My shout-out to queer youtubers
Hbombs list was great but obviously not comprehensive. I watch a lot of video essayists and wanted to give a little love to the smaller channels that fall under the radar. Please feel free to add to this list!
let's talk about stuff/Sarah Zedig
If you've seen Jesse Gender's videos on the Matrix movies you may already be familiar with Sarah. She does excellent film and culture analysis with a lot of great conversations on paratext and outside influence in engaging with text. Her video on Tunic is one of my favorites.
Pamphleteer
No one makes videos like hers, which has the side effect making them a bit hard to describe. I will link one of my favorites which describes the disconnected temporality of being older when you discover you're queer.
Turbo Queer
Really really under watched channel. Skylar covers a lot of topics from video games, to anarchist history and modern events, to autistic life, to current politics. For a fun one check out her video on the SpongeBob strike episode.
Kaz Rowe
Kaz does a fantastic job examining modern myths and manufactured history primarily pertaining to western Europe, Victorian & Edwardian England, and 1800-1900s US. And of course, talking about historical queerness in all its ambiguities and evolutions. I highly recommend their video on Weimar Germany.
drapetomania
drapetomania interrogates the politics of low class and high class art and entertainment from a queer and Black perspective. Their art history videos alone cover many angles of white supremacist history I haven't seen anyone else discuss and I'm very excited to see more from them. They are also a very under viewed channel that more people should see!
I am error
Evelynn's channel primarily discusses video games in a presentation style and voice most similar to Action Button reviews. There's something just a bit more personal here though. I hesitate to say cozy since that word has a bit of an infantilizing connotation, maybe comforting is closer. She puts an immense amount of thought and empathy into the experience of playing video games and the personal narratives we build with them.
Swolesome
For more transmasc perspectives there's Swolesome. He has a lot of interesting insights into the more traditionally masculine and "broish" communities like fitness as well as commentary on recent trans issues.
Shonalika
Music, disability, and aggressively non-binary. Their video on gender presentation in heavy metal was really insightful. I would also check out the video "Why I Wear Gloves" for more insight on invisible disabilities.
Vivian Strange
Vivian delights in being a bit of a contrarian- something I really appreciate. She's probably going to challenge you and you're probably going to disagree at times, which is what makes her channel so important. Her video on Marquis De Sade is powerful and a must watch (if you can stomach the subject material, although I would encourage you to try). I haven't seen her most recent video on Saw yet but I am extremely excited to.
