CULTURE

WATCH: How poetry brought Phoenix's queer community together

The group thems. started out as a weekend market and has since exploded by using poetry and other art to build up the community.

Tirzah Sánchez Christopher, Joseph Darius Jaafari (he/him) Dec 9, 2024

WATCH: How poetry brought Phoenix's queer community together

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We have been seen. But it's time we are heard.

We're not a typical news site. We started LOOKOUT Publications in 2022 because we saw that there needed to be a new way to tell stories about LGBTQ+ people, beyond simply Pride parades and drag shows (though we love that those exist).

Instead, we wanted to create an outlet that had accountability news as its main mission, not an afterthought.

LOOKOUT delivers fearless journalism and community events with the unified purpose to improve and expand LGBTQ+ representation on the local news stage, while strengthening and engaging LGBTQ+ communities (and their allies) in the queer experience.

Our vision is to inspire and hasten a queer experience that’s liberated from injustice and delivers on the promise of equal respect, rights, and opportunity for all people – while holding those in power to journalistic account.

We bring together communities by activating them, and making sure that queer news is—to use newspaper terminology—"above the fold."

What does that mean? It means you can expect to see our work in local papers and national news websites, working side-by-side with other reporters at different outlets to make sure you get premiere LGBTQ+ news wherever you trust it most.

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Welcome to Rainbows Fest! And thank you for taking one of our bouquets!

Why did we give out flowers? Because it's part of our history.

For more than a millennia, queer people would use flowers to flag to others that they were part of the LGBTQ+ family. Different cultures used different flowers, but some have become so universal that they are recognized as part of the community's "flower code."

Below is an explanation of the flowers included in your bouquet, and what they represent.

Lavender

A color for all of us.

Before the 19th century, purple dye was rare, if not an impossible color to find in fashion. But when an 18-year-old student at the Royal College of Chemistry in London was trying to make a new version of quinine, he accidentally made a purple dye.

Soon after, the use of the synthetic dye became a way for people to wear color without spending beyond their means.

Within a few years, light purple lavender became linked to homosexuality, as the color was described as a mixture between blue and pink—the colors often aligned with male and female genders.

Also, a group of people called Aesthetes preferred the color opposed to the rugged, drab colors of the industrial age. Newspapers eschewed Aesthetes as "effeminate," and later the color became coded for people accused of being homosexual. Abraham Lincoln's biographer Carl Sandburg, for example, said a friendship between the president and another male had a “streak of lavender." It soon became a slur to call a gay man a "dash"—meaning a dash of lavender.

Lavender Menace at Second Congress to Unite Women, NYC, May 1970 (New York Public Library Archives)

In the 1960's, the color was co-opted during the Stonewall riots in New York City, and lesbians used the color in their protests. When the President of the National Organization for Women Betty Friedan said lesbians in the order were a "lavender menace," lesbians stormed the stage at the 1970 national women's convention and forced the audience to discuss the role of lesbianism in the feminist movement while wearing shirts with the same label.

Violets

The femme queen's choice.

Part of the reason lavender became so synonymous with LGBTQ+ people was, in part, due to the color purple having more than 1,000 years to establish itself as the color for lesbians.

In the 7th century, the poet Sappho often used purple violets in her stories and rhymes. In the following poem, she writes about women wearing crowns of flowers, specifically violets and roses, while making love in a field:

Many crowns of violets,
roses and crocuses
…together you set before more
and many scented wreaths
made from blossoms
around your soft throat…
…with pure, sweet oil
…you anointed me,
and on a soft, gentle bed…
you quenched your desire…
…no holy site…
we left uncovered,
no grove…

The imagery of violets lasted for centuries to the point where purple—just like lavender—became synonymous with queer people and their experiences. Oscar Wilde, for example, wrote about his "purple nights" with other men.

British writer Renee Vivien famously wrote poetry related to her lover and drew inspiration from Sappho, so much that she became known as the "Muse of Violets," and her grave site is often adorned with violet flowers.

Pansy

A celebration of drag.

In the 1920's, drag queens became regular performers in underground bars and clubs across cities such as Chicago, New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles. At the time, they were called "pansy performers."

The performances date back to 1869, when the first known drag balls were held in Harlem, New York.

Pansy performers helped shape the culture of bohemian life in the cities and, specifically, inside established gay bars such as New York's The Slide, which Joseph Pulitzer (yes, that Pulitzer) published in his paper how it was "morally the lowest in New York, Paris, London or Berlin."

The queen of the pansy crazy was Jean Malin, who brought flamboyance to his performances as a drag queen, and later ditched the dresses and instead performed in high-camp and obviously gay attire.

Painting of "pansy" performer Karyl Norman, titled The Creole Fashion Plate (1923)

The rise and popularity of underground pansy performers soon turned into pansy clubs—dedicated drag venues that often got raided by police or infiltrated by the mob.

With the attention pansy performers were getting, Edward P Mulrooney, the former police commissioner for the New York police Department, ordered police officers outside every pansy club. They were told to turn away female impersonators at the door.

The end of prohibition ended the pansy craze of the 1930's, though, as speakeasy's were forced to close. And the start of World War II began the national wave of criminalizing homosexuality, and the Nazi's killing and imprisonment of trans people and gay men soon drove pansy performers back underground.

Rose

From gay Asian men, to trans rights.

The use of the rose as a gay symbol between men is attributed to the Greek story of King Laius's affairs with boys under rose trees.

