ONLINE: Grace Perry – Isthmus

press release: Author, comedian, essayist, and podcaster Grace Perry comes to Mystery to Me (virtually) to kick off your Pride Month celebrations with her book, THE 2000S MADE ME GAY. Join us for a salon evening of all things gay, formative, and probably wearing a North Face fleece/leggings/Ugg boots!

About The 2000s Made Me Gay

Today’s gay youth have dozens of queer peer heroes, both fictional and real, but former gay teenager Grace Perry did not have that luxury. Instead, she had to search for queerness in the (largely straight) teen cultural phenomena the aughts had to offer: in Lindsay Lohan’s fall from grace, Gossip Girl, Katy Perry’s “I Kissed A Girl,” country-era Taylor Swift, and Seth Cohen jumping on a coffee cart. And, for better or worse, these touch points shaped her adult identity. She came out on the other side like many millennials did: in her words, gay as hell.

Throw on your Von Dutch hats and join Grace on a journey back through the pop culture moments of the aughts, before the cataclysmic shift in LGBTQ representation and acceptance—a time not so long ago, which many seem to forget.