Feature image by Eddie Mulholland – WPA Pool/Getty Images
I feel like the intro’s to these link roundups lately have been a running diary about my mental health? Which was not on purpose, but to keep the theme alive I did have an hour long panic attack this morning. But I’m feeling much calmer now! And I promise next week we’ll go back to talking about what I’m eating for dinner or whatever.
Queer as in F*ck You
8 Hour Meetings and Shouting Matches: School Boards Are Making LGBTQ+ Students’ Lives Hell. From the editor, Matthew Rodriguez: an “incisive look into the politiciziation of school boards, which have gone from bureaucratic budget-balancing bodies to ideological arenas.”
Staying with that same back to school energy, “Don’t Say Gay” Bill and The Fight to Preserve LGBTQ+ History (related: Miami-Dade School Board Votes Against Recognizing LGBTQ History Month)
Meet the Real-World Rude Lesbian Swordfighter Behind Gideon the Ninth
Saw This, Thought of You
Queen Elizabeth II Dies at 96; Was Britain’s Longest-Reigning Monarch. “She ruled for seven decades, unshakably committed to the rituals of her role amid epic social and economic change and family scandal.” I am American, and I feel ill equipped to weigh in on the 70 year rule of Queen Elizabeth II, the role of the modern monarchy, and the legacy of the Royal Family, all of it, in front of the thousands of readers who will see this. So, I am purposefully in this moment staying in my lane during what’s truly a once in our lifetime changing of the guard. I am also sure there will be an infinite number of pieces that we’ll be able to link to and learn from in the days and weeks to come, questions to be asked, histories to be re-evaluated.
What I do feel confident about is this one piece of a very large pie, so I am including it here:
Black and brown people around the world who were subject to horrendous cruelties and economic deprivation under British colonialism are allowed to have feelings about Queen Elizabeth.
After all, they were her "subjects" too.
— Karen Attiah (@KarenAttiah) September 8, 2022
And also, you’re going to be hearing a lot about Operation London Bridge: Britain Has an Intricate Plan That Maps Out the 10 Days After Queen Elizabeth’s Death
I’m someone who’s always had a lot of long-distance, text based friendships, way before there was pandemic surge of the “almighty group chat,” so this article mostly confused me? But for the rest of you, Would You Exit The Group Text?
A Swimming Cap Made for Black Hair Gets Official Approval After Previous Olympic Ban, as a Black girl for whom swimming is a mental health life line, this means a lot to meeeeeeee.
Everyone Should Wear Absolutely Huge Sunglasses. I emphatically agree, and also wrote about this back in May: “I describe this aesthetic as ‘rich white republican grandma on her fifth martini, sitting in the backyard her family’s estate in Connecticut and watching her grandson Chip play polo.'”
In Defense Of Black Women (Like Me) Who Can’t Dance. Speak on it!!
Political Snacks
If I had to see this headline, then so do you. Ted Cruz Says Workers Forced to Pay for Degrees in Queer Pet Literature.
And One More Thing…
This clip led to a very excited 5-10 minutes in the Autostraddle office as we furiously debated whether or not Susan Sarandon came out last night on The Tonight Show.
waking up to susan sarandon saying she's bi with her whole chest we never fucking losepic.twitter.com/4EOZmvw3RL
— talia (@tinapkennard) September 8, 2022
(We’ve landed on she’s making a joke about her cats. But in 2017 she sure did tell an interviewer “My sexual orientation is up for grabs, I guess you could say” and we wrote about it.)
Trying to decide if it’s okay that “rich white republican grandma on her fifth martini, sitting in the backyard her family’s estate in Connecticut and watching her grandson Chip play polo” is a total GILF…
Carmen, as a citizen of a Commonwealth realm I just wanted to say, I really appreciate everything about your approach in what your wrote (and didn’t write), and linked to, regarding Queen Elizabeth II’s death
As a person living in the commonwealth navigating the social aspects of the queen’s death at the moment I’d say it’s generally “condolences” to your employer and “congratulations” to your friends.
Mostly I’m hoping this will push more commonwealth countries to ditch uk monarchs as their head of state.
Although i will say I’m super confused by American politicians/public figures who are lavishing praise on her. From a historical perspective that is not what i was expecting. Like do they know?
(I’m sure they do but do i ever have some jokes about george 3 and elizabeth 2)
https://www.facebook.com/aotearoaliberationleague/videos/4781608328609580
Susan actually said she was bi on a podcast back in 2021! I believe it was Divorced Not Dead!
As a Brit (whose feelings about the monarchy are…in line with yours + Bank Holiday hopeful) since it was at Balmoral, the 10 day sequence is actually Operation Unicorn 🦄 which is something!
Where does one obtain a degree in Queer Pet Literature? I think I have some credits I could transfer.
A bisexual woman who has been open about her sexuality for years and single handledly bisexualised both The Hunger and Thelma and Louise: I’m bi
Lesbians of Autostraddle: what could this POSSIBLY mean???????
I live in England and am half Irish. The colonisation aspects are important and real – and lets’ not forget, the British empire still has several foreign ‘possessions’, including the Caymans, the Falklands, Gibraltar, Northern Ireland.
There’s also a really nasty, collective outpouring of very performative ‘grief’ going on. This has material consequences. At the brink of an extreme cost of living crisis, councils have cancelled events last minute, costing business’ in outlay of funds, and in sorely needed profits. This also costs casual workers wages – people who often aren’t entitled to benefits, salary or employment insurance.
I live in England and am half Irish. The colonisation aspects are important and real. Lets’ not forget, the British empire still has several foreign ‘possessions’, including the Caymans, the Falklands, Gibraltar, and Northern Ireland.
There are also classist and economic factors to the way this is being handled. A long term issue for socialists in our country is that the Royal Family is funded by the taxpayer.
The UK is in a cost of living crisis so bad that thousands are predicted to die this winter, because they can’t afford heating. Before government intervention our bills were expected to average £500 a month.
Despite this, councils have responded to the Queen’s death by cancelling events last minute. Costing businesses and individuals money they cannot afford to lose. All in order to ‘mourn’ the passing of Britain’s wealthiest woman.
There’s also a collective outpouring of very performative ‘grief’ that I find disturbing, and has already gotten nasty.
Working class TV pundit Stacey Solomon is currently being brutally harassed on social media. Why? Because in *2018*, she said she said she didn’t understand the country’s obsession with the Royal Family, and added:
“It’s freezing cold outside and people are homeless and these people have houses to spare and it does sometimes become a little bit frustrating because I don’t see the purpose of all that money going to this entire family.”
Yes. Thanks for putting it so eloquently.
They’re now arresting people for expressing anti monarchist sentiment.
A woman was arrested for holding an anti monarchy sign in Edinburgh, and a man was arrested for yelling “who elected him” at the announcement of King Charles accession.
I’d like to address any Non-UK people if I may:
In future, please do not use North Korea as the go-to example. People are being arrested here for simply holding up anti-Monarchist signs. They’re being arrested for shouted “who elected him?”. These are just the first two days proper. There’s no need to bring another country into it or be the benchmark for comparison when the perfect one is already on display in perfect pearlescent white.
The UK rightly has a lot to answer for with regards to its history AND its present, and my comment on an Autostraddle article is never going to do justice to the full coverage of that subject, but the whitewashing here has been breathtaking, even by British standards. Truly we are all having our face held down in the gruel of grief here: some are lapping it up and others are drowning in it against their will.
I went back to watch it. She was clearly joking about her fondness for cats and dogs, but it was pretty appalling of Jimmy Fallon to quickly and in a borderline bi panic to make sure and clarify that it was a joke. He was embarrassing.