July 15, 2025 • 56 mins
Join Joseph for a spicy and spirited discussion with guest Brandon Kyle Goodman of the Tell Me Something Messy podcast where we discuss how pornography, religion, and identity have played out in our respective lives. Follow Brandon on IG @brandonkylegoodman. Listen to the TELL ME SOMETHING MESSY podcast here - https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-tell-me-something-messy-w-212748346/. Follow Joseph on IG/X/Threads @josephtheythem and send your praise reports/prayer requests to josephreaves@iheartmedia.com. HELLA BLACK, HELLA QUEER, HELLA CHRISTIAN is an iHeart podcast apart of the Outspoken! network which seeks to amplify LGBTQ voices in podcasting
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hella, Black Hella, Queer Hella Christian is a production of
iHeart Podcasts on the Outspoken Network, which seeks to amplify
LGBTQ plus voices within podcasting. Show me how good is
going to get today? God, dear Universe, you have permission
(00:21):
to amaze me today. I am a beautiful and blessed
being who deserves great things always. I love my life
and I am thankful for my life. I am safe
and I have everything I need. Show me how good
is going to get today? God, dear Universe, you have
permission to amaze me today. I am a beautiful and
(00:45):
blessed being who deserves great things always. I love my
life and I am thankful for my life. I am
safe and I have everything I need. Something amazing is
happening for me today. Show me how good is going
to get today? God, dear Universe, you have permission to
amaze me today. I am a beautiful and blessed being
(01:08):
who deserves great things always. I love my life and
I am thankful for my life. I am safe and
I have everything I need. Something amazing is happening for
me today. Show me how good it is going to
get today. God, dear universe. You have permission to amaze
me today. I am a beautiful and blessed being who
(01:30):
deserves great things always. I love my life and I
am thankful for my life. I am safe, and I
have everything I need. Something amazing is happening for me today.
(01:58):
You're listening to Hell Black, Hello, Queer, Hello Christian, where
we gather at the intersection of faith, identity, and culture
and tell the truth with our whole chest. This week,
we're sitting down with the radical Hold Themselves Brandon Kyle Goodman, writer, performer,
(02:18):
podcast host, and evangelist of sexual liberation and positivity. If
you've laughed at Big Mouth, been moved by Pussy Puppet
Show off Broadway, or just needed someone to name that
thing you're feeling, Brandon has probably already been part of
your healing circuit. Today's conversation flows through faith, family, fair, babies,
(02:41):
and finding your own rhythm. We talk about what it
means to love a pet like a person, how childhood
Easter traditions evolve when you claim faith for yourself as
an adult, and why storytelling from our roots still matters.
It's honest, it's joyful, it's New York, it's black, it's queer,
it even gets a little naughty, and it's exactly what
(03:03):
we need. Another episode of Hella Black Hella Queer, Hello Christian,
a fully black, fully queer, fully human, fully divine podcast
around society, culture and other fresh fried nigga shit I
feel like talking about with my dope ass friends. I
am your host, Joseph Friese. My pronouns are they them?
(03:25):
And I have a little praise report for myself, a
little something that I'm proud about. I had a little
brawny man moment this week because I was doing my
cleaning and I had to move my table, and in
the middle of my table, I caught a splinter in
my hand, and as my big person self, I got
(03:47):
a pair of tweezers and I actually took the splinter
out of my hand by myself. I felt very butcher
and very accomplished after that. So that is my praise
report for the week. Can always send your praise reports
to Joseph fries at iHeartMedia dot com, j O. S. E.
P h r E A as in Albert V. E.
(04:10):
S at iHeartMedia dot com. You are listening to Hella
Black Hella Queer, Hella Christian. I'm your host, Joseph Frees
and today we are chatting with the brilliant Brandon Kyle Goodman.
(04:47):
Now let me act like I come from good home
training and introduce our guests properly. Brandon Kyle Goodman is
a writer, actor, and advocate whose work stretches from the
animated chaos of Big Mouth to the soulful pages of
their debut book, You Gotta Be You. Their instrument heart, clarity,
(05:07):
and a whole lot of humor brings out the unexpected
color and discourse about race, gender, sexuality, and spirituality. Born
and raised in Queens, New York and now raised in
a pitbull named Corey, Brandon is part hologist, part storyteller,
and part dog mom. And I'm so glad we're in
(05:27):
fellowship today.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
I am Brandon Kyle Goodman, and pronouncer. They them theirs.
I am a writer, a performer, a host to host
the I Heard podcast Told Me Something Messy, which is
a relationship podcast about love, sex and dating. I used
to write on Big Mouth, also voiced on big Mouth.
I'm an author, wrote a book call You Gotta Be You,
and I am a dog mother to a pet named.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Corey Okay, so I'm a current plant parent, but a
betty White spirit has been trying to fall upon me,
and I've been thinking about getting a dog. The last
time I had a dog was on my childhood dog
or family dog. She was a German shepherd and around
the time I was eight, she caught us riders and
(06:15):
we had to put her asleep. Yeah, and that was
the last time I've really had a pet, And strangely enough,
I've been a little scared of dog since then. But
for some reason, I'm just kind of always scared of
them biting me. But I was never scared of Sheba,
and I always felt safe around her. But then there's
(06:36):
still this part of me that wants to get a pet.
But having a pet is like getting a human child's work,
and it's kind of like it's enough for me to
have insurance for me, but now I got to get
insurance for this other being. So if I don't get
a pet, there's still a part of me that thinks
(06:56):
I may want to start like volunteering at a local
animal shelter. Oh, that'd be beautiful, yes, because it's like,
you know, I can come in, I can do my thing.
But it's just like the medical care and the big
item up keep you. No shelter can do that exactly.
And then another thing I know about you, Brandon, something
that we share in common is that we both sprung
(07:19):
forth from the Borough of Queens, New York.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
Oh my god, I was going to ask what your accsaid.
I was like, where are you from? I recognize that?
Speaker 1 (07:27):
Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. So what part of Queen's
are you from?
Speaker 2 (07:31):
I'm from East Elmhurst, which is like right outside the story,
also known as Flushing, very close to La Guardian Airport,
like a ten minute drive from LaGuardia Airport.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
So my grandma always used to go over to Flushing
for her doctor's appointments. Okay, So when I came down
the pike, the hospital was called Downtown Beakman and it
was like in the financial District, but it's New York
Presbyterian Lower Manhattan. But I was Jamaica Springfield Gardens. So
(08:02):
like kind of like my my infancy years. It was me,
mommy and Daddy, and we were in an apartment off
of North konn do it, okay, kind of like by
that highway that would take you to JFK. So but
then you know, mommy and daddy split and me and
mommy moved out to the island, so Nassau County Freeport,
(08:24):
but you know, naw, especially like Freeport Roosevelt. It's like
a stone's throw from Queens. Like you can take a bus,
you can take the Long Island Railroad, and you're right
in Queens. And I mean even though we were on
the island when it came for things like Easter, or
when it came to things like first day of school,
we went to Jamaica Avenue. And then it's like I
(08:47):
was actually recently back in New York. Are you familiar
with Dustin Ross of like the friend Zone?
Speaker 2 (08:54):
I don't think so.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Well, he did like a stand up comedy special. So
I came back to New York and I thought about
going back to Queens. Okay, this is how, this is
how DC spoiled me. That E train ride from thirty
fourth Street to Jamaica Avenue.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
That's a long ride. Baby.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
There was a time I could do it, and did
do it on a regular basis, but that that time
has changed.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
I know, I live in a double far zone, so
you have to take the E train to seventy fourth Street,
Roosevelt Avenue and then I had to take a bus
the Q nineteen B to my So it was like
it was just too much.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
So for our icebreaker because we kind of got a
little bit into it when I talked about going out
to Jamaica Avenue for a week Easter Congen. You'll hear
this a little bit later in the year, but we
are currently in the throes of Holy Week, so this
is spy Wednesday. This is the day where Satan enters
Judas and Judas portrays Jesus. And I was just wondering
(09:52):
if you had any special memories around Holy Week of Easter.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
What I will always remember Easter is that, like it
is when everybody shows up, our church was full, but
then on Easter everyone was trying to repair, so it
was just like a massive amount of people would show
up on Easter, people I just didn't see regularly. But
I also Easter reminds me of Easter suits, and I
hate suits, so I don't have the happiest memories because
(10:21):
there was always uncomfortable suits, boxy suits, the shoes, and
that the service was a lot longer on Easter Sunday.
So it was my favorite until we got to the
food now that because there's a special meal for Easter
and so like that. I love, I love, I love
to eat. I love a good lunch.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
So my pastor calls them the CMEs the Christians that
come on Christmas, Mother's Day and Easter. Absolutely, ye, So
I've gotten more of an appreciation for like Easter and
like Good Friday and Maundy Thursday was like the foot
washing as I've grown up and kind of shows Christianity
for myself. But if I have to look back, kind
(10:58):
of like as a kid, I was a Palm Sunday
girl because I'm like, oh, we're handing out things and
raving things. There was just something that was just always
exciting for me about that.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
It was like an arts and craft because you're to
make the crust yourself.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
So I could never do that. So I was just
satisfied with the palm. It gave like a mini Christmas
vive for me. So that's what it was about for me.
And then I'm singing in the special celebration choir for
each of this year. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm looking
forward to it. So now that the ice has been broken,
(11:34):
I think we can get into the words so we're
gonna get in the main meat of this conversation. And
this week's episode is called See Daddy Sinners Half Soul too,
So shout out to Sugar Avery and the color purple,
the nineteen eighty five version. Yes, absolutely, let's speak the
(11:56):
nineteen eighty five Absolutely, we love everybody, but the nineteen
eighty five version. Yeah, And to kind of quote because
some of the church mothers, we're gonna talk about the
poem today, Yes, and we're just gonna have a conversation
kind of like around adult content. But that kind of
(12:21):
phrase kind of always strikes me because they call it
adult content, but in some ways porn can be looked
at as incredibly childlike and immature. We're gonna be talking
about the Freak. Nationalis love the Freak.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
It's my favorite.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
What was your religious formation, if any, and how did
it inform your sexuality?
Speaker 2 (12:44):
What I've learned in the work that I do is
that religion informs most of our sexuality, whether you are
religious or not. I'm a pastor's skin. My grandmother was
a minister, and my grandmother raised me essentially, so I
grew up going to your I grew up being the
face of the children of the church. I always say
it's like being the Malia or Sasha Obama, right, Like
(13:07):
you're just kind of always having to be perfect and
good and you have your hair in order, your outfits
in order, and so for that reason, I always say
pastors kids are the horniest and the freakiest because they
are the most repressed. So I think it definitely informed
my curiosity about sex and my curiosity about sexuality because
(13:28):
it was such a we don't talk about this, or
it's not meant to be talked about unless you're with
an adult, or like unless it's with adults, and it's
not supposed to be something that you do until marriage.
