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| WELCOME |

Contents On the cover

UP FRONT

06 07 10

DICTUM #MeToo – a powerful social media movement

YOUR SHOUT You tell us what you think of DIVA

NEWS This month’s round-up from OutNews Global

TRENDS

12 13 14 16

VOICES Mag-niﬁcent progress in our monthly Mediawatch

VIEWS

18 20 22 24 26 28

PICK’N’MIX Stuff that’s caught DIVA’s eye this month

WHY WE LOVE... Princess Nokia: leading the way

PHYLL OPOKU-GYIMAH “I was destined to be who I am…”

REETA LOI How I found festivity my own way

BRANDY DAWLEY My partner’s transition shone a light on misogyny

MUNROE BERGDORF What does family really mean to you today?

CERIAN JENKINS Your must-read Christmas survival guide

ELEANOR MARGOLIS My journey to ﬁnding love through tragedy

FEATURES

30 39 40 42 46

CARMILLA The boundary-breaking web series and movie

QUEER ACTUALLY DIVA discovers that queers, actually, are all around...

HOW TO ACE XMAS It’s time to dyke the halls with our festive guide

FESTIVE GIVING Our round-up of the best gifts for the leading person in your life

BEYOND THE BINARY A new exhibition challenging traditional ideas of family

SHE SAID Notable quotables from women to listen to

60 3

| WELCOME |

WOMEN ON TOP

CULTURE

50 53 56 58 59 60 62 64

78 82 84

DEE REES The Oscars-tipped screenwriter and director

BOOK REVIEWS Top reads from our books editor Kaite Welsh

O’HOOLEY & TIDOW Music for all varieties of festive folk and families

LEZ BOSS How, and why, to boss your next pay rise

WHAT’S IT LIKE TO BE A... Mary Page on working in an animal rescue centre

DIVA’s lowdown on the hottest new releases

MUSIC REVIEWS

TRAVEL

Heather Peace’s musical loves of the month

LOTS HOLLOWAY Behind the scenes with the singer-songwriter

PARISA TARJOMANI X Factor, sexuality, and going solo

TV REVIEWS It’s all happening on the small screen this month

Throughout the issue you will see this symbol, which indicates that there is digital content available related to that particular feature. You will be able to access this complementary content when you purchase our digital edition from divadigital.co.uk or directly through the DIVA branded app, available on the App Store, Google Play, Kindle Newsstand and Windows Store. (Please note that additional content may not be available via all of our third-part digital suppliers. However, buying the issue using one of the methods above will give you access to this content.)

86 90

SALZBURG Bella Qvist surprises her girlfriend with an Austrian adventure

FIRST CLASS Make the most of your holidays with DIVA’s travel tips

LIFESTYLE

MERMAIDS CHARITY

92 94 98

Supporting trans, gender diverse and gender non-conforming children

CHRISTMAS IN NIGERIA Priscilla Philips shares her queer experience

FAMILY

72 75

Support for parents in the workplace

FILM REVIEWS

COMMUNITY

66 68

P3 NETWORK

TOMORROW’S WORLD

DIARY DIVA’s monthly pick of the best queer events

ADVENT CALENDAR Join us for the #DIVACrimboChallenge

HOROSCOPE Michele Knight reads your stars

Could same-sex couples one day have their own biological children?

MY FAMILY DIVA readers introduce their everyday families

75 4 DECEMBER 2017

SUBSCRIBE Get DIVA delivered to your door before it hits the shops and save money!

| WELCOME |

DICTUM

Editor Carrie Lyell Deputy editor Roxy Bourdillon Staff writer Danielle Mustarde Sub-editor Ellen Tout Designer Fernando Safont Music editor Heather Peace Books editor Kaite Welsh Travel editor Bella Qvist Big thanks to: Joanna Whitehead, Emily Bashforth, Kathryn Bryant Commercial director Robert Harkavy +44 (0)20 3735 7872 & +44 (0)7805 614 471 robert@twinmediagroup.co.uk Advertising manager Raj Valentino 020 3735 7871 raj@twinmediagroup.co.uk Social and events manager Kat Stephens kat@twinmediagroup.co.uk Editorial 020 3735 7873 Sales 020 3735 7871 Subscriptions 01202 586 848 For UK prices see advert p80-81 Subscriptions help contact@selectps.co.uk

If you need a back issue to complete your set, email ﬁona@divamag.co.uk. If you have diﬃculty reading the printed word, you can get DIVA on audio cassette on subscription. Contact Feminist Audio Books on 0161 273 8038 or email books@feministaudiobooks.org.uk

#METOO I’m out with some friends – drinking, laughing, having a ball. It’s the end of the Edinburgh Fringe, and everyone is in high spirits. I’m dancing with a guy, a friend of a friend. I don’t remember how it happened, but suddenly I’m aware of his hand around my wrist. He’s gripping tight. He forces a hand down the front of his jeans and holds it there, on his junk, right in the middle of the dance ﬂoor. I try to pull away but he’s too strong. What the fuck is he doing? And then, just as suddenly, he lets go, smiles, keeps dancing. Like nothing happened. I ﬁnd one of my friends, tell her I’m going. “What’s wrong?” she says. I tell her what he did, that I feel gross, that I want to leave. “Oh come on,” she says, giving me a gentle shove. “It’s no big deal”. “It’s no big deal”. Those words have stayed with me for years, warping my sense of right and wrong. Making me doubt my own mind. So much so that when women started sharing their stories of sexual harassment and assault online recently, in response to Harvey Weinstein and others, I had to seriously consider whether this night – what he did to me – even counted. People are often dismissive of social media movements, but #MeToo had a profound effect on me. I 6 DECEMBER 2017

now know that it was a big deal. Just as it was when another friend came round to watch ﬁlms, gave me a hug and, in doing so, undid my bra. Despite my protests, he refused to stop, and cackled as he swung it around his head like a trophy. Just as it was a big deal when, last week, a stranger ogled my mum and I in the street before gesturing to his genitals and asking us, “What’s cooking, ladies?” Like many other women, I’ve been made to feel like this kind of thing is normal, but it’s not. And let’s not for a minute think that straight men are the only ones at fault. I’ve lost count of the number of gay men who have prodded and grabbed me without permission, and I’ve been made to feel intensely uncomfortable by lesbians too, who by performing masculinity often perpetuate misogyny. Whether verbal or physical, whoever it comes from, this kind of behaviour is not ok, and is a big deal. Let’s continue to tell our stories and call it out – in our own communities as well as the wider world – and make a promise to each other. Let’s never be that person who says it’s not a big deal, because it is. Carrie Lyell carrie@divamag.co.uk @Seej

THE JANUARY ISSUE OF DIVA IS ON SALE FROM 22 DECEMBER (DIGITAL) AND 28 DECEMBER (PRINT). Postal address DIVA, Twin Media Group, Room 32, Spectrum House, 32-34 Gordon House Road, London NW5 1LP Email editorial@divamag.co.uk Website divamag.co.uk Newstrade distribution Select Publisher Services Ltd, 62 Wimbourn Road, Bournemouth, Dorset, BH3 7AR Distribution help steve@magazineworkshop.co.uk Printed in UK by CPUK Print Publishing (cp-uk.co.uk) PUBLISHED BY TWIN MEDIA GROUP LTD CEO Linda Riley

All rights reserved © TMG 2016 ISSN 1353 4912 DIVA is published monthly in the UK by Twin Media Group Ltd. The mention or appearance or likeness of any person or organisation in articles or advertising in DIVA is not to be taken as any indication of sexual, social or political orientation of such persons or organisations. No responsibility can be assumed for unsolicited materials and submission is construed as permission to publish without further correspondence at the fee payable at our usual rates. Advertisers are advised that all copy is their sole responsibility under the Trade Protection Act. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of the publishers.

PHOTO TALIE EIGELAND

EDITOR’S LETTER

| MAIL | YOUR SHOUT |

WRITE TO US A STAGE FOR OUR STORIES

letters@divamag.co.uk

Literature is about exploring and experiencing. It’s about learning and teaching and growing and being inspired, and sometimes it’s about knowing that we’re not alone in the world. What happens when you love to read, but you never get to read stories about people who are like you? You start to believe that your voice, your story, doesn’t matter. You end up feeling like you shouldn’t be who you are. I was in my late 20s before it occurred to me that I could write stories about women and girls who loved other women and girls. Almost the entire world is designed for straight people. And I’m lucky, I’m surrounded by kind, accepting and loving people for whom my identity is not an issue. If the most trying experience I come up against day-to-day is referring to “my partner” and having to correct someone when they ask what “he” does, then I’m endlessly privileged compared to the horGAZINE DIVAMA rific experiences of other LBTQ K.COM/ K O O B E .C C G FA A O.U @DIVAM women. But what I realised this L E T T ER S / M O .C weekend, is that there’s an insistTWITTEARGAZINE DIVAM ent pressure there, all the time. Whether that’s weighing up whether I should out myself to someone new, or whether it’s safe to hold hands with my girlfriend in a public place, or wondering whether I’m going to get to see someone like myself represented in a creative or public sphere, or just making myself a little bit smaller out of fear of someone thinking I’m being a bit too gay (whatever the hell that means). We live with this every day – and many people live with a hell of a lot more. This is the weight we carry, and I didn’t realise just how heavy it was until this weekend. This was the first time I’d ever been in a space inhabited purely by LBTQ women, and for the very first time – it was gone. And it was breathtaking. I listened and laughed and talked and danced, and I cried a little bit as well. I heard the stories of so many courageous, hilarious, fierce women, who are making the world a better place by putting their Opinions expressed by stories out there. It was a privilege. I correspondents and can’t even put it into words. Thank you contributors do not DIVA Literary Festival, and everyone necessarily reflect the who made it happen – for creating views of the editors a space where I didn’t have to make of DIVA magazine myself smaller. KAT H or its publishers.

or use the old-fashioned method and drop us a line at

DIVA MAGAZINE Spectrum House, Room 32 32-34 Gordon House Road London NW5 1LP United Kingdom

TWITTER @DIVAmagazine @BillieJeanKing I don’t think many almost-74-year-olds get the honor of being named a Diva. Cheers, @DIVAmagazine!

JOIN Z THE BUZ

@D166ERS Fell asleep 21.30, awake 00.30. Catching up on old @DIVAmagazine issues, reading @heatherpeace ‘Insomnia whilst pregnant’ article. #relevant @ccarpentermusic Massive thanks to @DIVAmagazine for the mention in the new issue! Picked up my copy in Tesco. @AnnaNathanson So inspired and learning lots at the @DIVALitFest this weekend in

JOIN US TODAY! twitter.com/divamagazine Birmingham. Thank you @DIVAmagazine for putting on such a brilliant event! @LiverpoolPride “Maybe it does have to go dark before it goes light but we have a chance to change the world” @stellduffy @DIVALitFest @stellduffy Just been told we’re not tweeting enough. Sorry. Tea was yummy #DIVALitFest @GraphicChange Writing tips I’ve noted from @mariwriter @MsLadyPhyll @r_e_e_t_a_ @valmcdermid @stellduffy #terrijentz #DIVALitFest #sketchnote #writers

CALL OUT DO YOU WANT TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE EMPOWERMENT OF LGBT PEOPLE AT WORK AND IN BUSINESS? Researchers at Aston University are conducting an online survey to better understand the psychological experiences of LGBT people in the workplace, either as employees or as owners/managers of a business/social enterprise. The survey takes around 15 to 20 minutes to complete and is anonymous. You will also be given the opportunity to win a £50 Love2shop voucher! The study is being funded by the British Academy and will be used to inform policies and practices surrounding LGBT inclusivity within workplaces. For more details, please email l.ﬂetcher1@aston.ac.uk, or use the following QR code. 7

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| NEWS ROUND-UP |

In case you missed it... MONTHLY NEWS ROUNDUP BROUGHT TO YOU BY OUTNEWS GLOBAL

THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND PAVES THE WAY FOR GENDER EQUALITY IN SCHOOLS The Church of England has issued new guidance to its schools which states that “boys should be free to choose to wear tutus, a tiara or heels” and girls “to wear tool belts and superhero capes”. The guidance also advises teachers to avoid using labels that might alienate children’s behaviour “just because it does not conform to gender stereotypes”. The guidance, titled Valuing All God’s Children, was timed to coincide with anti-bullying week (13-17 November) and includes information on transphobic, homophobic and biphobic bullying.

WAS WHITNEY IN THE GANG? Whitney Houston was part of a secret group of famous lesbians, Rosie O’Donnell has claimed in a recent interview. O’Donnell said that she always knew that Houston and Robyn Crawford, her lifelong friend and assistant, were in a relationship. The documentary Whitney: Can I Be Me, looked at her relationship with women and the friction that this often created in her life.

A ONE-WAY TICKET TO A SAFE NIGHT’S SLEEP A reconditioned tour bus, once used by Status Quo, has been given an overhaul to become the UK’s ﬁrst LGBT-speciﬁc homeless shelter. The charity responsible, The Outside Project, was founded earlier in the year by a group of LGBT+ activists and outreach workers, solely to meet this need. The bus is based in east London and has facilities to host 12 people.

ANNA RICHARDSON “CONSIDERING ADOPTION” WITH PARTNER SUE PERKINS Anna Richardson has set tongues wagging by stating that she and her partner, Sue Perkins, are thinking about starting “our own little family”. During an interview on ITV’s Loose Women, Richardson said, “I can’t speak for Sue, but I’m considering looking at adoption. It’s important”. Richardson also spoke about a break-in that occurred whilst she was staying in a hotel in Cannes in the early noughties, contributing to a long-running battle with anxiety and panic attacks. Whilst asleep in bed, Richardson awoke to ﬁnd two men searching through her possessions. This episode resulted in the TV presenter being diagnosed with PTSD.

Join the conversation on Twitter @outnewsglobal 10 DECEMBER 2017

Ellen Page recently posted a heartfelt and frank statement on her Facebook page, revealing that she had been outed as gay by shamed director and producer Brett Ratner. During a cast and crew meet-andgreet ahead of ﬁlming X-Men: The Last Stand, Ratner looked at a woman 10 years Page’s senior and pointed to her, stating: “You should fuck her to make her realise she’s gay”. Page, who was only 18 at the time, wrote that she had “not yet come out to myself”, stating that although she knew she was gay, she “did not know, so to speak”. She continued: “We are entitled to come into an awareness of our sexual orientation privately and on our own terms”, adding that the “public, aggressive outing” left her with “long-standing feelings of shame”.

WORDS JOANNA WHITEHEAD

ELLEN PAGE OUTED BY DISGRACED DIRECTOR

Mag-niﬁcent progress in our monthly Mediawatch

TRENDS

VOICES

PICK’N’MIX Stuff that’s caught DIVA’s eye this month

WHY WE LOVE... Princess Nokia: leading the way

SHE SAID Notable quotables from women to listen to

Sonequa Martin-Green: unconditional Love and supPort

| TRENDS | VOICES |

DANICA ROEM Big round of applause for Danica Roem, a former journalist who has been elected to the Virginia House of Delegates in the US, making her one of the ﬁrst openly trans people to serve in a state legislature. Roem, who also sings in a metal band, dedicated her victory over conservative Robert G. Marshall to “every person who’s ever been singled out, who’s ever been stigmatised, who’s ever been the misﬁt, who’s ever been the kid in the corner, who’s ever needed someone to stand up for them when they didn’t have a voice of their own.” Congratulations!

CELEBRITY

tweets @JUNODAWSON

Can’t really say this enough: changes to the Gender Recognition Act will make no difference to anyone except trans/ NB people. So chill. @MISSCHAZMATAZZ White rich ppl making space for other white rich ppl is not progressive and certainly not “intersectional”. Whatever they try and tell us.

12 DECEMBER 2017

@EVANRACHELWOOD

I am bi, Have been to parties with minors while intoxicated & I have never assaulted anyone because being bi doesn’t make u a predator.

@BOOTSTRAPCOOK

Rough guide to being accused of sexual harassment at work: - keep your hands to yourself - ditto lewd remarks - have some fucking respect. @RUBYTANDOH Wetherspoons is a treasure, i feel very strongly about this.

@PENNYRED Women on the left aren’t ‘letting the side down’ by calling out abuse. Abusers are letting the side down. And their ideals. And themselves. @MALALA

5 years ago, I was shot in an attempt to stop me from speaking out for girls’ education. Today, I attend my first lectures at Oxford.

MEDIAWATCH with Carrie Lyell

MAG-NIFICENT! In the four years I’ve been writing this Mediawatch column, I think I’ve only written about good news twice. What can I say? It’s so much easier to hate on the Daily Mail than it is to ﬁnd coverage of lesbians and bisexual women that isn’t awful. Also because, as they say in my homeland, I’m a dour-faced quine. But this month, there’s a reason to be cheerful: a new bridal magazine for women marrying women. Dancing With Her, a celebration of women in love, was created by Australian couple Tara Baker and Arlia Hassell. Planning their own wedding, they realised traditional bridal magazines were overwhelmingly hetero. As well as being a physical magazine packed with 100+ pages of editorial, Dancing With Her offers an inspiring online space, and their Instagram feed will give you heart eyes for days. This is the kind of magazine I needed when my now-wife and I got engaged in 2010. I spent a small fortune on wedding magazines, thinking I’d cut out pictures and make a real-life Pinterest board, but there was no inspo in there for me – a “gooey butch”. I had the biggest fashion crisis and it took me ages to decide what to wear. Sure, there were blogs, but taking my scissors to Dancing With Her would have made such a difference. Weddings aren’t for everyone, sure, but whether you’re crazy for confetti or not, this is a cause for celebration. When was the last time a magazine for lesbians and bi women launched that wasn’t online only? It’s not cheap – shipping a copy to the UK will cost you $39 AUD – but if you can, please say I Do and support Tara and Arlia and Dancing With Her. It only takes a glance through those traditional bridal mags to see no one else is going to tell our stories for us. @Seej

WORDS CARRIE LYELL, JOANNA WHITEHEAD

PERSON OF THE MONTH

| TRENDS | PICK’N’MIX |

5 WORDS ROXY BOURDILLON

1 2 3 4

PUG BAUBLE To make your Crimbo tree look super cute. paperchase.co.uk, £7

LEG HAIR, DON’T CARE Highlight your DGAF attitude with this handy mirror. how-store.com, £5

THE FUTURE MRS MCKINNON Buy this badge and sit front row at SNL. etsy.com/uk/shop/ButchandSissy, £7.90

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Treasure your memories, no matter what your family looks like. etsy.com/uk/shop/LittlePickleCrafting, £15

| TRENDS | WHY WE LOVE |

In the predominantly male-dominated world of hip-hop, Princess Nokia is a revelation. Named after the brand of cheap “Obama phone” she was eligible for as a low-income earner, she identiﬁes as a bruja, queer, feminist tomboy. Describing her music as “bringing punk energy to hip-hop”, she recorded her ﬁrst track, Destiny, under the name of Wavy Spice in 2010 and released the critically acclaimed album 1992 Deluxe in September this year. The album is a love song to New York, her home city, and covers her childhood, identity, and hair touching. Standout tracks include ABCs of New York, Kitana and Tomboy,

which is accompanied by an awesome video of Princess Nokia and her pals cruising around the neighbourhood looking badass and riding skateboards. And she’s deﬁnitely not afraid of speaking up. Earlier this year, at a Cambridge University charity event, she left the stage and reportedly slapped a boy who she said had been mouthing rude comments like “show me your tits”. “That’s what you do when a white boy disrespects you,” she declared. In the grand tradition of riot grrrl, a genre which she loves, this princess

encourages women to go to the front at her gigs – an effort to reduce the dominance of men taking up space at her shows. “Girls are, like, quivering in the corners, holding on to their purses, and they deserve to hold so much more space than that,” she told the Guardian. “A Princess Nokia show is this place where girls can do that and take the space in the way that men and the brotherhood do.”

To ﬁnd out more about Princess Nokia, check out her website princessnokia.org and follow her on Twitter @princessnokia.

More information on p4 divadigital.co.uk

Princess Nokia PRINCESS NOKIA’S TUNES AND UNAPOLOGETIC ATTITUDE ARE OFF THE HOOK

14 DECEMBER 2017

WORDS JOANNA WHITEHEAD, PHOTO MILAH LIBIN

Why we love...

