| Les+ | |
| Country: | China |
| Based: | Beijing, China |
| Founder: | Jing Zhao |
| Founded: | 2005 |
Les+ Magazine is a Beijing-based community magazine. It was started in 2005 by a group of young Chinese lesbians, or lalas (Chinese: 拉拉; pinyin: lālā). Les+ is the first magazine for queer women in China, which has a growing lesbian culture.
Jing Zhao was one of the women who founded Les+ in 2005, China's first and only queer women's magazine.[1] The magazine surfaced from the growing online culture of forums and chatrooms in China in the 2000s. In 1999, the first online lala forum was created.[2] The slogan on the cover of the first issue states: "After the darkness fades away, I’ll be holding your hand, walking under the sunlight with pride, boldly and happily living our lives!".[3]
Although homosexuality has been legal in China since 1997, LGBT people continue to face social oppression and are not protected from discrimination by law. According to Xin Huang, Les+ exists within a growing lesbian culture: "In 2007 when I conducted the fieldwork for this research, lesbians in China have a national organization, Tongyu, their own magazine, Les+, and a club called lala, which holds weekly meetings in some large cities, as well as a lala website."[4]