So I had all these very clear ideas about sexuality
that I then had to unlearn in my adulthood. Wow,
(13:48):
I can relate to that, huh.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
But with my grandmother, it was almost like it's easier
for me to tell you what she didn't do in
the church than to give the long list of things
she did do in the church. So I grew up Presbyterian,
and she had a thing called lay leaders. So they
were like they weren't like deacons or elders or clergy,
(14:11):
but they were like rank and file members of the
church community who were recognized for their service and for
their leadership. So she was a lay leader that would
just reach out to other members in the church just
to check on people, just to make sure that people
were okay. There was a time my grandmother was the
superintendent of the Sunday School, and even after she stepped
(14:35):
down from that, she still taught first in second grade.
So from a religious aspect, there was a time where
my grandmother was my teacher. And then so my grandmother
was my Sunday School teacher for first and second grade.
My mother was my teacher for the nursery school of
Sunday School. My mother was also heavily involved with the youth.
(14:58):
There was a period where my grandmother was church secretary.
So it was kind of like I wasn't like a
pe k a about as close to that, get right,
And it was just like I was just known as
Missus Washington's grandson and Patricia Rees's son, and I was
(15:21):
so I was looked at as one of the gifted youth.
So it's but at the same time and even as
I was just kind of like in my head just
kind of like thinking and going through my day just
really knowing that I've lived my life as an unambiguously
black and clearly queer person, even from a child. So
(15:44):
I was looked at as like this gifted child that
had to be this example. But there was something about
me that clearly needed to be fixed. Yeah, and like
that thing was like my queerness and I was defemininet.
And even though like like my grandmother and my aunt
Naomi and my mother, like they gave everything that they
(16:06):
had to give me, I was still imbued with this
notion that I came from a broken home and there
was something wrong with my rearing because my father wasn't
in my home.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
Yes, similar my dad wasn't around. It wasn't treated that
way because Grandma was the minister, but my mom didn't
go to the church anymore. I didn't understand it at
the time, but I can look back and just imagine
how people were feeling or thinking about that because I
was there with my grandmother, but mother no longer went
to the church. But they also knew that I was
born out of wedlock, and so there was a protectiveness
(16:38):
about me. But I think also with the femininity, there
was also a attention with some of the church mostly
the boys specifically. The women were very you know moms,
you know moms and aunties, but the boys and the men,
it was always like tough enough, you know, mask up,
and there was that tension that was so confusing because
(16:59):
there's also I think as a kid, especially when you
understand what the family dynamics are or what the family
is supposed to quote unquote, look like there was a
yearning for that male attention, and not sexually, but just
like that male I just didn't have dad at home,
so it was a yearning for that that male camaraderie
that never quite fit right.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
Thank you for sharing that. And then the second question
I do want to move to is when do you
remember first being introduced to porn? And then when were
you first introduced to gay porn? And then how did
that inform your sexuality?
Speaker 2 (17:36):
I was first introduced to porn probably in middle school,
and it was Playboy magazines. Like going up to a
sleepover one of my classmates dad had like a collection
of Playboy magazine. So go to the sleepover and then
you know, you go into the room that has the playboys,
and you know, boys go one by one and they
explore the Playboy magazines, and that type of porn is
literally just kind of model like, you know, women posing
(17:58):
nude and really seeing the female form for the first
time and having a fascination with like breasts and volvas
and all of that. But then you know, I learned
about you could look up porn on AOL, so then
I started researching, or not researching, I started looking up
poor on AOL. But also at this time, this is
(18:20):
middle school, so it was the first time that I
had heard the word gay when I basically didn't get
invited to a party. One of the boys had a party,
and we were very small class, twenty something kids in
each grade, and so we got invited to everything. And
we've known each other since like first grade, so this
is now like seventh grade, so most of us have
known each other for a while, and so we always
(18:40):
do things together as like a class or it's all
the boys and then all the girls. So one of
the boys had a birthday party and didn't invite me,
and I found out about that, and I had like
was confused about it, and then one of the other
boys said, it's because everyone thinks you're gay, and I
didn't know what that meant. Had ever heard gay outside
(19:01):
of like happy, because you know, my grandmother loved nick
at night, and I feel like gay was like used
in the term of just like joy. So I didn't
understand it. And then when he explained what it was,
I think when I started moving into looking up porn.
You know, you go on a site and then you
have the subcategories amateur group, sex, and gay. So I
(19:23):
clicked on it, and then I you know, it was
given all these kind of hyperlinks to gay porn websites.
And also I want to mention that the AOL porn
or the porn on the Internet was different than the
Playboy because now I'm looking at people actually having sex, right,
There's a difference between like just modeling and like full
on intercourse or penetration. But yeah, there was there was
(19:43):
a couple the the gay porn was overwhelming. Again, Like
you know, I always talk about, like you up up
until that point, I thought my butthole only did one
thing right, and then you see gay point You're like, oh,
the butthole does that too. That's like kind of a lot.
But so like I needed to like find something that
(20:04):
was a little more demure, if you allow me. The
term and so there was one that was just like
a guy I think it was called Dino, the Italian Stallion,
and it was just like this guy on the beach,
and like, you know, websites were not very complicated back then,
so it's just like one homepage and then you kind
of keep scrolling and there are just pictures after pictures.
So it was like pick him on the beach, and
then him in a speedo and then the speedo is
(20:25):
like wet, and then the speedo comes off and it's
just like him and his dick swinging and my like
little eyes like bugged out, and my you know, my
puberty hit hit. So the my crotch was tinkling, and
that was kind of my first exposure to maybe I
am gay, but I knew that it was wrong, quote unquote,
(20:45):
and so also with that came repenting. Came a lot
of Kirk Franklin New Nation project called Me Now Track nine,
a lot of listening to those songs, you know, and
weeping and crying and Donnie mcclurk and we fall down,
Oh there we go and Donnie knows and so just
like a lot of those things. So yeah, so the
(21:07):
porn was tied to a lot of despair and sadness
and depression as well, because I would, I would, you know,
have the good time with myself masturbating and then feel
a lot of regret, and that regret wasn't my own, right,
that regret or that shame was put onto me by
(21:29):
my classmates but also by church because I understood that
quote unquote was a sin.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Right right right? Hold me now. Is also one of
my favorite songs from that New Nation project.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
Oh it's a beautiful song.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
The sopranos, fucking holler.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
Oh they eat it up.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
They eat that up. And then kind of like much
like what you said, kind of like in your answer
to question one, because I always had to be good
and proper and write and behave I also became sexually
active at a young age. And I say, for me,
(22:07):
my sexual activity really looked at I can really frame
that as I've masturbated from a very young age. And
then that even kind of ties into the whole conversation
of when I was first introduced to porn, because before
I even really got into triple X porn, for me,
it was like rated R movies and then growing up
(22:31):
black with ninety cinema, I mean Alan Payne and Alan
Payne and Jason's lyric Wesley Snipes in just about every
movie he was in, and.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
Swordfish, which was this, well.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
That was the two thousand and then I'm even thinking
of kind of like the men that were in waiting
to Exhale. And then for me, not the assault scene
and what love got to do with it that everybody remembers,
but kind of like that first sex scene where I
can Tina get together and it's more displayed as like sex,
(23:10):
kind of like before, like within the context of the
movie before I guess abuse. I just remember that being
kind of like a definitive moment for me as far
as sexuality. And then I mean seeing Gary daw Dan
and Boris Kojo shirtless with their chest out in essence massa,
(23:30):
I mean list them off, shump, I mean Chamar Moore
more Wow, Tyson Beckford. And then as a teen person
that was in the music, I mean we're talking about
genu Wine, We're talking about Llo cool J doing that
video right, and then like I'm fifteen years old and
(23:53):
I'm watching Midnight Love one night on B E T
and the untitled.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
I would stay up to watch Midnight Love, so that
I could see the entitled video and have privacy because
the family was asleep and I needed to watch that
video in private.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Right, And then there was this episode of Real Sexist.
It was Real sex twenty and it was kind of
like this showcase of blackmail strippers from Philadelphia, I remember.
But then I was still kind of like in this
place where I thought I was attracted to women, I
was still kind of like following that toe sure, so
like the Skinner Max that would come on late at night,
(24:33):
or like Emanuel in Space on Showtime. So there even
that that happened. And then I even had a Playboy
moment because we moved into a house we moved from
Freeport to Roosevelt when it was owned by one of
the ministers in the church. His family had lived in
it and his son had lived upstairs, and there was
still some stuff from when they lived there, and there
(24:54):
was a Playboy magazine that his son had, so I
too kind of like had that bought that that part right,
that play that Playboy introduction. And then as far as
gay porn, and this was actually incredibly this was kind
of like the moment that at least allowed me to
say I was bisexual. So spring of two thousand and one,
(25:18):
it was actually during the Easter season. It was the
weekend before Palm Sunday, and this time we were Upstates.
We were about two and a half hours away from
New York. But this was a time I was a
Patty LaBelle stand and Patty Levell was gonna be at
Madison Square Garden Palm that Palm Sunday. So I took
(25:39):
the bus down to New York to go to the
box office for Madison Square Garden to buy tickets because
this was the time before Live Nation and before tickets
back where you actually had to go in person to
buy tickets. And as I'm kind of like in that
time Square area, kind of like perusing the Hudson News.
And I don't know if Hesson New still sells Neudy magazines,
(26:03):
but this was a time where Hudder they did, Hudson
du still sell Neudy magazines. And there was this edition
of a magazine called Black Inches. And it took me
about thirty to forty five minutes to do it. And
this also is like a time castle because I'm fifteen,
(26:25):
sixteen years old at the time. Yeah, but I go,
I pick up the edition of Black Inches. I picked
at fifteen, sixteen years old, I pick up this gay
porn magazine and I take it to the counter and
I purchase it. Good for you, And as I'm heading home,
(26:49):
it just kind of clicked, like You've crossed the threshold.
You paid money to buy a gay pornography magazine and
you bought it in public. Yeah, at the very least
your bisection, sure at the but you clearly like men. Yeah,
(27:16):
because you just paid money right well, and you bought
a gay porn magazine in public.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Yeah, I thought, And it's just like a you know,
like because that way I did that too, or like
black planet dot com, you know. But I just thought
it was a mistake. Like I thought God made a
mistake and that I could just like pray it away.
I thought it was like an illness that could just
be cured with a little bit of prayer and holy water.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
I didn't grow up Pentecostal, so I didn't have that
explicit messaging. But even now, as I look over my life,
that messaging did still seep into me in some more
insidious ways. When we come back how our faith walks
hand in hand with our full identity. If you're loving
(28:34):
this show, don't keep it to yourself, Text it to
a friend, send it to your favorite group chat, or
drop the link and the family's thread where your cousins
swears they don't like podcasts, but we all know they listen.
All right, back to the show. How have religion and
porn co existed in your life? Did religion cause you
(28:54):
to feel guilty about liking porn? And then what is
your relationship now?
Speaker 2 (28:58):
I don't have a real relationship to porn that much.
