Thinking about sophomore year of high school when Paul (🚬) called me kaffir boy on our way to our cars after school, feigning ignorance as to the impact of the word. “What? You are.” The third person with us didn’t understand what he said or what it meant. Subtle knife.
Queer History Fact: during the AIDS crisis, many lesbians became frontline caregivers and activists for gay and bi men when society and institutions abandoned them. Their leadership and solidarity are part of why the ‘L’ now comes first in LGBTQIA+.
@cashewrising I would have a whole class on lines and door policies and how they evolved. Another on digital/physical media. Maybe a third on drugs/alcohol.
All of the (queer/fem) artists in the roll call of Le Tigre’s Hot Topic:
Gertrude Stein, Marlon Riggs, Billie Jean King, Ut, DJ Kuttin Kandi, David Wojnarowicz, Melissa York, Nina Simone, Ann Peebles, Tami Hart, The Slits, Hanin Elias, Hazel Dickens, Cathy Sisler,
Hyphenating “on-line” is such a strange choice. It’s not in any contemporary style guide. All caps “ZERO” and no apostrophe in “yall” are dissonant with “sum total” and “full of fully.” My guess is this was a ‘humanized’ PR/legal template with interpretive wiggle room.
@cashewrising I would have a whole class on lines and door policies and how they evolved. Another on digital/physical media. Maybe a third on drugs/alcohol.
@cashewrising The steelman version of this could be very cool. Maybe starting at the tail end of disco and do an overlap with punk and house. Paradise Garage. Vagina Creme Davis / genderfuck drag. Susanne Bartsch parties. Have one session on regional subcultures.
One more tangential snippet, same interview, talking about how people are “raced.” Wilkerson covers the construction of race in “Caste,” showing the serviceability for unifying Europeans under one moniker and enslaved Africans under another. 6/6
Very interesting! First draft thoughts: Gay and Black are both constructed identities. Black identity predates gay identity (not gay activity!) by ~300 years. Sexuality (biological? corporeal? innate?) is more indelible, or foundational, for the author than Black-ness. 1/6
Here’s Toni Morrison (1993, Charlie Rose) talking about Clarence Thomas’s Senate confirmation and her refusal to give up “one drop of melanin” to achieve success. 5/6