Letter From Your Editors
Hello there my January Snowflakes! How are you doing?
Four score and a million years, we had a prompt among the staff given to us by our former Marketing and Design Director Sarah (former! sob! 😭 we miss you, Sarah!) to take a “thirst trap pose” — which everyone on senior staff took as a sexy pose, but Heather Hogan took a literal photo drinking water as a joke. And when I tell you, what a joke it was! An inside joke strong enough to have lasted through a pandemic and at least two more photo shoots and three fundraisers. So this month, Nicole asked the entire Autostraddle Team to get in on the fun. May I present to you, our greatest thirst traps:
Top left to bottom: Anya / Carmen / Casey / Drew / Em / Heather / Kayla / Laneia / Meg / Ro / Sally / Shelli Nicole / Stef / Vanessa
In an average 30 day period, I usually have around 12 in person meetings a month — there’s a weekly Monday meeting for the Senior Staff to plot our weeks, I also meet with Laneia every week and Riese twice a month, there’s a pair of monthly reporting meetings where we go over budgets and set new goals, those sort of things.
But this January I have had more than twice that amount! Between January 3rd and 31st — 28 days, for those keeping count — I had exactly 28 meetings! If we were going to really break that down, that’s one meeting a day. Every day. Including weekends. (I did not actually have meetings on the weekends, just some 2-a-days or 3-a-days, but you get my point here). I met with every editor at least once, one-on-one to talk about their hopes and dreams for the New Year. What does Autostraddle look like as we enter our third year of the pandemic? After a 2021 brought us so much transition, what’s next for us now that our new editorial team largely in place? And not to be overly effusive and corny — ok I will, you know me — but I have never felt more bright or inspired about what we have to come.
Our team is so energized right now, everyone’s so ready and bursting with ideas about where to take their part of the puzzle. And thanks to your support, we finally have enough breathing room to put some of our dreams into motion. We planned TV/film coverage and theme weeks, tracked down interviews, and launched new columns (Hey Rainbow Reading!) and found new life in old ones, under new leadership (did you know that Vanessa’s has taken over the stewardship of our longstanding You Need Help column?), plotted personal essays from emerging queer writers and at least two big names that I can’t wait to for you to see. We also interviewed candidates for Autostraddle’s new Art Director position and welcomed aboard four (4!!) new writers to our team and…. Drumroll please… OUR NEW DIRECTOR OF BRAND PARTNERSHIPS, ANYA RICHKIND. Damn, Autostraddle is gearing up in a BIG WAY for 2022. You know what I mean?
You’re going to be hearing more from Yash, Analyssa, Em, and Amari — our new writers — in the weeks and moths to come! We’ve brought back our monthly “Get to know a new contributor” feature to the insider, so you’ll have plenty of time to dig in deep. You can also already find their bylines all over the site. I want to say for now that Kayla and I have been over-the-moon for their enthusiasm, their willingness to roll up their sleeves and get to work right away. They’ve already added to the tapestry of our humor, our voices, and that’s one of my favorite things about Autostraddle to tell you the truth. It’s never just about any one of us, it’s constantly shifting and changing to make room for what’s more.
(Speaking of what’s more, we aren’t stopping with these four! Over the next month, you’ll be seeing a public call for writers as we prepare for our next cohort on the team. Please share it widely! Hell, if you’re a writer, please apply! You’ll also be seeing an expanded roster of Saturday Morning comics soon, too. That one may take a few weeks to get all the pieces settled, but be on the lookout.)
