To Marie [Riese]: you are a visionary and a writer’s writer and oh so kind, and curious and smart – she’s always paying attention, isn’t she? – and all the beautiful people that were there at the beginning and continue to be apart of Autostraddle: you did it! I am soooooo honored to have been a little part of the beginning, to have contributed to this amazing space, and I support it with all my heart. Happy Birthday! Here’s to another 10!

Natalie Raaber

I think Rodeo Disco, Autostraddle’s first Pride situation, is my fondest memory. The whole weekend, actually. The Intern Army crammed sardine-style into one hotel room (and one cab, once, which horrified the driver!) Meeting everyone in person for the first time, but feeling like we already knew each other. For me it was my first accepting queer community, and I was a new baby queer, even then in my late 20s.

Elli Bradshaw

I met Riese because I commented on her blog in 2007. I was living in Orlando and had just gotten fired from my job and was going through a breakup and was about to move to NYC and thought we could be pals.

I had no idea we’d become such good friends and had no idea we’d try to create a TV show together and had no idea I’d get to be a part of the Autostraddle founding team in 2009 and had no idea we’d still be in each other’s lives in 2019.

When the site launched I was writing TV recaps. Eventually I had to leave but I was always part of the family, getting to contribute to occasional roundtables and then getting to be a part of A-Camp. Autostraddle has been a huge champion of my work and has supported all of my comic books and films and allows me to be a DJ once a year and I can never properly express my gratitude for that.

Because of Autostraddle and A-Camp I’ve met some of my favorite people and made some incredible memories. I am so, so proud of what Riese has created and what we’ve all gotten to be a part of. This is such a special community and it will be a part of my life forever.

Carly Usdin

I remember hanging out and dancing with so many readers and team members at Pride in NYC the summer of 2010! I’m pretty sure there was even mechanical bull riding. I remember my girlfriend at the time thinking it took me way too long to write about circle scarves. She was totally right. I remember the many awesome e-mails back and forth where we would say ‘hello your hair looks amazing today’ before proposing our article ideas, not to mention getting to ask all of those cute girls to participate in the “I’ll Have What She’s Wearing” segment (Hi Ericka!).

Most importantly, I remember feeling like I was a part of something real. It was real, and it was big, and it mattered, because it mattered to us, and we mattered. Actually scratch that. The most important part was feeling cool. So Cool you guys!! ALL OF YOU GUYS. Thank you <3

Becky Fonticoba

When I think about the one single moment that fully encompasses my love for, and belief in this website and the people who run it, it’s this:

We were in Riese’s Harlem apartment. “We”, I’m pretty sure, was me and the editors of the time: definitely Riese and Laneia, probably Sarah Palmer, too. Alex was maybe there, or maybe en route, or maybe she’d just left. It was June 2010.

I recall walking into Riese’s bedroom to discover that everyone was mad. [Other website] had just unveiled a new-look daily news column which had taken on the same format and schedule and everything of Autostraddle’s news column. It wasn’t the first time something we were doing was either ripped or coincidentally started later by somebody else, but they were well-established and funded and we were too small and too broke for anyone to accept it as flattery.

My stance was fuck ‘em, it was our thing, we should keep doing it. But Riese was adamant that we needed to change, so we did. Her instinct was right, per usual, because the next iteration of how we delivered news content was totally different and better than ever. That’s what Autostraddle does, and why it’s survived when others have not. It fights and perseveres through innovation and critical thought. I believe in Riese’s vision and talent more than I believe in most things, always have, and in Laneia’s creativity, and in the brilliance of every editor who has led us here. I’m just so proud of them all.

Crystal Silvester

2011 was hard. Our traffic was exploding — but so was the website itself (as in; it broke frequently) and we were barely making enough money to barely support me and Laneia, let alone anybody else. Alex had just moved to L.A. and I’d just moved to Oakland and we hadn’t yet figured out how to work well long-distance, and with Alex working another full-time job. Laneia and I went through our first (and last, hopefully!) major fight as best friends, which threw things off for a few months. At Dinah Shore, I passed out for TBD reasons and the $8k ER bill landed in my mailbox the same day I did my income taxes and realized the Autostraddle project could continue no longer.

So we asked for help — and we got it! We raised some funds and also got ourselves a management consultant who basically gave me and Laneia business couples counseling every day for several months. We learned how to manage people and organize our workload. I wrote 461 posts in 2011. FOUR HUNDRED AND SIXTY ONE. As you can imagine, there wasn’t room for much else.

