eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 30/09/2026read this book in bed while recovering from thesis submission, really like it / really attached to it. genuinely startling to see a decade-old book this incisive about the carceralism, gender binarization, and foundational shame that shapes narratives of sexual violence 101
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 29/09/2026submitted my PhD thesis :) i spent 4 years talking about all these books (and a few more that I don’t have in physical copy) 6632
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 26/09/2026i completed my PhD thesis today, barring proofreading / final corrections. also made tofu 1160
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 23/09/2026man you wouldn’t believe how good the albatross is for building your lats 020
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 19/09/2026watching naked acts (1996), which i’d never heard of before but which is a really really fantastic film 000
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 14/09/2026a trans guy i know personally & can vouch for, who’s finally found housing and started a degree after years of homelessness, is at risk of being kicked out if he doesn’t pay off $350 of meal plan debt by 9/20. his therapist etc are dragging their feet www.paypal.com/paypalme/srlj2paypal.comPay Samuel James using PayPal.MeGo to paypal.me/srlj2 and type in the amount. Since it’s PayPal, it's easy and secure. Don’t have a PayPal account? No worries. 11010
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 14/09/2026doing this PhD for the last four years (at realistically 3.5-year pace given how much extra work I’ve been doing the whole time) has been broadly alright most of the time but the last month fucking sucks oh my god. my mental health is up and down but the lows are the lowest they’ve ever been 150
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 10/09/2026local queer media studies scholar just got oneshotted watching withnail & i for the first time 140
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 07/09/2026my first academic article is finally out! it's on queer monstrosity and inheritance horror in the video game Darkest Dungeon (never beating the 'i am Kris from Camp Miasma' allegations). it's a collab with two of my favourite people and it's open access. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....tandfonline.com“FUSING ITSELF TOGETHER IN THE DARKNESS”Our contribution analyses the video game Darkest Dungeon through the frameworks of queer and crip ecology. We look at what is creepy about the game while simultaneously questioning who that creepin... 1113
Reposted by eel, iDefector @defector.com · 02/09/2026It's time to grow up: defector.com/its-time-to-...defector.comIt’s Time To Grow Up | DefectorHBO’s new Harry Potter TV series is premiering this Christmas Day. Under current plans, it will last at least a decade. The trailer looks like the original films were run through an AI generator, but… 211079338
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 03/09/2026bitter christmas trailer dropped the word ‘autofiction’ and i reacted like it was a surprise celebrity cameo 030
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 03/09/2026send positive thoughts i’m in the last 4 weeks of PhD writing now. gonna be Posting Through It a bit starting monday to make myself feel better 2331
Reposted by eel, iQueerAF @wearequeeraf.com · 28/08/2026New guidance - set to come into force in September - says teachers must not use materials that “encourage” pupils to question their gender. wearequeeraf.comEnglish schools to segregate Trans+ kids from toilets – including those who've already transitioned – from SeptemberNew ‘Keeping Children Safe In Education 2026’ (KCISE) guidance sets out in detail the limits now placed on schools on supporting Trans+ children 85624
Reposted by eel, iQueerAF @wearequeeraf.com · 28/08/2026🚨🆕 @wearequeeraf.com and @whatthetrans.com can reveal that the NHS has cancelled all gender-affirming surgeries for adult patients of the Welsh Gender Service Some trans patients received the news just days or even hours before they were due to take place 👇 www.wearequeeraf.com/nhs-cancels-...wearequeeraf.comNHS cancels all gender-affirming surgeries for adult patients of Welsh Gender Service with immediate effectSome trans patients received news their surgeries had been cancelled just days or even hours before they were due to take place 45793366
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 28/08/2026oh my god. the freelance journalist whose anti-trans blogging has just potentially contributed to the WGS withdrawing all surgery care is the ‘Director of the Scandals programme’ at the upcoming 2027 OLF 061
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 28/08/2026have been resting post internal submission but i gotta get back to the grind so i’m currently doing the equivalent of having a nap while stressful string music plays in the background 020
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 27/08/2026i think taking a hiatus from freelance journalism while i finish my thesis has taught me that i probably shouldn’t aim for a full-time all-encompassing job doing something else because if i can’t write my little essays i go mental 030
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 22/08/2026i don’t think air doll (2009) is a top tier kore-eda from what i’ve seen but i was very struck by it esp the last 30 minutes 000
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 18/08/20266 weeks until thesis submission. I have a title, everything drafted except the conclusion, 78,447 words / 215 double-spaced pages in a Word document, and a mostly-finished bibliography (which is currently 17 more pages). Crazy how real it's starting to feel 170
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 17/08/2026everything is like So Close To Being Done But Not Done Yet i wish to be free 250
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 17/08/2026i wonder if that exposé i did about the Oxford Literary Festival cosying up to the Right and the Free Speech Union might actually get some eyes on it now that David Starkey, one of its key speakers, is saying racist shit in public for the 1 millionth time www.vashtimedia.com/how-the-oxfo...vashtimedia.comHow the Oxford Literary Festival became a haven for the rightBehind the liberal festival facade, the OLF is providing a platform for the right-wing Free Speech Union and cashing in on culture wars – and it's not alone. 021
