Jenni Berrett

I don’t think the bar is low enough. We obviously need a way to work up to the Bechdel Test. Baby steps. And we all know women love babies.

More than any other unsolicited mental health advice I’ve received over the course of my life is the admonishment to “fake it till you make it.”

Culturally speaking, though, it’s pretty much set in stone. Even if I left the church entirely, there’s no getting out of my heritage. Cut me open; I’ll bleed funeral potatoes. I’m what you call a “legacy Mormon” — my ancestors migrated across the frontier and settled in Utah (then Mexico) after facing unspeakable persecution from countless communities in the United States. You probably know my ancestors best as the people with the wives.

“Girls don’t masturbate, right? I don’t masturbate. Do you masturbate? Can girls masturbate? I don’t think they can — I’m pretty sure my mom doesn’t.”

"I had always pictured myself spending afternoons studying there. I instead found myself curled up on one of those benches at five in the morning, promising the crises hotline operator that no, I did not want to kill myself. I just didn’t know who else to call."

The premise is pretty simple: We each give you one thing to watch, one thing to listen to, and one thing to read over the weekend.

“You are not the only person in the world who has anxiety. You are not the only person in the world who has depression. You’re not the only person in the world who has thoughts of self-harm. There are people who want to help you. There are people who have spent their entire lives helping people like you and me and all of the people that you’re seeing in this video. And you’re not alone. You are okay.”

"Disease takes the body over, and, in the cases of the diseases we vaccinate for, moves swiftly on to other bodies. It does not ask permission to enter. "

Part of me wants to write this off as innocuous and carry on with my day, because homophobia is already everywhere and there are better things for me to dedicate my words to — but then I remember 10-year old me.

I’m just going to come right out and say it: RuPaul’s Drag Race is the best show on television.