Also.Also.Also: Elliot Page & Mae Martin Got Matching Tattoos, So UMMM šŸ‘€

Tonight it is cashew shrimp & mango stir-fry, plus leftover chocolate cake! Let’s vote, should it be a beer or a glass of rosĆ© with this “very classy” meal? Let me know!


Queer as in F*ck You

I cannot even lie, I would follow this dreamboat couple (in my dreams, at least) to the ends of the earth…

Elliot Page & Mae Martin Got Matching Tattoos & They’re the Cutest. “The pair of nonbinary Canadian actors posted a pic to Instagram [last week] showing off their brand new matching coffee cup tattoos. Page got his on his arm, while Martin got theirs on their side…. This isnā€™t the first time the two have been seen hanging out since both came out. And we highly doubt it will be the last!”

Related, Elliot Page Says ā€˜But Iā€™m a Cheerleaderā€™ Helped Him Overcome ā€˜Shame and Self-Hatred’

Who Gets to be Femme? My favorite thing I read today! Directly being delivered to you, from my high femme heart!! šŸ’–

Speaking of things we love, this cover profile of Beanie was very popular with the Autostraddle team! Beanie Feldstein Is More Than Your Bestie

The Queer the Land Collective in Seattle Is Showing What Community Homeownership Means

Josephine Baker to Be Honored With a PanthƩon Burial. Madam Josephine will be the first Black woman to be entombed in the PanthƩon in Paris, a symbolic move amid racial tensions in France.

Tori Cooper Is 1st Black Trans Woman On Presidential HIV/AIDS Panel, Seeks To Focus On Equality

Neighbors Erect Large Pride Flag After School Bans LGBTQ, BLM Signs

At Least 29 Out LGBTQ Paralympians Competing in Tokyo, a Record Number


Saw This, Thought of You

It’s never too early for spooky season! The Many Faces of Women Who Identify as Witches (this also reminded me of Where My Black Witches At? Using Black Ancestral Magic Against White Supremacy, a piece I loved that we published last year)

How Sony Tarnished Jeopardy! and Alex Trebekā€™s Legacy

Bitch actually first published this in their print magazine in June (it was just released online), but wow couldn’t be more relevant to our OnlyFans times: Inside Social Mediaā€™s War on Sex Workers. I would pair that with: Inside StripTok, Where Strippers Have Started A New Kind Of Community

This knocked the wind outta me, Rest in Infinite Power. Lucille Times, Who Inspired the Montgomery Bus Boycott, Has Died at 100 Years Old. “Six months before Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat, Lucille Times had an altercation with a bus driver and stopped riding the cityā€™s segregated buses. She died at 100 from complications of Covid-19.”


Political Snacks

I don’t think I’ve ever done this before, and I cannot stress enough that I do NOT believe any of us should get news from comedians (not ever!), but I watched the John Oliver show this morning discuss the cruel clusterfuck of Afghanistan and it was honestly the most balanced take, damning of all sides of the American “intervention” over the last twenty years, that I’ve seen yet and I wanted to share it:

Before you go! Autostraddle runs on the reader support of our AF+ Members. If this article meant something to you today ā€” if it informed you or made you smile or feel seen, will you consider joining AF and supporting the people who make this queer media site possible?

Join AF+!

Carmen Phillips

Carmen Phillips is Autostraddle's former editor in chief. She began at Autostraddle in 2017 as a freelance team writer and worked her way up through the company, eventually becoming the EIC from 2021-2024. A Black Puerto Rican feminist writer with a PhD in American Studies from New York University, Carmen specializes in writing about Blackness, race, queerness, politics, culture, and the many ways we find community and connection with each other.Ā  During her time at Autostraddle, Carmen focused on pop culture, TV and film reviews, criticism, interviews, and news analysis. She claims many past homes, but left the largest parts of her heart in Detroit, Brooklyn, and Buffalo, NY. And there were several years in her early 20s when she earnestly slept with a copy of James Baldwinā€™s ā€œFire Next Timeā€ under her pillow. To reach out, you can find Carmen on Twitter, Instagram, or her website.

Carmen has written 716 articles for us.

11 Comments

  1. Lucille Times was a pioneer who has been largely forgotten. It really is a shame. Just like Claudette Colvin and the other women whose lawsuit helped change the segregation laws. Black history is American history.

  2. getting matching tattoos with your queer friend who might be more than a friend bc you just Vibe so well is something that can be so personal, actually

  3. Ahh Carmen thank you for that ‘who gets to be femme’ piece <3 <3

    I needed this piece for so many reasons and share the authors' questions. Yes language evolves. Yes queer culture is constantly appropriated by the mainstream/capitalism. Yes the word queer feels like it's losing its meaning. And yes I'm fucking mad about it [and constantly questioning whether it's okay to be mad about it…]

    Today I spotted a super-trendy straight-owned company that makes 'gender neutral' clothing (I mean, they're like joggers and t-shirts so, yeah – radical -_-) with "Chosen Family" splashed across its front page *puke* – after sending in my complaint, came directly to autostraddle (it's an automatic response when dyke rage descends, I don't even notice myself typing "a-u-t-o…") and ahhh…soothed. Thanks for providing an ever-relevant, nuanced, comforting home for all of us in a world of erasure <3

    • I second Autostraddle being the first place I go to when sexuality- or gender related rage engulfs me…it’s like coming home to your chosen family to rant

  4. That piece on “femme” was excellent. It’s so hard to explain what coming out in the 90s was like. You felt like you had to choose between extremes. Great for some, not great for others. But with the “femme” label came passing and erasure. The inclusivity of today is great, but the language is so different.

    • Thank you for this reflection. I came to the comments to read reactions on this piece. Iā€™m in my early twenties and read Stone Butch Blues a few years ago while coming out and remember thinking that if I had been born fifty years earlier, I would have had to choose, and wondering what I would have chosen.

  5. Thank you, Carmen. This has been a tough week, and you gave me something to watch that made it more tolerable (not sur

    • Ughā€¦

      (not sure why I hadnā€™t had Feel Good on my list until this post) and a willingness to consider a tattoo when my partner suggested it. The power of an Instagram photo and autostraddleā€™s ability to share only the good parts of social media with my antisocial ass.

Comments are closed.