Sometimes I'll watch it. I have an only fans. I
like amateur stuff. I fully support it, and I love
that we are in an era where because people have
their phones, if that's what they want to do, if
that's how they want to make their bread their money,
that they can I think that's such a beautiful thing
(29:20):
that people have the access, especially like knowing some of
the stories of how culture treats sex workers and sex
work and adult entertainment is not wonderful. It's allowed production
houses to get away with not being great to those performers.
And so the fact that performers can now start their
own pages and have direct consumer and make their own money.
(29:43):
I love that And if I were in a different lifetime,
I would probably also start me in only fans, But
I like the fantasies in my head more so than
watching porn. But I still do sometimes. So that's my
relationship to porn. My relationship to religion is that I'm
no longer religious spiritual. I have just a new definition
(30:04):
of God that works for me. My mom is a
born again Christian. We've been a strange for each other
fifteen years. Religion, which like this is not a unique story,
but very much harmed by it, very much betrayed and
hurt by it, and so just like didn't work. There
was a disconnect between religion and spirituality, and what I
(30:28):
had discovered was people hiding their hatred and their bigotry
and their chaos behind the Bible said, so, I have
a lot of respect for anyone, and whatever you believe,
I always say, as long as you're not hurting yourself
or anybody else, go off to you. But unfortunately my
experience was that there was a lot of harm that
(30:50):
was at the hands.
Speaker 1 (30:51):
Of the church.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
So I had to step away from it. Not an
immediate walk away, but a real boundary that had to
be set on my end order for me to thrive
and live a life that I'm proud of. I had
to cut my mother off because it was getting to
a place where my well being was just not doing well.
(31:14):
I'm an only child, single mother, so that relationship is
really close. And I'm also from Queen's and so like
a lot of people, I'm not really phased by a
lot of people, like you could say what you want,
to think what you want, I'll give a fuck. But
my mother I very much have her on a pedestal.
And I'll say this, I think my mother was my deity.
I think my mother was my God, which I think
(31:35):
for a lot of queer kids and for a lot
of kids, right, you're taught what God is, but you
don't really know what God is. But you know who
your parents are, you know who your grandparents are, and
you know what they believe in. But you're really like
there's really a worship of them, which is not I'm
not putting a judgment on it, whether it's good or bad.
I think it just is a natural thing that you know,
(31:57):
God is wonderful. But as a kid in your brain,
who's protecting you, who are you talking to, who you're
going to? It's your parent, and so I think having
my mother on that pedestal made sense. But I did,
in my adulthood, have to take her off that pedestal,
and I had to rework my relationship to what I
believe in and who I believe in. And so now
(32:19):
for me, I actually use the term ogg aug, which
is ancestors universe God. The God that I was raised with,
whether you know they want to say it or not,
was a white one. There were definitely white images of Jesus,
and so if that's the Son, then I'm assuming the
Father is also white. My concept of God was very
(32:39):
much rooted in kind of the colonized version of it.
I needed to undo that as well, And so the
last fifteen years has been that journey of reclaiming what
God is or who God is, reclaiming what spirituality looks like,
and reclaiming my belief systems and what works and values
(33:02):
and honors my black queer self.
Speaker 1 (33:07):
Yeah, thank you so much for sharing that. I also
saw a similarity to where not so much my mother
was my deity, but particularly as I came out about
my sexuality, because so I will be forty this July.
I came out sixteen seventeen. My mother embraced me, you know,
(33:29):
also as a born again Christian, as someone who would
have been considered an evangelical TBN and praised the Lord
and tdj's we mainstays in my house. But she was
clear that I was her son. She loved me, She
accepted me no matter what, and she probably took a
lot of flat for the way that she embraced me
as an openly gay person. But you know, when my
(33:51):
mother was here, I really used her as kind of
like a template as far as her love for me
was just the tip of the iceberg. How much God
loved me. Yeah, and then not so much having to
distance myself from her because even up until her pass
and we had a good relationship. But have had to
(34:11):
distance myself from my sisters because they're Pentecostal Church of
God in Christ and they struggle with my queerness. And
it has just been a situation of not a full
cut off, but definitely a thing of you know, I
have to love you all from a distance. And then
when I think about how religion collided with porn, it
(34:32):
really kind of like came to head during my college
life because I was openly gay. I was actually involved
in religious life actively Christian. I'm an alum of Howard
University and I was a chapel assistant at Howard University
during this time. But like I loved sex and I
(34:55):
loved porn, and at that time I didn't have my
own on phone, so I was getting my porn fixed
in the computer lab at school.
Speaker 2 (35:05):
Oh sure.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
So like I quickly kind of like became known around campus.
Is kind of like the preacher that likes porn. And
like I'm even thinking about that episode that Kirk Franklin
did where like he came out about his struggles with
porn right and then for me kind of like even
with what you said earlier in the conversation around like
you would look at porn and then it would be
(35:26):
like Kirk Franklin, so like I would look at porn,
I would not I would reach my climax, and then
I'm going to YouTube to listen to Running Back to
You by Fred Hammond or Sinking by Time Trip to
kind of like repent and purge myself, not because of
the sexuality piece, but because I like porn. And it's
kind of like what maturity both spiritually emotionally looks like
(35:51):
for me. Now, even sexual maturity really realizes me looking
at porn wasn't the problem. The fact that I was
doing this in this public setting and visiting myself upon
other people without their consent, that was like, that was
That's the actual issue. That's the problem. But the fact
that you know, on my personal phone in my personal
(36:14):
room with my headphones on, if the fact that I
like to start my day with prayer and logging into
as Men to jack off to whatever flix may be
on there, or to log onto Twitter pont and jack
off to whatever flix may be on there, and like
that in and of itself is not the problem, because
I'm being a sexual being, but I'm not visiting myself
(36:36):
upon other people without their consent. And then I've even
been able to kind of come to the place where
i can name like I'm a voyeur, Like I like sex,
I like to watch people have sex. By my naming it,
I'm taking it out of the shadows. I'm taking it
out of the darkness so that I can actually engage
(36:57):
my kink in ways that are healthy and ways that
aut a consent.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
Absolutely, I mean, I think that's where people get in trouble.
It's the repression doesn't allow you to. The repression is
rooted in shame, and you're not able to engage in
a healthy way, and you're raised or indoctrinated to think
that there's something wrong and there's nothing wrong with being
a sexual being. Your pastors like, we're all here because
(37:23):
our parents were sexual beings. So I think like really
working to un do that. And you know, religion at
its best, let me say this, church at its best
is community, right, It's it's people that you can fellowship
with who have shared values and who hopefully support and
(37:44):
love you. At its worst, it's oppression, it's control. And
so when I hear of somebody wanting to be religious
but struggling with their desire to masturbate or watch porn,
that's where religion is not supporting you. That's where you're
being controlled and repressed, and that should not be the
way that you're engaging with it. If God made you,
he made you a sexual being as well, and you
(38:06):
should be allowed to safely and healthily explore that and
talk about it. It's why I do the show that
I do. I understand that I'm against the grain. I
just had a conversation this morning with somebody who was
navigating somebody coming on my show and talking about sex,
and I could feel the fear around having this person
talk about sex on the show, and it's like, I
(38:28):
want to undo that. I think that that's where we
get into trouble that you know, like that we are
all experiencing varying moments of our sexuality, but we think
we're by ourselves in it. We think we're alone in
it because we're not talking about it, because it stays
in the shadows. And so it's important I think even
in church to talk about porn, to talk about sexuality,
(38:51):
to talk about your relationship to it, for a pastor
to come out and talk about the relationship to it
and not with shame or whatever, but like this is
what the ex experience is. I think it's important. It's
important for people to know that it's okay to be
freaky in the bedroom if you have your consent and
with the partner's consent, you good, God is not mad
at you for jerking off.
Speaker 1 (39:13):
Right, And then even kind of like and I think
like the justice and equity piece within porn on that
you kind of like touched on earlier to around how
like studios are kind of like able to get away
with not treating their talent all that great. I think
if Christians could be open around the fact that you know, hey,
I love God, I love sex, I'm a voyeur, I
(39:35):
enjoy pornography, and that doesn't take away from my Christian witness.
That could empower people to kind of like go into
these spaces and address the very real justice and equity
issues that are happening in porn, like the substance abuse
and misuse issues that happen in porn because people have
been so shamed around sex now that they're doing it,
(39:57):
but like they have to like get intoxicated to and
that's everywhere.
Speaker 2 (40:02):
That's like the secrecy that happens because everyone is trying
to maintain a look at me, I'm you know, my
churchat is on, my suit is clean, like I live
a perfect holy life because of the need to project
that you're not able to actually be a human, and
if you're not able to be a human, you're not
(40:23):
able to see other people's humanity, and so a sex
sex workers and performers are humans to act like you're
not engaging with their work, or that their work is
to bring sexual disgust around it. Is so hypocritical and
actually harms them and also harms you because you're not
able to live your full life. You're denying pieces of
(40:46):
yourself because you don't understand, because you're afraid to engage
in a thing because you don't understand it, or you're
probably scared that you're really gonna like it. You might
like being tied up, honey, you might like getting pissed on.
You might or you might like you know, vanilla six,
but you know, it's not something that just has to
be regaled to when we get married and just for
(41:09):
child wearing that to me, which is another thing is
so rooted in patriarchy. Hey, capitalism and capitalism that's about
oppressing women. That's about you know, like we even when
we talk about porn, we often don't see women's pleasure
being portrayed, right. We often see that it's a guy
getting off and where are the women? Where's women's pleasure
(41:29):
in that? Where's women's equity inside of that? So you know,
if you're looking up porn, looking up equitable porn is
really important and smart and also understanding that porn is
porn that is not what you should expect in your
bedroom that's what you should expect from your partners. There's
a whole production happening on that set. Ask your partner
(41:52):
what they want. Talk to your partner about what they
want and what they like. Those are two different things.
They do not need to match.
Speaker 1 (41:59):
Thank you. Yeah, and then we've kind of had some
kind of deep conversation. But before we get out of
the word, as we get ready to close the sermon,
move into the benediction. I want to have two kind
more fun, more lighthearted, because porn is supposed to be fantasy,
so there should be an aspect of it that's fun.
So is there a porn star on your sexual bucket list?
(42:20):
And who would you like to see do a porn
scene together?
Speaker 2 (42:23):
Oh? Interesting? Well, as I said, I don't really watch
a ton of porn, but if there is porn star
that's on my bucket list, his name is Rahiem Beautiful, gorgeous, stunning,
and he could do whatever he wants to me. Yes,
he's always in Brazil, but he lives not too far
from I actually just saw him walking his dogs the
(42:46):
other day.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
And it doesn't have to necessarily be a porn star,
just like.
Speaker 2 (42:49):
Two people together.
Speaker 1 (42:51):
Yeah, who would I like to see together.
Speaker 2 (42:58):
The Rock was my sexual awakening I was in middle school.
I would like to see Oh my god, I'm just
gonna stick with the Rock and Kevin Hart. I would
watch it with my clothes fully on and just as
like research be like.
Speaker 1 (43:14):
Wow, this is wonderful. So Max Connor is a paunch
star on my sexual bucket list, okay. And then just
two people that I would kind of like to see together.
