Gay 90s (and 80s): The Rainbow Remix with Denise Warner & JD Danner

“To be able to see it represented on TV means so much to a young mind."
Susan and Sharon continue their celebration of Pride Month by welcoming JD and Denise, hosts of "The Rainbow Remix", a podcast featuring LGBTQ lifestyle news, music, arts, media -- and mixology!

Denise Warner is an out lesbian and veteran podcaster going all the way back to 2006 with “The Lesbian Lounge". JD Danner is a musician and songwriter who came out after a 25-year marriage. She reached out to Denise during the COVID quarantine and together they created The Rainbow Remix, shining a light on LGBT creatives in all the arts.

In a fascinating and deeply personal conversation, we talk about queer characters on TV, the way representation changed from the early to the late eighties – and using television as a mirror, both then and now, to figure out who we are and where we fit in.

THE CONVERSATION

• “Pretending to be Gay”: From Jack Tripper on Three’s Company to Norm on Cheers -- What’s up with that?
• How going to a Pride event can feel like a life-or-death choice.
• Jamie Farr’s “Klinger” on MASH – was he gay? Trans? Or just trying to get out of the Korean War?
• “You Might Be A Lesbian If…”: How Kristy McNichol, an obsession with Charlie’s Angels, and a Cagney & Lacey birthday cake all helped Denise realize she just might be gay.
• How "Friends" got it right with TV’s first lesbian wedding – but then fumbled five years later with the transphobic “One About Chandler’s Dad” episode – and what show creator Marta Kaufman says about it now.
• Were Darlene on "Roseanne" and Jo on "Facts of Life" coded as gay?
• “The Secret Audience”: why straight viewers watch "The L Word" and "Queer as Folk" – juicy story-lines and hot crushes!
• The importance of supporting lesbian and diverse creative projects and creators.
• “We Want Ellen to Come Out”: How the show approached her “big life change” – and why the network suggested she just get a puppy instead.
• The "Ellen" Backlash: How Ellen’s coming out episode got Oprah hate mail, the Ellen TV show cancelled and almost destroyed DeGeneres’ career.
• The night Susan went to Ellen DeGeneres’ apartment -- with the Indigo Girls!
• How could you not know? In the 70s and 80s, we - and our moms - all loved Boy George, Prince, Grace Jones, Liberace and Paul Lynde.
• So join Susan and Sharon – and Denise and JD! – as they talk Golden Girls, best lesbian kisses -- and make-up tips from drag queens!

AUDIOGRAPHY
Listen to The Rainbow Remix Podcast.
Listen to Sharon and Susan on Rainbow Remix's 80s TV Ladies episode!
Catch The Rainbow Remix on Youtube and at TheRainbowRemix.com.
Learn about the The Trevor Project's work to support LGBTQ youth and Donate here.

Listen to JD Danner’s "Come out and Dance" on Spotify.
Read about Friends creator Marta Kauffman on the lack of diversity in Friends and the mis-gendering of Chandler’s parent on HuffPost.

For transcripts and more visit 80sTVLadies.com.
Don’t miss out. Signup for the 80s TV Ladies mailing list!
Help us make more episodes and get ad-free episodes and exclusive content on PATREON.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome to eighties TV Ladies, partof the weirding Way media network, Babes
Dance, Pretty the City. I'myour producer Melissa Roth, looking back at

(00:27):
female driven television shows from the nineteeneighties with your hosts Sharon Johnson and Susan
Lambert Adam. Hello, I'm Susanand I'm Sharon. Our guests today found
us and invited us on their show. They're the hosts of Rainbow Remix podcast
podcaster Denise Warner and South Florida singerj D. Danner have a show which

(00:51):
covers LGBTQ, lifestyle, news,music, arts, media, mixology and
more. And for Pride Month,we decided to a deeper look at queer
representation and television, particularly eighties TV. We got to sit down last episode
with videoographer and podcaster and author MattBaum to start our conversation about queer TV

(01:14):
history, and we decided to wrapit up with j D and Denise.
It's so great to have you guyshere. Welcome. We're so delighted to
have you with us. Yeah,we're happy to be here, so happy
to be here, and thank youfor having us on your show and reaching
out. We now wanted to haveyou on eighties TV Ladies so that we

(01:34):
could talk more about eighties television,about you guys, and about queer representation
on the TV Tube in the eightiesand beyond. I was so interested in
the topic when we had you guyson the show. You know, it
was just something that we never reallydelved into, you know, or thought

(01:55):
much about, you know, soit was really like the fact it was
thought provoking, and I'm like,you know what, I'm gonna go to
dive into this a little bit more. And I and I really went all
in and was researching all the showsof the eighties and what kind of storylines
you know, ever touched on,you know, gay, lesbian, queer,

(02:15):
trans and it was so interesting.Yeah, wow, Yeah. Were
there any themes or anything that stuckout to you just sort of in a
general sense as you were going throughthe list, you know, I saw
kind of like a timeline in myhead. And in the early eighties it
was more about pointing out, youknow, a gay character or the main

(02:38):
lead pretending to be gay for likeThree's Company, right, like Jack pretending
to be gay, like to youknow, riff On, mister Roper and
all that. And then you know, you had other shows that it seemed
like that was a thing. Likethere was a Cheers episode where Norm pretended
to be gay to get an interiordecorator job first, you know, and

(03:01):
it was you know, that kindof stuff, and of course everybody was
flamboyant, and it was funny becauseit was sitcoms, you know. And
and then I saw this like trendwhere the dramas were picking up on it,
Like I I never knew this,and I was a huge Miami Voice
maan. But Miami Voice had liketwo or three episodes that had a gay
character in it. But it wasone where an old colleague of Sonny's either

(03:25):
out in someone or you know,had some kind of like you know,
hate slurs towards um some one ofhis colleague's sons, and and he was
really bitter about it. And Tubbskept trying to figure out why he didn't
go along with this with this colleaguethat they were working with, and he

(03:45):
went back and explained it, andyou know, it was it was it
felt deep, you know, andI was like, okay, here we
go. And then I did alittle bit more and I noticed that,
like other dramas started, you know, taking on you know, some some
queer representation as far as like agay character goes and then protecting that person,

(04:06):
right, you know, right thatthen the trend went to like all
the hospital shows that were picking upsteam, like Saint Elsewhere, and you
know there was um Prepper John Yes, and then and it was AIDS came
into the picture, and it wasa lot more about you know, the
AIDS and the lack of funding andresearch and characters dying and you know,

