Half the Self Hate: Kate Bornstein Wriggling Towards Fun
Inspired to create a series about self love by the People Magazine series “Half Their Size,” the Half The Self Hate series is about how artists and activists have put into practice the radical act of loving oneself in a society that commodifies self hatred. This is a series about self love triumphing over self hate, and valuing yourself as a radical act of resistance.
Gender Outlaw and legend Kate Bornstein joins the conversation about learning to let go of self-hate:
“I don’t have to follow anyone else’s rules about gender and sexuality—rather, I can explore the non-binaries of me. The struggle? I’m a double Pisces. I don’t struggle so much as I wriggle. I’m wriggling toward being the most fun me I can be. The challenges all seem to come down to someone else’s respectable rules, regulations, standards, and values. I’m wriggling away from all that, as best I can. ”
Plus Size Pageant Documentary–There She Is and some questions for my readership about being fat and expressing gender
I’m wondering from readers what they feel like about wearing make-up, whether they find it compulsory, if they feel comfortable in public spaces or specifically queer spaces without it (if they are a make-up identified person)?
In what ways do you feel “in your gender,” and how does that present? How does that differ from day to day, moment to moment?
How do you respond to weight loss in your life? Are there ways that you make it value-neutral?
The Forest of the Future: A Sanctuary at the Edge of the World
Back in March, I had the opportunity to spend a lot of time in an amazing sanctuary space amidst a temporary art installation in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. It’s hard to explain what the Forest of the Future was, but for some background you can read the curator/producer Quito’s statement about it here. It really gives a good background of how they just wanted to make a magical space to bring together a bunch of the visionaries they’ve met in their world travels, see what connections and catalyzing could happen, and that space was a forest.
Cupcake Cabaret, a Performance Celebrating Self Love at Stonewall, 7PM on Thursday, April 18th
My mission in life is to make the world safe for people to love themselves. One of the ongoing projects I keep is very dear to my heart, which is a performance art series celebrating the radical act of self love. It is definitely very radical to love yourself in a society that tells you that you aren’t worthy of any love or appreciation, or conditional love and appreciation (like, if you lose 20 pounds, etc…). One of the things I love most is to hear how artists have used their differences to become empowered. That’s what I curate in this series.
I’m super excited to have Ivan Coyote, the dreamy professional storyteller, author and multi-award winning bad ass, in NYC from Canada and featured performer at the upcoming Cupcake Cabaret.
Q and A with Author of Rye, a Genderqueer Erotica Novel
Sam Rosenthal asked me to take a look at his new, self-published genderqueer erotica novel called Rye. It is a really awesome method to love your body and reclaim your sexuality by consuming porn, erotica and images that reflect your body, gender and sexuality. Rye features a genderqueer main character as well as a polyamorous relationship, both things that aren’t depicted in mainstream sexuality.
I did a Q and A with Sam about the process of bringing Rye to life! Enjoy!
FAT SEX WEEK: Single for Lyfe Lifestyle with Mads Dudebabemodel
Mads Dudebabemodel, a Portland-based queer style icon, is the only person I’ve ever followed on the internet just because of babeliness. (“Stop/don’t stop shamelessly flirting with me on the internet,” they said.) I noted that they declared that they were “Single for Lyfe” identified and I thought this was a great topic during the time of year when our culture strongly pushes couplehood. I want you to imagine that me and Mads are chilling, Bevin-as-Queer-Oprah style in a couple of fabulous fat-friendly chairs and having a proper talk show interview.
FAT SEX WEEK: My Favorite Places to Buy Plus Size Lingerie
Probably one of the questions I am asked most often by people I don’t know very well, other than legal advice, is about plus size lingerie shopping. I suppose it’s a compliment to my personal shopping prowess and exceptional cleavage enhancement techniques. It’s true, I ADORE lingerie. I wear loungerie to hang out in the house in and to sleep in, I wear fancy lingerie in the bedroom as well as on stage femmeceeing, I often wear vintage lingerie as dresses and shirts. I have the equivalent of a full closet of lingerie. That’s not hyperbole. I believe lingerie is for all times and not just special occasions. It’s like make-up for the bedroom.
I thought for FAT SEX WEEK I would do a round-up of the places that I really like (this list is by no means exhaustive, I could probably do four blog entries about lingerie). I also include a quickie product review of the Milana Bra by Genie!
Pre-Order Sissy Calendar by Elisha Lim Now!
You might freak out about your 2012 plans if you think about them now (I do), but what better way to queer up that freak out than to pre-order a subversive gender queer celebration of femininity in the form of Elisha Lim’s latest project SISSY: A 2012 Wall Calendar.
“[E}very month brave and beautiful queers talk about sequins, glitter, femininity, insults, courage, happiness and femme pride.”
Hot Piece of Hipster: Summer Genderqueer Hair
I think a lot about hair. I just had a discussion with a friend of mine about why we have no overlap in the folks we sleep with though we are both 32 year old queer fat femmes who live in the same borough. Given how small the community we queers roll in, I have overlap with friends of mine all over the country. This friend said she has a thing for people with bad hair and I said “Aha! That’s it! I only date people with good hair.” It’s really the very first thing I notice about someone when I am attracted. Hair, style, tattoos in that order.
So when my friend Max Voltage from Portland asked my opinion about good genderqueer summer hair looks I was totally into the task of compiling favorites. And with Max’s permission I repost my email below so that you out there looking for summer genderqueer hairstyles might benefit from my research. (And for those of you who do not start out with hair like Max, I’ve thrown a few favorites that I didn’t suggest to Max below.)