Queer Voices
Queer Voices
5/1/24 Queer Voices - Poonam Kapoor, Molly Cook, cast of ACES, and Mike & Kyle of GAY-ISH
Discover the vibrant spirit of community and activism as we converse with Poonam Kapoor from the Victory Fund about the exhilarating Sunday Funday event, celebrating and bolstering LGBTQ candidates. We're also joined by Texas Senate hopeful Molly Cook, as she passionately discusses the interplay of social issues from school safety to racial justice. Plus, we take a theatrical detour with the imaginative play 'Aces' and delve into the evolution of 'queer' with Mike Johnson and Kyle Goetz of the Gayish Podcast, revealing how this term shapes identity and experience.
My own journey into politics has been driven by an unyielding resolve to ignite change in Austin, anchored by my history of community involvement and legislative accomplishments. I detail the intricate dance of the Texas Two-Step election process, share the impact of local endorsements, and reaffirm my commitment to environmental justice and disability rights. The deeply personal and widely resonant topic of reproductive rights is also at the heart of our discourse, emphasizing the urgency for collective action.
As Queer Voices evolves into a home-produced podcast, we ensure the essence of our show remains accessible across platforms. Frequent contributors Andrew Edmondson and Deborah Moncrief-Bell join the fold, and we introduce the News Wrap segment from This Way Out. While maintaining political neutrality, we present unfiltered opinions from our guests and their organizations. And just for kicks, we offer a quirky reminder about podcast usage – all part of another compelling chapter of Queer Voices that's sure to engage your heart and mind.
Queer Voices airs in Houston Texas on 90.1FM KPFT and is heard as a podcast here. Queer Voices hopes to entertain as well as illuminate LGBTQ issues in Houston and beyond. Check out our socials at:
https://www.facebook.com/QueerVoicesKPFT/ and
https://www.instagram.com/queervoices90.1kpft/
Hello everybody. This is Queer Voices, a home-produced podcast that has grown out of a radio show that's been on the air in Houston, texas, for several decades. This week, brian Levinka talks with Poonam Kapoor of the Victory Fund about their Sunday Fun Day fundraising event on May 19th. Then Brian interviews Molly Cook event on May 19th. Then Brian interviews Molly Cook. Molly is running for the Texas Senate in District 15 in the special election May 4th and the runoff election on May 28th.
Speaker 2:Folks understand that you can't talk about one issue without talking about every issue. You can't talk about school safety without talking about common sense firearm rooms. You can't talk about school safety without talking about common sense firearm rooms. You can't talk about maternal mortality without talking about racial justice, and our district understands that.
Speaker 1:Next, Brian interviews the writer and cast members about the play Aces, which has a limited run at Match Theater until May 5th.
Speaker 3:It's based in history, but what you're watching on stage is not factual. It's something fun and unique and the imagination of Davis brought to life on this stage, and it's everything that you would imagine. Five queens reunited after 30 years would be.
Speaker 1:Brett Cullum talks with Mike Johnson and Kyle Goetz from the Gayish Podcast based out of Seattle. Kyle Goetz from the Gayish Podcast based out of Seattle. They're going to discuss the word queer, what it means and where it came from. Speaking of which Queer Voices starts now.
Speaker 4:This is Brian Levinka, and today I'm speaking with Poonam Kapoor from the Victory Fund Victory in Houston Committee to put on the Victory Fund Sunday Funday. Welcome to the show, poonam.
Speaker 5:Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 4:What is this event that you're putting on and how is it helping out the community?
Speaker 5:It's an annual fundraiser and it is on Sunday, may 19th, 2024, from 2 to 5 at the Revere, and really it is an opportunity for our community to come together to network and socialize and to celebrate Victory Fund and its many achievements. Victory Fund is an LGBTQ organization that helps to identify, endorse and elect LGBTQ candidates up and down the ballot. We are really excited for having our first fun day, as opposed to a more sit-down formal brunch, which is what we've done in the past, and to celebrate many victories of this past year.
Speaker 4:Talk about how this year is going to be different, with the fun day. Sunday fun day.
Speaker 5:We're still going to have the unlimited champagne and delicious food throughout the event, but we have spread out seating that allows for more dynamic conversations, more time for people to mingle and connect. We realized in last year's fundraiser slash brunch that folks just really love being together. We need more togetherness, especially in times like this where we have so many anti-LGBTQ bills already in the first quarter of the year more than last year in total. So we're ditching the stuffy brunch and we're bracing a fun-filled Sunday experience. One of the highlights of this year that makes it different from previous years, too, is that we are going to be honoring Mayor Anise Parker's seven years with victory, as she will be stepping down as president and CEO after this year.
Speaker 4:How are we going to honor Anise Parker?
Speaker 5:Some of it is a surprise, brian. I can't tell you everything, but we definitely want her friends and supporters and allies to come and acknowledge her activism, leadership and championing for our LGBTQ rights. So we want everyone to come out and celebrate her, in addition to the others that we'll be honoring and recognizing at the event.
Speaker 4:Can you talk about some of the victories that Victory Fund has had and how does the Victory Fund work?
Speaker 5:The Victory Fund is a national LGBTQ organization. We also have the Victory Institute, which is a little different, but it is a political action committee. Together we work together to help identify LGBTQ candidates that may want to run for office, help to endorse them, and so they have to prove viability and they also have to be completely out as an LGBTQ person. They also have to be pro-reproductive rights and then from there, once we determine that viability, we help to raise funds for them. We help to provide consultation and communication support, and it means a lot, because it's hard enough to run for office. But being an LGBTQ candidate running for office means you have a target on your head. With so many anti-LGBTQ bills, it's not always that they can just stick to policy without being personally attacked. And when many of them are trying to create an inclusive environment for everyone, especially having had that experience of being marginalized themselves, it makes it even more challenging and difficult to be in a space that may not be welcoming.
Speaker 4:Can you talk about spotlight candidates, what they are and who are some of the spotlight candidates?
