Around a year and a half ago, after experiencing sexual trauma in a relationship, I thought I would never enjoy sex or masturbation again. I couldn’t bear the thought of kissing someone or being touched in any way. Even non-sexual touch triggered panic attacks. I thought I was destined for a life of anxiety about …

I became single in the midst of a pandemic. Everything feels different, and not just because the process of uncoupling and change is unconventional in its slowness. I have felt a shift in the way I view all of my relationships, the ebbs and flows of connection and distance, valuing time I get with my …

I want to tell you something about being quiet. I want to tell you about the four weeks I spent at an artist residency in rural Finland. I want to tell you about the forest and the lakes and the summer evenings when the sky went a different shade of blue but never darkened. About …

As a child, I gravitated towards whatever connected with me on an emotional level. The first film I remember loving was High School Musical at around age nine. I only discovered the reputation the film had when I entered secondary school a few years later. At best, it was considered an embarrassing thing to like, …

In the morning light I went to my mirror and examined my ass. The heat radiating from it was enough to feel on my hand from centimetres away. Blackened rectangles puffed out against my pale backside. I pressed my index finger into my flesh and watched the colour change. My eyes shuttered close and I …

I’ve long known that I view relationships differently when compared to most people. As a teenager, I regularly felt perplexed by the accepted practice of getting a boyfriend or girlfriend, entirely prioritising them, and moving friends to the sidelines. Why am I suddenly less important? I would wonder when close friends disappeared with their new …

We recently hosted our very first digital event, Archer’s Issue 14 Launch and Fundraiser! Our event was held in conjunction with GiveOUT Day, a national fundraising day for LGBTQIA+ organisations. We really appreciate GiveOUT, whose work helps support LGBTIQ+ projects, groups and not-for-profit organisations. Funding for LGBT+ organisations is often lacking, so having a day …

In the window between lockdowns, I go to a friend’s birthday. A bunch of touch-starved gays sit together on the same couch. We joke about what kind of Cottagecore, polyamorous transqueer commune we would hope to live on, once the rich were dead and climate apocalypse averted somehow. “In all likelihood,” someone says, “we’ll just …

I write about gender a lot. Usually I do it through fan fiction, stepping into the shoes of the few well-represented trans characters in the media to explore how they experience their gender. One such character lives in the far future, a gender utopia where nobody’s transition is questioned, and gender roles are a figment …

Ah, beauty norms, my least favourite oxymoron. There is nothing ‘normal’ about heteronormative beauty. What we’re told are ‘beautiful’ characteristics usually represent the outliers of the diverse toolbox of human features. And this thing – ‘beauty norms’ – seems to predominantly hang itself off those of us who identify as femme. It drapes itself over …