{"id":41181,"date":"2024-01-20T20:20:40","date_gmt":"2024-01-21T01:20:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=41181"},"modified":"2024-01-20T20:20:45","modified_gmt":"2024-01-21T01:20:45","slug":"florida-student-at-fau-launches-lgbtq-newspaper-despite-desantis-legislation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2024\/01\/20\/florida-student-at-fau-launches-lgbtq-newspaper-despite-desantis-legislation\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida Student at FAU Launches LGBTQ+ Newspaper Despite DeSantis Legislation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Florida banned state funding of college diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, so one student started an LGBTQ+ newspaper on campus \u2014 distributed outside the defunct DEI office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In early October 2023, Mary Rasura, a senior multimedia journalism major at Florida Atlantic University (FAU), was investigating a story about the closure of the university’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) center for a local LGBTQ+ publication.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

FAU officially shut down the Center for Inclusion, Diversity Education, and Advocacy (IDEAs) following the July 1 enactment of Senate Bill (SB) 266, which banned all state funding of DEI initiatives on Florida college campuses \u2014 but did it almost silently, according to Rasura.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was the perfect topic, as it turned out, for not just a story, but a new publication.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rasura, along with Jason Parsley, the publisher of OutSFL<\/a>, the Southeast’s largest LGBTQ+ weekly print news publication, started a new student-run newspaper \u2014 meeting in and distributing outside of the former Center for IDEAs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Jan. 11, they published the first issue of OutFAU<\/a>. The tabloid-sized publication seeks to establish itself as a significant voice for LGBTQ+ FAU students despite Florida’s restrictions on DEI initiatives on college campuses throughout the state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis championed SB 266<\/a>, one of many anti-DEI bills throughout the nation<\/a>. Numerous LGBTQ+ and DEI centers on Florida’s college campuses have been forced to close as a result, leaving LGBTQ+ students without established safe spaces and critical resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite this, Rasura wants to show DeSantis that LGBTQ+ students will not be silenced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government has tried to stifle expression of the queer community, but we’re still here. We want to express ourselves. That’s the whole point of OutFAU. DeSantis can’t get rid of us, Rasura told BestColleges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bill does not stop DEI-related student clubs or organizations from operating independently. OutFAU is one of a growing number of student-led organizations throughout the nation that have continued to offer DEI-related programming without state funding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Necessary Response<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

OutFAU was made possible via a partnership with Parsley’s publication, OutSFL. The progeny of the decades-old South Florida Gay News, OutSFL, a free weekly publication, distributes throughout South Florida and focuses on news relevant to the LGBTQ+ community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Parsley said the partnership, which will be funded by advertising revenues, was a natural response to the current hostile climate toward the LGBTQ+ student community, paired with the evolving informational needs of the LGBTQ+ community as a whole.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most of [OutSFL’s] focus has been on the older communities, Parsley told BestColleges. But because our youth are being targeted, we need to be there more than ever. We need to be on the ground, telling the stories of the LGBTQ+ community in higher education \u2014 to bring awareness, to bring life to what’s happening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

OutSFL issues distributed off campus included inserts of the eight-page inaugural OutFAU issue. With permission from the university, Rasura and Parsley installed OutFAU’s first on-campus distribution bin just outside the Center for IDEAs’ former entrance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rasura, whose formal title is executive editor, wrote the entire inaugural issue herself, including:<\/p>\n\n\n\n