But in 1963, the rose became a more established code for queer people in Japan, when Japanese writer Yukio Mishima and photographer Eikoh Hosoe collaborated to make what is considered one of the more important photography books of the 20th century called Barakei: Killed by Roses (or in other translations, an Ordeal of Roses).

The portraits by Hosoe show Mishima bound in rope, naked among foliage, or dressed in ornate headdresses. The book inspired the first gay men's publication in Japan called Barazoku (the Rose Tribe), which lead to gay men in Japan referring to themselves as "bara."

A photograph taken by Eikoh Hosoe of Yukio Mishima smelling a rose in the book Barakei.

In 1969, the film "Funeral Parade of Roses" was released during the Japanese New Wave cinematic movement. The film took place among Tokyo's underground gay and transgender nightlife venues, and is credited with inspiring Stanley Kubrick's film "A Clockwork Orange."

Today, roses are often used among transgender communities in protest, with the call of, "Give us our roses while we're still here."

Green carnation

An Oscar Wilde tradition.

Oscar Wilde, the author who was put on trial for indecency after an affair with another man was made public, popularized wearing a green carnation as a symbol of gay identity. In 1892, during the performances of his play "Lady Windermere's Fan," he asked friends to wear them on their lapels to show solidarity.

Wearing the green carnation on a specific side of the body was how gay men flagged they were among family. Worn on the left side, as Wilde did, meant you were a man looking for another man for companionship or sex.

The 1894 satirical novel The Green Carnation written by Robert Hichens was loosely based on Oscar Wilde and his circle of friends. The book poked fun of Wilde and the lifestyle of gay men in 19th century Europe. (The novel was taken out of circulation during Oscar Wilde's trial a year later.)

Cover of "The Green Carnation," written by Robert Hichens and based on Oscar Wilde.

When it was suggested that Wilde wrote the book about himself, he said that he had no part in it, only the flower: "I invented that magnificent flower. But with the middle-class and mediocre book that usurps its strangely beautiful name I have, I need hardly say, nothing whatsoever to do. The flower is a work of art. The book is not."

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News has a problem with reporting on communities through a very specific lens. And even though the industry is more diverse now than it's ever been, news outlets are still dominated by people who either have an old-guard way of reporting.

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PREAMBLE:

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LOOKOUT follows the guidance of the Trans Journalists Association and the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association style guides. Both of those guides can be found here and here, respectively.

Below are select style references for our audience to understand and know:

biological sex

The phrase biological sex is common in scientific writing as a synonym for birth sex, natal sex, or assigned sex at birth. Outside of medical literature, assigned sex at birth is preferable over biological sex if used in this way.

cisgender

Refers to people whose gender identity aligns with their sex assigned at birth.

drag queen, female impersonator

Drag is the practice of dressing and acting in styles typically associated with another gender, usually exaggeratedly so and for entertainment value. Drag queens portray women and drag kings portray men. Drag performer is the gender-neutral term. Drag and impersonation are more strongly determined by the nature of the costume and performance than by the performer’s gender identity or sex. Drag is not synonymous with but is sometimes considered a type of male or female impersonation, in which performances may be spoofs of a specific person or character or may be more subdued than a drag performance. Not synonymous with transgender, though some drag performers may identify as such, or with cross-dresser.

gender ideology

A charged term commonly deployed by anti-trans commentators and activists that implies trans people, merely by being trans, are participating in a political activity or have a political agenda. Refer instead to trans identity or simply being transgender.

groomer, grooming

Refers to the practice of building trust and eroding boundaries to facilitate the sexual abuse of a child or vulnerable adult. Avoid using these terms, even in quotes, to portray LGBTQ+ people broadly as predators or as “recruiting” people, particularly children. If it is necessary to quote someone using this term, be clear about whether they are using it as a rhetorical device or if actual child abuse is alleged or proven; if the latter, add necessary details. See misleading associations below.

false balance

Including opposing views in a story even when doing so is unnecessary or insensitive or would perpetuate falsehoods, or assuming there are only two sides to a story. Sometimes called bothsidesism. Just as journalists should not default to giving a platform to doubters of the scientifically established concept of climate change, they shouldn’t automatically give opponents of LGBTQ+ rights a voice unless it furthers the understanding of the issue or story. For instance, a story about legislation related to LGBTQ+ people could quote supporters, opponents and possibly the indifferent. A story about an LGBTQ+ awards ceremony, a hate crime or a person’s coming out usually does not require opposing comment.

lifestyle

An inaccurate term sometimes used to describe the lives of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. Sexual orientation may be part of a broader lifestyle but is not one in and of itself, just as there is no “straight” lifestyle.

misleading associations

Terms including bestiality, experimental, grooming, mutilation, pedophilia and sodomy are frequently false or defamatory when used in stories about LGBTQ+ issues.

transgender

Generally, transgender describes people whose gender identity and/or expression does not align with their sex assigned at birth. Journalists covering transgender people must ensure they correctly understand and communicate the parameters of the communities about which they are reporting. In news coverage, identify people as transgender only when relevant to the subject matter and only if they are widely known or describe themselves as such. Otherwise, describe trans men as men and trans women as women. People can be transgender regardless of age, but journalists should take the usual legal and ethical precautions when reporting on children.

For all other style, we follow Associated Press style guidance. For questions on why we describe things in certain ways, or the language we use, feel free to email us at editor@lookoutphx.org

Coming soon

State rep with ties to hate groups files similar anti-LGBTQ+ bill that was vetoed last year.

“I didn’t want them to write my obituary”