(04:30):
and I was like, well,isn't this like an interesting trend? You
know where it started as being funnyand flamboyant and you know, all out
for the laughs and stuff, andthen it got a little darker, you
know, where you you know,closeted characters were outed, and then it
went to the heaviness of the AIDSepidemic. So it was really really interesting,

(04:56):
and I was surprised at some ofthe shows like Hotel like that just
didn't feel like a heavy drama backthen to have these you know, big
gay storylines on it. You know, I was all about like love boating,
golden girls and you know, stufflike that. And then I'm like
reading more and more and I waslike whoa okay interesting. And then another

(05:18):
one that popped up that was prettyyou know, like I had to like
read up on it a little bitwas La Law. La Law was one
of the first ones, you know, wasn't that towards the end of the
eighties. Yes, so they hadthe lesbian kiss episode, the first known
lesbian kiss episode that I actually remember. You know, the thing about the

(05:41):
protecting the gay character like that waslike true because I clearly remember in The
Golden Girls when Dorothy's friend from highschool from with college was gay and she
comes to visit and everyone thought thather partner who passed away, who was
passed was a man, and thenyou know, she's afraid to let everyone

(06:03):
know because she doesn't think that they'regoing to handle it, and like everyone's
fine with it. And then whenBlanche's brother was gay, that was another
character on that show, and theybrought him back quite a bit. Yeah,
there's a little more red occurring.I mean, even back into the
seventies with all in the family,everyone always accepted them like there wasn't like

(06:26):
a problem, like they weren't rejectedwhen it finally came out. So I
did notice that that there was thattrend of making it like okay, like
no one even on The Golden Girls, when Blanche originally didn't accept it,
at the end she saw how muchof a relationship and how much it meant

(06:46):
to her brother to have his boyfriendwith them and show everyone that they are
loved for each other, and thenshe even accepted it. So that was
true. It was kind of niceto see that. What they side noticed
in looking at some of the listthat I looked at is it seemed that
most of the gay characters. Idon't think this list was completely comprehensive,

(07:08):
but by far it seemed that mostof the gay characters were men as opposed
to being more even he went menand women, And I hadn't thought about
in the eighties in particular, howmaybe perhaps the AIDS crisis might have pushed
it in that direction. Yeah,maybe not. Maybe it's because most of
the writers were men and so theywere Yeah, that's what they thought about.

(07:32):
One of the things that I wentback to, and I think this
is going a little bit further backfrom the eighties, But do you remember
Jamie Farr and mash Oh, yes, of course, yes, when you
ever commented on that, like noone in my family ever went like,
look at the queer in the dress, or he wasn't gay, though he
wasn't gay, right, just acrocus you wanted to get discharged from the

(07:56):
right. But yeah, it wasjust like you know, quality any comedy
that you know what, in thatrespect there was a purpose, you know,
but yeah, like there was Inoticed, you know, of course
there was so much like miss labeling, you know back that, I mean
even in friends, like when theystarted with Chandler's dad, you know dad,

(08:18):
yes, yes, yeah, butI read that. I read the
whole um article by I think itwas Marta Kaufman that were like an op
ed, you know, how irresponsibleit was back then. It just wasn't
on anybody's radar. You know.They were going for the jokes and they
had no reference, you know,no reference points to it. And then

(08:41):
they get like a big name likeKathleen Turner to come in and play the
part or whatever. But like Ifelt like she was genuinely remorseful for not
you know, doing a little researchand you know, and again I think
it's more in the spotlight now,you know, people care more about their

(09:03):
identities and how they're identifying or maybeless. She's right, It wasn't that
anyone's radar, and nobody was doingit purposefully to hurt our community in any
way, you know. So tome, the fact that they went and
now educated themselves, learned a lotfrom it and then kind of integrated,

(09:28):
isn't And correct me if I'm wrong? But isn't she one of the executive
producers of Grace and Frankie Grayson Frankie, Yes, she is one of the
creators, Marta Kaufman. You takeeverything worn from a community that just just
like you know, pointed a fingerin your face and went, you didn't
do everything right, and you didn'tdo anything. Now you know, and

(09:48):
then you you know, you learnfrom it and you grow. But I
think I do recall to that shemade a massive donations to a lot of
different like the HRC and places wherewe need the help well, and I
think intention is really important. Butbefore we keep going, because i'd like
to introduce you guys to our listeners. So because we dived right in,

(10:13):
which has been very exciting. Yeahright, it's ready to go. But
Denise, can you tell us alittle bit about yourself and you know kind
of where you come from, whereyou are now and a little bit about
Rainbow Remix. While I am Denise. I'm a big out lesbian and I've
been doing podcasts since two thousand andsix, started doing them out of a

(10:35):
little guest room in my tiny condoand turned it into a studio when I
realized that we were onto something.And they've always been, you know,
very queer centric, LGBT community driven, and you know, the sole goal
was always and probably will always beto shine a spotlight on LGBT creatives.

(10:56):
You know, people that are creatingcontent, whether books, shorts, films,
concerts, music, whatever they're doing. We know how difficult it is
to get some traction, to getsome eyes on your project. So that
was always the goal from the beginning, and always to have it be like
a conversation, and that's how itbegan, and everything was self taught then,

(11:22):
you know. I mean, wehad a great mentor and a guy
that owned pretty much an all gaymail website that took us under his wing
when he knew what we were tryingto do and he thought, you know,
I want to reach some women too, you know, not just making
about the men. And he gaveus a platform, but he also taught
us everything, you know, thetechnology he was. He was based in

(11:43):
Atlanta, and he literally flew downand met us and you know, gave
us some contracts to sign, toldus what his vision was. We were
all on board. And the nexttime he came was a couple of weeks
later and drove down from Georgia withhis SUV full of equipment, you know,

(12:05):
consoles, microphones, set up mywhole guest room like a little studio,
and he he was the one wholike really held my producer's hand,
who was a teacher, and wewere doing it live at the time.
We were going out live at acertain time, and then we decided to
make podcasts so we could edit outsome burps and uh, what what are

(12:26):
you talking about? Nobody does that, you know. Yeah, and then
after a while we were just like, you know, it's screw it,
man, like, don't even editit out, like we're real. Like
we would eat on the show.We would drink You could hear our ice
clinkin. You can hear us burp. We would fall off chairs, we
would you know, get a littleinebriated from time to time. But it
was always a good time. Andyou know, I feel like we did