New changes also brings me to Anya, who has only been with us for two weeks, but feels like she’s been here all along. Anya’s humor is impeccable and did you hear, she’s a playwright who also used to peddle poetry as a kid? I also have to say, from our various zooms (and you know I had a lot of them this month), she has an enviable Dolly Parton book behind her desk. I felt like you needed that intel. But seriously, when we’re talking about building sustainable queer indie media, we have to find models to pay our small taff and writer equitably while minimizing burnout.. in short, we need money. And I know you know that! As our A+ members, you’ve seen us through so much already. Over 80% of Autostraddle is reader funded, which yes is also a stat you probably already know — but we say it often because we are so grateful for you and what you’ve helped us to create, together. But if we’re going to see past our 13th birthday to our 14th and 15th (Autostraddle quinceañera anyone?) we have to find even more revenue streams. And yes, it’s hard to sell sex-positive, feminist, queer media to advertisers, but with everything we’ve learned from membership and community fundraising over the last few years —thanks Nicole and Riese! — we are primed for this next challenge… Anya not only gets it, she’s excited by it.
Whoa this month’s letter has already gotten long! So I’ll wrap us up here. You’ll see the this month’s Insider Newsletter got a bit of a revamp, and you can thank your A+ Director Nicole for all of their hard work (also their incredible patience because I am… way behind deadline on writing this thing, sorry Nicole!). Nicole’s planning so much new shit for y’all in the new year. We had a three hour meeting (ha! theme of the month!) where they broke it all down for me, and you all won’t even believe all the goodness coming your way. I hope our A+ content this month gave you even a little taste of what’s to come:
- Two Advice Boxes: Into the A+ Advice Box #51: “Bed Death,” Opening Up Relationships and DIY Haircuts and Into the A+ Advice Box #52: NEW YEAR, NEW LOOK
- New SLICK Erotica: May the Best Girlfriend Win by Pearline and Cass Auto Repairs by Lexie
- We hosted an A+ Members Virtual Watchparty for the finale of Yellowjackets (we’re thinking of doing more small-to-medium A+ events like this in the new year, so let Nicole know if you’re vibing it)
- And finally, what I’m probably most proud of? The return of the A+ Roundtable, this month’s is really vulnerable and just… fucking honest. Hope you give it a read: The Relationships We Stayed In Too Long
Ok I have to press send on this because it’s almost 7pm on the East Coast and I want Nicole to be able to leave work at some point today. Seriously, thank them for all their hard work putting this Titanic of a newsletter together. WHEW WHAT A MONTH. However your January went, please know we are so glad to have you here with us. Hey mama we made it.
Carmen / Riese / Nicole / Laneia / Kayla / Heather / Anya
Top 10 Most Popular Posts From December 2021
These posts were hella popular last month.
- Christen Press Draped Around Tobin Heath in the Snow, by Heather
- Candace Parker Is Gay and Gay Married With a Gay Pregnant Wife, by Heather
- 22 Christmas Movies With Lesbian, Bisexual, Queer and Trans Characters, by Riese
- Pop Culture Fix: The Witcher’s Getting Queer Next Season, Finally!, by Heather
- The Best Lesbian Movies of 2021, by Drew
- 37 Reasons You Should and Shouldn’t Watch “We Need to Do Something”, by Drew
- 75 of the Best Queer Books of 2021, by Casey
- There’s an Unexpected Lesbian in Hallmark’s “An Unexpected Christmas”, by Heather
- December 2021: Whats New, Gay and Streaming on Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, HBO Max and Peacock, by Riese
- Tello’s “Christmas at the Ranch” Is a Welcome Horse Girl Holigay Rom-Com, by Heather
Nine Important Excerpts From Editorial Conversations
Kayla: wind chill in the TWENTIEEESSSS by lake okeechobee which is like 90 miles north of us but still means it’s gonna be like below 40 here which is WHAT
Nicole: Kayla I hope all your wonderful Miami wildlife friends are okay in this cold!!
Kayla: Iguanas pass out at these temps and then fall out of trees
Nicole: NOOOOOO
Kayla: They wake back up once they get warm again
But all the weather reports have iguana warnings
Nicole: IGUANA WARNINGS
I cannot imagine living like that. As an iguana.
Kayla: That are like be CAREFUL an iguana might fall ON YOUR HEAD
i think an iguana falling on my head would legitimately knock me out lmao they’re SO BIG
Nicole: Claws! What if it falls on you claws-down?
