The need to understand gender as a spectrum must include non-Western identities and a move towards decolonising queerness. Ibtisam Ahmed explores the history of the Hijra community in Bangladesh.

Ways of exploring and experiencing queerness are extremely diverse, and this is being accepted by a growing number of people in recent years. It is an encouraging development but it still carries its pitfalls. One of the biggest challenges that is still being faced is a false equivalence of conceptualising all types of genders and sexualities through a strictly Western lens. In particular, there is often a misconception in cisgender activist circles of misunderstanding non-Western third gender identities.

In Bangladesh, the third gender identity is known as Hijra. The community is an indelible part of not only queer culture but of the national social fabric. Centuries before Bangladesh was even conceived as a modern nation state, and even before the…

Guest writer, Peter Minkoff, recounts his very personal journey with depression as part of our mental health month.

There was a time in my life when I absolutely loathed the word ‘depression’. Whenever someone is having a bad day, they nonchalantly throw around the phrase ‘I’m depressed’ – no, you’re not, you’re just having a sucky day. I felt so frustrated with people around me because they had no clue what real depression is. I, on the other hand, did. You’ve probably heard this story a thousand times, but no depression story is the same, and each and every person fighting depression is different, their experience is different. It took a lot of self-convincing for me to share my story, but I’m doing it because I truly hope that my voice will be heard and that some struggling gay person will take away something positive from it.

The beginning

Let me…