Riese Bernard

I’m so lucky to have been part of this community since the beginning. I met Riese before Autostraddle’s launch through my wife Carly, who was my very new girlfriend at the time. We were all in our mid-20s and had no fucking clue. We would hang out in a weird apartment in Trump Tower of all places, sitting around a large table with a pole running through the middle and talk about what this website would look like, what it would do and who it would serve. We threw pride parties and got drunk doing L Word recaps. In the beginning, I wrote a few articles and did photoshoots with folks like Kate McKinnon.

Early on I co-created (shout out to my stylist partner Sara Medd) a project called The Calendar Girls, which was a yearly photo/video project where we highlighted queer women each month. Most of these took place over a REALLY fun weekend in CA and queers would come in from all over the country to participate. My dream is to relaunch this project and make it more inclusive and get it funded!

Thank you to Riese, Laneia and all of the editors and writers and camp staff and designers and illustrators who have dedicated so much time and talent to building this incredible place!

Robin Roemer

When I first began working for Autostraddle in 2012, a family member expressed concern that I was suddenly “on the radical fringe.” I scoffed but it turns out that person was right! Autostraddle radicalized me in pretty much all possible ways. Working there introduced me to brand new political and social ideas. It brought me into a group of friends more interesting and diverse than I’d ever had before. It convinced me that a mullet—itself a radical fringe, if you think about it—could work for me. Most of all, it taught me that a group of dedicated people can make something amazing and keep it alive. All of these lessons have energized me ever since. Long live Autostraddle and long live queers.

Cara Giaimo

I’ve been here for so long! I was here before we even existed! I was the Music Editor when we first launched. I quit for a couple of years because I was in the midst of a years-long sexual identity crisis and I wasn’t sure this was a place where I could really feel my specific queer community, but I’ve found it, helped build it, and have never once regretted returning. Every time we hold an A-Camp I am SHOCKED by how many people come to this weird world we built! Every time someone signs up for A+ I am blown away. I’m amazed any time someone I’m talking to has heard of Autostraddle, even though like, of course they have. We’ve come a long way.

There is nothing I do all year that’s more gratifying than A-Camp, or playing in the Family Band. It’s something that evolved so naturally, and I get to live out my dream of being the Donnas playing the prom at the end of the movie Jawbreaker.

Stef Schwartz

After getting to know the Autostraddle community mostly online, meeting so many members of the team for the first A-Camp in 2012 was a really incredible experience. Hanging out with Carmen Rios, feminist powerhouse extraordinaire, to organize an activism panel was basically the best. Another highlight was aggressively representing monogamous relationships on the lesbian sex panel. I wrote being a part of the Autostraddle online community and the first two A-Camps in a book chapter, “The Revolutionary Possibilities of Online Trans and Queer Communities” in 2016.

Working as a Contributing Editor as a part of the Autostraddle team gave me the courage to approach human rights activist, and founding member of the Furies Collective, Charlotte Bunch for an interview. Bunch’s activism continues to inspire me in the work I do today.

Jamie Hagen

I was a contributing editor for Autostraddle in 2012, which, lucky for me, was the year that people were creating Tumblrs dedicated to the simple lovely idea of butches doing things. Inspired by the legendary “Butches and Babies,” I created a list of my other favorites—butches baking, smiling, holding pets—alongside a staff-generated list of butch Tumblrs we wanted someone to make, which included truly brilliant things like “Butches Leaning On Things” and “Butches Driving.” We were doing really important work.

Gabrielle Korn

Early on in my Autostraddle days (I started in Spring 2012), I decided that Crystal was super cool and I wanted to be friends with her. If you’ve ever met Crystal, she is really REALLY shy and a tough nut to crack friendship-wise, so I decided that if we co-wrote music reviews together, that would surely make her want to be my friend. Looking back, I don’t know why I thought co-writing an article would cement our friendship? I really like music and reading music reviews, but do I know how to intelligently talk about music? NOPE. Autostraddle was a much more Wild West/Why Not?/Let’s Try It situation back then. Anyway, somehow I weaseled my way into co-writing a Kaki King review. But then we really did enjoy co-writing that and started reviewing music more. This led to our infamous Bad Review of Tegan and Sara’s Heartthrob (sorry, world!) but it also let me review Mal Blum early on, which is awesome! And, for the record, Crystal is my Actual Friend now and I read a poem at her wedding, so I regret nothing.

Also, thank goodness we stopped those reply-all staff emails.

Sarah Hansen

I wrote Dear Queer Diary from 2013-2014 while teaching English at a boarding school. I lived in a tragically carpeted dorm with about 20 eighth and ninth graders, and I used to write my columns in between helping them write papers and reminding them to brush their teeth. Autostraddle was my secret identity and my first regular writing gig, and I’m still proud and grateful.

