Pulitzer Center Update June 28, 2024
Around the World, LGBTQ+ Stories of Resistance
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This project sheds light on health disparities and gender recognition hurdles.
Remembering Stonewall, Fighting for Change: LGBTQ+ Stories for Pride Month
On this day in history, June 28 of 1969, police raided the Stonewall Inn in New York City and frisked, harassed, arrested, and abused LGBTQ+ patrons. The Stonewall uprising helped catalyze a Pride movement in the United States. Today, Pride events are attended worldwide as a celebration, but also as protest. Pride is a way for LGBTQ+ people to organize, care for one another, and fight for an equitable future.
This Pride month, we reflect on Pulitzer Center-supported stories that document this ongoing struggle around the world.
Ecuador’s criminal justice system discriminates against trans women and sends many to male prisons, reports Jessica Zambrano for Indómita. The system has become increasingly militarized since January 9, 2024, when President Daniel Noboa declared an “internal armed conflict.” In the male prisons, trans women face sexual assault, torture, forced detransition, and the threat of disappearance. Incarcerated people are also seven times more likely to live with HIV, but less likely to have access to care. Zambrano tells the stories of trans women protecting each other and seeking justice for their mistreatment in prison.
Despite Thailand’s reputation as a queer bastion in Southeast Asia, a story by 2023 George Washington University Reporting Fellow Joy Tosakoon for Washington Blade finds that trans people face challenges in accessing health care, gender-affirming care, and cultural and legal recognition. Gender-affirming care is not covered by Thailand’s Universal Health Coverage program and trans people are unable to change their gender identity and prefix on legal documents. As a result, many Thai trans people rely on informal sources for medical guidance, face indignities when they seek out public health care, or pay exorbitant out-of-pocket costs to private, LGBTQ-friendly hospitals. However, Tosakoon finds reason for hope in new clinical models.
In Salt Lake City, queer Utahns are building an inclusive community and faith practice. Declan Casto reported on “Sacred Space: Utah’s Queer Haven” as part of the Pulitzer Center’s annual William & Mary Sharp Seminar. Salt Lake City has the seventh-largest queer community in the United States. The city’s surrounding suburbs, however, overwhelmingly subscribe to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which maintains that same-sex relationships are sinful. Many queer people navigate code-switching, safety concerns, and the adverse health effects of constant vigilance. Despite this, they are finding ways to heal their relationship with faith.
We are proud to support stories like these that rise above prejudiced narratives and amplify the everyday stories of LGBTQ+ communities. Read more about current issues facing LGBTQ+ people, such as efforts to prevent homelessness for trans people in India and how misinformation is used to disenfranchise marginalized groups, on our website.
Best,
Impact
Multiple Pulitzer Center grantees have been honored at the Society of Publishers in Asia (SOPA) Awards for their outstanding work. Indonesian newspaper Kompas received an award for its story "Food Independence Emergency in the Islands" by Ahmad Arif, Frans Pati Herin, Saiful Rijal Yunus, and Yola Sastra. Andy Ball was recognized for his photography featured in "How Dams in China Are Destroying Livelihoods Downstream in Cambodia," published in the South China Morning Post. The Rappler investigative team won the Carlos Tejada Award for Excellence in Investigative Reporting for its Pulitzer Center-supported project Immunity and Impunity: How Diplomats Get Away With Exploiting Domestic Workers. Earth Journalism Network took home an award for “It’s a Wash,” a cross-border collaboration that included Rainforest Investigations Fellow Vo Kieu Bao Uyen’s project Vietnam’s Forests Have Been Cleared To Supply the World’s Timber Industry. Initium Media also won an award for Chinese reporting for the Center-supported project Smoking for the State.
Rappler journalist Ana Santos highlighted the impact of Pulitzer Center grants.
"Pulitzer Center reporting grants give us journalists the gift of time. Time to immerse ourselves in the complexity of issues and, most importantly, time to earn the trust of our interviewees," she said.
Read the full impact update here.
Photo of the Week
Didi Juruna bathes in the Xingu River near where he and other Indigenous river monitors and researchers have camped for the night. From the story “A River's Pulse.” Image by Dado Galdieri/Hilaea Media. Brazil.
This message first appeared in the June 28, 2024, edition of the Pulitzer Center's weekly newsletter. Subscribe today.
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W&M students developed reporting and writing skills with the support of Pulitzer Center staff.
The prison emergency in Ecuador, which has left 482 deaths in the last two years, has profound...
