In the weeks after Jared and Tim Deluca started flying a rainbow pride flag facing a busy street behind their home, they faced queerphobic backlash from their community. The first incident, Jared Deluca said, happened while he was sitting on his back porch. “I heard people screaming slurs from their car while passing behind our house. Which is funny because they didn’t know I was there. They were literally screaming at my house for the sake of screaming at it.”
Since this incident, the flag has been slashed by queerphobic neighbors, the pole broken, the flag stolen. On one occasion, a neighbor “freaked us out pretty good. They took off down the end of the road and went around the cul-de-sac. They came back, stared us down, and then took off with tires screeching into the community.” Luckily, a neighbor was able to find and return the flag to the Delucas.
On TikTok, the couple addressed each new incident of hate, poking fun at the neighbors who screamed slurs at them and posting a video of them putting up a new banner with a sturdier pole. “You won’t win,” they said in a TikTok together. “You will not quiet us. You will not silence us.” In addition, they insisted that despite friends’ concerns, wondering, “If something were to happen to you and your husband, is it worth it?” Jared said, “It is.”
But that wasn’t the end of the troubles with the flag. Two weeks ago, the Ocotillo Heights HOA sent the Delucas a letter demanding them to remove the pride flag from their backyard. The community manager apparently said that they were within their rights to demand the pride flag be taken down, as Arizona statutes do not protect Pride flags the same way it does U.S., state, and military flags.
Jared and Tim refused. The flag will stay up, they said.
