Web Crush Wednesdays: Femslash Revolution

If you are a regular reader of our blog, you may have noticed something: namely, we are big fans of queer ladies being included in things. Whether it’s a plea to include more lesbians in media or to write more femslash, there are few things we are more adamant about than the representation of LGBTQ+ women in popular culture.

It’s probably not surprising to know that we are not the only ones who are invested in queer female inclusion, and that’s where this week’s Web Crush enters the picture.

Femslash Revolution is a Tumblr devoted to showcasing f/f relationships in all their variations. From their FAQ:

We accept recs for both original and derivative works in any media which are primarily focussed on one or more F/F relationships. This includes:

• Relationships which are sexual and/or romantic.
• Committed platonic and/or queerplatonic relationships.
• Polyamorous relationships.
• Relationships involving cis women, trans* women or non-binary people.

Sexualized Saturdays: Femslash and Fandom

We mention femslash a lot on this blog, namely that there isn’t enough of it in fanfic. Well, since we’ve previously discussed why there’s so much slash in fandom, I thought it only proper to discuss why there isn’t that much femslash in fandom.

Why Is There So Much Slash Fic?: Some Analysis of the AO3 Census

If it exists, there’s porn of it—no exceptions. That’s actually a rule of the internet. But most often, when we talk about fanfiction, we’re talking about a relationship between two guys. This is commonly known as “slash” (accordingly, a relationship between two girls is “femslash”, etc). It’s hard to explain this phenomenon to those outside fandom: the usual explanation runs something along the lines of, “Well, there are a lot of straight girls in fandom, and they like reading about two guys together… what?” I’ve used that explanation myself when trying to explain to my brother why, upon ascending to the internet, Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy can no longer keep their hands off each other. (To be fair, it was a much better explanation than the first one that popped into my head, which ran something along the lines of, “Because… shh”.) Now, however, there’s some legit data on the inner workings of fandom, and it means we might do well to rethink the assumptions that lead to this explanation.