Focus!

Coming to you from the dining room table at East Barbary Lane. Welcome to a new episode of Full Circle the Podcast. A visit to our home where we squeeze a few headlines through our decidedly queer lens and see what happens. This episode is brought to you by Decanta jug Wine and the find out phase of November is fucking around.

I am your host, Charles Tyson Junior, and.

I'm your host Martha Madrigal. Welcome to the first episode of Full Circle the Podcast in twenty twenty five.

Charl let's buckle in. Okay, how you doing, baby, I'm here, same, I'm here, We're here. We're you know, we're fabulous. Don't fuck with us.

Yeah, you know, it is what it is. We do have a new patron, we do.

Jim is our most recent Hi Jim. Thank you for the support.

Yes, you're appreciated. Definitely. We have all kinds of stuff to talk about.

We do some good stuff, some very good stuff and the rest.

Yeah. Yeah, speaking of shipwrecks, it was a Gilligos Island reference there. I caught it.

Look at you.

Yeah, I was in PGN, Yes you were. I was profiled.

Yes, in that good way, in that good way.

Yes, they wrote a story. It was a twenty five hundred word interview. It's pretty good.

Then you realize how substantial.

I knew that that was substantial because I used to write three and four hundred word articles, so I was like twenty five word a law, right, that's a lot.

It was a great profile. Thank you. You know, we're going to put the link to that in the notes of this episode.

Let's be sure to put that in the show notes.

It was fun. It was fun.

Susie Nash is the reporter. We actually the columnist actually at PGN, and we met while we were touring with Nico with American Teenager, So that was a lovely surprise. Yeah, yeah, it's fun. Oh you know what, I've got to say, Happy New Year, baby, Happy it is. Indeed, somebody just looked at me with such a look when I said happy New Year. I went new Year, and they went.

Okay, fair enough, Yeah I hear you. But you know what, no, because I have decided, okay that for this year, my plan is to move forward being as intentional, like good and fabulous and positive as I can be, because the alternative just like being angry and sad and depressed and whatever like for what.

Well, I mean, I agree with you. You know, there's the whole jack boots in the street thing that is a little unsettling. But no, I get that we'll find out. But yeah, no, I mean I think that's you know, that's been the theme of the talking I've done since November is, you know, we are stronger together. We are stronger when we stand in community. We are stronger when we stand up for one another as part of the same community. Correct, I invite the other letters to join me.

And I am by no means suggesting that I'm you know, going to ignore what's going on, because I can't.

It's timely capitalize the TA y'all.

Right, because you know, none of those letters are silent. One of them should be.

And you know we've had a long and storied history of dealing with one another throughout the acronym. And you know what comes to me today is very likely to come to you tomorrow. You know, let's let's us learn something from history if no one else exactly cared to, because it's you know, it's going to be interesting. We know that as far as the electorate is concerned we're not the priority. But god damn it, you know that's

Record number of new pieces of anti transit.

And now and now they get to play with fuck around on the federal level. Eighty one Democrats joined them, you know, in the National Defense Bill and Biden signed it. So yeah, plenty of disappointment to go around right now.

It's true.

Yeah, I you know, you know, I really hope we figure out at some point we're talking about human beings. We are not talking about politics. We're talking about lives, right.

Not theoretical people either, Yeah.

Not theoretical people. You don't know more than the doctors. You don't know more than the expect you don't know more than us about who we are. You know, I'm just anyway sick of hearing it. We're still gonna have to talk about a few things. But I think that's why I'm surly. I'm just I know, and I'm over here like let's just shine our light well, and you know I'm working on that. I know, I shine my light of a goddamn day I know you do. Yeah,

Oh you know what I meant to tell you last night when we went out, No, you look like money, did I Your outfit and the hair and the jewelry and the coat. I meant to tell you that you looked like money.

And it was just out to dinner with your sister.

But I know, thank you. My sister came to visit briefly, and so we went out to dinner, and you know, you got cute and but it was like.

Somebody spent a lot of money on those clothes. It wasn't me.

Hey, you wore them. You wore the right things in the right combination at the right time. You looked good.

Thank you, Thank you.

I just wanted to go on record as saying that, and we're in front of a microphone, so now.

It's thanks recorded for Pasterius. I tried it was your sister drove all the way in from Pittsburgh and all the first time she's done that in a very long time by herself. Yeah, you know, we just lost her brother in law, but she did. She made it all the way east and We took her out to dinner, and she spent the night and she's off to pick up a friend in Philadelphia and drive back to Pittsburgh. So, yeah, she's got a hole full. Was a nice though, it was.

It's nice we got the chill.

Yeah, it was one of those days where I was in the fancy clothes closet and I went, oh, that's pretty right.

And it was the perfect end of the day because I started the day at a funeral.

Right, Well, it's hard to be sad about the funeral of one hundred and four year old person. Well true, I mean not truly a celebration of life, because Granny was one hundred and four, right, And it was not grandmother really a.

Sad time, it wasn't.

You know.

It was a bittersweet, of course obviously, but.

Well yeah, because she was you know, present and with us, you know, in December, I mean she really was.

It was chicken very literally, like she was here and then she wasn't, right, Yeah, And she was loved by so many people. A good friend's grandmom died at one hundred and four, and she was loved by so many people, and she loved so many people, and you know, I had my moment where I said, no, thank you for being so kind to me. And she was my baby.

She was she was lovely, and she cooked up a store. Yes odd I you know, I wonder if you added up how many meals that woman served, you know.

And how many times Miss Jay and I would be like somewhere in the city and when we go, we're hungry, you know what, Let's go see what Granny made. And always something, always something. She was either getting ready to make something, making something or just made something.

Right right, always food, always food to pull out of the fridge, or it's already on the stuff.

So that's how I started yesterday.

I do love them.

And then we had a nice visit, so it was like a family day all around.

It was today's Sunday, January fifth. It is tomorrow sixth, to rinse the taste of January sixth out of my mouth. Joe Miller is being sworn in. Yes, yeah, that will have already happened by the time this episode gets released. But Joe is the first trans woman elected to partisan office in the entire state of New Jersey.

Yep.

And she'll be sworn in actually for the third time to Woodbury's City council, very very close to here. She was appointed initially to fill a vacant seat and then she had to run and won in a special election to finish the full that term. This is her first full term, like three year term. Right that she's being sworn in, and we've got a bunch of folks going because, yeah, it's a moment, it's a moment, it's an important moment. It's one to docum and show up in force because

You're not. That's that you do the opposite, thank you. Yes, literally the definition of your words and your deeds doing opposite things.

You aren't making anyone more safe, but you are teaching your children to hate. So since that seems to be the goal among the Christians, you know, whatever, I guess we're gonna figure it out, right mm hmm. But anyway, Joe's being sworning I'll be there.

Yeah.

Again. This is our first official episode of twenty twenty five.

Well, right, because we released one last week, which was an interview we had done like the week before or something.

We released an interview with David Beck, who is a writer, director, and star of a film that will be coming out One of the Stars. Yeah, yeah, coming out at the end of January.

Yeah, regarding us, regarding us, and it's really you know, I'm excited about that film. Amazing representation and it's a good story it is and it's not tragedy porn. I liked it. I liked it a lot. We didn't even get our Christmas trip until Christmas Eve, it's last Christmas Day and Christmas Day because well that's you know, we've been busy doing things that felt useful.

Right the week that we normally would have spent decorating, we were spent touring an award winning journalist and author on their fabulous.

Book, an amazing book, and getting it out in our area. So I'm not I'm not up upset about that. The house looks lovely. It's fine, you know, the tree is up.

We had our lovely Uh Day brunch. Yes, that I got to be off of work for Yeah.

That was fun. It was fun. We had like forty people come through if I counted, right, I think you're right. I think I did. It was fun, lots and lots of good food. We do brunch now because you know, everyone we know is old. None of us go out for New Year's Eve, so we're all awake, exactly, I might as well be able to drive in daylight, right and come and hang out.

I drank so much champagne.

We didn't have much. Yeah, we had champagne, but we had non alcoholic punch, and so because you know, it.

Was literally something for everyone, right, there.

Were some people having you know, Billini's and mimosas, which was good.

That's why we had them.

But we also had I made sherbet punch. Yes, I filled the punchba if we have a gorgeous crystal punch bowl, and I thought, what the hell exactly, might as well use it, bad boy, let's make some old school punch.

And it was lovely, even though there was sherbet in it.

That's wrong with that.

I don't like sherbet, although to be fair, to be fair, I have not had sherbet since I was a little kid, and when I had it, I was expecting ice cream and it's not so I didn't like it when I had it, but I've avoided it my whole life.