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| TRENDS | SHE SAID | PAINTED OUT OF HISTORY

“Very often women had to pass as men to live their lives and if they were caught, they were sometimes convicted of fraud. Most were not criminalised for their love of each other, but they were still punished. They were both invisible and demeaned. Ostracised from their communities and families. Punished and painted out of history.” MSP Kezia Dugdale giving a speech celebrating the Turing Bill, urging the Scottish government not to forget the plight of LBT women

#METOO

“My ﬁnal audition for a Steven Seagal movie took place in his office. He told me how important it was to have chemistry off-screen as he sat me down and unzipped his leather pants. I ran out and called my agent. Unfazed, she replied: ‘Well, I didn’t know if he was your type.’” Portia de Rossi on Twitter speaking out about sexual harassment

“I couldn’t say that I didn’t like it, because if that’s what he truly believed, I’d have to support that, because I love him unconditionally.” Star Trek actor Sonequa Martin-Green, responding to Good Morning Britain’s Piers Morgan asking how she’d feel if her child was gender-neutral 16 DECEMBER 2017

PHOTOS TWITTER @KEZDUGDALE, WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

UNCONDITIONAL ACCEPTANCE

PHYLL OPOKUGYIMAH Destined to be who I am

REETA LOI Finding festivity my own way

CERIAN JENKINS Your must-read Christmas survival guide

ELEANOR MARGOLIS Finding love via tragedy

VIEWS

Phyll Opoku-Gyimah Reeta Loi Brandy Dawley Munroe Bergdorf Cerian Jenkins Eleanor Margolis

“Compliment her strength, resolve, talents – not looks”

Those of you who know me know that family matters a great deal to me. I have a 23-year-old daughter who is my heartbeat and who I love unconditionally. She is my minime. My baby girl has just graduated from

18 DECEMBER 2017

university and I’m so proud. Although she identifies as a heterosexual, she will be the first to wave the rainbow flag and support me in being out and proud on Pride days, and every other day. She talks so proudly about me when asked about her mother being a lesbian, an executive director and co-founder of UK Black Pride, a Stonewall trustee, a DIVA columnist and a black woman who declined an MBE from the Queen because of the toxic legacy the empire and colonialism has left. It’s not been all smooth sailing

– I’ve had to strike the balance of being the authoritarian whilst also wanting to be approachable enough that she can tell me everything. I was a young mother, so we have had to grow and learn how we connect with each other on a spiritual level. Our communication, honesty, openness, trust and transparency is what keeps our love and friendship as mother and daughter respectful. She has seen me dedicate my life to fighting for change for people seeking justice and rights. At times there have been sacrifices that have

PHOTO AJAMU

Family matters

| VIEWS | PHYLL OPOKU-GYIMAH |

impacted on the quality time she has needed and wanted, especially when I was studying and working at the same time. It’s hard to write this down and to be so honest as it opens up moments which were such a challenge – a stark reminder of how tough life was as a single mother. I certainly don’t want sympathy because women have been raising children by themselves for the longest time, but you do question if you have done enough and ask yourself, “Could I have done anything differently?” I know that there will be single mothers reading this and relating in a big way. My word to you is that there’s no manual or handbook on how to be a brilliant parent. A lot of it is about learning on the job and improving areas that are not your strongest points. I grew up with a very strong family network – brothers and sisters who have always got my back while getting on my last nerve as well! My mother and father are strong African Ghanaian people who ran a strict Christian household. They came to the UK as migrants to make a better life for their children. My parents are so hardworking that I used to pray that we could win the “pools” and they could take a well-deserved break. I certainly get my work ethic from them. When I was younger, I believed I was their only child; I didn’t know about my older siblings who were still in Ghana. When they arrived in the UK, it’s fair to say I was mortiﬁed and acted like a bit of a spoilt princess. I’m not sure I liked them that much, and I sure as hell knew that they didn’t like me. But my gosh, I’d give them my eyes, ears and organs if I knew anything was wrong. When I started getting to like and love them,

PHYLL OPOKUGYIMAH ON THE EVOLUTION OF HER FAMILY

“I am a warrior. I was destined to be who I am today”

along came a new issue – my little brother – and I was no longer the baby of the house. Yes, I have middle child syndrome. Nowadays, my little bro is my partner in crime and we are so close that we would go to the ends of the earth for each other. We were raised on Woodberry Down council estate in north London. My family are working class and my parents worked days, nights and also studied. We didn’t have much money, but what we did have was a roof over our heads, and we never went without food. Education was key and my folks didn’t mess around with our learning. A lot of things happened while growing up – every family has hidden secrets or skeletons in their closet, and my family is not exempt from that. But my parents have always been my backbone, and if I have ever needed anything, they will always try their best to provide it. My mother – very militant, strong, assertive, dominant, and a natural host and carer. My dad – so humble, quiet, very observant and ever so intelligent. When you put those characteristics in a pot, voilà, you have me! I am a warrior, and I believe I was destined to be who I am today. It’s in my DNA to be all that my parents have instilled in me, given me and taught me – I’m not built to break. I love my parents dearly, but coming out many years ago really changed the relationship we had. It’s improved now and although I’d say my mother is “tolerant” of my sexual orientation, it’s taken her over 10 years to get to this point. Our faith and my sexuality were incompatible for her and diﬃcult for her to comprehend. At the same time, she is so proud of what I do to support people

in helping to make their lives better. My dad, on the other hand, is liberal and more laid back. He is currently back in the UK, staying with me while he is being treated for prostate cancer. We have spent a lot of time talking about LGBT+ rights, and the state of race relations here in Europe and the US. He thinks I’m famous because of UK Black Pride, and wants me to be a little more cautious when coming home late because he believes that anyone who speaks up about the importance of equality, freedom and justice will not always be liked. It always takes us back to his early memories of when he came to the UK and could not ﬁnd accommodation because of signs that said “no dogs, no Irish, no blacks”. Racism was horrendous then, as it is now. I’ve always felt like the black sheep of the family – that young, unwed single mother who did not become the doctor or lawyer that they wanted me to be, whilst also having to prove to my family that just because I have a different sexual orientation to them, I don’t love them any differently. As challenging as it’s been at times, I wouldn’t change a single thing about my life and my experiences – even those really hard times when I’ve felt like giving up – because it’s made me the woman I am today. Yes, I’m proud to be a DIVA! Sharing a little about my family has been therapeutic. I hope it helps some of you and is a reminder, DIVA readers, to stay strong and embrace family – be it blood or otherwise. Let me know your thoughts on this column, and if you relate to any of it, which part. Email or tweet me, it would be great to hear from you.

@MsLadyPhyll 19

| VIEWS | REETA LOI |

Open Christmas, open mind REETA LOI LOOKS FORWARD TO CELEBRATING HER CULTURE, HER WAY

“Christmas gradually grew into a real celebration” 20 DECEMBER 2017

When I was a kid, we moved to Winchester, a beautiful English city and all-round great place to grow up. We were one of the first brown families to move there and it was a huge contrast to Southall, the bustling Indian heart of London where I’d spent my first six years. My mum’s family are Hindu and my dad’s family are Sikh, and I’ve been raised celebrating lots of different festivals, including Diwali, the festival of lights, and Holi, the celebration of colour. Christmas didn’t feature massively in our house, apart from it being the only day we closed our shop and all got the day off. Most years we would drive to Birmingham to see family, trying to fit as many visits as we could into one day, and coming home even more tired than when we’d left. This holiday for me was listening to the chart countdown to see what was Christmas number one. It was spicy curries and way too many sweets. It was dancing around the living room with the disco lights on with my cousin-sisters, dressed in Indian dresses and playing ABBA records. It was sleeping top to tail and gossiping into the night. But attending a Church of England primary school with prayers and hymns meant that I suddenly had

access to an entirely different set of traditions and cultures. The kids at school talked about what they wanted for Christmas and raved about their new toys when we came back after the holidays. We didn’t celebrate with presents in my house and by the time my little sisters came along, I decided it was time to take this up with the grown-ups. I had tried pitching the idea of Christmas to my parents before, but they were too busy working and raising us, and we were poor so it didn’t feature high enough in their priorities. I, however, wanted my sisters to feel that they fitted in once they started school, and I guess I wanted to fit in too. So I convinced my dad that not celebrating Christmas was seriously uncool, and that we should be trying to fit in with the people in our city by celebrating with them. He gave in and bought a little plastic, tinsel tree. I loved it and felt that it had magical qualities that were guaranteed to make me smile. Convincing him to buy us presents was a much tougher sell, but we reached a compromise. At the time, polo mints were running a sales promotion. For every however many packets sold, you could get a beautiful

green polo watch with a cool digital interface. I needed to sell enough polos to get three watches – one for me and each of my sisters. I went for it, selling polos to the kids at school, the kids I played with after school and I even did a bit of upselling when I was working at the till in our shop. I did it – we got our polo watches! They weren’t wrapped, but we didn’t care. We felt so awesome wearing them. After that, Christmas gradually grew into a real celebration in our home with a much bigger plastic tree, as well as decorations, turkey and lots of presents – all beautifully wrapped. I’d started a movement in our little home, one that we made our very own. As we approach Christmas this year, my family of origin are not present in my life. They will continue the movement I started without me. I’ll be with my friends – the family I have chosen and who have chosen me. These are the people I choose to celebrate and create wonderful new memories with. I’m creating a new movement – one that is about celebrating our culture our way, with friends and Gaysians; the family we choose. This year, I’m my family, and my home is open to all.

@r_e_e_t_a_

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Feminism in transition BRANDY DAWLEY REALISES HOW MUCH WE ACCEPT MISOGYNY WHEN HER PARTNER TRANSITIONS FROM MALE TO FEMALE

22 DECEMBER 2017

When I first started dating the woman who will soon be my wife, I never thought in a million years that I would have a conversation with one of her friends about why commenting on social media about her breasts was not appropriate. Though to be fair, when we started dating, I didn’t know she was a woman – and neither did she. My fiancée, Ashley, is a trans woman. She came out to herself last November, and to me, and then the rest of the world, very shortly after. She’s the most wonderful, kind and caring individual I’ve ever met, and our line of communication has always been strong. I’m openly pansexual, and gender has never really played a factor in my attraction to someone. For that reason, I naively assumed that because I didn’t need to explore and redefine my sexuality, or worry about my attraction to her, Ashley’s transition wouldn’t cause any stress

in our relationship. But issues quickly came to the forefront, and these were not problems I could ever have anticipated. Back when she was presenting as masculine, Ashley never got any encouraging comments about her looks. At best, she’d experience good-natured ribbing from one of her male friends about her penchant for brightly coloured hoodies. She was adorable, but never received attention for her cuteness. Indeed, all of the compliments directed at her, in person or online, were centred around her talents as a director and writer, or her compassion, courage and kindheartedness. Then Ashley came out and transitioned, and everything changed. Suddenly, people would fall over themselves to tell her how cute she was, in person and online, every time they saw her. They weren’t wrong – Ashley is a cutie. But she was already cute when

she presented as male, and no one ever remarked on it. This immediately made me feel incredibly uncomfortable, and led to some of the first rows in our relationship. When you aren’t used to your partner receiving attention about their appearance, a sudden influx of it from everyone, about every picture, can be unsettling. Jealousy rose up in our relationship where it had never been before. Whilst I realise that most people were trying to be supportive to a woman finding her bearings in a world that was entirely new for her, all it did was draw her attention to her looks – something she’d never really paid much attention to before her transition. I couldn’t tell if the comments made her dysphoria better or worse. My partner hates her body, and she’s often said that the comments rang false to her, as if her friends and followers on social media were giving

| VIEWS | FEMINISM IN TRANSITION |

her a participation trophy for being a girl. At that time, I was struggling with some really intense, uncomfortable feelings that I needed to unpack. But why did this make me uncomfortable? I trusted my partner implicitly, and didn’t believe her friends would try to cross any boundaries or disrespect our relationship. I wasn’t worried about the possibility of her cheating on me, so why was I so upset? She had done nothing wrong. I started asking myself some tough questions. Was I not as ok with her transition as I pretended to be? Did I feel like trust was broken when she came out to me as a woman? I did some soul-searching and found that wasn’t my issue. I realised that my discomfort came from the fact that her friends and followers, in changing their interactions with her from talking about her achievements to focusing on her looks, were indeed treating her like a woman – or rather, they were treating her as we are culturally ingrained to treat women. Men and women alike were welcoming her into womanhood, alright, and they were doing it by objectifying her. One of the most uncomfortable moments for me came when Ashley jokingly posted a photo of herself before and after transition, commenting on how much she had changed. One of her friends – not a close friend – crudely left a comment about how much her breasts had grown. When I highlighted how uncomfortable that comment made me feel, and how othering it was to point out a trans woman’s breast growth in a photo where they weren’t asking for that type of feedback, her friend became defensive and said that she often commented on her female friends’ bodies. I won’t even get into the occasional internet troll who has decided to attack her by telling her she doesn’t “pass”. It’s horrifying and hurtful, and again, focuses on her looks. I take no issue with a woman’s appearance being commodiﬁed – as long as she is the one who chooses to

“Men and women alike were welcoming her into womanhood by objectifying her”

commodify it. I’ve made a living off of my body – first as a model, and then as an anchor for a TV show called Naked News, in which news presenters tell the day’s stories in the nude. I’ve endured many off colour comments about my appearance. I’d become so desensitised to it; I made money from my looks. Until my partner came out, and I saw how she was being treated, I was completely blind to the fact that appearance was commodified for all women, not just people who willingly choose to entertain that type of attention. That realisation hit me like a ton of bricks. Watching people change how they reacted to Ashley opened my eyes to quieter, more insidious, forms of everyday misogyny. I started scrutinising my social media presence more closely. Every photo was indeed full of comments about my body, and some definitely creepier than others – that, I knew. I already regularly deleted comments from my social media that I found to be distasteful. What I didn’t notice until then, however, was that my looks were even commented on in many of the photos that weren’t even of me. “Don’t eat too many of those!” cautioned one stranger, on a photo I had posted of freshly baked cookies. This person, who I had never met, and who had no claims to my body, was trying to police my weight on a photo so that he could enjoy how I looked, the way that he liked the best. This stranger thought that he was entitled to have an opinion about my body, simply because he liked it. I wasn’t even in the photo – he saw cookies and felt the need to restrict my eating habits, presumably in case I got a belly or a little bit of extra cellulite and made myself unattractive to him. “Let me see your tits”, another stranger commented on a photo I had posted of a scarf I had made. I was not in the photo. The photo was not in the least bit revealing or even remotely sexy – unless you have a strange fetish for outerwear. The photo was of a knitted, black acrylic scarf, stretched

across the couch. The scarf was not lounging sexily. The scarf did not have tits to show. It was an absolutely ridiculous thing to write. Here I was, posting photos of the things I had made, crafts that I was proud of, and I was still being reduced to my body parts. I decided to conduct a little experiment. I stopped posting photos that could be considered even remotely sexy. I lost several followers, but I found that I didn’t care. I still received the occasional creepy comment, but mostly I just lost a lot of engagement. I was floored. I always thought that by consciously choosing to put myself in the public eye in a sexual fashion, I was taking the power away from those that would objectify me – or, at least, making them pay for the privilege. But after seeing how people treated my girlfriend, I realised that by being a willing participant in the system, I was helping to perpetuate that a woman’s self-worth is defined by her looks and little else. Shortly afterwards, I quit my job and took a drastic career change, with a massive pay cut. It’s been nearly three months, and even though money is tighter, I’m far happier with my life. I used to be a very angry person, and I’ve relaxed lots. It isn’t just men who do this – plenty of us are guilty of focusing on looks. It’s societal, and with each comment, we’re reinforcing the idea that our appearance should be the primary focus. The next time you want to boost a friend’s ego, I urge you to compliment her strength, her resolve, her talents – not her looks. My fiancée is a godsend. She’s the sweetest, kindest person in the world and I’m lucky to have her. But by far the most important thing she did for me was accidental. She opened my eyes to something I was blind to, a problem affecting all women. And she did it just by being her true self.

@therealoverlady 23

SOCIAL ACTIVIST AND MODEL MUNROE BERGDORF ON THE MEANING OF THE F WORD

24 DECEMBER 2017

As LGBT+ women, we all know that “family” is a word that means different things to different people. It’s a powerful and inescapable word that has the potential to conjure feelings of comfort, joy and hope, or sadness, regret and loss, simply depending on your personal journey. But do we talk enough about the pressures put on us as LGBT+ women within our family structures? Whether our family is chosen or biological, accidental or intentional, as queer women living within a patriarchal society that still places heteronormativity as the default, we are often put in uniquely emotionally laborious positions – “Am I doing enough? Could I have done more? Am I enough?” These are all questions I have asked

myself in response to the societal pressures put on me as a queer woman trying to navigate the notion of family. The constant balancing act of juggling the multiple expectations of who I am and where I want to go, with the expectations of others within my family units, has at times felt overwhelming and paralysing. But it has also forced me to learn how to prioritise my worth when placed in demanding situations. I have learned that neglecting self-care is not an option if I am going to be of value to my loved ones. Let’s begin by deconstructing the feeling of “am I doing enough?” It’s easy to say that we should not feel guilty for setting aside time for ourselves, but in a society that assigns women the role of a seemingly endless fountain of empathy and compassion, it’s easier said than done. You are just one person living in 2017, a time which – for a great number of women from many walks of life across the globe – is an extremely uncertain and unpredictable point in history. Truth is, right now, we all feel a little helpless, but try to ﬁnd the certainty in the uncertainty

through implementing boundaries and managing expectations. You are not an emotional vending machine and you do not need to be one. Society may expect that of you, but opening a dialogue with your chosen family is key. You need to let your loved ones know when you are struggling, and vice versa. Don’t just ask “am I doing enough?” when it comes to how useful you are to other people. Remember to ask yourself “am I doing enough for me?” and see if that helps to reduce your anxiety about not doing enough for others. It’s ok to lean on your family, as well as them leaning on you. Coming out to your family is diﬃcult and as a queer trans woman, who has essentially come out three times because of the intersections of my identity, I can safely say that there is no easy way to do it, no matter how much practice you get. You are sharing an extremely sensitive part of yourself with the people you love the most, and it will always be important that they receive the information favourably. However, retrospect is a ﬁne thing and whereas I don’t think that there

PHOTO EIVIND-HANSEN

Family is forgiveness

| VIEWS | MUNROE BERGDORF |

would have ever been a perfect way or time to have come out, I do think I could have allowed for a bit more give than I granted my loved ones in those moments. This is where patience comes into play. Whenever I ask myself “could I have done more?” with regards to coming out, I think that I could have been a bit more mindful of my family’s individual emotional processes. That everyone was also having their own “could I have done more?” moment. Where this feeling is highly isolating and often drives a wedge between us, there is a power in it. For some who are fortunate enough to have come out to their biological family and work through it – it can be an opportunity to become closer. When I came out as transgender to my parents, the rug was well and truly pulled from under my feet. I thought I had it all figured out in my head as to how they would react, purely based on how they reacted when I originally came out as gay when I was 16, but the reality couldn’t have been further from how I imagined it to pan out. My father is Jamaican – old-school Jamaican – and growing up he was extremely hard on me. He didn’t take my first coming out well, so I didn’t expect a lot of support from him the second time around. However, he is a great example that people can really surprise you, and also that people can learn from their past mistakes and make amends. This time, he took it all in his stride. He didn’t understand it completely, but his reaction was as if he had made the decision to get it right this time, that this was an opportunity to use last time as a reference point and change the narrative. It was his chance to answer his own “could I have done more?” moment. This time around he asked me, “what can I do?” Although my relationship with my father improved after I came out as trans, my relationship with my mother took a nosedive. My mum is extremely similar to me. Hot-headed, a slave to her emotions, stubborn, and a worrier. When I came out to her the first time, it was awkward for a few weeks, but she eventually realised it wasn’t a big deal unless we made it one. However,

“We had both pushed each other away because of our own fears”

the second time around saw us lock horns to such an extent that we went without talking for the best part of a year. I didn’t see her for my birthday, her birthday or Christmas day. We are both that stubborn. During this time, I was filled with an overwhelming guilt and a feeling that I was a disappointment to my mother. I was constantly asking myself “am I enough?”. Something that stuck with me from a row with my mother after coming out the first time was her saying, “When you have a child, there are certain things you hope for them and this isn’t what I want for you”. The fear in her voice told me that she wasn’t upset about me coming out because she disagreed with homosexuality, but rather because she was scared about what I would have to endure living life out of the closet. It was that fear that caused her to shut down. However it wasn’t until after our year-long falling out, that I realised it was also the reason for my mother acting the way she did the second time around. When I came out as transgender to my parents, I came out hard. I laid down the law that this is how it is, this is what’s going to happen, these are MY plans and this is what I want for MY body. I had it all figured out; I had factored in everything except how my family felt about it all. It just didn’t occur to me. I guess I was on self-preservation autopilot. Maybe subconsciously I didn’t want to open myself to their feelings, through fear of rejection. It really was a case of “I’m here, I’m queer, get used to it”. What if I had just exercised a little sensitivity and taken stock of the phrase “when one person in the family transitions, the whole family transitions”? My mother is lots of things, but she is not transphobic and bigoted – which, if I’m honest, I brandished her as when I felt that I was being rejected. If I had stopped to acknowledge her feelings and the intensity of the worry that she must have been experiencing – that her child was, yet again, going to be out in the world, largely misunderstood by a society that was not built for them to exist in. Combine this with her extremely stubborn nature

clashing with mine; and there was just a complete lack of acknowledging each other’s feelings, and fear of the unknown, on both sides. One year passes and, to everyone’s surprise, it was my dad who began to facilitate the meetups for me and my mother to see each other and rebuild our previously close relationship. We talked about how we didn’t put ourselves in each other’s shoes. How I felt that I needed to be accepted and understood straight away, without giving her any time to process the information that I had presented her with. But also how my mum didn’t acknowledge that I was extremely scared and anticipating possible rejection, so I had my defence shields up and wasn’t willing to bend for anyone. We had both pushed each other away because of our own insecurities and fear that we were not able to handle the situation that we were presented with. Once we both realised that, all that was needed to resolve the situation was a little vulnerability and empathy for the each other’s feelings, and we were able to rebuild. Today, my family and I are closer than ever. There is a higher level of communication and we are all more mindful of how our actions and feelings can affect one and other. If I have learned anything from my experiences, it’s that we ALL get things wrong and we always will, but your family – biological or chosen – is who you work through those life-changing situations with, who you go to and let down your guard with. Who you invest and nurture your emotion in. In that year that I didn’t speak to my mother, I learned more about how beautifully human she is than in the 25 years previous. Our imperfections can be our strengths as long as we are willing to learn from them and stay committed to change. Emotional support cannot be a one-way street, we need to learn to lean on each other to stop all of us from falling down. Family is teamwork. Family is community. Family is imperfect. Family is forgiveness.

