“It hits particularly hard on young queers, who already have little support.”

The Lambda youth network is the nationwide self-organization of queer young people. This means that young queers are not only the target group of offers, but can also determine their own topics, advocate for their own interests and contribute their perspectives to politics and society. For example, there is our “Queer Support”, a nationwide advisory service for queer young people. It's about coming out, self-discovery, family conflicts or discrimination, but also psychological crises. We are also currently setting up a digital queer youth center, because around 30 percent of queer young people have no corresponding offers in their area.

Above all, we are experiencing great uncertainty. For many young queers, our association is a place where they can organize themselves, experience community, take responsibility and represent their own interests. 

What consequences does the expiry of funding have for the network?

With the termination of our framework agreement at the end of the year, federal funding will end on December 31st. The concrete consequence is: We have to close our doors and discontinue our offerings in their current form. This applies, among other things, to our advice, our digital youth center, our events and youth meetings as well as our queer youth magazine. The federal political representation of interests and the support of volunteers are also on the verge of extinction. Young queers, who already have little support, are hit particularly hard. In rural and structurally weak regions, our digital advice and events are for some the only access to queer community and support.

Above all, we are experiencing great uncertainty. For many young queers, our association is a place where they can organize themselves, experience community, take responsibility and represent their own interests. At the same time, very specific offers depend on this structure. When these are suddenly on the verge of extinction, many people ask themselves: Where can I turn in the future? This uncertainty is particularly great for young people who have little support in their immediate environment or no queer offerings. This is also problematic because at the same time we see that the number of requests for advice to us is increasing and more and more young people are turning to us with serious crisis issues such as self-harming behavior, violence in the family or suicidality.

The threat of closure not only makes us sad, but also angry. We are forced to abandon young people who are particularly affected by loneliness, psychological stress and discrimination. At the same time, we are also hopeful. Since we went public with the situation, we have experienced an enormous amount of social support. Many people support us. At the moment we don't know whether we can still be there in our current form in 2027. But we are doing everything we can to ensure that queer young people do not lose their nationwide self-organization.