I would love to see what would happen between Little
nas X and Coleman Domingo if they got fifteen minutes together.
Speaker 2 (43:33):
Oh wow, that's a really good answer. That's a great answer.
I would watch the fuck out of that. That sounds lovely.
I'm gonna keep my joke answer as a joke answer.
Please don't at me. I love Coleman and Lona's accent
sounds really beautiful. As soon as I hang up on this,
I'm gonna be like, I want to see these twenty
people together.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
Okay. And then the last question for this word porsche
a gospel single or religious figure you had or have
a crush on, and then a gospel song you could make, love,
have sex a fuck too.
Speaker 2 (44:08):
I'm gonna keep it in the Kirk Franklin family and
say Lovely Day is that? But yeah cover the cover
of Lovely Day just has Oh actually no, it's it's
the remix of Clark's Sisters Brought the Sunshine. They played
it in clubs. It's wild. I'll be at gay clubs
and the like the dead of night and suddenly it's
like you.
Speaker 1 (44:28):
Brought Yes, I think I saw Kevin Aviance.
Speaker 2 (44:32):
Oh yeah, yeah, Like I don't like, I'm just like
no one, no, people don't hear Jesus being blasted. But
like it's a gospel song. It's like all my friends
that I look around are like, all right, praise. So
that song is great for sex. And who do I
have a crush on?
Speaker 1 (44:49):
Or maybe someone that you had a crush on, you
know when you were younger, still listening to gospel, still
in the church.
Speaker 2 (44:54):
Yeah, who is the I don't know, but you know who.
I don't know his name, but he was one of
the judges on Total Praise and he's so pretty.
Speaker 1 (45:03):
Here would it be Jonathan McReynolds.
Speaker 2 (45:07):
Absolutely, yes, he's so pretty. He's cute.
Speaker 1 (45:10):
Okay, So for me, I'll Kirk Franklin before the Rebirth
of Kirk Franklin. So Kirk Franklin before I believe he
got work done because I'm a lips person and his
lips just were thicker and fuller.
Speaker 2 (45:26):
I love you calling it the rebirth. That's I live
in LA and I'm start calling that the rebirth.
Speaker 1 (45:31):
Well, no, I'm talking about the rebirth of Kirk Franklin album.
Speaker 2 (45:34):
Oh when the girls get to the doctor, I'm calling
a rebirth. Sorry, the album.
Speaker 1 (45:39):
And then growing up, I thought Smoky Norfolk was cute.
Speaker 2 (45:42):
Oh I don't think I know where that is.
Speaker 1 (45:44):
I need you now, I need you now, I need
you now, I need and if you like, if you
google him, like, because I feel like we came around church,
so it's Smoky s M O K I E. And
then it's Norfol and or r f L and then
as far as it's pretty, and then as a gospel
(46:06):
song that I could like fuck to, it's gonna be
a medley because I'm verse bottom to whereas I prefer
to bottom. But if we're both attracted and you need
me the top, I got my top entering me and
like I would ride him to like this song called
you Deserve It, and it's like my hallelujah belongs to you.
(46:29):
And then like the choruses like you deserve it, so
like I'm riding him as the course is going, and
then like in my fantasy, like we're having raw sex,
so as he's getting ready to like nutting me, like C. C.
Wining's Holy Spirit comes fill this place. Would be playing.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Perfect literally perfect. I want that for you. I think
that is curated beautifully. I want that for you.
Speaker 1 (47:03):
Yes, So I think me talking about being flooded by
my top is a great way to close the service.
Speaker 2 (47:08):
I think so too, so with a reference.
Speaker 1 (47:10):
To and also it would be a way of kind
of like subverting her music because she's like known to
be a homophobe. So yeah, I'm taking backshots to your
worship music. We'll be right back. Hey, y'all. We're wrapping
(47:38):
up our time with Brandon Kyle Goodman. So like we're
gonna go into the benediction and it's just gonna be
a rapid fire of some quick questions, going to ask
a question and just whatever else whatever comes up for
you. You know, do that. What are you looking forward to?
Speaker 2 (47:57):
A break a vacation? That's awesome.
Speaker 1 (48:01):
So the aunties and the uncles are going on tour
this year. So there's an Auntie Summer tour that's like
Patti LaBelle, Sad Night, Stephanie Mills and Chaka Khan. And
there's an Uncles One yet, so it's Uncles One, Charlie
Wilson of the Gap Band, of course, Casey Haley from
Jo Deasy, Okay, Babyface and El DeBarge.
Speaker 2 (48:26):
So JoJo's not coming.
Speaker 1 (48:27):
Yeah, it's just gonna be Casey.
Speaker 2 (48:29):
What's Casey's He did that cover.
Speaker 1 (48:31):
Of Bobby Womax if you think You're lonely Now I
think he did it.
Speaker 2 (48:39):
Yeah, he's gonna sing the song solo.
Speaker 1 (48:41):
Yes, I think he is, because I've never seen him solo,
but apparently he has performed solo before.
Speaker 2 (48:47):
Okay, work and baby Face is gonna it's incredible, come
on the legend yep a Babyface tour but anyway, it's good.
Speaker 1 (48:55):
And then what is one thing you like about yourself?
Speaker 2 (48:58):
I like my life and I love to laugh.
Speaker 1 (49:01):
I'm really starting to fall in love with my smile
and particularly my teeth. And it took a while to
do that because I've always been insecure around the overcrowding
of my teeth, to where not only did I think
I've spent a lot of my life not only thinking
I was ugly, but thinking I was deformed before, so
I had an overcrowding in my teeth. So I'm good,
thank you absolutely, And where are you a year from today?
Speaker 2 (49:25):
I'm in Amsterdam living my life.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
So a year from now, I'm either back in school
at Howard or I've moved back to New York. Okay,
what are you thankful for?
Speaker 2 (49:40):
What am I thankful for? I'm thankful for my community.
You know, these are really shitty times, so I'm really
grateful that I have people that I can depend on,
that I love, that love me, that I care for,
that I can pour into that can pour back, so
that I'm really really thankful for that.
Speaker 1 (49:58):
What are you proud of?
Speaker 2 (50:01):
I'm proud of my career, and I don't say that lately.
I've really you know, I'm a black queer doll. They
them in a really tough industry and I've managed to
fight tooth and nail and I'm still here. So I
am really proud of that and learning to celebrate that.
Speaker 1 (50:24):
Yep, I'm both thankful and proud for growth. I just
kind of had a flashback moment earlier this afternoon, and
it's just kind of like, I'm not everything I need
to be, but I'm not everything I used to be either,
So you're thankful. What is a thorn for you? What
is something that annoys you? And it doesn't have to
be a big thing. It can be a small thing.
Speaker 2 (50:43):
Oh, people cutting their nails in public? Really hate that.
Hate that with a passion. Also the current administration fucking
up people's rights. Hate that even more.
Speaker 1 (50:58):
Quite honestly, people riding their bicycles, riding their scooters, riding
their mopez on the sidewalk.
Speaker 2 (51:06):
Because why are you on the sidewalk? Skateboarding on the
sidewalk makes sense?
Speaker 1 (51:11):
And going at full speed.
Speaker 2 (51:12):
That's crazy to me when people are walking. Why are
you on the sidewalk when the whole road is right there?
Speaker 1 (51:17):
What gives you joy?
Speaker 2 (51:20):
Real Housewives gives me a lot of joy? Yeah? And food?
I can't wait eep, I'm thinking about food right now.
I love a good meal. Some of you a cheese
or burger?
Speaker 1 (51:31):
Wow?
Speaker 2 (51:32):
Heaven? Now that see that's my foreid my word is
you saying that you got us reservations to some nice
ass restaurant with some good ass food and you're paying
the bill. That's my foreign love it.
Speaker 1 (51:46):
Okay, So what gives the fact that the spring, oh
and the colors are really coming alive in my neighborhood,
the trees are sprouting, you know, being in DC with
the cherry blossoms, which aren't just at the tidal basic
and what's giving you hope?
Speaker 2 (52:02):
Do you like podcast like this? Like being in communion
with other black queer creatives. You know, I think we're
around the same age. So growing up, we didn't have
a lot to look at it, not so to all
these years later be part of the collective of people
who are creating representation like that is hope at the
(52:25):
highest degree.
Speaker 1 (52:27):
Okay, And it's kind of like, never put your trust
in institutions. But I do have to be honest. Harvard
University standing up to Trump and saying no action that
was now And I mean, of course they can do
it because they have a multi billion dollar endowment. But
(52:50):
the fact that that's how they use that, the fact
that they're kind of like using their muscle when other
ivy LEAs are not using their muscle, that's something that's
given me. Okay, Well, Brandon, I don't want to hold
you too much longer because I want you to be
able to get to your dinner, let people know how
they can find you, and let people know what's coming
(53:11):
up for you that's exciting, and you want us to
keep a lookout for absolutely.
Speaker 2 (53:16):
You can find me on my website Brandoncogoman dot com,
which will take you everywhere. My Instagram is at Brandon
Cale Goodman and my substack is Brandon Coogodman dot substack
dot com. My podcast is Telling Me Something mes see
also on the Iheartnetwork and it comes out every Thursday
in the fall. I'm doing my next stage show in
New York called Ho Church h E a u X
(53:39):
HO is the Fancy because we fancy hose Baby. It's
all about being a PK and you know sexual liberation,
and there are puppets. One is a pussy puppet. One
is a puppet named Bussy. It'll be a fun time,
so I'm excited about that.
Speaker 1 (53:53):
Yep. So we come out during the summer, and Gabby
has already told me about that, so I'm glad that
you brought it up. I'm definitely looking for the dates
to be released to find out where it's going to
be in production so i can book my hotel and
my AMTRAC ticket because I definitely want to get up
for the Yep, you're still here, looking forward to you so,
(54:14):
and then looking forward to being able to see the
dates for that, see where it's going to be planned,
so I can get my book, my hotel room, and
get the air trated ticket to get out there. Yep. So,
once again, thank you so much for joining us, Brandon,
And then don't feel pressured, but we are getting ready
to as you exit out, me and the congregation to
(54:36):
get ready to close out and pray is that verything
you can pray for you on you have to.
Speaker 2 (54:40):
Pray for me on that my booty gets fatter, that
my pockets get fatter, okay, and that this meal hits
the spot.
Speaker 1 (54:50):
That's what you can pray for as we close out
today's episode. Let this be your takeaway that there is
holiness in laughter, That your memories, yes even the awkward
easter suit ones, are sacred, That your identity, your softness,
your growth, your love for a dog or a burrow
(55:12):
or your faith, that all of it matters, and that
you beloved, don't have to split yourself to be whole.
You got to be your friend Thank you for your words, Brandon.
