BIPOC Committee to Evaluate Locations of IQA Events
As a reaction to global protests against racism, the International Quidditch Association (IQA) created a BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and people of color) Committee in June. Now, the committee has started to evaluate the safety and accessibility of IQA events.
The BIPOC Committee has six members from different national governing bodies. The members’ identities aren’t publicly known, only that they are from four continents. When the IQA was selecting the members, it paid attention to their quidditch experience, age, gender, ethnicity, and unique perspectives.
The goal of the committee is to evaluate the location selection process to make all future IQA-hosted events more welcoming, safe, and accessible for all attendees.
The BIPOC Committee members began with a survey for potential attendees of IQA events. They asked for feedback from the Muggle quidditch community about their demands on the safety, accessibility, and inclusivity of events. The survey was open until November 7, and the responses to it will help create criteria for potential host locations.
The new criteria will be applied first in Richmond, Virginia, as the potential host location for IQA World Cup 2022 or 2023. The IQA World Cup should have happened there in June 2020, before it was postponed to summer 2021 and then postponed again to 2022 or 2023. The selection of Richmond as the host city also prompted an open letter to the IQA about fears of the potential for racist incidents. It is possible that Richmond might not meet the BIPOC Committee’s criteria, which would require the selection of a new host location.
