Pgh Lesbian Correspondents

Dear friends,

The Facebook page for my blog has garnered a lot of new followers these past months. And that’s great. Of course I want people to read my original content and engage the content I spend hours amplifying every day.

Along with new followers comes new haters. They post rude, nasty, and vicious comments on all sorts of posts. I receive private comments, including a death threat for publishing the content.

I also get private comments from people who want me to do something about the hate.

The thing is, I can’t or not completely. Yes, there are steps I can take. I filter out words so those comments are hidden. I spend a little time each day moderating comments.

But I can’t turn off commenting. And I can’t create a replica of me. I can’t create more hours in the day.

It doesn’t feel great to get snarky comments that I’m not willing to create a safe space on Facebook when I literally cannot do that. I can control my blog so reading the content there is an option. But implying that I am somehow failing the community because I choose and they choose to use Meta for social media is just well, rude and nasty, maybe a little vicious.

I’ve been hearing this my entire blogging career – moderate comments, don’t moderate comments, post most lesbian content, share more content created by others, don’t share content without approval, but share content more often, pay people who contribute but I can’t commit to investing in your blog, etc, etc, etc.

So this is not a Trump 2.0 thing. This is a human using social media thing. And more specifically it seems to be humans who don’t create content or manage blogs but use social media thing.

I do understand that you want to feel safe when you move about the world, including online. I get it if you don’t want to wade through the nasty comments to read the content I share. I’m glad there are other safer spaces – I visit them, too. You deserve that safety.

So I get that you don’t understand that I can only control so many things. But when I tell you that your desire for a safe space doesn’t line up with how FB works, you blame me. And that’s not really different than the haters because all of you want to silence me or control what I say. At the end of the day, you punish me for not creating the environment you want. My shorthand for this is “not enough lesbian content.”

Meta makes Facebook unsafe, not me. I choose to use it because I think the good outweighs that bad for now. FB is where LGBTQ+ folx congregate still. But I know that’s a compromise. And if you don’t want to join me, I completely get it.

For 20 years, I’ve published this blog, creating tens of thousands of posts. I moderate all comments, but most people don’t comment these days. Still, I weed out whatever hates comes this way. I have a subscription option so you can get (free!) a copy of each post in your email inbox. You can use the RSS feed to follow each post on Feedly or other readers. You can follow me on multiple social media platforms where you’ll see each post plus all the other content I amplify.

That is how I am creating safer spaces for you. I show up on Instagram and Medium and Reddit and even still, X. I post content that I curate, that matters. Content that is created by Black, Indigenous, Latinx, women creators. Basically, I say “Hey look at this” (with attribution) a dozen times each day. That’s howo I use my social media capital. That’s how I make the world safer.

Yes, I use BlueSky.

I’d have to give that all up to have time to moderate comments on Facebook. And I choose to be the sharer over the monitor.

If I had help, great. But I don’t. People don’t sign up for Patreon and Paypal to help me compensate someone to do that work. If you have these values about the work being necessary and the person doing the work deserving to be compensated … well, that compensation has to come from somewhere. You.

You have the capacity to make the Pghlesbian page and Instagram safer spaces by investing in the blog. It is not like a pay to play thing or a secret subscription post thing. I’m just putting it out there as a possible solution to what’s clearly a problem.

Contrary to public opinion, blogging costs me money. I am in the red every month, paying out of pocket. I rely on donations and investors to bridge that gap. My income is limited.

I know you are scared and need a space to access information that’s affirming. I know you deserve that and I truly wish I could make it so. But I cannot do that on third party platforms. Berating me for not controlling Meta is unfair. Accusing me of not wanting to create a safe space is hurtful. Why mimic the behavior of those who want us to turn on each other? Why give them that win?

You don’t owe me anything, but neither of us will accomplish anything if we are letting the bastards get us down. Please don’t lash out at me. Work with me to create solutions.