It's slightly somewhere between a sorba and an ice cream, right.

So to be fair, I should try some.

Even taste my punch, not because I didn't want to. People said it was still icious, That's what I heard.

Yeah, I wasn't avoiding it. I just never got to have any mm hmm. No, really, I was gonna.

Try it, but I think the other half chunk of sherbet is in the freezer.

Yeah, I'll try it.

And yeah, well I don't think it's any I'm sure my kind of throat in.

There palette has expanded.

It makes it cold, it makes it a little bit creamy. It's just it adds another fruit flavor, but not really creamy because it's you know, and it makes the fizzy's fizz and right, I mean it was simple and there was a bottle of vodka next to it, just in case anyone just made it that part.

But yeah, and my love of food, my love of fruity desserts has expanded considerably since I was a kid.

Because I had lots of food.

Yeah, we did the best scones I've ever had in my life.

My girlfriend Jenny brought scones and clotted cream and lemon curd and jam.

I'm sorry you didn't say scones and clotted cream and jam and lemon curd gorgeous. You have to say it like that.

And they were delicious.

Yeah.

No, we had a We had a ton of brunchy food and I loosely, I Kathy and I repeatedly watched The Family Stone and this Christmas.

You keep saying you and Caro love.

Actually, I mean you are there sometimes.

I love The Family Stone.

Okay, but you're not there every time I watch it. Well, because I'm not always home anyway. I made the Morton family strata from The Family Stone.

My point is that's our movie, now, Okay.

I made that. And I made Socker to Me cake, which features prominently in this Christmas.

Yes, and I was. It was this year that I learned that socket to Me cake is not this uh recipe that's been passed down from generations of generations. At this point, it has a black women.

Now. It's started in the sixties. I mean they passed it down for a little while. But I because every time in my life that I have encountered socket to Me cake, it's been a black woman in my life who had her.

Socket to Me cake. This time I made it. I thought it was like one of those like recipes that you know, came through like black folks throughout the years. Come to front of it. It is.

But since you know, late nineteen sixties when I think the recipe was first printed on the back of Duncan Hein's cake.

Right, that's what I'm saying. It came from Duncan Hines. It didn't come from like.

But that's part of the zeitgeist, that's part of our culture. I mean, like there were recipes, right you know. Then I learned as a child that that incorporated modern conveniences, right.

You know.

My grandmother's keighley and aunt Lady's keighley was the best I've ever had. And it was not fucking yeast. Oh. It was like cream, cheese and flour and butter, and it makes the best dough in the world, simple, simple, simple, right, But you know that so those things evolve, right, I.

Was just interesting.

I was like, oh, look at me learning green bean casserole was you know, trying to sell more Campbell's cream and mushroom soup and what that did. I still love that, Okay, I really do.

Like when I found out that that wasn't just something that like came through the generations of white people.

Well, I mean it did, but right ever since it was on the back of the cans, the French or the French's onion cannas where I think that recipe might have come from.

So the songa toomey cake is to black people what the green bean castrole is to white people.

Maybe maybe, I mean, you know, I mean that, And soccer toomy cake is basically bun cake, yes, where the filling is pecans and cinnamon and brown sugar.

And it's nummy.

It is, it's great. It's actually like a coffee cake, right, and it is tasty.

I mean I and I have encountered enough black women in my life that when I hear soccer toomy cake immediately go mmmmmm.

That was delicious. No, So that was fun. I made those made some caisa, yeah, that candied bacon. I was just normally I don't even cook meat in this house.

But I was like fucking the candy bacon, nothing, you know, like whatever that I've bagged for it and got nine.

Of Well, it's not my fa I put it out.

I didn't say it was your fault where all the other appetizers were. I turned my back for a full four minutes. That was the problem. That was a pound of bacon. I know I was the one because you had said something about I was thinking of candied bacon. I was like, oh, candy bacon. I never had it. And then you were like or maybe I was like, no, no, no, no, you can't just dangle candy bacon in front of me

They cleaned that plate, you know they did. I wasn't going to make more than a pound. No, you know, it's like that.

Was probably the universe going that, you know, you didn't need this way. And here's the thing.

So the whole good luck for New Year's and God knows we need it is always like cabbage or sour kraut, pork and black eyed peace. So I made hop and John and Rice vegan. Right, it was very good, big raves, and the pork was the bacon, and and then I made Hungarian We call it kappa sub, which is just the word for cabbage. But I think anyway, Hungarian cabbage and noodles, which is like hullishky with bacon for the Polish people. But anyway, so I made that. So I

See, growing up in my house, it was always the traditional New Year's meal was pork roast, collared greens, and black eyed peas. I didn't do greens for health, money and luck perspective. Of course, I skipped the money. Fuck well that was what the shabbage was for.

Well, right, I white people do cabbage, I guess not always. Yeah, I would have done greens. I just didn't. I just didn't.

And I didn't beg for it. No you didn't, So I mean I didn't think. But I made the hop and John and we bought that can of glory greens too.

And you had that, Yeah, that would be quick. Yeah whatever I didn't do. I didn't make a pot of greens, but I made a whole thing of popping john and rice and that was delicious.

So yeah, lots of food.

And then Kathleen catered half the damn thing. So we had begel. We had a begel tray, had smoked salmon croissants that were getting were they I didn't have? They were getting raves.

Those disappeared quick too, mm hmm.

We had a muffin tray.

Because I didn't get a second smoked salmon, right.

We had We had a French toast castle.

That was very good, all kinds of dessert a.

Lot because mm hmmm, and brought because lacas and with our cream and apple sauce and cranberry sauce.

Aunt Joan made me bowls.

She made the appetizer and she walks and dismissing the food, and everybody's like, what which made them taste it?

And they're like, these are actually good.

Exactly what a mountain they got eaten exactly.

But she was like let her fail.

I'm like, knock it off.

I believe, she said, I am an emotional cripple over these appetizers. You know, drama. There was a lot of drama in the room.

So all things can said, it was a very lovely event with not much of that. Right when you consider all the potential drama we had.

Right, A lot of queers, right, a lot of queers. You put more than three queers in.

A room, anything can happen.

The potential for drama increases three hundredfold.

And we had desserts and cookies, and you know, the scones were outstanding, like it's just so much good food and lovely people. It was a lovely day, lovely, lovely people.

Nice little cross section of humanity.

Absolutely absolutely, and they were all our and I realized, yeah, at one point, I don't know, the four trans people left in the house where we were all standing in the kitchen like good tuck in the living room where we're allowed to sit down. Why are we standing here like we're segregated?

There was It just happened because I was in the kitchen, probably like cleaning something, and we just started keykeying and the key key got extended maybe and no one left until you.

Well, no, but there were still people in the living room. But it was just I don't know, it was weird and I was like, no, let's go in the living room. We're allowed in there. It's my living room exactly. No, it was. It was. It was good. There was good conversation and lovely people, and there's where we need to focus our time.

Exactly. That's my point.

Wow, you know somebody had to fiddle wall room burned, might as well be. I guess I don't know.

The important things are relationships and family and connections and working together to move forward. And since we can't look to the folks in quote unquote charge for that, we'll do it our damnself.

Well, no, because the children are going to be back in charge of our government, not the experts, but those who you know, exploit our environment and you know, our treasury for their own ends. That's what's happening. That's what folks voted for apparently, so that's what's going to happen. And watch the deficit triple Watch you know what's bigger than a trillion? How many trillions do get before you get up to a Google or something? Because you know,

It's our rip section first.

Of all, and you put them at the bottom, but I want to bring him at the top. Jimmy Carter left us at one hundred because he was looking at, you know, the inauguration coming up on the calendar and went, fuck this. Yeah, that's what I feel like happened. He just went, now, I don't need one hundred and one.

I gave you all one hundred years and that's all you go and get.

Yeah, there was a piece about his legacy with our folks, you know. Obviously Nobel Peace Prize winner Georgia native passed away on December twenty ninth. He left behind a legacy of progressive values, racial advocacy, and early, though imperfect LGBTQ support.

Yeah.

He was born in October first, nineteen twenty four and Cleans, Georgia. Yeah, raised on his parents' peanut farm, and he died in the same town in the house he and his wife, Roslyn spent the majority of their lives.

What A what A.

I used to say the reason he was a one term president is because we just can't elect an honest man under the presidency, not.

At that level of.

Integrity. And you know, and I kind of back that up because Obama certainly had a ton of integrity, and I believe Joe Biden does too. But I'm just saying there was just no sleeves on Jimmy Carter, and you're such a sincere human and we couldn't take that. So then we brought in, we ushered in, you know, all of the dystopia we've experienced since nineteen eighty when we brought in Saint Regan, and we're still paying for that. And look where we are again today. I'm really not Mary Sunshine today.

