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Rotten Zucchinis Zine-- call for submissions


Omnes et Nihil

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Omnes et Nihil

Rotten Zucchinis—The Zine

Have you ever had a relationship with your zucchini or a queerplatonic (QP) partnership end or go horribly wrong?

So many of us in the ace world have been doing our important relationships without any road maps or “how-to” guides—these relationships aren't romantic relationships, but they aren't typical friendships either. And we've been fighting for years to get our friends, families and communities to take these relationships seriously. (Especially when we're also queer, and/or trans* and/or non-binary and/or agender.)

We finally have some language to talk about these “non-normative” relationships existing... queerplantonic partners and zucchinis. What's more, we can make sense of them in a polyaffectionate framework if we want to. And we can resist compulsory sexuality, question why so many people use “enthusiastic consent” as a weapon, and recognise that anti-asexual violence is real.

But we don't have the tools to talk about when our “non-normative” relationships end or go wrong. Too often we don't even have the space to admit that sometimes they do.

Rotten Zucchinis is a zine for people's stories about QPs, Zucchinis and “non-normative” relationships that don't end in happily ever after—the not-so-pretty stories I don't see people sharing yet. And yes, that's political.

Some optional guiding questions:

  • How do you talk about a former zucchini? (As “ex” after a “break-up” or is other stuff going on? And how do you tell people what you are now?) And what other language do we still need to create or change?

  • What does zucchini violence or QP abuse look like, and what are some stories of people who've survived it?

  • How do the problems we have with our zucchinis play out with other parts of our identities and lives in a social context of power and oppression (like patriarchy or White supremacy)? And how does compulsory sexuality matter?

  • When it comes to zucchinis, QPs and non-normative relationships, what do we still need to keep quiet about... and why?

I welcome any submissions (credited as you like or anonymous) that can be formatted onto regular letter-sized printer paper—words or images of some ilk... essays, rants, poems, artwork, pictures, fears, semi-coherent ramblings and so on.

Please e-mail contributions or questions/comments to: rotten.zucchinis@gmail.com

EDIT: Deadline for contributions extended to May 15, 2014 AND Zine scope extended (see new post)

(I really want to have this zine printed by the asexual conference in Toronto in June 2014.)

Please feel free to re-post or pass along this call for submissions.

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What's a zucchini?

A zucchini is a partner in a queerplatonic relationship, which is a platonic relationship, but with commitment levels similar to that of a romantic relationship.

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Omnes et Nihil

What's a zucchini?

A zucchini is a partner in a queerplatonic relationship, which is a platonic relationship, but with commitment levels similar to that of a romantic relationship.

I know people generally value romantic relationships, and use relationship type as a shorthand-proxy for relationship significance, but it really shouldn't work that way. In theory, a QP relationship may be any degree of "significant" (just like romantic relationships can be any degree of "significant")-- it's just that the people talking about these relationships are doing it because these relationships are important (and nobody is bothering to figure out how to talk about non-normative relationships they don't really care about).

I wouldn't use the word "platonic" myself (because I don't like the philosophy behind that word), but certainly zucchinis are people one has a relationship with that

a) is *not* a romantic relationships and

b) also does *not* fit the "friendship" category properly.

That covers a whole range of "non-normative" relationships.

This is a good blog entry about zucchinis: http://writingfromfactorx.wordpress.com/2011/07/11/my-thoughts-on-the-word-zucchini/

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  • 2 months later...
Omnes et Nihil

Since nobody seemed to have anything to contribute... I'm opening the call up to be more broad:
Asexuality-related stuff there isn’t really room to talk about in asexual/ace communities..

What asexuality-related thing do you feel silenced about in asexual/ace communities?
And what do you have to say about it?

Full details in this thread: http://www.asexuality.org/en/topic/101904-zine-callout-stuff-you-feel-silenced-about-in-asexualace-spaces/

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