#identity

#identity

Fundamental to her work is an exploration, as a queer woman and as a documentarian photographer, of the nuanced, multifarious nature of identity, most prominently in LGBTQ+ communities, but also far beyond them. She has committed from her earliest mature images to the idea that, as she has phrased it, "Without representation, there is no visibility"-a belief that remains more vital than ever in the US and across the world in the 2020s.

You know that ache you get when you stumble across evidence of your past self being genuinely, effortlessly happy? It's not that you want to go back. Not really. I think what kills you is the proof staring back at you - proof that you were once capable of feeling that alive, that connected, that certain about where you belonged in the world.

When he was eight years old, Markus Lidman realized he was different from the other children in Pitea, a town in northern Sweden. They had all inherited the same pale skin tone as their parents. He, on the other hand, was dark-skinned. I decided to ask them if they were really my parents, and they told me they had adopted me in Colombia in 1982. They sat with me and showed me a video of the orphanage, he recalls.

The song reflects on two contrasting visions. In the first verse, he looks back on his childhood growing up female and compares it to living in a dream. Then, after a stirring bridge, he revisits the same reflective structure and ponders his childhood growing up as a boy: "When I was a little boy I wanted to be real/ I wanted to feel all of the things my body wanted me to feel," he sings.

The light fades earlier, city lights turn on before the afternoon is over, and the wind bites the skin. During Scandinavian autumn and winter, people dress more warmly, and time slows down. I carry the memories and connections from summer longer than I should, still feeling them in my body. The longing for closeness and warmth is there, but it does not come easily. As everything around me changes, I do too.

There's a refrain that follows Sean Hayes around in The Unknown, and it doesn't take much to hear echoes of The Phantom of the Opera in the way the playwright David Cale has arranged its scansion and melody. "I wish you'd wanted me," Hayes's character, Elliott, a playwright who's on a digital-detox retreat upstate, hears a mysterious voice singing somewhere outside his window.

The singularly most important question we will ever ask is, "Who am I?" Generally speaking, we are not taught how to answer that question. We don't commonly even ask it. That is, until we reach a place where we are screaming into the abyss, waiting for the sound of an echo. And then, we want to know. But do we have to get to the edge of the abyss before we can even think of asking that question?

For most of my life, I assumed that arriving was the point. Like many people, I believed adulthood would eventually deliver a clear role, a measure of security, and a sense of belonging I could point to and say, This is it. This is who I am. I trusted that if I worked honestly, followed what mattered, and stayed true to my values, that moment would come.

Ever feel like you're playing a character in your own life? Like you're constantly adjusting your personality based on who's in the room, what they might think, or what seems "acceptable" at the moment? I spent years doing exactly that. Morphing into whatever version of myself I thought would get the most approval, the least conflict, or the best opportunities. It was exhausting, and worse, I started losing track of who I actually was beneath all those masks.

Labey stars as Rex Gallagher, a former gang member and the son of Fraser Black (Jesse Birdsall) and the late Grace Black (Tamara Wall). Rex has not been the nicest person to the residents of Hollyoaks but is trying to make amends whilst also processing his grief over Grace's death. As part of a new storyline, Rex was seen admiring his mother's clothes and put on her lipstick.

Zero trust is not a thing; it is an idea. It is not a product; it is a concept - it is a destination that has no precise route and may never be reached. But it is described very succinctly: trust nothing until the trust is justified. Justification starts with verifying every subject's identity and authority. This is the single constant in all zero trust journeys: they start with the subject's identity. Zero trust's reliance on identity, and identity's reliance on AI Two questions. Can you have zero trust without effective identity verification? No. Can you have effective identity verification in the age of AI? Maybe, and maybe not.

Long before social media feeds or targeted ads, my mother used to say that life tends to show you the thing you're looking for. Or the thing you're afraid of. Or the thing you keep insisting you don't want. If you were trying to get pregnant, suddenly everyone around you was pregnant. If you wanted out of your relationship, magazines on the grocery store rack were filled with tips on "spicing up your marriage." If you were single, you noticed couples everywhere.

February 2026 issue.When I was a child I was terrifiedof the space between One and Zero vast as the ages before my birthstrait as my death-late at night I heard my parents arguinglovingly in their locked room, the angora cat coming homewith a sparrow in her mouth, and the raindrops on the shinglescounting themselves-how to sleep, how to cross the empty placebetween the name "sparrow" and that limp thing crying,adamant, creating me with its cry

One of my dear friends was recently caught up in this swirl and roil. An attorney in the Department of Justice, the days of DOGE forced her to choose among uncertain options and to try to find firm footing in a landscape that shifted from solid to sand on a dime. Should she stay or go? Retire early or risk being fired? Each option had potential consequences beyond where she might clock in each day. What of her career trajectory? Her sense of purpose?

When I was 4 years old, my parents divorced, and my father moved away. I grew up thinking that my biological father was "John," but recently discovered that my mother had an affair with another man, "Allen." Allen is my biological father. This was a surprise and filled with a lot of drama, but it's gotten weirder than you'd imagine.

I lost all my contacts. My number has changed, multiple times. I am being encouraged to build upon a false narrative. A false past. A clean slate, a story that is "permissible" to move forward. With those who are less than trustworthy or truthful. No questions are allowed. I did not willingly sign up for this. My current strategy is to survive.

Ahead of his time, Bowie spoke of post-apocalyptic landscapes, of isolation, of the technological journey beyond the human realm posing the great question of our time: Is the planet going to survive? He talked of dynamiting binarism and making room for different notions of identity, while forging a deep and warm bond between those who listened to him.

At the core of violence lies emotional rupture, not only when harm is inflicted intentionally, but also when life is interrupted by forces beyond one's control. Forced displacement is one such rupture. It does not simply change location; it reshapes identity, possibility, and the nervous system itself. For those who leave home under threat, hunger, or despair, exile is not a chapter that closes. It becomes a psychological terrain carried within the body and mind.

Annie Ernaux, winner of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature, begins her memoir, The Other Girl, written in the form of a letter, with a description of a photograph of an infant in an embroidered dress. The description ends with these startling words: "When I was little, I believe-I must have been told-that the baby was me. It isn't me, it's you." (Italics mine.) 1

Last week, someone asked me, "Did you always want to be a mom?" My instinct was to say yes - but then I paused. Sitting on the floor with my 15-month-old daughter, I realized I'd never actually asked myself that question before. I'd always imagined what kind of mother I'd be, but not whether I wanted to become one. Motherhood, I would soon learn, has a way of undoing everything you think you know about yourself.

Are there people you wish you could be more like? You have goals, such as to speak up more, to stop and breathe when you get angry, or to listen with more curiosity before declaring your opinion. You set these self-improvement goals and then find reasons for not changing now, or you simply forget them. Your desire to transform is real, but your brain is sabotaging your goals.