About
Moon-bow: A rare and remarkable phenomenon created by the refraction of the moon's glow.
Who We Are
Moonbow is a community-based queer and trans Asian organization that lives at the intersections of queerness, disability justice, and abolition. We cultivate spaces for connection and relationship-building, with a focus on mental health.
Our Vision
We envision a world in which queer and trans Asians, alongside our queer and trans Black, Indigenous, and siblings of color, live with an abundance of resources to create the care they need in order to experience safety, healing, and joy.
Our Mission
We cultivate leadership and kinship of queer and trans Asians so they may determine their own paths towards healing and mental well-being.
Our Aspirations
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We create space for safety and trust so that queer and trans Asians can explore and prioritize mental health and well-being.
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We center the experiences and needs of those who are most vulnerable and marginalized to guide our practices for collective and individual healing.
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We invoke abolitionist principles, disability justice, and healing justice to guide our movement.
Our Values
These values guide our work and decision making as we navigate how to care for our community and ourselves in the face of oppressive systems.
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We maintain that community care and self care are inseparable. We advocate for interdependent relationships, both as an organization and as individuals, to increase our collective resilience. We practice community care and self care by continually reflecting on both collective and individual needs, and responding to them through advocacy and support. We believe that being in relationship with others, where we are able to practice giving and receiving care and building trust, is vital to individual and collective healing.
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We nurture relationships that facilitate healing, growth, and empowerment in opposition to individualism perpetuated by capitalism and white supremacy. We seek to co-create with queer and trans Black, Indigenous, and People of Color to strengthen our collective power and dismantle oppressive structures
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We remain steadfast in the expansive journey of learning that allows for exploration and creativity. We accept mistakes as part of this journey and exercise compassion when we ourselves or others misstep. We create spaciousness for accessibility, ease, and regeneration in opposition to the dominant cultural norms of urgency and burnout.
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We embrace joy as a daily practice in our collective organizing. We aspire to express ourselves beyond survival and to live with exuberance, vivacity, and love.
Moonbow: Our Story Arc
In 2005, API Equality-LA - now Moonbow - was formed in response to opposition campaigns led by conservative Chinese churches. Our work contributed to increased LGBTQ+ acceptance in the Asian and Pacific Islander community and the 2015 Supreme Court ruling on marriage equality.
After the legalization of same-sex marriage, API Equality-LA began training API LGBTQ+ youth and adults as social movement leaders, focusing on immigration reform, school bullying, and civic engagement. In 2018, we conducted a needs assessment that found mental health as the most critical issue facing our community and our organization began shifting our work accordingly.
The organization has pivoted towards Disability Justice, Healing Justice, and Transformative Justice in our mental health approach. After undergoing a values realignment that took place in 2022-2024, with extensive community input, we have redefined our work, vision, and values, as a queer and trans Asian disability-led mental health organization to respond to our community’s needs.
Meet the Board
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Acie Juco “Juks” Roxas (they/them) serves as the Board Chair of Moonbow. Acie Juco is the oldest child of Filipino immigrants who immigrated to Chicago in the 1980s during Martial Law in the Philippines. They come from a background of community organizing; organizing with Filipino domestic workers and Filipino youth across the Chicagoland area. They are currently the Program Director at the Vietnamese Association of Illinois. With their skills in program development, community building, and fundraising, they are dedicated to further advancing Moonbow’s mission, vision, and values. When Acie Juco isn’t thinking about how to serve the community, they’re usually found writing music, painting, or relaxing with a cozy video game.
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Jasmine (they/she) is a community builder and student of love and otherwise possibility (Ashon Crawley) living in so-called Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Serving on the Board since spring 2022, Jasmine organizes for the end of death by incarceration through Let’s Get Free: The Women and Trans Prisoner Defense Committee and the Abolitionist Law Center. Jasmine also co-facilitates an arts education program for educators to deepen their racial consciousness through engaging with and creating art. It is through art and creative resistance that Jasmine desires to cultivate more liberatory ways of being.
