When Lady Gaga’s Born This Way song came out, it was globally taken as an anthem for LGBT folks (not by all of us, of course, and there are a lot of reservations to the “Born This Way” motto that persists). It was obviously written, and its music video produced, with that in mind.

There are a lot of songs throughout history that played that part, and some of them aren’t really that obviously written bearing queer people in mind. It’s interesting, though, to listen to those songs and understand the role they played, for some particular generation, in helping them make their statement.

What do you think is the most significant queer anthem that is? How do you feel about electing a song to represent the queer community? Do you hold any particular song or artist as a personal anthem or iconic figure?

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Welcome to Queer History! Queer History will be a bi-monthly feature highlighting important days in queer history from around the world during the month.

The beginning of May is not exactly chockfull of queer historical events, but I did manage to find a couple of dates of interest.

First week of May, 1970 – Morris Knight leads the Los Angeles Gay Liberation Front (GLF) in a zap of American Psychiatric Association conference in San Francisco

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This review is not safe for work, and includes text and images that you almost certainly don’t want you boss to see you looking at. It also may be considered by some to be TMI, but that’s what happens when someone reviews sex toys.

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There will be a vigil/pride rally in remembrance of Brandy Martell, a transwoman and trans-rights activist who was murdered in Oakland last weekend by some truly worthless scumbags, on May 13th at 6PM in Frank Ogawa Plaza. Frank Ogawa Plaza has been the main rallying point of Occupy Oakland and is just a few blocks from where Martell was fatally shot. Let’s come out and show them we’re united and we’re not going to tolerate their hate.

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• “Being bisexual is actually a thing. It’s not made up.” – Anna Paquin on being a bisexual woman.
• Absurd organization One Million Moms protesting JC Penney’s inclusion of lesbian couple and daughter in catalogue.
• UK’s Prime Minister David Cameron supports marriage equality.
• Washington State University considering including hormone replacement therapy in student insurance plan coverage.
• SHOCKER! US House Republicans are demanding the removal of protections for queer people, immigrants, and Native Americans from the Violence Against Women Act.

Featured image of JC Penney ad featuring lesbian couple and daughter.

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Last week saw many international comedians make their way down under for Sydney’s Comedy Festival, and while I couldn’t really afford to catch their main acts, a friend of mine managed to score free tickets to a last-minute improv gig, which many of the visiting comedians were encouraged to participate in. I tagged along, not knowing what to expect but hoping for the best. The show turned out to be a traveling gig, the premise of it being comedians were provided with a phrase (often a non sequitor or absurd situation) that they then had to use as the basis of a joke as part of their ten-minute ‘set’. Sounds potentially interesting, I thought. ‘Gives you a clear view into the mind of a comic’, a tagline for the show read. Being a fan of comedy and an admirer of the skill and intellect it takes to be a stand-up comedian, I must admit I thought I was in for a bit of a treat. It turned out to not be exactly what I was expecting.

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I was sitting in a booth this weekend, wedged between a couple I had just met, and a few long-time friends. We were having a good time, when one person in the new couple started a sentence with “Not to sound racist but…”

In my experience, anything that follows that, or a handful of other sentence starters (“No offense…” or “I’m not sexist but…”) is not going to be a good thing. In this case that held true – the story he told included making a sweeping generalization about an ethnic group based on a single interaction he had. I have been known to simply walk away from conversations like this before, but in this case that would have meant making 3 people get out of the booth for me to leave, so it wasn’t something that could be done gracefully.

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On Sunday Redeyechicago.com posted a good article about female condoms. They covered all of the basics: What they are, how they have changed since they were new, how to get them in Chicago, and what people do and do not know about them.

Scientific American also has a good description of the improved female condom that was approved by the FDA in 2009.

Despite the name, female condoms aren’t really only for women – or even just for vaginal sex. I tend to think of them as “female” in the same sense that the receptive end of my coax cable is female. I kind of wish they had a different name, but mostly I think they’re a good option to have on the table.

Have you ever used a female condom? Have your experiences been good or bad? Do you intend on using them in the future?

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Oppressed brown girls doing things is an awesome tumblr.

Tomorrow is May Day, an international day for labor organizing.  It’s the anniversary of the first 8-hour workday law that went into effect in Illinois on May 1st, 1867.   When employers immediately ignored the law, the response was an enormous general strike. This year, May 1st is incredibly relevant given the recent legislative attacks on labor organizing, equal pay for women, and the right to organize into unions.  If you can, join the general strike!

” Cherry is an accurate, lyrical snapshot of one 18-year-old’s entry into modern-day hardcore BDSM pornography.”  Don’t miss this review of an LGBT friendly, sex positive independent movie Cherry.

If you haven’t already, check out Rachel Maddow’s epic head-swivel response to Alex Castellanos mansplanation that women aren’t paid less “if you actually look at the numbers,” something women never, ever think to do.  Then, go read the actual studies on the wage gap that, shock amazement, take things like “number of hours worked” into account.  Amp’s Wage Gap Series is an excellent resource for any encounters with online wage-gap mansplainers.

Featured image borrowed from OBGDT Tumblr. Original source unknown, but the image had too many badasses in it to pass up.

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The internet, with all its downsides, is a wonderful thing. It allows so many people we otherwise would have never heard of to project their voices over the seas to other continents. There’s no denying its unifying power over geographical frontiers.

On a more personal level, for me, it has always brought great friends, people much more compatible to my personality and my ideologies than those in my “real” life. And this seems to be a reality for a lot of the people I meet, especially if they identify into the queer spectrum.

So I thought I’d ask:

What role does internet play in you interpersonal relationships? Do you think that role is bigger in queer people’s lives?

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