I notice. Sorry, oh Mary Sunstroke. Yeah.

At the DNC in nineteen seventy six, he disappointed advocates when convention officials, at the request of the Carter campaign, refused to include a gay rights plank as part of the party's approved platform. They said it was too slow to speak out again to Proposition six in nineteen seventy eight in California, the ballot measure that would ban gay and lesbian individuals from working in public schools. People, none

Yeah. In two thousand and five, he told Sean Kennedy at The Advocate that he was quote a worshiper of Jesus Christ who never mentioned homosexuals in any way. He said, I've never looked upon sexuality as any sort of reason to condemn a person. I think it's an inherent characteristic, just like other things that we do with their lives. Yep. And then in two thousand and seven he called for an end to Don't Ask, Don't Tell, calling it the only law in America today that regulates a group of citizens.

Yeah, I mean right, and many of them evolved, I mean, God knows right, but yeah, exactly, and yeah, the list goes on. But thoroughly, thoroughly decent human being.

Yeah, no one's perfect, but you know he got I think, more right than he did wrong.

The other person who died on the same day of December twenty ninth Linda Lavin, who was eighty seven. I loved her work. I loved Alice.

I did too.

Oh my god, I loved Alice. You know, she's been in so many things I grew up on. I'm guessing Rerun I must still possibly, yeah, because that was like the yeah you were I don't think you remember, like the seventies.

Or maybe like it was like the end of the first run, but it was also syndicated.

Possibly, yeah, because that was Alice came out in like nineteen seventy six, so I would have been one year old. Yeah.

How long did it run?

Like nine years? Yeah? Nine seasons?

Hmm, so until eighty five something like that. Okay, so yeah, I was watching First Round episodes.

Yeah, yeah, I was just old, you know, obviously older than you. But I loved Alice and and a lot of the work she's done since then. She's still she was still working quite recently. Apparently she had a lung cancer diagnosis and did not last very long. Yeah but yeah, what a what a what a phenomenal actress, what a what a storied resume? Yeah, you know, Broadway, et cetera. Just yeah, so, and.

Of course, you know, I loved her character of Alice, but my favorite character, and Alice would have been Flowing. I kiss Margret's Polly.

Yeah, Vira and flow now and Alice and Polly.

Holliday was in one of my favorite episodes of The Golden Girls when she played Rose's blind sister.

Oh that's right, that's right. I forgot about that. I forgot about that. Yeah, she was again. She was in the Sopranos member she played the therapist that Meta went to that they hated that. Okay, Yeah, she's been in so many things, so yes, she's gone. Yeah, now we got others, others story masters. Yeah, not at sixty.

Three pioneering LGBTQ journalists at the home of several influential publications, notably Gay City News in New York City and the LA Blade since twenty seventeen.

Yeah. She died on December eleventh in his home in West Hollywood at sixty three, younger and younger. I no, that's sorry, and the medical examiner determined the cause was suicide. Oh, I didn't realize that.

Yeah, damn.

He grew up in Tennessee, went to New York City in the eighties, worked for Out Week, QW LGNY and the successor Gay City News before moving west and starting the LA Blade in twenty seventeen in partnership with the Washington Blade, which was founded in nineteen sixty nine.

Kevin Naff, who is the editor of The Washington Blade and the owner of both the Washington and LA papers, said that Troy was a pioneer of LGBTQ media who was fueled by a passion for advocacy and brought his commitment to justice, truth and best in class journalism.

Yeah.

In the first issue of the LA Blade, mister Masters described the heady promises and challenges that his readers faced. Quote, we are living in a paradigm shifting moment in real time. You can feel it. Sometimes it's overwhelming, sometimes it's toxic. Sometimes it's perplexing, even terrifying. On the other hand, sometimes it's just downright exhilarating.

You know he did. He used his platform to really talk about monkey pocks and bring it to the f and you know, get it discussed. And yeah, that early work with that was pretty instrumental. And you know, we've talked to Rob Rekerd even about how it could have been much worse and it wasn't because of folks like Masters.

And he went there about monkey pops too. He said, this is not a gay disease, nor is it a sex panic, but it is hitting our community hard and we must protect ourselves and each other. If monkey pox is used as a cudgel against the community of men who have sex with men, it will be time to act up and fight again. Act up in all caps. So that was a double reference. Joe.

Yeah, he is gone, Rest in peace.

Art Evans died. You knew who this is.

I know you do.

You've seen him in things, okay, I know you have. He's always playing like the older black man who is a voice of reason to the younger black man, like that's kind of been his his thing, and a lot of things, like for instance, in the movie School Days when he was trying to school Laurence Fishburne's character about like advocacy is great, what you have to think about the bigger picture. But his two of his more notable roles were I know is I was going say, I

Two yeah mm and last Brenton would Yes.

He was the singer known for the song the Ugam Bughem song. You know Ukham bookham Ugum buogm baby now that song?

Okay?

Yeah. He was eighty three died from a natural causes surrounded by his family at his home in Marino Valley, California. Okay, apparently he lived a good life. He was from Shreveport, Louisiana. H He was on a farewell tour in twenty twenty four catch You on the Rebound the last tour, which paused after his hospitalization. But uh, that was the jam the Ugambogem song that back when you could just string some syllables together and have a hit.

I came out in like nineteen sixty seven.

Yeah.

Yeah, anyway, So rest in peace to arts who Brighton Wood.

Yes, was that everybody?

They're the ones you listed? I mean there were certainly others. There were a lot of folks. We just heard about Aubrey Plasi's husband who also suicided.

Oh, I didn't know about that.

Yeah. Filmmaker Jeff Baina. Huh was Aubrey Plas's husband, found dead in their La home. He was forty seven. Damn.

Yeah, that's a damn shame.

I guess that is right now the apparent clause of Jeff. But yeah, that one I just heard about. Maybe it was yesterday.

I did not hear about that. Yep.

Yeah, they did several films together. He was an independent filmmaker. He did go to NYU for film school. He co wrote I think probably most famously, I Heart Hockeates.

Oh I did hear about this. I didn't realize he was Aubrey Plaus's husband.

Yep. He directed five of his own films, four of which premiered at Sundance.

Mm hm, I am said that he died, but I did not enjoy his work. Okay, specifically, iHeart Huckebees don't.

I don't remember it. I feel like I've seen it, and I don't think I was in love it was anyway, he also left us recently. There was also who.

Was the other one?

Eighty one? She was eighty one. I think britt Allcroft write a producer and voice actress, best known as the creator of Thomas the Tank. Nd.

Oh yeah, I did see that.

Yeah, she died on the twenty seventh.

Yeah, I saw that on social media.

Okay, yeah, so that was another one. That was another one.

That's a shame.

And it's that time of year apparently, Yeah, apparently this is the busy season.

As it were.

Now, well, my father was you know, we actually had his funeral between Christmas and New Years because he his official date of death is the twenty sixth of December, but really he tried the twenty fifth. It's when he collapsed Christmas morning, ten o'clock.

Yeah.

Well, I mean it wasn't a shock, but it was pretty sudden because he was up an alert and we had a big party on Christmas Eve, and he you know, he was good until he wasn't. Wasn't yep.

So but you know, it's it's.

Apparently common, you know, this time of the year. Yeah, on the holidays. My mother was the day after Thanksgiving in twenty seventeen, and he's day after Christmas in two thousand and four.

So the holidays are never like.

Yeah, it was just this was the twenty year anniversary of my father's death this Christmas.

The holidays are never an easy time for you. Yeah.

I think that just because it was so important to him, especially Christmas, you know that it was such an important day. Just so many things have changed. I used to cook for twenty five people, right, but you know, we know how to make a reservation for Thanksgiving dinner too, don't getting twisted. That's made some good reservations very tasty, truly, it was. Yeah, so let's take a break because we do have a lot of good news and we'll come back with that.

Yeah, okay, and we're back.

We're back.

So eight LA comps were fired after a mess of cover up a police beating of a transmit.

Yeah. I had been seeing this story develop, but now that there's actual, like you know, consequences feel like we can talk about. Yeah.

A contempt of cop indictment involving a twenty three year old transman and the LA County sheriff who beat him in the parking lot of a seven to eleven grew to include at least eight deputies fired for participating in a cover up of their colleagues action yep. The La Times reports multiple La County Sheriff's deputies have been relieved of duty amid a federal investigation into the beating of teacher Emmett Brock after he flipped off a sheriff's deputy

YEP.

