Where the Hope Comes From

Every time Pride Month rolls around, I find myself thinking about—long-time readers, prepare to be unsurprised—the whole non-inheritability of queer culture thing all over again. The sheer volume of "I don't even know what I don't know" that comes to most queerlings when they realize they're different, but by virtue of the people around them, …

The Shoulder Check Problem

A couple of days ago, there was a discussion that sort of flashed past my timeline. An author of gay romance who is also a gay man was expressing the frustration over a sentiment in an m/m group that was posted—“women write the best m/m”—and how unwelcoming it can feel to gay men writing gay …

Just Another Baseball Game

By now, you've likely heard about Thom Brennaman's "accident." He said something homophobic on a hot mic. It went on the air at a baseball game. And, happily, there were consequences for him. He's been suspended, is my understanding. And the Reds put out an almost-decent apology, even. I say "almost decent" because if they'd …

Judging for Yourself

Both the Lammies and the RITAs have announced their finalist lists for the year. Now, before anything else, I want to make sure I begin with a simple declarative here: there are some really great things that are happening on both lists. And there's some buts. I don't know how coherent I'm going to be …

Not All Catholics (or Christians, or…)

Recently, I shared a post on my Facebook about a Denver Archbishop preaching hate in the form of conversion therapy (which is widely debunked and incredibly harmful, just to make that clear). I dismissed him with a series of invectives, and then edited the post after someone asked why I'd share the post in the …

#PrideMonth — Family Values

I live in a bubble. More specifically, I live in a queer, lower-case-L liberal bubble. I often hear people refer to living in a bubble as a bad thing, and I do understand why. The bubble gives you a skewed view of what you think most people think. Talking about queer rights in my bubble doesn't …