Kayla: my friend has a very funny story about working for her university and one of her jobs was to corral passed out iguanas during a cold snap and move them to a facility until they warmed up but then one time they started waking up in the van
Nicole: Oh no oh no
Kayla:
Nicole: “Immobile Iguanas Possible” like how there is a possibility of shower
Kayla: lmaooooooo iguana showers are indeed possible.
i’m not NOT scared of them
Heather: drew i’m done with my movies! if you never ask me to vote in anything again because i ranked a cartoon where a real life dog named “doug the pug” gets an acting credit the same as a pedro almodovar film, i totally understand.
Drew: I RANK THEM THE SAME TOO
Heather: !
I AM A FILM GENIUS
Riese: what if i fall asleep sitting up
Laneia: you could try it and might enjoy it, like a little vacation
Riese: does anybody remember this formative queer film about the friendship between a tomboy and a seal
Vanessa: RIESE YOU KNOW I DO
ARGUABLY THAT MAIN CHARACTER IS MY ROOT, ASIDE FROM THE KID WITH THE BACKWARDS BASEBALL HAT IN THAT DINOSAUR CARTOON MOVIE
hm it seems as a child i liked movies more
Riese: THIS IS YOUR CINEMATIC NICHE
Ro: Oh this movie was MY SHIT
Riese: SHE TAKES A SEAL TO SCHOOL
living the team
*dream
as a team
dream team
seal + person
Vanessa: if i wasn’t consistently worried about being fired from my job teaching children bc i’m a dyke who writes about queer sex on the internet
i would do a version of shelli’s article about “my type”
and it would just be tomboys and boys wearing backwards baseball hats in early 90s films
Riese: there are so many
it was a great time for me personally to be a tomboy in a backwards baseball hat
Nicole: we can keep the yellowjackets spirit in our heart year round
Laneia: yellowjackets valentines, spring equinox outfits inspired by yellowjackets, which bathing suit should you wear based on which yellowjackets character scares you the most
Kayla: so many straight men have tweeted at me about yellowjackets but like……to say nice things 😮
it is wild
i had some popular recaps at The AV Club but NEVER like this
and never without a heaping side of people YELLING AT ME
Natalie: I love this show and wish it was gay so we could write about it for the site but this is awesome, nonetheless
Heather: whoa this is HUGE!
Carmen: We are writing about it fyi natalie! don’t worry, we got an angle
Heather: also what is that teddy bear coat quinta is wearing and where can i get one in orange? what’s that called?
Carmen: Heather you pretending you’re not a fashion gay is me pretending i’m not a sports gay
because it’s LITERALLY called a teddy bear coat. and you clearly knew that.
(I point out, again, you’ve done some of my favorite butch fashion content on our site of all time, just for the official record and whatnot)
Heather: no i swear i didn’t
are you serious
Carmen: hmmmhmmm, you didn’t know that, and i don’t know that cynthia cooper is one of the greatest and underrated wnba players in history.
Kayla: yes lmao it’s called a teddy bear coat!
Carmen: (kayla do not let her trick you!)
Kayla: hahahahaha
Riese: bonjur
bonjour?
i’m not french
Laneia: ceci n’est pas une femme française
Riese: laneia is french
Kayla: excited for that post since i am a weirdo who prefers winter olympics to summer
Heather: !
you truly contain multitudes
Kayla: i got so into curling in high school that i actually started curling
i think i wrote about it for the site an eternity ago
but the piece was def also about [REDACTED EX’S NAME]
What We’ve Been Reading
The Incendiaries
– Nicole
Don’t Cry
– Nicole
Body Work: The Radical Power of Personal Narrative
– Meg
Sirens & Mues
– Kayla
Several People Are Typing
– Sally
The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina
– Heather
The Subtweet
– Vanessa
Animal
– Riese
Feel Your Way Through: A Book of Poetry
Detransition, Baby
– Casey
People Change
– Casey
What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat
– Ro
Don’t Be Sheepish: Ask the Hot Butch Lamb Out!