@MunroeBergdorf 25

| VIEWS | CERIAN JENKINS |

Cerian’s survival guide. Part 2: Christmas WANT TO FASTFORWARD THROUGH THE FESTIVITIES? CERIAN JENKINS HAS SOME TIPS FOR YOU

“Spend the day in bed with takeaway and horror films. This is your Christmas” 26 DECEMBER 2017

Being part of the queer community, for me, means sharing the highs and the lows with one another. Rejoicing together when someone makes their unity with a loved one official. Celebrating the birth or adoption of a much-anticipated family member. Commiserating over breakups, heartache and lost love. Yet one of the times we are most needed as a community is in supporting those who, because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, have become estranged from their family. Christmas can be a particularly painful time. Whether you’re facing full estrangement, enduring the achingly hurtful “we love you in spite of who you are” attitude, or you’re not out and feel like you have to hide an important part of your identity from your family, for many in our community the holidays can be some of the most difficult days of the year. On top of everything else, there’s so much pressure to really “do” Christmas. From sickly-sweet TV adverts through to workplace “secret santa” presents, avoiding The Season is a mission. The good news is that you can take control of your own little bubble. I’ve put together some pointers on prioritising your own wellbeing during the festivities – with the addendum that one size really doesn’t fit all, and what works for one person may not work for another. Above all else, you should feel free, and able, to do (or not do) Christmas in your own valuable way.

1. GO YOUR OWN WAY No matter what John Lewis wants us to believe, there’s no right way to do Christmas. If you do want to take part in the festivities, then now is the time to start creating your own rituals and traditions that aren’t linked to triggering or diﬃcult memories. Go out to a local pub for Christmas dinner. Go hiking in the mountains. Volunteer at your local homeless shelter. Spend the day in bed surrounded by your go-to takeaway and enjoying your favourite horror ﬁlms. It’s up to you, because this is your Christmas.

2. OPT OUT COMPLETELY Of course, you don’t have to stick your stocking up or put out those mince pies if you don’t want to. Whilst people will, I’m afraid, look aghast if you tell them you’ve no plans for Christmas (and, inevitably, invite you over to take part in theirs), you don’t actually have to treat the day differently to any other. It’s a day off to get through that to-do list you’ve been avoiding for so long. Oh, and make sure you stay off of social media, because that’s the last thing you need when you’re just trying to get the fuck on with things.

3. LEAN ON OTHERS Seriously, it’s ok to reach out and ask for what you need right now. If you would like to spend the day with other people, make sure you let them know. Put some feelers out on Facebook, take a look at local events happening

during the holidays, and drop a line to anyone you think might be in a similar position. As part of the Gender Equality Network, we used to make sure someone was always on hand at Christmas to talk, and a number of us would run an “open house” on Christmas day. Honestly, those dropins were some of the best Christmases I’ve ever had.

4. SELF-CARE, NOT SELF-DESTRUCTION Tempting though it may be to curl up with that bottle of Christmas liqueur and gorge yourself on advent calendar chocolate, it’s not going to make you feel great. Alcohol is a depressant (I say as I sit here nursing my second glass of wine this evening) and not eating properly will make you feel lethargic and slow. Instead, prioritise self-care. Take a nice bath, make yourself some hearty comfort food, and get an early night. You’ll wake up feeling better and more able to face the post-Christmas world.

5. USUAL SERVICE WILL RESUME If all else fails, keep reminding yourself that the Christmas period will soon be over, and the new year well underway. At some point soon, everything will be back to normal – save for the fact that you might be able to pick up some banging bargains in the January sales!

@CerianJenkins

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| VIEWS | ELEANOR MARGOLIS |

Sharing love and rituals ELEANOR MARGOLIS EXPLAINS HOW DIFFICULT CHALLENGES INITIATED HER NEW PARTNER INTO HER HOME

“Via tragedy, Leo was fasttracked into my family” 28 DECEMBER 2017

In June last year, I went on a date. We got drunk and I kissed her outside Peckham Rye station. Just over one year later, I watched as she helped my sister shave my mum’s legs. This would be a lot easier to write if “the shaving of the mother” was a Margolis family initiation ritual for new partners. The reality is less bizarre, but more harrowing. My mum had been in hospital, in intensive care, for about a month. In a bid for a glimmer of normality (in the ends, rather than the means), she asked – as her mobility was very restricted – if one of us would shave her legs. My sister arrived with a razor and got to work. My girlfriend, Leo, who seemed as unperturbed by the situation as the most hardened Margolis, offered to help. She ended up standing with one of those cardboard hat-shaped puke receptacles full of water, so my sister could clean the razor between shaves. At the beginning of this year, my mum was diagnosed with stage four, terminal cancer. I could list clichés about suddenly ﬁnding myself upside down, inside out and lost at sea, but I’d rather not. I was – I am – devastated, and that’s that. Leo and I had been together for just six months. I realise that, in Lesbian Time, this is the equivalent of about four years, and it was a glaring anomaly that we hadn’t moved

in together yet! It still seemed early in our relationship for her to become my go-to for support. But, via tragedy, Leo was fast-tracked into my family. And if you’re looking for a fun exercise in emotional chaos, I recommend being simultaneously heartbroken and in love. When my mum was in a medically induced coma for a week, Leo camped out with us. She played scrabble with us, and heard us argue. She let me cry all over her every night. It was strange to think that there was a time before she was one of us. She was the enzyme to our sad and furious substrate, slotting right into our crisis. Something I was so distracted by that it took me a while to realise is just how strange this must have been for her. To go, within a year, from casual drinks to daily hospital visits, complete with crying and vomiting on all sides. “I’m worried I’m becoming bitter and messed up,” I told her, one particularly bad night. “Oh come on,” she said, “everyone’s messed up.” I think she’s right. Although I think that her composition when thrown right into the middle of my family at its messiest speaks volumes to her un-messed up-ness. It’s, at the same time, incredibly lucky and incredibly unlucky that my ﬁrst long-term relationship has

coincided with my mum’s illness. It’s something – on top of everything else – diﬃcult to wrap my head around. I’ve always been terriﬁed of introducing a partner to my parents and, ideally, I would have eased Leo into my (intense at the best of times) family like a very old man getting into a very hot bath. Instead, she’s jumped right in and is simply refusing to complain. In the hospital the other week, my mum grabbed mine and Leo’s hands. She squeezed them and smiled at us. Maybe she was grateful to Leo for helping out with the shaving, and me for, I’m not sure what. Either way, it was an ok moment. Not beautiful, not overlyprofound. Just ok, in what had been a whole month of anything but ok. “Two beefs,” my mum said. It’s really hard to explain, I’ve realised, what my mum and I mean when we say “beef” to each other. It’s this affectionate thing we’ve developed since her diagnosis. It basically translates as, “you’re tough: you’ve got this”. But her sharing “beef” with Leo, in that very ok moment, felt like the “shaving of the mother” all over again. My girlfriend was well and truly initiated.

@EleanorMargolis Eleanor’s mum Sue sadly passed away on 1 November, 2017.

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real representation: Sam, Debs, and our adopted family

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the little Web Series that did I’m only ﬁve minutes into The Carmilla Movie and I’m already gripped. Laura’s tearing down an old-timey corridor, panting in a corseted gown, her heart hammering in her chest and causing mine to do the same, while her 300-year-old ex-vampire girlfriend Carm takes a dip in a literal bloodbath. What the Creampuff is going on?

30 DECEMBER 2017

PHOTO ASHLEA WESSEL FOR SHAFTESBURY, COPYRIGHT SHAFTESBURY

ROXY BOURDILLON MEETS THE STARS OF YOUTUBE PHENOMENON TURNED FEATURE FILM, CARMILLA

| COVER STORY | CARMILLA |

An hour and a half later, and I’m still buzzing. I’ve just watched a loved up, queer female couple on-screen and neither one was killed off. I’ve seen the LGBTQ gang of my #SquadGoals fantasies ﬁght evil, while being hilarious and diverse. Heck, I’ve even marvelled at a masked ball attended exclusively by luscious ladyghosts and rejoiced at a romantic subplot between two queer women of colour (it’s about time smart-mouthed Mel got some action). From a two and a half minute webisode in 2014 to a full-on feature ﬁlm in 2017, oh Carmilla, the little lesbian vampire “web series that could”, bloody bravo. As a fan of the show who has eagerly binged all three series, I can’t wait to jump on a three-way transatlantic call with its Canadian stars Natasha Negovanlis, who plays broody rock chick vampire Carmilla Karnstein, and her on-screen paramour, Elise Bauman, perhaps more familiar to you as crusading, well-meaning, if slightly tightly wound, reporter Laura Hollis. “I chose to be an actor so that I could tell stories and connect with other human beings,” Natasha explains earnestly. As Carmilla, she’s been around forever, seen everything and is consequently moved by very little, but out of character, Natasha is far more compassionate. “I feel extremely lucky, especially as an openly queer actor

32 DECEMBER 2017

who plays a queer character. That’s really special.” It’s special for viewers too. Watching two out actors portray dream duo “Hollstein” provides an extra frisson and makes Natasha and Elise’s passion for positive queer representation all the more powerful. Like Natasha, Elise is thoughtful and eloquent, acknowledging: “It’s pretty revolutionary that the two leads of the show are in a same-sex relationship. To be able to have a story that’s centred around the relationship, but not have it only be about the fact that they’re queer, is still something that is not seen that often.” Natasha agrees, adding, “We don’t make their sexual identities the forefront of the story, but at the same time it’s not just subtext. We aren’t afraid to say the word ‘lesbian’ or have a nonbinary character or a queer woman of colour. The fact that our fans can see themselves reﬂected on-screen as the heroes is what makes the show really unique. I read a GLAAD media report last year that found that only 5% of on-screen characters are members of the LGBTQ community, and that’s gotta change.” These switched-on young actors are in the extraordinary position of embodying the shift they want to see in the world. They’re thrilled when I mention the overwhelming response I received from readers when I posted

about The Carmilla Movie trailer on the DIVA website. “Every time that people express their gratitude, I just mirror that gratitude right back tenfold,” declares Elise fondly. They describe the “handwritten fan letters” they receive on a weekly basis about how “Carmilla gave people the courage to come out”. Natasha notes that, “People are finding a community online, which they might not be able to find in their country, especially as some of our fans live in countries where being queer is illegal, which is crazy and so sad.” Then there are conventions like the recent ClexaCon, which give them the chance to meet their fans, affectionately nicknamed “Creampuffs”, and hear firsthand how the show transformed their lives. “I now know to wear waterproof mascara,” smiles Natasha. I ask if they’re planning on appearing at the hotly anticipated London ClexaCon in 2018 and they exclaim in unison that they’d “lurve” to. Sounds promising, so watch this space, Creampuffs. Talking to Natasha and Elise, I discover that they both possess the same silly sense of humour the show is known for, but it’s counterbalanced with a certain seriousness, an awareness of the gravity of their responsibility towards their fanbase and the wider significance of the feel-good, campy, adventure-rom-com-romp they star in. “Sometimes it makes me

PHOTOS BRENDAN ADAM-ZWELLING FOR SHAFTESBURY, COPYRIGHT SHAFTESBURY

“the fact that our fans can see themselves reflected on screen as the heroes∫what makes the show really unique”

a little anxious because I really care about Carmilla and I really care about our fans,” admits Natasha. “They’re so important to me that I do feel a pressure to be a good role model for the community and I can get in my head about it. But at the end of the day, I try to be myself and I try to teach others to do the same.” Elise is admirably candid when I tentatively broach the subject of her own coming out experience. She conﬁrmed her bisexuality in an interview with Daily Xtra earlier this year, and she reveals it was being in Carmilla that helped her accept this part of herself. “For the ﬁrst couple of seasons I was so trying for it not to be real. Playing Laura helped me face that head-on. To be completely honest, I’m still dealing with some shame around being bisexual. I remember in high school when I was starting to

34 DECEMBER 2017

question my sexuality, I would always call people out for saying ‘that’s so gay’, and I was called a dyke. That really chipped away at my bravery, but part of being an actor is standing up for what you believe in. I want to be the kind of person that’s on the frontline, and Carmilla definitely helps me with that.” Natasha’s coming out story is “very different from Elise’s”. Whilst Elise was homeschooled with a “semi-religious upbringing”, Natasha studied at a progressive performing arts school in Toronto, “where being sexually fluid was actually cool”. “I first came out as bisexual when I was a teenager. Later I found the terms queer and pansexual, which felt more fitting as I made more non-binary friends and realised that I could be attracted to all gender identities.” One of the things that drew her to Carmilla was her burning desire

to play a lesbian. “I grew up watching shows like The L Word.” I suggest she might fancy a gig in the forthcoming reboot and she assures me, “I have already talked to my agent about that.” Despite their contrasting journeys to self-acceptance, they’ve both had to deal with prejudice. Natasha is keen to stress, “It’s important that bisexual and pansexual women understand that they are valid and their identity is ok. So often when you are sexually ﬂuid, you receive criticism from the straight community and the gay community.” She recounts being labelled a “slut” when she identiﬁed as bi in her teens. Elise laughs bitterly in recognition, remembering a negative experience of her own. “I once had a person tell me that you don’t need to come out if you’re bisexual. I remember that moment feeling, ‘I’m not valid. People don’t think that’s valid.’”

PHOTOS BRENDAN ADAM-ZWELLING FOR SHAFTESBURY, COPYRIGHT SHAFTESBURY

| COVER STORY | CARMILLA |

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It’s hardly surprising that Carmilla It’s hardly surprising that Carmilla superfans are preoccupied with whether or not Elise and Natasha are a couple IRL. Their chemistry practically explodes off the screen and they’re not averse to fanning the ﬂames of speculation, albeit in a jokey way. They’ve made several “girlfriend tag” vlogs for YouTube, and when Natasha won the Canadian Screen Fan’s Choice Award, in her acceptance speech she described her date for the evening, Elise, as “my on-screen love interest and maybe my real life one sometimes”. So how do they feel about all the are-they, aren’t-they gossip? “I personally don’t read any of the fan ﬁction,” states Natasha matterof-factly. “But it doesn’t bother me. If we’re helping people be more creative, then so be it.” Although they insist they’re not dating off-screen, there’s no doubt that they make a compelling couple in front of the camera. After three series of mounting sexual tension between our two leads, the movie rewards fans’ patience with one of the best samesex love scenes I’ve seen (and believe me, I’ve done the research). From the smouldering Uh Huh Her soundtrack, to their soft but urgent caresses and the raw lust in their eyes, it’s sensual, feminine and authentic. I can’t think

36 DECEMBER 2017

of many on-screen depictions of same-sex passion that are as truthful or as enjoyable. But what are those intimate scenes like to ﬁlm? “It doesn’t feel any different than shooting any other scene,” shrugs Elise. “We’ve been working together for so long now that there was an innate sense of trust and support. We would have conversations before those scenes, checking in with each other about what’s ok and what’s not ok.” I’m surprised when Natasha informs me that Carmilla is directed by a man, the talented Spencer Maybee. “He is an example for how other male directors should behave. He gave us a lot of freedom to do what made us feel comfortable – to portray these queer characters how we wanted to portray them. It was really important for him that this ﬁlm looked like it was directed for women, by a woman.” Although the director may be a guy, the majority of the team is made up of women. “Having a project created by a queer, female producer and a female writer means playing female characters who are more three-dimensional,” enthuses Natasha. “They’re more than just pretty or just funny. Side note, I actually once had a drama teacher tell the class ‘you’re either pretty or you’re funny.’” I gasp in horror and

Elise manages an, “Oof, oh… my… god.” Once she’s recovered, she lifts our spirits by sharing how inspiring it was to see producer, Melanie Windle, breastfeed her newborn baby on set. “Watching her continue to be a boss and get things done and be so loving, and balance all of that within a community of people that just accepted it, completely redefined what I thought my career could look like in the future. I thought that maybe I’d have to make a choice between motherhood and a career, and now I don’t think you have to.” As I get to know Natasha and Elise, I’m struck by their intelligence, their warmth and their constant consciousness of the impact that they and the little web series that bloody well did are having on queer people all over the globe. The significance of their work is staggering, but to me what’s most exciting of all, is that this film isn’t just important, it’s also damn good. It’s funny, it’s sexy and it’s queer as Christmas. So do yourself a favour – download and devour it with the ferocious appetite of a bloodthirsty vampire who has been starved of vampiric representation for way too long. Bon appetit.

Watch The Carmilla Movie now at carmillamovie.vhx.tv.

PHOTO ASHLEA WESSEL FOR SHAFTESBURY, COPYRIGHT SHAFTESBURY

“It’s important that bisexual√ pansexual women understand that they are valid√that their identity∫ok”

| COVER STORY | CARMILLA |

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| FEATURE | QUEER ACTUALLY |

More information on p4 divadigital.co.uk

queeractually ROXY BOURDILLON REIMAGINES A CHRISTMAS CLASSIC

It’s that time of year again. The streets are full of shoppers festively screaming at each other, the Amazon delivery guy is weeping on the pavement – a broken man with a broken back – and you’re settling down on the sofa with a Terry’s Chocolate Orange (it’s not Terry’s, it’s yours) to watch Love Actually, a ﬁlm that celebrates love in all its forms. All its heterosexual forms, that is, because “love is all around”, but only if you’re straight. Richard Curtis’ Crimbo classic features dozens of characters, and not one of them is queer. That’s not just disappointing, it’s statisti-

cally unlikely. What about Pat, the Prime Minister’s housekeeper? Come on Curtis, you couldn’t have made Pat a lez? Love Actually is as straight, actually, as my mum wishes I was. But did you know that the crowd-pleasing flick originally included a same-sex love story? Naturally, one of the sisters of Sappho died, because nothing says Christmas cheer like Dead Lesbian Syndrome. Curtis took burying his gays to a whole new level. He went to all the trouble of shooting our death scenes, and then killed our storyline too, like some sadistic patriarchal puppeteer. The lack of queer characters isn’t the only rage-inducing factor in the film. For starters, everyone wears polo necks and still finds each other attractive! (Bonus drinking game: every time someone wears a polo neck, take a swig – you’ll be wankered before Hugh Grant has dad-danced his way round Number 10.) The thing is, even though the accepted wisdom is that Love Actually is Crap Actually, that it’s sexist and problematic and clichéd and all of those other qualities movie execs look for in the next box office smash, I still love it. I know it isn’t good for me, but like scoffing all my advent calendar choccies on November 15th, I just can’t help myself. But chin and bottoms and Terry’s Chocolate Orange up, because I present the festive rom-com of your lady-loving fantasies – Queer Actually… We open on the airport and it’s full of lesbians and bi women hugging and kissing and scissoring as Prime Minister Ellen DeGeneres booms over the tannoy, “If you look for it, I’ve got a sneaky feeling you’ll find that queers actually are all around.”

