In that moment, I realised that this was mostly everyone’s stance on the LGBTQ+ community in Mysore. No one was willing to talk about it, and those who thought differently about it were too scared to speak up because Mysore is a very close-knit community and family name matters a lot over here.
By Zeba Vagh Aug 5 2020 |
Min adamantly hooked his fingers in Kim’s belt loops and led them away. His nudging was gentle at first, but his insistence grew when the other made no move to follow. There was a lot of courage to be mustered just so a man could follow.
By quagmireisadora Aug 4 2020 |
In 2018, I came across an ad of an agency on Facebook. They claimed to help find partners for the homosexual community in India. Their impressive portfolio of a year and golden words made me believe that there is actually something like this and it is possible.
By Anubhav Sharma Aug 4 2020 |
Nagarkirtan is a story about two characters, Puti, a trans-woman stuck in a man’s body living in a ghetto for hijras in Kolkata with her Gurumaa and her chosen family, and Madhu, a cis-gender man who is a flutist with a kirtan group and a part-time delivery boy from the rural heartlands of Bengal.
By Raqeeb Aug 1 2020 |
With all on-ground job fairs cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Vividhataa has stepped up and created an alternative way for minority candidates to find work during lockdown. The online event — scheduled to take place via Zoom from Aug. 1st to 3rd — is believed to be the first of its kind in India.
By Neeti Upadhye Jul 31 2020 |
I got really tired of being a woman who had to be “perfect” at every turn. I could not have a many days where I could sit and do nothing because I was depressed. It was frowned upon. Depression is frowned upon.
By Avery Wilde Jul 31 2020 |
I can't kiss my love on the street, because she might notice the bruises on my heart from beating too loud,
might notice I tremble too much,
night notice I'm bringing an earthquake on the pavement.
By Anureet Watta Jul 30 2020 |
I had read a lot of Urdu poetry and prose from this time for my 2012 book Gender, Sex and the City, and had discovered that several major writers from Lucknow, Agra and Delhi (but also one from Hyderabad) wrote in the same range of tones and with equal ease about female-female, female-male, and male-male erotic relationships, as well as about all kinds of friendships, including female-male non-sexual friendships.
By Sakshi Raikar Jul 30 2020 |
The journey we’re leading will always be riddled with hurdles and more often than not, we’re going to find ourselves at odds with our own thoughts. So today, I write to you solely with the intention of letting you know that it’s okay, everything you’re feeling is okay.
By Malika Singh Jul 29 2020 |
As someone who had been the new kid too many times and didn’t have a close group of friends, I longed to fit in somewhere. I desperately wanted to be a part of the queer community. I took so many “Am I Gay?” and “Where are you on the Kinsey Scale” quizzes, modifying my answers to get the result I wanted.
By Niharika Jul 28 2020 |
Nudity or boudoir art is the oldest form of art which has suffered from perceptions of the audience. However, nudity in my body of work developed meanings and answers the question why on a daily basis but in its truest form it is a celebration of oneself.
By Elina Banerjee Jul 28 2020 |
When I was 16 or 17, just starting to realise that I was trans (though FAR from accepting it), I was also in the early stages of identifying as asexual. I always felt like my attraction to girls was different than people around me. Obviously, I later realised it’s partly because it was gay attraction and not straight attraction, but at that point I figured that the sexual component was missing for me.
By Asis Jul 27 2020 |
With mainly jazz, soul and pop influences in addition to stunningly vulnerable lyrics, “Aloe” is Coup Jean's debut album, and a brilliant one at that.
By Saachi Gupta Jul 27 2020 |
I know I'm living a lie, but it's only because the truth is uglier. I cannot go a day without talking to you, I lose sleep even at the thought of fighting with you. The idea of you not being okay with something in my life makes me wonder if it really is worth it.
By clitika Jul 24 2020 |
As cis women, trans and non-binary persons’ home with and without parents, physical environment, alone spaces are different and are dealt differently but what happens when sexuality never appears as a question out of fear. Is it a privilege that the question appeared much later in my life and I still do not have to bear the brunt of it because I look no different than a cis-heterosexual woman?
By Abhiti Jul 24 2020 |
But if I’m being honest, I don’t know if I deserve to be deep about my experience as a bisexual, because that aspect of my has been the easiest to deal with. Sure, I’m not out to my family, so that’s a struggle waiting for me in the future.
By Srishti Berry Jul 23 2020 |
This ideal, set in 1915, of female and femme presenting bodies, to have smooth, alabaster skin, was one of capitalistic opportunism. However, over the years, through perpetuation and amplifying media imagery, it has evolved into a defining characteristic of femininity itself.
By The Nude Abstract Jul 22 2020 |
The moment I saw my little cousin’s eyes droop lower, his face covered in deep grief when my aunt took away his barbie doll, which he was dearly attached to, I strolled down the memory lane when my aunt criticised me for smiling too much because it gave me wrinkles, or when my friend told me that I annoy them too much with my love.
By artbethefoodoflove Jul 21 2020 |
We met when I was exhibiting Out Here and Now, a series of paintings that became my personal and professional coming out breakthrough. Only the week before I had ended a 13-year relationship, mostly hidden, with a younger man from my village. Our views of the future had diverged and began to conflict. I was coming out as a gay man and artist; he didn’t want to test the dangers of a more public life any further than we already had. I didn’t blame him.
By Balbir Krishan Jul 21 2020 |
Homonationalism, coined by Rutgers University professor Jasbir K. Puar in 2007 is, to put it simply, the intersection of gay identity and nationalist ideology. This sexual nationalism marks a global shift from Queer identities being pervasive to the idea of the nation, to one which is now a benchmark for progressiveness.
By Anureet Watta Jul 20 2020 |