Abeni: Presented without context: butch lesbian lambs who are weirdly hot
Laneia: can’t stop seeing how much this lamb lowkey has Vanessa’s number
Ro: This lamb is the ultimate soft butch.
Riese: love a lamb who knows how to row a boat
Abeni: I’m not sure if I want to be or be with this lamb. This lamb says “I know a spot” and it’s in the middle of a lake on a winter day, but they brought hot tea in a thermo flask and your favorite poet’s latest collection. This lamb want to take you on a date to a marsh in the country, but they brough you a pair of waders in your size and they promise it’s going to be actually fun, and you know what, reader? It was.
Vanessa: The lamb on the right is genuinely wearing the same outfit my new date wore yesterday to the dog park.
Stef: Have you guys seen lamb? The movie lamb. The lamb has one human hand and one hoof.
Drew: Wait is THIS the lamb from the movie lamb??
Stef: That lamb is much more femme.
Stef: There’s a picture I can post but it’s very spoilery.
The spoiler is that the lamb is gay and dating Vanessa.
Drew: Is Noomi Rapace forcing flowers on her masc lamb’s head because I will not stand for that
Vanessa: While we’re here talking about lambs, does anyone play Dominion?
Drew: Unless masc lamb like the flowers because gender expression is nuanced
Vanessa: I’m Getting Into Games because of the girl I’m dating who looks like this lamb
Stef: Oh wait they’re both from lamb
Lamb was upsetting
Vanessa: Stef I’m trying rly hard to not engage with the feel bad aspect of these pictures
Stef: The butch lamb’s name is Ada
Nicole: All of this lamb talk reminded me of this incredibly controversial local children’s play
Vanessa: hm ok Nicole I instantly regret clicking that link
Drew: Lamb children’s play looks more disturbing than Lamb movie
Vanessa: agree x 1000000
Drew: Lamb movie looks cute
Stef: I thought lamb movie would just be like art house weird but
No
Vanessa: The way stef is selling lamb movie is upsetting me. I just want it to be about a suft butch lesbian lamb who is rly good at card games
Laneia: wait did
Vanessa: nicole I’m going to be honest with you
Laneia: did a human have to actually
Vanessa: the promotional image for this play
reminds me of that meme
about how bdsm is sex for theater kids
Stef: I think the implication is that sheep man had sex with a regular sheep
Laneia: how in the
Vanessa: this is why i hate movies!!!
Laneia: will anyone stop a24 before it’s too late
Abeni: i wish i didn’t know this was from a disturbing feel bad movie
i am going to pretend none of this is true and instead focus on the fanfiction i wrote above about how good a date this lamb is
Vanessa: ABENI YES SAME
Drew: When will A24 be brave enough to make THAT movie
Abeni: maybe u should make it drew
Drew: “When I was hired to make Lamb 2 I thought, what hasn’t been done before? Sure, we’ve had Lamb be scary but what about having Lamb be sexy? It was with that goal we approached the film and I couldn’t be prouder of my team.”
What We’ve Been Watching
Arrival
– Vanessa
Encanto
– Both Em AND Riese
Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald
The Lodge
– Ro
The Philadelphia Story
– Nicole
The Dead Zone
– Kayla
Spider Man: Far From Home
– Heather
Emails That Lost Their Way
More often than we’d like, people email us about things that demonstrate they might be missing the point.
Meet A New Contributor!
Get to know some of our newest faces.
Amari Gaiter, Writer
Instagram: @amari.fg
Twitter: @missgaiter
TikTok: @amariphobia
What is your favorite kind of sandwich?
When it comes to sandwiches, I’ll eat just about anything as long as it has sourdough bread, cheddar cheese, and avocado.
What’s something you’ve been really proud of lately?
I’m really proud of my personal growth! I’ve been doing a lot of reflection, healing, facing traumas, etc… and it’s been really lovely to see myself grow into the powerful being I’ve always known myself to be :)
What would be your superpower and why?
