HELLO and welcome to the 287th installment of Things I Read That I Love, wherein I share with you some of the longer-form journalism/essays I’ve read recently so that you can read them too and we can all know more about JT Leroy! This “column” is less feminist/queer focused than the rest of the site because when something is feminist/queer focused, I put it on the rest of the site. Here is where the other things are.
The title of this feature is inspired by the title of Emily Gould’s tumblr, Things I Ate That I Love.
The Boy Who Cried Author, by Bruce Handy for Vanity Fair, April 2008
I saw the trailer for the upcoming J.T. Leroy movie starring Kristen Stewart and then went RIGHT back down the J.T. Leroy rabbit hole. Here’s one of the places I landed!
“Sex Education” Taught Me How to Masturbate, by Drew Gregory for Autostraddle.com, March 2019
Wow I just really love this essay — it talks about nervousness around dating while trans, being a closeted peer counselor in high school with crushes on girls but unnamed discomfort around pursuing them, the show “Sex Education,” awkward adolescence in general.
Looking back on this period of time, my desire to play psychologist (and activist) was more often than not just a means of deflection. It was easier to fight for LGBTQIA+ rights than figure out which of those letters applied to me. It was easier to take responsibility for other people’s mental illness than confront my own. And it was easier to give boy advice to sexually active friends than act on my own confused desires.
Scam or Die, by Maya Binyam, Lou Cornum and Tiana Reid for The New Inquiry, April 2019
A New Inquiry roundtable on The Summer of Scam that gets so deep into a lot of the questions and dynamics that compel us to care about these scams, including how gender and race play into our perspectives.
The Marriage Issue via New York Magazine, April 2019
This cover attracted attention for its apparent conclusion that lesbians sleep with all their clothes on, but little did you probably know that also in addition to that, there are zero articles focused on lesbian couples inside the issue itself! How neat! YET I read it and enjoyed it anyhow — particularly interesting was the gay male couple who took a third person into their marriage AND the article that begins the series, which is I believe what is immediately linked above.
“Being Gay Was Never The Hardest Part”: Rosie O’Donnell On Her Show, Her Past, And Her Passion For Barbra Streisand, by Ramin Setoodeh for Buzzfeed, March 2019
I loved this so much. I’ve been a Rosie fan since I was a kid, have hung out with her a few times, and remain very interested in how her treatment by the media when she came out impacted an entire generation of queer women. (Like me)
The Creeping Capitalist Takeover Of Higher Education, by Kevin Carey for Huffpost Highline, April 2019
Wow so the for-profit colleges scam we’ve discussed here many times continues to be really bad — which is discussed here — but also there’s ANOTHER really bad thing and that’s how E-Learning has evolved within the structure of established universities who are funneling most of tuition revenue to the companies that facilitate online courses!
The Believer, by Davy Rothbart for The California Sunday Magazine, March 2019
Who was the girl who made it to the half-pipe freestyle skiing competition in the actual Olympics and, on her turn, did basically zero tricks and scored last but seemed really cool about it regardless? Here she is: Elizabeth Swaney!
We All Scream, by Charlotte Druckman for Eater, April 2019
The story of ultra-premium ice cream — how it’s made, who makes it, what it costs, why it costs so much, and why the business is booming right now.
There’s Gotta Be Something Better Than This, by Alexandra Molotkow for Hazlitt, April 2019
This wave of appreciation will also be a reckoning. Fosse’s behavior was never a secret, and not much will be revealed that wasn’t known, or inferable, decades ago; but moral immunity has been rescinded for geniuses, and the humanity of those harmed is not so easy to discount, at least in criticism, when it complicates the legacy of someone beloved. The liminal, disturbing emotions that come with this process—the restive coexistence of pleasure and disgust, the disappointment and self-suspicion—form the mood of Fosse’s work; this mood feels appropriate for its consumption.
Riese! These! Links! Are! So! Good!
This column is one of my favorite things on the internet. I totally understand why the This Business of Art fix was discontinued, but I sure miss it.
Wow! That Rosie article was something else! I didn’t realize how much of that show is imprinted in my memory— the Koosh balls, Chub Club, the Livin La Vida Loca music cue 😅
Excellent Rosie O’Donnell article. Love how she defends her fondness for Tom Cruise. So often gay men idolize and objectify beautiful famous women—Madonna, Lady Gaga, Cher—why can’t gay women appreciate the bods of hot famous men?
Saved, saved, saved.
I’m really curious about the article on the chill pro skier.
Is it just me, or does the “handmade’s tale” quip in the ice cream article fall a little… weird?
Love the Elizabeth Swaney story.