Speaker 5:In Houston, specifically, we have two spotlight candidates that made it to the runoff for their Democrats. Even though we're a bipartisan organization, these two happen to be Democrats and they're in the runoffs from their primaries, so their opponents are Democrats, but what really stands them apart is their pro-LGBTQ stance, along with their willingness to work so hard for everyone. One of them is Molly Cook. She is running for Senate District 15. And then the other person is Lauren Ashley Simmons, who's running as state rep for 146. So they're really, really amazing people. Great work that they've done grassroots organizing, again, very inclusive of everyone, and going across a range of topics that they support, whether it be gender affirming, care, multimodal transportation, healthcare, inequities the list goes on and on. These are two very, very smart people that we are hoping to help elect and, if so, at least with Molly Koch, she would be the first Texas LGBTQ senator elected.
Speaker 4:How did you get involved with the Victory Fund?
Speaker 5:They say don't get mad, get elected. So while I'm not interested in running for office, I'm very interested in helping, support those who are willing to do that hard work day in, day out to really fight the good fight for all of us. I didn't want to sit by the sidelines and not contribute some of my time and resources.
Speaker 4:Tell me about the Revere. What is it? Where is it? What is it like? Tell us about that.
Speaker 5:It's in Houston. It's a very sleek, elegant event space that we're really going to transform. It's almost like a blank canvas that we get to transform into a fun day environment, with the seating being cool and classy and the event space being spread out enough to where people can mingle, but where everyone still has a good seat. It's going to be a fun place where people can take group photos, they can have side conversations, can take group photos, they can have side conversations, they can enjoy our emcee drag queen Persephone on the mic, along with our DJ, rockabye on the turntables.
Speaker 4:I read something about candidate corners. Can you talk about that?
Speaker 5:That is also something we're working towards. We haven't finalized the details on that, but I think, ultimately, what we're trying to do is give folks more exposure to our candidates. I think, ultimately, what we're trying to do is give folks and come to our events. We want people to feel close to one another and their elected officials.
Speaker 4:Can you talk about some of the speakers that will be at the event?
Speaker 5:We definitely will have Mayor Parker speaking. We will be honoring Judge Phyllis Fry as a recipient of the Anise Parker Leadership Award. We will also be having a Houston City Council member who was very recently elected and endorsed by Victory, mario Castillo. We'll also be hosting a former congressman who's also a candidate running again for Congress Mondaire Jones from New York. Those are a few names that will be speaking on stage.
Speaker 4:Tell us more of the details of the event. When is it coming up, where is it going to be and where can people get information about tickets?
Speaker 5:You can just Google Victory Fund Houston and you'll see. Our theme this year is Democracy in Action, and because it's a fun day, we want you to dress your best. I plan to be wearing a rainbow dress with cute frills and silver boots. It's on Sunday, may 19th, from 2 to 5 at the Riviera, and all that information can be found at victoryfundorg backslash Houston. Even if you're just interested in coming to volunteer, we would love that as well. So just go to the website, check out the information. You'll see some contact name and email.
Speaker 4:You mentioned volunteers. Can you talk about that and what the requirements are to be a volunteer?
Speaker 5:We'll have a simple orientation, but for the most part, the volunteer requirements are that you volunteer from 12 to 4. It could be a number of different things that help support setup or activities during the event, and then post-event Valet is included. You'll also have food to enjoy and, just in general, you'll be supporting the community and ensuring a smooth and successful event.
Speaker 4:Is there anything I didn't ask you that you want our listeners to know?
Speaker 5:I just think coming out and supporting this organization is putting your money where your values are and being together in community and acknowledging all the hard work that our community does to keep one another safe and included and represented. And again, it's a fun day. So, while there might be lots of things not going right in the world, it's an opportunity to celebrate what is going right and working towards keeping things moving in a positive direction for our community, towards keeping things moving in a positive direction for our community.
Speaker 4:We've been speaking with Poonam Kapoor about the upcoming Victory Fund Fun Day happening on May 19th. For more information, go to victoryfundorg slash Houston. Thank you for coming on, Poonam. Thank you so much for having me. This is Queer Voices.
Speaker 6:This radio program, queer Voices, has existed since the 1970s on KPFT. We have this little crew of folks working every week to produce what's no longer unique because we're almost mainstream now, but we're still an important voice that might not otherwise get heard because it's not on that many places. So KPFT is very important to give voices to those who might not otherwise have voices. So, as Glenn always says, you participate by listening. You should also participate by supporting the station by listening. You should also participate by supporting this station. So please go to kpftorg and make your donation right away.
Speaker 4:This is Brian Levinka, and today I'm interviewing Molly Cook, who's running for State Senate District 15. Molly, who are you and why are you running for office?
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, brian. I am Molly Cook I use she her pronouns. I am an emergency room nurse, medical professional and a community organizer and I am running for Texas Senate District 15 to champion public health and public safety for all Texans.
Speaker 4:Why run now?
Speaker 2:I get that question a lot and I'm running now because I'm alive right now, and now is always the time for young people, for medical professionals, for members of the LGBTQ plus community to get out there and be leaders and shape the change that's happening around us. But in Texas, we are particularly in a moment of crisis when it comes to a lot of the public health outcomes and values that we cherish. So we need people to stand up now and take a stand for what's right in our state.
Speaker 4:Talk about some of the challenges that you're referring to.
Speaker 2:Texas unfortunately ranks pretty low for most public health outcomes, most quality of life outcomes that we measure frankly. And, as you know, the trans community, the LGBTQ plus community at large, has been under a direct and violent attack. People do not have access to the health care that they need and deserve. Doctors cannot practice freely in this state, cannot provide data-driven or evidence-based care, and for so many people. You know, 15% of the district lives in poverty right now and there are not services and systems that can act as safety nets or uplift the communities who need them the most. So it's time for the state to change course and to invest in public goods and public services that will make a meaningful difference, no matter which community you're in.
Speaker 4:So talk about your district. Where is it and where does it cover?
Speaker 2:Our district is entirely in Harris County. It is absolutely amazing. It's really diverse. It's shaped like a horseshoe. That kind of starts in the southwest corner of Bel Air, meyerland West U. It includes all of Montrose and the Heights. It includes Independence Heights Acres, holmes and Wood Garden Oaks, oak Forest, parts of Spring Branch, all the way up to nearly Jersey Village. It has the airport and Aldine, a little bit of Humboldt and then on the east side we even have Sheldon and Pleasantville. So it is just a really cool, diverse historic district, and I mean diverse in every single sense of the word, what folks say at the door, differences in life experiences, racial diversity, income diversity, however you measure it.
