We Were Here
In 1978, in a city built on spectacle and secrecy, someone decided the LGBTQ+ community of Las Vegas deserved to see themselves. Not in the margins. Not in code. Not whispered. On the page, by name, out loud.
That decision — made before the internet, before Pride was a corporate holiday, before "it gets better" existed as a concept — became us.
We have been publishing continuously since 1978. The name has changed. The design has changed. The world has changed in ways that would have been unimaginable to the person who printed that first issue. But the mission has never changed: to make the LGBTQ+ community of Las Vegas visible, connected, and fully, unapologetically alive in the pages of their own publication.
In 2004, we became QVegas. But our story is longer than any name.
What We Have Witnessed
We were publishing when the CDC first reported on an illness that would become the AIDS crisis. We were here when Las Vegas lost people — when families rejected their children, when government looked away, when the entire weight of an epidemic fell on a community already taught to survive alone.
We printed the names. We ran the phone numbers. We put safe sex information on pages that many publications refused to touch. We did not sanitize what was happening to protect advertisers or comfort people who did not want to know.
We were here for Obergefell. We published the day marriage equality became the law of the land, and we will tell you honestly: some of us cried writing it.
We are here now. In a moment when transgender children are being told they do not have the right to exist as themselves. When books are being banned. When the rights the community fought for are being contested by people who have never once sat across from a queer teenager trying to understand who they are.
We are not frightened by this moment. We have been here before.
Who We Are For
We are not here for some of you. We are here for all of you.
We are here for the 70-year-old Boomer lesbian who survived the AIDS crisis and deserves to see her life reflected with the same depth and beauty it actually contains.
We are here for the 17-year-old nonbinary teenager in Henderson who found our website at 2am and for the first time felt less alone in their own city.
We are here for the drag performer who transforms a room into something sacred every night. For the gay father coaching little league. For the bisexual woman whose identity is constantly erased and constantly real. For the trans woman navigating a healthcare system not built for her.
We are here for the deeply faithful Christian who is also fiercely, unapologetically queer. And for the person who lost their faith because of what the church did when they came out. Both experiences are real. Both deserve space in these pages.
What We Believe
We are progressive. We publish a voter guide before every election because civic engagement is not separate from community service — it is the same thing. We cover LGBTQ+ rights as civil rights.
We are not anti-religion. Faith has been weaponized against this community in ways that have caused profound harm — and we cover that harm honestly. But faith has also been a source of survival and belonging for millions of LGBTQ+ people, and we cover that too.
We believe that journalism is a form of love. That covering this community accurately, completely, and without flinching is one of the most important things a publication can do.
This City
Las Vegas is not a backdrop for us. It is our home.
The LGBTQ+ community of Las Vegas has shaped this city in ways that most people never know about. The bar that became a safe space. The non-profit that changed how Nevada treats HIV. The activist who rewrote state policy from a living room. The drag performer who gave a generation its first glimpse of what freedom could look like.
We have been here to document all of it. We are the community's memory. That archive goes back to 1978. 48 years of this community's life. It belongs to all of you.
Where We Are Going
In 2028, we turn 50. Fifty years of uninterrupted LGBTQ+ publishing in Las Vegas.
Between now and then, we are rebuilding our digital presence. We are building Qmunities, the community network. We are building the most complete LGBTQ+ tourist guide Las Vegas has ever had. We are building a business directory, an events platform, a podcast network. We are digitizing every issue we have ever printed.
We are not building products. We are building a home for the community to live in. The products are just the rooms.
"Every other LGBTQ+ publication in Las Vegas is a newcomer. Every national publication without Las Vegas roots is a visitor. We are neither. We are home."