The older members of our rainbow community have taken to Facebook to reconnect, sharing memories and photos.
Lost Gay Perth was set up by the owner of Hair Boss Salon in Northbridge, Michael Edwards, just a few weeks ago. It has since garnered the support of 1300 older LGBTIQ Facebook users, who are using the page to reminisce and rebuild the community.
Edwards initially got the idea from sister-page Lost in Sydney, which he was invited to join. ‘It was amazing what was happening, I started watching it’. Edwards then set up the Perth based page and invited all his friends to partake.
‘Within a day we had 500 members. By the weekend, it clicked over a 1000 members. It’s wonderful to reconnect. The scanners are running hot all over the place’, he said.
The page, which has photos and memories featuring from the ‘70s, ‘80s, and ‘90s, has served in rekindling a community which was once very connected.Â
‘The most wonderful thing is everybody is remembering the most wonderful things that happened; there was a period of our history that was really torturous and dark and very heavy and nobody is wallowing around in that. That’s not how we’ve ever been as a community anyway’, he said.
Edwards stated that getting everyone together at an event would be a big task but one that is highly requested.
‘Reconnection is the most extraordinary thing. When it comes to an event there’s going to be a bit of coordination from a few other people’, he said.