Why We Exist

When we grow up as LGBTQIA+ people of colour, it can be difficult to find spaces where we feel safe, supported, and understood.

Luckily, there’s a space where your culture, faith, and queerness can exist unapologetically. It’s called the Multicultural Peers Project, or MPP! We’re a peer-led space for queer and trans SWANA, South Asian, and Muslim youth here in NSW.

Multicultural Peers Project (MPP) is dedicated to providing inclusive mental health and community support to queer and trans youth from Middle Eastern, North African, South Asian, and Muslim communities in NSW. Our mission is to create a culturally focused, safer spaces  where young people can find the support they need, build meaningful connections, and celebrate their identities with pride and dignity.

We started out as the Muslim Peers Project, a community service focused on supporting LGBTQ+ Muslims in NSW.

Since then, we’ve grown to better serve wider cultural communities so that everyone can access safe and empowering resources, and cultural events.

Here at MPP, the work is driven by people and mental health professionals who come from the communities we serve, creating an environment of shared understanding and trust.

We continue to grow with intention to meaningfully service other multicultural and faith communities in NSW. We can’t wait to meet you!

We offer culturally-focused mental health support and counselling for people aged 14-30, whether in person, over the phone, or online. This includes our group creative therapies workshops and trauma-informed creative spaces to foster wellbeing and self expression.

We also offer additional crisis support, including referrals to trusted service providers and transitional housing.

MPP also hosts safe, queer cultural events for people of all ages, from public art exhibitions to private and accessible events that celebrate our unique cultures; inclusive Iftars, open-mic nights, picnics, and more. Some of our private events are focused solely on our QTBIPOC communities, while public events are also welcome to our loved ones and allies.

And last but not least, we offer online resources and communication - using our digital platform for referrals, as well as sharing info on psycho-education, cultural events, and resilience resources.

Wisdom from our teacher and confidant Dr Sekneh Hammoud-Beckett, and a practice we honor at MPP. No matter where you are in your journey in relation to your identity, we are here for you.

For some queer Muslims (and many of us with diverse lineages and connections to culture and faith), “Inviting in” rather than “coming out”, may feel more aligned in how we affirm and honour our familial and intimate relationships. To “invite in” someone means consciously and selectively welcoming specific people into your life to share personal information about your gender or sexuality. It also implies that only those who have earned your trust will be invited in and only those who truly deserve that knowledge will receive, rebalancing traditional power dynamics and western-centred norms of “coming out.

With this, we honor our LGBTQIA+ elders and trailblazers who risked so much to come out, and continue fighting for their rights as well as those who have had this choice unjustly taken away from them from being “outed”. MPP dreams of a world where we can all find ways to connect that honors safety, authenticity, autonomy, respect and care.

We are proudly part of Outloud, a youth arts organisation based on Darug land in Bankstown, Western Sydney that provides dynamic, socially-driven arts opportunities for young people.

Outloud (formerly Bankstown Youth Development Service) is an award-winning intersectional, youth-led arts organisation that has championed creative social change in Western Sydney, since 1987. Based on Darug land with deep roots in Bankstown, Outloud works with local professional artists and service providers to support young people to co-create impactful, culturally relevant art that speaks to their lived experiences, dreams and ambitions. Supporting young people to understand, analyse, and have agency in social topics that affect them, and positions them as agents of change both within their own lives and in their communities.

Outloud’s work is grounded in a journey of care - a long-term, relational model that centres trust, safety, and creative development. Through strengths-based programs, the organisation supports young people to explore complex topics such as gender equality, identity, mental health, and community connection. These programs use the arts as a tool for self-expression, skill-building, and dialogue while also scaffolding transferrable life skills and showing them practical pathways into education and employment in the creative industries.

MPP has previously been supported by Aurora, Wear It Purple, The Pride Foundation, The Social Policy Group, Department of Social Services providing funds to keep our vital work going.

We are currently supported by Rainbow Giving and Multicultural NSW.