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Flaggots Ohio launch new website for 2005 Season

25 APR 2005

FlaggotsOhio.org is a whole new site this year! It has been redesigned to act a central portal to all of the organization's web needs. Darrin Hunter, the current Flaggots webmaster, said, "There were so many disparate sites the Flaggots were using. It was an overdue change to bring it all together in one place on the web."

"We had done a lot of work last year putting new graphic materials together for all sorts of purposes: T-shirts, stickers, flyers, print materials....It all had to be translated to a cohesive web experience."

Hunter continued, "It's a really simple site, functionally speaking. The ideas that Flaggots Ohio represents are the most exciting part to me. The group is a colorguard; we use flags, rifles, and choreography to entertain. But what we're REALLY about is presenting a positive and joyous face to a diverse and fascinating community....a community that is always in need of positive representation to fight the negative images of the GLBT community that still linger in people's minds and in mainstream media. "

"So we incorporate the image of a pink sky to represent the future and hope and a world that's further along in accepting and mustering equal love for GLBT individuals. The actual equipment (flags/rifles) show what we do: spin. And I wanted the materials of our craft to wind up in the imagery as well. So you see leather, camo, tape, and sparkly things in the headers: all things we couldn't survive without!

"The hands show the actual release of equipment into the air. In colorguard terms, once equipment is released in an aerial skill, the hand is called a "free" hand. Here, we show the free hands to represent more than just tossing flags into the sky. They literally become symbols of freedom: of people standing up to be counted, fighting fear and prejudice, and building community with people who share mutual respect and ultimately, love."

"The site also gives us a place to build community online, with new message boards for the public, members, and our administration to use. Hopefully, it will present a better face to the public, let them interact with us, and make running our organization easier."