Speaker 4:I've gotten several knock on my doors from the Molly Cooks campaign. Can you talk about knocking on doors and what you've heard out in the field?
Speaker 2:Absolutely that's my favorite thing to talk about is knocking on doors.
Speaker 2:I am really proud to have been knocking on doors in this district for years, long before I even knew that I was running for it as a part of my work with a team of volunteers, a grassroots organization, to stop TxDOT from widening I-45 and instead invest in multimodal transportation solutions and a project that really meets people's needs and centers racial justice, environmental justice and safety.
Speaker 2:So I've had the distinct pleasure of knocking on doors in this district for a really, really long time and what I have found over and over again is that when you show up repeatedly, when you bring good information, when you follow through on promises, you really start to build a reputation and earn trust in these neighborhoods and folks are comfortable relying on you for credible information and for ways to plug into these fights that are affecting them and affecting the change in their backyards. So we are very committed on this campaign, not just because it is strategically the right decision, but because ethically it is the right decision to reaching people at their doorsteps in the language that they prefer, repeatedly, so that they know what's happening in your democratic process, how can you be a part of it and where do you need to go to make your voices heard?
Speaker 4:Talk about working in Austin. What will you do on day one to make a difference?
Speaker 2:I'm going to pick up right where I've left off after the last session. So after I primary the previous senator in 2022 and got 42 percent of the vote, I had to turn around and figure out what comes next, and what I kept hearing from neighborhoods and communities across our district is that folks show up when they want your vote and then they don't show up again. So I said, well, I'm going to show up again. So I helped run a charter amendment campaign, worked at the bedside, etc. But I had pleasure of running a legislative pilot program for our district and administered a survey in two languages and got back about 90 responses and worked with those folks throughout the session to create a bill tracker that reflects the values of the district.
Speaker 2:We followed bills together. We traveled back and forth to Austin, helped folks develop comments on policies that affect them. Some people gave their first ever public comments and we worked on issues that affect you know the rights of children to be and express, membership in the LGBTQ plus community and the rights of researchers to research that and understand it. We champion environmental justice issues. During the Texas Commission for Environmental Quality sunset review process, we worked on a transportation portfolio, worked on advocating for bills about disability justice. I mean, you name it right.
Speaker 2:The Texas landscape can be very discouraging, but what I found in our district is that folks understand that you can't talk about one issue without talking about every issue. You can't talk about school safety without talking about common sense firearm reference. You can't talk about maternal mortality without talking about racial justice and our district understands that. That came through in the survey and it came to work that we did. So we'll pick right back up where we left off, be ready to file some bills day one that I know the district supports and wants and continue to make the Capitol accessible to every single person who wants to help shape that change.
Speaker 4:So talk to me about the endorsements that you received.
Speaker 2:I am so proud Thank you for asking that of our list of endorsements. We have a pretty strong list of local endorsements, including groups like the Houston LGBTQ Plus Political Caucus. We got Greater Heights Dems, which is really exciting Harris County Young Democrats I'm very proud to be really leading the charge here on helping to turn out young voters and engage young voters, and, of course, you can see a list of all of them on mollyfortexascom and most recently earned the Leaders. We Deserve endorsement and I'm very, very proud of that one. David Hogg is an incredible leader in our nation for not just firearm safety reforms, but also for young people getting elected and beginning to really take our place in our political landscape nationally. So, yeah, very proud. And then, of course, a list of elected officials and community leaders and precinct chairs are on our website as well.
Speaker 4:What have you learned during this campaign?
Speaker 2:Every single moment of any campaign is a learning process, which is very exciting. I mean you learn from people when you knock on their doors. You learn from folks when you show up to these hearings and hear testimony, learn from organizations as they sit and meet with you and energy that folks want to invest in organizing more Democrats are in office and until Democrats are in office in the highest offices in this state and I am seeing a lot of energy from the issue organizing side of things, where I come from, as well as the electoral side of things, where I've been spending the last few years and folks are ready. Folks are ready to knock on doors, to make those phone calls and to get this information and education out to their communities to make sure that people are turning out to vote, and that's been kind of the biggest swell of energy that I've seen during this round of campaigning.
Speaker 4:Speaking of vote. We have what's called the Texas Two-Step. Can you tell me about that?
Speaker 2:Yes, the Texas Two-Step is the combination of special election and runoff election that it will take to ultimately fill this seat. So my race we have a special election on May 4th and a runoff election on May 28th. There is early voting for both. If you ordered your vote by mail ballot for the primary, you will automatically get it for the next two races. The special election on May 4th and early voting is April 22nd through April 30th will fill this seat for the remainder of the term, meaning then Senator now Mayor Whitmire left the seat open and it is open through the end of 2024, unless we have this special election to fill it.
Speaker 2:So whoever wins on May 4th will be the senator elect or the senator for the remainder of 2024. Senator-elect or the senator for the remainder of 2024. And then we have to turn around right away and run in the runoff election which will determine who is a senator for the next four-year term that starts January of 2025. I just really don't know how to do something halfway. It's just not my nature and we are going full bore for both races and planning to win both races the special election May 4th and the runoff on May 12th.
Speaker 4:Can you talk about the reproductive issue in Texas and what will go from here?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, as a woman, as a nurse who has had an abortion in this state, there is just hardly anything else that's more personal to me and more important to me.
Speaker 2:And what is sad and terrifying but also exciting to me is every single door that I knock on.
Speaker 2:That is a number one issue and I don't care who it is at that door, what their gender is or what their lived experience is. Getting abortion rights and reproductive justice and bodily autonomy back in Texas is a huge priority for Democratic voters in Texas Senate District 15. And we have a total abortion ban and we're seeing that sort of draconian policy play out among every kind of community. So of course, black and brown communities will pay a higher price than anybody else when it comes to a loss of rights to safe and legal and stigma-free abortions. Of course we see horrible consequences playing out for the LGBTQ plus community, whether that's trans children not being able to access you know evidence-based and data-driven care or folks who need it not being able to access an abortion regardless of their gender. So that is a number one priority for me, it's a number one priority for our district and I think it's going to be a real opportunity to build the grassroots power that we need in Texas to flip those seats and make real change around public health and public safety issues.
Speaker 4:Where can people find out more information about your campaign, Molly?