Hear that, Curtis? We’re all around so put us in your goddamn deeply flawed, irresistibly watchable films! All of a sudden, Shane McCutcheon swaggers through the arrivals gate with nothing but a backpack full of strap-ons, on a quest to meet British women to hook up with. We form an orderly queue. Next the camera zooms in on Piper and Alex, newly released from Litchfield and getting hitched while best woman Suzanne

“Crazy Eyes” Warren watches on jealously. All she wanted for Christmas was a chocolate and vanilla swirl, dammit. Suddenly, Missy Elliott, who inexplicably no one had noticed chilling in the pews until now, starts serenading the lovebirds with her classic romantic ballad, Work It: “I’d like to get to know ya so I could show ya, Put the pussy on ya like I told ya.” There’s not a dry seat in the house. Suzanne later turns up on Piper’s doorstep with a boombox and a bunch of placards: “Say it’s carol singers”, “To me, you are perfect”, “Will you be my dandelion?” When Piper refuses, Suzanne wees aggressively on the welcome mat, maintaining eye contact the whole time like a badass with impeccable bladder control. Next up it’s Bette and Tina, and holy Schecter, the carpenter’s back. She’s prowling around in her toolbelt purring, “I’ll be hanging around the mistletoe, hoping for something to hammer.” “Nooooo!” we all scream at the screen, but Mr Bean’s already gift-wrapping the gold-plated screwdriver… Cut to Sue Sylvester from Glee, looking extra fancy in her red tracksuit with the white faux fur trim, recording a bargain basement cover of a Wet Wet Wet golden oldie: “Queers are all around me, and so the moistness grows.” Cut back to the airport and it’s ﬁlled with queer women, their faces gleaming with happy tears, some because they’ve just had the ride of their lives with Shane, but most because all they wanted for Christmas was some decent representation in the media.

r e e u q A mas carol

now Don we apparel! ! a y our ga a-la la-la la-l

Christ

a Fa-la-l

(To be sung joyfully to the tune of The 12 Days Of Christmas)

-l

On the ﬁrst day of Christmas Rachel Shelley gave to me: The L Word season three. On the second day of Christmas Heather Peace gave to me: two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three.

On the third day of Christmas my girlfriend gave to me: three ﬂannel shirts, two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three.

On the fourth day of Christmas my lesbro gave to me: four trips to IKEA, three flannel shirts, two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three. On the fifth day of Christmas DIVA mag gave to me: FIVE GAY THINGS, four trips to IKEA, three flannel shirts, two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three. On the sixth day of Christmas Rose and Rosie gave to me: six vlogs a vlogging, FIVE GAY THINGS, four trips to IKEA, three flannel shirts, two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three. On the seventh day of Christmas Big Boo gave to me: seven pussies a purring, six vlogs a vlogging, FIVE GAY THINGS, four trips to IKEA, three flannel shirts, two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three. On the eighth day of Christmas Lucy Spraggan gave to me: eight maids a making out, seven pussies a purring, six vlogs a vlogging, FIVE GAY THINGS, four trips to IKEA, three flannel shirts, two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three. On the ninth day of Christmas Ellen gave to me: nine ladies lap dancing, eight maids a making out, seven pussies a purring, six vlogs a vlogging, FIVE GAY THINGS, four trips to IKEA, three flannel shirts, two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three. On the 10th day of Christmas Samira Wiley gave to me: 10 lezzas a lezzing, nine ladies lap dancing, eight maids a making out, seven pussies a purring, six vlogs a vlogging, FIVE GAY THINGS, four trips to IKEA, three flannel shirts, two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three.

1 2 3

4 4 5

ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS EQUALITY spreadshirt.co.uk, £31.77

ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS BOOBS ebay.co.uk, £14.99

WE’RE LIVING FOR RUDOLPH IN HIS REINDEER SCARF

BE QUEERFUL, IT’S CHRISTMAS! ebay.co.uk, £7.95

ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS PROPER QUEER REPRESENTATION IN THE MEDIA lookhuman.com, £27

ebay.co.uk, £19.95

Merry Queermas! It’s time to dyke the halls and m ake Yuletide sup the er-gay.

Words: Rox y Bourdillo n

It’s party season, which means you’d better change out of that rainbow onesie, step away from the multipack of vegan mince pies and get out into the fairy-lit world. This is going to be the Kristen Stewart of Crimbos, The L Word reboot of festive times. You, my queer angel, are going to sparkle brighter than a drag queen’s eye make-up. So choose your fave tacky knitwear and sample our seasonal sapphic chat-up lines, but ﬁrst, please warm up your vocal chords for a classic Christmas carol…

On the 11th day of Christmas Taylor Schilling gave to me: 11 Piper Chapmans, 10 lezzas a lezzing, nine ladies lap dancing, eight maids a making out, seven pussies a purring, six vlogs a vlogging, FIVE GAY THINGS, four trips to IKEA, three ﬂannel shirts, two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three. On the 12th day of Christmas Lauren Jauregui gave to me: LGBT equality, 11 Piper Chapmans, 10 lezzas a lezzing, nine ladies lap dancing, eight maids a making out, seven pussies a purring, six vlogs a vlogging, FIVE GAY THINGS, four trips to IKEA, three ﬂannel shirts, two cuddly pugs and The L Word season three! 40 DECEMBER 2017

| FEATURE | MERRY QUEERMAS! |

sly gay u o e g r Go

s g n i t e e gr cards

FESTIVE AND FLIPPING GORGEOUS etsy.com/uk/shop/ BettyRobbin, £6.99

RAINBOW + SEASONAL CHEER = PERFECTION IN A CRIMBO CARD etsy.com/uk/shop/ YellowBlossomDesigns, £2.99

3 4 5

5 MAKE YOUR BAE SWOON etsy.com/uk/shop/ TheBeehiveHandmade, £2.90

HAPPY HOLIGAYS! etsy.com/uk/shop/ ExGirlfriendsCards, £3.95

LET’S PARTY LIKE IT’S 1909 etsy.com/uk/shop/ VintageImagesUK, £2.39

festive \ W]

W`bOb

Mulled wine and eggnog can help you get a snog, but know your limits. Slurring and spewing are not half as seductive as they may seem at the time. Aim for cheeky, like one of Santa’s elves, not creepy, like his sleazy brother, Sid Claus, who never gets to ride on the sleigh because the reindeer have had it up to their antlers with his shit! Here’s some lines to try on that cutie under the mistletoe:

“I’d throw my mince pie for you.” “Would you care to hurry down my chimney tonight?”

3 1 1

LGBT ORNAMENTS TO SPREAD A LITTLE CHRISTMAS QUEER Rainbow wreath paperchase.co.uk £20, Snowman squad etsy.com/uk/shop/Silverpasta £22.95, Candy cane and stocking etsy.com/uk/shop/ SpiroCeramics £11.91

2 3 4 5

MATCHING MRS CLAUS OUTFITS FOR YOU AND YOUR BETTER HALF partypacks.co.uk, £14.34

BAUBLES IN EVERY SHADE (ESSENTIAL!) paperchase.co.uk, £10

RAINBOW TINSEL (OBVS) eBay.co.uk, 99p

“Yule do.”

“I’d like to see your stockings on my fireplace.”

“Get your coat. It’s freezing outside… and you’ve pulled!” “Your jingle bells rock.”

“Is your name Carol? Because you make me want to sing. On the first day of Christmas Rachel Shelley gave to me…!”

BACK ISSUES OF DIVA TO REPURPOSE AS WRAPPING PAPER divadirect.info, £3.99

5 FOUR PAGES OF ON POINT PREZZIES TO TAKE THE STRESS OUT OF YOUR FESTIVE SHOPPING

WORDS ROXY BOURDILLON

#DAPPERDIVA 1 2 3 4

WIFEY FOR LIFEY Show off your commitment to kickass totes. how-store.com, £12

QUEER BADGE When in doubt, go rainbow. feministapparel.com, £9.10

BOMBER JACKET

GRAPHIC TEE

STATEMENT SOCKS

FRINGED KIMONO Femme fabulousness, available in UK sizes 8 - 24. playfulpromises.com, £50

FEMINIST NECKLACE Give this to someone tough and gorgeous. rocknrose.co.uk, £29

42 DECEMBER 2017

Say “yaaas queen” to this stylish jacket. wildfang.com, £67 Let her outﬁt do the talking (and the scissoring). hellomerch.com, £20 Adorn her ankles with a pop of colour. notonthehighstreet.com/ mrdlondon, £10

| FEATURE | XMAS GIFTS |

6 #RIOTGRRRL 1 2

WE CAN DO IT! Words to live by from women who rock. asos.com, £6.99

TO-DO LIST Because overthrowing the patriarchy requires organisation. veronicadearly.com, £3.95

3 4

MOTIVATIONAL MUG Give her an extra boost in the morning. zazzle.co.uk, £12.30

FEMINIST GIFT SET A beautiful box of empowerment and sass. notonthehighstreet.com/ houseofwonderland, £35

5 6 7

FIGHT LIKE A GIRL Feminist cross-stitch? Yes please. stitchsperation.com, £25

RANTY KNITWEAR The ideal combo of snuggly and protesty. lookhuman.com, £27

FRIDA CANDLE Bound to look awesome in any room. rocknrose.co.uk, £24

6 7

#ANIMALLOVER 1 2 3

RESERVED FOR THE CAT This will make her purr with happiness. sassandbelle.co.uk, £13

YOGA CATS They’ve even mastered downward-facing dog. prezzybox.com, £4.99

CAT SCRATCH LAPTOP For geeky cats and the owners who love them. allthingsbrightonbeautiful.co.uk, £17.45

44 DECEMBER 2017

4 5

BOW WOW BOW TIE For canines with class. theddcompany.com, £15.50

PET PHOTO BOOTH Provides hours of silly fun and snaps for Instagram. lisaangel.co.uk, £9

6 7

BEWARE SIGN Warning! Super cute pooch in the vicinity! notonthehighstreet.com/wellbreddesign, £12.95

PUGS AND KISSES Novelty knitwear she’ll adore. batch1.com, £34

| FEATURE | XMAS GIFTS |

2 1 4

3 6

#SPORTYSPICE 1 2 3 4

TENNIS BISCUITS Tasty treats shaped like her favourite sport. notonthehighstreet.com/biscuitvillage, £20

SWANKY SCARF

GOLF SYSTEM FOR IOS AND ANDROID PHONES

ACTIVE SUBSCRIPTION BOX The perfect present for gym bunnies. activemonthly.com, from £14.99

BUILD-A-BIKE WORKSHOP For the cyclist who digs DIY. notonthehighstreet.com/theindytute, £623

“GO BEYOND” POSTER Inspirational artwork to keep her on track. boncourageapparel.com, £8

She’ll be the best dressed football fan in the stadium. notonthehighstreet.com/ savilerogue, £66.95

She can monitor her shots with this nifty gadget. iwantoneofthose.com, £57.99

TOOL ROLL

Get your biker bae all revved up. the-cafe-racer.com, £89

| DISPLAY | BEYOND THE BINARY |

This

is us

46 DECEMBER 2017

DIVA LOOKS AHEAD TO A NEW EXHIBITION CHALLENGING TRADITIONAL IDEAS OF WHAT FAMILY LOOKS LIKE

Above: Petra, pregnant Diz, and their daughter.

Imagine a family. What comes to mind? A backlit image of a mum attentively pushing a pram while the dad carries a small boy on his shoulders. Pick up any childrenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s book or watch a TV show, and these are often the images of family life that we are offered.

Next page: Verity has two daughters from previous relationships. She is now in a relationship with Piper, a trans woman.

| DISPLAY | BEYOND THE BINARY |

But what about the other families? The family with a child who refuses to be a girl and isn’t sure about being a boy either; the dad who is terrified of losing his children should they find out he’s transgender; or a lesbian parent unwilling to be the “other mum”, wishing she could find her role reflected in society. Beyond The Binary is a new project by photographers, Geoff Brokate and Kaye Martindale, and seeks to widen

48 DECEMBER 2017

our idea of how families look and to examine the evolving role of gender and sexuality within our culture through the lens of family life. Subject to stereotypes, the LGBTQ community are often portrayed in such a way that represents labels – butch, jock, genderqueer, FTM. Reluctant to show the participants as different or other, Geoff and Kaye sought to go beyond these classiﬁcations and to tap into the universal themes that unite

Jenny-Anne, a transgender woman, found herself rejected by her adult children, but has found solace and acceptance with her genderﬂuid partner, Ellen, and adopted daughter Jasmine.

families throughout the world. Asking families across the UK the question, “What would a typical family day involve for you?”, the resulting images reveal the constellations of frustration, love, expectation and quirkiness that are familiar to us all.

Beyond The Binary is showing at Hull International Photo Gallery 8 December – 14 January as part of the City of Culture celebrations. For more information, visit beyondthebinary.online.

DEE REES The Oscars-tipped screenwriter and director

O’HOOLEY & TIDOW Music for all varieties of festive folk and families

LOTS HOLLOWAY Behind the scenes with the singer-songwriter

PARISA TARJOMANI X Factor, sexuality, and going solo

CULTURE

Books Film TV Music

“I needed space to find that love & passion”

More information on p4 divadigital.co.uk

50 DECEMBER 2017

| CULTURE | DEE REES |

Exposing America

PHOTOS MATHIEU YOUNG, NETFLIX/STEVE DIETL

ee Rees is a busy woman. I’m sat in a fancy hotel room in central London, waiting for the screenwriter and director to finish her umpteenth interview of the day, hoping that my questions aren’t ones she’s already been asked. When she finishes with the call, and I’m ushered through to meet her, I’m expecting her to be grouchy, tired, standoffish. I’m her last interview before she jets off to Italy. But she’s none of those things. When she smiles, it’s warm and it’s kind. This is going to be a good one, I think to myself. The 40-year-old from Nashville, Tennessee has quietly been smashing stereotypes in Hollywood since 2007, when her short film Pariah made rather large ripples at film festivals around the world. Bessie, which starred Queen Latifah, was also warmly received, picking up a handful of awards, including four Primetime Emmys. Now she’s set to turn those ripples into waves with Mudbound, an epic story of family, friendship, racial hatred and struggle set in the post-WWII South, and based on the novel of the same name by Hillary Jordan, which Netflix bought at Sundance for $12.5 million. I watched the film a few days before the interview, and I’m still reeling. Few things shock me these days, I tell Rees, but this story did. “In Hillary’s book, there’s this great passage,” she says, leaning back casually in her chair. “Laura’s monologue about country violence. I wanted that

SCREENWRITER AND DIRECTOR DEE REES TALKS TO CARRIE LYELL ABOUT RACISM IN AMERICA AND HER OSCAR-TIPPED FEATURE FILM MUDBOUND

“This idea of race in itself is a construct. There’s no such thing as race”

in the script because that to me says everything about the everydayness of violence. The nonchalance of violence. I wanted to see a kid eating dirt. I wanted Laura chewing callouses off her hands. I wanted a dead mouse. I wanted a possum with ants crawling out of the eye sockets. That imagery lets you know that in this world, death comes easily. This whole world is a low-grade threat.” It’s uncomfortable viewing at times, not least because of the graphic violence. Does she worry that it might be too much for some people? “People talk about things being ‘hard to watch’ and I hope they don’t trot out that excuse with this,” says Rees. “A Clockwork Orange is hard to watch. American History X is hard to watch. Into The Void is hard to watch. It’s a conveniently trotted out, selectively applied excuse that people use when they don’t want to face something. If we’re honest about the history of cinema, what’s hard to watch? This isn’t it. I hope people keep that perspective and don’t turn away. Lean into whatever discomfort. But beyond that, I don’t want to be didactic or preachy. Just enjoy the fucking ﬁlm. I’m not ramming anything down your throat.” While Mudbound is set in 1944, Rees says it’s very much about the now. “Whether you’re working in the future or in the past, it’s also commenting on the moment that you’re in. This ﬁlm felt very much like a conversation. We can’t say ‘Oh, that was America then’. No, this is America now. This is who we are. This

is exposing.” What, then, can it teach us about life in 2017? Says Rees: “That it’s not nameless, faceless forces that impact how we live – it’s us. People, when talking about the past, rationalise it or excuse it by saying, ‘He was a man of his time’ or ‘Those were the times’. No, we are the times. It was us. The Klan is hooded because you know them. It’s the general store owner. It’s your neighbour. It’s the sheriff. It’s us. We can’t disassociate from them. They are our grandfathers, uncles, cousins. If I can find slaves in my family not so far back, that means you can find slave owners in your family not so far back. We can’t disassociate from that and we can’t be dishonest about how we got to have what we have.” Rees talks about her own experience of integration in the 1980s, a process which attempted to end race-based segregation in US schools. “This is not long ago. We’re not even a generation out of it and we’re already seeing the undoing of it. These false cries of ‘reverse racism’, which is a fallacy. It’s like saying reverse sexism and men’s rights. Well, the patriarchy has always existed and it hasn’t needed help. That all stems from this unwillingness to deal with who we are and this disconnect we have. ‘Wow, that wasn’t me’. Even if you were recent immigrants in the 1940s and your people weren’t connected to holding slaves, still they’re benefitting from a system that was set up to advantage people of different complexions. This idea of race in itself is a construct. There’s no such thing as race, really.

| CULTURE | DEE REES |

We all come from one place, so race is an economic construct to justify an unequal distribution of resources. I think that’s why America is falling apart, because people are realising their whiteness doesn’t mean as much. Well, guess what? It was never real. So you’re mad because you think, ‘Wait a minute, I’m not supposed to be struggling, I’m white’. It was used to pacify the masses. ‘Well, you may be in the bottom, but at least you’re white’ – and that’s not mattering anymore. In some ways it’s a good thing because maybe we can get at the fact that the currency you thought you had was not real currency. It was something to keep you in your place. As long as there was someone under you, you weren’t focussed on the fact that there was a foot on your neck too.” Mudbound, which has already scooped prizes at the Gotham Independent Film Awards and the Hollywood Film Awards, has also been tipped for Oscars success, and a win for Rees in the Best Director category would be a ﬁrst for a black woman, and a ﬁrst for a lesbian. How important is that kind of recognition? “The cool kid in me wants to say, ‘Oh I don’t care’ but that would be bullshit,” she laughs. “I totally fucking care and it would be wonderful.”

52 DECEMBER 2017

But Rees wants the Academy to take notice, not just for her, but for the cast and crew. “It would be wonderful for the actors, who have signed on to an ensemble drama. This isn’t anybody’s one shot. You’re on the dais together so they’ve made a sacrifice to do this. And it would be great for the craftswomen in the film. Rachel Morrison [cinematographer], if she were nominated and won, she’d be the first female DP to win. And she’s a lesbian. Mako Kamitsuna, my editor, she’s from Hiroshima. If she were to get nominated… well, I don’t know how many other Japanese women editors have been nominated.” But while the film has a good shot, Rees is realistic. “When I’m all alone, I’m honest with myself about the fact that it would be wonderful for a lot of reasons, but I’m also sober. It doesn’t mean that things have changed necessarily. Awards are often not a meritocracy. Sometimes, the best film does win or the best film does get recognition, but I learned from Pariah that you can make something that you feel is resounding and great and it can be wilfully ignored or talked about in a reductive way. So I just try not to get my hopes up too much. I just want the work to live on.”

Mudbound is on Netﬂix and in cinemas with Curzon now.

| CULTURE | BOOK REVIEWS |

FICTION

THE BRUTAL TRUTH Lee Winter

When it comes to tangled romances with complex, fascinating queer characters, Lee Winter rarely disappoints. The Brutal Truth takes crime reporter Maddie Grey back to the motherland, Australia, with her media mogul boss Elena Bartell in tow. A seemingly harmless bet – to tell each other the complete truth – risks bringing Maddie’s elaborately constructed facade tumbling down, as well as revealing the depth of her attraction to Elena. But Maddie isn’t the only one with secrets, and as their game spins rapidly out of control, will they be able to handle the unvarnished truth about themselves? Ylva Publishing, £8

BY KAITE WELSH

SHORT STORIES

HER BODY AND OTHER PARTIES Carmen Maria Machado NON-FICTION

WOMEN AND POWER: A MANIFESTO Mary Beard

Over the past few years, Mary Beard has become synonymous with a fearless sort of bluestocking intellectualism – beset by trolls who seem as concerned about the state of her hair (glorious, but completely irrelevant) as they are about her take on such controversial subjects as women being allowed to speak in public and hold opinions. Once a cult favourite among academics for her weekly Times diary of life as a Cambridge don, she has found a new audience of millennial feminists through Twitter, where men regularly try to educate her on her specialist subject of Roman history. Witty and uncompromising, this is a searing analysis of women’s access to, and relationship with, power throughout the ages. Proﬁle Books, £7.99

In a striking debut, Carmen Maria Machado’s first collection of short stories rampages through horror, magical realism, comedy and science fiction as she weaves eight spellbinding tales about women’s lives, bodies and sexualities. Even the most banal settings become unnerving in Machado’s pen, and her images linger with the reader long after the last page has been turned. Although her voice is invigoratingly fresh, Her Body And Other Parties never reads like a debut collection. Rather, it reads like a writer at the height of her powers – confident and assured, fearless and experimental. With a biography full to the brim with fellowships and residencies, and a publication history that includes The New Yorker, Granta and The Paris Review, it feels like discovering a well-kept secret you immediately want to share with everyone you know. Serpent’s Tail, £10.00

FICTION

WINTER Ali Smith

The second novel in Smith’s seasonal quartet, Winter follows the Booker-shortlisted Autumn – one of the rare books that deserves exactly as much hype as it received. Winter is an uncomfortably insightful novel that fuses the personal and the political, Smith’s lusciously poetic language casting an icy light on the realities of a “post-truth” era. Readers who thought she was robbed of this year’s Booker might want to start placing their bets for 2018 now. Hamish Hamilton, £16.99

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An Alternative Christmas with O’Hooley & Tidow More information on p4 divadigital.co.uk

One of British folk’s mightiest duos, Belinda O’Hooley and Heidi Tidow’s newest album sets out to shine a light on both the darker hues of winter and the alternative ways we celebrate – or don’t celebrate – Christmas. DIVA: We last spoke in 2015 when you were prepping for your Summat’s Brewin’ tour. How did it go? HEIDI: Oh, it was fantastic! We did 30 dates in pubs and breweries up and down the country – singing drinking songs and exploring the nation’s fascination with alcohol – from the good, to the bad, to the ugly. We managed the ﬁrst half sober, but because we were spending so much time in all these lovely pubs, we actually started drinking beer again! [laughs] Understandable! What else have you both been up to since? HEIDI: We released our ﬁfth album, Shadows, in 2016, and have been touring and playing it at festivals for the last year. It went down really well and we’ve had a lot of fun singing the songs from it. On top of that, we’ve also been performing with our feminist, folk group Coven, an allfemale collective which we created to celebrate International Women’s Day three years ago.

