The Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration, and Immigrant Rights and Fight for Equality By Any Means Necessary (BAMN) is building the new civil rights movement. We are a primarily student- and youth-based organization of leaders in our schools and communities, committed to making real the promises of American democracy and equality.
We have carried out successful campaigns against gay bashing in urban high schools, prevented the deportation of gay asylum seekers from countries with repressive anti-LGBT laws, sponsored tribunals on hostile campus climate. and organized a "Day Without Gays" at UC Berkeley to undo Prop 8 and pass the Dream Act.
While BAMN is not a specifically LGBT organization, over half our members and leadership are LGBT youth because BAMN practices what we preach (excerpts of BAMN pledge):
I pledge to accept the challenge of becoming my generation’s voice of freedom. ... this requires always speaking for and to the oppressed... I pledge to be a youth leader of mass actions led by the youth themselves. I do not fear the anger, boldness or power of youth in struggle... I pledge to be a great leader by always being proud of who I am and by just being myself. I am a role model for others when I am not ashamed to be myself. I pledge to work collectively with the other young leaders of the new movements, struggling to overcome the ignorance, prejudice, and bigotry that living in a society so divided by race and distorted by the racism, sexism and anti-LGBT bigotry imbues in everyone. I cannot win a bright, happy or hope filled future for myself by fighting only for my own prosperity or immediate self-interest. I know my future is bound up with our shared future.