Speaker 2:Everyone can always go to our website. It's mollyfortexascom, all spelled out. And then our social media is at Molly for Texas, across Twitter, TikTok, Facebook and Instagram, and I always tell folks. If you're just kind of curious, who am I, what have I been up to for the last few years, Go check out the Instagram. It really is sort of a repository of a lot of the work that I've been doing with different groups across town specifically associated with the campaign but also with the issue organizing spaces that I've been grateful to be a part of. So mollyfortexascom and at mollyfortexas across social media.
Speaker 4:Is there anything that I did not ask that you want our listeners to know?
Speaker 2:It's really exciting and important to note. Not that it's absolutely everything, but I would be the first woman in this seat and the first out member of the Texas Senate ever, and that is the kind of change that we're looking for. That is the kind of change that we need in Texas to lift up the next generation and start being able to be proactive about the changes that we want to see. Stop playing defense and get out there and make Texas the Texas we know it can be.
Speaker 4:We're speaking to Molly Cook, a candidate for State Senate, district 15. And for more information, go to mollyfortexascom. Thank you, molly.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:This is Queer Voices.
Speaker 4:This is Brian Levinka, and today I'm talking with Davis Gordon Gilbert about an upcoming event called ACES. Joining him is Nora, kelly, amy and Lisa, who we're going to find out who they are and what this is all about. So, davis, take it away. What is ACES?
Speaker 7:As a young gay boy growing up in Port Lavaca, I loved pageants and I'd rather watch pageants than fishing and especially hunting. And we always hoped that Miss Texas would win, and she didn't really happen all that much. But in 1977, kim Tomes won and I was very excited and so then I was hooked forever for a Miss Texas to continue winning. Well, that didn't happen until 1985. Well, in 1985, miss Texas won and then she crowned 1986 a Miss Texas, in 1987 a Miss Texas, in 1988 a Miss Texas and 1989 in Miss Texas.
Speaker 7:So that was just remarkable accomplishment that I thought that these young ladies, who are all of 22 years old, managed to do in five years with each one. And the ladies went through an amazing amount of to get to this part where they were number one in almost every single category, and they were. And so the reason I wrote ACEs is I want to know about the accomplishments of these five ladies and how much I respect them and how much I think that people really should know about these accomplishments, and I think it should be part of Texas history, if not part of Texas women's history.
Speaker 4:So let's meet these ladies. We're starting off with Nora Hahn. Who are you and tell us about yourself.
Speaker 8:Well, hello everyone, I'm Nora Hahn. I've been acting in Houston for almost 20 years. As a matter of fact, it was about a year ago. I was doing a production of Steel Magnolias I've graduated from Malin to Clery and this man came up to me after the performance and gave me this little card and said hey, I've written a play about five Miss Texas USAs would love to see you audition for it. And I was like, who is this guy? I got to check him out, I got to Google him up, and so I did, and I read more about the story and then he sent me the script, kind of on the side, and it just sounded so fascinating and fun. What he didn't say is that it's about these women 35 years in the future, when they get back together for a little talk show to allow the people of Texas to get to know him, because nobody really remembers them anymore. It was just such a fun story and so we met and it's just wonderful a year later to see this come to life.
Speaker 4:Next up is Kelly Wuer.
Speaker 9:I am Kelly. I play Gretchen. She's actually the last to be crowned. She was crowned in 1989. I am kind of the baby of the group, which is a lot of fun. I've been acting on and off since I was a kid. I'm from Columbus, ohio, so I was acting there. I moved here. I had two small kids when I moved here, so I didn't do a lot of acting for a while, but I'm getting back into it and I'm loving it and this has been a great experience. It's been a lot of fun.
Speaker 4:Next up we have Amy Millen.
Speaker 3:I am Amy Millen or Amy Gustin Millen either way, I do play Michelle Royer in the play in Aces. She was Miss Texas and Miss USA in 1987. I'm a fairly recent transplant to Houston. My husband and I moved here from the Hudson Valley area of New York just a little over a year and a half ago, but getting involved in theater was top priority for me when we got down here, so I searched out theaters and started getting involved in the community right away. I saw the posting for Aces on a Facebook group and, as a slightly more mature actress, sometimes good roles are a little harder to come by and I thought, ooh, this looks like a really fun project and an opportunity for some amazing women to get together and create some good times and fun art together, and I'm really excited to be a part of it.
Speaker 4:And finally we have Lisa Cahoon.
Speaker 10:Brian, thank you, and Deborah thanks for having us on the show today. I am a presentation coach here in the Houston area and also I'm an actor in Houston. I play Courtney Gibbs, miss 1988. And this has really been a fun adventure. To start out, the day I came to the match to audition I looked down the hallway of the match or the foyer, and I looked down there and Davis's face was just glowing. And I had seen him on social media but I could see his face just glowing. He was so excited so to walk, but I could see his face just glowing. He was so excited so to walk up to him and see that he was so excited to tell this story. It has made it a lot more fun, I think, for all of us as a team.
Speaker 4:We have a theory on our show that all theater is gay. How is this theater show gay Davis?
Speaker 7:Well, it's gay in that most all gay boys grew up watching pageants and I think, just for the beautiful women and dresses and the pageantry, which was amazing. But what I love about Show Aces is the competition and the energy that these ladies put into being the best of the best of the best, because they kept wanting to win and you know that's pretty hard when you're competing against 50 other women, 22 years old. It's very subjective with the judges and these ladies just did the best they could in everything. They just accomplished the incredible.
Speaker 4:What did you learn about writing this? What did you learn?
Speaker 7:incredible. What did you learn about writing this? What did you learn? I learned about them? That there are some tragic things that happened in their lives some when they were younger, some when they were in middle school and some when they were older and that these women were able to overcome these some of them were actually horrible things that happened to them and not only go forward with life, but have this most amazing life because of what happened to them, and I think that's just an amazing story also now we're missing one uh, can you tell me about her?
Speaker 7:okay, so laura martinez herring, she was the first one and she was the first hispanic and naturalized american to ever win Miss Texas, usa and Miss USA. And then she had a very good career in Hollywood for a while. She was in Mulholland Drive, was in another movie called the Forbidden Dance. Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful actors.
Speaker 9:And Christy.
Speaker 7:And Christy. Christy, she's one of my favorites. She actually was not from Texas, but she represented Texas in a very nice way. She has a very oh gosh what is the term? Deep and disappointing memory. I don't know. I forget that. She just doesn't want to talk about right now most of the show.
