Written by Dr Briony Hannell, University of Sheffield

This post is published to mark the beginning of LGBT+ History Month.

Over the past decade, few social media platforms have been as hypervisible in their ability to attract young queer (i.e. those broadly aligned under the LGBT+ umbrella) users as the multimedia microblogging platform Tumblr. At the height of the 2010s, Tumblr’s popularity among queer English-speaking Internet users secured its subcultural reputation as the “queerest place on the internet” and as a platform that “queer[ed] an entire generation”. But how and why do particular sensibilities seem to stick to some platforms and not to others? And under what conditions might they become unstuck?

“A safe space for self-expression, comfort and validation”: Tumblr as a queer safe space

The latest Social Media Safety Index report from the US-based Gay…