#lesbian day of visibility 2021

[maxkilledtheirghost]

xenogender visibility day is coming up

Hello everyone, i just wanted to say that xenogender visibility day is soon, it has been celebrated on May 15th since 2021! Please reblog, share and like this so more people can know about it :D

(also happy lesbian visibility week to those who celebrate it!)

[lesbiansovereverything]

2024 Lesbian Visibility Day Call for Submissions

Every year on Lesbian Visibility Day, LesbiansOverEverything.Com puts out a list of “real life lesbian adults who are living their best lives.”

The women we feature usually write 1-2 paragraphs about their careers or passions and submit a picture of themselves to go along with that. The point of doing this is to promote positive representation of lesbians and to highlight lesbian achievements. 

Submissions for this year are open until Friday, April 12th. If interested, please send a pic and 1-2 relevant paragraphs to editor.lesbiansovereverything@gmail.com

Visibility Day articles from previous years: 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020

[this-world-of-beautiful-monsters]

happy lesbian visibility day to all the girls kissing girls with sharp sharp teeth

“From 'Dracula's Daughter' to 'Carmilla,' lesbian vampire depictions prove immortal,” Elaina Patton, 2021 / “Carmilla,” Sheridan Le Fanu, 1872 (art by D.H. Friston) / “A terrifying history of lesbian vampires: From 19th century scares to chilling moral panic,” Patrick Kelleher, 2021 / The Vampire Lovers, 1970 / “Christabel,” Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1797 / Lesbian Vampire Killers, 2009 / “From 'Dracula's Daughter' to 'Carmilla,' lesbian vampire depictions prove immortal,” Elaina Patton, 2021 / Blood and Roses, 1960 / “Why Are We Still So Obsessed With Lesbian Vampires?,” Michelle Hyun Kim, 2019 / The Gilda Stories, Jewelle Gomez, 1991 (25th Anniversary Edition) / “Carmilla,” Theatres Des Vampires, 2011 / Bit, 2019 / “Lesbian Vampyres From Outer Space,” Scary Bitches, 2005

(terfs and radfems fuck off, lesbian vampires eat terfs and radfems)

[shoujoboy-restart]

16-year-old non-binary student Nex Benedict was beaten to death at Owasso High School in Oklahoma.

Self-described stochastic terrorist and January 6th Capitol rioter Chaya Raichik, owner of the social media account Libs of TikTok, has become infamous for her viral harassment and moral panic campaigns targeting minorities— with an emphasis on vilifying LGBTQ+ existence. Since 2021, Raichik’s posts targeting advocates for and members of the LGBTQ+ community have been followed with a deluge of violent death threats (including lynching threats against the Los Angeles Unified School District). Nowhere has Raichik’s influence been more visible than Oklahoma, where her anti-LGBTQ+ exploits earned her an official position on the Oklahoma Department of Education’s Library Media Advisory Committee by controversial far-right Superintendent Ryan Walters. Under Walters’ leadership, Oklahoma has been aggressively working to ban books and education on LGBTQ+ issues in schools across the state, with Oklahoma’s Attorney General Gentner Drummond stating that proposed rules to ban LGBTQ+ books and content were “unconstitutional and cannot be enforced.” It’s been confirmed that Raichik’s posts have fueled multiple bomb threats against schools specifically in Oklahoma. Officials from Oklahoma told NBC News that they believe Chaya Raichik’s anti-LGBTQ+ culture warring “sparked threats in their localities with her posts on social media that digitally heckle people such as drag performers, LGBTQ teachers and doctors who treat transgender patients.”   One of these instances was at the Owasso School District (just outside of Tulsa, Oklahoma). In 2022, Chaya Raichik targeted an Owasso teacher for speaking out in support of LGBTQ+ students who lacked acceptance from their parents. Raichik’s post was shared thousands of times on social media and resulted in the teacher getting condemned and harassed until they resigned. The posts Raichik made about the teacher were later deleted, but have been archived. It’s unclear what prompted the deletion of the posts by Raichik. We know Raichik’s Libs of TikTok posts have contributed to a culture of intolerance against LGBTQ+ youth in schools, and now this hate may be manifesting beyond mere threats. This month, a non-binary 16-year-old student at Owasso High School was brutally murdered in the girl’s restroom. According to local news outlets and family, Nex Benedict was beaten by three older female students. The mother of Benedict’s best friend told KJRH News that "one of the girls was pretty much repeatedly beating [Benedict’s] head across the floor.” Reports say Benedict was unable to take themselves to the nurse’s office after a teacher finally intervened in the brutal assault. For reasons that remain unclear, Owasso High School refused to call an ambulance for 16-year-old Nex Benedict, who died from their injuries in the hospital the next day. A motive for this killing has not been shared by law enforcement, but we know that schools in Oklahoma have been specifically pushing violent eliminationist rhetoric against transgender and non-binary youth— a fact exemplified by the state’s hiring of Chaya Raichik following her incitements of terror against the state’s schools over LGBTQ+ rights.  “This is the inevitable result of the anti trans moral panic,” said civil rights attorney Alejandra Caraballo, who shared an article about Benedict’s death published by the Pittsburgh Lesbian Correspondents Blog. “This is horrifying, and comes as lawmakers are increasingly spreading fear over trans people in bathrooms,” wrote LGBTQ+ journalist and advocate Erin Reed regarding this murder.

[travosti]

It’s not easy for some queer/lgbt+ people to be able to go out and live the queer experience in person but what needs to be clear is that external queer spaces vs internal queer places are two different experiences inside our community, and those who live not having online discourse on Twitter or Tumblr over who’s more valid or what’s correct to identify as, most of the time, don’t care. I was so chronically online years ago that I got into silly debates that in the end never existed in real life situations. I ended up having constant hiatuses on Tumblr or Facebook because of how mentally draining it was to be fighting for situations that most of the time do not happen in person. Then I realized that there’s situations that needed more visibility of.

