Feature Image via Net-a-Porter
Well, look at us! We’re making it through another day!
Queer as in F*ck You
“I don’t think I should be a spokesperson for any community! But, as far as the individual and emotional, nothing gets me more than having a moment with another T girl. I’m like… [she emits a long squeak]. There is a wavelength that is special and important. Whenever I see another T girl or a pair of lesbians, I’m like, ‘Yes!’ It’s a good feeling to know that you are not singular.”
Euphoria star Hunter Schafer on being a Supernova for Porter
Spelman College Today Announced That It Has Met the $2 Million Dollar Match It Needed for Their New Audre Lorde Chair Endowed Professorship of Queer Studies!!! LET’S GO BLACK QUEER STUDIES, I AM SO EXCITED ABOUT THIS DEVELOPMENT!!
Speaking of which, Language Is Critical: How Alice Walker Broke Taboos in Writing Celie in The Color Purple
I have been waiting all week to tell you about this, but we have to talk about Aretha Franklin’s queer sister Carolyn that I never knew about until now! (This is an excellent biographical essay, with a lot of great analysis of Carolyn’s music, if that’s your kind of thing)
I actually don’t even know how to describe this one, but please just know that it is delightful and one of the best personal essays I have read about life in your 30s, probably ever, and certainly one of the best personal essays I read last week — The “Flop Era:” Acceptance, Liberation, and Renaissance by Harron Walker for W
Big news from the weekend: Nicki Minaj Has Agreed to Pay Tracy Chapman $450,000 to Settle a Lawsuit Over the Rapper’s Song “Sorry
Katie Sowers not returning to Niners (but we will always have that sexy ass Super Bowl ad from last year)
We technically already have a whole post about it on the site, but I’m too hyped to keep my mouth shut! Have y’all checked out the trailer drop for Lee Daniels’ new Billie Holiday biopic yet?
Speaking of which…
One day I'd like for us to discuss that Tallulah Bankhead fcked both Billie Holiday and Hattie McDaniel. It doesn't have to be today. Lots going on in the world. But one day, and one day SOON, we're circling back to this.
A bad bitch. I tip my hat. pic.twitter.com/91pVsqAcC3
— Carmen Phillips (@carmencitaloves) January 12, 2021
Saw This, Thought of You
Instead of a ‘New You,’ Reconnect With Your OG Self
“It’s very difficult for people to really have a very clear perspective on the future if you have not really taken the time to understand your history.” Meet the Southern Librarians Fighting for Racial Justice and Truth-Telling
As an Intense Winter Unfolds, Some Lessons From Herbalists from Jenna Wortham at The New York Times
The WNBA Can’t Keep Kelly Loeffler Around by Jemele Hill for The Atlantic. (“The defeated senator and Atlanta Dream co-owner is too far out of sync with the league’s values.” — ya damn right.)
Yesterday was Mary J Blige’s 50th Birthday, and while Black women online every celebrated with #ToMaryWithLove, I wanted to share my favorite performance of hers of all time. From her Lifetime Achievement Award from BET in 2019 when — at 48 years old! — she performed an entire 20 minute set, with full choreography and live mic, by herself:
Political Snacks
Whew political snacks are weird AF today because… well last week there was an insurrection and attempted coup on United States, and tomorrow Trump will become the first US President to be Impeached twice. And it’s at least reasonably likely that there might be another violent insurrection between now and the inauguration of a new President. So, yeah. There’s that.
- Impeach Him, but We’re Past the Point Where Impeachment Fixes This
- If you, like me, are still trying to wrap you brain around what the fuck happened last week — may I suggest Melissa Harris Perry’s (who I trust always) new podcast “System Check” with Dorian Warren at The Nation, Political Violence Is No Anomaly in American History
- Also perhaps more surprisingly, this Twitter thread: To make sense of the pro-Trump attack on the Capitol, many folks have analogized to military conflicts like the War of 1812. A better analogy is rooted in our long history of racial authoritarianism. This wasn’t war, this was a Lynch mob.
Tallulah Bankhead is such a legend! I only wish she had done more films, but she is absolutely delightful in Alfred Hitchcock’s movie, Lifeboat. I also wish she had written a memoir because it probably would have been the greatest book of all time.
As a 30something, that flop era article was spot on, right down to the Blink-182 that’s been in my head so often lately. Loved this in particular:
“The old me might have needed a shitty boss and an unreliably caring [partner] to feel affirmed by the world, but the new me—the one I’m still in the process of becoming, but closer to being than ever before—just needs herself.”
So many emotions from the Hunter Schafer article… Joy that things have changed and this gorgeous girl is out there beat jealousy that it didn’t happen 35 years ago for the win.
1st – Tracy Chapman is dreamy.
2nd – Rosie O’Donnell was a WNBA supporter from jump. maybe she could join LeBron James’s ownership group for the Dream. they are such a deserving team :?
I really love that “connect with your OG self” article, thanks for sharing it:
“Look at the things you needed the most in 2020. How can you give them to yourself in 2021?”
Hunter Schafer is such a peach! I want her to have everything!