affirmative>, it's just a different
thing. People look at us and say, why you need the whole military marching with you, why you need the
whole-- and I understand the sense of the fact that LGBT people are everywhere. We [want to] show the
normalcy, that being queer is not anything that's out there, but you know, you can be a police officer
queer, a doctor, and I do like that. I do marry the cost that every price should be open to everyone that
marches. But we got in a point here in Northern America, where now police is telling us how they [want
to] show up. They are in San Diego in particular, they are dictating almost the way they should be
representing themselves when maybe they have only three, four LGBT police officer. And they're using
them as a token to show that the whole force is pro-LGBT. Then they run surveys through the UCSD
[University of California San Diego] or through the service for the Sheriff department that you realize
how much homophobic and transphobic and racist the force still is. To me, they haven't earned that
spot. I'm just gonna be frank. And I told this to chief of police from Oceanside to San Diego to Chula
Vista. I tell that in a very not threatening way, they trust me actually. And they like to talk to me because
I'm truthful. I don't beat the bush around. I'm just gonna tell I'm gonna work with you and everything
else. But I think you were invited at the table and now you think you own the table and that's okay with
me, but the police has an incredible force in America. The lobby of policing, the elected officials get
money from policing <affirmative> San Diego Police Departments extremely powerful, and they impose
their will on, or social organizations and organizing. <affirmative> To ask, for instance, going back in the
merit, I will have been happy to see the police marching maybe with their own t-shirts and shorts, you
know, so that you can tell everybody you are the San Diego Police Department. And so that your
department can be proud of you. And I think that should be alright. But the whole presence of uniform
and weapons in a inclusive parade is meant to be inclusive of everyone. Includes those that are now
super patriotic, or nationalistic, nationalist and so forth. I think it's very not conducive of a good
relationship. It's just a parade. <affirmative> I don't feel it's very-- so I'm sorry if I took you a little bit off,
but this is--
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Teater:
No, you're good. I'm right there with you.
Disposti:
It's such a current happening. Maybe people watching this many years from now, I wonder what they
will think of it, but right now I feel that we're not there. They have to earn their space. And also let's
remember talking about our region when you have a pride parade, you have people coming from all
over the county, you have people coming from LA Mesa, Fallbrook in places where policing, the impact
of policing on the streets is not as kind of transparent as it could be in any other spaces where we earn
that. Right. Like in Hillcrest <affirmative> right. We need to be mindful of the experience of our queer
people of policing in Chula Vista or other places, not just San Diego proper. What you see the police
marching, is not everyone has the same reaction, and you cannot normalize policing by just marching an
parade. You need to work every single day. So that's my-Teater:
Yeah, exactly. So, what is the center's relationship with military members of the community then?
[Be]cause I know they sort of have a kinship, but like they're different, but they're not, but they are.
Disposti:
Well. Because we cannot, I mean, I can tell you my personal stance about <affirmative> worth’s, and
army, and the military. I think we spend too much money into it when this country struggle to support
its own people that live here. Obviously, I'm not sympathetic about any choice of military that's military
related, but when it comes to LGBT experience, I have to say the immediate impact of let's say the
Marines here, the Navy on our immediate community is incomparable with policing. And what I mean,
they're not doing racial profiling here in San Diego. They're not doing-- There is not a direct impact and
<affirmative> for a city like Oceanside, which every family member has someone in the military. I would
say that also understanding the importance of what they give and how they feel it. That is their
dedication, their passion. We need to respect that. We serve a lot of veterans, a lot of military folks, but
many of these folks, LGBT usually we serve them because they struggle through the military services.
They went through <affirmative> health, sexual assault abuses that could never report from their
commanders, <affirmative> transphobia, homophobia, punishments of any kind. We support folks
because these are our people. <affirmative> It's not my place to tell them where they should go. We
meet them where they are. <affirmative> But definitely it's a different experience. I would say I met
amazing folks that actually have been a resource for the center and helping others from the army, from
some of the Marines or the many, many veterans that they are a part of our volunteer team. I'm sure
some of them might not share my views. These are personal view, again, not the center view, but
definitely we did think about building a center in a military community. You could completely subject to
it and be dictated on how to express your sentiment around military actions. You can be who you are
and supporting the queer people around the world. That's my goal as a human rights and civil rights
activist that I-- doesn't believe in any borders, or in any particular nationality, I focus on the help that my
folks need in the entire world. If the America gets in the middle of that, then I will definitely denounce it
but it's beyond the scope of the center. It's more my personal perspective. <affirmative> I think we are
all connected in so many different ways.
Teater
Transcribed By
Sierra Jenkins
10
2022-10-21
�MAX DISPOSTI
TRANSCRIPT INTERVIEW,
2022-04-26
<affirmative> I love that. I have a couple more questions. I'm [going to] switch gears a little bit. What
does it mean to you that the resource center has been open for eleven years now?