For instance, did you know trans masculine people in latin america have a higher chance of committing suicide before their 30s? One of the examples would be of a black Brazilian trans man, Demétrio Campos, was an activist who committed suicide on May 16th of 2020, because of social injustice towards the lack of opportunities he had from being black and transgender, many times also denying mental health services towards his well being.

Did you know that Argentina is the only country in the continent that has won the legalization to having a non binary ID? Being the first country to legalize this in all of LATAM.

Did you know that just a few months ago, a trans man named Estéfano González , was wrongfully sent to jail because he defended himself from being murdered in the streets with his girlfriend while the attacker kept shouting transphobic AND lesbophobic comments towards him even though he does not identify as lesbian?

Did you know there is no law in Chile that protects trans people who have the right to labor?

Did you know that Tehuel de la Torre, a trans masc in Argentina, was forcefully disappeared after he went to a job interview in 2021, and to this day the police hasn’t done proper investigations and closed the case saying he passed away when there is no body to be found?

And in another occasion, a few years ago another trans masc (Santiago Cancinos), again, in Argentina, was made to be off the radar, the police not helping this trans male whatsoever, just to find out approx 4 years later that the remaining parts of his body was found deep in a hole just a few meters away from his home?

Two Peruvian trans men went to celebrate their honey moon In Bali this year, both were detained by security airport, because of “supposedly having illegal substances in their luggages”. They were brutally beat up in their cells, to the point one of them died because of the attacks. Leaving the newly wed male, becoming a widowed individual in just short time.

This is what’s happening in Latin America towards trans mascs and men but the internet is so focused in the experiences of trans mascs in countries like the USA, or countries that are in Europe. The trans experience, in this case trans masc experience, is NOT the same in every country. As a trans masc living in Chile, it’s very frustrating to see that many comrades typing from their homes, in a first world country, dare to criticize our experiences saying that our privilege is the same as theirs. I invite you to acknowledge our pain and re-think that not everything is centered around countries that is socially looked as more important than others. Please take your time translating the articles I cited, because my job informing is sufficient. I’m not debating with someone that invalidates trans experiences from my continent. Thank you, and you’re welcome from your angry sudaca.

The suicide of Demétrio Campos (Brasil): https://www.hypeness.com.br/2020/06/mae-de-demetrio-campos-fala-como-a-alegria-de-viver-do-filho-foi-abreviada-pelo-racismo-e-transfobia/

Legalization of the non binary identification in Argentina: https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/07/22/argentina-recognizes-non-binary-identities

The wrongful incarceration of Estéfano González (Chile):

https://www.eldesconcierto.cl/reportajes/2022/06/27/el-caso-de-estefano-el-joven-trans-encarcelado-por-homicidio-y-que-clama-legitima-defensa.html/amp/

No law that protects trans people from working in private establishments in Chile: https://www.latercera.com/paula/inclusion-laboral-trans-una-deuda-pendiente/?outputType=amp

The disappearance of Tehuel de la Torre (Argentina): https://agenciapresentes.org/2022/02/11/donde-esta-tehuel-a-11-meses-de-su-desaparicion-las-organizaciones-reclaman-justicia/

The disappearance of Santiago Cancinos (Argentina):

https://www.infobae.com/sociedad/policiales/2021/07/01/que-revelaron-las-pericias-al-cuerpo-de-santiago-cancinos-el-adolescente-trans-desaparecido-hace-4-anos-en-salta/?outputType=amp-type

The murder of Rodrigo Ventocilla and mourning husband, Sebastián Marallano (Perú): https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-internacional-62683218

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Judd Legum at Popular Information:

In 2020, Bari Weiss quit her job as an editor and writer at the New York Times editorial page in a huff. In her public resignation letter, Weiss argued that she was forced out because the paper had become "illiberal" and her more conservative beliefs made her "the subject of constant bullying by colleagues." 

In January 2021, Weiss launched a newsletter, Common Sense, with her partner, Nellie Bowles. Weiss billed Common Sense as the antidote to "cancel culture," which she argued was the practice by progressives of seeking to punish and ostracize anyone who diverged from their ideological orthodoxy. "The fact that cancellation tales have become an everyday feature of American life should do nothing to diminish how shocking they are, and how damaging they are to a free society," Weiss wrote in October 2021. "Everyone… of conscience needs to start saying no to the mob." Whether or not Weiss' core critique is true, it is lucrative. In 2022, Common Sense rebranded itself as The Free Press to reflect its growing ambitions. It now reportedly employs about 30 people and generates millions in revenue annually. The rebranded publication continues to rail against "cancel culture." Bowles recently published an excerpt from her new book in The Free Press in which she describes the "pleasure" she used to get from helping "cancel people" — before she saw the light and embraced intellectual freedom.

Ironically, as Weiss cashes in on her critique of "cancel culture," The Free Press has become a central part of a sophisticated right-wing ecosystem that seeks to tear down anything and anyone who diverges too far from their ideology.  The latest effort began on April 9, 2024, when NPR editor Uri Berliner wrote in The Free Press that his employer had "lost America's trust." Using a formula that is typical for The Free Press, Berliner describes himself as fitting the liberal mold — admitting that he was "raised by a lesbian peace activist mother" and "eagerly voted against Trump twice." But Berliner says that NPR has gone too far. NPR, according to Berliner, has abandoned its "open-minded spirit" and is too focused on catering to the left. 

One of the core pieces of evidence Berliner cited was NPR's coverage of allegations that the "Trump campaign colluded with Russia." Berliner said NPR "hitched our wagon to Trump’s most visible antagonist, Representative Adam Schiff." He complained that Schiff was interviewed 25 times and, during those interviews, "alluded to purported evidence of collusion." But an NPR spokesperson told Washington Post media critic Erik Wemple that between January 2017 and December 2019, NPR conducted 900 interviews with congressional lawmakers, including stalwart conservatives like Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Paul Ryan (R-WI). In other words, Schiff did not dominate the coverage. Overall, Wemple describes Berliner's critique of NPR's Russia coverage as a "lazy… feelings-based critique of the sort that passes for media reporting these days."

