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posted by Liam Reed at 7:45 pm.

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Aight y’all, I’ve been in Vegas and haven’t had time to write. Since I was there, I also didn’t do much homework, which means that’s what I need to get on right now. So, in the meantime, here’s an interview I had with Solomon Hursey and Julia Napolitano, the co-chairs of the MBLGTACC over at IU. If you haven’t yet registered for MBLGTACC and are interested in going, get on that!

Before we get into the deep dark questions, what the hell does MBLGTACC stand for, and why does it go by such a long name?
MBLGTACC is short (that’s arguable) for “Midwest Bisexual Lesbian Gay Transgender Ally College Conference”.

What exactly is this conference? What are its aims? Who does it cater to? Will there ever be a time when conferences such as this one are no longer necessary?
MBLGTACC is a regional conference for sexual and gender minorities and those supportive of them. Since “College” is also in the name, we tend to focus on issues relevant to university students, staff, and faculty. The annual conference (in its 17th year) has been a place where mostly college students can gather and discuss these issues that are, in many environments, taboo or “offensive”. Personally, I would love to see this conference and others like it be obsolete, but I think that goal is a far one.

What goes on at the conference? Are there any special guests/performances this year? How many people usually attend?
Each year, MBLGTACC provides many workshops, speakers, and entertainers for participants to learn from. The conference also serves as a way for students to network to reinforce their own campus advocacy efforts. This year’s conference will be featuring Dr. Kand S. McQueen (a university professor of gender and transgender studies), LZ Granderson (a sports writer and commentator for ESPN).

How long has the conference been going on? Do other regions have a similar conference? Which states are within this region? Who is invited to come?
This is the 17th year of the conference, but there were two large planning meetings before that (1991 and 1992). I’ve heard that there are Eastern and Northwestern conferences, but I don’t know any specifics. MBLGTACC covers Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, Minnesota, Wisconsin, North Dakota, South Dakota, Kansas, and Nebraska, Iowa, and Missouri, and it is open to university students, staff, faculty, and anyone else interested in LGBTQA issues at universities.

When and where is the conference this year? Is it too late to register? Where do students generally reside? Is there anything new going on this year, namely people giving up space to students who can’t afford hotels? How does one go about that?
This year’s conference is at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. Online registration is open until February 9th, but onsite registration is available at the conference. Conferencegoers will mostly stay in hotels, but many IU students are offering to host people who may not be able to afford a hotel. Check out our webpage for accommodation information, or our Facebook page for student hosting.

Why is it important to have such a conference? Why shouldn’t there be a Straights-and-their-allies conference? Should there be? I know there was a bit of a controversy with the Student Union at U of Illinois last year. Has there been any controversy over in Indiana this year?
A conference, or any event, celebrating LGBTQ and other “not straight” people is important mostly to empower the “not straight” people, but it also lets “straight” people know that their sexuality and gender identities are not universal. Personally, I think that most days are unofficial “Straights and Their Allies” conferences, just because of the massive amounts of media, culture, legislation, and policy favoring (though not always intentionally) heterosexual and cisgender people. As far as controversy, I don’t know anything about what happened at U of I, but there hasn’t been any trouble here. Indiana University and Bloomington are both very accepting of “not straight” people, and we have actually had amazing support from both the university and the city. Many of the planners and volunteers for MBLGTACC 2009 identify as allies.

What does it take to make this conference run smoothly? How many people are working on putting this thing together? How far in advance do you start planning? What does it take to get the conference to happen at your school in the first place?
I honestly have no idea when the planning for this conference started, but a bid to bring the conference to IU was submitted and accepted at MBLGTACC 2007, so two years at the minimum. Granted, we didn’t really start digging into the details until a little over a year ago, before the 2008 conference. Several of us took notebooks to the 2008 conference and recorded everything we saw that was good or could be better. Soon after that, we organized into committees and about fifteen people stuck out as leaders. In addition to the leaders, we have many consultants that help us on issues from booking entertainers to making sure we have rooms reserved for workshops. I would say that collaboration is the most important part to putting something of this size on.

So there ya have it, y’all. You can find out more information about specific events and the like at their website, http://www.mblgtacc.org. Have fun at the conference!

Liam Reed: 1987 model, runs fairly well, few dents, starts in cold weather, no baggage, loves flea markets and canned soup. Send all hate mail, love mail, and sexual advances to withtongue@gmail.com