Youth Invasion 2010!

Every year the Andy Warhol Museum is taking over by teens for a night for Youth Invasion. There’s dancing, music, art, a fashion show, free food, and of course tabling by local organizations reaching out to the hundreds of youth at the event. This year Carnegie Library, the Women and Girls Foundation, Rustbelt Radio, the Youth Empowerment Project/PERSAD, Bike Pgh, the Pittsburgh AIDS Task Force, and the Animal Rescue League. Of course Planned Parenthood was also there running a table filled with pamphlets, condoms, PPWP chapsticks and our “Be Safe, Be Sexy” buss pass holders stuffed with cards and condoms. Yay Freebies!!!

As expected, youth loved the table and grabbed up the chapstick and other give aways saying how cute the buss pass holders were. What was a bit unexpected for me, however, was how a lot of the adults at Youth Invasion would come by the table and grab stuff for their kids, fill out the “I support Sex-Ed” cards and were genuinely excited that we were there for the youth. It was great to see adults who liked seeing teenagers stuffing condoms in their pockets instead of becoming protective and defensive.

Planned Parenthood wasn’t the only organization there promoting sex ed and handing out condoms, which is awesome for our cause. The Pittsburgh Aids Task Force and The Youth Empowerment Project/PERSAD were also tabling, encouraging youth to have safe sex and make healthy choices. By having three organizations all relaying the same message is a great way to really get a point across.

Leaving around nine with considerably less stuff than I came with was not just a relief to my back, but also showed how much stuff people had taken from the table. Outreach events like Youth Invasion are a great way to reach out to a lot of people by directly giving them some tools to practice safe sex, and also inform them about the other services Planned Parenthood offers. As a volunteer it’s extremely satisfying, but if the idea of empowering youth to be healthy and safe isn’t enough to get you to come out and volunteer, consider that I got free food including cupcakes for Dozen Bakery, and if that’s not enough to convince you that it was a great night, I don’t know what can.