(12:48):
so much good with that ran forlike ten years. This is the Lesbian
Lounge. Yeah, yeah, becauseI heard of that show. I remember
hearing about that show. Yeah,it was weird phenomenon that kind of took
shape in like two thousand and eight, two thousand and nine. We were
kind of doing all that, tryingto do live events too, and it
was fun. It was really fun. And then my co host got her

(13:11):
like dream job, like she alwayswanted to work for the LGBTQ community and
she finally got a job, youknow, and uh, and it was
it was doing just that. Sowe had to you know, kind of
bring it to a close. Andthen for a while I was producing other
podcasts. I sat on a panelfor podcasting at Clexicon, and then JD

(13:35):
called and it was like, youwant to do this all over again,
and you know, we found ourfooting. It took us a little while.
Like we started, we were tryingto think of things that we had
in common to do a podcast about, and we went right to whiskey in
music, sicky and music can't gowrong there. Both of us realized that
LGBTQ projects just gets so neglected,you know, they really hard time,

(14:01):
especially filmmakers, you know, toraise funds, you know, with their
go fund means and their seed andsparks and all the indiego go things.
And I've seen my friends have crushingfailures, but I've also seen them have
like some supreme success, you know, and I just want to be able,
you know, to have people havea little taste of that kind of

(14:24):
success, whether it's like new youknow, somebody new following their project,
or a decent donation, or youknow, just give them a shout out
that they deserve. So we bothkind of agreed maybe that was the way
to go with the remix. Ilove that, I really do, and
j D tell us your story.Basically, my role in the entertainment world

(14:46):
has been being a musician a songwriterand having my own band and also writing
my original music. But I alsohad an internet radio show, I guess
it's before they called them podcast calledThat's Life, and I had like two
people that we did it in astudio down here in Lake Worth and every

(15:09):
week would be my co host,which was my niece. She's a journalist,
and we had a chat room,so we had people that would come
in the chat room kind of likeyou did with the Lesbian Lounge, and
so I would read what the peoplewere asking, so they weren't really calling
in, but anyway, I gota taste of that doing that. So
when COVID hit and it was justsitting around with not much to do as

(15:31):
a performer, I did go onlinea couple of times and I did some
shows out of my studio in myhouse and I couldn't believe and like,
you know, the first time Idid it, in an hour, I
was getting people from all over theworld literally, and they were like two
hundred and seventy people the first timeI went live to do it, and

(15:52):
I'm like, this is a greatway to reach people, so why not
do a podcast, And that's whatI got in touch with Denise because I
was getting people saying Hello from Spain, Hello from the UK. You know,
it was crazy. It was thefirst time I did it, and
I had done some touring performing forthe troops. I did some homeland tours
and I got to go to Guantanamobeywith my band and yeah, so I

(16:17):
was like, it was nice tobe able to even reach some of those
people because of my being online.The way the world is now was when
I toured. It was before weeven had GPS's in the car, so
it was early two thousand to havea map. Good to get out that
map. Yeah, sounds like itwas so far away, but it was
like two thousand and seven or something. You know, it wasn't that far

(16:40):
away, but just getting that stuff. So yeah, so I think so
this has been really great fun.I mean, when I first did my
first radio show, it was reallytherapy for me when I was coming out
of a divorce. So I wasa late bloomer coming out as lesbian.
I was married for twenty five yearsto man. But you know, they

(17:03):
knew, they knew, they werewaiting for me to tell them. It
was an exclusive for us. Theyalways said, when you finally come out,
you have to do it on ourshow. Because I was denying,
denying, denying, you know.But but yeah, so I ended up
having this whole big thing. Iwon't go into the story, but I
was actually cheated on and that's whenended my marriage, which was probably best

(17:26):
that it all happened, but formy therapy, I started doing a show
every Tuesday night. So yeah,so that's kind of like how I delved
a little bit into this world,and I'm enjoying doing what we do every
week. I think it's a lotof fun, right, Denise, It's
true. Yeah, I thought itwas a way to get through COVID.

(17:48):
You know, I've always found itkind of a really great tool, a
really great escape and to be artisticanother avenue. Yeah, I love that,
and it's true, Like I thinkSharon and I are sort of enjoying
the process a lot more than wethought we would. Not that I didn't
think I'd enjoy it, but itreally is something that I miss. I

(18:08):
get tired. Wait, we don'tdo every week. We do every other
week because we're not hardcore. Butyou know, at the same time,
I'm really excited to keep doing it. I'm like, oh, we can
do this, you know, forever, sorry, forever. Now. It's
such a great niche topic that youguys have tapped into. You're writing like

(18:32):
it is. It is never ending. You can just go and go,
and you're getting such great people.Huh. We have been very blessed.
I'm thrilled with our guests too,which are both stars and TV creators and
stuff. But we're also sort ofexpanding yeah, uh huh. So I'm
curious for you guys, what ladiesdriven eighties TV shows did you watch and

(18:53):
love and what does representation mean toyou now? And what did it mean
to you either before you came outor for coming out. I'll just go
huge questions, like fifteen questions,but go right what I was doing the
Deep Dive and I was, youknow, reading through and they just give

(19:14):
me like a little clip of likewhat the episode was and the character and
who played it and blah blah blah. And I was reading up on the
one, the La Law one thathad the first lesbian kissing it and I'm
thinking to myself, you know what, I remember that and I was young.
I was probably like maybe twelve orthirteen, and I remember thinking this

(19:36):
might be what, like all ofa sudden, like the connectors were connecting.
And you know, when I wasyounger, I was like a die
hard Charlie's Angels fan, I meandie hard. And you know, it's
funny, like especially when you've comeout late in life and you go back
and you and it's like in hindsight, you know, like my family would

(19:57):
say, in hindsight, I shouldn'towned by the way you were right front
of the TV watching Charlie's Angels drooling, you know, or you know that
you had a pet Beta tire posteron your wall, and most people had
like other people, so you know, there were a lot of little tips
that people just didn't pick up onalong the way. But I do remember,

(20:19):
like all of a sudden, Iwas making that connection to why I
loved Charlie's Angels as much as Idid to that La Law, like seeing
two women kiss on TV for thefirst time, and then all the Cagney
and Lacy that came into it too, Like I was such you know again,
like a diehard Cagney and Lacey fanthat my birthday cakes were decorated with