Another central component of Berliner's critique is this statistic: "In D.C., where NPR is headquartered and many of us live, I found 87 registered Democrats working in editorial positions and zero Republicans. None." There are a few problems with this. First, Berliner doesn't disclose that there are 662 employees at NPR producing content. It's unclear how or why he selected a subset of just 87 people. Second, in DC, voters have the option of registering as independents. That's how Berliner and other NPR employees who live in DC, like host Steve Inskeep, have registered. Finally, many NPR employees live in places like Virginia, which does not have voter registration by party. 

[...]

That is when the effort to punish NPR and Maher intensified. Chris Rufo, a right-wing operative, has been featured in The Free Press as a contributor and a podcast guest. Rufo began examining Maher's 29,400 tweets and highlighting examples that "exposed" her as liberal. (He later summarized his findings in a piece published by City Journal.) Rufo objects to tweets in which Maher discusses "structural privilege," "non-binary people," and "toxic masculinity." He also highlights that Maher's daily routine included "yoga, iced coffee, back-to-back meetings, and Zoom-based psychotherapy." In another tweet, Maher calls Trump — who rose to political prominence by falsely claiming that the nation's first Black president was illegitimate because he was born in Africa — a "deranged racist psychopath." For Rufo, Maher is but one example of a growing problem: a "rising cohort of affluent, left-wing, female managers."

For Rufo, expressing liberal views at any point in your life is a fireable offense. “If NPR wants to truly be National Public Radio, it can’t pander to the furthest-left elements in the United States,” Rufo told the New York Times. “To do so, NPR should part ways with Katherine Maher.” NPR, however, stuck by Maher. The organization noted that the tweets in question were written while Maher "was not working in journalism… and was exercising her First Amendment right to express herself like any other American citizen." NPR further noted that Maher, as CEO, was not involved in the editorial process. 

[...]

The incoherence of the argument underscores the reality of the political moment. There is a relentless right-wing operation seeking to inflict pain on their ideological adversaries. Some, like Rufo, are the political equivalent of street brawlers, willing to say or do anything to achieve their objective. Others, like Weiss and The Free Press, give the movement a more journalistic and professional sheen. But no one involved is a supporter of free expression or an opponent of cancel culture. Rather, they are the cultural force aggressively pursuing cancellation.

This Popular Information piece goes hard on the right-wing’s BS obsession with “cancel culture.” In reality, right-wing polemicists such as Bari Weiss and Christopher Rufo are the ones who got to where they are by practicing cancel culture on ideas that don’t align with their worldview.

[female-buckets]

It’s Oct. 8, 2021, and the Phoenix Mercury are one possession away from an improbable return to the WNBA Finals. The Las Vegas Aces get the ball to A’ja Wilson going toward the hoop, and the reigning MVP is met by the long arms of Brittney Griner, who rejects the shot attempt and secures her team’s victory.

Five days later, Griner is on a roll to start Game 2 of the finals. She has scored six straight points, and then two more come in spectacular fashion with the first dunk in WNBA Finals history. It’s the 24th dunk of her career, but she’s always proud of any that come in the playoffs. As she would tell members of the Mercury, “If I still have the legs at the end of the season, watch out.”

Phoenix would go on to lose the finals, but Griner cemented her return as one of the league’s greats. A year after having to leave the WNBA bubble to address her mental health, Griner was a starter on the Olympic gold-medal team and an all-WNBA first-team selection — and as bouncy as ever. Turning 30 didn’t mean that Griner was past her prime, not in the slightest.

Griner has not returned to WNBA action since. She has been detained in Russia for 293 days — a detention the U.S. has deemed wrongful — and she’s currently working in a penal colony almost a year since being arrested on drug charges after Russian customs agents found hashish oil in her luggage in February. Still, no player mattered more to the WNBA in 2022 than she did. Griner’s absence was the biggest story of the year, making her The Athletic’s WNBA Person of the Year.

The exceptional outcry from the women’s basketball community on her behalf speaks to who Griner is as a person. The WNBA is a league of minorities, and Griner has proudly embodied several of those identities since she was drafted in 2013. A one-of-a-kind individual and player, it was easy for many to see parts of themselves in her and take pride in that representation.

“BG’s lived experience of being different and sounding different and looking different didn’t harden her. It made her more accessible. It made her more empathetic,” Mercury president Vince Kozar told The Athletic. “It made her more of all of the things that people respond to when they meet her or think about her. And so she came to understand herself as someone who provided this visibility and representation for other people that was so important to other people.

“Whether it was meeting people in person and having them tell her that, or so much of the fan mail she received or we received on her behalf, or the outpouring that she always felt on social media, where she was active, she came to understand that, like, just being herself, whether that was being 6-(foot-)8, whether that was presenting fairly androgynously, whether that was being an out and proud lesbian who not only wanted to speak out on behalf of LGBT rights and causes but also just live out loud with her wife. I think all of those things people responded to, and I think she did that and lived like that because that’s just who she is, but I think also she came to understand, like I said, that it was really important to so many people.”

Griner’s fate could have befallen any number of WNBA players. The majority of the league heads overseas during the offseason to supplement their income and have an opportunity to play year-round. Griner earns a supermax salary from Phoenix but has played in Russia for UMMC Ekaterinburg since 2014 for a contract rumored to be at least four times that number. That team specifically recruited her and her skill set to win EuroLeague titles and establish dominance as the best club in the world.

Her detention is a reflection of the worldwide nature of basketball, as well as the specific geopolitical circumstances of 2022. Her arrest took place as Russia was preparing to invade Ukraine, which has received billions of dollars in aid from the U.S. since that invasion began. Yet, while citizens of Russia faced punishment for speaking out against the government, Griner’s teammates and general manager advocated for her as character witnesses during her trial.

“The ironic thing that I tell people all the time is that she loves Russia. She loved going over there; she loved that and not being away,” Kozar said. “It has an expiration date, right? Because it’s a hard lifestyle being away from family. But that situation, that team, those accommodations, that salary, which demonstrates how much they value not only women athletes but her in particular … that team from this small, little oil city in the middle of Russia multiple times won EuroLeague.

