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[mplchameleon]

It's Transgender Day of Visibility! Why not celebrate it by diving into some YA fiction, graphic novels, and non-fiction featuring trans and non-binary teens?

Titles Listed (from left to right):

A Million Quiet Revolutions - Robin Gow

Lakelore - Anna-Marie McLemore

Across a Field of Starlight - Blue Delliquanti

The (Un)Popular Vote - Jasper Sanchez

Cheer Up! Love and Pompoms - Crystal Frasier

The Heartbreak Bakery - A.R. Carpetta

And They Lived ... - Steven Salvatore

The Passing Playbook - Isaac Fitzsimons

Boys Run the Riot - Keito Gaku

Between Perfect & Real - Ray Stoeve

The Hazards of Love, vol. 1: Bright World - Stan Stanley

Meet Cute Diary - Emery Lee

Beyond the Gender Binary - Alok Vaid-Menon

Seeing Gender: An Illustrated Guide to Identity and Expression - Iris Gottlieb

Growing Up Trans: In Our Own Words - ed. by Dr. Lindsay Herriot and Kate Fry

A Quick & Easy Guide to Queer & Trans Identities - Mady G & J.R. Zuckerberg

[mplchameleon]

At our first Chameleon meeting back in person (!!!) on January 18th, our theme was "Fave LGBTQIA+ Media," and the teens attending didn't disappoint! We had a spirited discussion about what some current favorites are, which also included content that might not directly have LGBTQIA+ characters, but the content still feels queer in some way (even though, as one teen stated, some of that media tends to lean towards queer coding and queerbaiting instead of "real" representation).

Even as LGBTQIA+ representation in the media continues to grow, there still isn't enough! One teen summed it up neatly by stating in their opinion that, "books are 90% straight, it needs to be the other way around!" Therefore, queer teens still find themselves seeking representation in other mediums, especially fanfiction and fanart, where, as one teen said, "We can see ourselves [specifically QTBIPOC] more!"

The list of media above is a combination of movies, TV shows, and video games that either contain canon queer characters, or that feel very queer to the teens who enjoy them.

Medford Public Library Chameleon Teens LGBTQIA+ Media Recommendations:

TV Shows: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (Netflix) Harley Quinn: the Animated Series (HBO Max) Black Mirror: San Junipero (Netflix) My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic (Discovery Family) Movies: Rocketman (Amazon Prime) Single All the Way (Netflix) Eternals (Disney+) Venom: Let There Be Carnage (in theaters) Video Games: Five Nights at Freddy's (PS4, PS5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox) Batman: Arkham Asylum (PS4, Xbox)

[mplchameleon]

(Image description 1: 10 images with white backgrounds and lavender and green geometric borders; along the top of the image is text that says "My pronouns are:", below that is a different set of pronouns in each image, along the bottom of the images are the words "International Pronouns Day".)

The pronouns in the images are:

They/them/their

He/him/his

She/her/hers

He/they

She/they

Ey/em/eir

Zie/hir/hirs

Ve/ver/vis

Fae/faer/faers

Xe/xem/xirs

[mplchameleon]

(Image description: black text on a white background with a purple and green border, the text in the center of the image says "Respecting pronouns is a way to create a safe and welcoming environment for trans, gender non-conforming, two-spirit, and intersex people." and below this is smaller text that says "International Pronouns Day".)

[mplchameleon]

“Today, the fields of queer and trans history are still in the process of finding ways to talk about gender and sexuality diversity among Native people in a way that is neither appropriative nor exotifying. Here I am trying to tell the story of Ozaawindib’s life, not as a way to show the myriad possibilities of gender and sexuality among “primitive” peoples, as some white queer writers have done. Nor am I telling her story so it can be used as a sort of precursor or opening scene which non-Native queer people can inherit after Native people seemingly vanish from the dominant narrative of history. I am sharing her story simply because it is an apt demonstration of how gender diverse Native people were important actors in North American history. Ozaawindib’s story reveals important historical realities of queer, trans, and/or Two-Spirit experiences in North America, especially relating to the process of colonization and the erasure of people who did not conform to the accepted dominant standards of gender and sexuality.[i] Both her story and its subsequent narrative fracturing are symptomatic of larger trends in the history of North American queer, trans, and Two-Spirit peoples.”

— Kai Pyle Ozaawindib, the Ojibwe Trans Woman the US Declared a Chief

[mplchameleon]

Fave Five: Queer Indigenous YA

Fave Five: Queer Indigenous YA

Fire Song by Adam Garnet Jones Elatsoe and A Snake Falls to Earth by Darcie Little Badger Love After the End ed. by Joshua Whitehead (anthology) The Boy from the Mish by Gary Lonesborough (publishing in the US as Ready When You Are on February 1, 2022) Songs that Sound Like Blood by Jared Thomas Bonus: Coming in 2024, Godly Heathens by H.E. Edgmon

[mplchameleon]

Happy National Coming Out Day to all queer youth! Art by Brianna Vieira.

[mplchameleon]

Want to take part in one of the longest running, most trusted and safe inclusive online communities for young people and their allies to talk about sex, sexuality, relationships and more? Come on over to the Scarleteen message boards. We got you.