If I could survive without sleep, I would be absolutely unstoppable. The world is not ready for the day I get bitten by a forever-awake spider and become eternally restless.
If you could invite four famous people (dead or alive) to dinner, who would you choose and why?
I would 100% invite James Baldwin, Audre Lorde, Toni Morrison, Karl Marx, and W. E. B Dubois (yes, I’m cheating with 5!). I consider each of these folks to be some of the most inspiring, intelligent people/thinkers to have ever lived, and they inspire so much love, care, and dedication in my own heart as I write and do social justice work.
Who was your first woman celebrity crush?
It’s a pretty close tie between Nia Long, Aly Michalka, Shego, and Mindy Crenshaw from Drake & Josh. I feel like from those answers alone, you can tell I’m a Scorpio lmfao
Where Is Carmen’s Swag: Chapter 15
Drew: Hi @channel! If you haven’t done your lesbian movie ratings yet, I’d really appreciate having those in today. Thank you!
Valerie: i did mine and have apparently never seen a movie in my life and should probably fix that
i only had two things to rate and one was sort of a tv show and the other was a cartoon
Drew: Two of the best movies on the list tbh
Riese: much like valerie it turns out i have not spent much time in the cinema
but i did see the cartoon
Drew: You watched like 45 Kristen Stewart movies though
Riese: that’s true
WHY ISN’T SPENCER ON THIS LIST DREW DO YOU HATE MOVIES
Drew: Spencer isn’t gay enough !!
Minor character gay doesn’t count !
Carmen: To be fair to everyone, this list gets deeper and deeper dives every year as Drew finds more movies!
Like I think it’s ok you didn’t see Working Girls (1986)
Drew: Okay but you SHOULD see Working Girls (1986)
Riese: right but is it ok i didn’t see Everything Else On This List (2021)
Drew: It’s true though there are movies on that list officially unavailable
Carmen: I truly thought it was the Melanie Griffith Working Girls and was like… wait that movie is not gay???
But sadly, it’s a different Working Girls
Though I’m sure still great
Drew: I’ve never seen Melanie Griffith Working Girl!
I really need to
Carmen: It’s fun! I used to watch it alot when I was a kid because I was an only child with a single mother, so I watched a lot of adult movies because there was only so much Disney she’d handle.
Riese: i saw Mitchell and the Machines
Carmen: I did not like Mitchell and the Machines and I am ashamed to admit that.
Drew: I feel biased as someone who left my complicated family to attend film school
Carmen: Yes, I did watch it and go “wow this is a Drew movie, 100%”
I also thought the animation style was gorgeous
Riese: Netflix also sent me a Mitchell + the Machines book and stickers
the book is so cool
it’s just about the art
Valerie: i thought it was fun. and yes i love the book! and the lil wooden moose is p cute
Riese: oh yeah that’s where that came from?
i have it out but long forgot where the moose came from
Carmen: why does netflix send me zero things
Riese: since i got so many packages at once
Valerie: haha
Carmen: i’ve gotten exactly 1 candle and 1 bottle of wine, in my entire netflix life*
Valerie: when i got back from spending 6 weeks in boston i had a mountain of dvds waiting for me and for some reason two separate boxes from Power of Dog
Riese: carmen you’d probably really love the 10-pound photo book from Passing they sent me
Carmen: SURE WOULD HAVE.
SERIOUSLY WHAT DO I HAVE TO DO TO GET ON THE NETFLIX PRESS LIST
* note that since this conversation occurred Carmen has received a Netflix box containing whiskey, a blanket, tea, coffee, and a very nice candle and is hopeful her membership with GALECA will be a turning point w/r/t her relationship with press swag
Failure Is An Art Form
We are here to normalize trying, failing, trying, and failing again!