56 DECEMBER 2017

WE CATCH UP WITH YORKSHIREBASED FOLK DUO O’HOOLEY & TIDOW AHEAD OF THEIR WINTER TOUR

“Whoever you are, there’s always someone who can connect with you”

Who makes up the Coven collective and what’s the ethos behind it? HEIDI: Belinda and I asked folk trio Lady Maisery, as well as activist and singer-songwriter Grace Petrie, to come together and do a few gigs. It started out as a bit of a songwriters’ circle – there’s no hierarchy, we take turns to perform songs in a bit of a round on stage. The ﬁrst year we did it it was so well-received that we did more gigs the next year, and this summer, took it to lots of different folk festivals. We actually played the main stage at Cambridge [Folk Festival] this year, which was absolutely brilliant. It’s been an amazing thing to do and there seems to have been a real call for it, for women coming together. It’s quite political and it seems to really get people going. Alongside Coven, you also worked on a project called The Passerine. Could you tell us a little more? HEIDI: The Passerine (meaning songbirds) came to be after the organisers of Shrewsbury Folk Festival heard our song Made In England, which is about attitudes to immigration. Off the back of that, they chose us to lead the project, which involved forming a band of immigrant and refugee musicians to tell the story of migration and the plight of refugees. Me and Belinda, both having Irish backgrounds, saw

this as a way of telling the story of those people who’ve always moved throughout countries and continents. Letting people know it’s not something to be frightened of, in fact, it’s something we could, and should, celebrate. It was an amazing roller coaster of an experience, bringing together lots of different minority groups and is something we feel really proud of. BELINDA: And we learned to sing in Punjabi, Swahili and Arabic! To bring us up to date – you have a new album out right now. What’s the story? BELINDA: We’ve really been doing the Winter Folk tour for a couple of years now. It started off as just a few local gigs, but turned out to be really popular. We decided then that we wanted to do something more, to make an album about winter that looked at the different sides of Christmas, other than the one we’re sold, namely the consumerist Christmas. We wanted to make an album that was real and explores the darker hues of winter. It’s for those who may not celebrate Christmas in a conventional way. It might not be with family, or with blood relatives – it might be an alternative to the traditional. It certainly is for myself and Heidi, we celebrate Christmas just the two of us and our cat. It’s lovely actually.

PHOTO DAVID FIRN, WORDS DANIELLE MUSTARDE

| CULTURE | O’HOOLEY & TIDOW |

Did the themes running throughout the album come out of your own experiences, do you think? BELINDA: Often when you’re telling a story, your own experience seems to ﬁnd its way into that song. We’ve written a carol on the album called The Winter Folk Carol, and in that, we look at the different sides of Christmas and how it must feel for somebody who might be homeless, or who migrated here under diﬃcult circumstances, or even people like myself and Heidi, who are gay. With my family it wasn’t always easy to be completely out and proud, especially at Christmas when other relatives were there. The Winter Folk

Carol looks at those different experiences and says that whoever you are and whoever you’re with, there’ll always be someone out there who can connect with you in some way. Why was it important for you to shine a light on the alternative faces of Christmas? HEIDI: For us, the coming together of this album and the Winter Folk show is quite an emotional experience; we poured a lot of our feelings into the record. I think so often in life, we’re all so busy and Christmas can be so wrapped up in what you haven’t done or bought. In Winter Folk, we try to

bring it right back down to really feeling our emotions, and being ourselves – being yourself. I think just the very act of me and Belinda getting up on stages around the country, in places which aren’t exclusively LGBTQ, feels important. That we’re out and proud in our music says to people that Christmas is made up of all different colours and all different types of people, and that it’s ok to celebrate it in a way that’s just as unique as you are.

O’Hooley & Tidow tour throughout December. The album is out now. ohooleyandtidow.com

| CULTURE | FILM & ONLINE REVIEWS |

THE CARMILLA MOVIE Directed by Spencer Maybee

BY CARRIE LYELL & ROXY BOURDILLON (FILM) AND JOANNA WHITEHEAD (ONLINE)

MUDBOUND Directed by Dee Rees

Set in rural Mississippi during World War II, Mudbound is a compelling story about family, friendship and the ugliness of racism. An epic tale of two families pitted against each other by a ruthless social hierarchy, Rees seamlessly transposes stories from her grandmother’s upbringing onto a screenplay by Virgil Williams, based on Hillary Jordan’s novel. It follows the McAllan family, who arrive in the farmlands of the Mississippi Delta completely unprepared for the harsh realities. Meanwhile, Hap and Florence Jackson – sharecroppers who have worked the land for generations – struggle to build a small dream of their own. But everything changes when their returning loved ones forge a fast but uneasy friendship. Featuring a brilliant ensemble cast – with a standout performance from Mary J Blige – Mudbound is one of those ﬁlms that will stay with you long after the credits roll. Watch now on Netﬂix

Whether or not you’re already a fan of the “little web series that could”, Christmas just came early. This lesbian vampire adventure rom-com is bursting with spectacular LGBTQ representation, ROFLs for days and sizzling sexual chemistry. Set five years after the third series finished, Carm (Natasha Negovanlis), Laura (Elise Bauman) and the whole gang are back to fight evil and inspire us to be more awesome. It’s fun-filled, action-packed and we can’t recommend it enough. In fact, we love it so much we’ve made Natasha and Elise this month’s cover stars. Turn to page 30 to read our exclusive interview. Available now at carmillamovie.vhx.tv.

VITA AND VIRGINIA

We’ve got ﬁve copies of the newly remastered Desert Hearts on Blu-ray to give away. To be in with a chance of winning, email editorial@divamag. co.uk with the subject line PICK ME.

NEWS

DVD RELEASE

NESTING DOLL

MIXED MESSAGES

Legendary lesbian ﬁlmmaker Nicole Conn (Elena Undone, A Perfect Ending) has announced her latest project – a story about three broken women. Inspired by Conn’s own experience of raising a disabled child, Nesting Doll stars Australian actress Zoe Ventoura as McKenzie and Kayla Radomski as Samantha. Watch this space for more details.

Meet Ren, a London dyke struggling to navigate the treacherous terrain of the Berlin queer scene. From speed dating to bondage, meditation and menstrual cup mishaps, this sharp-witted and quirky comedy – directed by Kanchi Wichmann – perfectly captures the trials and tribulations of being young, queer and single. Out 4 December

online WEB SERIES

INSTAGRAM

PODCAST

HOME: A QUEER COOKING SERIES

CARRIE BROWNSTEIN

MADE OF HUMAN

This fascinating new web series proﬁles a range of queer people who talk about the concepts of home and identity, while also cooking a dish of their choice. The ﬁlms are beautifully shot with a pumping soundtrack, providing food for the body and soul.

Musician (guitarist with iconic bands Sleater-Kinney and Wild Flag), author, writer and director (of Portlandia)... is there nothing this woman can’t do? Check out her Instagram for lots of Portlandia outtakes, book hauls and cute pics of her dogs.

Soﬁe Hagen is a London-based Danish comedian. In this podcast series she speaks to an awesome bunch of people “about life and how to do it”. Guests have included Jo Brand, Nimko Ali, Scottee, Ross Noble, Katherine Ryan... the list goes on. Well worth your time.

homequeercooking.com

instagram.com/carrie_rachel

madeofhumanpodcast.com

58 DECEMBER 2017

We’re really excited about this one – the true story of the passionate relationship between literary trailblazer Virginia Woolf (Elizabeth Debicki) and the enigmatic aristocrat Vita Sackville-West (Gemma Arterton). This ﬁlm, expected sometime in 2018, tells the story of the birth of the novel their intoxicating encounters inspired; Woolf’s bold experiment in art and androgyny, Orlando. When their paths cross, the magnetic Vita decides the beguiling, stubborn and gifted Virginia will be her next conquest, no matter the cost. Chanya Button’s Vita And Virginia is a beautiful celebration of their unconventional bond – a vivid exploration of gender, sexuality, creativity and passion. Coming soon

PHOTOS NETFLIX, ORLANDO-BLINDER

Directed by Chanya Button

| CULTURE | MUSIC REVIEWS |

LINDSEY STIRLING Warmer In The Winter

DIVA DISCOVERS

MUNA I Know A Place

This month’s DIVA Discovers is possibly a discovery already made by many of you. MUNA are an American electro-pop band consisting of Katie Gavin, Josette Maskin and Naomi McPherson, and their ﬁrst full length album, About U, was released early this year. All three members identify as queer and their songs frequently address issues of sexuality and gender. I Know A Place is not their usual sound, but well worth a listen to see just how talented this band are, recorded live for the Mahogany Sessions.

BY HEATHER PEACE

I’m not a fan of a Christmas record until the mulled wine is warming in the pan, the tree is in the lounge and the baubles are out of the cupboard. Then – and only then – is it time for Christmas tunes. And once it’s time, I’ll be putting this on. Lindsey Stirling is one of the biggest artist development breakthrough stories in recent years OF THE with over nine MONTH million YouTube subscribers, and this album, which follows 2016’s Brave Enough, features beautifully recorded string instrumentals of Christmas classics, including Silent Night and All I Want For Christmas Is You. Warmer In The Winter is sure to get you in the mood for the festive season.

ALBUM

VIDEO OF THE MONTH

MAGGIE SZABO Don’t Give Up

DOLLY PARTON I Believe In You

Maggie Szabo is a Canadian singersongwriter. Hailing from a small town in Ontario, Szabo is now an accomplished musician, living in Los Angeles and using her music to conquer social injustice. This video is a love letter of support to the LGBTQ community and tells the story of a transgender high school student attending prom. It’s a touching and relevant narrative – have a look.

SIA Everyday Is Christmas

Singer/songwriter/producer, and eight-time Grammy award nominee, Sia has released her ﬁrst-ever holiday album. Everyday Is Christmas is a collection of original holiday songs written by Sia and Greg Kurstin. With tracks including Santa’s Coming For Us, Puppies Are Forever and Candy Cane Lane, this is deﬁnitely a Christmas cracker.

If you’re buying presents for any babies this year, do the parents a favour and don’t bother with toys that just take up precious space – buy them the Dolly Parton kids album instead. No more naff versions of nursery rhymes, just the legend herself. Plus, all the proceeds go to Dolly’s Imagination Library, a non-proﬁt organisation that promotes early childhood literacy by providing free books from birth to age ﬁve. Baby’s Christmas present done! Boom. You’re welcome. 59

More information on p4 divadigital.co.uk

60 DECEMBER 2017

| CULTURE | LOTS HOLLOWAY | I’m standing next to Lots Holloway seconds before her performance. “Nervous?” I ask. “Excited,” she grins. “I feel better up there than I do down here.” She leaps onto the north London pub stage and immediately makes it her home, tearing it up like she’s playing Brixton Academy. Her performance is visceral; the crowd is transﬁxed. Once she’s thrashed her way through her half hour set – a stirring mix of her own alt-pop tracks and a rock ’n’ roll cover of The Cranberries’ Zombie that has the whole venue singing along – we grab a drink from the bar and scout out a table in the fairy-lit beer garden. As we take our seats, she confesses that this will be her 11th night on the trot of gigging and drinking. “I’m all about enjoying the moment. I can’t say ‘no’ to a good time.” But, she assures me, she’d take a friendly local over a swanky celeb do any day. “I was playing Kensington Roof Gardens the other night and it’s not my scene. I don’t need to pay £7 for a Peroni. I don’t even like Peroni!” Bored of the panoramic views and overpriced Peronis, she took the other performers to a local boozer. A few rounds later, she was “stood up on a bar stool” leading a singalong of Oasis’ Don’t Look Back In Anger. “The whole pub was like, ‘So, Sally can wait’. That’s my idea of a good night.” Despite her penchant for revelry and the Gallagher brothers’ greatest hits, she remains dedicated to honing her own musical craft. She describes beavering away in her home studio for hours on end, beer in hand, chasing that elusive, perfect sound that will make her songs stand out. “Do you remember Dexter’s Laboratory on Cartoon Network? I’m that kind of crazy professor working at all hours, and the hair’s gone wild.” Her unruly mop falls over her eyes and for a moment, in the moonlight, her look is ramshackle rock chick meets madcap inventor. This is one of the things I really like about Lots. She may look pretty cool, with her cheekbones and her tattoos and her off-duty rock star wardrobe, but she’s actually dead down to earth and totally at ease describing herself as a cartoon geek. As we chat and drink and laugh, fans keep coming over to congratulate her on her spellbinding performance. They want to shake her hand, take her card, follow her on Instagram. And she takes the time to make every single person feel

ROXY BOURDILLON GOES BEHIND THE SCENES WITH THE UPAND-COMING SINGERSONGWRITER

“If you know who you are, no one else has to get it”

special, to give them a dose of that Holloway charm. So what do I want to learn about Lots? Having seen her perform several times, I already know she’s insanely talented, and having interviewed her previously, I’m well acquainted with her backstory – how she was thrust into the spotlight as part of dubstep duo MK1 on X Factor back in 2012, how her management urged her to tell journalists she was bi instead of gay – to “keep the appeal open to boys and girls” – and how she eventually left the band to focus on being her authentic self and making music that mattered. I challenge her to tell me something I don’t know about her. “Ok,” she says, swigging her pint thoughtfully, her large eyes as twinkly as the tiny lights that trail through the trees overhead. “For my new Slow Down EP, I had to step up my game and I have found myself to be very compulsively controlling. I’ve always thought I’m a very chilled person, completely laid-back.” I’m nodding. One of the first things you notice about Lots is her mellow vibe. “In my relationship, I want Elle to do exactly what she wants.” We speak more about her girlfriend of six years, because I’m nosy… I mean, a good listener. “We actually met at Ruby Tuesdays. No one stays together at Ruby Tuesdays!” I giggle in recognition, having had my fair share of trashy, gropey nights out at Soho’s infamous weekly girl party. Lots sidled up to Elle on the dance floor, after spotting her in the bathroom queue. “She was looking at her shoes, very coy, but pretty, unbelievably pretty. I like that. I don’t really like cool girls who spend a lot of their time thinking about how they’re perceived. I want you to have a laugh, I want you to get it wrong and make a shit joke that no one gets, ‘cos that’s real. I like a bit of shy. Only it turns out she wasn’t that shy ‘cos she kissed me!” Who knew that true love could start at Ruby Tuesdays? “I know! We went back on our fifth anniversary. We went downstairs for one song and then we were like, ‘No. We’re gonna go home.’” The number of women who approach her at the gig, and a quick scan of the comments she receives on social media, make it obvious that Lots is something of a hit with the ladies. Do audience members often invite her back to theirs? “I’m gonna say yes, because

it’s the truth, but I don’t want to come across like a wanker… It happens fairly often.” She explains why she’s “very flirty as a person”. “When I was in school I was not very good-looking and I played upon my humour and my ability to talk to people. I still have those characteristics, so it comes across like I’m very forward.” Does Elle ever object? “She knows I’m not flirty for a reason. It must be difficult sometimes, but she’s alright with it.” The other woman with the keys to Lots’ heart is her mum, who she calls “the best person in the world”. “I’m very boyish, you know, like a mummy’s boy. Not in the lame way; she doesn’t do my washing! But she is my person.” I’m intrigued by her “mummy’s boy” remark and encourage her to elaborate. “I’m born as a chick, but in my mind I’m very boyish, I’m very much a dude. I would describe it as a kind of gender neutral, gender fluid. If you know who you are, no one else has to get it.” She tells me her agent has her name stored in her phone alongside a top hat emoji because she acts like such “a 1940s gentleman”. A 1940s gentleman with ripped skinny jeans and multiple tattoos. “When I talk to girls I like to buy them a drink, I like to hold the door open, I will pull out their chair. I’m not trying to achieve anything, that’s just how I feel you should treat a lady.” She “definitely” wants to have kids and I wonder if she’d pull a Paloma Faith and raise them gender neutral. “I would just raise them to be who they want,” she says simply. “If I had a boy that wanted to wear a skirt, he can do that. You only get to live on earth once. People stifle their own lives to appease other people and then when you’re on your deathbed, you’ll be like, ‘Oh, why did I spend my life doing that? Why did I do that job? Why did I say that I was straight?’ I just want everyone to embrace who they are.” So what does the next year hold for rock chick/crazy inventor/ mummy’s boy/1940s gent Lots? Well, there’s an album in the works, talks of a tour and, no doubt, a fair few spontaneous singalongs to Oasis classics in an old man’s boozer near you. She’s a star in ascendance, overflowing with boundless talent and sparkly charm. Look out 2018 – Lots is coming for you.

Lots’ EP, Slow Down, is out now. 61

CREDITS

More information on p4 divadigital.co.uk

62 DECEMBER 2017

| CULTURE | PARISA TARJOMANI |

Parisa Tarjomani rose to fame in 2014 with X Factor group Only The Young. After performing at sell-out shows, she decided to call time on the band and spent the next two years writing, recording and developing her own sound. Now with a fresh single and an upcoming EP, Parisa speaks for the ﬁrst time about her sexuality, and gives DIVA the lowdown on her brand-new solo material. DIVA: Hello Parisa, thanks for chatting to DIVA. First of all, how are you? PARISA TARJOMANI: I’m great thank you. I’ve not long come back from the States where I’ve been recording and writing in the studio and having a break, which has been lovely. How has the release of your new single gone? Congrats, by the way! The response, especially from the fans, has been amazing. They love the song and I’m so pleased. I really spent a lot of time working out the direction I wanted to go in. To know people are enjoying my original material is such an overwhelming feeling and it really is the cherry on top to the whole process. How have things been since X Factor and leaving your band, Only The Young? I’ve done a few bits, from TV to

ONLY THE YOUNG’S PARISA TARJOMANI TALKS TO DANIELLE MUSTARDE ABOUT X FACTOR, SEXUALITY, AND GOING SOLO

“Not having a constant secret really is a huge weight off of my shoulders”

magazines and live shows, but having the time out to focus on my style and my own original music has been really important in the time I’ve had away from being in the band. You’ve had space to reflect on the band and the breakup, so why did OTY really come to an end? From the moment we were in the public eye things got very demanding, very quickly. I had some real personal issues that happened during my time in the band and because I was away from home and constantly working, I needed a break from it all. I started to become really unhappy in something that I love, and I felt like some space was needed to find that love and passion for the music industry again. This is the first time you’ve talked about your sexuality. Why now? To be honest, the idea of coming out has always been a strange one. I’ve never really understood having to announce it and tell people. I’m quite a personal person, so something like that has always been an issue for me. But I’m at a point in my life where things aren’t as crazy and I’ve also grown up a lot. I’ve met someone who has made me want to be open about my relationship and not hide it. Were you ever encouraged to keep your sexuality quiet while in OTY?

I was never necessarily encouraged to keep it quiet, but when I was in the band, only the band members and my closest friends knew, and at that time I didn’t want all of these stories to come out and distract us from what we had going on. Not only that, but I was scared of how people would react and ﬁnd it all; it was a bit daunting and something that I just brushed to one side. How do you feel now you’ve decided to be open about your current relationship? I feel so much happier. I’m more comfortable within myself and not having a constant secret really is a huge weight off of my shoulders. I remember, I used to go to gay clubs with my friends when I’d just come off X Factor, and I’d be hiding behind people, scared that someone would tweet something. Now it’s great being able to be myself and enjoy it! That’s great to hear! So what’s next for you? I’m currently writing and recording the rest of my EP and I cannot wait to get it out there. There’s so much personal music that means a lot to me that I’ve written and I’m looking forward to having other people be a part of it.