[mplchameleon]

LGBTQ+ History Month Reads

LGBTQ+ History Month Reads

October is LGBTQ+ History Month in the United States. We celebrate the history and achievements of the LGBTQ+ community across the country. Here are ten amazing books that capture the many lives and experiences of real and imagined queer and trans people of the past.

[mplchameleon]

Queer Indigenous Resources

With Indigenous People's Day approaching on Monday, October 11, what better time to share some resources for queer Indigenous folks?

Indigenous Pride LA Sunday, October 10, is Indigenous Pride LA, which will be held ENTIRELY ONLINE! From 11 am-4 pm PST, tune in via their website or YouTube channel for a livestream of queer and two-spirit Indigenous content from creators across all lands, waters, and nations. And check out their website for links to local and national resources!

"I'm Queer and Indigenous, I'm NOT Two-Spirit" A blog post from an Afro-Indigenous person about her personal connection to the terms that identify her, and her own journey in the intersection of her identities.

NativeOUT The Facebook account for NativeOUT, a national unincorporated nonprofit education and media organization that seeks to create social change in rural and urban communities that benefit Indigenous lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and Two Spirit people

Native Justice Coalition Two-Spirit Program A Two-Spirit program which engages in decolonizing gender roles and identities within Native and First Nations communities.  They work to restore gender balance through honoring the entire gender spectrum that exists in Indigenous communities. They work by and for individuals, families, and communities who need safe and supportive spaces. Their work also focuses on sovereignty and cultural resurgence as well as the restoration that Indigenous people deserve. They do this work through culturally based healing stories, talking circles, workshops, gatherings and other forms of community engagement.

Being Two-Spirit: a Brief Explainer "They’ve gone by a lot of names. They’ve endured colonialism and hatred. But they are still here and they are amazing. Here is a brief history of queer Native culture." Short YouTube video.

[mplchameleon]

Finally, an informational post on genderqueer identity!

(Image description: ten square images with blue, white, and lavender gradient backgrounds; every image has a border across the top and bottom with a thin black line framed by a black diamond on each side and every image also has black text.

1) Large centered text that reads "A Brief Introduction to Genderqueer History and Identity", below that is the instagram handle "@genderqueer.positivity"

2) "Genderqueer is a term that was created in the mid-1990's to cover a wide range of Queer experiences of gender, as well as marginalized gender identities and expressions. In its earliest usage, "gender queer" was a term for those who were Queer specifically because of gender, rather than sexuality."

3) "The earliest usage of "gender queer" comes from the April/May first edition of the zine GenderTrash From Hell, edited by Xanthra Phillippa Mackay." Below this is a quote from page 19 of the zine reading "gender queers & gender outlaws are what we & only we are, since lesbians & gays seem to think that queer means lesbian/gay (& sometimes bi) only".

4) "The terms "gender queer" and "gender trash" would appear in another set of zines two years later, the In Your Face newsletters published by Riki Anne Wilchins. It's unclear if Wilchins drew inspiration from the GenderTrash zines, or if she created these terms independently; however, she claims to have coined the term "genderqueer" and she is the one most commonly credited with creating and defining the term."

5) A quote that reads "I coined the term “genderqueer” back in the 1990s in an effort to glue together two nouns that seemed to me described an excluded and overlooked middle: those of us who were not only queer but were so because we were the kind of gender trash society couldn’t digest." Smaller text below attributes the quote to Riki Wilchins, from an advocate.com article titled "Get to Know the New Pronouns: They, Theirs, and Them"

6) A second quote that reads "It's about all of us who are genderqueer: diesel dykes and stone butches, leatherqueens and radical fairies, nelly fags, crossdressers, intersexed, transexuals, transvestites, transgendered, transgressively gendered, intersexed, and those of us whose gender expressions are so complex they haven't even been named yet." This quote is also attributed to Riki Wilchins and comes from the first edition of a gender activism newsletter called In Your Face, published in Spring 1995.

7) "Today, Genderqueer is both an umbrella term and a specific gender identity label. As an umbrella term, Genderqueer still covers a wide range of Queer experiences of gender. As the basis for a gender identity, Genderqueer can be used as a label by any person who feels that their gender is best described as Queer, or anyone who actively chooses to Queer their own gender identity and/or expression."

8) "Genderqueer is used by some individuals to describe having a gender identity outside of the male/female binary. However, it is also possible to have a binary or binary-aligned gender and be Genderqueer. Genderqueer can be used as a stand-alone label or as one of multiple gender-related labels used by an individual."

9) This slide has text along the bottom that says "This is the Genderqueer pride flag; this version was created by Marilyn Roxie in 2011." Above that is a square image of a Genderqueer pride flag on the left side; the flag has three stripes of the same width: a lavender stripe on top, a white stripe in the center, and a chartreuse green stripe on the bottom. To the right of the flag is text which describes what each color represents. Lavender represents "queerness and androgyny", white represents "gender neutrality and genderlessness", and green represents "genders unrelated to the binary".

