Lesbian Visibility Week: 8 amazing queer women who have spoken to Attitude in the last year
From Santi Toksvig to Baby Reindeer star Jessica Gunning - here are just some of the fabulous ladies we've chatted with over the last 12 months!
How has it been a year already since the last Lesbian Visibility Week?! Running from Monday 21 to Sunday 27 April 2025, this marks the movement’s 35th outing since originating in West Hollywood in 1990.
Alongside a reappraisal of the best movies with sapphic themes and interviews with the likes of lawyer Jacqui Rhule-Dagher, here, we take a look at some of the queer women who have appeared on our hallowed pages over the last 12 months.
Mel B – April 2024
“I didn’t start off my sexual journey going, “I’m this, I’m that, I’m bisexual.” I was, and always will be, very open. I happened to fall in love with a woman and was with her for five years. We still talk to this day. I don’t want to put a label on it, but I’ve always thought women are beautiful.”
Jessica Gunning – November 2024
“Very naively and stupidly, when I was younger, I used to think it was quite embarrassing because you were telling your parents, ‘I like boobs’ or whatever. And it’s so not that, it’s so not sexual — it’s like a revealing of your soul. You get to say, ‘This is who I am,’ and hear everyone else’s stories. It’s actually really lovely.”
The Blessed Madonna – November 2024
“I was so ashamed because I was going to try to get married [to a man] and be a good girl — you’ve never seen anyone clear their browser history faster. I mean, the shame was so deep. This was in the era of Will & Grace, when even gay people were terrible about trans people. There’s still a lot of real nasty anti-trans behaviour from the gays. Over here [in the UK], you’ve got some special single-batch anti-trans shit.”
Sandi Toksvig – January 2025
“Never think that you’re on your own. There is a notion, particularly amongst the heteronormative media, that now that gay representation and rights are improved, we’re done. But young people come to me all the time in great distress who can’t come out because of their culture, their faith, the particulars of their family. There are still people in our community suffering every day. So, if you are suffering, know you are not alone, and we will stand by you. You really can choose your own family.”
Charley Marlowe – September 2024
“What do lesbians do better? TV — just saying! I don’t want to create any nasty rivalry there, but I hope we get a series two of I Kissed a Girl. It went down very well with the lezzers, and, in fact, everyone else. I think us lesbians can make some excellent TV.”
Harriet Rose – January 2025
“What I say to people in my DMs is, allow the feelings you’re feeling to sit inside you, and work through them. In a way I think I did that with my sitting indoors for two weeks crying. I look back and think, oh my god, it’s so sad that that girl did that. But if I hadn’t, I wouldn’t be where I am now. The other advice is, find your family. Whether your own or your chosen family who can support you. If you are seeing unsupportiveness around you, that has nothing to do with you, and everything to do with them. There’s not one person in my life I regret getting rid of who had an issue with me being gay. It’s probably the coolest thing about me. I’m extremely chuffed that I’m a lesbian. You are loved, cared for, wanted. And you can change your mind. You can work it out along the way. I started straight, went to bi, went to gay – who knows, I could marry a man in 15 years, and it would be no one’s business!”
Cindy Ngamba – issue 361, November 2024
“I left Cameroon when I was 11, I didn’t get to see my mum until I turned about 21. I didn’t even get to speak to her from 11 years old all the way to age 18, but I knew she was alive. I ended up coming out to my mum on the phone. I felt like I had to — it was like a big, massive stone that I was carrying on my shoulder. She wasn’t very happy about it. It took time for her to come around, but she’s my support now, my first fan. To me, family is the only thing that keeps you going in life. … In the UK, we have equality and diversity, and everyone has the right to be whatever they want. But in Cameroon, the laws are very strict. I found loads of cases of how people will be sent to prison in Cameroon for being LGBTQ+. It was the law that ruined everything for me. I love my country — that’s where I was born. And I love the UK — that’s where I was raised. Cameroon did not disown me; the law is just different there. But I’m proud of my sexuality and of my ethnicity.”
Beth Ditto – May 2024
“I puked on a boy’s back once for being a homophobe. I was in my early twenties on tour in Australia, and he was in another band. He was so fucking surly and entitled, and I overheard him saying, “There’s so many fucking dykes at this party.” I was like, ‘Oh, fuck you,’ and literally put my fingers in my throat and spewed all over his back. I was with this band Pretty Girls Make Graves, and the singer Andrea Zollo looked at me before, like, ‘Oh my God, she’s going to do it.’ I looked at her and I nodded and was just like “bleurgh”. Vomit on Homophobes could be the name of my side project.”