JANUARY 2024 VOL. 1 • ISSUE 1 VISIT US ONLINE AT: OUTFAU.COM INSTAGRAM: @OUTFAU FAU’s Faded Rainbow New law erases school’s diversity safe haven.
2 OUTFAU | JANUARY 2024 OutFAU newspaper is a part of J&J Media Group. You should not presume the sexual orientation or gender identity of any featured individuals solely based on their names, appearance, or inclusion within this publication. Any opinions shared within stories, columns, graphics, or letters to the editor should not be assumed to represent the opinions of OutFAU or its publisher. Any stories or content, either in print or online, and also including any articles that are featured in conjunction with any media partners, are protected under federal copyright and intellectual property laws, and this ownership is carefully and jealously guarded by this media group. Nothing that is published may be reprinted, either in whole or in part, without first receiving written consent from Publisher, Jason Parsley. OutFAU is owned by Jason Parsley and Justin Wyse, and is represented legally by Russell Cormican. As a private corporation, J&J Media Group reserves the right to enforce its own standards regarding the suitability of advertising copy, illustrations, and photographs. Copyright © 2024 J&J Media Group. FIRST COPY IS FREE, EACH ADDITIONAL IS 50 CENTS WELCOME to the first issue of OutFAU, a new student publication at FAU – by and for the LGBTQ+ and allied community. The Center for IDEAs, a safe space for queer students and those belonging to other marginalized communities, has closed. The diversity page on FAU’s website now says “page not found.” FAU’s annual drag show in the fall faced uncertainty until it changed its name, and restricted who was allowed to attend including no one under 18. WELCOME to OUTFAU – An Act of Defiance BY MARY RASURA EXECUTIVE EDITOR WE’RE LOOKING FOR WRITERS, PHOTOGRAPHERS, AND DESIGNERS! EMAIL [email protected] VISIT US ONLINE OUTFAU.COM FOLLOW US ON INSTAGRAM @OUTFAU Subscribe to our newsletter! These issues and more are what inspired us to launch OutFAU. The DeSantis administration wishes to silence and erase us. This fight is far from over. A few years ago, this publication would not even be noticed. Today it is an act of defiance. Today being queer is an act of defiance. For many in the LGBTQ+ community just existing is an act of defiance. I’ve often felt the desire to leave Florida after I graduate, even though I’ve lived in this state my entire life, due to the current political climate. I’ve come to realize that Florida is my home as much as anyone else’s, and I, and the LGBTQ+ community as a whole, shouldn’t be made to feel unwelcome. OutFAU is for our community to come together, to recognize and express the vibrant queer community that still exists in Florida even as our government seeks to make us disappear. This is a publication where we are visible. This platform is not only a tool of resistance, but a place for joy, art and connection. Please contact me with any questions, concerns or tips at [email protected]. Executive Editor MARY RASURA Assistant Editor KENNY RUFF Designer IVAN BENAVIDES Advisors MICHAEL KORETZKY JASON PARSLEY BRENDON LIES AURORA DOMINGUEZ Sales & Marketing FOR AD PLACEMENT, CALL 954-530-4970 OR EMAIL [email protected] OUT FAU JANUARY 2024 VOL. 1 • ISSUE 1 This publication is solely the expression of the author and/or publisher and it is not an official publication of Florida Atlantic University, nor is it in any way intended to express any policies or opinions of Florida Atlantic University, or its personnel. Cover: OutFAU file photo. Spot an error? Let us know at [email protected]
JANUARY 2024 | OUTFAU 3 Drag queens, free condoms, DeSantis trolling The queer alt-pop star played Fort Lauderdale in October and comes to Miami in March BY MARY RASURA EXECUTIVE EDITOR That’s what the crowd chanted – loudly – at a late October Chappell Roan concert. It was preceded by chants of, “Gay! Gay! Gay!” The mostly female audience at Fort Lauderdale’s Revolution Live was as raucous and raunchy as Roan, the 25-yearold queer singer-songwriter. She is opening for another artist in Miami on March 6 at the Kaseya Center, so fans will have another opportunity to see her in South Florida soon. Roan’s music defies as many labels as her persona does, but The Washington Post described her debut album like this: “Her sound mixes the energy of 2008-era Lady Gaga and the lyricism of Carole King, served with a side of early-aughts Hannah Montana glam. Cheeky lyrics teeter between unabashedly horny and strikingly selfaware.” At the Oct. 26 Revolution Live show, I cried. I laughed. It was a full range of emotions. These are songs I’ve sent to crushes and wept to. They’re soundtracks to my hot girl walks. At the show – where I felt incredibly seen and in a supportive space that DeSantis wants to erase and silence – healed me. Like I could finally stop picking at the scab. Roan’s opening act featured multiple drag queens, including Kat Wilderness and Suzie Toot. “It was actually really cool because one of the drag queens said, ‘Are there any lesbians here?’ and then so many people were like ‘Yes!’ and I was like ‘Oh my god,’” FAU political science graduate Isabella Feaheny said. “I don’t