Nicole’s Failure:
After a triumphant foray into holiday cards in 2020, I thought this year would be a repeat success. It was not. I had dreams of doing New Year’s cards once it became clear we would not meet anything resembling a deadline for holiday cards. It’s now on the cusp of becoming February. It’s even too late to conceivably get a concept together for Valentine’s cards, which are pretty weird to send en masse, anyway, but I did consider it, Photo-shopping Mya and Sadie and myself onto Cupid bodies. Alas, it was not meant to be.
Let me tell you about the posts I tried to write and failed to complete this month and last!
- An essay called “Sex and the City Made Me a Nightmare Heterosexual” that I’d wanted to time with the reboot debut but couldn’t really figure out what the point of the piece was even though on a sentence-by-sentence level it was pretty good.
- Two Vapid Fluff end-of-year wrap-ups — the first was “everybody who came out in 2021” which I simply didn’t have the time to finish and the second was “times celesbian couples wore matching outfits in 2021,” which was harder to find than I had anticipated but IDK I think there’s still potential in this as a long-term project.
- A bunch of quotes from sober queer celebs to fit in thematically with Dry January but I think that I will still finish this at some point it just will be for a different month.
Carmen’s Failure:
I was originally going to ignore this new segment because I am faaaaar too much of a type A perfectionist to — gasp! — publicly air my failures, but hey that’s what therapy is for! Riese inspired me so here we go! I also wanted to do a quote round up, but sad girl quotes from celesbians talking about anxiety and depression (if we are honest with ourselves, that is also on theme for January, is it not?) but my own depression and anxiety got in the way of me finishing it?? So.
Hey, Babe!
Honestly shocking that more of us don’t have Pizza Party Kevin as a gender.
This Shirt
A new segment in tribute to the ultimate cult classic Autostraddle column, Laneia’s These Shirts
I got this old wrinkled mess of a sweatshirt five years ago, proudly declaring me a graduate of Harriet Tubman University, the first time my best friend thought I’d finish my PhD (he turned it into a “30th Birthday Present” when I didn’t make the mark) —it reminds me what it feels like to have someone who believes in me and my dreams.
Well, that and the fact it I always chuckle and am charmed by white people who do a double take on the rifle insignia (not that I’m an advocate for guns, but I have the utmost respect for Harriet Tubman’s steadfast belief that the only way forward was the march towards your freedom. The reminder that turning back in the face of that freedom would be death).
Originally, this sweatshirt was gifted to me with a twin sister, a deep burgundy number that said I was a graduate of Audre Lorde College. Surprising no one, the Lorde one was my favorite, until I lost it to an unfortunate bleach incident two years ago. Now listen I’m not the same size I was when I’m 30, and I cut the bottom off the college style crewneck, turning it into a crop top. It’s allowed my favorite sweatshirt to remain mine, growing with me.
Oh and it’s super soft and looks amazing with my eggplant colored sweatpants from The Gap on a Saturday morning making pancakes in my slippers, in case you wanted to know.
It Was Real
Heather: Yes Dolphins Have Lesbian Sex
i love that this headline is so aggressive. OH MY GOD YES THEY HAVE LESBIAN SEX DROP IT!
Dani Janae: LMAO
Nicole: Dolphins honestly freak me out, but also, good for them.
Evidence Puts Dolphins in New Light as Killers
Heather: Wow are all headlines about dolphins amazing?
“scientists see dolphins in a new light… AS AXE MURDERERS”
Yash: dolphins
havelesbiansexandthey’reVALID
Abeni: this is weird but honestly one of my first online memories is of a website called “dolphinsex” that involved a detailed step by step guide of how to have sex with a dolphin. it’s possible it was satire but i remember it being very bizarre and weird and scaring very young me.
Nicole: ABENI SOMEONE SHOWED THAT TO ME TOO
Abeni: omg
it was real
wasn’t 100% sure it was a real memory lol
Nicole: It was like one of those pre-viral things. Like someone whispers to you. “You have to see this.” And then shows you.
It was real.
Abeni: wow
Nicole: yeah.
Well! Didn’t expect to remember that today!
