Gay Line/CAEO Québec marks 50 years of volunteer-led service with their Queer Joy fundraiser at Café Cléopâtre on September 18. Founded in 1976 as Gay Line, CAEO Québec is a charitable, volunteer-led organization serving Québec’s English-speaking 2SLGBTQIA+ communities. CAEO combats discrimination and advances acceptance, equal status and opportunity through education, outreach and their SILK workshops.
When Gay Line began 50 years ago, trained volunteers answered two phones every evening and soon received 20 to 30 calls a night, providing information, referrals, listening and connection. “Fifty years ago, gay, queer and trans folks had few places to go for any emotional or legal support,” says organization historian Gregg Blachford who has been a Gay Line/CAEO Volunteer since 1992. “Many were facing workplace discrimination, school bullying, and even being cut off from their families.”
Gay Line has overcome many hurdles, such as government cutbacks in the early 1980s which eliminated Gay Line’s professional counselling services. In 2008, as the Internet changed how people found information and community, CAEO Québec was created. Their volunteer-led SILK program delivers testimonial-based workshops in English-language schools, CEGEPs, universities, workplaces and community organizations.
“Our role, when we go into schools, is not to lecture,” says CAEO Québec General manager Kimberly Wong. “It is to make room for honest questions, lived experience and the understanding that changes how people treat one another.”
INFOS | QUEER JOY — GAY LINE & CAEO QUÉBEC’S 50TH ANNIVERSARY FUNDRAISER will be held at Café Cléopâtre on September 18 at 8 p.m.
Admission: Pay what you can; suggested $15-$25.
For more Gay Line and CAEO Québec info, visit https://caeoquebec.org