Parisa’s new single, Stupid, is out now. 63

| CULTURE | TV REVIEWS |

NOW FILMING

PRESS

We’re excited for this new series about the British newspaper industry from the folks behind Doctor Foster. Expect a heady mix of personal dramas and professional dilemmas in Mike Bartlett’s latest offering, which features a brilliant ensemble cast, including Charlotte Riley (Peaky Blinders) as deputy news editor of a ﬁctional broadsheet, and DIVA favourite Ellie Kendrick (Game Of Thrones) as a junior reporter.

POFICTHKE We’re big fans of Charlie Covell (Cucumber and Banana, Marcella) and it seems everything she touches turns to gold, so when we heard she was writing a new series for All 4, we knew it was going to be a winner. The End Of The F***ing World is an eight-part comedy-drama based on a graphic novel by Charles Forsman about two teenagers who run away and ﬁnd themselves caught up in a series of violent events which become progressively more ominous, all while being followed by two uniquely mismatched detectives, played by Wunmi Mosaku and the wonderful Gemma Whelan. Dark, delicious and very, very funny.

DON’T MISS

BY CARRIE LYELL

Available now on All 4 WE CAN’T WAIT FOR

MARY, MEL AND SUE’S SURPRISE PARTY If Bake Off just wasn’t the same for you this year, you’ll be thrilled to hear that the squad to end all squads – Mary Berry, Mel Giedroyc and Sue Perkins – are reuniting on the Beeb for a very special Christmas programme, where they will be bringing a little festive magic to an exceptional group of people in South Wales. In an area that’s experienced some tough times, Mary, Mel and Sue surprise a group of volunteers at a local community centre with the most magniﬁcent Christmas party the town has ever seen. Sounds like the perfect recipe for brilliant telly. BBC One, December

It’s a time for spices, sweets and tasty baked treats as Prue Leith, Paul Hollywood, Noel Fielding and Sandi Toksvig bring some holiday cheer to Channel 4. In the two episodes, four former bakers will return to the tent hoping for a Christmas miracle in three seasonal challenges. Who will top the tree as Star Baker? Only one way to ﬁnd out… well, unless you follow Prue on Twitter! Channel 4, December

WHAT WE’RE WATCHING

DANGER & EGGS Described by Autostraddle as the “greatest and weirdest queer and trans inclusive kids show ever”, Danger & Eggs is kind of a big deal. It’s the ﬁrst children’s cartoon to be co-created by an openly transgender person (Shadi Petosky), it features a non-binary character called Milo, and one episode takes place at Pride. And if that’s not enough, it also boasts a superqueer cast, including Cameron Esposito, Rhea Butcher, Stephanie Beatriz, Laura Zak and Jazz Jennings. Watch it with your kids. Watch it with your friends. Hell, watch it by yourself. But whatever you do, watch it. Now streaming on Amazon Video

64 DECEMBER 2017

THE GREAT CHRISTMAS BAKE OFF

ON THE WEB

DRINK RESPONSIBLY

Grab yourself a drink and settle in for a night of lols with Rachel Paulson. The premise of this YouTube show is simple – loosen the guests’ inhibitions, and lips – with a tipple, or 12. Watch now on YouTube

PHOTO LOVE PRODUCTIONS CHANNEL/4 MARK BOURDILLON, BBC/EMILIE SANDY, ROBERT CHILTON/CHANNEL 4

THE END OF THE F***ING WORLD

BBC One, 2018

MONTH

Supporting trans, gender diverse and gender non-conforming children

COMMUNITY

MERMAIDS CHARITY

CHRISTMAS IN NIGERIA Priscilla Philips shares her queer experience

“Putting myself out there, alongside Mermaids, as a role model” 65

Embrace, empower, p , educate... Mermaids is a charity which was formed in 1995 by a group of parents. It aims to support transgender, gender diverse and gender non-conforming children and young people and their families. DIVA’s Danielle Mustarde met with Susie Green to ﬁnd out more about their work and why it’s so personal for her. DIVA: First of all, could you tell us a little more about what Mermaids does? SUSIE GREEN: Mermaids supports children and young people who are transgender or gender diverse. We also support professionals, whether that’s directly supporting a young person who is being supported by a healthcare professional, for example, or going into schools to do training. We talk to people like The Equality and Human Rights Commission and parliament to help give a voice to our parents and young people, and to battle things like discrimination in schools and GP surgeries.

Mermaid’s CEO Susie Green: championing love 66 DECEMBER 2017

Why is the work of Mermaids so necessary?

Gender dysphoria in children and young people is very much misunderstood. People still believe that it’s a “lifestyle choice”, that it’s something that is chosen by children and young people. There’s often disbelief around the fact that younger people could possibly know that they don’t want to be their birth gender, and assumptions are often made around those who support them. The parents of children with gender dysphoria are constantly made to feel that their decision to support their child is wrong. Thankfully, the 2017 Stonewall report has really shone a light on the bullying and abuse young trans people face in school. The statistics in terms of self-harm and suicide attempts were not a surprise to us, but to have some more robust evidence in the UK has been extremely useful. Of our children, 45% attempt suicide – that’s serious. And 84% selfharm. You can’t ignore that. When did you become involved with Mermaids? Twenty years ago, my four-year-old son (at that point) told me that God had made a mistake, and that he

WORDS DANIELLE MUSTARDE

DIVA SPEAKS TO SUSIE GREEN FROM MERMAIDS TO FIND OUT WHAT THE CHARITY DOES AND HOW THEY’RE HELPING FAMILIES ACROSS THE WORLD

| COMMUNITY | MERMAIDS | should have been a girl. I was terrified. I just remember thinking to myself, “What on earth am I going do with this?” At that time, the depiction of transgender women – because that was all that was really reported on – was as objects of fun and derision, and of being mentally ill. It was absolutely, totally ok to ridicule someone who was trans and – to a certain extent – it still is. So for me, looking at my four-year-old, this gorgeous child, I was just thinking, “How can this possibly be?” I spent the next two years trying to tell myself that it was perfectly ok to be a boy and like “girl things”, but that didn’t make them a girl. Whereas, she just kept telling me that she was a girl and that she should be a girl, and eventually – when she was six years old – she asked me, “when could she have the operation”. It was at the point that I found Mermaids and spoke to somebody who, for the first time, understood what I was going through. Up until then I’d been surrounded by people who were telling me that to allow my child to play dress-up in “girl clothes” and to play with “girl toys” was encouraging and facilitating something. To finally speak to somebody who said, “No, no – that’s not the truth”, was a complete relief. My daughter is now 24. She’s working in Italy, and

most importantly – she’s happy. Mermaids has faced some negative press recently. Why is that? We have come under a lot of ﬁre recently, yes, because you’ve got the far-right, who don’t believe that transgender children exist, and that it’s abusive parents who are “forcing” things on young people. Then you’ve also got the trans-exclusionary radical feminists (TERFs) who talk about trans women not being real women. A lot of our parents don’t want to put themselves in a position where they’re outing their children. So, even if they do some engagement – one of our parents wrote an absolutely fabulous blog post recently, for example – they’re not going to say who they are or where they’re from because they’re protecting their child. For those reasons, we take our responsibility to represent those families who wouldn’t have a voice without us very, very seriously. The fact is that young people have got to adulthood and are getting on with their lives, and they are happy – that’s not what the papers want to report on. We are here to give information and support. We don’t tell people what to do – we can’t, we’re not medical professionals. We tell them where to ﬁnd that medical help. We also don’t hold a line on whether someone

should socially transition, whether they’re a child or a young adult – we just don’t. This is something that needs to be a decision for the family and that child or young person – it’s not ours to make, and that’s what certain media outlets don’t understand or make clear.

“Children who are allowed to be themselves do far, far better”

If a young person, or the family of a young person, is reading this and want to know more, where should they go? Phone our helpline, email us or join our parents’ group. We’ve also just introduced online chat, as we’re aware that teenagers and young people don’t necessarily want to talk to people directly – they’re all on their phones! [laughs] Even if gender dysphoria doesn’t go on into adulthood – and we have seen that, though it doesn’t happen a lot – what we have seen, is that children who are allowed to be themselves and are supported by their parents and loved, even with that uncertainty, those young people and those families do far, far better.

If you’d like to ﬁnd out more about Mermaids visit mermaidsuk.org.uk or call 0344 334 0550.

Ellen’s story Ellen Stephenson was 11 years old when her parents phoned Mermaids. Now 20, Ellen dedicates her time to volunteering and supporting Mermaids. “As a three-year-old, preaching to my parents about how much I wanted to be a woman when I grew up didn’t seem like something signiﬁcant to me. It was just how I felt and something I was confused about. If it wasn’t for my parents listening to me as a child, and doing something about it to help me and my mental health, I’m almost positive that my story wouldn’t be a story – at least, not a long one. The support I’ve had from my parents has been vital. They allowed me to explore my feelings towards gender from as early as I could articulate that I was confused and frustrated about it. They also allowed me to transition at a young age, which means I was able to go through female puberty and live my teenage years as a ‘regular girl’ – something I could

only dream of as a young child. The support that Mermaids gave my parents has been essential to my story. They provided a safe and supportive space where, as a family, we could meet other parents of young trans children and share questions, experiences, and advice. I like to think that my relationship with Mermaids has come full circle now that I work with them. Growing up, there were so few trans and LGBTQ+ role models that I could look up to in the media. Now, I am putting myself out there, alongside Mermaids, as a role model both to young people and their parents.” Follow Ellen on YouTube at youtube.com/ ellenstephenson. 67

68 DECEMBER 2017

| COMMUNITY | A NIGERIAN CHRISTMAS |

Will they know it’s Christmas? Christmas is traditionally a time to spend with family, but what happens when your sexual identity is illegal in your home country? When you can’t speak to your relatives about who you really are for fear of a 14 year prison sentence? We spoke to fashion PR, media consultant, blogger and poet Priscilla Philips to ﬁnd out.

DIVA: When did you realise you were a lesbian? PRISCILLA PHILIPS: Aged five I remember having this funny dream of me in a village filled with women and I was like the King-Queen with access to all the women. In the dream, being attracted to a woman was normal so I grew into my early adulthood thinking it was normal. My first kiss with a girl was with Blessing, aged seven. Her lips were red and inviting, her skin was dark and shining. I remember her stares. And of course, we went beyond just kissing. My second experience was when I was 13, with Seyi. Playing mummies and daddies was boring, but it got fun when Seyi and I played “mummy and mummy” in the bathroom every night during long summer holidays. Believe me, it was exciting, emotional and beautiful. As a teenager, I became more introverted. I didn’t dress like a girl. I hated myself for a long while for being female, and I didn’t understand why girls were so thrilled about boys. As I grew into adulthood, I found out that it was a taboo in Nigeria to be called a lesbian and this deepened my distance from myself. I lived life thinking I wasn’t supposed to be happy, or to give love. Embracing my sexuality at the beginning was slow and burdensome. Life for me has been

an exhibit of hidden desires, mostly after I became aware of my sexuality as a queer woman. Did you come out to your family? What was that experience like? It was demonising. When one of my sisters found out, she almost ﬂipped the bible open and was going to quote how demonic of an act it was, before I walked out on that never-invited conversation. My brothers were clueless until recently. When one brother heard I was a lesbian, he went around calling me irresponsible. I was a Sunday school teacher, so the questioning from certain individuals from church was much stronger in comparison to my biological family. I left church to start living in my own truth. I was cut off from my religious identity and my family as well. The situation seems so bleak for LGBT people in Nigeria. What’s it like for them at this time of year? Do LGBT people still go home for Christmas? There is no home! LGBT people in Nigeria, who are mostly silent about their sexuality, would rather hang around with friends from college or other LGBT people than go home for Christmas.

Are you planning to leave Nigeria? It is my plan to leave Nigeria soon, because of the homophobic hate crimes that are permitted by the 14 year jail time for LGBT people. I want to give myself a chance of love and a relationship. My biggest dilemma is trying not to date someone who is still in the closet. In Nigeria, that is the best you’ll get.

PRISCILLA PHILIPS SHARES HER EXPERIENCE OF BEING QUEER AND NIGERIAN DURING THE FESTIVE SEASON

WORDS ROXY BOURDILLON

Tell us about your blog (onbeingg. wordpress.com), and how you use your online presence to demystify queer identity in Nigeria. On Being Gay is an online magazine that celebrates LGBT people within African cities. I use poetry as a tool for advocacy and reforming norms, mostly towards negative narratives around women and LGBT people. I also use my personal social media accounts to raise awareness, which has caused loved ones to fear for my safety and urge me to tone down my voice. What can readers do to help LGBT people in Nigeria? Educate us. Give us faith in our own selves. Career-wise, empowering more LGBT people to be skilled so that we don’t depend on any system to have access to basic needs. This is also the reason for the silent culture – people don’t want to lose access to their basic needs, which can be taken away from you by your family once they know.

“I lived life thinking I wasn’t supposed to be happy, or to give love”

How will you be spending Christmas this year? I will be at my mother’s graveside. My mother died when I was 14, and so her death was somewhat hidden from me. It was assumed I wouldn’t have the heart to take it. But I knew. She visited me in my dreams, telling me to be strong. So I will be at her grave bed to tell her about my sexuality and all she has missed from my life.

The Bisi Alimi Foundation is holding a fundraising evening of music, poetry and shared real life experiences in London on 8 December. Find out more at tinyurl.com/NigeriaXmas. 69

Could same-sex couples one day have their own biological children?

FAMILY

THE FUTURE OF FAMILIES

MY FAMILY DIVA readers introduce their everyday families

“The loving of that child is paramount”

Future families

72 DECEMBER 2017

| FAMILY | FUTURE FAMILIES |

“Sperm cells created from female embryo,” declares one headline. “Eggs fertilised without sperm,” shouts another. We’ve probably all seen news like this over the last 10 years, but what’s really possible? What can the most recent fertility technology offer LBT women? Could a cisgender, lesbian couple, for example, have their own biological children? We spoke to CARE Fertility CEO, and embryology and IVF specialist, Simon Fishel to separate fact from ﬁction.

A SOCIETAL SHIFT “When we started treating single women – the ﬁrst big move away from married couples – it was pretty serious stuff,” says Fishel. “At that time, which was around the mid-80s, you were allowed to be a ‘conscientious objector’. So we used to have situations where we had to be sure we would have a team available to treat a single woman or a lesbian couple, otherwise staff had the right not to be available for treatment. It’s amazing to think of that now. I think the future will be all about technology, rather than discrimination of any kind.”

NO MORE MEN? “Everything we see in the media in relation to being able to generate sperm and eggs from, let’s say, skin cells, is about what you can see under the microscope,” continues Fishel, whose career in fertility spans more than 40 years, even before Louise Brown, the ﬁrst “test tube baby”, was born in 1978. “What’s fantastic about sperm is, where a woman is born with all the eggs she’ll ever possess, a male has only stem cells which have to be modelled over a period of about 70 days to form this incredible structure called the sperm. Yes, we can reprogramme cells to make them look like egg cells, or to make them go through the changes to become a sperm cell – it doesn’t matter the biological sex of the person that the cells come from. The important thing to grasp here is that it looks like a sperm and it looks like an egg, but what’s far more important than how a cell looks, is

what’s happening to its DNA.” There are certain things that go on during the process of natural or “inbody” production of both sperm and eggs, he explains, and that’s something called “imprinting”. “Genes have an imprinting process within them. So, we have two copies of all of our genes – one from our maternal side, and one from our paternal side. Now, for a cell to function, and therefore for our body to function, often it’s only one gene that’s working at any one time. In other words, it’s only one copy that is actually switched on or off in order to regulate a process, and this gene regulation is critical. It matters whether it’s the paternal or maternal gene that’s switched on. In fact, we now know that several illnesses form if the corresponding gene is wrongly switched on.” So even though we can model what looks like a perfectly healthy sperm down the microscope, the DNA within that sperm might not be normal? “Precisely. So the bigger question is, will we in the next 10, 20, or even 50 years, be able to control that imprinting process? Could we have, let’s say a lesbian couple, where we produce a sperm from one partner and take an egg from the other, will the sperm that we produced have the normal imprinting, functioning genes when it fuses with the partner’s egg? Will it function normally? And at the moment, we honestly don’t know the answer to that question.”

COULD SAMESEX COUPLES ONE DAY HAVE THEIR OWN BIOLOGICAL CHILDREN?

A CELL METROPOLIS

“The future will be about technology, rather than discrimination of any kind”

What is it that makes programming a cell so diﬃcult, I wonder? “If you close your eyes and imagine the metropolis of a great city like London, with all the moving parts and all the things that are happening – people moving around, transport, lifts going up and down in buildings, that incredible variation of activity in a city – think that that’s what’s happening in every single cell of our body. How do we make all of those moving parts work normally? There’s lots to go wrong, I think that’s what people often don’t appreciate. And so, do I genuinely think we will

DANIELLE MUSTARDE INVESTIGATES

be able to offer this safely as a clinical treatment within 10 or 20 years? The answer is no. It’s theoretically possible, but whatever time frame that takes, I can’t say. It certainly can’t be done now. It certainly won’t be within the next ﬁve years.”

FAMILIES OF THE FUTURE For the moment then, it seems samesex parents aren’t able to have their own biological children. But could it happen in the future? Within a generation or two? “I do think we tend to get there eventually. I remember once giving a lecture to some students and someone asked, ‘Do you think we’ll be able to clone mammals in the future?’ And I said, ‘Yes probably, but it’s unlikely in my lifetime.’ It was about a month later that Dolly the Sheep was announced. So, you never know. But then what happened, of course? They found that Dolly, and a lot of other cloned animals after her, have many abnormalities. I’ve no doubt that we can probably produce a human being by manipulating cells into sperms and eggs, but will that be safe?”

CONTEMPORARY TECHNOLOGY “Fertility is very big – if we talk about higher-end technology such as IVF, I think that there will be big changes. The preservation of fertility, for example, for couples and individuals is a big thing, especially those going through cancer treatment, or for transgender people, for example. Processes of IVF are all going to change; there will be more robotic technology used, enabling the processes to be more eﬃcient and helpful. It’s just going to be more sophisticated and there’ll be less and less human involvement in the process. In short, genes are just a small matter of biology really – a small matter of great importance – but the existence and the loving of that child is paramount, not actually where or how the genes came about.”

What’s available for LBT families today? Find out your options at carefertility.com. 73

What is your biggest wish for Christmas? Most people dream of having a child and starting a family of their own. Maybe getting pregnant is your biggest wish for Christmas? There are plenty of good reasons for starting a family. Continue reading this and learn more about the top reasons to start a family from the experience of the world’s largest sperm bank, and think about what your dream of having a baby means to you.

Letters from happy parents Cryos International is the world’s largest sperm bank and we are proud to say that we have helped women for over 30 years make the dream of a baby come true. As a company, we cannot wish for a better vision, because we know from experience how much happiness we help bring women from all over the world. For over 30 years, we have received heartwarming and grateful thank-you-letters from happy parents with pictures of their newborn babies, and from these letters and the many great conversations we have had with the mothers and mother-to-be, we understand the many different motivations for wishing to start a family.

Here are the top 5 motivations that we most commonly meet:

TOP 5 MOTIVATIONS FOR CREATING A FAMILY

SOMETHING IS MISSING

COMPLETE DEVOTION

TAKE ON A NEW EXCITING CHALLENGE IN LIFE

Having a baby is a big decision and it is a decision that will change your life forever, and as we all know there are no limits to how much love and happiness a baby can bring. What does the dream of a baby mean to you?

May all your wishes come true.

You feel like something is missing. You long to raise and nurture a baby to complete your vision of a family. 7KH IXO¿OOPHQW RI FRPSOHWH devotion and the chance for you to be “the favourite mum” instead of just being a “favourite aunt”, and with this devotion getting a sense of deeper purpose in life.

You just feel ready and you want to seize the moment and experience everything that it has to offer.

LAUGHTER

SPREAD JOY

Children offer love and a sense of purpose in life, but they are also funny. The stories of how babies and children bring laughter into the world are countless. You multiply your laugh rate with 10. You wish to bring light into a new life and letting the baby do the same for you.