(20:42):
the Cagney Lacey Lobo, with theblue Cagney and Lacy and the little television
brown frosting, you know, likeinsane everybody knew. And it was just
like all those things were like,you know, making the connections in my
mind to think, maybe that's howyou are, you know, And then

(21:04):
now when I see it, Ifeel so much more relaxed, you know.
Or the little kids you know thatare watching something you know, that
can say, hey, that's likeme. Because there's so many knees out
there now, you know. Thereyou've got like, you know, non
gender conforming, non binary, andyou've got transgender, and you've just got

(21:26):
queer, you've got bisexual, andthere's a little bit of that and just
about everything nowadays. Not enough ofit, don't get me wrong, but
there's a little bit. And Ithink that even I think Jay when we
had Katrina on who was a youthservices worker from Liverpool here that does a

(21:47):
lot with LGBTQ kids and what arethose things I think we were talking about,
was it how important it is tosee things like that on TV or
in your real life, like areyou are your parents hiding it from you?
Are they? You know, arethey shielding you from a gay cousin?
Are they? Say? It's verythings and you know, like to

(22:08):
be able to see it represented onTV means so much to a little mind,
to a young mind. Doesn't meanyou're gonna be that way, right,
you know, it doesn't mean thatthat influence all of a sudden they're
going to become queer. It justyou know it just if you already are
having those feelings and you see it, you won't think they're wrong, right,

(22:30):
right, And you know what thatmakes me think of the show Family
with Buddy and Christy Nickel and andshe was so clearly the tom boy,
and I think that that was someonethinking back that I could relate to because
she'd had a boyfriend. She datedWillie Eames was her boyfriend, right,

(22:51):
And so you know, for someonelike me growing up and and also growing
up in the seventies, that youfigure that's just what you do, for
what you did. I don't knowif I'm saying that right. I'm just
saying like they took a character whowas kind of a tomboy but made her
still have a boyfriend and be,you know, living like like a straight

(23:11):
kid, where nowadays I think ithopefully would be different or they would show
you that she's more of uh.You know, I think I used to
confuse myself like do I want tobe like them? Or? Am I
like them? Why do I wantto us? Like? Dam do I
want to be like them? Like? That's where my confusion came because I
Christy McNicol haircut until I was likeyeah, in my graduation at sure I

(23:37):
still looked like that, but Imean those were the yeah, those were
the things that you connected with youknow, like the look of somebody that
wasn't wearing a dress, or thatwasn't wearing like a print shirt, or
you know that had bows in theirhair or wearing high heels or something like.
Those were the things I was connectingwithin characters. But I hadn't put

(24:02):
that all together, right because theyput in the box of like normal,
you know, like she was puttingin that box and she had a boyfriend
and not a girlfriend or whatever.That. No, it's it's true,
It's like, yes, I meaneven just having a tomboy character felt groundbreaking

(24:22):
in the seventies and eighties. AndI'm thinking of Joe from Facts of Life
right as well, in that inthat category, you couldn't go any further
than that, I think, evenfor you know, for me as a
tomboy, yeah that you know,not gay, but could have been.
Certainly there was a tomboy element.So there's there's both the tomboy and then

(24:45):
there's also the gay tomboy exact.And we know you never got the gay
tomboy in seventies or eighties television.You just got to tomboy and m But
those characters clearly resonated with girls aswell as I think some guys, right,

(25:07):
we're like, Joe's my favorite,right right, and Darlene on on
on Roseanne. Looking back, it'slike, how can anybody believe that she
was with David? Like you No, Like, how did anyone buy that?
Right? I don't know. Yeah, but you know, I,
as someone who was not a regularRoseanne watcher, I don't know. I

(25:32):
think that you can look at itboth ways. I had no problem believing
that Darlene and David were a couple, but she was straight. But you
could certainly read it a totally differentway up her more with just like a
like a moody, miserable teenager.Pretty much everybody what did that engsty period?

(25:52):
Yeah? But um, and thisis so funny, like I was
trying to think of how I,oh, I would spend um a day
off from school, like a snowday or a sick day or whatever,
and all that was on television duringthe day, where daytime talk shows like
Sally Jesse, Rappael and filled becauseI was thinking soap operas. But forgetting

(26:15):
that you are younger than I am. So yeah, definitely because when that
was happening, staying home from schoolor whatever, it was soap operas that
run. This was in the orgame shows. It was. It predated
all of the daytime talk shows forme, so totally so anyway, sorry,

(26:36):
but I would always get like suckedinto like a daytime talk show that
would have something on about like awife that was leaving her husband because the
husband she found out the husband wasgay or something. I'd be like,
you know, like really, youknow, like there's a word again,
because I think you know, Igrew up in Niagara Falls in New York,
you know, on the American side, but right right there, you

(26:59):
know, it could much walked toCanada, you know, no big deal,
but um it was. It wasa town where you know, like
even now when I go back,like I can look at women that are
wearing jeans and that play in asoftball league and you know, got their
hair and a pony, wearing flannelshirts, you know, and I'm like,

(27:19):
they could be gay. They lookedlike they could be, and yet
they're not. So it was soweird you know for me, you know,
is that there was no gay bars. There were no there wasn't a
lot of talk of it. Ihad one cousin my mother's he was like
my godfather actually, and he livedin Las Vegas. He was a hairdresser

(27:41):
and he he was Lolapalana's hairdresser,not just any addresser. Well um,
but yeah, he moved and hemoved back home, and he and a
friend of his opened up a hairsalum. And the thing I loved about
him was that, like he wasnot flamboyant at all. I mean a
little bit. You know, hehad the lisp or whatever, Like I

(28:03):
mean, you knew, but nobodymade a big deal out of it in
my family, you know, andyou know, like right like, nobody
made a big deal out of it. He was just he was just pat,
you know, like go get yourhair cut, you know, like
that's coming to the house, Gowash your hair, He's gonna cut your
hair. That kind of thing wasnothing major. And then as I got

(28:25):
a little bit older, I hadanother cousin who came out and she's a
lesbian, really successful chiropractor, likemassive business, like, very well known
and well respected in the community.So I guess like I didn't see a
lot of it growing up yet whatI did see was completely normal, but
I was still too young to likeask questions about it or whatever. So
everything I was getting was from TV, right, you know, I didn't

(28:49):
want to just like you know,bombard my cousins with all kinds of questions
and then have them go, welldo you think you are? And then
have to answer that, So,you know, it was more or like
I just want to see someone likeme on television like that. That's you
know, it's what I want tosee. And there was so little of
it. It was really really difficult. You know. The older I got,