Disposti:
<laugh> It means a lot. I can't believe it. And I don't look back too many times, when I do I get
emotional. We had our first staff meeting after a while. I mean, in person and in the past six months
alone, we hire[d] six people. So now we're[employees] twelve. <affirmative> And just look around the
table with beautiful queer diversity around us, people with incredible (unintelligible). And I just couldn't
even envision this years ago, I knew it was coming, but now seeing these people around me, each one of
them gives so much, it brings so much to the center. I get really emotional, but I tend to look ahead of
me in terms of, there's so much we [want to] do. Just to give you an idea, this center is really small. Now
we really need that center is four or five times bigger, so we can grow and serve really serve North
County. I don't feel, we are able to say we are the North County LGBT center because we serve
everyone, but truly serving everyone from Escondido to--, it’s just not, at this moment, practically
possible. It takes resources. <affirmative> Not just volunteers and time and resources and money. I can't
imagine a queer person in Escondido, in order to be served they have to come to Oceanside. That alone
is a barrier. We encourage, even though we like to serve the whole region, that there are new
experiences that we can support them and share with them what we did so they can learn it. We're not
in competition with other spaces growing and coming up, but it's not an easy thing to do. I would say I'm
proud of what we did, of what we accomplished, but before I finish with the center experience,
whenever that is, I [want to] see a huge building, thriving with a lot of people in it. And mostly with a lot
of brand-new leaderships that can take that, toward and moving forward. That would make me happy in
so many different ways. So, yeah.
Teater:
Oh, that's so nice. During your time as an activist, and this'll be my final question, during your time as an
activist, what has brought you the most joy?
Disposti:
Oh gosh. I don't think I can single out one.
Teater:
What were some of the experiences?
Disposti:
Opening the center, the grand opening of the center. Definitely. People showed up for that dream.
Really so many, I've been so fortunate to have so many memories, but definitely the opening the center.
The meeting that we had two weeks ago, I told you looking around and see, oh my gosh, these are my
people and the staff, and the center is growing. The people coming forward after a few years of months
that visit us, and we help them and thanking us for truly-- And when I say save the life, I don't mean in
such a-- these were people struggling with their own existence. When I say save the life, I mean, it
physically not--I mean, taught them the way. Right. I don't [want to] be so pretentious of presumptions
or, we are not telling people what to do, but many people really couldn't survive without our support
that has to do with mostly believing in them. When stories like that are coming back to you, you know,
you're on the right path, are doing the right work. So many, I can't pin it down, but mostly had to do
with my community being there for my community and here at the center. So--
Transcribed By
Sierra Jenkins
11
2022-10-21
�MAX DISPOSTI
TRANSCRIPT INTERVIEW,
2022-04-26
Teater:
Yeah. Awesome. Well, thank you for sharing with me. Is there anything else you wanted to mention
before we sign off?
Disposti:
No, it's hard to recollect now, but I'm sorry for getting through the emotions.
Teater:
Oh no, I love it all. It's perfect.
Disposti:
You know, me? Yeah. I don't shy away from that. No, thank you. Thank you for doing this work. That's
what I [want to] say that I know how important it's because we're doing an archive here at the center as
well, and we are doing the same interviews to the people that were here, the key leaders in the
communities, even prior to the opening of the center, it's a very tedious, slow process that takes years
in the making. I appreciate you and your team for even thinking about this. And for creating this record
that one day will be so helpful for people, or maybe not for people to watch. And I wish I had that when
I started the center, looking back to the stories and the voices of those that came before us, because we
always stand on the shoulder. Those that came became before us, even though there was not an LGBT
center, but, you know, yeah. That's what we got. Thank you. Thank you.
Teater:
Thank you. Well, I'm [going to] stop the recording now.
Disposti:
Perfect.
Transcribed By
Sierra Jenkins
12
2022-10-21
�
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Transcripts
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Title
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Disposti, Max. Interview transcript. April 26, 2022.
Description
An account of the resource
Max Disposti is the founder and Executive Director of the North County LGBTQ Resource Center. In this interview, Max discusses his upbringing in Rome, Italy as a queer male and his experience coming to the U.S. and his quest to open the Resource Center. Max Disposti also talks about the parallels in how the LGBTQ+ community is treated in Italy in comparison to America.
Creator
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Max Disposti
Contributor
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MJ Teater
Sierra Jenkins
Date
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2022-04-26
Subject
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LGBTQ+ activism
LGBTQ+ rights
North County LGBT Resource Center
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North County (San Diego County, Calif.)
Rome (Italy)
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California State University San Marcos University Library
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English
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Max Disposti
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Property rights reside with the university. Copyrights are retained by the creators of the records and their heirs. This resource is licensed for noncommercial educational use using CC NC-BY 4.0. Please contact Special Collections at archives@csusm.edu if you need reproductions made. Please see the related “Preferred Citation note” for language on citing materials from this collection. Permission to examine Library materials is not authorization to publish or to reproduce the examined material in whole, or in part. Persons wishing to quote, publish, perform, reproduce, or otherwise make use of an item in the Library’s collections must assume all responsibility for identifying and satisfying any claimants of the copyright holder. The researcher assumes full responsibility for use of the material and agrees to hold harmless the University Library, and California State University, against all claims, demands, costs, and expenses incurred by copyright infringement or any other legal or regulatory cause of action arising from the use of the Library's materials. In assuming full responsibility for use of the material, the researcher also understands that the materials they examine may contain Social Security numbers, other personal identifiers, and/or sensitive material on potentially living and identifiable individuals (e.g., medical, evaluative, or personally invasive information). The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found.
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text
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SC027-14
Activists and activism
Community history
History Department internship
Immigrant experience
LGBTQIA+ experience