“That organization, that city, those teammates love her, and she had a great deal of pride in, as her wife had said, when her career started playing overseas, the goal was to be one of those players who a Russian team wanted, right? And this Russian team wanted her. She not only became that player for herself, she became that player for that team.”

In June, Tina Charles requested a contract divorce from the Mercury. Phoenix attempted to construct a superteam in the offseason, reuniting the frontcourt of Charles and Griner, Olympic teammates for three gold medals. Instead, the team had a year from hell, falling to the No. 8 seed, and Charles asking for a buyout midway through the season. There was no reason to stay without the person she came to Phoenix to play with.

“At the very beginning of this, I was super hesitant to talk about BG in terms of basketball at all, because of the humanity of it and what she’s enduring. Basketball is, like, the very last thing on the list that matters,” Kozar said. “But the more time has passed, and frankly, the more letters I’ve gotten from her, I’ve been reminded she’s had a lot of things taken away from her — family, freedom, friends, all of that — but she’s had basketball taken away from her.

In July, Chicago played host to the 2022 All-Star Game. Griner, an eight-time All-Star who had been selected to the game every year of her career, was instead an honoree. The players wore her jersey number during the second half — and all Griner could do from Russia was later hold a photograph of the No. 42 All-Stars at a pre-trial hearing while in a cage.

Three months later, the U.S. defeated China in the championship of the 2022 FIBA World Cup. Griner had represented the United States at every major international competition from the moment she turned pro. In a letter she wrote to President Joe Biden on July 4, she said that her family traditionally spent the holiday honoring those who served the country to protect their freedom. Her opportunity to serve her country came in the form of USA Basketball, and this was her first absence from the national team.

Kelsey Plum, who was on Team USA in 2018 with Griner, said that Griner built community within that group when she and her wife Cherelle led card games with the American players and their families. Plum’s best memories of Griner come from playing Phase 10 and Uno those nights in Tenerife.

That’s the Griner that people around the WNBA talk about, the one who disarms with her kindness and her humor. She’s always looking out for others, even now, when she would have every reason not to.

“She spends her letters, just like she spent her time in Phoenix, and how she has spent her life, concerned about other people,” Kozar said. “Her letters ask me how I’m doing. Her letters ask me about her teammates. Her letters ask me to make sure we are all taking care of Cherelle. And her letter to President Biden was also about all of the other people in the same situation that she is in around the globe. That’s authentically BG.”

[hellomynameisbisexual]

A fixture of Pride Month marches is the parade of colorful flags. The rainbow flag, designed in the 1970s by Gilbert Baker, is best-known, and while it’s embraced by the LGBTQ community, there are also flags that people of certain gender identities rally around. Among those is the bisexuality pride flag.

Designed in 1998 by bisexuality activist Michael Page, the flag is made up of a layer of fuchsia at the top to represent females, a layer of royal blue at the bottom to represent males, and a lavender or purple stripe across the middle to represent attraction to both males and females.

“I feel like it’s all shades of my sexuality; like I am attracted to women; I am attracted to men; and I am attracted to people without thinking about what their gender is,” says Wendy Curry, 55, former President of BiNet USA, an organization promoting bisexuality awareness, who helped promote the flag in the late ‘90s. “But I think the idea that there’s more than one color to our sexuality is reflected in the flag and I love that.”

A 2021 Gallup poll found that more than half of LGBT adults (54.6%) identify as bisexual.

The flag was part of an effort to start an annual Bisexuality Visibility Day—or Bi Day for short—which, the bisexual community began marking every Sept. 23 starting in 1999. It came at a time when activists were working to bring the bisexual community together online in chatrooms. The bisexuality pride flag was seen as just one way to help form a community among bisexual people.

As Curry recalls the rationale for a flag back then, “We need something so that when we go to a pride parade, people know that it’s us, and we’re not hidden.”

Fellow BiNet board member and activist Gigi Wilbur, 66, who also helped promote the flag in the 90s, saw the flag as a bold statement in the era of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” The topic of gays and lesbians serving in the military was a hot-button political issue at the time, and he saw the flag as flying in the face of that policy—and making sure bisexual people were included in those conversations. “And so I think part of that was what motivated this to become more visible and say, ‘Yes, we do exist and we should have the same rights as everybody else,’” Wilbur says.

Overall, the flag and the awareness day were designed to reach out to people who may be looking for that kind of community.

“I think there are many rural communities where people have feelings about being bi but think, ‘Oh, am I the only one?’” says Wilbur. He hopes bisexual people will see the flag in pride parade coverage and think, “’I’m not alone.’”

[thechronicmasochist]

Hi, I saw ur post about the research paper about the illusory rise of queer acceptance. I do queer history. Do you mind sharing your source base if not the full essay I’m very interested in it!

YES because maybe if I'm lucky this will help me compose some thoughts bc this fucker is due tomorrow and I've written seven unusable pages

I actually approached this subject with a structure that I think helps understand the source base, it is that I wanted to a) prove that the perception of increased queer tolerance is there, b) that it's false, and then c) the ways in which the control agents use the discrepency between perceived and actual tolerance to censor queers.

So for question a) I pulled statements from the white house and fucking Joe himself such as his executive order on day one (which did nothing, just like all the others he's signed, beyond establishing task forces to encourage other agencies to stop discriminating against queers btw). I noted the GLAAD/Harris Institute Accelerating Acceptance report 2018, which led with "Four years ago, GLAAD commissioned The Harris Poll to launch a first-of-its-kind index to measure American attitudes toward lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people and issues. Each year [prior to 2018], the Accelerating Acceptance report showed positive momentum. Year over year, Americans said they were more comfortable with LGBTQ people and more supportive of LGBTQ issues. These results paralleled historic steps in LGBTQ Visibility in our culture as well as the passage of marriage equality nationwide and other pro-LGBTQ legal wins." This is directly suggestive that we were winning, but that something has stopped us from progressing. That argument led to the massive mobilization of queer people to vote for and elect Biden in the first place, which the Human Rights Campaign takes credit for on their website.

