Hello Beloved listeners (a little nod to the butchfemme zine you should totally check out the first 2 issues + adorable lesbian merch of belovedzine.com)! Here is a special liminal space episode for you (post-break Taylor break up but before this M*tty H**ly mess)! Our hot-takes this episode are all bound by GAYLOR! This episode was recorded pre-Matty Healy's... inclusion into Taylor Swift's rotation but after her breakup from Joe, but we WILL be talking about the former soon, on Patreon (same place where we talked about Joe breakup Gaylor implications.) This episode is a hot-take exclusive one. We respond to quite a few listeners' emails (submit yours to thelavendermenacepodcast@gmail.com to perhaps get it featured and discussed on a future episode!!!) and speak to the heart of gay Swiftian iconography and lyrical parallels as picked up by y'all, and how people on the internet really hate when we talk about it. The 1st hot-take is a close reading of Oscar Wilde and possible allusions/references to him in the Lavender Haze music video and lyrics. Very compelling observations for a brilliant listener <3 The 2nd hot-take is about the consequences of speculating sexualities and coming out/”outing” politics, as submitted by listeners who seem to literally be the embodiment of the Heartstopper British lesbians. We’re living in a time where coming out can both be self-serving (Pete Buttigieg) and possibly make you the victim of public hate crimes, and as LGBT people today it can be difficult to parse out where we fall. Our 3rd hot-take comes from a listener getting backlash on TikTok on their video close-reading lyrics in Lover. This sparks a conversation about heteronormativity and the dynamics between gaylors and “anti-gaylor” Swifties and homophobic harassment in fan spaces. We swiftly (tongue-and-cheek) transition towards questions about how fans who grew up with Taylor view her versus how kids today see Taylor (new wave of 2nd generation Swifties, who is scared?) Our 4th hot-take comes from a hashtag Real Femme who witnessed what they refer to as Swiftgate in real time. AKA our most recent cancellation in which for multiple days in a row, Twitter was dogpiling and harassing us. This listener raises an important question: are Taylor haters more annoying than even the most insufferable gaylors? We say YES but feel free to come to your own conclusions. Part 2 of the hot-take speaks to 'sapphic spaces' and different manifestations of lesbophobia in queer spaces. The attitude that lesbians are automatically probably hostile towards trans people draws, most likely, from the tenuous idea of radical feminism and lesbian spaces in the 20th century. Essentially, people need to learn their history and read more theory and shit... Not like we've said that before.
Thanks for joining us for this episode! You can find us on Twitter https://twitter.com/TheLavenderPod, Substack https://thelavendermenace.substack.com/, Instagram https://www.instagram.com/thelavendermenacepod/, Tik Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@thelavendermenacepod, and Letterboxd https://letterboxd.com/thelavenderpod/ if you want to connect!