Fording The River Styx 2.0

Let's try something new!

It’s now been over a year and a half since I retired/paused Fording the River Styx. September 2019 seems like an epoch ago thanks to a global pandemic, a new racial justice revolution, a presidential election, an insurrection, and — I don’t know, WandaVision?

Through all of that, I’ve really missed writing in my own voice. In recent months, I’ve been compensating a bit more with some Twitter threads that have garnered a lot of attention. Not only have folks really engaged with the content, but they’ve encouraged me to memorialize the threads somehow. Rather than just copy and paste content from a mostly ephemeral platform, why not write something a bit more cohesive?

So yeah, I’m going to start publishing here again I think. Here are some of the questions you may be asking (and that I’ve been asking myself) to lend some clarity about what may be coming.

Is the format still going to be a recap of LGBTQ news?

No, most assuredly not.

I don’t currently have the bandwidth to scour LGBTQ news like I used to, nor do I feel like that’s currently the best use of my energy. LGBTQ issues are still important to me, however, and will feature prominently or intersect with other social justice topics I might cover. For example, the massive campaign against transgender kids playing out across state legislators is definitely one of the motivators for me to resume some kind of long-form writing.

My thinking is to use this space for more focused essays, commentary, and analysis. I promise it’ll be more elevated than the personal musings of a blog. As always, my motivation is to help people better understand and contemplate society around them, and I’d like to use this space to drill down on some of the pressing or curious topics.

That said, while I have a few ideas percolating, I also welcome questions and requests if there are topics you want me to write more about. If you’re a subscriber, you can reply to these emails with your suggestions, or reach out to me on Twitter or Facebook.

How will this intersect with the job you took when you stepped away?

It won’t.

I am very much picking this back up to write in my own voice and express my own views. Nothing written here is affiliated with my current organization. Some of the topics we work on will likely come up here, but this is an independent project written on independent time.

How often will I receive this new version of the newsletter?

I don’t know actually!

My current thought is to aim for once every week or two. While I’ve certainly still been writing through my profession, this isn’t a muscle I’ve exercised in a while so I’m not making any promises. That said, if something catches my interest I want to dig into with some urgency, I won’t wait a week to do it just because I just put something out. If nothing’s on my mind or my job or other commitments get in the way of producing what I want to produce, I won’t pressure myself to follow through.

It’ll be when it’ll be but it definitely won’t be overbearing.

How can you stay on Substack?

Substack has a big problem.

It’s a publisher but doesn’t know it and/or won’t admit it. That means it’s not taking responsibility for the massive amounts of transphobia (among other things) that it’s not only publishing but profiting from. I offer my stalwart support to all the writers who left Substack in protest and I join the calls for Substack to implement proper content moderation.

My commitment is this: So long as I am writing at Substack, I will not charge for any of my content. Nothing will be paywalled and I’ll never ask you to become a paid subscriber. I won’t seek to make a penny off of it, and thus neither will Substack. If for some reason this grows to the point Substack thinks it would be profitable (which was very much not in the cards when I retired it), I’ll find a different platform to explore those options.

Given I already have a foundation here and it remains free for me to use no matter how this newsletter grows, I’m going to stick with it for now solely for convenience sake.

This isn’t what I signed up for two years ago, so how do I unsubscribe?

Though I’d encourage you to stick around and see if you like what’s coming, I totally understand if you’d prefer not to. At the bottom of the email, you should see a light grey box with an Unsubscribe button. I’ll miss you!

I’m excited you’re back! How do I share this with others?

You’re too kind, hypothetical reader channeling my own ego! Here’s a button to help with that:

Are you really sticking with that strange Fording the River Styx title?

Yeah, I still like it. We’ll once again wade through the rivers of hate together. There may be some aesthetic changes coming soon too.

Well then, when’s the first new issue?

Because I knew you’d ask, I waited to send this out until I had one underway. So the answer is: very soon! Stay tuned!

Until then, stay platinum!