TODAY IS AUTOSTRADDLE’S BIRTHDAY!!! 🎉

Let’s read some things!

Queer as in F*ck You

Ok so first! When I said we were going to read some things, we ARE! GOING! TO! READ! SOME! THINGS! And I have some excellent essays for you!

“I don’t feel like an elder but to have gotten to this place in my life means that I survived and I did so because women who probably didn’t feel like elders when they met me, rose to the occasion.”

Let’s start with this piece from Roxane Gay about coming-of-age in the 90s and finding yourself a queer elder before your 50th birthday absolutely broke me into pieces. I had to physically lay down mid-essay because it was so good and too much. It’s your must read!

And then moving from a legend to a legend-in-our-own-making, the one and only Dani Janae was published in Refinery29 this week and you absolutely need to make this your other must read! How lucky are you:

“I came out as bisexual at 12 years old, after years of sweating when beautiful Black women would come on screen in music videos. The first lesbians I saw had been the lovely, iconic, mostly white, and all thin cast of Showtime’s The L Word. Watching this show, all I could think was: That can’t be me. I don’t look like these women. “

I’m Fat, & That Makes Using Dating Apps Difficult by Dani Janae for Refinery29

And oh what’s that now!?!? Autostraddle writers making big waves everywhere!?!? Get ready for Kayla’s newest entry in what I’m calling her growing collection of devastatingly mean gay girl short stories:

“This is her favorite game. I bet you I could jump over that fence. I bet you I could hit that sign with this peach pit. I bet you I could make you come five times in a row. I bet you I could make that bartender flirt with me. I bet you I could chug this, shotgun that, shoot cheap whiskey without a chaser. I bet you I could swim out to that post in less than two minutes.

I bet you I could kill you out here and get away with it. This one is new.”

Field Games by Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya for fugue

AHHHHHH!! Welcome to ‘Octavia E. Butler Landing.’ NASA has named the landing site of the agency’s Perseverance rover “Octavia E. Butler Landing,” after the science fiction author.

Drag Kings Are Ready to Rule. “Blurring gender boundaries has allowed for more freedom in online pageants — and soon, it’s hoped, back in the clubs.”

Torrey Peters (Detransition, Baby — have you read it yet? You should!) Wants a Punk Utopia for Trans Girls and a Cuisinart Mixer

How a Queer and Trans Latinx Gardening Collective Is Working to Reverse Food Insecurity in Atlanta

Trans History You Never Learned in School

The Radical Queerness of Dolly Parton

From Heather: “this is bonkers lesbian music video and i love it so much” Allison Ponthier’s “Cowboy” Video is a Campy Tribute to Her Texan Roots

Saw This, Thought of You

Disney’s Raya and the Last Dragon Is a Sumptuous Fantasy — but It Makes a Mess of Southeast Asian Culture. And Himani highlighted this quote in particular: “Perhaps the biggest tell that Raya isn’t the representation Southeast Asian Disney fans deserve is that many of them won’t actually be able to watch it with the rest of us — because Disney+ is currently only available in three Southeast Asian countries.”

S.P.O.R.T.S! NWSL announces Challenge Cup details

More S.P.O.R.T.S! Fans Can Buy Cutouts for Women’s Final Four. All proceeds go to the Pat Summitt Foundation, the Kay Yow Cancer Fund and the San Antonio Food Bank.

“Queen Sugar and This Is Us, both in their fifth seasons, integrate the pandemic in their scripts. The differences between how they do so highlight the staggering differences in how COVID actually affects white communities and communities of color.” Even Television Is Showing the Racial Disparities of COVID-19

The Pandemic Has Changed Me. but How Will We Collectively Heal? This comic will gut you in the most eloquent, poignant ways.

My God, I love this. I Created ‘Call Your Elders Day’ to Lift Up My Loved Ones

Political Snacks

That’s it! No political snacks today! IT’S OUR BIRTHDAY!! 🎉

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