For question b) I also public perception polls from Gallup which document overall support of same-sex marriage (june 6, 2022) and polls from the Pew Research Center which document overall support of diverse gender identity and expression (august 6, 2022). I also used reports from The Trevor Project (showing an increased in queer youth discrimination, experiences of violence, and adverse mental health outcomes), The American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom which tracks censorship efforts in libraries and schools (showing an astounding increase in censorship efforts in 2021 compared to the past), the CDC's Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance student surveys 2016-2022 (showing the ways in which queer youth experience disproportionately high rates of adverse health experiences compared to non-queer peers, difficult for me to link but easy to find on their website), GLAAD's Accelarating Acceptance reports 2018-2022 (easy to find on website as well) which show an increase in discrimination experienced by queer people, and the reported increase in legislation introduced to discriminate against queers reported by the Human Rights Campaign.

question c) is, obviously, more reliant on theoretical construction to draw the lines. The main bulk of my structure which I am happy to discuss is Stanley Cohen's Moral Panic construction theory, published in his book "Folk Devils and Moral Panics." Basically, I'm drawing the line between the people pushing to exert greater control on queer people and the people who are manipulating the media and the general public towards a decreased tolerance of queer people. AND I'm arguing that those who are acting "in support" of queer people are doing so for their own agendas and are empowering the censoring agents by down-playing the reality of the situation in service of their own self interest, be it capital or constituencies (which is also, arguably, capital).

[lesbiansovereverything]

2023 Lesbian Visibility Day Call for Submissions

Every year on Lesbian Visibility Day, LesbiansOverEverything.Com puts out a list of “real life lesbian adults who are living their best lives.” The women we feature usually write 1-2 paragraphs about their careers or passions and submit a picture of themselves to go along with that.

The point of doing this every year is to promote positive representation of lesbians and to highlight lesbian achievements.

Submissions for this year are open until Friday, Apil 21st. If interested, please send a pic and 1-2 relevant paragraphs to editor.lesbiansovereverything@gmail.com

Visibility Day articles from previous years: 2022, 2021, 2020

[iloveabunchofgames]

#JakeReviewsItch

Amelie

BIG OL' CONTENT WARNING! At the bottom of the description on the Itch page

by Two and a Half Studios

Price (US): $3.99

Included In: Bundle for Ukraine, Queer Games Bundle 2022

Genre: Visual Novel

Pitch: Aristocrat Amelie is in lockdown while the plague ravages the outside world. Her maid feels prickly about a visit from Amelie's pen-pal. A short, anime-style visual novel, retold three times from each character's perspective, with a few branching paths

My expectations: Much to my disappointment, this does not appear to have anything to do with the major motion picture of the same name. Fox Interactive's Alien: Resurrection: The Game and Psygnosis' The City of Lost Children remain the only games based on Jean-Pierre Jeunet's illustrious oeuvre. Is no one brave enough to take a chance on a Micmacs game? So anyway, I'm going to have to put that disappointment out of mind and try to focus on reviewing Amelie for what it is rather than what it is not. I'm open to a queer visual novel with "psychological horror." Two and a Half Studios released five games in this style from 2018 to 2022. Given my recent experience with prolific visual novelists, I have concerns about them being stretched too thin. They're saying Amelie is ~20,000 words (1-1.5 hours), which is relatively constrained. This could be good!

Review:

A young woman lives with her maid in an ornate manor. Her parents, infected by the plague, have left their home until they’re better. When the woman’s pen-pal arrives for a visit, the maid is livid. The pen-pal assures them that lockdowns are lifting and travel is becoming more common, but the maid insists that for everyone’s protection, this interloper must go.

Ooooookay… It’s a game from 2021, back when we still kinda took the pandemic seriously, but society at large was starting to get comfortable admitting that we’re more concerned with Starbucks and letting children be someone else’s problem for eight hours a day than we are with preventable deaths…

One possible reading of Amelie is that we have to get back to normal. Making minimal personal sacrifice to curb the spread of a case of the sniffles that’s not even dangerous if you’re young and healthy is oppressive. Women are being oppressed by life-saving courtesy.

My reading is that it’s a ghost story. Current events like the pandemic and attacks on womens’ rights influenced it, but it’s primarily a self-contained story about ghosts.

The presentation and design are uneven. The ghost story isn’t bad. Maybe a light recommendation?

+ As trope-y ghost stories go, this one is fine. I was a few steps ahead of almost everything, but even so, it had me asking questions and looking forward to what might happen next. Plus, feminism and lesbian visibility. Cool and cool. + Dig those backgrounds and special insert shots. + The developers call the music "gorgeous." I don't agree, but it is memorable and effective, both when trying to lure you in and spook you out. + Each character is distinct. Most of the time, there aren't visual or audio cues to indicate who's talking. The name of the speaker is displayed, but I could usually ignore that and still figure it out based on the written voice.

– It's possible the ultimate message is that we need to stop living in fear and forget about coronavirus prevention. I'm immunocompromised. A member of my family died from COVID-19 last week. I believe it's just a funtimes ghost story, but maybe, just maybe, this is a work of COVID denial, and I'm not onboard with that. – Background/character art mismatch. – Going through the story multiple times with multiple characters and multiple outcomes? Good! Clicking through repeated dialogue but not clicking too fast because there might be something new inserted between the old stuff? Not good. Did we learn nothing from Arrested Development's fourth season? – Two and a Half Studios, you have promise, and I hope you learned some lessons. Think about how long we're going to be in these scenes, and figure out your artists' priorities—and make sure they're working together. Think about what you're saying. Are we making choices or not?

🧡🧡🧡🤍🤍 Bottom Line: If you got Amelie in a bundle and creepy ghost stuff is up your alley, sure, why not? It's nothing new or exceptional, but the ghost stuff? It's fine. For potential paying customers, here's an endless list of Itch visual novels tagged with "horror" and "LGBT". You don't need this one.