If you want to see all the cute Cryos-babies and read letters from the happy parents, visit dk.cryosinternational.com

| FAMILY | READER FAMILY |

My family A MOTHER AND A CHILD SHARE A STORY OF BEING BONDED BY CHOICE, NOT BIOLOGY. AS TOLD TO CARRIE LYELL We are Lucy Power, a 46-year-old loneliness and an ache for something lesbian using pronouns she/her, and else. We have created this something Laura Power, 27, a non-binary lesbian else. During the process of deciding who uses they/them, and we are a to become a family together, we have family who are bonded by choice, and reflected on what is important and not biology. what matters most to us in this vital We knew each other first as and formative relationship. We have colleagues, and then as friends. Our chosen to offer and ask for what meets relationship had always been shaped our truest needs and wants. We now around a mother-child dynamic, and have an honest, loving and supportive this summer we decided to make this relationship which nourishes us both official by adopting each other in a in every iteration. supportive and loving ceremony, five Reactions from others have been years to the day since we first met. We mixed. While our cishet friends seem used the adoption model to create a uncomfortable – some vocally so – the promise to each other that we couldn’t queer people in our lives are delighted otherwise access, and we are both so and inspired, with some definitely happy and healed by becoming mum yearning for similar. Some have been and child to each other. moved to tears, while others have The ceremony took place in Laura’s been led to reflect on what family back garden in Brighton and we were means to them. Other reactions have surrounded by queer friends, partners been funny. Many of Lucy’s Facebook and loved ones. We made vows to each contacts read us as a couple because other which affirmed our promise to of our shared surname, the matching be straightforward with each other, tattoos and cuddly profile pictures honest, trusting and, above all, loving. which have clearly thrown the internet We took the same surname, to confirm into a lazy frenzy of heteronormaour familial relationship, and chose tive assumption! lavender as a symbol to use in the We know that our family set-up has ceremony because of its healing and caused, and will continue to cause, soothing properties, and because it negative reactions from those who thrives in difficult conditions and is choose not to accept or understand very gay! We were gifted beautiful what we have done together, but we matching lavender tattoos by a loved couldn’t be happier. This non-sexual one, to symbolise the permanence of ceremonial bonding of lesbians our promise. together as family is an important and We both had difficult relationtransformative part of our lives, ships with our birth families and it has inspired others, Want – we felt rejected and offering an option to them, to share judged, and were raised should they choose this. your family A? We view our decision as within a chaos which left IV story with D us neglected emotionally an important part of the and not accepted for who historical lesbian journey, Email editorial@ divamag.co.uk we were. In the past, family and choose to be a family invoked within us sadness, unevery single day, through love, met needs, yearning, hopelessness, joy and acceptance.

2017

POWER LIST

LESBIAN | BISEXUAL | QUEER | CIS AND TRANS A new day is dawning for lesbian, bi and queer women working in entertainment, politics, culture and business. Those who are LGBT are ﬁnding new forms of opportunity and success every day, as the UK moves towards a more inclusive climate for gender and sexual minorities.

The DIVA Power List brings together the most influential lesbian, bi and queer voices. It is not confined or defined by economic status, education or skin colour, but by the actions taken to influence and enact positive change across our community.

Nominations can be made in the following categories, they will then be included in the ﬁnal list:

NOMINATE NOW divapowerlist.com Launching at our DIVA Christmas Party at Scala London, 20 December

Supporting parents in the workplace

WOMENONTOP

P3 NETWORK

LEZ BOSS How, and why, to boss your next pay rise

WHAT’S IT LIKE TO BE A... Mary Page on working in an animal rescue centre

“Family and love is a common thread throughout”

Alice Mu is a proud, professional parent who works for one of the Big Four accounting ﬁrms. She also sits on the board of P3, a parenting support network for LGBT professionals. Alice and her wife, Christine, have a little girl, Charlotte, conceived through donor insemination in 2010. She talked to DIVA about the challenges for samesex parents in the workplace, and what P3 can do to help. DIVA: What is P3? ALICE MU: P3 was established in 2014 to better support LGBT professionals who are looking to become parents, or who already have children. Previously, support wasn’t easy to access, and what was required was either too niche for existing LGBT employee networks, or too nuanced for traditional

78 DECEMBER 2017

P3’S ALICE MU TALKS TO DIVA ABOUT THE CHALLENGES FACING LGBT PARENTS IN THE WORKPLACE

family networks – leaving the needs of professional parents and the organisations that supported them unmet. P3 actively supports professionals in over 60 UK multinational companies, government and regulatory agencies, providing access to an authentic, bespoke and diverse network of experts, parents and prospective parents. We help organisations and schools to create inclusive environments, and run several community events supporting LGBT families more broadly. We promote an agenda of diversity, acceptance and love – from the family home through to the school yard, the boardroom and beyond. P3 believes that family is family – irrespective of sexual orientation or family make-up – and that at the heart of every family is love. And love doesn’t discriminate.

How did you get involved? Do you have a personal connection to P3’s work? I have been involved with P3 since it was ﬁrst established. Tuvia Borok, co-founder and chief executive, is a friend of ours and he approached me about getting involved and becoming a board member. My partner and I were very excited when we ﬁrst heard about P3 and what it was aiming to do. It was exactly what we had been searching for… a family LGBT network where we could meet other families like us. It was particularly important for us that our little girl, who was three at the time, could meet other families like hers. What would you say are your particular points of interest or goals within P3’s remit?

WORDS CARRIE LYELL

Proud professional parents

| FAMILY | MEET P3 NETWORK |

For myself and my family, our main goal was to meet other families like us in the LGBT community, to become more aware of the issues LGBT families face, and to share our experiences with prospective families so that they can avoid some of the challenges we ran into on our journey. Speaking of challenges, what do you think are the biggest facing LGBT parents in the workplace? Are there particular challenges for lesbians and bisexual women? What can P3 do to help? There are two main challenges that I see – one being continued heteronormative biases on family units and structures, and the other that we still see a generation of members of the LGBT community that are not out at work. The latter becomes a big issue when discussions around parental leave arise, as they are forced to come out in order to explain requests around leave or time off to help assist with social worker visits, medical appointments if proceeding with IVF, or travel abroad if undertaking international surrogacy. Starting a family can be an emotional journey already for LGBT parents, given they generally do not conceive naturally, and this just adds one more layer of potential stress. Tied with that is the fact that many still have to deal with biases around what makes up a family unit. Most people, sadly, continue to automatically use language that suggests a family created by the LGBT community is somehow not “normal”. In some respects I think women may have it slightly easier than men, given people seem to have a natural presumption to understanding a woman having a child. For gay men, that is not the generally accepted pathway within the community itself. As for bisexual women, bisexuality continues to carry a stigma and I think more needs to be done to raise awareness of the B in LGBT. P3 does a lot of work with organisations to educate heterosexuals about modern families and to help demystify what it means to be an LGBT parent – mainly that a parent is a parent and a family is about love; sexuality has nothing to do with it! Are companies doing enough to provide support for LGBT parents? Which industries are getting it right?

Which can do better? Some companies are better than others. Sometimes it’s a question of their size and how international they are. But it has been a steep learning curve. It is one thing for organisations to have policies and believe they can support LGBT parents; it’s another to then try it out in practice. What is great is that through my involvement with P3 I see more and more organisations trying, and that’s the key. It is difficult to say that one industry gets it better than another. It comes down to the culture and ethos of an organisation, and how accepting they are of diversity as a whole. If an organisation is still grappling with the general equality rights of women then it’s expected that a discussion around LGBT parenting is far off for them. You also work with heterosexual professionals who want to know more about diversity. Tell me more about that. I think the entire P3 leadership team and board were surprised by the number of heterosexual professionals that have joined P3. While originally it was seen as an ally community, in fact, many who have children that are LGBT come forward to join and network with LGBT parents. They want to discuss parenting, and parenting a child that is coming out or being bullied. Anecdotally, they find it easier to relate to P3 members than a classic LGBT network at their organisations. Aside from that, there is a large outreach and education programme to help break down myths for heterosexual parents and to arm them with an understanding and language so that they can have a more inclusive discussion with their children at home. We see many benefits from that. Firstly, parents feel more comfortable answering questions children may have when faced with a school peer that has same-sex parents. And secondly, the more inclusive the discussion at home, the more likely that child will grow up to not bully and to have an easier coming out journey at home in later life, should that happen. Imagine how much easier coming out would be if a child grows up in a family where LGBT families are discussed openly and in a positive light, rather than as something taboo.

“At the heart of every family is love”

How do you see P3 growing over the next ﬁve years? The growth of P3 has been amazing, and I think beyond any of the board’s or team’s expectations. One thing that remains clear is that the growth is happening as a result of P3 continuing to be the only network of its kind that is focusing on non-traditional families, something that has never been done before. P3 going into an organisation starts a dialogue to realise that people can straddle multiple diversity strands, and that the issue of family and love is a common thread throughout. There are clear plans to continue on the steep growth trajectory. P3 is in discussions with key partners outside the UK who want to work at bringing the P3 offering to a broader demographic. This is supported by many of the organisations we work with who wanted to take the discussion beyond the UK. It’s very exciting; the topics of family we discuss are universal. There will be an ever-growing number of community campaigns looking to address issues no one is willing to talk about. For example, earlier this year P3 focussed on what it means to be a trans parent; what those discussions look like with children for trans parents to come out; and what those discussions are like with educators, for example. The World AIDS Day campaign around parenting with HIV was yet again another groundbreaking step to look at stigma and biases, and to tackle them, all in the name of love and family. And ﬁnally, there is the digital footprint. P3 is investing to offer more digitally and in an interactive manner. It is pretty cool having seen some of the proposed plans for 2018! I think the future for P3 is very exciting, and I know that the team are always on the lookout for more volunteers to join our P3 family, so if you don’t mind the plug, I invite any of your readers to get in touch if they want to join. Likewise, if anyone needs support or just wants to understand how we can maybe work with employers or other groups to help promote a more inclusive environment, I would hope people feel free to reach out for a chat.

Find out more about P3 and how you can get involved at thep3network.com. 79

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| WOMEN ON TOP | THE LESBIAN BOSS | THE LESBIAN BOSS – AKA KATE BARKER – SHARES HER TIPS

How to get

a pay rise 82 DECEMBER 2017

How to get a pay rise? It’s easy… Work hard, meet your targets, be committed and diligent, and you will be rewarded. Mwwaahhahha! I’m kidding, of course. As an employer, I can tell you that the single factor most likely to increase your chances of getting a pay rise is to ask for one. Here’s how to go about it. DO SAY: “I’ve met all of my goals; I’m loving the role and I’m ready to do more. I’d like a rise to go with it.” DON’T SAY: “Erm, well, no one has died and I’m mostly on time.” (Looks at ﬁngernails.) “But how do you think I’m doing?” There’s no gender pay gap in my business, but I’ve noticed that men and women often approach the sticky subject of money differently, and I’ve tried to think about why. It seems to me that for a woman who wants to get ahead at work, life is a series of negotiations in which she must balance the soundness of her judgement with an equal measure of likeability. A man is allowed to be unpleasant and right. A woman’s perceived lack of warmth, humour or self-effacement, on the other hand, chips away at the credibility of her opinions. So, in asking for a raise, she must also ask whether her boss thinks she is “nice enough” to deserve it. It starts early. Picture a little girl at nursery who asserts her right to a prime spot at the sand table. She got there ﬁrst and that sand is not going to pour itself. Budging up is for babies. So the chances are she’ll be labelled “a right little madam”. If she’s tough, smart and resilient enough to battle her way to the boardroom table, she’ll likely face the same again. But the little boy, jabbing her with his elbows, is admired for his feistiness from the get-go. Men learn to be

assured of their own deservedness in a way that I see in women less often. Research by Anglia Ruskin University shows that lesbians in the UK earn around 8% more than straight women. Bi women earn between seven and 28% less! I don’t believe we’re more or less clever than our hetero sisters. Instead, it’s as stark a demonstration of gender disadvantage as you’ll ﬁnd. Because our lot, by refusing to ﬁt neatly into rigid gendered expectations, expose the fact that pay and gender are too often linked. Lesbians may not be favoured as highly as straight men when it comes to pay, but we do escape being penalised quite as much as straight and bi women. We’ve basically confused them into paying us more... Whether or not you enjoy an advantage, building on your strengths will help you to get the pay rise you deserve. If you’re good at managing meetings, being creative or supporting teams, then say so. Share your successes loudly with your boss and your colleagues. Equally, own up to a mistake and make a point of showing how you intend to learn from it. Schedule in regular performance reviews and be fully prepared to toot your own horn. If you want better pay and conditions at work – ask. Remember: you deserve it. Your boss is not doing you a favour by employing you. Your own twirly chair and unlimited use of the whiteboard do not count as perks! A friend once told me that the best way to end an article is with a funny summation of your main points. Here’s mine: There are lots of things you can do to ensure that your contribution is recognised and you therefore earn more money. But if, (in 2017!), you want to better your chance of a pay rise – don’t be a woman. Almost 50 years after the introduction of the Equal Pay Act, that’s the biggest joke of all.

Kate Barker is a writer, political activist and parent. She is the founder and owner of the award-winning London creative agency Dekko.

Join in h t i w n u f e th e, c a e P r e h t Hea y b l i W e i s Ro and some ! s t s e u g g n i amaz New Roving Reporter RACHEL SHELLEY Check radiodiva.uk to ďŹ nd out our upcoming live studio guests! Radio DIVA is co-produced and co-hosted by Heather Peace and Rosie Wilby

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DIVA Discovers Unsigned artists: send your tracks to heather@radiodiva.uk for a chance to hear them on Radio DIVA!

Tune in every Tuesday at 6.30pm (104.4FM and DAB in London) or stream the show online at player.resonancefm.com Catch up will be available at mixcloud.com/Resonance

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| WOMEN ON TOP | WHAT’S IT LIKE TO BE |

animal rights activist? MARY PAGE TELLS DIVA ABOUT WORKING AS THE PRESIDENT OF A SPANISH RESCUE CENTRE FOR ABANDONED ANIMALS The Association for the Rights of Abandoned Animals (ADANA) is an animal charity based in Spain’s Costa del Sol, run by Mary Page and her wife Sandra. Originally from the UK, Page spent her career in education and politics before retiring and moving to Estepona, where the couple now spend their time rescuing dogs across the country. DIVA: How long have you been in this job? MARY PAGE: Nearly two years; previously I was the vice president. Before that, back in the UK, I worked in education and was politically active, as well as representing my union on

various national LGBT committees. After I retired, we moved to Prague for three years, then on to Spain, and I commuted on a weekly basis attending meetings and seminars in the UK and other European countries. How would you describe an average day in five words? Frustrating, depressing, uplifting, emotional and fun. What’s the best thing about your job? Seeing a neglected, unwanted dog being loved and cared for. The first kind touch a dog may have experienced in its life… I’m not sentimental, far from it, but I sometimes I get a lump in my throat. What’s the worst thing about your job? Having to repress the urge to tell some people what selfish, cruel, uncaring bastards they are. I loathe people who treat animals with less care and concern than they would show to their car or Gucci loafers. Has your sexuality or gender identity ever been an issue? Never, at least not that I was made aware of. I worked and was politically active in the small town I lived in with my partner. The year I was town mayor was the year my partner left her husband to live with me. I guess people talked about it for a few weeks, then moved on to another more interesting subject of gossip. And anyway, other people may have had a problem; I didn’t. Did you ever have any doubts about being out at work? I never was out if that means making

84 DECEMBER 2017

What one superpower would make your job easier? Having wings. Not only would it make daily life so much simpler in that I wouldn’t need to use planes, trains, buses or cars, but it would also lower my blood pressure and prolong my life as I am the kind of driver that yells imprecations and curses in Spanish or English, as appropriate, at drivers I consider transgressive! Who inspires you professionally? I can’t say any one person inspires me, but I have a lot of respect and admiration for many people. I owe a lot to my mum who had a hard life with few pleasures, but who always supported me and encouraged me to get the best education I could. If I could choose my ideal dinner companions I’d choose George Eliot, George Orwell, Harold Wilson and Barbara Castle. I guess you could say that I see Barbara Castle as inspirational, politically. Where do you see yourself in ﬁve years? Hopefully alive, ﬁt and in possession of all my faculties. As long as I’m able, I’ll be involved in some group or other. I’m an active member of the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party, the Spanish sister party of the UK Labour Party, and was a candidate in the last local council elections.

Find out more about Mary’s work at adana.es.

WOR WO RDS C CA A RR RIE E LY YE ELLL

What’s it like to be an…

some kind of public declaration. After all, anyone who knew Sandra and me would have to have been pretty dim not to put two and two together. One day at work, I happened to mention that Sandra’s mother was visiting and a colleague said, “Oh, mother-in-law coming to stay”. Just like that. When you come to think about it, why should anyone have been interested in my sex life? When I was young, I joined the Communist Party and a seasoned old party member gave me a great piece of advice. “Never reveal yourself as a comrade until you have established yourself as a good friend and reliable colleague”, she said somewhat conspiratorially. I followed that excellent advice in the political and personal/sexual sense. It has never failed and it’s a course I recommend to anyone. I hope that throughout my life I have been thought of as more than Mary Page, lesbian.

Bella Qvist surprises her girlfriend with an Austrian adventure

TRAVEL

SALZBURG

FIRST CLASS Make the most of your holidays with DIVAâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s travel tips

romantically rustic with gorgeous walking

et’s go hiking in Austria one day.” It’s been one of those things my girlfriend Cyd and I have said, and dreamed of, over the years. Probably ever since I plucked up the courage to speak to her on a university organised walk in the Peak District some eight years ago. It never happened – despite her being the biggest Sound Of Music fan I know. But when Cyd was due to finish her PhD, and I was thinking of ways to celebrate her efforts, I decided it was time. I organise everything in secret, and it isn’t until we get to the airport that I reveal our destination: Salzburg. You should have seen her face – actual hearts for eyes. A few hours later and we are toasting with champagne inside a very comfortable British Airways flight when the clouds below start breaking up. A stunning Alpine landscape reveals itself and the picturesque city of Salzburg, surrounded by mountains and split in two by the river Salzach, appears below. High above the Altstadt – the baroque old town that is also one of the most beautiful UNESCO heritage sites in Northern Europe – the magnificent Hohensalzburg Castle makes Austria’s fourth largest city look like something out of a Disney movie. We land and our trip continues by car into the Austrian countryside. We travel along green fields with grazing cows, rippling rivers and traditional country houses, decorated with beautiful paintings and intricate wooden rooftops ready to hold vast amounts of snow. It is September and, instead of being covered in white dunes, the hills are alive with autumn colours. Every shade of red, green, yellow, brown and orange appears on the mountains either side of us and the 90-minute journey flies by. In the district of Leogang, our driver takes us up the Hütten mountain range, where we reach our destination.

86 DECEMBER 2017

ALPINE DREAMS Forsthofalm ( forsthofalm.com), a romantically rustic designer hotel and spa, sits 1,050 meters above sea level, but is submerged in stunning nature. The rooms are made from wood cut during a particular winter moon phase, giving the whole establishment a fresh scent of pine, blending with the smell of open ﬁres, newly baked bread and the freshly picked herbs used to create bespoke treatments in the spa upstairs. The entire place breathes a wonderful, relaxing ambience and it is with pleasure that we start our

“These moments are like medicine for the soul”

day by opening the curtains to the wild outside, nipping down for an abundant breakfast buffet (complete with freshly cooked hot and cold food, a DIY muesli station, vegan spreads and Prosecco), and spending a day relaxing in the spa and rooftop pool. The moments spent sitting in a panoramic sauna, watching the mist move through the forest, enjoying a personalised back massage in front of the brutal mountain landscape outside, and the romantic evening spent drinking champagne in a private rooftop jacuzzi lit up only by the

full moon, are like medicine for the soul. As guests here, we have free access to the full Mountain Life programme, which includes wellness, sport and social activities. We try mindful yoga with the wonderful Nika, enjoy an organic, vegan three-course dinner cooked over ﬁre in the Noma-inspired KUKKA

| TRAVEL | A ROMANTIC GETAWAY |

restaurant (half board, excluding drinks, is included in our stay and there are plenty of non-vegan options too) and, best of all, we hike up the mountain following a trail that starts right outside the hotel. Forsthofalm sits at the bottom of a ski lift station, making it an ideal winter ski holiday location and in autumn the slope makes for gorgeous walking. Having nabbed a couple of sandwiches from the afternoon tea spread, we hike a comfortable 45 minutes up to the middle ski lift station where we slump down on a bench and admire an astonishing view. Behind us we have the mountain, on the other side of which lies popular ski resort Saalbach, and looking out over the impressive landscape we hear the faint sound of goat’s bells, the greetings of the odd fellow hiker passing or cyclist enjoying Europe’s biggest mountain biking park – but mostly the still sound of nothing. Oh, for a bit more time up here, where all troubles melt away.

