Sunday services of the Ames Friends Meeting are held at their meetinghouse on S Maple Avenue, marked by a sign in the front yard declaring “All are welcome.” I visited on a sunny spring morning. Beams of sunlight seemed to make the houseplants against the walls glow. Occasional birdsong seeped through a barely open window. […]
Pride Month
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Pride 2025 events across eastern and central Iowa
From raucous Pride parades and festivals to intimate LGBTQ+ support groups and book clubs, there are dozens of ways to celebrate Pride Month this June (and July, and August) in Iowa. Browse more than 50 options below. Iowa City area Tuesday, June 10, 7 p.m., Pride at FilmScene: I Am My Own Woman, FilmScene Satuday, […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
At LIAL, queer history is an ever-growing hodgepodge of letters, diaries, doodles, recipes, magazines and ‘GAY ART’
My best friend Valentine will sometimes text me a picture of a page from his old journal. We’ve been friends a long time. Last fall he sent me a page, a beautiful letter — he still writes entries like the poets do, formally — in which he gushes about the sanctity of queerness, of our […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Thieves target Pride flags flying at homes in Des Moines, Project Rainbow reports
Progress Pride flags have been stolen from yards in Des Moines over the past two weeks. The flags are from Project Rainbow of Iowa, which distributes Progress Pride flags to people in Polk County and the surrounding area, so they can fly them at their homes to show support for the LGBTQ community during Pride […]
Posted inCommunity/News
After years defying United Methodist rules as an openly queer chaplain, Iowa City’s Anna Blaedel is out of the church and proud to be a ‘spiritual misfit’
Rev. Anna Blaedel is a chaplain, public theologian, writer and a graduate of the University of Iowa’s Religious Studies program. They earned a Masters in Divinity at the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, California, and have been chaplaining students on the UI campus since 2014. Affiliated with the United Methodist Church (UMC) for 109 […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Project Rainbow of Iowa has a simple mission with a visible impact
It’s not surprising Project Rainbow of Iowa is getting the attention of local TV news outlets. After all, what the Des Moines-based nonprofit does is literally eye-catching. Project Rainbow delivers Progress Pride flags for people to fly in their yards throughout the month of June, as a statement of support for the LGBTQ community during […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Events around Iowa to fill your Pride Month 2024 calendar
Though some cities in Iowa have already kicked off their official Pride festivities the first weekend of June — we see you Rock Island! — there is still lots to look forward to this Pride Season in SE and Central Iowa. Keep reading to check out some highlights of the plentiful array of celebrations happening […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Amid an anti-LGBTQ culture war in Iowa schools, the GSA is a safe space — with constitutional protections
If you’ve seen a student-organized drag show or queer rights protest over the past couple decades, odds are a GSA is behind it. GSAs — gender-sexuality alliances — serve as both social clubs and advocacy orgs for LGBTQ students, those questioning their identity and straight, cisgender allies in middle school, high school and college, and […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Employees at Iowa’s only unionized Starbucks ‘strike with Pride’ as part of national campaign
This story originally appeared in LV Daily, Little Village’s Monday-Friday email newsletter. Sign up to have it delivered for free to your inbox. The sky was overcast early Friday morning, but spirits were high on the picket-line outside the downtown Iowa City Starbucks. The store’s workers were joining unionized workers at 150 other Starbucks across […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Photo Gallery: Iowa City’s 51st Pride Parade and Festival
Thousands of people participated in the Iowa City’s 51st Pride Parade and Festival on Saturday. The parade began at College Green at noon and ended on the corner of East Washington Street and South Linn Street. After the parade, there were musical performances by Alisabeth Von Presley, Miss Christine, Alyx Rush and the Quire of Eastern Iowa. The […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Jo Allen celebrates being both Black and queer with Pride and Soul skate night
Pride and Juneteenth have so many intersections to navigate. Jo Allen has challenged Des Moines to take those roads and realize that every marginalized community in the city are fighting for the same rights against the same people. “I was just recognizing that there wasn’t anybody that was doing something that focused on the intersections […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Iowans on the asexual spectrum face misconceptions, lack of visibility
By Alyssa Craven for IowaWatch Growing up, Noelie Boardman felt like there was something different about her. “As I hit puberty, I noticed a lot of people around me were getting into relationships and talking about sex, especially in high school,” Boardman, a 2021 Simpson College graduate, said. “That was just never a thing I […]
