ARIZONAN JOURNALIST CREATES LGBT NEWSLETTER TO BOLSTER QUEER NEWS

Arizona, like Florida, is one of 15 states with 10+ anti-LGBT bills this legislative session.

Joseph Darius Jaafari, an investigative reporter with the Arizona Republic, founded LOOKOUT PHX, an online LGBT newsletter on Substack, due to the lack of queer coverage in local Arizona news.

“This is something that we need. This is something that people want,” said Jaafari in an interview with Fronteras.

Jaafari founded LOOKOUT in January with his husband, Jake Hilton, and has clarified that the newsletter is not affiliated with the Arizona Republic.

LOOKOUT has covered a range of pieces, from prisoners being punished for queer intimacy to a gay couple being run out of their home and more. Jaafari says that’s “just the beginning.”

“We have health issues that we need to talk about, we have testing issues we need to talk about, we have education issues, we have housing issues, all these things that just are not covered thoroughly and consistently. They’re treated as an afterthought,” said Jaafari.