TAYLOR ALXNDR! Good dogs! Good advice! Etc!

Hey friends,

Hope you’re all hanging in there. I am currently eating a LOT of popcorn because scientifically it’s impossible to suffer when you’re eating popcorn.

Anyway, this week’s episode features triple-threat icon TAYLOR ALXNDR! Topics include:

• “Can we develop the surgery that turns me into a sassy amorphous cloud?”
• Organizing hundreds of events with dozens of queers over a decade… and not having it collapse from infighting and drama somehow?!
• Drag as gender euphoria
• Drag as a political organizing tool
• Drag as something that should go back underground?
• Why queer Southern culture is so overlooked
• One of the greatest drag show concepts of all time (mitochondrihanna!)
• Talking to your friends about your gender crisis on close friends IG stories while you thrive on the grid, lol

We also have a very special TWiG segment this week, in which Ozzy shares some fun facts about the Iditarod. Did you know that there have been at least three trans mushers in the last few years?

Photo ID: Apayauq Reitan's 2022 sled dog team. There are roughly 8 dogs standing in the snow, all wearing blue jackets and little booties.

Next week on the show, we’ll be speaking with Jo Krishnakumar about their work within the queer, trans, anti-caste, sex worker and mental health advocacy movements. Excited for y’all to hear it!

This week’s Links & Stuff is longer than normal, so hopefully at least one of these sparks ur interest:

• Eve 6 Guy (Max Collins) has an advice column now and it’s weirdly very good??
• Speaking of advice, my friend Lizzy wrote this article based on a tweet I did about social anxiety lol. I think it turned out well!!! 
• I loved Jess Zimmerman’s piece from last September about abortion and family and Jess’s grandma’s dream of being “a bum.”
• As a non-parent, I really appreciated the parenting observations that Ijeoma Oluo shared in her newsletter.
• I also really appreciated this conversation between Nicole Chung and Dr. Chandra Prescod-Weinstein, which includes “think[ing] about science outside of the military-industrial complex, outside of colonialism.”
• For people who are able to access New York Times articles:
  • This article about why Ukraine has so many surrogate mothers and what’s happening to them during the war is....... :( 
  • Do y’all already know about Dr. John Fryer, who spoke anonymously at the 1972 APA convention about how homosexuality shouldn’t be considered a mental illness? I think someone made a podcast about it at one point? Anyway, here’s a recap.
    • Here’s a good line from it: ““Dr. Fryer was giddy as he left the stage, so exhilarated that, before returning to Philadelphia, he splurged on a manual harpsichord, which he wryly described as “among the least wise choices of my life.””
  • On a completely different note, here’s how they picked out the props to make Severance so spooky.
• I learned about a cool truck that’s designed to be safer for pedestrians and cyclists .
• Ending on a light note: I love these photos of this Starbucks worker who wears his fursuit to rallies.

Photo ID: Someone wearing jeans and a Starbucks apron and a white Arctic wolf fursuit is standing outside a Starbucks with a sign that says "UNION YES"

That’s it for this week! Here’s your weekly Rhubarb, taken by my roommate as usual. (This is one of my all-time favorite pictures of her :) :) :) )

Photo ID: Ruby sleeping under a blanket with her head on a pillow like a tiny human.

Xo,
Yr resident gender detective

PS:

Photo ID: A screenshot from Duolingo that says "Write this in Spanish: I need a new brain."