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 16/08/2026i’m watching robocop for the first time and ohhhhh my god. 390
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 16/08/2026bf showed me John Wick 1 & 2 and i proceeded to have a nightmare with extremely upgraded fight choreography 091
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 14/08/2026really deeply upset that arday has been found dead. days like this i wonder if my industry is unfixable 070
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 13/08/2026i’ve now started MONSTER (2023) which i know nothing about but i’m suspicious that this one might be gay too 040
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 13/08/2026in my continuation of ‘i’m not even watching films with queer subtext on purpose’ i just hit that scene in Bringing Up Baby 160
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 12/08/2026if you are going to cold email me - while i’m visibly on hiatus for academic reasons, mind - asking me to interview you, i would recommend not doing so via AI-generated copy that insults my work in its first sentence 020
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 12/08/2026when i finish my doctorate (IT WILL HAPPEN) i think i’m going to try to publish the first chapter as an article, mainly because if i don’t get my critique of anna kornbluh’s immediacy out into the public eye soon i’m going to go insane 110
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 11/08/2026it seems apparent that meredith kercher’s family want amanda knox to disappear from public view for the rest of her life for the crime of having been falsely convicted of their daughter’s murder lmao 1101
Reposted by eel, iSabrina Imbler @sabs.bsky.social · 10/08/2026it's a good day to read this @eliacugini.bsky.social blog defector.com/its-time-to-...defector.comIt’s Time To Grow Up | DefectorHBO’s new Harry Potter TV series is premiering this Christmas Day. Under current plans, it will last at least a decade. The trailer looks like the original films were run through an AI generator, but ... 114845
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 07/08/2026it’s not difficult to have a progressive understanding of the Arday scandal that understands it as part of wider racism in academia and tokenism; this is a really really good analysis of it 020
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 07/08/2026bf has shown me a bunch of christopher nolans and is planning a marathon of every john wick he should be afraid of how homosexual the programming will be when the rota swings my way. like i’m talking beau travail with supplementary notes on the epistemology of the closet billy budd essay 090
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 06/08/2026anyone wanna guess the mid 2000s comedy i just threw on and then turned off after 4 minutes 530
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 04/08/2026ok it is the three weeks that suck where i finish my full thesis draft. day 1 was yesterday. keeping track of stuff here so i don't become fully detached from reality 230
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 01/08/2026essential reading www.thekeymagazine.com/p/israel-rap...thekeymagazine.com“Everything Is Legitimate”: How Israel Uses Rape as a Tool of GenocideThe rape of Palestinian detainees is so commonplace that it’s no longer hidden. It’s filmed, joked about, and celebrated in parliament. This is no mistake; it’s core to Israel’s colonial project. 031
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 31/07/2026occasionally see someone going viral online who is like five degrees apart from me in the same polycule and it feels like when someone who was in your junior school class gets on the news 050
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 31/07/2026also i was literally just complaining about buffy overloading us on heterosexuality and then it delivered buffy/faith lesbian nuclear bomb 230
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 31/07/2026have regrettably determined from trip to brighton that i am most in my element in the club a girl described as ‘where to go if you want a camp time’ 140
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 29/07/2026was out at the weekend with beautiful plus size woman who was feeling down on herself about her weight and we both cooed over an excellent fat seagull and i was like ‘so you’d let the gull be fat, but not the girl?’ and she looked at me like i’d shot her 090
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 29/07/2026there’s a really cool bit in édouard louis’s monique s’évade where he was like ‘i was gonna include in this book the exact costs of getting my mother away from her abusive partner but it kind of made the book unreadable and also looked like i was blaming her for how much it cost’ 000
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 21/07/2026groundbreaking information here but finishing a PhD fucking sucks 1100
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 17/07/2026i have much respect my monogamous siblings in christ but you gotta learn to post about monogamy being better for you in a way that doesn’t sound like you’re coping and seething 1101
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 14/07/2026sam and i saw rosebush pruning last night and if it wasn’t 90 minutes i think we would have both walked out 000
Reposted by eel, isasha baker @sasha98.bsky.social · 10/07/2026EXCLUSIVE: How one racist tweet about a hotel housing asylum seekers set in motion fascist protests, a government crackdown on couriers, and the eviction of the hotel's residents. www.vashtimedia.com/fascists-v-t...vashtimedia.comFascists v the ThistleThe butterfly effect of one anti-migrant tweet. 28854
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 08/07/2026have been reading some of a really fantastic trauma studies book from 1996 (one of the foundational texts for the field) that ALSO has the author self-disclose her entire field of personal data - ethnicity, sexuality, CSA history - at the start because she thinks that's the ethical thing to do lol 000
eel, i @eliacugini.bsky.social · 08/07/2026was ill yesterday so double billed bridget jones’ diary and pride and prejudice (2005). happy for straight people honestly 020