So, what have you been thinking about?
I’ve been thinking a lot about the difference between being uncomfortable and being unsafe. It’s the kind of thing that I think everyone would benefit from sitting with and trying to get better at navigating, but it feels especially important to me because of my particular intersecting identities. White people mistaking discomfort for danger has cost a lot of black and brown folks their lives and generally made BIPOC physically/mentally/emotionally unsafe. Simultaneously, as a queer person and someone assigned female at birth there are a lot of ways in which I’ve been told implicitly and explicitly that I’m being dramatic/hysterical/paranoid/crazy for feeling unsafe in situations that were unsafe for me. It makes for a really complicated soup to move through. I want to prioritize my safety and sit with/lean into/be okay with discomfort. Feeling really grateful for the people I have in my corner who are helping me navigate this.
Chelsee
In last week’s episode, we talked about Catherine House by Elisabeth Thomas, just like we promised we would back in May. We also talked about representation in queer literature in general, and about our own expectations for explicitly labeled queer lit. You can listen to “What counts as a queer book?” wherever you listen to podcasts!
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See you back here in two weeks.
Chelsee & Christina