#JakeReviewsTwitch is a series of daily game reviews. You can learn more here. You can also browse past reviews...

• By name • By rating • By genre

[coochiequeens]

Another man making an events for women about himself and his “identity”

Lesbians who had congregated at Dyke March in Hamburg on Friday were met with hostility, and at least one woman was physically assaulted by trans activists after asserting that men cannot identify as lesbians.

Women had gathered to peacefully protest one of the event’s scheduled speakers, a male politician who recently began identifying as a lesbian woman. The official Instagram account for Dyke March Hamburg advertised that ‘Tessa’ (Markus) Ganserer, who declared a female identity in 2018, would be a guest speaker at the event.

Ganserer, a trans-identified male member of German parliament, was elected to Germany’s Bundestag in September 2021, taking a seat that was reserved in quota for female political representation.

Ganserer was first elected as a male to the Bavarian state parliament in 2013 representing the Greens. Since self-identifying as a woman, he has made numerous appearances at events specifically for women. In March, Ganserer was selected by the Green Party to present at an event highlighting women in politics. The event, titled Women*. Power. Politics, used an asterisk throughout its description to indicate “all women are welcome,” by which they were referring to males who identified as women.

Last year, he took part in a demonstration for lesbian visibility organized by Dyke March Nürnberg, where he was photographed with his wife holding signs that read “Lesbian cake.”

On April 26, Ganserer tweeted in support of the Lesbian Day of Visibility for “all lesbians, cis and trans*.” In July, he was interviewed by Siegessäule, a publication owned by Manuela Kay, organizer of Dyke March Berlin, and spoke about the rights of “lesbian mothers.” Ganserer has fathered two children with his wife.

Leading up to the event, the hashtag #MarkusIstNichtLesbisch was trending on Twitter as German women expressed their outrage that a man was set to speak, ostensibly on his experience of identifying as a woman.

A group of women who attended the Dyke March to protest held signs which read, “You never need to apologize for not liking dick,” “I like women, not men,” and “Lesbian: a homosexual adult human female,” as well as other signs pointing out the homophobia of trans activism and denouncing lesbian erasure.

Other participants of the Dyke March began hurling insults at the women, and some chanted “TERFs go home.” As the animosity mounted, police pulled the women out of the main march and stood with them to the side.

Ana Julia Di Lisio, the founder of women’s rights group Radfem Berlin, told Reduxx that trans activists had attempted to set fire to the banner defining lesbians as female in a previous demonstration in Berlin. At the Hamburg Dyke March, the same banner was targeted, and a woman attempted to rip the banner from Di Lisio’s hands. “She wanted to destroy all of it. She tried to break the bamboo poles that held it up, and when they didn’t break, she put more force until I tried to stop her. She reacted violently and continued to twist the banner and this way she hurt my arm with a cut and scratches and a hit to my lip,” Di Lisio said.

As the police officers were in close proximity, Di Lisio immediately filed a report.

Di Lisio stressed that although a woman had attacked her, she believed that several men who were identifying as transgender worked her up to it. “These men kept agitating verbally while we walked with our banners, but the ones who came to attack us were mainly women triggered by these men.” 

According to Di Lisio, Ganserer did not speak at the event as scheduled. When asked why she believed that was the case, she said, “That might have to do with the fact that Dyke* March Hamburg was expecting us and they did not want to expose Markus [Ganserer]. It gave me the impression the police were informed about us coming, and I say this because the police came to us before we even joined the march… to ask us what we were doing there.”

Di Lisio told Reduxx that the police pulled their group aside before they had even entered the march and cautioned them. “The police told us that they were informed of who we are and they asked us to remain peaceful, which we did.”

“When I got attacked, someone from the Dyke March Hamburg was taking photos instead of coming to help,” Di Lisio said, and clarified that under German law passersby are required to intervene when witnessing an assault, “So the organization neglected their duties to keep order as promised.”

Di Lisio told Reduxx the widespread acceptance of males identifying into lesbianism has had grave consequences for the rights and safety of lesbian women.

“The effects of these men declaring themselves lesbians and pretending to fight for the specific rights and needs that lesbians have are devastating … The lesbian erasure in countries which already have self-identification laws is tremendous,” Di Lisio said. “No man who declares himself a woman or a lesbian changes his status as a man, nor by doing so do his privileges disappear because of a legal fantasy in a document, nor because he has ‘feelings’ of being a lesbian.”

Prior to the event, organizers uploaded photos to social media showing them creating signs which read, “F*ck TERFs” and “TERFs are stupid.”

Ganserer is not the only man identifying as a woman who holds political power in Germany. Maike Pfuderer is a trans-identified male who is a spokesperson for the Federal Working Group on Lesbian Politics for the Green party. On social media, Pfuderer frequently denounces as “TERFs” those who reject the notion that men can identify as women.

In April, a heterosexual German man named Francois Etscheid declared his sexual orientation as “lesbian” and was interviewed by media as stating that he was looking to raise awareness of the “rare phenomenon” of “lesbian men.”

In July, lesbians were attacked at a Dyke March in Cologne, and one woman was grabbed and choked by a transactivist. At the same event, a small group of pro-pedophilia activists displayed a “MAP” flag (minor-attracted person), and did not report being attacked or insulted.

German lawmakers are currently considering a proposed self-identification policy which would allow anyone aged 14 years old and older to change their legal sex by filling out a form. Parents of children under 14 would have the right to file the form on their child’s behalf. If one of the legal guardians refuses to sponsor their minor’s sex marker change, a family court would reserve the right, at the request of the minor, to “replace the decision of the parents based on the best interest of the child.”

The full text of the proposed and amended legislation is expected to be made public by autumn.

A group of academics co-authored an open letter on June 1, calling for an end to the promotion of gender identity ideology in government-sponsored media. Simultaneously, they also released a dossier that revealed how “explicit sexual media directed at children and young adults,” particularly on the topic of gender identity, was being promoted by government subsidized media channels.