We've got more next week, so meet us right back
here where me and my friends will be discussing the
(55:33):
queer past, the queer present, and the queer future of
the Quiet Storm until next time. Special thanks to our guest,
our listeners, and to all of you holding space for truth,
joy and transformation. Hella Black, Hella Queer, Hella Christian is
(55:54):
a production of iHeartMedia on the Outspoken Slate, which does
seek to amplify LGBTQ plus voices within podcasting. I am
your host and executive slash creative producer Joseph Freese. Gabrielle
Collins also serves as executive producer. Dylan Heuer is a producer,
(56:15):
and then Triple is our lead producer and editor.
Hella, Black Hella, Queer Hella Christian is a production of
iHeart Podcasts on the Outspoken Network, which seeks to amplify
LGBTQ plus voices within podcasting. Show me how good is
going to get today? God, dear Universe, you have permission
(00:21):
to amaze me today. I am a beautiful and blessed
being who deserves great things always. I love my life
and I am thankful for my life. I am safe
and I have everything I need. Show me how good
is going to get today? God, dear Universe, you have
permission to amaze me today. I am a beautiful and
(00:45):
blessed being who deserves great things always. I love my
life and I am thankful for my life. I am
safe and I have everything I need. Something amazing is
happening for me today. Show me how good is going
to get today? God, dear Universe, you have permission to
amaze me today. I am a beautiful and blessed being
(01:08):
who deserves great things always. I love my life and
I am thankful for my life. I am safe and
I have everything I need. Something amazing is happening for
me today. Show me how good it is going to
get today. God, dear universe. You have permission to amaze
me today. I am a beautiful and blessed being who
(01:30):
deserves great things always. I love my life and I
am thankful for my life. I am safe, and I
have everything I need. Something amazing is happening for me today.
(01:58):
You're listening to Hell Black, Hello, Queer, Hello Christian, where
we gather at the intersection of faith, identity, and culture
and tell the truth with our whole chest. This week,
we're sitting down with the radical Hold Themselves Brandon Kyle Goodman, writer, performer,
(02:18):
podcast host, and evangelist of sexual liberation and positivity. If
you've laughed at Big Mouth, been moved by Pussy Puppet
Show off Broadway, or just needed someone to name that
thing you're feeling, Brandon has probably already been part of
your healing circuit. Today's conversation flows through faith, family, fair, babies,
(02:41):
and finding your own rhythm. We talk about what it
means to love a pet like a person, how childhood
Easter traditions evolve when you claim faith for yourself as
an adult, and why storytelling from our roots still matters.
It's honest, it's joyful, it's New York, it's black, it's queer,
it even gets a little naughty, and it's exactly what
(03:03):
we need. Another episode of Hella Black Hella Queer, Hello Christian,
a fully black, fully queer, fully human, fully divine podcast
around society, culture and other fresh fried nigga shit I
feel like talking about with my dope ass friends. I
am your host, Joseph Friese. My pronouns are they them?
(03:25):
And I have a little praise report for myself, a
little something that I'm proud about. I had a little
brawny man moment this week because I was doing my
cleaning and I had to move my table, and in
the middle of my table, I caught a splinter in
my hand, and as my big person self, I got
(03:47):
a pair of tweezers and I actually took the splinter
out of my hand by myself. I felt very butcher
and very accomplished after that. So that is my praise
report for the week. Can always send your praise reports
to Joseph fries at iHeartMedia dot com, j O. S. E.
P h r E A as in Albert V. E.
(04:10):
S at iHeartMedia dot com. You are listening to Hella
Black Hella Queer, Hella Christian. I'm your host, Joseph Frees
and today we are chatting with the brilliant Brandon Kyle Goodman.
(04:47):
Now let me act like I come from good home
training and introduce our guests properly. Brandon Kyle Goodman is
a writer, actor, and advocate whose work stretches from the
animated chaos of Big Mouth to the soulful pages of
their debut book, You Gotta Be You. Their instrument heart, clarity,
(05:07):
and a whole lot of humor brings out the unexpected
color and discourse about race, gender, sexuality, and spirituality. Born
and raised in Queens, New York and now raised in
a pitbull named Corey, Brandon is part hologist, part storyteller,
and part dog mom. And I'm so glad we're in
(05:27):
fellowship today.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
I am Brandon Kyle Goodman, and pronouncer. They them theirs.
I am a writer, a performer, a host to host
the I Heard podcast Told Me Something Messy, which is
a relationship podcast about love, sex and dating. I used
to write on Big Mouth, also voiced on big Mouth.
I'm an author, wrote a book call You Gotta Be You,
and I am a dog mother to a pet named.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Corey Okay, so I'm a current plant parent, but a
betty White spirit has been trying to fall upon me,
and I've been thinking about getting a dog. The last
time I had a dog was on my childhood dog
or family dog. She was a German shepherd and around
the time I was eight, she caught us riders and
(06:15):
we had to put her asleep. Yeah, and that was
the last time I've really had a pet, And strangely enough,
I've been a little scared of dog since then. But
for some reason, I'm just kind of always scared of
them biting me. But I was never scared of Sheba,
and I always felt safe around her. But then there's
(06:36):
still this part of me that wants to get a pet.
But having a pet is like getting a human child's work,
and it's kind of like it's enough for me to
have insurance for me, but now I got to get
insurance for this other being. So if I don't get
a pet, there's still a part of me that thinks
(06:56):
I may want to start like volunteering at a local
animal shelter. Oh, that'd be beautiful, yes, because it's like,
you know, I can come in, I can do my thing.
But it's just like the medical care and the big
item up keep you. No shelter can do that exactly.
And then another thing I know about you, Brandon, something
that we share in common is that we both sprung
(07:19):
forth from the Borough of Queens, New York.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
Oh my god, I was going to ask what your accsaid.
I was like, where are you from? I recognize that?
Speaker 1 (07:27):
Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. So what part of Queen's
are you from?
Speaker 2 (07:31):
I'm from East Elmhurst, which is like right outside the story,
also known as Flushing, very close to La Guardian Airport,
like a ten minute drive from LaGuardia Airport.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
So my grandma always used to go over to Flushing
for her doctor's appointments. Okay, So when I came down
the pike, the hospital was called Downtown Beakman and it
was like in the financial District, but it's New York
Presbyterian Lower Manhattan. But I was Jamaica Springfield Gardens. So
(08:02):
like kind of like my my infancy years. It was me,
mommy and Daddy, and we were in an apartment off
of North konn do it, okay, kind of like by
that highway that would take you to JFK. So but
then you know, mommy and daddy split and me and
mommy moved out to the island, so Nassau County Freeport,
(08:24):
but you know, naw, especially like Freeport Roosevelt. It's like
a stone's throw from Queens. Like you can take a bus,
you can take the Long Island Railroad, and you're right
in Queens. And I mean even though we were on
the island when it came for things like Easter, or
when it came to things like first day of school,
we went to Jamaica Avenue. And then it's like I
(08:47):
was actually recently back in New York. Are you familiar
with Dustin Ross of like the friend Zone?
Speaker 2 (08:54):
I don't think so.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Well, he did like a stand up comedy special. So
I came back to New York and I thought about
going back to Queens. Okay, this is how, this is
how DC spoiled me. That E train ride from thirty
fourth Street to Jamaica Avenue.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
That's a long ride. Baby.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
There was a time I could do it, and did
do it on a regular basis, but that that time
has changed.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
I know, I live in a double far zone, so
you have to take the E train to seventy fourth Street,
Roosevelt Avenue and then I had to take a bus
the Q nineteen B to my So it was like
it was just too much.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
So for our icebreaker because we kind of got a
little bit into it when I talked about going out
to Jamaica Avenue for a week Easter Congen. You'll hear
this a little bit later in the year, but we
are currently in the throes of Holy Week, so this
is spy Wednesday. This is the day where Satan enters
Judas and Judas portrays Jesus. And I was just wondering
(09:52):
if you had any special memories around Holy Week of Easter.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
What I will always remember Easter is that, like it
is when everybody shows up, our church was full, but
then on Easter everyone was trying to repair, so it
was just like a massive amount of people would show
up on Easter, people I just didn't see regularly. But
I also Easter reminds me of Easter suits, and I
hate suits, so I don't have the happiest memories because
(10:21):
there was always uncomfortable suits, boxy suits, the shoes, and
that the service was a lot longer on Easter Sunday.
So it was my favorite until we got to the
food now that because there's a special meal for Easter
and so like that. I love, I love, I love
to eat. I love a good lunch.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
So my pastor calls them the CMEs the Christians that
come on Christmas, Mother's Day and Easter. Absolutely, ye, So
I've gotten more of an appreciation for like Easter and
like Good Friday and Maundy Thursday was like the foot
washing as I've grown up and kind of shows Christianity
for myself. But if I have to look back, kind
(10:58):
of like as a kid, I was a Palm Sunday
girl because I'm like, oh, we're handing out things and
raving things. There was just something that was just always
exciting for me about that.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
It was like an arts and craft because you're to
make the crust yourself.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
So I could never do that. So I was just
satisfied with the palm. It gave like a mini Christmas
vive for me. So that's what it was about for me.
And then I'm singing in the special celebration choir for
each of this year. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm looking
forward to it. So now that the ice has been broken,
(11:34):
I think we can get into the words so we're
gonna get in the main meat of this conversation. And
this week's episode is called See Daddy Sinners Half Soul too,
So shout out to Sugar Avery and the color purple,
the nineteen eighty five version. Yes, absolutely, let's speak the
(11:56):
nineteen eighty five Absolutely, we love everybody, but the nineteen
eighty five version. Yeah, And to kind of quote because
some of the church mothers, we're gonna talk about the
poem today, Yes, and we're just gonna have a conversation
kind of like around adult content. But that kind of
(12:21):
phrase kind of always strikes me because they call it
adult content, but in some ways porn can be looked
at as incredibly childlike and immature. We're gonna be talking
about the Freak. Nationalis love the Freak.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
It's my favorite.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
What was your religious formation, if any, and how did
it inform your sexuality?
Speaker 2 (12:44):
What I've learned in the work that I do is
that religion informs most of our sexuality, whether you are
religious or not. I'm a pastor's skin. My grandmother was
a minister, and my grandmother raised me essentially, so I
grew up going to your I grew up being the
face of the children of the church. I always say
it's like being the Malia or Sasha Obama, right, Like
(13:07):
you're just kind of always having to be perfect and
good and you have your hair in order, your outfits
in order, and so for that reason, I always say
pastors kids are the horniest and the freakiest because they
are the most repressed. So I think it definitely informed
my curiosity about sex and my curiosity about sexuality because
(13:28):
it was such a we don't talk about this, or
it's not meant to be talked about unless you're with
an adult, or like unless it's with adults, and it's
not supposed to be something that you do until marriage.
So I had all these very clear ideas about sexuality
that I then had to unlearn in my adulthood. Wow,
(13:48):
I can relate to that, huh.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
But with my grandmother, it was almost like it's easier
for me to tell you what she didn't do in
the church than to give the long list of things
she did do in the church. So I grew up Presbyterian,
and she had a thing called lay leaders. So they
were like they weren't like deacons or elders or clergy,
(14:11):
but they were like rank and file members of the
church community who were recognized for their service and for
their leadership. So she was a lay leader that would
just reach out to other members in the church just
to check on people, just to make sure that people
were okay. There was a time my grandmother was the
superintendent of the Sunday School, and even after she stepped
(14:35):
down from that, she still taught first in second grade.
