Carving out my non-binary identity felt like going through a second adolescence. I found myself experimenting with various styles, spaces, activities and relationships – I was trying everything on for size to see if it fit. Much like my first adolescence, sexual exploration was a formative rite of passage, full of nervousness and a bit …
Content warning: sexual assault, ableism and surgical procedures. In Australia, non-consensual sterilisation is lawful if a court decides a woman with a disability “lack[s] mental capacity to consent to medical procedures.” Courts authorise the sterilisation of a woman with a disability and claim it’s not discrimination. If the case brought to them passes the ‘best …
The rumour around the suburban street was that Nan was a hussy; strangely, having two men in your life wasn’t the norm. For me, though, growing up around the three of them, I knew nothing different. Visiting my grandparents for dinner consisted of Nana, Zaida (the Yiddish word for grandfather) and Leon. I had a wonderful …
Content Warning: This article recounts an incident of sexual assault. Although I didn’t have the words for it at the time, my first sexual experience with another man was as a closeted 15-year-old victim of sexual assault. I say sexual experience deliberately instead of ‘sex’ or ‘when I lost my virginity’ because sexual assault is …
The most wonderful time of the year in Melbourne is upon us: International Comedy Festival time. Each year my dad and I watch the televised MICF events – usually the Gala performance and opening night. Comedy is one of the things that Dad and I bond over the most, sharing a similar sense of humour …
This series by 20-year-old HIV-positive American photographer Sam Stoich confronts a subject that has long been misunderstood, and remains burdened with stigma even today. Q&A with Jess Desaulniers-Lea Shot in the Dark has a sense of continuum; is this series ongoing? If so, how has it evolved so far and in what direction do you see it …
Content warning: this article discusses drug use. It’s widely acknowledged that drug-use in LGBTIQ+ communities is high. It also happens that many of the drugs we take are recreational, and illegal. This doesn’t seem to be deterring queer communities, who consume ecstasy alone at a rate almost 6 times that of the general population. What …
Where are the butch button-ups? The dungarees? Where are the rainbow buses? My exchange semester in Paris was a culture shock but not the type I was expecting. I had uprooted myself from Canberra, home to a visible queer community and the largest percentage of ‘YES’ votes for the same-sex marriage postal survey, to find …
I found out the results of the marriage equality postal survey while absent-mindedly scrolling on my phone in an IKEA food hall. My attempt to block out the ugliness of the marriage equality ‘debate’ had meant that I’d also blocked out when the results were being revealed. When my brain finally processed what I was …
This piece explores experiences of autoimmune hair loss and gender, written and limited to the perspective of a white settler person, identifying as queer, living in Naarm. When I was 11 my psychologist told me that one day soon I’d grow breasts and that this would resolve the issue of people confusing my gender. This …