really use labels or anything, but I’m a queer woman for sure so seeing so many people that are like me in one space, I was kind of shocked. It was wild.” Wilderness and Toot gave an electrifying opening performance, with Wilderness including the trans flag in one of her dances. “I am here, I am real, and I’m not going anywhere,” Wilderness told the enthusiastic crowd. At Roan’s upcoming Miami concert, she opens for Olivia Rodrigo, who regularly features LGBTQ+ themes in her music and has gained a loyal queer following. As for Rodrigo’s sexual orientation, nothing has been confirmed, but fans love to frequently speculate online. “FUCK DESANTIS! FUCK DESANTIS! FUCK DESANTIS!” CHAPPELL ROAN ENTERTAINMENT Photo by Jason Martin via Wikimedia Commons. CHAPPELL ROAN OPENING FOR OLIVIA RODRIGO WHEN: MARCH 6 WHERE: KASEYA CENTER IN MIAMI TICKETS: SEATGEEK.COM OR STUBHUB.COM REVIEW
4 OUTFAU | JANUARY 2024 P AIGE ALLEN used to visit the LGBTQ+ resource center on the second floor of the Student Union, known as the Center for IDEAs. Allen would see Pride flags hanging down the walls, free condoms, resource pamphlets, and the sound of her friends laughing. Allen, a studio art major, graduated in December. She’s also the previous president of Lavender Alliance, one of the two main student organizations for LGBTQ+ students on the Boca Campus. The place she once knew no longer exists after Gov. Ron DeSantis passed Senate Bill 266, which eliminates or heavily restricts diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs in the state university system. The law took effect July 1, 2023. The IDEAs Center closed shortly thereafter. But how that law will further affect FAU and other campuses is still unknown and much debated. For Allen, the Center for IDEAs might be gone, but she still shows up there – although it’s a sad visit. “The lack of human interaction is the biggest loss I suffer from the center being gone,” Allen said. “I found people who were like me and had experiences I related to at the center, and now they are scattered. There are fewer places for marginalized students to gather that are not student-led.” That trend could easily spread to far more than campus DEI centers, experts say. For years, FAU’s Center for Inclusion, Diversity Education, and Advocacy had a suite of offices on the second floor of the Student Union. Then one day, it was gone. Many other campus efforts might be next. BY MARY RASURA EXECUTIVE EDITOR A Center of Silenced IDEAs EXPLAINING THE PROBLEM Because of the new law’s vague language, experts fear other student groups – from women in STEM to historically black fraternities and sororities — may be censored or will censor themselves out of fear of noncompliance. “There are a lot of groups that fall outside of what this law is clearly designed to protect, which is this sort of traditional white male Christian student and organizations they support,” said Andrew Gothard, the president of United Faculty of Florida, the state’s faculty union. “We’re very concerned about the harm that this is going to cause to all of these communities, especially communities that have historically had a more difficult time accessing higher education.” Congress and state legislatures have a long history of passing laws that have unintended consequences. Gothard, who’s also an English professor at FAU, is worried this new law will put a target on groups far beyond its DEI offices. Other experts share in Gothard’s concern, such as Carlos Guillermo Smith, senior policy advisor at Equality Florida and a former member of the Florida House of Representatives. “Basically, it is going to severely limit how students are able to exercise their free speech rights as college
JANUARY 2024 | OUTFAU 5 students,” Smith said, “And it says that no funds from the state or federal government can be used to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion, nor can they be used to fund student groups that advocate for what they define as social issues.” Smith continued, “They have a very broad definition of social issues, which covers pretty much anything a student would ever want to advocate for or against ever. So I think it’s incumbent upon university students and all others to speak out against these attacks to speak out against the attacks on academic freedom, and the attempt to censor students and faculty in the so-called free state of Florida.” ‘PAGE NOT FOUND’ When the Center for IDEAs closed over the summer, senior English major Austin Browne was working at the Council of Student Organizations, which is located on the same floor as the Center for IDEAs was. Browne shared that the Center for IDEAs had a bookshelf with books on topics such as queer media and critical race theory. “Any sort of marginalized demographic had some level of representation in these bookcases,” he said. After the Center for IDEAs closed, Browne said the books were moved from the Center into a conference room in the Student Government office. “It felt kind of weird because I’m a gay person myself,” Browne said. “There’s like old gay and lesbian magazines and stuff, there’s some history here, right? This is like a snapshot of how the culture was for this community.” Browne said that the removal of the books “just