personal essay
As My Family Tried to Arrange My Marriage, I Was Secretly Swiping on Tinder
My parents, unaware that I already had a dating profile of my own, signed me up for an online matchmaking service—similar, in a sense, to Tinder, but with far different expectations.
For Women Who Wear Hijab, Finstas Can Be a Space to Let Loose Online
By the time private accounts with curated followers became mainstream, they were old news to me. I knew many women who wore hijabs who would set their Instagram profiles to private, write “WOMEN ONLY” in their bios, and post pictures with their hair down.
The Subversive Sexual Power Found in Erotic Fandom Forums
For young women on fandom forums, the freedom to profess subversive attractions online means becoming agents of their own sexual journeys.
How Being Radically, Unapologetically Open About Sex Freed Me
I spent a decade building a separate life as an A-grade dress-wearing, dick-sucking moral vagrant. Then I realized that the secrecy only served to deepen my shame.
The Affirming—But Bittersweet—Experience of Watching YouTube Coming Out Videos
I expected the clips from LGBTQ vloggers to be too earnest and saccharine, but I fell down the wormhole anyway.
When I Made a Sex Work Pseudonym, I Didn't Know I'd Be Her Forever
I didn’t realize at the time, that my new name would both protect and endanger me—and that my youthful attempt to rewrite my story would actually help form the person I would become.
The Loneliness—and Comfort—of Being Online
I’m into the internet as a gateway to systems of care—the kind of care that turns a sad finsta post into a spontaneous visit, a phone call, a gift; turns a silent question into 1,000 late-night answers, turns the monster within into a collective hum.
As a Trans Woman, Our Obsession With Labels Feels Limiting—Not Liberating
I’m trans, HIV positive, and I don’t seek to fit into a single gender binary. But my simple desire to land a date on a dating app is often lost in the terms I'm expected to use.
My Avatar, My Self: How Video Games Gave Me Ownership Over My Body
As a trans kid unable to wear what I wanted, to look how I wanted, to be seen by others as I saw myself, the avatars I designed reflected more of me than any mirror ever could.
Deepfakes Were Created As a Way to Own Women's Bodies—We Can't Forget That
When Redditors started using AI to attach celebrities' faces to porn performers' bodies, the media reaction focused on the implications for potential political hoaxes, but we need to focus on the women they harmed.
As a Sex Worker With a Chronic Illness, FOSTA Means Losing My Medical Care
In a nation lacking universal healthcare, recent legislation effectively cut a thread by which many disabled people climbed out of poverty.
As a Black Woman, Interracial Dating Has Always Been a Political Choice
Fifty-one years since Loving v. Virginia, and Black women's dating decisions are still read as a reflection of racial politics in America.