Video captured Benza beating Brock for three minutes YEP as the young man pleaded for his life. Benza admitted he lied to the FBI, alleged to other deputies, including supervisors, helped him obstruct the investigation and cover up his misconduct.

He's taking everybody with him.

The La County Sheriff's Department confirmed he had been fired on December eighteenth. The next day, they admitted multiple other deputies had also been relieved of duties.

I saw the video, but I didn't watch it. I was happy that there was video. I fast forwarded through it just to make sure that every like there was damna evidence caught on the camera, And there was. That's all I need to say. Oh yeah, yeah, because he flipped someone off. So yeah, I mean, which is ridiculous. It's a mess.

This is how thin the skin is on so many law enforcements, which is terrifying.

You know.

I know that they did a strip search of the transman, which is you know, I don't know.

How that came into play. That part, but of course it did.

So Yeah, I imagine a civil suit will follow and good, but at least there's a little bit of justice out of la.

Exactly, you've got a gun, you've got a taser, you've got pepper spray, you've got a stick like but someone a hand gesture threatened you.

Mm hmm, yeah, exactly. It's all ticks because they think that they are somehow uh you know, above it.

All these people have balls made of soap bubbles or something.

I swear to Craze that's true.

So the courthouse that issued our country's first gay marriage license becomes a National Historic landmark. Good. US Secretary of the Interior deb Holland announced that the Boulder County Courthouse in Colorado has been designated a National Historic Landmark for being the site of the first issuing of a same

Yep, within weeks, X issued five more same sex marriage licenses, and new That's across the country spotlighted Boulder as a trailblazer for civil rights work. At the time, Boulder was deeply divided over gay rights. A few had thought about same sex couples marrying, singing parallel with the women's movement,

Didn't realize it was that long ago. Yep, that's crazy. First with gay marriage, then legal we Colorado. There you go. For five minutes, I was considering going to University of Colorado at Boulder from my master's degree. But then I was like, but you'd be living in Colorado. I mean, no shade of Colorado, but it gets called there.

Okay. That was really a thirteen LGBTQ plus elected lawmakers join the one hundred and nineteenth Congress. This is the largest group of out LGBTQ plus members in US history, A dynamic thirteen legislators who are redefining what representation in Washington looks like. Heerry McBride made history as the first openly transgender person elected to Congress, Emily Randall of Washington,

Yeah, how about it. That's cool.

It is.

I mean, you know, it's bittersweet because Sara McBride immediately sucked it up.

Well, but that's a whole exactly. I mean, you know, she is our first trans member of Congress. She's sworn in on January third. She represents you know, Delawares one at large district.

But not the trans people in it.

Well, you know, yeah, it's a complicated, not really, but I was going to say, is it not really? Not really anyway, a lot of firsts. So here's a quote from Sarah McBride. It is not surprising to me is that an anti trans bill will be one of the first they put forward. She called it part of a

Right, that part is going to be true regardless.

Yeah, but this Kumbaya, we're all the same, you know, I'm not going to single out the trouble. Well, We're being singled out, my dear, we are being singled out. You know, they are directly targeting folks, and the example you just set is still reprehensible. Sorry, you know, every trans kid just herdue and you know, lost a little error and a little height.

But whatever you do. You just because you're the first, does it mean you're the best? Well?

Right, I mean, you know, and if you well, never mind, we already talked about this. If you can't connect civil rights and the greater you know what I mean. Nobody ever gained ground by saying yes, so please, can I have some more of that? Never happened, but let's try it just in case.

What's the definition of insanity?

Yeah, exactly, I've said enough So. California has banned schools from forcing teachers to out queer students. Yay, rights, I mean, and obviously in particular we're talking about trans kids, right. The new law prevents schools from acquiring staff to notify parents if a student identifies as LGBTQ, in its response to some districts requiring staff to notify parents when students identify as a gender other than what's in their official files.

Have a K.

Newsom said at a press conference. Teachers can still talk to their parents. What they can't do is fire a teacher for not being a snitch. I don't think teachers should be gender police here here exactly.

Because if you don't know, it's because your kid doesn't trust you, and there's probably a good reason for.

That, exactly.

And you know, a rule like this doesn't protect kids, not the queer kids, not the trans kids.

No, no, no, it's not designed too.

But they aren't human anyway. So yeah, you know, there are opponents to the new law. Of course, the parental notification policy is actually strengthen ties between students and parents. No they do not, No, they don't. Nope, no, sorry, No. I don't know where I would have lived if I would have been out at as trans as a child, I really don't. I I doubt it would have been in this house, I hear strongly. I doubt that, and I'd had more than just the one exorcism. But you know,

That actually protects kids.

Yeah, that actually does and the teachers that right, spend the most time with them.

Now, this story is kind of cool. Okay, So there's a camp in northern Minnesota that is closing down. Pine County Camp.

The eighty acre site in Willow River, Minnesota, about forty minutes southwest of Duluth, has served kids living with or effect by HIV and AIDS for more than thirty years. The number of babies contracting the virus through their mothers has declined to the point where such a camp no

Right. So it's like it's a bittersweet thing. It's like, ah, this tradition, this thing that has a standing tradition, has to go away. But the reason for it is great.

Right in the United States, the perinatal HIV transmission rate, or the rate of a mother passing the virus onto a child through pregnancy, birth, or breastfeeding, is now less than one percent thanks to anti retroviral medications. According to the CDC. The World Health Organization says that globally, new infections among children up to age fourteen have declined by thirty eight percent since twenty five fifteen, and AIDS related deaths have fallen by forty three percent.

Okay, right, and that's a cool thing.

I think so, I think so.

And I didn't even know that that camp existed. I did, Oh you did. Okay, Yeah, that's cool.

I did. During the first several years, of course of the camp's existence, death was common. Now, many of the thousands who swam and hiked and mid crafts at the camp have married and had children. A documentary is being filmed about the camp, which eventually broadened its reach to serve different campers, including those with diabetes and LGBTQ youth. It was largely serving the latter group last summer. The nonprofit hopes to sell the camp to another group that

That's actually not uncommon.

Yeah, that's cool.

It is cool.

I mean, you know, these things were rearranging things because it's possible, right, Yeah, And there's not the same call that there was when it began thirty years ago. So that is good stuff.

It's amazing. Yeah, what else for goot? So this is something that I've been seeing happen here and there for the past few years, since the whole CRT debate has become a thing. Oh right, this is in Florida.

Those words right exactly.

Florida's students are giving up Saturday to learn black history lessons their schools don't teach.

Wow.

Yeah, it's becoming like the new underground railroad of education and shit.

Okay. The Spady Cultural Heritage Museum in Delray Beach and in similar programs that community centers across the state, many supported by Black churches, which for generations have helped forge the cultural and political identity of their parishioners.

Yep. In an old wooden bungalow and Delray Beach. Charlene Farrington and her staff gathered groups of teenagers on Saturday mornings to teach them lessons she worries that public schools won't provide. They talk about South Florida's Caribbean roots, the state's dark history of lynching, how segregation still shapes the landscape, and how grassroots activists mobilize the civil rights movement to up end generations of oppression.

Wow, she said to her.

Students, you need to know how it happened before so you can decide how you want it to happen again.

M hm agreed, Yeah, agreed.

That's been a thing. I was reading stories about, like folks gathering in the basements of churches or like small rooms and like having clandestine black history conversations in history lessons.

How ridiculous.

You know, the fact that you have to do this shit in secret?

Well, and this is you know that this is the direction we're all headed.

You know, you know what it feels like. It just occurred to me. It feels like when enslaved people had to like teach each other to read and write in secret.

And then pretend they couldn't and write it does well. You know a lot of these folks harken back to that era as at the good times, right back in the good old days.

Ain't that some shit? Ain't that some shit?

It's awesome shit.

That's why I like on social media. Every now and again, I'll see a post like someone will stop a group, like be on a college campus or whatever, and stop a bunch of random people and show them a bunch of different photos of notable historical Black figures, and if they can guess all of them, they get money, Like right there. Wow, Like let's just incentivize, you know. And the number of young black people that can positively identify

You know, we all should.

I agree, it shouldn't be relegated to a special category at a special time. It's all history. Black history is American history, Queer history is American history. You're preaching to the choir, and they're both world history, you know.

And what a better world it would be, you know, And how much less ugliness and bullying would you know we suffer if we bother to teach that we all have a place in this world. But that's some of them.

Like what would the last ten years look like if it was common knowledge what happened on Black Wall Street in Greenwood? You know what I mean? Anyone?

Okay, So I think that's all the good news we could take up this week. I can't think of them anymore. We tried, We tried, you know, we gave it our best shot.