Maggie Cooper

Working for Autostraddle (2013-2015ish) was always a delight. I loved writing the site’s first marijuana column, High Femme (with a beautiful illustration by the lovely Rory Midhani), and and being an A-Camp counselor for Camp 5.0. with Carolyn (Bloody Valentines!).

Some of my best memories include giggling with Carmen Rios and Rory Midhani, hosting the Buffy Once More With Feeling Singalong, and getting high as a kite and reading tarot cards. Also, to all my fellow bisexuals, yes you ARE queer enough!

This community is truly special, and I feel lucky to have been a part of its growth and legacy. Here’s to decades more of AS, until technology advances enough for it to be beamed directly into our brains/souls.

Chelsea Steiner

It’s crazy to think how much time has passed since I first wrote for AS back in 2013. At the time I was still in college in Tallahassee, FL counting down the days until graduation with no idea of what I was going to do afterwards and still trying to make Betty Page bangs work. And here I am now, in Athens, GA with a community of lifelong friends, a job I love and a really nice hairdresser. Haha!
Even though I don’t cut my own hair anymore, I definitely still daydream about hanging out with Taylor Swift.
I always had such a fun time writing for AS. I felt comfortable writing about all the dorky things I was into and knowing that there would be a friendly community who would connect with it. Thank ya’ll for including me in the AS family, I would not have been able to survive my early twenties without it.

Nina Guzman

My very favorite thing I got asked to do as an intern was photoshop the L Word characters into an IKEA shopping scene. In fact, this may be my favorite thing I was asked to do at any job.

Liz Settoducato

Look, I have so many great memories of Autostraddle, yet the one I want to tell now is really random and definitely not like the best memory but it’s still something I think about, apparently. It’s 2014 and I’m at my first ever Shakedown, Autostraddle’s yearly senior editor retreat. At the time, it was me, Rachel, Laneia, Riese, Alex and Grace up in a cabin on a mountain for a week where we launched A+ and I think recorded a podcast that was probably never published?? We definitely launched A+ which was not met with the enthusiasm and support we had hoped for but that’s a whole different story!

On one of those days, I think we were taking a break from work and Riese, Rachel and I were sitting on the couch in the downstairs living room and I’m not sure where everyone else was at this point. I think I was on Twitter and I saw that everyone was talking about John Legend’s new music video for “You and I” featuring Laverne Cox and Tig Notaro. I think I asked Riese and Rachel if they had watched it and then they were like no so we proceeded to watch it on my laptop. The music video is a bunch of individual frames of women and girls intimately looking at the camera as if they were looking at a mirror at themselves. It’s almost too hard to hold their gaze because it feels like you’re intruding in on such a private moment, gaining glimpses of how they view themselves in the world. Women and girls go about their days, getting dressed, working out, going to school. Some women are laughing and smiling and some are crying. At the end of the video, Rachel and I had shed a few tears and felt really emotional about the video. Riese, however, was so perplexed that we were crying and did not shed not one tear. And that’s it, that’s the memory I wanted to share! In Riese’s defense, I recently watched the video and I did not feel the same emotional pull that it had in 2014 so I think Riese is just way ahead of her time.

Yvonne Marquez

My favorite article I wrote for AS was a response to the finale of the Legend of Korra. I remember watching it that night (Dec 19, 2014), and freaking out when Korra and Asami walked into the spirit portal together, and immediately emailing the AS folks to see if I could write about it. It was the fastest turnaround I ever did.

SJ Sindu

In 2014, someone plagiarised a personal essay I’d written for Autostraddle. They changed the photos to make it more salacious (yes, *salacious*) and laid out my connection to the Overlords, a conservative organisation that I was beholden to. The plagiarised version went semi-viral in some of the the worst corners of the internet back home at a time when tensions about LGBTQ rights were at a peak. I e-mailed the Senior Editors, title: “Hi I am in a bit of trouble”. That turned out to be an understatement.

This episode essentially ended my time at Autostraddle, so y’know, it’s not a *good* good memory. But the folks here helped get me through it. The Senior Eds were on top of the situation from day 1, taking the plagiarists to task. I don’t think my fellow writers were 100% aware of what was going on but the staff channel was a lifeline nonetheless — knowing that some very excellent people were living their best and bravest queer lives even as it felt like mine was collapsing in around me. I moved to New York later that year, and while I could no longer be a regular contributor online, my Autostraddle community materialised irl in homemade pizza and bad lesbian movie nights and spoken word open mics. I would not do it again (esp not the spoken word), but I would also not have given up any of this for the world.

So my brief time as an Internet Gay(tm) taught me that sometimes when you spill your heart out onto the internet, some fucknuggets will stab it onto the end of the pitchfork and try to burn down your door. But so many more, especially those here, will carry it with them in their own. Part of my heart still lives here, and I’m glad for it.

