Growing up as part of the LGBTIQA+ community, Maddie said she knew not everyone had the support system she had.

“I’m very blessed with an accepting family and a friend group in the same shoes as me, figuring stuff out, a lot of people don’t have that,” she said.

A source of inspiration for her writing was a passion for sharing queer stories, experiences and successes.

When she was tasked with an assignment to write an article using interactive, visual storytelling platform Shorthand, Maddie said she felt encouraged by her lecturer Tiffany Fox to follow this inspiration.

Her journalistic curiosity led her to seeking out trailblazers in the queer community who sought to “change queer nightlife for the better”.

Boosting events made by queer people for queer people to go out and have a good time and be around people who are just like them is so important,” Maddie said.

“Knowing where you can go out and have a couple of drinks and a dance without feeling so unsafe at every corner you turn.”

On her list of interviewees were Sapphic Disco founder Cleo Schurrer, events planner and creator of Club Sapphos and alternative, pop-punk queer party ‘Cherry Bomb’ Georgia Sassenfeld, Drag King Mr Meaty and performance artist Miss Phoria.

The piece, published on The Quenda, explored not only the safe spaces being created by queer people, but the beauty of queer joy and community.

November is the month of Perth’s Pridefest, making this a particularly poignant time for Maddie’s article.

“My tutor said ‘yes, let’s do it’ - and it made me really happy, sometimes there is good change in the media,” she said.

I’ve always felt very accepted and encouraged at Murdoch – with the ally training, sexual health seminars specifically for queer people, and seeing people walking around with the ally lanyard, I’ve never felt like I had to hide on campus.”

Read Maddie’s article Out of the Closet and onto the Dance Floor: Perth’s Emerging Queer Nightlife here.