We did.

Do you have a fifteen minute pig.

I do, And it actually kind of piggybacks off of that last story. Okay, So when I am at work and I have to do med audits, which involves counting. I like to silence the white noise in the back of my head by putting on music that I don't actually have to pay attention to. Okay, Like sometimes it's drummond bass. This time it was house, and so I was listening to house music and this song pulled my focus. I had never heard it before. In fact, the chorus

That's not what I thought was happening in our house. But it's good to know. What's a song that's not true? Not so this will be a fun way to go out to the break.

What is the name of the Claudette Claudette featuring Monique Binger.

All right, then we'll be right back.

Cuse ever result ever resarty only all the time away.

Don't get that confused.

Baby, can.

Let me go out my saying so they know to never try or even think whise and think this is a.

Cut on.

People, Come lumber, I got people.

Come one, come mother, you don't m h.

M hm.

And we're back. We're back. That was you know, jam right, I hear you.

And every time we say don't fuck with us, whoever we may be, there's a mouth breathing Republican somewhere going hold my bear right true good lord. So you know, here's the thing before the official cavalcade of nonsense. I'm nonsensing, okay, because I don't know where else this story belongs. And I'm not It's not so much that I am trying to judge my fallow queers as I you know, I just feel sad about this story and I want to talk about it. Okay, So this is from today's Philadelphia Enquirer.

Part of the.

Problem with gun ownership and within our communities is we have a great propensity to use it on ourselves.

Yeah.

You know, I've lost too many people that were really close to me because you know, they had easy access to a loaded weapon at a time when life got challenging, and that became a permanent solution to what was for sure a temporary problem, right.

I mean they didn't see it that way, but you know.

Well, you know, research and statistics do tell us that the likelihood of an accident, the likelihood of having the gun turned on ourselves. You know, it goes up, not down. They're dangerous, agree, and you know, and I understand the fear, but you know, the fear that has driven this country, you know, brought us another like this is you know, it's still unthinkable that that jackass is going to be

You know, it used to be men proved themselves as men and men.

With you know, their fists right, which was you know, problematic enough for me throughout grade school. But we keep needing weapons a family and you know what an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. That keeps resonating in my head.

I remember that it was like an unofficial movement in black pop culture because this was at the height we're talking about like the nineties, because this was at the height of quote unquote gangster rap, and so you know, gun culture was glorified as you know, a display of how strong and how hard and how bad you are. And so there was like this counter movement of people saying,

Well, and here's I don't know, maybe that wasn't aside, but yeah, I mean this idea, you know, like, let's because the level of fear, right, the level of bad judgment right, seems to go up exponentially as we hide behind a gun, like the cop story we talked about earlier, you know, like that there they are, they have, you know,

He was black and so close, thank you.

And you know, we owned a bar in a neighborhood that did have some drugs and violence and you know, nonsense going on around us. And I had friends who told me I was absolutely insane for not keeping a gun in the bar, And I said, I actually want to live, and I want my employees to live. And if you're going to keep a weapon, now let me let me let me clarify. If you were going to draw a weapon, only do so if you really are

So you know, if you.

Don't have the wherewithal two and the life of another human being, don't pull a gun. Because pulling a gun has never de escalated a situation, not one, not that I'm aware of, not one, you know what I mean, And certainly not here in the real world. I mean maybe it does in the movies, but here in the real world, you know, pulling that weapon escalates, it builds it, it makes it deadly. Err And so that was the you know, I knew, yeah.

Because I think about like the confrontations that I had when I was behind that bar, and if my words didn't cut it in a few instances where like it got to that level, I'll pull that bad out and that was it.

I mean, right, but that's not a gun, right, that's my point, right, And we had panic buttons, and we had cameras, and we had you know, like there are things that are deterrents. There are things, you know, and I my point is we never had significant problems and we didn't have gun We did not. It's just, you know, it's a I don't think we're more safe having got

Right. And let's not even get into like how fucking easy it is to get a.

Gun, right, you know, less so in our state, thank you. But I'm not just people will go to great lengths and these are not This is an article about responsible gun ownership, learning how to properly handle the weapon, et cetera. Right, and still I don't know. It still doesn't sit well with me. And you know, maybe it's because I'm such a pathifist. I don't know. But we've just gotten so afraid of each other. And I can't help but feel that that drives these kinds of politics, allows them to

They're playing into their hands.

Right, all the people that you know, certain people are afraid of, they really should be, I guess, because this is going to escalate and keep going, you know. And I don't blame I can't, especially people who have already been a victim of violence or know someone who has been based on their identity.

I get it.

Just this does not sit well in my spirit.

I would much rather read about queer people learning self defense. So what I you know that? I mean, even if it comes down to like something like krav Maga, Hey, like the idea of a young trans woman walking around with that knowledge in her head, I'm cool with that.

I'm better with that, you know, I'm better with that. But and again, because so often it doesn't end well, right, yeah, And I didn't want to be less safe because we had a weapon in the bar. I didn't want, you know. And and when people are afraid, they their judgment is no its best right, you know.

And and when you I mean, I know, for me, if I'm in a situation where I feel in any way concerned for my safety, my mind immediately goes to, Okay, what is available to me at this moment.

If a gun is not an option, you get creative and no one dies, right, you.

Know what I mean?

Right? I mean, how many stories have there been about, like, you know, the neighbor on drugs or drunk walks into the wrong house and winds up dead.

You know.

It's just I don't know. I have a hard time with the idea that meeting violence with violence is ever the answer. I have a hard time, you know, with this constant escalation, and you know, from an otherwise peaceable people, because you know, the other thing is when we start to use the same tactics they use, I'm afraid the consequences for us are going to be much more dire.

Black Panthers, That's exactly.

What I'm thinking.

Yeah, uh huh.

When they say, you know, good guy with the gun. They don't mean us, right, and I I don't know, I don't know how many times, how many times? You know, I have a client who's got a record right now because he defended himself because he was jumped, sweetest, sweetest.

You know, defended himself with a gun, queer.

Human, no knife, but but yeah, land of charge, just like everyone else. And it was eleven to one. And it's hideous to me that that happened, but it happened, right, you know, he's got a few strikes against him.

Black, queer, poor.

Mm hmmm mm hmmm, aka disposable, right, and having a hard time now with some things in life because of those tray and I look at situations like that, I'm like, shit, this is what like, you know, we they don't let us play by their rules, Sarah. That's why we can't usually play by theirs and expect to have the same. How do I say this benefit of a doubt? How about that?

Right? Right?

You know, I'm waiting for the story of the first trans woman who you know, shoots and kills somebody's white Christian son and what happens.

Mm hmmm, murderer.

I don't think we're going to hear about. I don't think we're gonna hear justified in that case. That's that scares me more than I'm afraid of like random people walking around.

And with guns or whatever.

No, that's real, is what you know is looking down the road, looking down the road, I mean, you know how many and this is all minority in this country right now. This is if you look like you might be an immigrant. This is if you know you've got any degree of melanin in your skin. And this is certainly for gender and otherwise minority that the rules are different. And that's the problem, you know, And what is being ramped up in this country right now is not a

Not.

You know, all this nonsense we know is just you know, this stirring up, trying to stir up some fear of trans people, like of all the people to be afraid of her crying out loud, right, But you know, nuggets of nuggets of this and that take hold then and make our lives exponentially harder, you know, but it's it's hard to imagine. And again, this is personal. All this is, you know, two women that we were very close to both ate their gun as a solution to a problem

Right.

Doesn't feel like a recipe for peace, does it.

I mean, of course not. And you know there's the fact that's been true for a long time. In this country, fear is big business, and we have an incoming president who values vengeance over justice.

So right, right, Like I get it, but again I do wonder self defense. You know, better training is be aware of your surroundings. Better training, you know, like we used to do it, pen Like, hey, you're in the city. Now you have to be aware. There's just a who lot more people.

Not to mention. You know, if you have knowledge of self defense techniques, it bolsters how you walk through the world period, and you tend to not find yourself in as many of those kind of situations.

I mean, we both grew up in a house with guns on them. In the house my father had kept a shaku. Didn't have a pistol, but he kept a shakum.

You know, my father had two guns.

Right, well, he was a cop. That's different, right, But yeah, I mean I'm just I don't know that it ever made me feel safe, the idea that there are weapons around, right, or the idea that you know, it's the only way to survive an attack of some kind. Uh, you know, because again in those and things happen in such a split second, you know, and again being overpowered for the gun that you're just you know what I mean, uncertain about having in the first place and having it turned on you.