Speaker 4:Can you talk about some of the bad experiences these contestants had and talk about the research that you did?
Speaker 7:There's so much research. When you find out about these five ladies, I don't think it'll be hard to tell you, because she said it herself Laura Martinez, elena Herring. When she was 12 years old, she was shot in the head in a drive, almost died if there had been one closer or farther away from the temple. When she was in the hospital she had this end of her guardian angel coming to see her and she thought that she died. And her guardian angel reassured her that not gonna die and I'm gonna griff you rest of your life. And laura has carried that mantra with her everything that she's done. So she never goes into any experience being afraid, because she knows that that guardian angel saw is going to be with her for the rest of her life, which I think okay, I'm going to go through now and ask you the same question.
Speaker 4:All of the cast members why should people go see the show?
Speaker 8:nora, you're up it's just so fun to learn about these women and their stories and see how they might have related to each other. You know they all knew each other because each one had to successively crown the next one. And although this television show that they're appearing in is fictitious, it's fun to see how their lives are very real. But in the end their desire to find the next Miss Texas USA and possibly the next Miss Universe kind of unites them. And taking all of this great learning that they had with these two coaches who were just iconic in pageant history they all had these coaches and so to take that collective knowledge and then pool it into sort of the new kind of woman who really represents who women are today we're not just objects of beauty, there's so much more to us and to take those learnings and put them into this fictitious new Miss Texas USA it's just fun to see what they are.
Speaker 4:Same question to you, Kelly. Why should people go see the show?
Speaker 9:First of all, it's a lot of fun. We're having so much fun doing it and I hope the audience enjoys it as much as we do. We refer to ourselves often as a sisterhood and I think that really comes through. There's definitely some sibling-like relationships. We can kind of push each other's buttons, kind of poke at each other a little bit, but in the end we really do support each other very much and so I think that really comes through and that's a really sweet undercurrent to the show.
Speaker 4:Same question to you, Amy why should people go see this show?
Speaker 3:I like the idea or the fact that it is based in historical, factual occurrences. These are real people that we are bringing back to life on this stage as unique characters that we then have created out of what we've learned about them. So it's based in history, but what you're watching on stage is not factual. It's something fun and unique and the imagination of Davis brought to life on this stage and it's everything that you would imagine five queens reunited after 30 years would be. You know it's going to be. There's going to be cattiness. There's going to be, like Kelly said, you know there's a little poking, each other's pushing each other's buttons, um, but then also, like Nora said, the coming together and the unity and the warmth of of five lovely women and their souls coming together to um to do something productive and the final cast member, lisa.
Speaker 4:Why should people go see the show?
Speaker 10:First off, you're going to see the dynamic between all of us and we all have a lot of fun together, but there's always been a stigma behind women who are in pageants, or I believe there's been a stigma. They've been labeled and many times I think that we forget what they were trying to do was use the pageant as a stepping stone to step into a career, to go to the next level in a career in acting or in broadcasting or in modeling or any other many other careers. That wasn't recognized very often. It was a lot of times just about the bathing suit competition which we are not going to be having and, um, you know, and it's also. I had a friend actually asked that. I said no, there will be no bathing suit contest in this.
Speaker 10:But, also there's been that stigma of of that, that pageant women, they don't have a voice. Just like this, you know, just like your podcast, that many people who did not have a voice, and so this gives pageant women a voice, just like you're giving a voice to the, to the gay community of Houston and throughout the US.
Speaker 4:So, davis, we can't talk about ticket prices, but where can people get information on tickets for the show?
Speaker 7:Yes, absolutely. They can get ticket prices by going to matchorg clicking on the ACES link, and I just want everybody to know that men and women gowns and crowns are strongly encouraged.
Speaker 4:Interesting. It's running May 2nd through the 5th at Match, is that correct?
Speaker 7:That is correct. Thursday through Sunday. We have Thursday night, friday night, at 730. We have a Saturday matinee, which is two. Our Saturday night eight o'clock show is sold out, which we're very excited about, and then again we have a Sunday matinee at 2. So Sunday would be the greatest time to go to brunch. Have some mimosas, come see the show, have more mimosas and just have a really good time.
Speaker 4:Is there anything I didn't ask you that you want our listeners to know?
Speaker 7:I want the listeners to know that the accomplishments of these five ladies were so incredible. These ladies happened five times and I just want to introduce or re-encomplishments of these five ladies who were babies at the time. Their average age was 22. They did toss them over again and they have had very successful lives. They had daughters that had gone on also win state pageants, movie careers, and it's just. I think these ladies have not been given the due that they be given credit for We've been speaking with the cast of Aces written by Davis Gordon Gilbert.
Speaker 4:That included Nora Hahn, kelly Wuerr, amy Millen and Lisa Cahorn. Thank y'all for coming on.
Speaker 1:This is Queer Voices. Amy millen and lisa cawhorn. Thank y'all for coming on. This is queer voices I am brett cullum.
Speaker 11:Right now, I am joined by two guys who do a podcast in the pacific northwest. It's one of my personal favorites to listen to, and I am happy to welcome mike and kyle, the hosts of gay ish. Hi guys, I am totally fangirling right now, so excuse me, but welcome to Queer Voices, thanks for having us.
Speaker 12:Thanks for having us. Yeah, it's great to be here and don't worry, we put our pants on the same as everybody else.
Speaker 11:All right, I may ask for a demonstration later, but okay, so I brought you on to address a specific problem that we have, but first I wanted to find out about you guys, because I get the chance to talk to you. So, gay-ish, how did you get that title?
Speaker 12:Well, so when we were starting the podcast, kyle and I sat down and, on a literal whiteboard, wrote out a bunch of ideas for the show's name, and I think the working title at one point was like Mike and Kyle talk to each other about stuff and explore what it means to be gayish or something. It's a horrendously long title, but the whole concept behind the podcast was just wanting to explore this idea that there's no wrong way to be gay, that gay culture isn't a monolith, that if you, as a gay man, don't feel like all of it applies to you, that doesn't invalidate you. I just wanted to explore gay stereotypes and really talk about what they mean and how they came to be, and and explore the feeling that he and I both had that that we were gay, ish, in a lot of ways do you ever notice that, like there's certain things that you think I'm not stereotypically gay this way?
