don't carry it all

When fascism spikes, we get a two-fold where folks who cannot or will not assimilate are pushed by our oppressors to reconsider, and fellow queer/trans folks become some of the most aggressive enforcers of that “choice” in an attempt to buy safety within the majority.

This shit is why inter-community discourse is not just petty complaints—the refusal to hold solidarity with the weirdest, loudest, most visible queers in our midst is fascist as well as self-destructive. People are being forced into the closet, forced into labels that make others—including queer and trans people—more comfortable, because comfort and conformity becomes the biggest priority for many when shit hits the fan. And these are the scenarios that dont end up with nonbinary people dead.

i have a mission for you, should you choose to accept it!

you know how libraries weed and edit their book collections based on what circulates? and how censorship doesn't have to be explicit bans to proliferate in our communities? and how being queer on the internet is getting increasingly fraught?

we need accessible physical media. we need physical accounts of our history, of our past and present. we need informative free books that help people explore themselves-- and it's harder to justify discarding or weeding actively used resources.

do you have a library card? if not you should get one first- you wouldn't believe the number of resources you can find.

if you do though, will you join me in checking out and reading- and requesting- queer and/or trans books? fiction or nonfiction, historical or current. come back to this post and share what you found, if you like!

It’s that time of year! 🌈

Updated COVID vaccines are mostly for preventing severe acute illness, but it modestly reduces your chances of getting COVID at all! (54% less symptomatic illness in the following 4 months, in this recent MMWR report.) Best paired with a respirator! People who always wore N95 masks in indoor public settings had *83%* reduced risk of testing positive for COVID, in this 2022 MMWR report.

COVID is still a threat. Getting sick sucks, plus your risk of long-lasting symptoms—aka long COVID—gets higher each time you're infected. Fortunately, there's a lot you can do to lower the risk of transmission! Protect your ability to party—and protest—this Pride!

Get a Booster. Like Drag Race spinoffs, new COVID variants are dropping all the time. Antibodies from your latest vax or infection wane after a few months. Get a booster matched to the latest variants, and your resistance will peak in a couple weeks!

Mask up! COVID virus spreads through the air like the smoke from a fag [British]. A well-fitting N95 mask gives great protection! More reasons to mask up: sexy and mysterious, shows community care, avoid all the other airborne diseases!

Take it outside. The more fresh air to disperse the virus, the better! Transmission is still possible, especially in a crowd, but going outdoors is a major safety update!

I think there are useful conversations about M/M being written by women (and F/F being written by men) especially in the context of the romance publishing ecosystem often shutting queer men out of the M/M romance space in favor of female authors and in the context of some women in fandom using their gender as a shield against criticism about some trends in slash fiction, and about F/F being written by men in the context of the history of fetishization by men of lesbians in pornography.