Because I already have that fear about knives. I have a lot of knives, and I always like think about like the design of the knife in my hand, like how easily can this be taken from me? You know, that's things you got.

To think about, right And I just, you know, I saw it, and my heart sank a little bit just because like I get it, but I got it, you know. I just when I think about, you know, peaceful resistance, I always think it makes more sense. And when I think about, you know, being unsafe, right, I don't know, this just doesn't I'm like, okay, okay, right, but yeah, it's I know, a lot of folks are feeling like, if you know, I can't protect myself, nobody else is

Yeah, I get it. I'm not going to pretend they don't get it.

American gun culture has of course drastically shifted in recent years, you know, And there was a quote in here that said, you know, twenty twenty was apparently a pivotal year because remember, we saw a lot more people buying guns because people felt uncertain and I guess, you know, it's the end of the world coming, Do I have to keep a gun?

I'd think about several times in my life where if I'd had a gun, we might not be sitting here having this conversation.

Well, right, and that's part of the problem. Well, you don't have one anywhere on your person or near you when the cops show up, guess what? And that's my point, Well, yeah, that if they're already afraid of you and you have a weapon, right God, And that's the first thing. Are we not paying attention? That's the first thing you'll hear people ask, well, did he have a gun?

Mm hmm.

And when we say he was unarmed. You know, like, well, what if he was armed. What if he had a permit to carry it and he was armed, and he's still dead because he was armed, because the cop was afraid of the fact that someone the cop is afraid of was armed.

What do we do? I mean, you know, we have evidence to the fact that it doesn't even have to be a gun for cops to think you have one, right, it could be a wallet, it could be a phone.

Right, you know, there have been responsible gun safety classes happening, Thank god, I guess despite people's hopes this is out of the article about increasing their safety. Researchers have found that higher rates of gun ownership and access is correlated with higher rates of gun related homicides, suicides, accidental deaths, and injuries.

Yeah.

Yeah, And that's the thing. If you know, if you're so afraid, in a moment of fear, you pull that gun, you shoot, and you kill your own kid, you know, who's broken into your house and has another kid. There's just so many.

Scenarios and you cannot unwring that.

Back, right, You can't undie a person right, right, when you calm down and realize that this was you know, an excessive use of force. And you know, eighty five percent, according to the article of suicides attempted with firearms lead to death. Yeah, you know, you've got to pay attention to mental health in this situation. You've got to really

First gun Jesus Christ.

Yeah, because their official gender identifications are non specific, which could alert authorities to the fact that they are non binary. And they feared that they may not be able to buy a gun in the future. So let's, I guess, start with an AR fifteen. I'd rather be prepared, but prepared for.

What, right, And let's not even get into the whole ghost gun thing where you can three D print a gun, I know, and put it together.

I mean, and don't twist it. I'm a good shot. I grew up here among hunters. Okay, so I'm not unfamiliar. I'm actually not unfamiliar with gun safety. And it's not a it's not a lack of knowledge. It's it's all the other stuff, right, it's all the other stuff that gives me pause. And as you know, a nation, as we enter into these it's like what have we wrought? You know, right, because all that fear hasn't made us actually safer.

Well, I think about like what my father always said about guns. He was like, a gun is designed for one purpose and one purpose only. It is not self defense. It is not a warning, it is not stopping power. It is designed to kill, period period. Yep.

That's what it's for. That's what it does. That's what it's for. And when you introduce it, know that, know that search deep because you can hypothetically think you can pull a name of gun, but if there's a moment's pause in there, now it's pointed at you. And that's the thing. It's that, you know, an eye for an eye man, Not the way I want to live, Not a civilized society, you know what I mean? Like that's the way.

It's The wild wild West was a point of history for a reason.

Right right, And that was because we couldn't live peacefully with Indigenous Americans and stuff like that, you know, and the people that were going at each other.

It did the whole thing.

And then there's that and again fear nothing more dangerous than white people afraid chaw inconvenience.

I always think about that little section in Bowling for Columbine. The little animated section was basically the history of white people in America, and everything was like and they got scared, so then then they were still scared, so then and there still scared. Yeah. And I you know, the fact that it was put so bluntly, I was like, damn, that is exactly what that is, right and all it's ever been right.

And it's like, you know, this is what we're spending our time on, is learning how to use weapons instead of worrying about one another's mental health, instead of you know, building community and figuring out ways that we stay in community, because really connection is what saves us. Ultimately, connection saves human being.

Right, creating more situations where people feel safe, and the idea of even needing a gun doesn't even enter the equation.

Yeah, but of course connection to the same people, because some.

Connection doesn't work out that way.

I'm thinking church at this point. You know, I'm not saying I have an answer here exactly, but you know, things just keep escalating and getting worse, and we've never had more cameras everywhere, and we've never had more, you know, of everything else. I just I don't know, I don't know. I think it's just a sad thing. I think that we're having this conversation that it's you know, in today's newspaper, that people are feeling that unsafe and that they think

Especially if it's made public that enough of us are carrying guns, right right, I just you know, because don't think that the man won't start a fight for no reason other than you know, and.

They're over there, right Just because you white and queer or wait in trance doesn't exactly you were completely exempt. But you need to pay a little bit of attention to what has happened traditionally to minority communities who warm themselves. You just got to kind of pay attention to that.

And no go, I was literally with my mouth to say, like, because let's not forget about again Greenwood, Black Wall Street. No one was no one was bothering anybody, they were minding themselves. But the fact that they were, you know, self sufficient, and you know it was that was a threat. Yeah. Yeah, so you know, organized queers with guns, it's a threat.

Yeah, it is a threat. And if the government decides to meet you with.

Force, they can afford more guns than you'll buy a lot, m by a lot.

It's fucked up, well what it is, and it's just I find it disheartening.

Yeah.

I don't have a better answer other than it is a false sense of security.

Yeah, you know, do you feel like you got it off your spirit? Though?

No, not really, but probably enough to move on, I get. I don't have a solid conclusion other than think four times, you know, is this really gonna make me safer? Beyond just that false sense of security? Am I really prepared to use a weapon? Am I willing to and ready to take the life of another human being? And just all that, just all of it belongs in the thought process. And again, when minorities start to arm themselves, doesn't always go well for the minorities word, and we should just

Named.

Meghan Alexander told The Advocate she usually receives about three calls a week from queer parents seeking second parent adoptions. The week Trump won, she filed a twenty six call. Since then, they've kept coming. Project twenty twenty five believe to be the blueprint for the Trump administration, essentially calls to eliminate our rights yep and states quote, only heterosexual two parent families are safe for children, even though we know that's not true.

That's documented proof of that.

Oh my god.

Yes, the advice is the same as it's been for the last couple of decades, which is to do a second parent adoption. Alexander explained. It do not depend on the federal government or the gay right to marry to give you parental rights.

Because I'm sorry, only heterosexual two parent families are safe for children. How many heterosexual two parent families have kicked their kids out?

We're molested them, has sucked them up for life. Uh huh, yeah, I know.

I got you know, I didn't want to have you in my life as quote unquote ruins, I'm going to take it out on you for the rest of your life. Yeah.

I mean, there's people that have to move around the country to be safe and it's excruciating. But even second parent adoptions are not bulletproof in some states. A twenty twenty three report from a coalition of queer advocacy groups explains that second parent adoption can be used to establish a legal relationship between a parent and a child, or to obtain an adoption decree for someone who is already a legal parent through another pathway to present to parentage,

Damn, so many extra fucking steps.

For married couples. Being on your child's birth certificate reflects the legal presumption that any child born into marriage is the child of both parents. Still, there is a difference between a legal presumption and a legal judgment establishing parentage. Each state must respect valid legal judgments of other states. This is true for both parentage orders and adoption decrees, and it is what sets them apart from parentage that arises out of state law or doctrine. It is what

Yeah. Yeah, I saw this and I was like, fuck.

Yeah. The AICALU of Florida is of course suing in the state's Department of Corrections because their new anti trans policy will restrict transprisoners' access to gender affirming medical care as well as their ability to express their gender identity. Yep, oh god, it is a non constitutional ban on gender firming care. Of course, obviously we're waiting for the ruling. Under the new policy, Florida prisons will only provide inmates

She might.

She's got a much higher likelihood of regretting that than we do of you know, gender affirming medicine. But that's just you know facts, and what do we need those for, right Pushall incarcerated trans women were told that trans inmates would be reevaluated to determine whether they would still be allowed access to their healthcare and other accommodations they were already receiving. Yeah, they were not told how prison officials would determine whether they would still be allowed access to care.

Wow, yep, the prison system is already designed for dehumanization. But god damn.

