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“Satan is Our Only Hope:” Jennifer’s Body and Making Women's Sexuality A True Monster

The week of Halloween has finally arrived! But since our definition of the Halloween Season starts September first, (when the weather drops below 65 degrees and a leaf somewhere gets just the slightest tinge of not-green), Remy and I got together a few weeks ago to rewatch the 2009 movie Jennifer’s Body for more reasons than just the wonderful soundtrack. One of those reasons is because it is a masterpiece cobbled together with themes such as sexuality, feminine rage, and friendships that develop into lust.  In case you happened to somehow miss the movie that is quickly becoming a cult classic, allow me to recap (spoilers abound, proceed with caution):  To begin, Diablo Cody, the amazing human being who also brought us Juno and, most recently, Lisa Frankenstein, wrote this raunchy, gory rollercoaster ride that shaped some of my formative years. The movie opens with our leading lady Needy already in isolation, living life in some sort of institutionalized setting. This delightfully qu
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Horrors Persisting: Discussions on Queer Identities in the Horror Genre

  WELCOME FOOLISH MORTALS!!!!!! Friends, we are SO excited to announce our partnership with Transplaining for a virtual Halloween lecture series! Starting next week, we'll be coming live from our haunted house to yours with a series of three spine-chilling talks dedicated to queer themes and artists in the horror genre. (NOTE- all lectures will be recorded, so if you buy a ticket but can't join us in real-time, you can always watch later.) Throughout history, there has always been a link between the supernatural, the otherworldly, and queer identities. Historically this has led to thinly veiled references to LGBTQ+ identities in the monsters and villains of many stories. In today’s world, LGBTQ+ content in stories has taken on a new label of “villainous”; that of the “forced inclusion”, of “everything is gay nowadays.” We at the Virtual Queer Library reject both of those narratives; that of LGBTQ+ characters as perpetual villains and as queer representation being a new, fr
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Thank You Random Acts!

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Hey everyone! We wanted to tell you all about an amazing gift we’ve received- a mini grant from Random Acts ! In addition to this being a public thank you note, we’d like to take some time to tell all of you about this amazing organization. What is Random Acts? “Random Acts was founded in 2010 by actor Misha Collins after an earthquake hit Haiti, causing massive damage. Collins, who had been involved in charitable projects since college, decided to harness the energy and resources of the followers he had gained during his acting career in order to raise funds for the UNICEF disaster relief program. Within days, over $30,000 was raised. Using this momentum, Random Acts was created to inspire kindness in Haiti and beyond.” What Do They Do? “We fund proposals for acts of kindness. If you have an awesome idea for an act of kindness, but need some assistance with funding, we can help you out!” Application Process: Submit Your Proposal Complete  the Act Proposal F
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Making the Yuletide Gay- An Ode to "Dashing in December"

  'Tis the season for a thousand and one holiday films bursting with evergreen farms, surprise snowstorms, last-minute flights, and of course, snow-capped romantic happily ever afters. But for many years, the movies all seemed to share the same glaring omission- a lack of representation. In the past decade or so, Hallmark and Lifetime and the like have made an effort to increase racial diversity of their holiday romances. (NOTE: They have not always been successful at this and they have not done nearly enough.) Still, pairings other than a man and a woman were nowhere to be found in the holiday lineups. Hallmark specifically has struggled with LGBTQ+ equality,  making headlines  in 2019 when they aired an ad that showed a lesbian couple, promptly pulled the ad after public backlash, and then apologized for pulling the ads. But in 2021, the company appointed a new CEO, Wonya Lucas, who said that Hallmark was committed to a “seismic” shift in their expansion of diversity. Now,
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Virtual Queer Halloweenposting Part 1: Queer Themes in the Scream Franchise

 It's September 1st, friends!!!! The day where I personally think I am allowed to start publicly celebrating Halloween without judgment. In honor of this most auspicious day, we are posting our first of many articles discussing queer themes in Horror. In this post, C is tackling one of her favorite horror series, "Scream". ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- What’s your favorite scary movie?      Well, Creepy Caller in a Universally Known White Mask, that list is so long, you will get bored and find another target fairly quickly. But since you asked… my favorite scary movies are the ones that can laugh at themselves, that are so meta, they quickly became a satire of themselves. Forget the fourth wall, the fifth and sixth walls are coming down, too. Ones that don’t use gore just for the sake of gore (unless you’re anything in the Evil Dead series, but that’s another blog post for another tim
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Book Review: "First Born Sons" by Vincent Traughber Meis

Reading First Born Sons by Vincent Traughber Meis became an absolute honor within the first few pages. As soon as it started out with a Langston Hughes quote, I knew I was in the right place. Although Meis has a few other books that have been published, this is the first one I have read, and I was able to decide within two chapters that I immediately needed to read the others by this author. Meis writes about the Burd siblings, each with their own struggles, each with their own chapter breaks and point of views. The writing is beautifully lyrical and very timely, as it talks about the pandemic, wildfires, LGBTQ themes, current political climates, and includes a fantastic soundtrack that I created on Spotify to listen to in the background while I read (we’re talking REM, Madonna… Lamar is the type of person I would trust making a playlist for a twelve hour road trip). Parts were difficult to read, as they did discuss tough topics, such as death, racism, police violence, and the Proud
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