Glossary
DIY
DIY (Do It Yourself) describes the long queer tradition of building community, culture, art, health resources, and organizing outside of mainstream institutions.
DIY, short for Do It Yourself, names a long queer tradition of self-reliance: building community, culture, art, health resources, and political organizing without waiting for mainstream institutions to provide them. When LGBTQ+ people were shut out of media, medicine, and public life, they made their own. That ethos runs through the zine and punk scenes of the 1980s and 90s, grassroots AIDS activism and buddy networks, underground drag and ballroom, mutual aid funds, and independent queer publishing and music. DIY is both practical and political. It reflects a belief that queer communities can take care of their own and set their own terms, and it remains visible today in house parties, small presses, mutual aid, and locally run spaces.