Many of them are already incarcerated in men's prisons. M a trans woman they spoke to, that her gender dysphoria diagnosis was now considered a serious psychiatric illness. She was told she would have to removed to a more restrictive facility with fewer work and programming opportunities if she wants to continue receiving treatment, They're told the Marshall Project. After spending ten days in solitary for refusing to cut her hair, a prison barber buzzed her hair short while she was handcuffed.

Yeah, and your humanity and yep, your fucking ugh.

Previous court decisions have held that prisons in the US are required under the Constitution to provide gender affirming care as needed.

Yeah.

Yeah. Psychiatrist Dan Krossik University of California, San Francisco, who helped develop international standards to the treatment of transgender people, told the Marshall Project that Florida's knew anti trans prison policies were a fig leaf on the state's efforts to ban gender affirming care. Yeah, that's putting it nicely.

Mm hmm.

I'm so sorry. Yeah, this is the stuff Nellie Fitzpatrick was fighting. Yeah, if you recall directly, Yeah, that interview, go back and listen. Well, you know, Timmy Baldwin, by the way, and twenty other senators did try to strike the anti transprovision from the Defense bill with no luck. And yeah, eighty one Democrats signed on.

And stuck them exactly in the ear.

The Pulse night Club is going to be torn down, which many have said is really the only way to deal with right that. The Pulse Memorial Advisory Committee took a pivotal step toward honoring the legacy of forty nine lives lost and the resilience of survivals in the wake of the Pulse night Club tragedy.

Yeah, it's the whole thing is going to be turned into a.

Memorial now, right So, designers, members of the community, leaders, survivors, and families of the victims met at City Hall to review to refine proposals for a commemorative piece that will stand as a begon of love, unity, and hope. Quote. For those who think this is closure, that this ends grief and ends the pain, it doesn't work that way. What it does do, however, is kind of put a dot at the end of the sentence that's been open for a very long time, said Nancy Rosatto, Pulse Memorial

I think it's powerful. They're going to use the dance floor and like as part of the design of whatever ends up being there, and that's a powerful symbol. You know.

There there were points in the story where there was not a lot of agreements, so you know, I guess coming to terms is actually I get them, yeah, and hopefully we can move on. But you know, I don't know, and they could make people walk through. I kind of want Florida politicians stuff to it's been the night there, hm hm. Anyway, Yeah, some idiot who refused to use a trans student's pronouns is getting a payday from their

Wow, this is why trauma caused by people like Wow.

They paid a settlement of four hundred and fifty thousand dollars because the teacher said she was forced to residey after refusing to druss students by their trans names at personal proteos. Vivian Garrity was an English teacher that's rich for two years in a middle school. Two years.

Damn.

Garrity, a Christian, reportedly neither faced any kind of complaint or disciplinary action about her work, nor communicated openly about her religious beliefs while at school.

Why don't I believe that?

Yeah, while she was doing That's exactly what she was fucking doing.

Thank you. Yeah.

The Star County School District has a policy requiring teachers to participate in the social transition of gender nonconforming students by using names in pronouns consistent with each student's gender identity. Here's the part where she talked to Vanner religion, but her faith believes that God only creates two districted sexes. Well, her faith is ridiculous and limited, has no actual factual

Yeah, so she's an English teacher. So what happens when we get to the class where we actually talk about pronouns? What do you just not do it?

Fuck?

Nugget?

So she claimed to religion. That's why she can't follow district policy. They told her she could not set her religious convictions aside. She should resign. Yeah, agreed, right, But I don't know why she got a pay day for this. Violated her First Amendment rights to freedom of religion.

Really, what about the.

Kids' rights to freedom from her religion?

That because isn't freedom from religion part of religious freedom?

In her lawyers? Of course? Uh, let's say the anti LGBTQ plus Christian nationalists legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom. There's the bitches again said trans identities are quote a matter of national and local public debate and concern because you made it so there's no sane person debating us. You idiots are creating the situation.

The walk, Yeah, and then blaming nobody for it.

Nobody should be forced to facilitate another person's transitioning when they themselves disagree with that.

Fuck you and your disagreement.

Yeah, and of course they quote the cast for you such bullshit, Oh my god, mm hmmm, which they point to his proof of something, which of course it isn't. Wow. Well mm hmm. She's found it difficult to apply for employment in other public school good because she has no recommendation from her district's superintendent. Of course she doesn't.

Good. Yeah, not even the first time I know this shit has happened.

Well, if that's not nonsense, I don't know what is word? Yeah, four and fifty thousand dollars. Well, actually the headline said forty five thousand, but then the article said four un and.

Fifty Either one is way too much money.

There's way too much money for this ignorant bitch who did this for a payday, who aligned with these people for this agenda.

What's you going to spend it? An? I am believing that twelve foot cris and gasoline.

What do you have to say to intersex people? They don't actually exist? Huh, what do you have to say to them? And how dare you again and tell human beings you know them better than themselves and act as if you know we all have all this trauma. No, we don't. The trauma comes from people like this, ah, not inherently from being trans or queer or non binary or anywhere on our beautiful spectrum. Right, That's not where the bullshit comes from, folks, comes from a shit like this.

Oh, no one has ever asked me that question.

Yeah, that's a great question, something I've been thinking a lot about.

That's a really good question.

Okay, let me explain to you about sex.

And then I was like, oh my god. Also, there's no Santa Claus.

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And we're back.

We're back.

So what have we been watching? Let's talk about what we've been watching.

We actually had some time on our hands to watch something a little bit well. The first thing on the list I actually watched while I was at work because it was short. So on Christmas Day there was some football thing on Netflix and I heard that for the halftime performance, Beyonce gave a thirteen minute performance of songs

Gesture of her finger guns exactly.

But apparently there's this policy uh that players, I think the players from whatever team is Texas whatever, they were doing that and then they got penalized because that's considered bad for whatever reason. So how come Beyonce can do it and they can't? Thank you? That's that's the answer to the goddamn question.

But maybe maybe maybe she didn't agree to those us.

Right, and like, but what I will say about the performance, like the album was an exploration of, you know, the roots of country, the black roots of country, and it was like basically neo Americana alb and she chose to spotlight all these up and coming black country artists as well as country artists from like previous generations who never

And it's like, who is saying this broke.

People who have no goals? I mean, is my okay? I just wanted and it's it's just like this common thing on uh on on social media. It's people hating on Beyonce, and it's like, I don't know, like I hate the fact that I'm sitting here like defending someone who doesn't know I exist and I'm not getting the cut of her check. But you know, it's just like this is just pathological behavior. It drives me crazy.

Yeah, well we've been swimming in pathological behavior since I don't know, late October.

True. So all that to say, I watched it. It was good. I enjoyed it. Watch it again. Well good, we finally got to uh sit down and watch the six trip late.

Loved it.

Yeah about the all black woman uh squadron battalion troop. But if you call it unit in the army.

Yeah, in the army in World War Two who actually made the mail work again? Right? They Yeah, they were charged with, you know, distributing millions of pieces of.

Male and the string the morale of the troops, and.

They took it very seriously and creatively and did an amazing job inside of what was it nine months?

Yeah, Yeah, great movie. It was the first Tyler Perry movie that like I thoroughly enjoyed from beginning to end and didn't have any harsh criticisms.

For Carrie Washington was brilliant.

Yeah, that was a different role for her.

Having the Obsidian was brilliant. Blackest name ever true, like Onyx is her middle name. God damn, I'm kidding, but right now then she would be e oh oh but no.

It was great and that it's historic. It was a Tyler Perry film where the women weren't victims. I know, right, nobody got cheated on, nobody got a's.

Maybe he consulted with an actual woman.

Well that's the thing. He actually like, consulted with the real people. And so there was no room for him to take his usual artistic license. And because it's Tyler Perry and he was spending Tyler Perry money, it's good. It was given the scope that the story deserves.

It's a really good movie. It's worth watching. It's on Netflix right now.

I agree. And then after we watched that, we were on our I Love Black Women kick Well. The next thing we put on was the movie about Whitney Houston, where Deborah Cox played Whitney Houston. I wanted you to see that because you were unfamiliar with Deborah Cox, and I had said when I heard that Deborah Cox is going to be playing Whitney Houston, I immediately was like, Okay, she got this because Deborah Cox has that voice. She has one of the best voices of our generation. We

I mean the Bobby Brown fan club that birth this movie.

Right that you know, she didn't have a girlfriend. She had a best friend.

Mm hmmm yeah, Robin, Yeah that was that.

Was not her friend, that was her friend.

No, my understanding, right, But you know.

And once we realized that that's what we were doing, we were like, yeah, if we're going to watch the Whitney movie, let's watch the one where they actually agmit that Whitney was queer.