So from a religious aspect, there was a time where
my grandmother was my teacher. And then so my grandmother
was my Sunday School teacher for first and second grade.
My mother was my teacher for the nursery school of
Sunday School. My mother was also heavily involved with the youth.
(14:58):
There was a period where my grandmother was church secretary.
So it was kind of like I wasn't like a
pe k a about as close to that, get right,
And it was just like I was just known as
Missus Washington's grandson and Patricia Rees's son, and I was
(15:21):
so I was looked at as one of the gifted youth.
So it's but at the same time and even as
I was just kind of like in my head just
kind of like thinking and going through my day just
really knowing that I've lived my life as an unambiguously
black and clearly queer person, even from a child. So
(15:44):
I was looked at as like this gifted child that
had to be this example. But there was something about
me that clearly needed to be fixed. Yeah, and like
that thing was like my queerness and I was defemininet.
And even though like like my grandmother and my aunt
Naomi and my mother, like they gave everything that they
(16:06):
had to give me, I was still imbued with this
notion that I came from a broken home and there
was something wrong with my rearing because my father wasn't
in my home.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
Yes, similar my dad wasn't around. It wasn't treated that
way because Grandma was the minister, but my mom didn't
go to the church anymore. I didn't understand it at
the time, but I can look back and just imagine
how people were feeling or thinking about that because I
was there with my grandmother, but mother no longer went
to the church. But they also knew that I was
born out of wedlock, and so there was a protectiveness
(16:38):
about me. But I think also with the femininity, there
was also a attention with some of the church mostly
the boys specifically. The women were very you know moms,
you know moms and aunties, but the boys and the men,
it was always like tough enough, you know, mask up,
and there was that tension that was so confusing because
(16:59):
there's also I think as a kid, especially when you
understand what the family dynamics are or what the family
is supposed to quote unquote, look like there was a
yearning for that male attention, and not sexually, but just
like that male I just didn't have dad at home,
so it was a yearning for that that male camaraderie
that never quite fit right.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
Thank you for sharing that. And then the second question
I do want to move to is when do you
remember first being introduced to porn? And then when were
you first introduced to gay porn? And then how did
that inform your sexuality?
Speaker 2 (17:36):
I was first introduced to porn probably in middle school,
and it was Playboy magazines. Like going up to a
sleepover one of my classmates dad had like a collection
of Playboy magazine. So go to the sleepover and then
you know, you go into the room that has the playboys,
and you know, boys go one by one and they
explore the Playboy magazines, and that type of porn is
literally just kind of model like, you know, women posing
(17:58):
nude and really seeing the female form for the first
time and having a fascination with like breasts and volvas
and all of that. But then you know, I learned
about you could look up porn on AOL, so then
I started researching, or not researching, I started looking up
poor on AOL. But also at this time, this is
(18:20):
middle school, so it was the first time that I
had heard the word gay when I basically didn't get
invited to a party. One of the boys had a party,
and we were very small class, twenty something kids in
each grade, and so we got invited to everything. And
we've known each other since like first grade, so this
is now like seventh grade, so most of us have
known each other for a while, and so we always
(18:40):
do things together as like a class or it's all
the boys and then all the girls. So one of
the boys had a birthday party and didn't invite me,
and I found out about that, and I had like
was confused about it, and then one of the other
boys said, it's because everyone thinks you're gay, and I
didn't know what that meant. Had ever heard gay outside
(19:01):
of like happy, because you know, my grandmother loved nick
at night, and I feel like gay was like used
in the term of just like joy. So I didn't
understand it. And then when he explained what it was,
I think when I started moving into looking up porn.
You know, you go on a site and then you
have the subcategories amateur group, sex, and gay. So I
(19:23):
clicked on it, and then I you know, it was
given all these kind of hyperlinks to gay porn websites.
And also I want to mention that the AOL porn
or the porn on the Internet was different than the
Playboy because now I'm looking at people actually having sex, right,
There's a difference between like just modeling and like full
on intercourse or penetration. But yeah, there was there was
(19:43):
a couple the the gay porn was overwhelming. Again, Like
you know, I always talk about, like you up up
until that point, I thought my butthole only did one
thing right, and then you see gay point You're like, oh,
the butthole does that too. That's like kind of a lot.
But so like I needed to like find something that
(20:04):
was a little more demure, if you allow me. The
term and so there was one that was just like
a guy I think it was called Dino, the Italian Stallion,
and it was just like this guy on the beach,
and like, you know, websites were not very complicated back then,
so it's just like one homepage and then you kind
of keep scrolling and there are just pictures after pictures.
So it was like pick him on the beach, and
then him in a speedo and then the speedo is
(20:25):
like wet, and then the speedo comes off and it's
just like him and his dick swinging and my like
little eyes like bugged out, and my you know, my
puberty hit hit. So the my crotch was tinkling, and
that was kind of my first exposure to maybe I
am gay, but I knew that it was wrong, quote unquote,
(20:45):
and so also with that came repenting. Came a lot
of Kirk Franklin New Nation project called Me Now Track nine,
a lot of listening to those songs, you know, and
weeping and crying and Donnie mcclurk and we fall down,
Oh there we go and Donnie knows and so just
like a lot of those things. So yeah, so the
(21:07):
porn was tied to a lot of despair and sadness
and depression as well, because I would, I would, you know,
have the good time with myself masturbating and then feel
a lot of regret, and that regret wasn't my own, right,
that regret or that shame was put onto me by
(21:29):
my classmates but also by church because I understood that
quote unquote was a sin.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Right right right? Hold me now. Is also one of
my favorite songs from that New Nation project.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
Oh it's a beautiful song.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
The sopranos, fucking holler.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
Oh they eat it up.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
They eat that up. And then kind of like much
like what you said, kind of like in your answer
to question one, because I always had to be good
and proper and write and behave I also became sexually
active at a young age. And I say, for me,
(22:07):
my sexual activity really looked at I can really frame
that as I've masturbated from a very young age. And
then that even kind of ties into the whole conversation
of when I was first introduced to porn, because before
I even really got into triple X porn, for me,
it was like rated R movies and then growing up
(22:31):
black with ninety cinema, I mean Alan Payne and Alan
Payne and Jason's lyric Wesley Snipes in just about every
movie he was in, and.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
Swordfish, which was this, well.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
That was the two thousand and then I'm even thinking
of kind of like the men that were in waiting
to Exhale. And then for me, not the assault scene
and what love got to do with it that everybody remembers,
but kind of like that first sex scene where I
can Tina get together and it's more displayed as like sex,
(23:10):
kind of like before, like within the context of the
movie before I guess abuse. I just remember that being
kind of like a definitive moment for me as far
as sexuality. And then I mean seeing Gary daw Dan
and Boris Kojo shirtless with their chest out in essence massa,
(23:30):
I mean list them off, shump, I mean Chamar Moore
more Wow, Tyson Beckford. And then as a teen person
that was in the music, I mean we're talking about
genu Wine, We're talking about Llo cool J doing that
video right, and then like I'm fifteen years old and
(23:53):
I'm watching Midnight Love one night on B E T
and the untitled.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
I would stay up to watch Midnight Love, so that
I could see the entitled video and have privacy because
the family was asleep and I needed to watch that
video in private.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Right, And then there was this episode of Real Sexist.
It was Real sex twenty and it was kind of
like this showcase of blackmail strippers from Philadelphia, I remember.
But then I was still kind of like in this
place where I thought I was attracted to women, I
was still kind of like following that toe sure, so
like the Skinner Max that would come on late at night,
(24:33):
or like Emanuel in Space on Showtime. So there even
that that happened. And then I even had a Playboy
moment because we moved into a house we moved from
Freeport to Roosevelt when it was owned by one of
the ministers in the church. His family had lived in
it and his son had lived upstairs, and there was
still some stuff from when they lived there, and there
(24:54):
was a Playboy magazine that his son had, so I
too kind of like had that bought that that part right,
that play that Playboy introduction. And then as far as
gay porn, and this was actually incredibly this was kind
of like the moment that at least allowed me to
say I was bisexual. So spring of two thousand and one,
(25:18):
it was actually during the Easter season. It was the
weekend before Palm Sunday, and this time we were Upstates.
We were about two and a half hours away from
New York. But this was a time I was a
Patty LaBelle stand and Patty Levell was gonna be at
Madison Square Garden Palm that Palm Sunday. So I took
(25:39):
the bus down to New York to go to the
box office for Madison Square Garden to buy tickets because
this was the time before Live Nation and before tickets
back where you actually had to go in person to
buy tickets. And as I'm kind of like in that
time Square area, kind of like perusing the Hudson News.
And I don't know if Hesson New still sells Neudy magazines,
(26:03):
but this was a time where Hudder they did, Hudson
du still sell Neudy magazines. And there was this edition
of a magazine called Black Inches. And it took me
about thirty to forty five minutes to do it. And
this also is like a time castle because I'm fifteen,
(26:25):
sixteen years old at the time. Yeah, but I go,
I pick up the edition of Black Inches. I picked
at fifteen, sixteen years old, I pick up this gay
porn magazine and I take it to the counter and
I purchase it. Good for you, And as I'm heading home,
(26:49):
it just kind of clicked, like You've crossed the threshold.
You paid money to buy a gay pornography magazine and
you bought it in public. Yeah, at the very least
your bisection, sure at the but you clearly like men. Yeah,
(27:16):
because you just paid money right well, and you bought
a gay porn magazine in public.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Yeah, I thought, And it's just like a you know,
like because that way I did that too, or like
black planet dot com, you know. But I just thought
it was a mistake. Like I thought God made a
mistake and that I could just like pray it away.
I thought it was like an illness that could just
be cured with a little bit of prayer and holy water.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
I didn't grow up Pentecostal, so I didn't have that
explicit messaging. But even now, as I look over my life,
that messaging did still seep into me in some more
insidious ways. When we come back how our faith walks
hand in hand with our full identity. If you're loving
(28:34):
this show, don't keep it to yourself, Text it to
a friend, send it to your favorite group chat, or
drop the link and the family's thread where your cousins
swears they don't like podcasts, but we all know they listen.
All right, back to the show. How have religion and
porn co existed in your life? Did religion cause you
(28:54):
to feel guilty about liking porn? And then what is
your relationship now?
Speaker 2 (28:58):
I don't have a real relationship to porn that much.
Sometimes I'll watch it. I have an only fans. I
like amateur stuff. I fully support it, and I love
that we are in an era where because people have
their phones, if that's what they want to do, if
that's how they want to make their bread their money,
that they can I think that's such a beautiful thing
(29:20):
that people have the access, especially like knowing some of
the stories of how culture treats sex workers and sex
work and adult entertainment is not wonderful. It's allowed production
houses to get away with not being great to those performers.
And so the fact that performers can now start their
own pages and have direct consumer and make their own money.