Speaker 13:yeah, all the time there's always. We do a segment on a show every week called Gayest and Straightest, which is the stereotypically gayest and straightest thing about us that week, and so we're always finding things that are like this is what a straight dude would do right now. Why am I doing it and does that make me any less gay? And of course, the answer is no, it doesn't. But it's fun to explore kind of what those stereotypes are and how you what you fit and don't fit about them.
Speaker 11:So how did you?
Speaker 12:guys meet. I came out at 30, and I was looking for a way to meet gay people and I joined the employee resource group at Microsoft and Kyle had just, as a recent college grad, started working there and was on the board or membership team for GLEAN, which is Gay and Lesbian Employees at Microsoft, and that's how we met at a work event for queer Microsoft.
Speaker 11:And you, Mike, you were mentioning that you didn't come out till later. You were actually married to a woman at some point. Is that right?
Speaker 12:Yeah, I have an ex-wife and an ex-husband, so you know, pokemon, I did it, I caught them all, so you came out later.
Speaker 11:but Kyle, you actually came out a little bit younger. Yeah, I came out during college, when I was 19. Good age to do that, for sure.
Speaker 13:Yeah, it was the right time for me. I grew up in Houston, went to school in Austin, and being in Austin helps me show that there are lots of different kinds of people. It's a little bit more diversity of experience there that I could then kind of learn to be myself and learn who I was.
Speaker 11:So, kyle, your roots are actually here, locally in Houston.
Speaker 13:Yeah, I grew up in Katy.
Speaker 11:Okay, well, I'm really familiar with that. All right, okay, so what you guys do on Gayish a lot of times is you take a topic and you research the heck out of it and you come up with all this data and all of these interesting points and week to week it changes. Their topics are very varied. I don't think that they're always typically what I would think of two gay guys would talk about, although sometimes, like when you bring up Kylie Minogue, I'm like yeah, okay, that's pretty gay and that was probably the gayest thing I did that week listening to your podcast about Kylie Minogue.
Speaker 11:But this is why I brought you guys to Queer Voices here in Houston. You both did an episode about internalized homophobia. Mike and Kyle on Gayish talked about different things and different aspects of this, but one of the things you mentioned was that a lot of times we have this reaction to the word queer and we've been talking as a radio show and as a podcast that whenever we post on our personal Facebooks, twitter, linkedin, queer voices gets a lot of backlash over the choice of our title and calling ourselves queer. People really react to that negatively and you guys kind of talked about that. Do you recall kind of that conversation in the podcast or.
Speaker 12:Yeah, oh yeah, absolutely, absolutely, and I stand by the assessment that it's largely internalized homophobia. It's nuanced and you have to pick it apart, but I think that all of that angst, that's where it comes from.
Speaker 11:Well, I think it's notable that almost every word that we have for ourselves as a community whether you're lgbtqia or whatever letter you fall in it's people use these descriptions, and they were negative for a long time and they really have homophobic or transphobic origins just in general, like even the words we use to describe ourselves. How do you two define yourselves, like kyle? How do you define yours if you're gonna pick a letter?
Speaker 13:I always use gay and queer. Gay, I think, is the most like accurate. So if I had to just pick one, it would be gay, but yeah, usually gay and queer the the two words that I use because I feel like part of not feeling like you totally fit in with gay stereotypes is also like. Queer allows for a little bit of that uniqueness and difference in your experience. That may not align with exactly what every gay man has gone through.
Speaker 11:And Mike same thing, because we know a little bit about your history. So what do you kind of line up with?
Speaker 12:Yeah, also gay. I identify as gay, but I like the term queer as a umbrella term, right Like there's a lot of either alphabet soup, lgbtqia plus two, spirit, like all of all of that, and there's so many identities that are on the bubble between those things, and and queer is just a good shorthand term for all of them. So I identify as a member of the queer community, a part of the queer umbrella diaspora, and and my particular identity as a cis gay man.
Speaker 11:I always feel like queer saves time, I don't have to do the whole LGBTQIA2S++, all of these things. It just seems to get longer and longer and longer, and it's great because we're trying to include everybody, but at the same time, I like having an umbrella term and I like just having a shorthand. Hey, this is the queer community and this is a part that I am, and even though I identify mostly as a gay man, I've had experiences that weren't considered queer. I mean that's, and obviously you have.
Speaker 12:I mean, you have an ex-wife, yep absolutely, and I think there are so many attempts to divide the community these days by the political right in our country, and I think having a unifying term is really useful there too. Like it's important for us to remember that we're in the same boat as trans folks when it comes to fundamental rights. We're in the same boat as gender non-conforming folks in terms of just our right to exist, and I think having a term that we can use that is that shorthand that's easy to say and quick. It provides a sense of solidarity and community, if you think about it.
Speaker 13:And I think it helps. You know, if someone may not know a trans person, but if they know me, they know a queer person. And if we're all under the queer umbrella then it's like, okay, I know a queer person. So it adds a little bit of sense of familiarity and ability to kind of know queer people more individually if we all are part of that umbrella.
Speaker 11:I did a little research I was trying to get into my gayish mode of researching my topic and I realized that it says that it's uncertain really where queer came from. There's a debate of whether it's a Germanic word or if it was a Scottish term. But it somehow entered the English language probably by the early 16th century, and it was primarily used to mean strange, odd, peculiar, eccentric, somehow off center. But by the late 19th century it was being used colloquially to refer to same-sex attracted men, and actually the men themselves adopted that term first and used it as an identifier and then it kind of became a slur. And I know growing up I heard it as a slur a lot of times. I mean, there was always that game, you know, smear the queer and things like that. So did you guys grow up with that sense of the word or did you grow up with a more positive?
Speaker 12:I'm in my mid 40s and, at least my childhood, we played smear the queer on the football field and that was that was the word that got thrown around pejoratively. It's interesting, I think the people that push back the hardest against that word do seem to be like my age and older. There are exceptions to every rule, but, like the trend seems to be gay dudes in their fifties and sixties that seem to have the biggest problem with that word. I think that the positive connotation came later, so I don't know. Kyle, does that match your childhood experience?
Speaker 13:I did not hear the word queer thrown at me a whole lot. I heard other words that, like I remember distinctly being called fruity or gay.