Yeah, that'd be nice. So yeah, yeah, this one was you know, kudos to Deborah Cox.

She did that.

I mean she did, but it was like, I don't know, like she ain't right it. No, we didn't watch the whole thing, right. And then because I'm just yeah, really terse lately about quick representation film, I'm down with that.

And then because we went from black women to musical black women, Amazon Prime was like, oh, you like black people, you like music, you like black music. Here here's the Temptations mini series from nineteen ninety six that I personally never saw, even though you know, it was part of like it's a cornerstone of black culture, and like I know all the references, but I never actually saw it when it aired, right, like you know, I was, I said, right along with the actor, even though I hadn't seen

It was entertainment. You know, I love The Temptatione.

Thirty years late, but I finally saw the.

Temptation loved the Temptatione.

And we got to see the new comedy special from Michelle Buteau. It's a Butteau full life. Yes, she's so goddamn funny.

She is funny. I love that she you know, went after Dave Chappelle. Yeah, and stayed funny while she did it, but very much on point, very much, you know, mocked him and his obsession with punching down and attacking our community, and she said it's unsafe, which it is right, it is dangerous.

And the overall point of her of her bringing him up was talking about how it is possible to talk about a community and make it funny and not hateful. And she was like, see how that's possible. Can somebody go tell Dave Chappelle that? And she said, you know, he's the goat, assuming that goat means going on about trans people.

It can be right, going on about trans people. It can be done. We can tell jokes and stories and not disparage a whole community. We can do that. We can make it funny. We just have to work at it right. So, if you guys ever run into Dave Chappelle, can you let him know that shit? I don't think he knows that shit. I don't think we'll ever run into Dave though, because he is the goat. Uh, And he's the goat if that means going off about trans.

People, going off about transit.

She later remarked on his jokes not being funny but actually being dangerous. Make it funny, that's all. I can't believe somebody would make millions and millions of dollars from making people feel unsafe.

That is so wild to me. Mm hmm. And what's especially cool about that special and that performance, Well, first of all, she's made history, her history as being the first woman comedian to have her own solo special at Radio City Music Hall, which I didn't realize. And it's interesting that she made this commentary about Dave Chappelle and the danger of him using his platform to spread such

I remember traceless that saying of Dave Chappelle. So at this point, it's giving client. I don't know what doll hurt Dave Chappelle, I really don't, but it's giving disgruntled client.

It's giving anger trick, angry trick.

It's giving He wanted to kiss on the mouth and she was like, no, I don't do that. I up charge for that. If you want to do that, you got to give me x y Z And he's like, oh no, ma'am. And his ego was bruised time, so he went on a rampage. It's giving angry trick?

Am I lying? Dolls? Am I lying? Oh my god?

Who goes on to make three specials, The Ray Comedy Specials about the dolls because you can't take get him some help I loved that.

I did not lost her for that because I gave her a shout out for that and she liked.

It good because it's insane. Yeah, it is insane. The obsession is insane.

Yeah.

And it's not funny, pathological, it's really not funny, especially at this point in history. And you know, I loved what Michelle did, no notes. I mean, first of all, she is funny. She's a funny bitch, she is, and good say it, keep saying it. Yep. Comedy doesn't have to be that. I mean, how many comedians we know comedians who have said similar Like, if you're saying you're not allowed to say anything anymore, maybe examine what it is you're trying to say. Right, maybe you never had

Par Maybe you were just lazy. And you know, we live in a culture that rewards mediocrity. Everything about that. Of course you didn't because you're mediocre and you failed up and you thought you won.

Whatever happened to us, do no harm, you know what I mean? Like that, just just that concept because punching down isn't funny. There's so much to punch up about, and that's just it. I mean, you know, when you look back at Dave Chappelle's work, I mean, brilliant, brilliant take on racism in America.

Why stay in your lane?

Not mine, right, because now you're just being hurtful and Tracey's that was right, And I've gotten.

With people when they try to say that, like, you know, people didn't used to be so sensitive back in the day, and you can make these jokes and it was funny. It's like no, no, no, no, it was shitty then. Yeah, we just didn't have a comment section because like I was watching this docu series about Andrew Dice Clay and you know, people saying, oh, people thought that was funny. Back in the day, there were plenty of non white people and non straight people who were vocal about their

So and y'all are not the ones that have the comedians we do. We've had to be funny because we've been dealing with you all our lives.

Anyway, So yeah, so that was good. And I had been I had been saying for weeks that I wanted you to start watching The Penguin.

Two episodes or three. I think we watched three. We watched three. Yeah, I gotta keep going. I can't believe that is Colin Farrell. I still can't believe That's like I'm trying to see him in there and I'm just not saying, so wow.

Yeah, and like I've started watching it.

That's hard to believe. We couldn't find an unattractive heavy man. But anyway, anyway, Wow, we had we had to make up Colin Farrell and put him in a pat suit.

But okay, right, but you know, I was about six episodes in and I was like, I will start over for you. Yeah, that's how good I think it is, and how I much I think you will like it. It is good.

I'm enjoying it.

Yeah, because it's not like a cartoon. It's not a cartoon move, even though it's based in the Batman world, right, you know, it's really about a gangster trying to like make his way, and you know, I think it's very cool.

I feel like he's giving hints of Tony Soprano in his portrayal so far.

And I also enjoy how like much of the cast are folks who like came to prominence in other HBO series.

So yeah, we're seeing a lot of yeah, actress who were in different things and or American horror story and or not one of them. Yeah, because the dude that was in Carnival, I think, yes, because we watched we started watching it with your sister when she was visiting.

Let's yes, probably watch a couple episodes tonight.

Before I go to bed. Maybe that could happen. Yeah, so we had a little time for television. Yeah, amazingly enough. Back to work tomorrow for me, tonight tonight for you? I have work. I have to get finished. Yeah today, that's true before I go to work tomorrow. Because busy girl. Yes you are.

Did we get everything?

I don't know?

Oh? You know what we didn't do?

Podcast business?

Yeah?

Okay, we'll do that all right.

If you haven't already, why don't you swing on by Apple Podcasts or good Pods or wherever you enjoy our show and leave us a review or a rating, or hit that subscribe button five stars and more. Please follow us on social at Full Circle the Pod on Instagram and threads at Full Circle of the Podcast on TikTok. You can follow Martha at I'm Martha Madrigal Everywhere. Her writing can be found at i Ammarthamadrigal dot WordPress dot com, i am at Never Stirred Everywhere, or you can just

Feel about it?

Hey, do good?

Yeah, I'm not sure. I'm not sure I had much of a point. You know, as we get closer to the inauguration, just like whatever, I guess, you know, we've got to keep doing what we do. We've got to keep you know, building community and trying to make smart decisions, and I hope standing together and checking in on folks because a lot of folks are not okay right now, and this is true. Let's do our best to stand

Yes, what else we got? Those are good things.

Those are all good things because we just don't really know where this goes, and we don't know. Hopefully our courts hold once again, hopefully we have some checks and balances, and hopefully that hopefully they eat their own, which is something they're very good at.

This is true.

I just hate that we're all so good at it. So maybe we could knock some of that shit off for a while and focus, right, I'd like that.

That'd be good.

There's my wish for the new year. People, focus, focus, focus.

I'm down.

Yeah, all right, yeah, I don't think I have anything left. Okay, you know, well, well we will endeavor to do this next weekend as well.

I'm down.

In the meantime, you've been listening to Full Circle the podcast. I'm your host Martha Madrigal and.

I am Charles Tyson Junior.

And thank you for listening and sticking with us. And if any of you know someone famous, never mind, we didn't, did we mention? We finally hit ten thousand downloads? We did? We hit that number.

We did, Thank you, finally, thank you.

That's not per episode, that's per lifetime, but still right, it's a thing. It is, and we have we have a whole lot of hours and in the in the tank.

Yeah. So if you're a new listener, feel free to go back and listen to some of the older ones. There's some good stuff there. If you've been with us the entire time, thank you so.

Much, and yeah, we look forward to.

Having fresh stuff for you in the future.

I like to believe our voices are more important than ever. Yeah, because I think they are.

That's right.

Yeah, So find somebody with money and send them our with you. Thank you so much for listening, and have a great week.

Bye everyone. Full Circle is a Never Scured Productions podcast posted by Charles Tyson Junior and Mark the Madrigal, Produced and edited by Never Scured Executive. Produced by Charles Tyson Junior and Mark the Madrigal. Our theme in music is by the jingle Beerris. All names, pictures, music, audio, and video clips are registered trademarks and or copyrights of their respective copyright holders.