(29:11):
I guess, the busier you get, you know, and then you're
not thinking about those things. Likenothing in Friends ever offended me, you
know about that? Even even nowI look back and I go, man,
it's like I don't know, Ijust I did. I wasn't offended
by it. But then again,I'm not transgendered or I'm not you know,
well so, but in let's talkabout friends. I remember the lesbian

(29:33):
couple getting married right from Channing uhRoss's ex Ross's Yeah, that was pretty
huge. Like I don't remember therebeing a lesbian wedding on screen. There
might have been, I don't,I can't or was that the first lesbian
wedding in a like primetime TV show? It might have been I feel like

(29:59):
it might be almost has to be. And it was treated so well,
I mean, the whole idea ofit, like Ross was disappointed and Ross
was annoyed, and it was playedfor comedy. But at the same time,
their relationship and her lesbianism was notmade fun of, right, you
know, it was sold accepted byall of them like it's funny, like

(30:19):
everyways goes. I hated Ross,like my wife hated Ross, and I'm
like, I know why, Iknow why. You all know a guy
like off winning, I get it, But in that instant, like didn't
he step up and end up walkingyes, yes, down the aisle or
one of them down the ail andthe parent didn't show up, So yeah,

(30:41):
like I thought, you know,he had a few redeeming qualities where
he could have really, you know, bet a jerk. He wasn't.
Like I was a lot older watchingfriends and thinking yay them for doing it,
Like that was the feeling and anytimeI would see something after that,
and that was why, like inthe nineties and then going into two thousand

(31:03):
and those characters started becoming more prevalent, you know, like a Jack McFarland
and you know that kind of stuffI would just will and grace in general.
You know, I was just like, oh my god, thank god,
you know, we're finally getting there, because it felt like it was
really bad towards the end of theeighties, in the very beginning of the
nineties, you know, like whereit took like a lot of guts,
I think, and I hate tosay it, but I think there was

(31:26):
a lot of network executives, youknow, that we're protecting their advertising dollars,
right, you know, and theywere not going to step on anything
any landmines whatsoever. And that wasyou know, the feeling for the longest
time, you know, and evennow I watched things, so yeah,

(31:47):
I think we've bought such a longway to go. But I see it
more and I do credit streamers.You know, original content on streamers seemed
to have less restrictions, you know, And I always think to myself,
good because I'm paying a membership feefor these things, you know, whereas
I could disconnect from regular cable,I care about what they're doing on ABC

(32:08):
and NBC and all that stuff,you know anymore, because I'll find what
I'm looking for on streamers. Now, you know, I'm happy to give
my money for that. Okay,this is probably a good time to take
a break, but we'll be backwith more. Hey, movie lovers,
it's Jackson here from the Back tothe Blockbuster podcast. If you've ever wanted

(32:28):
to hear an amateur cinephile and anindustry professional chat about film and television,
then look no further because every weekmy co host gay Us and I we
bring you the latest industry news,break down the most recent trailers, try
to be the box office with ourweekly predictions and dive into our favorite movies
on their anniversaries. And every secondFriday you can look forward to the Back
to the Blockbuster spinoff Deep Dives withOwen and gay Us with the duodissex and

(32:49):
movie of their own choice. Allthis and more. Wherever you get your
podcasts, welcome back. If youdon't want to listen to those ads anymore,
go on over to patreon dot comslash eighties TV Ladies and you can
get a mad free Anyway. Wherewere we? So? I just wanted
to bring this article that when Iwas doing a little bit of research.
That's from February twenty twenty two NBCNews. For the first time that season,

(33:13):
Lesbian's outnumber game Men among broadcast televisionLGBTQ characters, according to a report
released from GLAD, which I thoughtwas interesting given how little lesbian representation there
was in the seventies and eighties,right, and then all of a sudden
and then moving, we're more likable. And according to Wikipedia, Carol and

(33:38):
Susan's ceremony was the first lesbian weddingon network television are on television the US,
so which makes sense. I couldn'tI couldn't think of anybody else.
One of the things we're doing iswe're looking back from a modern lens on
these elements in the eighties and inthis episode, nineties and beyond, because

(34:00):
is you know, of what wegot right and what we got wrong,
And so you can argue that Friendskind of got the lesbian character right exactly.
And I think being able to say, yeah, we got it wrong
is a really big step, right, And I felt like it was genuine,
Like I didn't feel like lip servicein a programmed kind of press release.

(34:23):
I was actually really impressed with whatshe had to say and what she
learned from it. And you know, because those are the people that are
still making things today, you know, and here are the ones that I
mean, that's a huge lesson.When society is pushing back at you to
be canceled because of your mistakes inthe eighties. You know, what if

(34:45):
to come forward and say, yeah, we we did get that horrifically,
Yeah we apoplogize, you know,we didn't know what we were doing.
Then here's some money. Here's themoney, and these are my newest shows.
I'm trying to get things right,you know, and I think that's
how it's gonna be done. Wehave a friend Jay Jill Bennett, right,

(35:09):
she has made two quality sitcoms thatyou will never see. They just
can't get the funding and they can'tget eyes on them, they can't get
them to the right people, andthey are it's just quality work. And

(35:30):
it's so heartbreaking that they're doing likecontests and fundraising and all this stuff,
and it's all for what, youknow what I mean, Like there's always
going to be some executive that's notquite comfortable making that decision or relighting that
project for whatever reasons. And that'swhat they're up against all the time.

(35:52):
And it you know, when yousee that kind of talent getting wasted working
in a day job that they're sounhappy doing to pay the bills when they've
got this project sitting on a shelf. It's just gut wrenching, you know.
And there is this Jill, whatare the films? And then came

(36:13):
Lola. The show was called SecondShot Okay great. It was about an
ex famous soccer star that has tocome home and work again because soccer never
really took off, and all thecharacters and it were great and it had
like their cheers vibe feel to it, you know, but all made and

(36:34):
written by lesbians, and the fundingwas raised by them and everything, and
it was like a really quick,like blink if you miss it kind of
thing, like on video or somethinglike that. We had Haviland Stillwell on
the show, who was working withJill on this called Bad Habits, about
two women have to pretend to benuns for obvious reasons and they're both like,

(36:58):
you know, criminals. But theconcept and everything was great and there's
absolutely no reason that these things aren'ton TV, you know. And that's
what like a podcast like ours istrying to do, is to get people
interested in get them talking, andget them pushing and pushing for it,
you know, that's the only waythat these things are going to get done.