Speaker 11:Like those you know I I got called other variations I think I got called everyone in the book, to be honest, and I'm probably closer to Mike's age, I would guess, but I definitely heard it a lot of different variations and used very pejoratively and things like that. In the 60s and 70s we saw more of a rise of queer culture and people trying to kind of get that term back, and I think most notably it was probably the 1980s and 90s when the queer nation used to use it as a chant we're here, we're queer, get used to it. It kind of became a badge of honor almost to call yourself that.
Speaker 13:Yeah, I think people don't realize that. They think it's a new thing to use the word queer and we are using it now as a umbrella term to describe the whole lgbt plus umbrella. But yeah, we've been using the word queer since the 90s with with queer nation, so it's not new that we're reclaiming this term.
Speaker 11:It's being we've been reclaiming it for a while yeah, and I think that it's more typical to like for gay men. I think gay means men a lot of times now. I don't think it's it used to be. I've talked to a lot of lesbians that tell me that there was a time before when gay kind of was an umbrella term, that now queer has kind of taken that place because lesbian came out and that was the start of the kind of branching out into these different groups and having.
Speaker 12:You may remember when ellen degeneres came out on her show it was because she leaned into a hot microphone and said I'm gay and at least in the 90s, at that time that was. That was, I think, less gendered term than it has become or not.
Speaker 11:Gay implies male and and lesbian it's the female equivalent well, one of the things that our listeners may not know is that this radio show it it has a 50-year history and when it was started it was definitely not called queer voices. We actually were called wild and and when it was started it was definitely not called Queer Voices. We actually were called Wild and Stein and it was for Oscar Wilde and Gertrude Stein and that was the identity of gay, lesbian type thing. And then it became Lesbian and Gay Voices. And then a man that's here that's an activist, jack Walensky.
Speaker 11:He was an executive producer of the show and in January of 2002, he decided that hey, I'm going to call this queer voices and they had a segment on the show which was very popular at the time, which was queer music heritage, hosted by JD Doyle. So they rebranded it back then. So it's been, it's been our title for about 24 years, but it's interesting that it causes such a controversy and then it's still such a thing. I wonder you guys are Pacific Northwest, you're Seattle, so what's your climate like? What do you feel like? Do you feel like that gay is accepted, queer is accepted? I imagine Seattle is a little bit more progressive than here in Texas.
Speaker 13:Yeah, it definitely feels more progressive than when I was in Texas. Then again, I was growing up and wrestling with my own internalized homophobia at the time, so yeah, it feels very accepted here. I think it's been. The most recent time where someone yelled a slur out their car at me was when I was traveling, so it's other places that I experienced more of the backlash than here in Seattle.
Speaker 11:And Mike, did you grow up in the Pacific Northwest or were you like Kyle and came there?
Speaker 12:I'm a lifelong Washingtonian. I only lived outside of washington state for three months and that was 25 years ago, but I grew up in eastern washington so I grew up in in the rural, agrarian, conservative part of the state it's.
Speaker 11:I grew up in trump country, even though it's only a two-hour drive from very, very liberal, liberal blue seattle well, I sometimes feel like I still am in trump country, but even though we're in Houston and we're solidly blue in the inner city, which that's typical right Like.
Speaker 12:we have this myth of the red state, blue state and, any way you slice it, we really are blue urban centers in a sea of red, and it's just a question of how urban is that state's populace.
Speaker 11:It's interesting. Texas politics really plays a lot to the outliers. The country vote houston, austin, dallas, blue in any election and it's really the wide expanse of country counties that really hold us hostage and beholden to this kind of red state mentality. So it's interesting and you guys are kind of flipped. I mean that's you're pretty much in blue country, except for those kind of outer things going on. I mean, how did you feel, kyle, when you came from Texas to the Pacific Northwest? What's the difference?
Speaker 13:I always felt like Austin was a good kind of training ground for me to experience, to get to a far more liberal city. Austin helped me like I was still in Texas we still had that same Texas pride and Texas roots that I grew up with but it was more liberal. So I think it was a good transition city for me to eventually move up to Seattle and my experience in Austin helped me understand kind of what I was getting myself into by moving to a more progressive city.
Speaker 11:And Mike, why did it take so long for you to come out? I mean, what was the internal struggles there? Or did you know? Or what was that journey for you like?
Speaker 12:It's a great question. I knew that I was gay. I was out to myself at around puberty time 12, 13 years old, give or take and growing up in Eastern Washington in the late 80s there was no visible community whatsoever. I didn't know any gay people except for my great uncle, and I watched him and his partner die of AIDS, and then on TV we were largely just jokes. We were comic relief at that time. What little representation that we had.
Speaker 12:So I had this message that to be gay was to be invisible or a joke or dead, and I didn't want to be any of those three things. So I was just determined to not be gay. I was going to fight this thing and live a straight life, because that's what I thought I wanted. But by the time I turned 30, though, I had moved to the Seattle area and met a lot of really happy, well-adjusted, amazing queer people, and it just slowly chipped away at this idea that it was a life or a lifestyle that I didn't want or couldn't identify with, the issues that I had with my marriage, but ultimately came out and started the process of getting a divorce, all just right before my 30th birthday.
Speaker 11:What does it feel like coming into this a little bit later in life, because I think that the gay world a lot of times is driven by youth. I think that we do a lot of making youth an ideal. Yeah, so how do you feel coming in as a, an older man, from the, from the job?
Speaker 12:yeah, I mean, it's funny now being 45 and looking back and thinking the 30 is older, older, but like it I. I think that you're right. We we are youth obsessed as a culture, but I also know that I got out. I was lucky in a lot of ways. There are a lot of men who come out in their fifties and that's because they got married to the white picket fence thing and had kids and then raise the kids and they don't find their opportunity or their escape route until after the kids leave for college. It's a really common story of the 55-ish year old man who the kids are out of the house and now I'm going to go with my gay life. So from a certain perspective, I feel really lucky and grateful that it was 30 instead of 50 or 60, right. At the same time, I did feel like I had been cheated out of a youth that I deserve and thank God for therapy.
Speaker 11:And Kyle, you kind of always had this identity, I mean you've has that been the case, or yeah, yeah.
Speaker 13:I think that I just needed enough time to realize that it wasn't going away. I think my hope. The entire time I, like Mike, around puberty, knew I was gay, or at least knew that I liked boys. I don't know that, I knew exactly how to define it, but I was just waiting for it to go away, that's. And then, by the time I got in college, I was like, okay, this has been around long enough that this is not changing.
