Join us raising money and awareness to support deaf rights worldwide!

This Saturday | Fire Island Pines | 2PM–7PM
Hosted by the Global Deaf Research Institute (GDRI)
Featuring open bar + splashy performances by Selena Minogue

With: DJ CLINTON FOSTER

Grab your speedo, your statements, and your solidarity—we're taking the plunge for a cause.

Yes, it’s open bar. Yes, there will be bubbles. Yes, Selena Minogue is performing. And yes, your hot queer summer can be righteous and rowdy.

Deaf Voices Counted — Dominican Republic

Deaf people in the Dominican Republic are navigating education, health care, and public life without the language access they need and deserve. Through Deaf Voices Counted, GDRI is partnering with local Deaf-led organizations to document these experiences and fight for change. We’re collecting critical data on sign language access, school placement, and community health outcomes—and working with Dominican stakeholders to make sure Deaf people’s voices are finally centered in policy decisions. This isn’t charity. It’s infrastructure.

And here’s the tea: in the DR—like in much of Latin America and the Global South—most interpreter resources are controlled by religious institutions. That means deaf queer people often face double exclusion: from the state, and from the very institutions meant to “serve” them. Need an interpreter to access HIV care? A job interview? Legal help? You might be stuck going through a church that sees your existence as a sin.

This project uplifts the voices of deaf people and queer people whose truths are inconvenient, unrecorded, and revolutionary. We know what it's like to be left out of the data and denied the mic. This research hands it back.

Global Deaf Research Institute (GDRI)

GDRI is a queer and deaf-led research and advocacy institute committed to global disability justice. We mobilize Deaf communities around the world to gather their own data, tell their own stories, and drive policy that reflects their lived realities. We’ve led deployments in Nigeria and Ecuador—and now, we’re diving into the DR. Think of us as a global census—but queer, Deaf, grassroots, and fierce.

Come drink, dance, and donate—because when Deaf communities are counted, they’re powerful. And when you mix drag, data, and Fire Island? Honey, everyone wins.

🎟️ All proceeds go directly toward the Dominican Republic deployment

HANDSY 2025

By Global Deaf Research Institute

HANDSY 2025