An Open Letter to the MogaDao Community
We the undersigned are all students of Zhenevere Sophia Dao and/or teachers in the MogaDao practice tradition. We represent but a tiny portion of the thousands of students who have studied faithfully and safely with Zhenevere Sophia Dao over her career of 25 years. We have become aware of recent defamatory accusations that have been directed toward Zhenevere Sophia Dao and the MogaDao practice tradition, and because we were the students and teachers present in the room at the MogaDao Institute during the time in which the events of these allegations supposedly occurred, we here make our presence known as witnesses.
The most damaging and intentionally misleading of these accusations center around the two class environments of Jingshen Gongfu (martial arts) and Depth Sexuality. Every allegation of groping and sexual misconduct ostensibly occurred within these classes. However, we were all in attendance at these classes, which were held in one open, entirely visible room, in an environment of explicit mutual consent, and we categorically refute these claims of sexual impropriety.
We have to conclude that these accusations stem from personal grievance rather than actual events. The class environments in question were in fact conducted with safety, consent, and trust as the highest priority; we know this because we were there. As a tradition founded by a transgender woman, we speculate that since these attacks are not based in reality, they can only spring from the history of misunderstanding, fear, and vilification that all too often characterizes the interface of normativity with queerness.
By writing and signing this letter, we are confirming the integrity of our teacher and our tradition, as well as protecting our community and all future students from the blatant dishonesty and deep-seated transphobia that is present, both explicitly and implicitly, in these attacks.
Don Freeman
Willow Ruth
Eve Bradford
Helene Minot
Olin Christy
Nikesha Breeze
Devante Love
Carl Baccellieri
Diane Chase
Sunny Smyth
Thomas Jaggers
Derek Fraser
Jaye Marolla
David Borton
Brian Roberts
SueJ Johnson
Amy Baker