Speaker 13:So that's when I, when I came out and I still feel like I was you know, mike talked about being robbed of kind of a younger experience. I feel like I was robbed of a younger experience in high school, you know, being out and being gay. I wish I could have had that experience and had my first kiss with a boy instead of with a girl. That I felt like I was supposed to, or, you know, I think I'm I'm glad I got that experience in my twenties being out, but I feel like I could have had more had I come out sooner, I feel like I could have had more had I come out sooner.
Speaker 11:I feel like we both have similar experiences and I feel like I have a lot in common with Mike as well. I think that I struggled a lot coming out and I have a lot of internalized homophobia that I had to get over, especially at the times that we all kind of came out. It was, I mean, let's face it queer wasn't just a pejorative, gay was a pejorative. It was like a sense of we were in the middle of this medical crisis and people were dying and it was a scary time to really find that identity. I really envy the kids now that have that spectrum to look at already and they've got all of these different things. And that's what I appreciate about the word queer is that at least now we've got an umbrella and we don't have a specific label that says you're gay, you're trans, you're lesbian, although we all identify as that, but we do have this nice umbrella term. That's one of the things I appreciate about having a queer culture, if you will, because I think it's a little bit more expansive.
Speaker 12:Yeah, I think there are gay men of a certain age who seem to look at the queer youth and say they don't respect us and they don't respect our history and they're ignorant to like the AIDS crisis and they didn't have to put up with all of the issues that we did for fighting for our rights, et cetera. And I I just want to. I just want to shake those people and say wasn't this what you were fighting for? Wasn't having, wasn't having that, not be this huge crisis Wasn't like? This is what we want, and a youth that is ignorant to those challenges is what we wanted, I would think, because they're not going through them. They have different challenges.
Speaker 12:There's a lot going on in the world that still needs to improve, but thank God, they don't know anything about aid. That's exactly what we wanted. I think that when we look at the word queer, there's a lot of people who react to that word because it immediately takes them back to getting beat up on the playground and getting called that and they just can't get over themselves and the hurt that that caused. To realize that reclaiming that word and putting power to it and having it as an identity, that helps people and makes them feel like they belong to a community far outweighs whatever their personal painful reaction is to that word at the moment.
Speaker 11:I mean, I definitely feel that and I see that reaction a lot. I see this visceral reaction to the word and it's somebody that has maybe that internalized struggle of I can't get over this, I can't get over this era. One of the things that's interesting, too, is queer has also become a term to differentiate the transgender community as to whether they are a queer trans woman or maybe a straight trans woman, by their preference of relationships, how they identify as a gender as well, which I think is a wild concept as as well. It's definitely a new layer to that word yeah, queer is definitely a very versatile term.
Speaker 13:It can be used as an individual kind of descriptor from like people can use it to describe their own personal identity, but then it's also that umbrella term for the full community. So I think it's a really interesting word that we use in a lot of different ways, and I think what I want to recognize is the word queer being used for the community. That's happening. So there's, you know, people that are upset with that. It's. It's like sorry, that's just the way that that things are going. That's the word we're using now. That's being adopted and and reclaimed. But if an individual doesn't want to be called queer on their on a personal level, I think that's really important to respect whatever individual identity they say. If they say I identify as gay, then let's call them gay and let's not call them queer as an individual. So separating out the umbrella versus the individual term I think is really important.
Speaker 11:Well, Mike and Kyle from Gayish, I certainly respect everything that you guys have said. I think that you are two of the smartest voices on podcasting. I've enjoyed Gayish throughout the years. In fact, Kyle was telling me me how long has it been on the air we're coming up on our seventh anniversary our seventh birthday is next week. Yeah, wow are you gonna do anything to mark that occasion or anything like that?
Speaker 12:we always have a birthday show. I I may or may not have surprises in store.
Speaker 11:We'll see another question that I would like to ask you just about the podcast in general, since I've got you here and I've got you trapped in a in a room. How do you guys come up with the topics? I know sometimes you pull your listeners, but do you always do it that way or do you kind of like say, hey, this is what I'm interested in this week?
Speaker 13:no, yeah, we sit down and brainstorm and, yeah, kind of what we're interested this week. We try to do variations on, like, topics that are more stereotypically gay, topics that are more stereotypically straight, topics that are a little bit more sexual, topics that are. You know, we try to have a variation of topics when we pick. And then, yeah, we also pull listeners and we have a giant list that includes anytime someone writes us in and suggests a topic. We have a giant list of topic suggestions. So sometimes we'll use that to get ideas and we have even though we've been going for seven years, we have a list of 400 some odd ideas. So we have even more episodes in store.
Speaker 11:Well, I can't wait to see where you guys go next. I'm always surprised every week when I see the topic. I'm always like what X-Men we're talking about? X-men, okay, and I love the title gayish. I wish I would have thought of that, because gayish voices probably would be a pretty good thing for queer voices. Unfortunately, we have more than a gay identity. We obviously have the entire community underneath us. So I kind of feel like we're not going to be able to change that queer term because it embraces everybody and hopefully everybody sees the spirit in which it is. But I appreciate you guys' time. I am big fans and can't wait till you guys come back to houston. You recently were here on a meet and greeted was it kiki's? I think? Yep, yep, we were at kiki in houston, yeah. Well, now you have to come back because we're gonna try to drum up more people in the in the fan base here well and I I left the crowd in Houston I thought just the sweetest folks and really energetic.
Speaker 12:I really really liked our show in Houston. It was fun.
Speaker 11:It's because we're prisoners of Trump country. That's why Just kidding.
Speaker 1:Thank you. This has been Queer Voices, which is now a home-produced podcast and available from several podcasting sources. Check our webpage QueerVoicesorg. For more information. Queer Voices executive producer is Brian Levinka. Andrew Edmondson and Deborah Moncrief-Bell are frequent contributors. The News Wrap segment is part of another podcast called this Way Out, which is produced in Los Angeles.
Speaker 14:Some of the material in this program has been edited to improve clarity and runtime. This program does not endorse any political views or animal species. Views, opinions and endorsements are those of the participants and the organizations they represent. In case of death, please discontinue use and discard remaining product.
Speaker 1:For Queer Voices. I'm Glenn Holt.