(37:21):
I think when you say about that, a lot of the characters that
were gay characters on the earlier sitcomsin the eighties and the seventies, they
were mostly met. That is reallytrue. And I think that even like
when Queer as Folk came out,you know, there was one lesbian couple
and all of these guys, andthey didn't even see them with once in

(37:44):
a couple of episodes. You wouldsee them with friends, but you know,
they're women, they're gay friends,but mostly and it was so it
was really hard within as a personwho was, you know, closeted but
wanted to see that on TV.I didn't really see the women except for
when l Ward came out, obviously, but you know, like Queer as

(38:06):
Folk, it was just always men, and it was just really I don't
know why that was. I alwayswondered, why don't the women get the
representation even with that that the mengot. I guess it's kind of consistent
across television exactly. And yet there'san audience. There's an audience. If
podcasting has taught us anything, there'san audience for everything, And I think

(38:34):
that's the same that is being foundand streaming, and that in some ways
it is the perfect place to speakto a particular audience. Yeah. Absolutely
always amazes me, doesn't it amazeyou? Ja, Like when you had
how many straight people come over totell you that they watched The L Word
or they watch something, you know, like like, well, what did

(38:57):
Judy and her husband come over andwatch with you? Oh, we watched
Tammy and George. Oh, nevermind that it is straight. But I
used to I remember, like whenI had a day job and I would
come into work and there were somany straight people that we'd sit around at
lunchtime and talk about, you know, the L Word, and they would
all have like straight crushes on Shaneand Jennifer Beale's and and it was so

(39:22):
they were so open about talking aboutit, you know, like it was
no big deal. And I alwaysthought to myself, sheer, I thought
it was only lesbians watching it,But it's not, you know, it's
lesbians and straight men. No.Um, But yeah, I do think
that, you know, there isan audience for that kind of thing.
I was really sad when the newqueers folk didn't get a second chance.

(39:44):
They only end in season. ButI do think they were trying to take
too many boxes off, you know, like you hate when someone I said,
scrap a dream or put their passionaside and try something else, you
know. And I have a lotof friends that are doing that now.
And it's like, if they couldjust go down the street that they're supposed
to be on, you know,we would all get access to that kind

(40:05):
of like good quality programming and wittywriting and sharp you know, good laughs,
like you know, like nothing offensiveto us, you know. But
again, I always feel like itcomes down to some you know, rich
conservative white male saying no, youknow, and it's really it's hard not

(40:29):
to recognize that the gatekeepers, say, I don't know ahead of NBC,
yeah right, who got kicked outbecause of inappropriate relationships with female employee of
the company. So like you're likewhen the gatekeeper is that right? They're
not interested in true female representation.They're not interested in something that isn't hot

(40:53):
to them, right, right,And that is not about money, That
is not about advertisers. That isabout being at the whim of man's opinion.
Yeah, power, which anymore,speaking of that, let's talk about

(41:15):
Ellen. Yeah, oh god,and the puppy episode. I can remember
vividly sitting there watching that my greenleather couch, and you know it was
coming. We knew it was coming, right, it had been that it
was coming. Yeah, and I'lltell you you know, like I remember

(41:36):
watching when Rosie o'donald had a talkshow. Yeah, yeah, she had
Ellen on and they were discussing howthey were both lebanties. It was a
great way of getting around it,you know. It was like fantastic was
I think maybe I Lebanese too.So for our listeners that don't remember or

(41:57):
weren't around, Ellen was a TVshow story Ellen DeGeneres. It actually started
as a different title and Friends ofMind, and it was more ensemble,
and then Ellen was the breakout starof that. So the second season it
came back basically as Ellen and Ellenran a bookstore and had a bunch of
crazy friends. Are very When itstarted out, it wasn't supposed to be

(42:20):
about what it ended up being,right Ellen, I mean it's a character
comedy. Yeah, yeah, thatbecame very successful. I think ABC was
trying to create their version of Friends. Perhaps, Yes, the very the
opening of the first season is verymuch, oh We're trying to do friends.
It was a little blatant. Yeah, I think they're holding umbrellas in

(42:42):
the opening a group of friends.They can get away with that, but
they can't say like piss oh good. And then Ellen DeGeneres was a known
comic when that went on, anda lesbian, A known lesbian in the
entertainment story. I don't know ifit was known out Okay, So I

(43:05):
went to high school with the IndigoGirls Amen, so you know. Anyway,
I was at a concert after ashow of theirs out here and a
friend of mine, who was gay, was like, oh, we have
to go to the after party.And again I'm not quite cool enough to
be fully gay, so I butI got to. I got to get
a pass every once in a whileto go to the after party, and

(43:27):
so I got to go. Andit was at Ellen DeGeneres's apartment. Oh
my cow. And so but beforeEllen was on the air, it was
just I think they had shot itbut it hadn't aired. But my friend
was like, that's Ellen de Generes, she's in the kitchen. We gotta

(43:47):
go say hello. So we wentto say hello to Ellen de Generes before
and I that was the first timeI had met her. So I guess
in that moment, I'm like,everyone else in this room is lesbian.
I am officially at a lesbian party. I am officially at a lesbian party
because Indigo girls, Hey, myfriend and Ellen degeneress the lesbian party and

(44:12):
you know, all women. SoI guess in my mind I was just
like, oh, she's a knownlesbian comic who wasn't out the way you
might be out now, right,but certainly wasn't hiding it right. And
yet it took many years, andso there was a moment season five where
were we I think, so yeah, where they go to the network and
they're like, we're going to weneed to make a shift for the character.

(44:37):
Ratings are dropping, we need todo something, and Ellen herself,
they star of the show, wantsto stop coding everything. Yeah, I
mean I think it was everybody onthe show agreed, it's time. Yeah,
let's just make this happen. Andapparently at the network they were like,
well, you know, if youwant her to have a life change,

(44:58):
maybe she can get a puppy.That's how this episode became known that
I didn't know that a network executivesuggested that instead of coming out as game
maybe the Ellen character kicking a puppybelow. Wow. But leading up to
it, I do remember there wasa lot of a lot of hype.

