#queer press

I don’t know how many of the folks reading this were as active in Ye Olden Days Of The Internet as I was, but circa 2000, discoverability for a webpage was a very different process than it is now. I ran a fan site back in the day, and then, the key was getting involved with similar web pages and building connections, especially trying to get listed on relevant link farms and joining web rings related to things my page was about. A web ring is a lot like a link farm, but instead of being “one page with a big ole list of web pages,” it’s instead an interlinking system. Every website in the ring bears a badge and links to the full list, the previous site, and the next site, and the idea is that if someone clicks “next site” enough times, they’ll circle through the entire list of sites in the web ring and end up back where they started. Rings were always very handy for driving traffic (from the web site owner point of view) and for finding a lot of like-minded web sites (from the user point of view).

See where I’m going with this?

With big corporations now dominating the internet and often drowning out softer voices or throttling traffic to smaller pages, with our SEO often buried by the clamor of useless ads unrelated to our work, I’m looking back to how I used to find people to request WinAmp skins from me and thinking it’s time to go back to The Old Ways.

All of which is to say: I’d like to make a web ring for indie publishers. Especially for indie publishers on the smaller end of the spectrum and those who work in speculative fiction, LGBTQIA+ creators and works, or both. As in: places like Duck Prints Press.

But a web ring can’t possibly be composed of only one web page, and that’s where this post comes in. Do you own an indie press or run the website for one? Would you be interested in having the site for your press be included in a web ring of indie presses? Then fill out my web ring interest check! I figure if I can get about a dozen folks interested, I’ll put something together.

I hope to get to know y’all!

Not an indie press? please signal boost to help spread the word!

Absolutely zero pressure ping to a few indie presses I know have Tumblr accounts. @inclusivefuture (I know you're closing down but... yeah. <3 ) @spacefruitpress @archiveoftheodd @thewhumpyprintingpress @echolitmag

On this day in queer history: June 1972

The first issue of Gay News—the United Kingdom’s first national gay newspaper—debuted in June 1972, giving voice to a community too often silenced.

Founded by members of the Gay Liberation Front and the Campaign for Homosexual Equality, Gay News was unapologetically queer at a time when mainstream media wouldn’t touch LGBTQ+ issues. The paper featured news, politics, arts, and even personal ads for gay men—challenging obscenity laws and societal shame.

For over a decade, Gay News provided visibility, community, and political advocacy. It covered stories from across the UK and beyond, helped foster early queer solidarity, and faced legal battles for daring to publish LGBTQ+ content.

Though it ceased publication in 1983, its legacy lives on. Gay News paved the way for LGBTQ+ media across Britain and was a vital piece of queer liberation history.

This week, to continue our celebration of Women’s History Month, we would like to highlight a new acquisition here at Special Collections: On Our Backs. On Our Backs was founded in 1984 as the first magazine in the United States to feature lesbian erotica for a lesbian audience. 

The title On Our Backs is a reference to a long running feminist newspaper called Off Our Backs, which was considered by some feminists to espouse prudish views of sexuality and pornography.

Off Our Backs, however, was often critical of On Our Backs, publishing a scathing review in July of 1985 and publishing the work of many anti-pornography feminists.  

On Our Backs ran from 1984 to 2006. Throughout this time, its editors and creators worked hard to advocate for a new kind of sex-positive feminism that was instrumental in ushering in the third wave of feminist activism.  In addition, On Our Backs came to be an important publication within the queer press, which has often focused on the issues and concerns of gay men while under-serving its female-identified members.  Later issues eventually came to include a classifieds section, pictured below, which provided space for the ever-important personal ads.

Special Collections is lucky to have significant runs of both Off Our Backs and On Our Backs.  Visitors can see how feminist thinking and activism has shifted over time and how disagreements within the movement have historically and presently moved women forward.

For more information about our underground press holdings, visit:

http://pitt.libguides.com/undergroundpress

-Zach Grewe, student employee

References

 “Classifieds.”  On Our Backs, Vol 6, No 1.  September 1989.  Print.

Kulp, Denise. “Cruising On Our Backs.”  Off Our Backs, Vol XV, No 7.  July 1985.  Print.