Flowers for the Fire: What Blooms in the Fire Part I
In Part I of Flowers for the Fire: A Conversation on Trans Joy, Alia Stevenson and ananda parnaiba are joined by three Wisconsin-based trans leaders, artists, advocates, and community builders: Dina Nina Martinez-Rutherford, Orion Wells, and Mo Overby.
Together, they explore trans joy not as denial, performance, or forced positivity, but as something sacred, practical, embodied, and collective. The conversation moves through LGBTQIA2S+ community care, chosen family, trans youth, creative expression, political and cultural backlash, and the practices that help trans people stay connected to themselves and each other.
In a time when trans people are being targeted in public and organized ways, this episode centers joy as survival, truth-telling, protection, self-definition, and life. What Blooms in the Fire asks what becomes possible when trans joy is honored not as something fragile, but as something rooted, resistant, and alive.