(29:43):
I love that And if I were in a different lifetime,
I would probably also start me in only fans, But
I like the fantasies in my head more so than
watching porn. But I still do sometimes. So that's my
relationship to porn. My relationship to religion is that I'm
no longer religious spiritual. I have just a new definition
(30:04):
of God that works for me. My mom is a
born again Christian. We've been a strange for each other
fifteen years. Religion, which like this is not a unique story,
but very much harmed by it, very much betrayed and
hurt by it, and so just like didn't work. There
was a disconnect between religion and spirituality, and what I
(30:28):
had discovered was people hiding their hatred and their bigotry
and their chaos behind the Bible said, so, I have
a lot of respect for anyone, and whatever you believe,
I always say, as long as you're not hurting yourself
or anybody else, go off to you. But unfortunately my
experience was that there was a lot of harm that
(30:50):
was at the hands.
Speaker 1 (30:51):
Of the church.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
So I had to step away from it. Not an
immediate walk away, but a real boundary that had to
be set on my end order for me to thrive
and live a life that I'm proud of. I had
to cut my mother off because it was getting to
a place where my well being was just not doing well.
(31:14):
I'm an only child, single mother, so that relationship is
really close. And I'm also from Queen's and so like
a lot of people, I'm not really phased by a
lot of people, like you could say what you want,
to think what you want, I'll give a fuck. But
my mother I very much have her on a pedestal.
And I'll say this, I think my mother was my deity.
I think my mother was my God, which I think
(31:35):
for a lot of queer kids and for a lot
of kids, right, you're taught what God is, but you
don't really know what God is. But you know who
your parents are, you know who your grandparents are, and
you know what they believe in. But you're really like
there's really a worship of them, which is not I'm
not putting a judgment on it, whether it's good or bad.
I think it just is a natural thing that you know,
(31:57):
God is wonderful. But as a kid in your brain,
who's protecting you, who are you talking to, who you're
going to? It's your parent, and so I think having
my mother on that pedestal made sense. But I did,
in my adulthood, have to take her off that pedestal,
and I had to rework my relationship to what I
believe in and who I believe in. And so now
(32:19):
for me, I actually use the term ogg aug, which
is ancestors universe God. The God that I was raised with,
whether you know they want to say it or not,
was a white one. There were definitely white images of Jesus,
and so if that's the Son, then I'm assuming the
Father is also white. My concept of God was very
(32:39):
much rooted in kind of the colonized version of it.
I needed to undo that as well, And so the
last fifteen years has been that journey of reclaiming what
God is or who God is, reclaiming what spirituality looks like,
and reclaiming my belief systems and what works and values
(33:02):
and honors my black queer self.
Speaker 1 (33:07):
Yeah, thank you so much for sharing that. I also
saw a similarity to where not so much my mother
was my deity, but particularly as I came out about
my sexuality, because so I will be forty this July.
I came out sixteen seventeen. My mother embraced me, you know,
(33:29):
also as a born again Christian, as someone who would
have been considered an evangelical TBN and praised the Lord
and tdj's we mainstays in my house. But she was
clear that I was her son. She loved me, She
accepted me no matter what, and she probably took a
lot of flat for the way that she embraced me
as an openly gay person. But you know, when my
(33:51):
mother was here, I really used her as kind of
like a template as far as her love for me
was just the tip of the iceberg. How much God
loved me. Yeah, and then not so much having to
distance myself from her because even up until her pass
and we had a good relationship. But have had to
(34:11):
distance myself from my sisters because they're Pentecostal Church of
God in Christ and they struggle with my queerness. And
it has just been a situation of not a full
cut off, but definitely a thing of you know, I
have to love you all from a distance. And then
when I think about how religion collided with porn, it
(34:32):
really kind of like came to head during my college
life because I was openly gay. I was actually involved
in religious life actively Christian. I'm an alum of Howard
University and I was a chapel assistant at Howard University
during this time. But like I loved sex and I
(34:55):
loved porn, and at that time I didn't have my
own on phone, so I was getting my porn fixed
in the computer lab at school.
Speaker 2 (35:05):
Oh sure.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
So like I quickly kind of like became known around campus.
Is kind of like the preacher that likes porn. And
like I'm even thinking about that episode that Kirk Franklin
did where like he came out about his struggles with
porn right and then for me kind of like even
with what you said earlier in the conversation around like
you would look at porn and then it would be
(35:26):
like Kirk Franklin, so like I would look at porn,
I would not I would reach my climax, and then
I'm going to YouTube to listen to Running Back to
You by Fred Hammond or Sinking by Time Trip to
kind of like repent and purge myself, not because of
the sexuality piece, but because I like porn. And it's
kind of like what maturity both spiritually emotionally looks like
(35:51):
for me. Now, even sexual maturity really realizes me looking
at porn wasn't the problem. The fact that I was
doing this in this public setting and visiting myself upon
other people without their consent, that was like, that was
That's the actual issue. That's the problem. But the fact
that you know, on my personal phone in my personal
(36:14):
room with my headphones on, if the fact that I
like to start my day with prayer and logging into
as Men to jack off to whatever flix may be
on there, or to log onto Twitter pont and jack
off to whatever flix may be on there, and like
that in and of itself is not the problem, because
I'm being a sexual being, but I'm not visiting myself
(36:36):
upon other people without their consent. And then I've even
been able to kind of come to the place where
i can name like I'm a voyeur, Like I like sex,
I like to watch people have sex. By my naming it,
I'm taking it out of the shadows. I'm taking it
out of the darkness so that I can actually engage
(36:57):
my kink in ways that are healthy and ways that
aut a consent.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
Absolutely, I mean, I think that's where people get in trouble.
It's the repression doesn't allow you to. The repression is
rooted in shame, and you're not able to engage in
a healthy way, and you're raised or indoctrinated to think
that there's something wrong and there's nothing wrong with being
a sexual being. Your pastors like, we're all here because
(37:23):
our parents were sexual beings. So I think like really
working to un do that. And you know, religion at
its best, let me say this, church at its best
is community, right, It's it's people that you can fellowship
with who have shared values and who hopefully support and
(37:44):
love you. At its worst, it's oppression, it's control. And
so when I hear of somebody wanting to be religious
but struggling with their desire to masturbate or watch porn,
that's where religion is not supporting you. That's where you're
being controlled and repressed, and that should not be the
way that you're engaging with it. If God made you,
he made you a sexual being as well, and you
(38:06):
should be allowed to safely and healthily explore that and
talk about it. It's why I do the show that
I do. I understand that I'm against the grain. I
just had a conversation this morning with somebody who was
navigating somebody coming on my show and talking about sex,
and I could feel the fear around having this person
talk about sex on the show, and it's like, I
(38:28):
want to undo that. I think that that's where we
get into trouble that you know, like that we are
all experiencing varying moments of our sexuality, but we think
we're by ourselves in it. We think we're alone in
it because we're not talking about it, because it stays
in the shadows. And so it's important I think even
in church to talk about porn, to talk about sexuality,
(38:51):
to talk about your relationship to it, for a pastor
to come out and talk about the relationship to it
and not with shame or whatever, but like this is
what the ex experience is. I think it's important. It's
important for people to know that it's okay to be
freaky in the bedroom if you have your consent and
with the partner's consent, you good, God is not mad
at you for jerking off.
Speaker 1 (39:13):
Right, And then even kind of like and I think
like the justice and equity piece within porn on that
you kind of like touched on earlier to around how
like studios are kind of like able to get away
with not treating their talent all that great. I think
if Christians could be open around the fact that you know, hey,
I love God, I love sex, I'm a voyeur, I
(39:35):
enjoy pornography, and that doesn't take away from my Christian witness.
That could empower people to kind of like go into
these spaces and address the very real justice and equity
issues that are happening in porn, like the substance abuse
and misuse issues that happen in porn because people have
been so shamed around sex now that they're doing it,
(39:57):
but like they have to like get intoxicated to and
that's everywhere.
Speaker 2 (40:02):
That's like the secrecy that happens because everyone is trying
to maintain a look at me, I'm you know, my
churchat is on, my suit is clean, like I live
a perfect holy life because of the need to project
that you're not able to actually be a human, and
if you're not able to be a human, you're not
(40:23):
able to see other people's humanity, and so a sex
sex workers and performers are humans to act like you're
not engaging with their work, or that their work is
to bring sexual disgust around it. Is so hypocritical and
actually harms them and also harms you because you're not
able to live your full life. You're denying pieces of
(40:46):
yourself because you don't understand, because you're afraid to engage
in a thing because you don't understand it, or you're
probably scared that you're really gonna like it. You might
like being tied up, honey, you might like getting pissed on.
You might or you might like you know, vanilla six,
but you know, it's not something that just has to
be regaled to when we get married and just for
(41:09):
child wearing that to me, which is another thing is
so rooted in patriarchy. Hey, capitalism and capitalism that's about
oppressing women. That's about you know, like we even when
we talk about porn, we often don't see women's pleasure
being portrayed, right. We often see that it's a guy
getting off and where are the women? Where's women's pleasure
(41:29):
in that? Where's women's equity inside of that? So you know,
if you're looking up porn, looking up equitable porn is
really important and smart and also understanding that porn is
porn that is not what you should expect in your
bedroom that's what you should expect from your partners. There's
a whole production happening on that set. Ask your partner
(41:52):
what they want. Talk to your partner about what they
want and what they like. Those are two different things.
They do not need to match.
Speaker 1 (41:59):
Thank you. Yeah, and then we've kind of had some
kind of deep conversation. But before we get out of
the word, as we get ready to close the sermon,
move into the benediction. I want to have two kind
more fun, more lighthearted, because porn is supposed to be fantasy,
so there should be an aspect of it that's fun.
So is there a porn star on your sexual bucket list?
(42:20):
And who would you like to see do a porn
scene together?
Speaker 2 (42:23):
Oh? Interesting? Well, as I said, I don't really watch
a ton of porn, but if there is porn star
that's on my bucket list, his name is Rahiem Beautiful, gorgeous, stunning,
and he could do whatever he wants to me. Yes,
he's always in Brazil, but he lives not too far
from I actually just saw him walking his dogs the
(42:46):
other day.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
And it doesn't have to necessarily be a porn star,
just like.
Speaker 2 (42:49):
Two people together.
Speaker 1 (42:51):
Yeah, who would I like to see together.
Speaker 2 (42:58):
The Rock was my sexual awakening I was in middle school.
I would like to see Oh my god, I'm just
gonna stick with the Rock and Kevin Hart. I would
watch it with my clothes fully on and just as
like research be like.
Speaker 1 (43:14):
Wow, this is wonderful. So Max Connor is a paunch
star on my sexual bucket list, okay. And then just
two people that I would kind of like to see together.
I would love to see what would happen between Little
nas X and Coleman Domingo if they got fifteen minutes together.
Speaker 2 (43:33):
Oh wow, that's a really good answer. That's a great answer.
I would watch the fuck out of that. That sounds lovely.
I'm gonna keep my joke answer as a joke answer.
