Hey busy bees, it’s Sunday, and to be honest, it is not a great Sunday! BUT I think one of the ways to combat oppression as oppressed people is to vigilantly remember that we don’t live in an all bad world. So, here’s some good news worth sharing from the past week. I hope it can offer you a glimmer of hope in this trash world we’re living in.
Arts & Leisure
+ ZoomBug is a radically queer musical about racecars and shitty exes
+ 26-year-old Brandon Taylor created an online database for LBGTQ film
Licensed by their Florida-based company, Orlando Entertainment Group LLC, GayMovie Database includes several special-interest categories to allow users the ability to filter titles based on preference such as “transgender” or “lesbian.” After clicking on a movie for more information, users will see links where they can purchase or view it from sites like iTunes, Google Plus and Amazon Instant Video…GayMovieDB allows users to create accounts so that they can review full-length or short movies, save favorites and assign a “Queer Factor” — their company’s proprietary system for scoring how much of a movie’s content pertains to LGBTQ themes. The website also lets filmmakers list their short films and allows film festivals to specify related films they’re screening.
+ Check out the trailer for Flu$h, a comedy about queer, punk, sex workers.
+ Take an inside look at The Cocoa Butter Club, “a creative clapback where everybody is welcome.”
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bm8HU_qhhXS/?hl=en&taken-by=thecocoabutterclub
+ GLAAD’s Where We Are On TV report is out! Representation of LGBTQ folks as series regulars is up and I’d like to believe a lot of that has to do with Autostraddle’s TV Team doing the good work.
+ Raveena is normalizing queer brown love in her video for her new song, “Temptation”
Queer Society
+ Janelle Monáe feels “blessed” to be the black queer woman role model that she didn’t have growing up. I, too, feel blessed that Janelle is the black queer woman role model that I didn’t have growing up.
+ She also did a 20 minute interview with BuzzFeed Profile and it’s a healing balm.
+ Taiwan’s Gay Pride Parade drew thousands as the vote for same-sex marriage nears.
+ Lastly, maybe you’ve also just been watching the news/scrolling through Twitter in a fog of disbelief. Maybe your housekeeping has suffered as well. Maybe every time you open your fridge you aren’t sure what’s bad in there but you know something is. Maybe cleaning your fridge will help you feel a little better this week.
Love you, mean it! Take care of yourselves and each other this week! Take a walk, if you can, or watch the sunrise or the sunset, or just sit for five minutes and think about your heart, and not the news. Can’t wait to talk to you again next week about even more good news. Even if it feels like we’re always going back and back and back, we must move forward. We will move forward. To quote Tony Kushner, “The world only spins forward. We will be citizens. The time has come. Bye now. You are fabulous creatures, each and every one. And I bless you: More Life. The Great Work Begins.”