10) The last slide has a stock photo in the top/center of the image; in the stock photo a person stands on a staircase with beige walls and a white ceiling in the background, holding a large genderqueer pride flag up to a natural light source which isn't visible in the picture, the person wears khaki pants, but otherwise can't be seen from behind the flag. Below the stock photo is text that reads "Genderqueerness is radically inclusive, deeply personal, fiercely political, and beautiful." After the sentence is the outline of a black heart emoji.)

[mplchameleon]

HAPPY BISEXUAL VISIBILITY DAY (2021)

💗-💜-💙 -- 💗-💜-💙 -- 💗-💜-💙

[mplchameleon]

It's Bisexual Visibility Day! In honor of that, here are some great bisexual reads featuring bisexual teen characters! Some authors listed here identify as somewhere under the queer umbrella, which is always a bonus :). So celebrate the B in LGBTQIA+ and get reading!

Books listed in the graphic, from left to right, top to bottom (top image first, then bottom image):

Not Your Sidekick by C.B. Lee

Some Girls Do by Jennifer Dugan

Cool for the Summer by Dahlia Adler

Things We Couldn't Say by Jay Coles

Off the Record by Camryn Garrett

Leah on the Offbeat by Becky Albertalli

Little and Lion by Brandy Colbert

Hani and Ishu's Guide to Fake Dating by Adiba Jaigirdar

Perfect on Paper by Sophie Gonzales

Running with Lions by Julian Winters

I'll Be the One by Lyla Lee

Zara Hossain is Here by Sabina Khan

The Other Merlin by Robyn Schneider

Odd One Out by Nic Stone

They Both Die at the End by Adam Silvera

We Are Totally Normal by Rahul Kanakia

[mplchameleon]

My dear lgbt+ kids, 

There’s no reason to feel guilty or ashamed for being “in the closet”. 

Some people might read this and think “Yes, if it’s dangerous for you to come out, then it’s okay not to” but that’s not my point. It doesn’t really matter so much why you decide to not tell someone (or anyone), if it’s because you’re worried about your safety or for any other reason. 

There are no “good” or “bad” reasons to stay in the closet, for now or for a longer time. It’s your decision and your life - we don’t get to judge that! 

You don’t need to prove anything. It’s not your “moral duty” to tell anyone. 

We fight for the freedom to come out. Shaming people who don’t come out isn’t helpful.

With all my love, 

Your Tumblr Dad

[mplchameleon]

Do you know of any books, documentaries, articles, etc... on Latin American queer history? For years I struggled with being queer in Latin America and I think it would help me to know more about LGBTQ+ people from Latin (mostly South) America since we never really get to hear about them

(sorry if this is worded weird, English is hard sometimes. But Thank you in advance!)

So from our project, we have articles on stories from:

Argentina Brazil Chile Colombia Peru Uruguay

Cuba Mexico

As for other forms of media, there is Before Night Falls (2000) a film I haven't personally watched, but I know includes some queer history from Cuba.

For fiction books, I have enjoyed what I have read from A.M. McLemore, specifically Darkest and Deepest Red which while not set in Latin America includes some Latin American own voices representation mixed in with good discussions of queer history.

[mplchameleon]

September 15th-October 15th is Hispanic Heritage Month! In honor of this month, here are some YA books featuring queer Hispanic teens!

Books in order, left to right, top row to bottom row:

Meet Cute Diary by Emery Lee

Fifteen Hundred Miles From the Sun by Jonny Garza Villa

We Set the Dark on Fire by Tehlor Kay Mejia

Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo

The Insiders by Mark Oshiro

Aristotle and Dante Dive Into the Waters of the World by Benjamin Alire Sáenz

Spin Me Right Round by David Valdes

The Grief Keeper by Alexandra Villasante

Juliet Takes a Breath by Gabby Rivera

Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas

The Mirror Season by A.M. McLemore

They Both Die at the End by Adam Silvera

The Truth Is by NoNieqa Ramos

Labyrinth Lost by Zoraida Córdova

Indivisible by Daniel Aleman

Fire with Fire by Destiny Soria

[mplchameleon]

(Image description: six images with a background image of a pink, blue, and gold gradient, every image has white text in the center framed by white stars and swirls.

1) "So what does it mean to identify as Queer?"

2) "Queer is an identity label that can be used by any person who is non-cisgender, non-heteroromantic, or non-heterosexual. Queer can be used as a descriptor for gender identity, sexual orientation, romantic orientation, or even all three."

3) "Some people may identify as Queer in addition to other labels that fall under the LGBTQIA+ umbrella; other people may choose to identify as only Queer. Every individual will have their own personal reasons for identifying as Queer, just as they would for using any other identity label."

4) "Some people prefer to use the Queer label because their identities are fluid, or because their identities are complex and they identify with multiple different labels; other people may feel like the Queer label is best for them because no other existing labels fit them."

5) "Many of us feel like our Queer identity unites us with other Queer-identified people who have marginalized gender identities and orientations. We also value the term for it's powerful and vibrant history."

6) "Queer people do not have to further explain or clarify details about our identities unless we choose to. Every Queer person is different and every Queer person belongs in our communities. Queer is a legitimate and beautiful identity all on it's own.")