Please don't at me. I love Coleman and Lona's accent
sounds really beautiful. As soon as I hang up on this,
I'm gonna be like, I want to see these twenty
people together.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
Okay. And then the last question for this word porsche
a gospel single or religious figure you had or have
a crush on, and then a gospel song you could make, love,
have sex a fuck too.
Speaker 2 (44:08):
I'm gonna keep it in the Kirk Franklin family and
say Lovely Day is that? But yeah cover the cover
of Lovely Day just has Oh actually no, it's it's
the remix of Clark's Sisters Brought the Sunshine. They played
it in clubs. It's wild. I'll be at gay clubs
and the like the dead of night and suddenly it's
like you.
Speaker 1 (44:28):
Brought Yes, I think I saw Kevin Aviance.
Speaker 2 (44:32):
Oh yeah, yeah, Like I don't like, I'm just like
no one, no, people don't hear Jesus being blasted. But
like it's a gospel song. It's like all my friends
that I look around are like, all right, praise. So
that song is great for sex. And who do I
have a crush on?
Speaker 1 (44:49):
Or maybe someone that you had a crush on, you
know when you were younger, still listening to gospel, still
in the church.
Speaker 2 (44:54):
Yeah, who is the I don't know, but you know who.
I don't know his name, but he was one of
the judges on Total Praise and he's so pretty.
Speaker 1 (45:03):
Here would it be Jonathan McReynolds.
Speaker 2 (45:07):
Absolutely, yes, he's so pretty. He's cute.
Speaker 1 (45:10):
Okay, So for me, I'll Kirk Franklin before the Rebirth
of Kirk Franklin. So Kirk Franklin before I believe he
got work done because I'm a lips person and his
lips just were thicker and fuller.
Speaker 2 (45:26):
I love you calling it the rebirth. That's I live
in LA and I'm start calling that the rebirth.
Speaker 1 (45:31):
Well, no, I'm talking about the rebirth of Kirk Franklin album.
Speaker 2 (45:34):
Oh when the girls get to the doctor, I'm calling
a rebirth. Sorry, the album.
Speaker 1 (45:39):
And then growing up, I thought Smoky Norfolk was cute.
Speaker 2 (45:42):
Oh I don't think I know where that is.
Speaker 1 (45:44):
I need you now, I need you now, I need
you now, I need and if you like, if you
google him, like, because I feel like we came around church,
so it's Smoky s M O K I E. And
then it's Norfol and or r f L and then
as far as it's pretty, and then as a gospel
(46:06):
song that I could like fuck to, it's gonna be
a medley because I'm verse bottom to whereas I prefer
to bottom. But if we're both attracted and you need
me the top, I got my top entering me and
like I would ride him to like this song called
you Deserve It, and it's like my hallelujah belongs to you.
(46:29):
And then like the choruses like you deserve it, so
like I'm riding him as the course is going, and
then like in my fantasy, like we're having raw sex,
so as he's getting ready to like nutting me, like C. C.
Wining's Holy Spirit comes fill this place. Would be playing.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Perfect literally perfect. I want that for you. I think
that is curated beautifully. I want that for you.
Speaker 1 (47:03):
Yes, So I think me talking about being flooded by
my top is a great way to close the service.
Speaker 2 (47:08):
I think so too, so with a reference.
Speaker 1 (47:10):
To and also it would be a way of kind
of like subverting her music because she's like known to
be a homophobe. So yeah, I'm taking backshots to your
worship music. We'll be right back. Hey, y'all. We're wrapping
(47:38):
up our time with Brandon Kyle Goodman. So like we're
gonna go into the benediction and it's just gonna be
a rapid fire of some quick questions, going to ask
a question and just whatever else whatever comes up for
you. You know, do that. What are you looking forward to?
Speaker 2 (47:57):
A break a vacation? That's awesome.
Speaker 1 (48:01):
So the aunties and the uncles are going on tour
this year. So there's an Auntie Summer tour that's like
Patti LaBelle, Sad Night, Stephanie Mills and Chaka Khan. And
there's an Uncles One yet, so it's Uncles One, Charlie
Wilson of the Gap Band, of course, Casey Haley from
Jo Deasy, Okay, Babyface and El DeBarge.
Speaker 2 (48:26):
So JoJo's not coming.
Speaker 1 (48:27):
Yeah, it's just gonna be Casey.
Speaker 2 (48:29):
What's Casey's He did that cover.
Speaker 1 (48:31):
Of Bobby Womax if you think You're lonely Now I
think he did it.
Speaker 2 (48:39):
Yeah, he's gonna sing the song solo.
Speaker 1 (48:41):
Yes, I think he is, because I've never seen him solo,
but apparently he has performed solo before.
Speaker 2 (48:47):
Okay, work and baby Face is gonna it's incredible, come
on the legend yep a Babyface tour but anyway, it's good.
Speaker 1 (48:55):
And then what is one thing you like about yourself?
Speaker 2 (48:58):
I like my life and I love to laugh.
Speaker 1 (49:01):
I'm really starting to fall in love with my smile
and particularly my teeth. And it took a while to
do that because I've always been insecure around the overcrowding
of my teeth, to where not only did I think
I've spent a lot of my life not only thinking
I was ugly, but thinking I was deformed before, so
I had an overcrowding in my teeth. So I'm good,
thank you absolutely, And where are you a year from today?
Speaker 2 (49:25):
I'm in Amsterdam living my life.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
So a year from now, I'm either back in school
at Howard or I've moved back to New York. Okay,
what are you thankful for?
Speaker 2 (49:40):
What am I thankful for? I'm thankful for my community.
You know, these are really shitty times, so I'm really
grateful that I have people that I can depend on,
that I love, that love me, that I care for,
that I can pour into that can pour back, so
that I'm really really thankful for that.
Speaker 1 (49:58):
What are you proud of?
Speaker 2 (50:01):
I'm proud of my career, and I don't say that lately.
I've really you know, I'm a black queer doll. They
them in a really tough industry and I've managed to
fight tooth and nail and I'm still here. So I
am really proud of that and learning to celebrate that.
Speaker 1 (50:24):
Yep, I'm both thankful and proud for growth. I just
kind of had a flashback moment earlier this afternoon, and
it's just kind of like, I'm not everything I need
to be, but I'm not everything I used to be either,
So you're thankful. What is a thorn for you? What
is something that annoys you? And it doesn't have to
be a big thing. It can be a small thing.
Speaker 2 (50:43):
Oh, people cutting their nails in public? Really hate that.
Hate that with a passion. Also the current administration fucking
up people's rights. Hate that even more.
Speaker 1 (50:58):
Quite honestly, people riding their bicycles, riding their scooters, riding
their mopez on the sidewalk.
Speaker 2 (51:06):
Because why are you on the sidewalk? Skateboarding on the
sidewalk makes sense?
Speaker 1 (51:11):
And going at full speed.
Speaker 2 (51:12):
That's crazy to me when people are walking. Why are
you on the sidewalk when the whole road is right there?
Speaker 1 (51:17):
What gives you joy?
Speaker 2 (51:20):
Real Housewives gives me a lot of joy? Yeah? And food?
I can't wait eep, I'm thinking about food right now.
I love a good meal. Some of you a cheese
or burger?
Speaker 1 (51:31):
Wow?
Speaker 2 (51:32):
Heaven? Now that see that's my foreid my word is
you saying that you got us reservations to some nice
ass restaurant with some good ass food and you're paying
the bill. That's my foreign love it.
Speaker 1 (51:46):
Okay, So what gives the fact that the spring, oh
and the colors are really coming alive in my neighborhood,
the trees are sprouting, you know, being in DC with
the cherry blossoms, which aren't just at the tidal basic
and what's giving you hope?
Speaker 2 (52:02):
Do you like podcast like this? Like being in communion
with other black queer creatives. You know, I think we're
around the same age. So growing up, we didn't have
a lot to look at it, not so to all
these years later be part of the collective of people
who are creating representation like that is hope at the
(52:25):
highest degree.
Speaker 1 (52:27):
Okay, And it's kind of like, never put your trust
in institutions. But I do have to be honest. Harvard
University standing up to Trump and saying no action that
was now And I mean, of course they can do
it because they have a multi billion dollar endowment. But
(52:50):
the fact that that's how they use that, the fact
that they're kind of like using their muscle when other
ivy LEAs are not using their muscle, that's something that's
given me. Okay, Well, Brandon, I don't want to hold
you too much longer because I want you to be
able to get to your dinner, let people know how
they can find you, and let people know what's coming
(53:11):
up for you that's exciting, and you want us to
keep a lookout for absolutely.
Speaker 2 (53:16):
You can find me on my website Brandoncogoman dot com,
which will take you everywhere. My Instagram is at Brandon
Cale Goodman and my substack is Brandon Coogodman dot substack
dot com. My podcast is Telling Me Something mes see
also on the Iheartnetwork and it comes out every Thursday
in the fall. I'm doing my next stage show in
New York called Ho Church h E a u X
(53:39):
HO is the Fancy because we fancy hose Baby. It's
all about being a PK and you know sexual liberation,
and there are puppets. One is a pussy puppet. One
is a puppet named Bussy. It'll be a fun time,
so I'm excited about that.
Speaker 1 (53:53):
Yep. So we come out during the summer, and Gabby
has already told me about that, so I'm glad that
you brought it up. I'm definitely looking for the dates
to be released to find out where it's going to
be in production so i can book my hotel and
my AMTRAC ticket because I definitely want to get up
for the Yep, you're still here, looking forward to you so,
(54:14):
and then looking forward to being able to see the
dates for that, see where it's going to be planned,
so I can get my book, my hotel room, and
get the air trated ticket to get out there. Yep. So,
once again, thank you so much for joining us, Brandon,
And then don't feel pressured, but we are getting ready
to as you exit out, me and the congregation to
(54:36):
get ready to close out and pray is that verything
you can pray for you on you have to.
Speaker 2 (54:40):
Pray for me on that my booty gets fatter, that
my pockets get fatter, okay, and that this meal hits
the spot.
Speaker 1 (54:50):
That's what you can pray for as we close out
today's episode. Let this be your takeaway that there is
holiness in laughter, That your memories, yes even the awkward
easter suit ones, are sacred, That your identity, your softness,
your growth, your love for a dog or a burrow
(55:12):
or your faith, that all of it matters, and that
you beloved, don't have to split yourself to be whole.
You got to be your friend Thank you for your words, Brandon.
We've got more next week, so meet us right back
here where me and my friends will be discussing the
(55:33):
queer past, the queer present, and the queer future of
the Quiet Storm until next time. Special thanks to our guest,
our listeners, and to all of you holding space for truth,
joy and transformation. Hella Black, Hella Queer, Hella Christian is
(55:54):
a production of iHeartMedia on the Outspoken Slate, which does
seek to amplify LGBTQ plus voices within podcasting. I am
your host and executive slash creative producer Joseph Freese. Gabrielle
Collins also serves as executive producer. Dylan Heuer is a producer,
(56:15):
and then Triple is our lead producer and editor.
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