This post marks the return of The Reading List, a collection of news stories, online posts and much more.
This week is marked by a selection of op-eds. Op-eds can be viewed as a form of journalistic vanity, but when done well, they can provide an insight through the lens of individual experience. These stories are great examples of this.
Case in point is Tyler Curry. Curry posts over at The Huffington Post’s Gay Voices, and this week has put out two must-read pieces. The first was an examination of what he terms the “HIV Generation Gap.” It’s a touchy subject, but Curry is smart in looking at the stigma and ignorance that each generation faced and continues to face.
Curry also wrote another piece for The HuffPo, this time about what he views as “The Strength in Being a Feminine Gay Man.” An excerpt:
“I spent hours in the gym, building my body in an effort to emulate the ideal of what men supposedly should look like. I stopped applying my coveted bronzer and shaved my head like a G.I. Joe. […] But the nasal voice and extra bounce in my step were inescapable. No matter what I tried, I always received degrading comments and snickers about my disposition, but not from the straight community. These came from gay men.”
Still at HuffPo, Roey Thorpe asks the question, “Where Have All the Butches Gone?” She answers her own question quite deftly, positing that “they’re still around, although some of them go by other names.”
Over at queer news stalwart The Advocate, Diane Anderson-Minshall emphatically states that her attraction to trans people is not a fetish, even if it is often sold and viewed as one.
And finally, one last bonus piece, but not an op-ed. Andie Shim writes for The Atlantic about funding sex-reassignment surgery for veterans in the US.
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