IMPACT Club seeks to serve and support the local LGBTQIA+ community

Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — The Inclusive Multifaceted Progressive Activists Changing Tomorrow, or IMPACT Club of the American Samoa Community College, is a group founded in January 2020 that serves the LGBTQIA+ population of American Samoa. 

In speaking with IMPACT club’s current president, Baykah Autumns Taumaoe, she states that their club's mission “seeks to foster respect for diversity, embrace individuality, and appreciation of global perspectives and viewpoints that enhance the quality of life.” 

Taumaoe also says that the IMPACT club promotes inclusivity to LGBTQIA+ members and their allies. 

The club seeks to provide a safe space for the LGBTQIA+ population to feel united, accepted, appreciated and supported, while also promoting the LGBTQIA+ population by conducting awareness projects and activities aimed at making changes towards the social, cultural, economic, technological and environmental issues of American Samoa. 

And importantly, the IMPACT club advocates for the protection of the LGBTQIA+ population of American Samoa.

To further their mission in providing safe space for the LGBTQIA+ population of American Samoa to feel safe and celebrated in, they are hosting a “Ballroom” competition this coming Friday, November 10, 2023 at the Multi Purpose Center located on the ASCC campus.

 A ballroom competition has become part of the underground LGBT subculture that originated in New York City in the late 20th century. At these ballroom competitions, Black and Latino drag queens organized their own pageants in opposition to racism experienced in established drag queen pageant circuits in the 1980s and 1990s. 

The initial establishment of ballroom competitions mimicked these drag queen pageants, but now, with the inclusion of gay men and trans women it transforms the ballroom scene into a multitude of categories in which all LGBTQIA+ people can participate.

Attendees “walk” a variety of categories for trophies and to have their names recognized in the LGBTQIA+ culture, and IMPACT club seeks to do the same this Friday at the MPC at ASCC. 

 “We hope that we can bring everyone together tonight to show their support in celebrating our LGBTQIA+ community members while highlighting their talent, in addition to having wholesome, clean fun,” said IMPACT club president, Taumaoe. 

The Ballroom competition this coming Friday, Nov. 10, is slated to start at 6 PM and conclude at 9 PM. Tickets are currently on sale for $20, with door admission set at $25.

Anyone interested in purchasing a ticket can contact IMPACT club president Baykah Autumns Taumaoe on Facebook.