Monthly Archives: August 2009

Calls for Submissions: Queer Zines

out of the closets!Future Fuck All

“Hello friends, I am putting out a call for writing, art, comics, photographs, on the practicial and philosophical aspects of gender, sexuality, bodies, and queerness.  Personal experiences (good, bad, and other), philosophies, rants, funny stories, observations, interviews, dreams of the future.  Ultimately, I want to put a zine out that is a positive fuck yeah for queernessi, transgenderisms, bodies, sexualityies, and ultra wave inclusive feminism.  A recognition that all oppressions are interconnected, and the time is now to share our stories and deconstruct the dead ends.  

Years ago I did four issues of a crudely similar zine call “Girl-Boy” with a co-editor.  It was a fun and enlightening exploration, I want to do it again, this time with everybody!

After the submissions have been picked and assembled I will submit the final zine to an awesome independent publisher.  I might also put it on a blog thing for he world to share.  If you want to specify rights reserved in your works, write that on the work, or let me know in some way.  This is not a profit venture, it is to share experience and open minds, our own, and anyone that reads.  

If you have suggestions for a title, please send them in!  My original brainstorm title idea “Beyond Girl-Boy” seems entirely cheesy.  My new working title is” “Future Fuck All.”  

Deadline is November 1, 2009.

Drop me a note if you have questions.”  – Robert, robotearl(at)gmail.comrobnoxious.wordpress.com 

Nowhere 2 Be Found Magazine

is a fanzine that focuses on diverse views & culture from a queer perspective. We’re looking for gear heads, geeks, dorks, sci-fi/horror fans, punks, metalheads, those dealing with health, mental health, & substance abuse, doing project…to tell their stories, share their art, poetry, fiction/non-fiction, advice, how to, sites, project, events, etc. Send all submissions to nowheretwobefound(at)gmail.com. You can find more info on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, or MySpace.

My Brain Hurts, Vol 2

OUT NOW!  Liz Baillie crafts a Degrassi-style teenage soap opera about queer punks in New York City! Our story resumes with Joey in a coma after an incident of queer bashing and Kate and Desi’s relationship on the rocks. Desi’s really religious, and Kate’s really not, and they struggle to find a middle ground. The boys get caught smoking and uh, other things in the boys room, Kate getting in awkward situations with a hate crime perpetrator at her internship job, and much much more! Will queer teenage romance succeed? Will our heroes prevail over high school principals, skinheads, and a homophobic society?

Call for submissions: substance abuse zine

all about glasses

Please send all submissions to benjaminyager@gmail.com or a hard copy to:

ben yager
po box 48131
denver, co 80204

I’m compiling a zine about substance abuse, getting clean, and supporting people struggling with it.  After spending a lot of my life personally struggling with addiction, I’m interested in hearing other people’s stories and putting together a resource to help other people getting clean and give some advice to people supporting someone going though it.

This is a call out for submissions from people who have gotten clean, sobered up, cut back, fixed their shit, relapsed, never got clean/sobered up/cut back/fixed their shit, and everything in between.  I’m looking for personal stories, experiences, thoughts, and ideas about: getting clean; getting sick, jonesing, and dealing with cravings; support from your community: what worked and what didn’t; moderation versus abstinence; tough love; harm reduction; and everything else that comes up for you.  I’m not looking for “and this one time, I got so fucked up…”

All pieces must be non-fiction; there is no style requirements (poetry to theory is welcome); there is no size limit, just keep in mind that pieces that are very long/short are less likely to be used; art submissions should be in jpg format.  Experiences are welcome from people who were direct support to someone getting clean, but priority is given to personal experience with substance abuse.  The deadline for submissions is September 1, 2009.  Anonymous writing/pen names is fine.  Hopefully the zine will be assembled and printed by October.

Do you have a call for submissions for your zine that you would like Microcosm to share with the world?  Send it to chris(at)microcosmpublishing.com or 222 S. Rogers St., Bloomington, IN 47404.

Blog: a dirty word in the print world… here’s my contribution to the death of print.

Alt text

I’m the Australian intern at Microcosm. Secondly my name has been Americanized, I’m now being referred to as Staples. And thirdly, I agree: Fosters is a terrible beer and most Australians have never seen a Fosters before, let alone drank that terrible sewer juice from the Australian outback. I’ve never actually seen a can of drink that freaking huge before. The stereotypes of everything is bigger in the states is actually true.

I’ve been residing in the beautiful town of Bloomington, Indiana for the past three weeks. A genuine community is the first thing that springs to mind about this place. It seems like everyone here either works at a rad socially aware workplace or they volunteer at three or four killer nonprofit organizations with little to no sleep. I’m not just working with the cool cats at Microcosm during my stay in Bloomington. I’ve also had the opportunity to do many insane things that the ‘big cites’ simply can’t offer. The highlight has definitely been the crazy ass quarry jumping, closely followed by the 100ft slip and slide in 9th street park, thanks to Mr.Matt Ray.

Sure I sound like a broken record. Everyone is sick to death at the house where I’m staying when I mention my disbelief of corn syrup shit in everything, and its amazing health benefits. That’s another rant for another time. Back to Bloomington: It feels so great to be in a real town with real people and real food. I’m not sure how much longer I could have taken being in LA eating overpriced terrible salads. That said, I did see a salad here, which may or may not have been consumed by one of the Microcosm workers. A salad that had those biscuit gold fish in it. In a garden salad. Crazy!

If you ever venture in these parts, which I strongly recommend you to do, your must stops have to include Boxcar Books, a very cool, volunteer run, non profit with an extensive collection of books on any topic imaginable. A close second would be Rhinos youth space, a super tight all ages music venue that hosts everyone from Dillinger Escape Plan to Against Me! But they also keep it real by supporting local emerging acts. A very cool space, well worth checking out even if you can’t buy booze.

In my time at Microcosm, some might say I’ve learned a ‘shit ton’. You know you’re working with rad people when you get in trouble for having the stereo too low. Publishing and distribution isn’t rock and roll but if you’re wanting to support the zine scene, educate people, and make people think outside the square, it might be for you.

If you’ve ordered anything over the past three weeks and it has been messed up, you can blame the Aussie. It’s been hard adjusting to everything back to front when coming from the land down under.

Support Microcosm, stop cutting your hair and quit that real job. Start a zine or a distro, dust off that screen printing gear and mess the system that doesn’t give you the time of day. 

Favorite American Experiences to date:

  • Getting my photo taken next to the tree that Lindsay Lohan crashed into in LA
  • Purchasing a Hollywood homes tour ticket then being asked if I was interested in an eight ball of coke.
  • Being bitten to death in New York City by bed bugs
  • Catching Greyhound buses
  • Getting pulled over by the cops. But then getting a lift to the airport in the front seat.
  • Shipping Australian zines back to Australia.
  • Visiting the restaurant that my country was founded on. My home town is actually on the menu. Toowoomba, it’s actually about three hours west of the ocean. But the dish is actually a seafood dish.
  • Scoring a twenty dollar ticket to a Broadway show. Front row center!
  • Meeting all the rad people of Tucson, Detroit, Bloomington and San Francisco.
  • Crashing at Guilty Pleasures at Bloomington. RIP best basement shows even though it’s the only basement show I’ve been to.
  • Quarry jumping

*(the photo from left to right – Adam Gnade, E. Chris Lynch, and Jeremy Staples)