(45:20):
I mean, right, Melissa Ethridgehad signed on, Laura Dern was was
the object of interest, right,Oprah Oprah in the episode, that's right,
playing Ellen's therapist. Yes, soyeah, I mean the build up
was just incredible. I feel likeevery lesbian was just like this, you

(45:45):
know, like game time, andyou know, and in my opinion,
I thought the episode was so welldone, you know, I mean it
was. It was comedy, youknow, saying it into the speaker at
the at the airport, you know, it was. It was absolutely perfect.
And to know how it imploded everythingfrom the show to her life to

(46:09):
even Oprah talking about it, youknow recently, about how much hate that
she got for being on the episode, and Laura Dern saying the same thing,
like, I don't know that anyof us knew how deep it went.
It wasn't just that the show gotcanceled. It was the horrific hatefulness

(46:32):
that came you know afterwards, thatthat almost like sank her entire career.
She was like she sacrificed it forthe show, like sacrificed herself for the
show, thinking it was going tobe this, you know, great idea,
and I don't think our country wasready for it, or certainly that
network wasn't ready for it, eventhough they invested so much, you know,

(46:57):
into it obviously to get these blowdidn't Melissa ethers like sign up or
a toaster, So I said atoaster or something to her, But like
they just had all these great littlenuances that they put into it. You
seem like so much work went intoit, only for it to just backfire
so spectacle, I mean, reallylost everything for a while, Like people

(47:20):
didn't know if she was going tobe coming back. I remember when that
book came out, which she wasdoing a tour with she wrote her book.
She had an interview with Barbara Waltersafter she lost the show and everything
about how she lost everything. AndI wrote a song called come Out and
Dance just watching that episode. Thewhole thing was kind of the whole song

(47:42):
was coming to me, and Itried so hard to get that song to
her, and I just never couldget it to her. And I even
gave a copy to her mom whenI bought the book and her mom,
I'm why could you please give thisEllen number number ten as far? And
I never did get it to her, but it just always is really it
really that hurt to see that happento someone who had built so much and

(48:05):
was so loved by fans, andto have everything turned against her. Yeah,
it felt personal, like not noteven a joke. It felt personal,
like all of a sudden, itfelt really really personal, like how
awful it was. And I thinkit's something that's it's a reminder, you
know, it's a reminder that youknow, just when you think you're onto

(48:30):
something really good and everything is copasaticand you're being accepted, and you know,
there's a lot of gay stuff onTV now and there's a lot of
lesbians out on the forefront and blahblah blah, it's like PTSD, like
there's still this thought that it couldall be taken away. Then you have
this stuff that's actually happening in thecountry, so it's not fat. You

(48:52):
know. Many years later, didit happened that she got her talk show
and then did so amazingly well withwas there a lot of time between that,
I don't remember now she had aone season or even half a season
of The Ellen Show a year ortwo after and then I think it was

(49:13):
a couple of years. It wasinteresting because it's also what you're saying,
a little bit of hate and vitriolis very powerful. Yeah, when it's
coming at you. Yeah, right, because it's not a little bit right,
like when I say a little bit. But the number of people who
were like great or fine, whatevermuch higher than the number of people who

(49:34):
are hateful about what happened. Butyou're going to hear from them. They
were louder. They're going to hearfrom them, and they're going to be
so hateful that they're going to writeracist, hateful letters to Oprah. Yeah
for being in a scene of thatshow. I mean, think of how

(49:55):
much you have to care, Iknow about something that if you don't like,
you could just not have watched.Yeah. By the way, we
haven't picked up a pen or apencil unless I'm writing my wife a note

(50:15):
like don't forget lettuce, you know, or something like. I mean,
like I can't imagine and even onTwitter, I mean, like you only
get one hundred and forty characters.How much crap can you spill? You
know. But yeah, there arepeople out there that it's not about one
hundred and forty characters. It's howmany times a day using those hundred and
forty characters and spinning it out,you know, like it's it's awful,

(50:38):
such a it's such a cesspool Twitter. But um, that's just it is
that the louder ones are the onesthat get the file. And again we're
seeing it right now, like there'sa absolutely huge backlash. Two all these
advances have been made for lg Btwo Q equality. Yeah, and it

(51:02):
is horrific and terrifying. It isdesigned to hurt people, Yeah, it
is designed to wreck havoc on people'slives. Yeah. And it is personal,
literally it really. You know.The thing is, like I was
just thinking about this today, likesometimes I feel like all that hate that's

(51:23):
out there, right, and lawsand legislation it's trying to get pushed through
and all that kind of stuff,that's that's over here, you know.
And then you have the abortion stuffand that's over here on the side,
and that's huge and overwhelming. AndI'm watching Grey's Anatomy and I see that
their storyline is about abortions and thehate that's going at abortion clinics, and

(51:49):
all of a sudden, you're like, I don't even think there's enough television
to spotlight all the things. There'sso many things like wow, you know,
like it's just it's just it's it'smind blowing. But I think the
thing of it is is to me, when I see something on TV,

(52:10):
it gets my attention. You know, when I see something on social media,
I'll just scroll past it right right, No, unless unless it's something
that's like positive, like donate tothis cause of whatever or make a donation.
Whereas if I see something on TV, it totally garners my attention,
you know, like one percent ofit. I don't know if that's like

(52:34):
shallow or wrong or well, no, that's the visceral, like like that
is the power and impact of television, and particularly for those of us who
grew up with it as our internet, right with our source of information,
right yeah, And that's just it. I mean, those were the things
that helped me figure out what wasgoing on in me, you know,

(53:00):
because I didn't have any other references, you know, I didn't have any
resources. So that was the thingsthat helps me until I could until I
was old enough, you know,to see a therapist and say, this
has been going on. It's beengoing on since this and you know,
these are the things that I figuredout. And does this make me a

(53:22):
lesbian intuit? Yes, Now wejust have to tell your husband, so
you know, yeah, it was. It was a long might a brave
thing for you to do, youknow, thinking as a person who was
also married to a man for manyyears, more years than you are,
that was a brave thing for youto recognize that in yourself and actually go

(53:45):
do something about it. It's justweird when you're sitting there, you know,
purging your guts to somebody. Ican vividly recall it was just like
so many times saying and then Isaw Christy McNichol, and then I saw
Joe I'm back, and then thereyou know, and then I and then
there was like this Cagney obsession,and then there was like it was just

(54:07):
like so many things that you know, like all of a sudden, everything
was going back to TV. AndI think that was another. If it
wasn't for that, I don't knowwhat I have ever figured it out.
I don't know, you know,like it's just maybe because of the Internet.
But you know, eventually the Internetcomes up into our lives. And
that's the interesting thing because again youand your wife met with you doing a

(54:30):
podcast, yeah, and her reachingout to you. I mean yeah,
think about like again, an elementof media that did not exist when we
were growing up. Radio did.But you wouldn't have had a radio show
about lesbians at the time of exactly. It seems strange. And do you

(54:52):
remember when we had you on ourshow and we were talking about designing women
and we were I was saying,how all along I thought Anthony was gay
and then he wasn't You pointed outthe wedding and all that. There was
an episode where a gay guy whowas dying of AIDS wanted them to do
his funeral. Yeah, yeah,and that was that was a very There

(55:16):
was an Emmy winning episode of renownedepisode killing the Right Right Feeling all the
right people. And it's a linethat the creator writer heard in the hospital
while her mother was dying of AIDSfrom a blood transfusion. Yea, And
within less than a year she wrotethat episode after her mother had passed.