made kind of all of the legislative stuff going on in the state feel very, very real.” FAU spokesman Joshua Glanzer did not give a date for when the Center for IDEAs opened but a quick search through the center’s X (formerly Twitter) account has posts going back through August of 2013. The X account hasn’t been active since 2021. To illustrate FAU’s scrubbing of DEI, the link (FAU. edu/diversity) that once promoted diversity now says “page not found,” when clicked on. It’s unclear when the page was removed, but Smith posted about it on Oct.19. “Now, FAU’s Office of LGBTQ+ Initiatives is shut down. Their Center for Inclusion, Diversity Education + Advocacy, dismantled,” he posted. “Both are a consequence of SB 266 defunding DEI in public colleges and universities. They are trying to erase us.” FAU’s center made national news when USA Today looked at a few similar centers around the country that have shut down recently. THE FUTURE For all the possible ramifications of the new law, FAU’s Center for IDEAs isn’t really dead. The students are keeping it alive on their own. Like Allen, students regularly gather in the empty offices that were once staffed by several FAU employees. They lament that emptiness. But one bright spot of this new law is that students are energized. In fact, on Dec. 1, around 12 student activists gathered in the space to write down and illustrate their feelings. Students expressed concern to OutFAU about the chilling effect of Senate Bill 266 and how they don’t feel FAU has their back in this battle. “If [FAU is] doing anything, it’s not enough, because it’s nice that they’re still letting the [student] organizations fill the gap, but they can’t do everything that the universities do,” said Lewis de Berry a freshman English major. Ximena Dipietro, a senior history major and a leader in Solidarity, an FAU socialist student organization, is also concerned about the bill and its effects on the students. “I think it’s a harmful bill and I think it has harmful effects on our community here,” said Dipietro, who identifies as queer. “[There’s] a symbolic harm of seeing a space explicitly designed and entitled for us, but it’s also led to reverberating effects in censorship by professors on certain topics, and loss of medical care through the schools for trans people like me.” OutFAU asked Glanzer about the empty space that was the Center for IDEAs. He replied… The physical space formerly housing the Center for IDEAs is used as a general gathering space for students, many of whom previously attended programs and services offered by the Center and the student organizations who were advised by Center staff. We have installed student workstations with free printing and student staff facilitate divisional Transfer Student Success Initiatives, including the Transfer Action Program and the Johnson Scholarship Program for First Generation Transfer Students. Finally, we have hosted the Let’s Talk program facilitated by Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS). “I hope that this is just a phase in Florida history,” said de Berry. “But at the same time, I don’t see myself living in Florida, because it’s just so volatile right now. I’m just here to go to college and get out.” Students gathered at the Center of IDEAs on Dec. 1 to express their feelings on the recent laws that have affected LGBTQ+ students in Florida. OutFAU file photo.
6 OUTFAU | JANUARY 2024 SOLIDARITY INSTAGRAM: @SOL.FAU EMAIL: [email protected] Solidarity is a progressive student organization that focuses on education and direct action to build anarchy and socialism. Solidarity hosts discussions and educational events about present-day sociopolitical matters and potential solutions through a left-wing socialist lens. It also strives to offer support to the local community through participation and volunteering, encourages gatherings and social interaction among campus members who share similar views, and promotes solidarity among all individuals worldwide, regardless of gender, orientation, skin color, nationality, or mental and physical abilities. They will be having meetings Tuesdays at 6 p.m. this semester, check their Instagram for the meeting location. If you’re an FAU student organization that considers yourself to be LGBTQ+-friendly, please email [email protected] LAVENDER ALLIANCE INSTAGRAM: @FAULAVENDERALLIANCE EMAIL: [email protected] Lavender Alliance is an LGBTQ+ student organization that hosts social events and provides a welcoming space for the queer community and allies. They host educational events and aim to offer students a safe place, resources and connection. Lavender Alliance hosts bi-weekly events on Fridays at 5 p.m. this semester, check their Instagram for the meeting location. PROGRESSIVE CLUBS BLISSS INSTAGRAM: FAUBLISSS EMAIL: [email protected] BLISSS, which stands for BIPOC LGBTQIA+ Individuals Seeking Safe Spaces, is an LGBTQ+ student organization focused on BIPOC students and allies. They host social events, offer resources and a focus on queer issues through a BIPOC lens. BLISSS as well as Lavender Alliance are the two largest LGBTQ+ student organizations on campus. OutFAU file photo.
JANUARY 2024 | OUTFAU 7
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