By Genevieve Gluck Genevieve is the Co-Founder of Reduxx, and the outlet's Chief Investigative Journalist with a focused interest in pornography, sexual predators, and fetish subcultures. She is the creator of the podcast Women's Voices, which features news commentary and interviews regarding women's rights.

[radiation-risk]

i can’t believe people are trying to cancel jacknjellify now we’ve truly come full circle huh

Just because someone wants to be supported financially by a creation they made doesn’t make them a scammer

Just because someone was likely unaware of a highly controversial situation doesn’t make them an apologist

JUST BECAUSE YOU IMPLY A CHARACTER IS GAY DOESN’T MAKE YOU A QUEERBAITER

like mother of irene shut the fuck up stop acting like it’s a corporation making a series and not independent artists who happened to get popular due to their hard work

explanation of my reasoning under the cut

BFDI was once intended for teenagers, and I don’t know if they wanted to go for a younger audience. It just turned into that. They ask for patreon supporters, and even then that’s usually intended for their older audience.

Yes, when you intend to make an audience CLEARLY for kids, it’s not a kind move to ask for support, but BFDI is clearly multi-age ranged? Are we just gonna forget the 2016 QnAs on Twitter? They clearly had an older age range in mind originally. The kids finding it was just coincidence and they had to adapt to that. Remember how the older seasons are unhinged? That was when they created for their INTENDED audience.

The StoneWeeg situation was generally small by the time Weeg was on the team (2021). Many people were unaware they’re a groomer, meaning it was very likely that people on the JNJ team didn’t know about the situation. I saw maybe 10 people complaining including myself about weeg being on the team? There were likely more, but it’s a small minority compared to the audience that would be old enough to know about the things weeg had done.

And last off, I feel like the group trying to cancel JNJ were talking about Lollipop and the implied lesbian she is. They’re likely not going to say it outright due to the show’s existence of being deemed kid friendly currently and current state of LGBT being deemed political discussion, but they do express that they care out of show, which they do it in a very different way than you’d see from fake supporters like Disney execs.

They don’t just add a pride flag for pride month, but they do all sorts of things like make art for the Trans Day of Visibility and other LGBT related days not in June. They’re supportive and do their best to show that and you call them a fucking Queerbaiter.

I mean, we’ve also seen them canonically deem Four and all other algebraliens genderless. If there’s a genuine hatred, it’s very unlikely.

[is-this-just-fantasy]

I posted 151 times in 2022

That's 127 more posts than 2021!

33 posts created (22%)

118 posts reblogged (78%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@prideplus

@lesbiacebian

@letters-to-lgbt-kids

@thedumbestavenger

@aftabkaran

I tagged 132 of my posts in 2022

Only 13% of my posts had no tags

#queer - 75 posts

#politics - 26 posts

#transgender - 19 posts

#moodboard - 18 posts

#abortion - 17 posts

#aspec - 13 posts

#asexual awareness week - 12 posts

#bisexual - 9 posts

#nonbinary - 8 posts

#lesbian - 8 posts

Longest Tag: 87 characters

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Lithromantic Candy Aesthetic

made with BeFunky

13 notes - Posted October 27, 2022

#4

I just heard about this Harry Styles thing... time for a gay girl's possibly unpopular opinion. I honestly think that "Harry Styles isn't queerbaiting" and "Harry Styles isn't the king of pop" can and should coexist.

I mean cmon... irl people don't exist to be the perfect queers. They're still people who make mistakes and stuff. The fact that people are looking at a real guy and calling him queerbaiting is a little scary... he's not a cartoon character.

13 notes - Posted August 24, 2022

#3

Lithosexual Sunset Aesthetic!

made with BeFunky

14 notes - Posted October 27, 2022

#2

It’s International Lesbian Day! Shoutout to everyone who uses the lesbian label, including but not limited to:

demi-girl/-boy lesbians, intersex lesbians, multigender lesbians and trans lesbians!

aro, ace, and aroace lesbians, and multisexual lesbians!

he/him and they/them lesbians! neopronoun-using lesbians! butch and femme lesbians!

poc lesbians, disabled lesbians, fat lesbians!

And any lesbians I didn’t mention, we love and support you!

17 notes - Posted October 8, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Legit JUST realized it's Pan Visibility Day... so uhmmm happy pan day to myself and all the pansexuals and panromantics out there!

Wanted to try the whole moodboard trend... idk if I did any good tho

made with BeFunky

60 notes - Posted May 24, 2022

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[hellomynameisbisexual]

APA Resources

Answers to Your Questions For a Better Understanding of Sexual Orientation and Homosexuality

This pamphlet is designed to provide accurate information for those who want to better understand sexual orientation and the impact of prejudice and discrimination on those who identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual. The brochure is also available in Russian and Spanish. Guidelines for psychological practice with sexual minority persons (PDF, 1.5MB)

These guidelines provide practitioners with a frame of reference for the treatment of lesbian, gay and bisexual clients, and basic information and further references in the areas of assessment, intervention, identity, relationships, and the education and training of psychologists.

Guidelines (February 2021) Div. 44 Committee on Bisexual Issues

The Div. 44 Committee on Bisexual Issues leads the Division's efforts to highlight and support the study of bisexual issues in psychology. The committee provides opportunities for psychologists to network and to participate in convention programs and other professional development opportunities focused on bisexual concerns. News Beyond the Binary

From the Div. 44 Committee on Bisexual Issues. A compilation of a sampling of recent scholarship and popular media coverage pertaining to bisexuality and psychology. VisiBility

From the Div. 44 Committee on Bisexual Issues. A three-minute YouTube video highlighting the importance of visibility and inclusion of bisexual people. Bisexual older adult women: A review of the literature

An overview on previous studies related to bisexual, older adult women to provide recommendations for future research on this group.

