Also.Also.Also: How to Have the Perfect Queer Zoom Date

Did you hear? IT’S A GREAT DAY TO BE GAYYYYYY!

Queer as in F*ck You

Federal Judge Halts Idaho’s Ban On Transgender Athletes

When Surgeons Fail Their Trans Patients (Important message from Carolyn: “note before clicking through that this piece is graphic in places”)

Rupaul’s Drag Race Queen Chi Chi Devayne Dies at 34. From pneumonia. A master of her craft. May she RIP.

And here’s a SERIOUSLY beautiful beach wedding between two queer poets who wore gorgeous white dress, in case you want to remember what it was like to be able to go outside.

Saw This, Thought of You

When the ‘Fat Friend’ Is Your Identity, Change Seems Impossible by Destini Hornbuckle for Zora

“Let’s Have A Sex Talk”: The Eras Of Sex Talk By Black Women In Hip-Hop (Related: Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion to Give Away $1 Million for ‘Women Empowerment’ via #WAPParty)

How to Have the Perfect Virtual Quarantine Date

How to Make a Good Impression in Phone Interviews

Nichelle Nichols’ Family Turns to GoFundMe in an Ongoing Legal Battle With Her Manager

School Reopenings Are Only Going to Get More Chaotic

QAnon Is Using the Anti-Trafficking Movement’s Conspiracy Playbook

Political Snacks

Lots of speeches happening over at the Democratic National Committee! On Monday we talked about Michelle Obama’s warning to America (still my favorite speech of the week). If you haven’t been watching, here are some others that have touched me:

“We stay in this fight so that when our children and our grandchildren ask what we did during this dark chapter in our nation’s history, we will be able to look them squarely in the eye and say: we organized, we persisted, and we changed America.” — Senator Elizabeth Warren

“Do not let them take away your power. Don’t let them take away your democracy.” — President Barack Obama

“The virus has no eyes, and yet it knows exactly how we see each other — and how we treat each other. And let’s be clear — there is no vaccine for racism. We’ve gotta do the work.” — Vice President Nominee Kamala Harris

Great! Now here’s some smart things you can read:

Trans Americans’ Voting Rights Were Already in Jeopardy. the Pandemic Threatens to Make Things Worse

A Cautious Celebration of Kamala Harris’s Historic VP Nomination. Melissa Harris-Perry (cue my screams!!) leads a conversation among Black women activists, scholars, and politicians to unpack the significance of Harris as the first Black woman nominated on a major party ticket.

Fannie Lou Hamer’s Dauntless Fight for Black Americans’ Right to Vote

‘A History of Great Glory’: The Consequential, Evolving Role of Black Sororities in Suffrage (Just in case Kamala Harris’ mention of being a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, INC. didn’t make sense to you)

An important deeper dive into Elizabeth Warren’s remarks: Treating Childcare as ‘Basic Infrastructure’ Means Valuing Black and Brown Women’s Work

Native Leaders Featured in DNC Roll Call. Between the rollcall and rising star speeches, a total of nine Indigenous people spoke during Tuesday night’s DNC.

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Carmen Phillips

Carmen Phillips is Autostraddle's former editor in chief. She began at Autostraddle in 2017 as a freelance team writer and worked her way up through the company, eventually becoming the EIC from 2021-2024. A Black Puerto Rican feminist writer with a PhD in American Studies from New York University, Carmen specializes in writing about Blackness, race, queerness, politics, culture, and the many ways we find community and connection with each other.  During her time at Autostraddle, Carmen focused on pop culture, TV and film reviews, criticism, interviews, and news analysis. She claims many past homes, but left the largest parts of her heart in Detroit, Brooklyn, and Buffalo, NY. And there were several years in her early 20s when she earnestly slept with a copy of James Baldwin’s “Fire Next Time” under her pillow. To reach out, you can find Carmen on Twitter, Instagram, or her website.

Carmen has written 716 articles for us.

5 Comments

  1. I’ve seen somebody point out that if look to the right of Senator Warren, the childrens’ letters spell out BLM.

  2. i LOVE fannie lou hamer! i saw a truly excellent play about her called ‘seat at the table’ a few years ago and she’s been on my mind since. iirc, she spoke out against forced sterilization and eugenics and coined the term ‘mississippi appendectomy’ for a hysterectomy performed without knowledge and consent

  3. I actually read part of the jezebel, lower surgery article yesterday and like… I just had to put it down part way through because I got so discouraged.

    I really wish there were more… I guess guides? About what it’s like to live post-op, like what I can realistically expect, not just about immediate recovery, but living with it. Like… I’m about to have lower in the near future, but a lot of times the only thing I can find about the after recovery bit is like ‘your quality of life will probably improve’… but I got to be honest, it’s so vague it’s practically not helpful.

    On the other hand it seems like these is no shortage of stuff online telling me what ‘possibly could go wrong’, between TERF misinformation, and surgical horror stories.

    Idk, with this looming over my head, it’s sort of really discouraging that it feels like people who had lower where it went well just kinda… disappear into the aether.

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