I’m really happy to see you asking this question and doing an investigation of a charity and a cause yourself. It makes intuitive sense to me that moving from a very dangerous place to a very safe one would have long term benefits to well-being and seems worth doing additional investigation on the intervention.
It’s hard to know how much risk people are facing and how much improvement people will experience by moving; migration has upsides (eg better economic opportunity) and downsides (eg isolation from family). I’m not an expert on either but would be excited to see you do any additional analysis on this that you can do and post about it.
I think an ideal version of the EA Forum would have a lot of people willing to help you analyze this issue and work out answers for yourself. Please don’t get discouraged if you don’t get a lot of feedback here though. The EA Forum has happened to develop into a place with a high concentration of people primarily interested in AI, biosecurity, and animal welfare. There are definitely people around with other interests but you might have to hunt around for them.
Thank you so much for this thoughtful and encouraging answer.
These are good things to think about. I’ll see if I can find any research on migration in general. I get the sense most of Trans Rescue’s clients didn’t have good family relationships before moving, which does change the equation some, but it’s a starting point for which research probably exists.
I’ll try to post if I do any analysis that’s worth posting. I’ll also look deeper into EA forum and see if I can find advice for approaching small, young organizations like this. (On my to-do list is asking them if they’d benefit from a donation specifically earmarked for administrative use, a savings buffer for emergencies, or other things that would help the mission but look unappealing to the average donor.)
It occurs to me that an important question I haven’t yet asked, is if the organization’s accounting of their funds includes everything they spend on helping people relocate, or if board members and/or volunteers are also paying out of pocket for things related to the organization’s mission. I need to figure out how to ask that tactfully.
I may have switched from replying to thinking out loud somewhere in there. Thank you again for your advice and for taking the time to read and offer encouragement.
I have an update: Eden House was raided after the Trans Community asked Anne Ogborn / Trans Rescue to STOP posting photos of the people who lived in Eden House to the public internet. She went so far as to have the AP (Associated Press) film and interview neighbors. Almost a week later the Kenyan police raided Eden House.
However, Anne Ogborn made it a FOREVER home, and paid the ultimate price after doxxing the location of the safe house to the entire world. Ending in the life shattering raid.
We wrote the Medium blog “The Trans Rescue” papers to warn people not to donate, to stop Trans Rescue from destroying more lives. This was not an “interpersonal dispute”—This is about protecting trans lives
It makes me very sad you could not see this, this is not “twitter drama”
I’m really happy to see you asking this question and doing an investigation of a charity and a cause yourself. It makes intuitive sense to me that moving from a very dangerous place to a very safe one would have long term benefits to well-being and seems worth doing additional investigation on the intervention.
It’s hard to know how much risk people are facing and how much improvement people will experience by moving; migration has upsides (eg better economic opportunity) and downsides (eg isolation from family). I’m not an expert on either but would be excited to see you do any additional analysis on this that you can do and post about it.
I think an ideal version of the EA Forum would have a lot of people willing to help you analyze this issue and work out answers for yourself. Please don’t get discouraged if you don’t get a lot of feedback here though. The EA Forum has happened to develop into a place with a high concentration of people primarily interested in AI, biosecurity, and animal welfare. There are definitely people around with other interests but you might have to hunt around for them.
Thank you so much for this thoughtful and encouraging answer.
These are good things to think about. I’ll see if I can find any research on migration in general. I get the sense most of Trans Rescue’s clients didn’t have good family relationships before moving, which does change the equation some, but it’s a starting point for which research probably exists.
I’ll try to post if I do any analysis that’s worth posting. I’ll also look deeper into EA forum and see if I can find advice for approaching small, young organizations like this. (On my to-do list is asking them if they’d benefit from a donation specifically earmarked for administrative use, a savings buffer for emergencies, or other things that would help the mission but look unappealing to the average donor.)
It occurs to me that an important question I haven’t yet asked, is if the organization’s accounting of their funds includes everything they spend on helping people relocate, or if board members and/or volunteers are also paying out of pocket for things related to the organization’s mission. I need to figure out how to ask that tactfully.
I may have switched from replying to thinking out loud somewhere in there. Thank you again for your advice and for taking the time to read and offer encouragement.
I have an update: Eden House was raided after the Trans Community asked Anne Ogborn / Trans Rescue to STOP posting photos of the people who lived in Eden House to the public internet. She went so far as to have the AP (Associated Press) film and interview neighbors. Almost a week later the Kenyan police raided Eden House.
It is illegal to be LGBTQIA+ in Kenya: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_in_Kenya . The original safe house was supposed to be a temporary space before people got their immigration paperwork in order.
However, Anne Ogborn made it a FOREVER home, and paid the ultimate price after doxxing the location of the safe house to the entire world. Ending in the life shattering raid.
We wrote the Medium blog “The Trans Rescue” papers to warn people not to donate, to stop Trans Rescue from destroying more lives. This was not an “interpersonal dispute”—This is about protecting trans lives
It makes me very sad you could not see this, this is not “twitter drama”