Fikri Alkhatib

I was a new-ish writer. I was a brand new camper and a first-time camp staffer. I’d never met anyone from the team IRL. I was 32 and felt like maybe I’d be too…old? I felt like I was joining a queer frat or…a cult…and I was the new initiate. Once I got there, though, I felt right at home, not just with these folks who’ve become fam, but like, in my body. I’ve never felt so free to completely be myself. There’s something about 100% queer-normative space and not having to interact with straight people for whole days at a time that just releases you. (A-Camp is a kind of cult, though, just to be clear. I was right about that!)

KaeLyn Rich

When I first started writing here in 2014, right off the bat we were asked to film ourselves lip-syncing to “Because You Loved Me” and “Crazy in Love” for two A+ team videos. I was, truly, like WTF have I gotten my queer ass into?! Not that I don’t love delivering a good lipsync performance in the bathroom mirror, but the prospect of doing a filmed lipsync for, like, THE WORLD was MUCH TERRIFYING. I kept procrastinating on it and Riese was so encouraging about it. Then I did, in fact, film myself and had a good silly time and another writer’s wife said they had a crush on me from that video and my eyeliner really looked perfect and, like, I ended up feeling really good about it! Still hella’ embarrassed, but also like…hot.

KaeLyn Rich

I first joined AS as a lowly baby intern while I was living with another AS writer, Audrey White, having a pseudo life breakdown in Nicaragua! I was so excited to get the news I was accepted!! Since then I’ve photoshopped some amazing things, my favorite being Kristin Stewart partying on a beach with a bunch of queers when she came out. A true masterpiece of mine, tbh.

Since then, I’ve been able to almost become a real writer, even a staff writer! I wrote pieces I’m super proud of about capitalism and speculum design. When I joined I was basically a graphics intern, and while I always wanted to be a writer, I never thought I could, especially while also trying to figure out my career. The senior editors saw more in me, and I’m so grateful to them even as I’ve struggled to write. I’m especially grateful to Rachel for taking the time to talk me through the piece on Yona’s speculum design — something I thought was dead in the water — which came out to be one of the pieces of journalism I’m most proud of.

Happy birthday, Autostraddle, thank you for giving me a chance and believing in me when I didn’t!

Raquel Breternitz

If I had to pick my favorite thing about working here over the last decade, I’d really have to say it’s how fucking gay Kristen Stewart has become and how busy she keeps me. I am ever grateful for her pivot to Shane. I owe her my livelihood. The day Alicia Cargile held her shoes on the red carpet at Cannes was a day I will never forget.

Stef Schwartz

Getting to have my work published on Autostraddle was like the first time I wore a sleeveless hoodie out in public. I HAD ARRIVED. Also getting to creep on the AS Slack for the better part of 2016/2017 — I have never been so entertained and so intimidated. Happy birthday, you beautiful internet queers you.

Maree Hamilton

I feel so honored that I got to be an intern for Autostraddle from 2014 – 2017. I loved that I got to witness some really great conversations via Slack that were insightful and made me think. Or just make me laugh. There are so many very smart and very funny people that work at Autostraddle. I love that I got to be a part of it with you bunch of weirdos.

Nikki Smaga

Working at Autostraddle is quite literally a dream come true. Everyone is so talented, everyone is so supportive, everyone is so freaking attractive! There’s so much to love!! That makes picking a favorite experience/anecdote difficult but I’d have to say it’s probably the number of times that Laneia has stated she had to pick herself up off the floor after seeing what’s up next for Femme Brûlée. There are truly few compliments that I’ve received in memory that make me feel as proud and appreciated, and it makes doing my job so so so much easier.

Reneice Charles

In 2011, Riese and Marni came to me with the idea of A-Camp and asked what I thought about co-running it. A literal dream. I did that for 7 sessions and still work closely on senior staff helping with the execution of what I think is the most important queer event happening currently. A-Camp has become like a family to me. At A-Camp 2018, my mom had just died and I showed up in Ojai and felt so incredibly loved. It took me months to realize a lot of the people showing me such great kindness and support didn’t even know I had just been through tragedy.

I’m so grateful to this amazing community for all that they do for others and all it has done for me.

Robin Roemer

The Queer Lady Magician playlist article in 2018 was the first proper public articulation of that idea, beyond “lol should I do this thing y/n”. It ended up being a useful piece of support material for applications to do this project, and Queer Lady Magician became a REALITY. I’m not sure it would have happened at all if it wasn’t for that one suggestion by Mey to do 2018 playlists.

Creatrix Tiara