Adult Development & Aging News , April 2018

Organizations with a Specific Focus on Bisexuality

The American Institute of Bisexuality

The American Institute of Bisexuality encourages, supports, and assists research and education about bisexuality, through programs likely to make a material difference and enhance public knowledge, awareness, and understanding about bisexuality. BiNet USA

As America’s oldest advocacy organization for bisexual, pansexual, fluid, queer-identified, and unlabeled people, BiNet USA facilitates the development of a cohesive network of independent bisexual and bi-friendly communities; promotes bisexual and bi-inclusive visibility; and collects and distributes educational information regarding sexual orientation and gender identity with an emphasis on bisexual, pansexual, fluid and queer (bi+) communities. Bisexual.org

The project is meant to introduce bisexual community to the world and give voice to the bisexual community, share accurate information, answer questions, and provide educational resources. It is a valuable resource for investigation of bisexuality, whether to better understand your own sexuality, to better understand a loved one or simply for learning. Bisexual Resource Center (BRC)

The organization envisions a world where love is celebrated, regardless of sexual orientation or gender expression. Because bisexuals today are still misunderstood, marginalized, and discriminated against, the BRC is committed to providing support to the bisexual community and raising public awareness about bisexuality and bisexual people. Bi Visibility Day

Bi Visibility Day, also known as International Celebrate Bisexuality Day, has been marked each year since 1999 to highlight biphobia and to help people find the bisexual community.

Organizations that Include a Focus on Bisexuality

GLAAD Accelerating Bi+ Acceptance

Through media advocacy, GLAAD lifts up the stories of bisexual and allied communities to build understanding and accelerate acceptance. Human Rights Campaign (HRC) – Explore: Bisexual

HRC is working with other advocates to increase bi-visibility and address the unique needs of the bisexual community.

Related Resources

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Aging

An extensive list of APA and other resources to support the aging lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Health

Resources reflect recent and ongoing work both in government agencies and the non-profit health care community to address LGBT health issues. PI blog post: What Can We Do to Improve Bisexuals’ Mental Health?

By Tania Israel, PhD

[gerbu]

I posted 25,693 times in 2022

That's 14,507 more posts than 2021!

167 posts created (1%)

25,526 posts reblogged (99%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@cabybapa

@sunsetwaffle345

@cabbagezonk

@dingdongyouarewrong

@shortgremlinman

I tagged 1,487 of my posts in 2022

#nashing my teeth violently - 105 posts

#fave - 82 posts

#unreality - 36 posts

#shining nikki - 27 posts

#stranger things - 24 posts

#strangerthingsedit - 14 posts

#yes - 13 posts

#art - 13 posts

#illustration - 13 posts

#will byers - 10 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#being an unabashed fan… writing fanfic… being so preoccupied with songs and driving through the mountains and iced lattes and my little gays

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

How s5 Byler would go down if I was in charge:

Will officially comes out (and he actually says he’s Gay. Like no just “I like men” he says the word gay)

Mike feels threatened by this because of his own internalized homophobia and sexuality, and gets upset

Will is understandably heartbroken and mad

Jonathan blows up at Mike

Next episode

Mike and Will haven’t resolved this yet, both are still upset and visibly uncomfortable w each other

Will and Jonathan talk about what happened, Jonathan is a fantastic brother once again

Dramatic shot of Mike staring at Will’s painting

He is visibly frustrated trying to figure himself out, thinking about Eleven etc., angry at himself for losing his best friend

Next episode

Mike thinks back to the “crazy together” scene

Realizes if he is gay and Will is gay, they can be gay together (platonically, not a couple in his eyes yet) just like they said in that scene

Mike tries to talk to Will, Jonathan refuses to leave them alone together, they end up talking in a closet for privacy with Jonathan outside the door “just in case”

Mike admits to Will he got upset because he is also gay and didn’t want to admit that to himself, they do the “crazy together” thing again, sappy mushy stuff, they hug and are best friends again.

Important that they are not romantically involved yet because Will still hasn’t fully gotten over Mike’s outburst. Jonathan is still wary of Mike despite Will forgiving him

Romantic tension is rebuilt over the following episodes

During the climax of main plot there is a Byler kiss (maybe Mike does it to save Will or vice versa)

Also side non-byler details: all the other gay characters get to actually call themselves gay or lesbian, and Robin gets a girlfriend. Mike gets more character development other than “boyfriend guy” and Eleven decides that she doesn’t need a man, or anybody.

66 notes - Posted July 9, 2022

#4

kitten school newsletter call that a school mewsletter

92 notes - Posted October 5, 2022

#3

amaury guichon will ask if somebody's already made something out of chocolate and not wait for an answer

104 notes - Posted September 28, 2022

#2

Among us babies are like butterfly wings when you touch them the color comes off on your fingers

112 notes - Posted February 18, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

As much as everybody's justifiably railing on Chris Pratt for his acting, after watching the new trailer I honestly don't think Anya Taylor-Joy is a very good fit for Peach either. The problem isn't that they're bad actors, it's that they are not voice actors. When I hear Anya's or Chris's voice I don't picture Peach and Mario, I picture two regular adult people who wouldn't stand out in a coffee shop. Which isn't the point of animated movies and voice acting! ESPECIALLY with Mario! This is supposed to be a movie about cartoonish characters in a video game fantasy world saving the day, and their voices should fit with that theme. That's why Charles Martinet's Mario voice works so well, because it makes sense for what Mario is supposed to be. This trend of giving voice acting specific jobs to non-voice actors who have no experience with this kind of work is detrimental to animation and film! It is removing job opportunities from people who have spent their lives learning this craft and handing it over to a celebrity with no experience just because they're famous. The beauty of voice acting and animation in general is how you are completely creating a character. The whole point of voice acting is that you don't point to a character in a film and say, "hey, that's Chris Pratt" the point is that people will point to the charcater and go "oh, new character!" This movie is more and more frustrating to me the more I realize how much it feels like a money grab exclusively because of the casting. The animation, the music, and the effects are all completely perfect for a Mario movie, but so many of the acting choices feel like someone just rifled through a list of "100 most popular celebrities" and chose whoever was vaguely similar to "average white man voice" or "average white woman voice". No matter how popular these people are or how good they are at acting in front of a camera or on stage, they can not voice act.

10,140 notes - Posted November 29, 2022

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