A FAIRYTALE CASTLE

TIPS The Salzburg card gets your free public transport and entry to lots of museums and attractions. See salzburg.info for more information. Cyd and Bella ﬂew British Airways direct from Gatwick to Salzburg. Flights start from £74 and business class is available from £267 (ba.com) The trip was made possible with help from Visit Salzburg (salzburg.info) and Lemongrass Marketing (lemongrass marketing.com). 88 DECEMBER 2017

Two nights at eco timber hotel Forsthofalm and its surrounding mountain wonderland are not enough, but nonetheless we leave on the third day, this time headed for Salzburg. Here, we stay at Motel One (motel-one.com), a very affordable option, perfect for a city break like this. It’s a no-frills but clean and stylish hotel which comes complete with breakfast and very friendly staff. Just like at Forsthofalm, there are no issues with Cyd and I sharing a room. Sehr gut, as we have no time to mess about. With just over 24 hours in town, we start with the most important thing: cake. Only, we really make sure we earn it ﬁrst, by climbing the beautiful Kapuzinerberg, a large forest-covered hill sitting right in the middle of town, just opposite the Altstadt. You see, to get to grips with Salzburg you want not only to wander the cobbled streets of the picturesque old town, stopping for coffee at traditional establishments such as Tomaselli (tomaselli.at) or admiring the birthplace of Mozart, you also want to see it from above. It’s a steep climb up Kapuzinerberg – but worth it. At the very top sits Franziskischlössl ( franziskischloessl.

Saturday, adding that four times a year they organise a so-called HOSi party (hosi.or.at/category/events/ hosi-fest). They also host Ladies Night on the ﬁrst Friday of every month, and twice a year there’s the womenonly party Feminale (hosi.or.at/ hosi-events/feminale-2). In Austria, gays and lesbians largely enjoy the same rights as straight people, however same-sex marriage is not legal at the time of writing. Cyd and I, however, have no trouble holding hands in town, and the female couple depicted on one of the traﬃc lights in the old town makes us smile.

at), a small, gay-owned castle, hotel and restaurant with a beautiful courtyard, rose garden and views to die for. The boutique hotel has two luxuriously decorated rooms (named after the owners’ two dogs, Darius and Cyra), so beautiful they’re ﬁt for a queen, or two. What’s more, the restaurant offering (including the cake – do try the apfelstrudel!) is divine and owners Toni and Wolfgang are just lovely. They host stunning weddings here and in winter they do a Christmas market. It’s just delightful – and the thought that Adolf Hitler once wanted to build a big stadium and festival establishment up here, but that it now instead houses a petite, magical gay establishment, is rather cheerful too.

THE SOUND OF (SING-ALONG) MUSIC On our last day in Salzburg, it is time for Cyd’s final surprise – and the event I know she’ll enjoy most: a Sound Of Music singalong tour. Hopping onto a SoM themed Panorama Tour bus (panoramatours.com), departing from Mirabellplatz, which also has a lovely local food market well worth a visit, Cyd is bursting with

SAPPHIC SALZBURG That evening we head to Urbankeller (urbankeller.com), a foodie dream establishment specialising in Austrian cuisine made with an ethical mindset. They have a full vegetarian and vegan menu alongside their usual meat offerings; they brew their own beer and they promise organic food without artificial flavourings. Situated next to Kleines Theater, the vibe is cool but relaxed and we order our spätzle, a type of potato pasta with lots of cheese, sitting comfortably by the bar. The local grüner veltliner wine recommended to me is delicious and cuts through the fattiness of this traditional Austrian dish perfectly. What’s more, prices are very reasonable and Urbankeller restaurant is within walking distance of Salzburg’s gay drinking establishments, of which there are six – which isn’t bad for a population of 200,000. In the daytime there is Cafe Mozartwinkl and Wernbacher (cafewernbacher. at), and at night bars open to all members of the LGBT community include Mexxx (mexxxgaybar. at) and Dreistein ( facebook. com/3SteinGaybarSalzburg), which we find to be quiet on a Wednesday night, but where the friendly bar staff put us in touch with Doris Posch from Salzburg LGBTQI Association, HOSi (hosi.or.at/facebook.com/ hosi.salzburg). She’s at a big lesbian conference in Vienna but tells us that HOSi bar is a very cheap place to drink on Wednesday, Friday and

“Gays and lesbians enjoy the same rights as straight people but same-sex marriage is not legal”

excitement for the four-hour trip ahead. Along the way, we not only get to dance like Liesl and Ralph in front of the famous gazebo at Hellbrunn Palace, view the Leopoldskron Palace where the famous boating scene was filmed, but after a tour through the Salzburg Lake District, we stop for lunch by the impressive chapel where Maria and the Baron were married in Mondsee. Throughout the journey we get to sing along to all the classic tunes with tour guide Barbara, clad in traditional dirndl, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen Cyd so happy. After all that singing, we relax with a walk through Mirabell gardens, where many selfies are taken, before strolling along the canal back to the Altstadt. Last, but not least, we take the lift up to the dreamlike castle of Festung Hohensalzburg (salzburg-burgen.at/ en/hohensalzburg-castle), where we can say a final goodbye to the magnificent city and region below. So long, farewell, auf wiedersehen, goodbye… until next time.

Bespoke British tUnderwear focx.co.uk 89

| TRAVEL |

READER SNAP

SINGING IN THE RAIN

TRAVEL NEWS

A HOLIDAY IN THE CLOSET You may have spotted a video making the rounds on social media. Called “What if we treated straight couples the way gay couples are treated on holiday?” – this ATTN and Virgin Holidays collaboration features all too familiar comments, such as “You must be the fun straight couple of the resort” and “You two? On honeymoon? Hahaha”. It hits the nail on the head in terms of the reactions us holigayers may face even in “progressive” destinations. The video was made to highlight new research* by Virgin Holidays, revealing that just one in 20 LGBT+ couples are at ease showing affection on holiday. What’s more, half of LGBT+ couples fear judgement and mockery, and are worried about their safety abroad. One in 10 LGBT+ travellers have been threatened with physical violence on holiday and one in three LGBT+ travellers have experienced discrimination, including judgement and ridicule. This compares to three quarters of straight couples being more affectionate with their partners on holiday than at home. In other words, it’s clear the tourism industry still has a little further to go... Find out more at virginholidays.co.uk/losethelabels.

ELL

Emilia from Finland, and Julcsi from Hungary are teachers and a married couple who normally split their time between Finland (term time) and Hungary (summer), but who currently live in Bloomington, Indiana, where Emilia is taking part in an exchange programme, writing about inclusion of LGBTQ+ students in US schools. Outside of work, the pair like to travel the US, and this particular picture was taken at the Louisville TO HAVE YOUR Slugger Museum and TRAVEL Factory in Louisville, P Kentucky. “We are very A N S FEATURED, TWEET T excited in the picture @BELLAQVIS because we’re about OR INSTAGRAM @BELLA_QVIST to see how most of the baseball bats used in the US are made,” says Emilia. As for other queer travel tips, Emilia says: “We really appreciate hotels that visibly welcome LGBTQ+ guests. One such hotel is Hotel Helka in Helsinki, Finland.” Follow Emilia and Julcsi’s lesbian love story as they travel around Finland, Hungary and the world on Instagram @emiliaontheroad and @peajaypea, and check out their blog: emilia-ontheroad.blogspot.com. TRAVEL TRIVIA

WORLD PRIDE 2021: COPENHAGEN Not only did Lonely Planet name the Danish capital the world’s most LGBTQ friendly place in 2014, Copenhagen has also been elected to host World Pride in 2021 – and seeing as they are bidding to host the LGBT sports championship EuroGames too (we’ll ﬁnd out in March 2018), this is lining up to be one huge hygge homo fest. Yay!

Send us your travel hacks, questions and pictures! Email travel@divamag.co.uk or tweet our travel editor @bellaqvist. #DIVAMagTravel

90 DECEMBER 2017

DID YOU KNOW THAT... Eight out of 10 gay couples surveyed by Attitude refuse to hold hands on holiday, and more than half won’t hold hands in the comfort and safety of their hotel. *The research was conducted by Attitude and OnePoll of 1,000 LGBT+ people and 1,000 straight people respectively.

Same-sex marriages performed onboard Celebrity Cruises are now legally recognised. Swap “I do” for “say ay-ay, captain!” celebritycruises.co.uk

PHOTO WILFRED GACHAU

PRIDE NEWS

DIVA’s monthly pick of the best events

PHOTO JONAS AKERLUND

LIFESTYLE

DIARY

ADVENT CALENDAR Take part in this year’s #DIVACrimboChallenge

HOROSCOPE What have the stars got in store for you?

inside pussy riot

DIARY

November/ December

28.11 WHO’S YOUR DANDY? Filmhouse, Edinburgh

Who’s Your Dandy? returns with more off-the-wall, accessible and ﬁlm-based artworks from Scotland and beyond. Featuring some of the most unique queer and trans shorts in English and sign languages. tinyurl.com/DIVADandy

30.11

BY DANIELLE MUSTARDE

PULL ON YOUR FAVOURITE FESTIVE THREADS AND MAKE YOUR WAY TO THESE GLITTERING WINTER HAPPENINGS

30 YEARS QUEER The LGBT+ Centre, Manchester

Join the LGBT Centre as they launch 12 months of celebrations to mark their 30th birthday. Hear from community activists and celebrity supporters, and pledge your commitment to raise the centre’s proﬁle and raise more funds. Happy Birthday! tinyurl.com/DIVA30Years

01.12 WOMEN’S WELLBEING The Melting Pot, Edinburgh

An evening of performances to celebrate Book Week Scotland’s theme of “nourish”. Got a few trashy lesbian erotica novels gathering dust? Bring them along to swap! lgbthealth.org.uk

02.12 POUT Tribeca, Manchester

A diverse crowd of women with a love for feel-good beats. Music-wise, think Whitney, Mariah, Aretha, The Eurythmics, Groove Armarda, P!nk and more. YASSS. tinyurl.com/DIVAPOUT

O’HOOLEY & TIDOW Various locations and dates

Join Belinda and Heidi as they tour their beautifully performed contemporary and traditional winter songs from brand new album WinterFolk Vol 1. The perfect gig to get you in a festive mood! See page 56 for our interview. ohooleyandtidow.com/gigs 92 DECEMBER 2017

WHAT’S ON WHERE YOU ARE?

Send your listings to letters@divamag. co.uk

02.12 CHOOSE YR OWN ADVENTURE! DIY Space, London

A queer dance party for people who want a night out without alcohol or any other intoxicants. CYOA welcomes people of all genders and sexualities (or none), and all ages, bodies and characters. tinyurl.com/DIVAChooseYrOwn

PHOTO MAISY CARR

1-23.12

| DIARY | LISTINGS |

06.12 CHRISTMAS FEMME SINGLES Bar Humbug, Bristol

Femme Singles, rejoice! This is the perfect, Christmas-shaped opportunity to meet conﬁdent, fabulous, like-minded femme lesbians and bisexual women – and even better, there will be games and prizes. tinyurl.com/DIVAXmasFemme

08.12 GEM ANDREWS

9.12

Cafe Kino, Bristol

UNSKINNY BOP XMAS Star of Bethnal Green, London

The most wonderful Bop of the year! Christmas pop hits, including Boney M and Sinister Mary Clarence in a Santa suit, plus the best in pop music throughout genres and generations. unskinnybop.co.uk

04-09.12 PECS: THE 80’S SHOW Soho Theatre, London

After a sell-out run earlier in the year, the Drag Kings of Pecs make their hotly-anticipated Soho Theatre debut with their smash hit 80s cabaret. Packed with power suits, Prince tribute acts, and New Romantic pretty boys, join the all-singing, all-dancing drag king collective as they bring beloved queer icons back to life. sohotheatre.com/whats-on

05-23.12

Gem Andrews performs new album, North – an intimate and stirring collection of country songs infused with the warmth and energy of the north east of England, Gem’s spiritual home. Worth a look. gemandrews.co.uk

09.12 VEGAN CHRISTMAS MARKET Blue House Yard, London

Christmas lights, Christmas music, Christmas EVERYTHING… and on top of that, it’s all vegan-friendly. The perfect market for those prepping for #Veganuary2018. bluehouseyard.com

09.12

Join the cast of A Curmudgeon’s Guide to Christmas in the wearing of illﬁtting party hats and garish Christmas jumpers, while they bring to life a warm, witty – and sometimes weird – look at a collection of real life round-robin letters. Think Mrs Merton meets Talking Heads. tinyurl.com/DIVAChristmas

INSIDE PUSSY RIOT Saatchi Gallery, London

Here’s the story of modern day, post-punk feminist art collective Pussy Riot, who stuck two ﬁngers up at the Russian system and suffered the consequences. To mark the 100th anniversary of the Russian revolution, audiences are encouraged to pull on the balaclava and stand up for what they believe in. #WeAreAllPussyRiot insidepussyriot.com

LGBTQ ROLLER DISCO Caledonia University, Glasgow

Enjoy a unique, community roller experience with instructors on hand at this family-friendly event. Skates, protective equipment and refreshments will be provided. You’re also welcome to go along and watch or just hang out. Lovely. tinyurl.com/DIVAGetYSkatesOn

CURMUDGEON’S CHRISTMAS Hope Theatre, London

14.11-24.12

19.12

21.12 NON-BINARY XMAS CABARET The Glory, London

Their last show of 2017, join Non-Binary Cabaret for a riotous, funny, thoughtprovoking mixed bill from the creators of Wotever World. Expect cabaret of the highest standing, bringing you that warm and fuzzy festive feeling. theglory.co

A REYT QUEER DO The Old Workshop, Sheﬃeld

Hosted by Sammy Silver, and with performances by fresh northern drag king talent. Expect seasonal food and drink and a beautifully queer soundtrack. Drag and festive sparkle actively encouraged. androandeve.com

Take a selﬁe with this issue of DIVA and share it using #DIVACrimboChallenge.

Rate it? Share it with a friend. Hate it? Write a better one!

Have a clear-out and take old clothes, books, bits and bobs to a charity shop.

Pick one Xmas present to make yourself this year and get your craft on.

Don’t have one? Cuddle someone else’s pet!

Whack on your favourite beats and dance around your house for 30 mins, or until the neighbours complain.

Create a mixtape of songs that make you feel amazing. Play it whenever you need a boost.

Buy a book by an YLVA and Bold LGBT author. Check out Strokes Books for ideas.

Give it to an elderly neighbour or someone else who needs cheering up.

Transform yo u a cinema. Ge r lounge into t the popcorn on the go, tu rn lights and “s down the hh” yourself to create that a uthentic fee l. Tune into Resonance 104.4FM at 6.30 pm and send your season’s tweetings to hos ts Heather Peace and Rosie Wilby @RadioDIVA 104_4.

with us! gie on down edia. o o b d n a n o cial m d rags Get your gla ke it, join in the fun on so a If you can’t m

#DIVACrimboChallenge 94 DECEMBER 2017

| LIFESTYLE | #DIVACRIMBOCHALLENGE |

Send our November cover star some love @margaretcho.

Spread a little festive joy and buy a homeless person lunch, or make a donation to a foodbank.

Why not volunt eer? It’s nice to be ni ce. Share a “helpie” @DIVA mag while you’re do azine ing your good deed . Disclaimer: not to be night bus; keep yo tried on the ur head down. You don’t need big bucks to light a couple of candles, run a bubble bath and play Enya’s Greatest Hits on YouTube.

BFF Plan how to make your ar. ye xt ne h feel extra spes

Download January’ s DI and share your thou VA at divadigital.co.uk ghts @DIVAmagaz ine.

Grab your thermals and your GF/BF/ bezzie/dog and enjoy the wonder of nature.

THE WORLD CAN BE A DARK PLACE, SO LET’S MAKE IT SHINE THAT LITTLE BIT BRIGHTER THIS DECEMBER. WORDS ROXY BOURDILLON To take part in the #DIVACrimboChallenge, simply join in with these activities every day of advent. Don’t forget to tweet and Facebook us @DIVAmagazine using #DIVACrimboChallenge to let us know how you’re getting on. Ho, ho, ho and away we go!

it Got an old copy lying around? Leave e. somewhere it might make a differenc It’s not littering, it’s spreading joy.

What’s the worst that can happen ?

A proper photo albu in Ye Olden Tim m, like back es. Get printing, get sticking, get reminiscing.

You’re going to se handwritten le nd a tter to someone, and it’s to make their da going y.

Go and have a drink in your local gay bar. Support the community by getting sloshed!

Just kidding, tuck into a mince pie or 10. The only running you should be doing today is towards a buffe t.

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| LIFESTYLE | STARS |

ARIES (21 MARCH-20 APRIL) December is your month of adventure. Expect to be surprised as you stumble upon babes with a difference. Kooky chicks, travel and all things unusual turn you on. Venus is teaching you to embrace your unique side and not care what anyone thinks. Mars, your ruler, enters your primal zone on the 9th, boosting your power – but avoid plotting revenge. A taboo lover rocks up, but should you do it? TAURUS (21 APRIL-21 MAY) Look out for an ex of Xmas past as mischievous Mercury trawls backwards. Should you indulge her whims? The choice is yours. Sexy Venus is encouraging you to dive deep – dangling all sorts of juicy temptations. Careful you don’t get caught up with a shady diva who wants it all her way. Secrets and power struggles should be overcome just in time for Crimbo when you’re dazzling. GEMINI (22 MAY-21 JUNE) Love is in the air and a Full Moon gives you an energy surge, rebooting your conﬁdence. Keep your eyes peeled for an important message on the 3rd. Thanks to a slew of planets in your relationship zone, you are fabulous at charming lovers. Fiery Mars is powering up your creativity, giving you the courage to go for that dream. CANCER (22 JUNE-23 JULY) The Full Moon on the 3rd gives you an early Xmas pressie – she’s making you super psychic. Expect a meeting with a gal you feel an intense, spooky connection with. Be sure to doublecheck all travel plans though, as dastardly Mercury moves backwards, bringing misunderstandings. You don’t want to be late for that hot date! Wow oh wow, on the 18th you’re a sorceress of love.

98 DECEMBER 2017

LEO (24 JULY-23 AUG) Welcome to the pleasure zone! Venus glides into your sensual and fun house. Expect lots of laughs as you’re even more brazen and outrageous than usual. Feeling moved to write, vlog, or shine your Leo light? Do it! After the 18th you’re all gym bunny as the cosmos encourages you to take care of yourself. Attention to detail pays off and you can bag a career opportunity. VIRGO (24 AUG-23 SEPT) The December Full Moon on the 3rd ramps up your career goals. Plan your move carefully. Mercury is messing with your mojo until the 23rd, but your tribe has your back. Hang at home with your girls to cheer yourself up. Has a pal got a crush on you? On the 18th there’s a passion reboot. Oh, and expect an extra special Crimbo as Venus enters your love house on Xmas day! LIBRA (24 SEPT-23 OCT) Your linguistic skills rock all December. Chatting up hotties, ﬂirting with your girl and sharing ideas come easily. The Full Moon on the 3rd wants you to stretch your boundaries, so make time for new experiences. Expect a cosy, love-fuelled 25th as sultry Venus goes into your home and clan zone. SCORPIO (24 OCT-22 NOV) The Full Moon on the 3rd has you swimming in the waters of temptation. You love all things forbidden right now. Hold your Scorpio seahorses though, as the rest of the festive season has you longing for a deeper commitment. With Mercury retro until the 23rd, you could get your love life in a pickle. Mind you, erotic Venus gives you the charm to wiggle your way out of it. SAGITTARIUS (23 NOV-22 DEC) Venus, the planet of love, is heading into your sign. You’re dripping sex appeal and can also work on your

DECEMBER

MICHELE KNIGHT READS THE QUEER STARS FOR YOU

relationship with yourself. Be your own fangirl and believe in you. Your ruler, Jupiter, is giving you witchy skills to sniff out secrets, so trust your intuition. Hooray! At last, heavy Saturn leaves your sign on the 21st, leaving you free of baggage, and on Xmas day a commitment deepens – enjoy. CAPRICORN (23 DEC-20 JAN) December is a social whirl and you seem to be the star attraction. Connect, network and hustle while you can. Watch out for missed texts or sending emails to the wrong inbox from the 3rd as Merc is retro. Your ruler, responsible Saturn, is entering your sign on the 21st, helping you have double the drive – just avoid being amBitchous! Finally, love brings many choices as a new babe catches your eye. AQUARIUS (21 JAN-19 FEB) Set up a hot date for the 3rd as the Full Moon brings you a peak sensual experience. You’re lusty and determined this month, which is a winning combination. When Mercury trines your ruler on the 10th, you meet a valuable contact. However, it might not happen straight away. Expect things to shift after the 23rd. Venus is making you sentimental on Xmas day. PISCES (20 FEB-20 MARCH) Hook up with your family or close tribe on the 3rd. A Full Moon in your home zone has you longing for cosy times. Mercury is causing confusion in your work zone from the 3rd, so be careful what you say on Facebook. When frisky Mars enters your adventure zone on the 9th you relish an unusual date. You might get more than you bargained for at the Xmas do though!

Michele Knight is a queer psychic, astrologer, broadcaster, TV personality and best-selling author. She lives in a castle with her Gemini gal, parrot, pigs, dogs and donkeys. micheleknight.com

Seasonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Greetings from all of us at Heathrow Airport