(55:38):
And yeah, and that was againlike an Emmy winning episode. It was
like and that was I think,I want to say, like eighty six
or eighty seven, maybe around then, Yeah, and I think that it
was starting to be a little bitmore recognized how powerful you know, that

(55:58):
words were, you know, whetherthey were about and when gay, whether
they were about someone with AIDS orwhatever. And I just I just remember,
you know, reading that about thatwriter, hearing that at a hospital
and naming the episode you know,back, and it was just like,
man, you know, like whatan impact? Again? What an impact?

(56:21):
Yeah? October seventh, nineteen eightyseven, Season two, episode four,
Early, you know, early LindaBloodworth Thompson, And yeah, what
an incredible and again very sophisticated insome ways, you know, because it's
like, how am I going towork this into an episode? Oh,

(56:44):
A guy's going to show up andsay, design my funeral because I am
dying. Yeah, And I wantit to be a celebration and I want
it to be reflective of who Iam. And and there's a b story
happening for Annie Pott's character about havingcondoms available and sex education available for their

(57:04):
high school kids. Yea, andit sort of combines and it says,
I don't want my kids to befacing a death sentence for experimenting with sex,
So can we just give them somecondoms and tell them about sex?
And so controversial though both those I'mputting both of those in, you know,
just very very controversial, but alsoimparting information that people across the country

(57:29):
didn't have and didn't have arguments against, like well, no, we shouldn't,
like you know, it's like you'regonna tell kids about sex, you
want them to have sex. It'slike, no, here's an argument that
just says, here's the reality.Kids are gonna have sex, and we
can make sure that they have theinformation they need. People kind of thought

(57:52):
they should be but yeah, theyforget it, you know, like they
get now they think that everything thatan eld GBTQ person, everything about them
is about grooming a child to begay or grooming that sex or you know,
something perverted about it, and that'swhat they're they're pushing now and it

(58:13):
just has nothing to do with education, resources, information, truth, fact,
you know, and never it's justthis weird thing that they have that
they associated with that kind of pervertedness, you know, and it's so offensive
you know, as a you know, again, as we find out from

(58:36):
the people that the loudest. It'soften projection. It's so is, and
it is I am inappropriate with mycoworkers, my whatever, like the loudest
people right now that are going afterthe groomers. You have an awful lot
of people who are inappropriate with childrenand teenagers in their ks, and so

(59:02):
it's a very weird way to,I think, throw up a lot of
noise. But it's also it's alsodesigned to be right now, this is
about I truly believe it's designed tobe hurtful. There's not a lot of
true believers. There's a lot ofpeople performing and trying to hurt people in
order to distract them for whatever theirother goal is. Yeah, say there

(59:27):
are and then and they're bringing thetrue believers with them and giving them rage
and vitriol and guns. And Yeah, it's really deeply upsetting right now how
much things are worse in many waysthan they were in the eighties, even
as there's more visibility. But Ithink it's in some ways the fear of

(59:49):
that visibility and the fear that peoplewill be allowed to sort of declare who
they are and be who they areand have those freedoms of choice in both
who they are and what they dowith their body. Yeah, that is
most fearful to the controlling factors ofBut then you might not think the way
I think or do what I wantyou to do, and I want to

(01:00:12):
control that. Yeah, it's justyeah. And speaking of the eighties,
it's like, think about who wewere most entertained by, you know,
um television aside, right boy,George Prince, Grace Jones, you know
what I mean, like the weirdestpeople ever that were just entertaining us,

(01:00:37):
and nobody went, oh my god, you know, like who wants to
look like that? No, wewere dressing up like them for Alloween.
I mean I remember growing my momloved Liberaci. Oh yes, I was
like like I'm as a kid,you know, seeing Abracchi. But I'm

(01:00:58):
like, did people think did theyknow he was gay? Did women not
know that? Or did they knowit and they just didn't say it?
Or I'm like, mom, didyou know did anybody realize that he was
gay? Like nobody really thought aboutit? Yeah, I don't know,
it's I don't know. And PaulLynde that was another fallow Yeah, right,
he was so like the Center Squareevery night, how he was you

(01:01:24):
were so entertained by these people.Your is it now? Now you have
a problem? Well, and againI think I think for a lot of
people, it was well, don'tdon't talk about it. Right, you
were fine unless you started declaring andwhy and owning it right? Didn't There's
this part of me that wants tofeel like people know the difference between right

(01:01:45):
and wrong. That feeling that yougot in your stomach, wing or saying
something wrong. You know it,you know it. You know. Why
doesn't that feeling and that why doesn'tthat matter anymore? You know, like
all of a sudden it doesn't matter. I gotta believe that there are more
people that know right from wrong andfeel it in their gut and do the

(01:02:07):
right thing. But I'm telling you, I'm struggling. Yes. And a
word I learned in the last monthwas stochastic terrorism. Nice. Stochastic means
basically just scattershot. It's like abiology term. I believe. It's basically

(01:02:30):
the use of mass public communication,usually against a particular individual or group,
which incites or inspires acts of terrorismwhich are statistically probable but happen seemingly at
random, so perpetuating that fear andthat sort of rage, and they like,
how dare you force me to feeluncomfortable? That a feeling of uncomfortableness,

(01:02:54):
right because I don't understand who youare or who you want to be,
and that makes me uncomfortable. Andthat feeling gets turned into disgust and
rage and anger and insights violence rightnow through the Fox newses and the you

(01:03:15):
know, dark media and things.And then it's like, oh, and
then let's give everybody guns and youdon't need a license for it. It'll
be fine, Like what a solution. We know that there are people purposely
feeding this rage, right, becauseit then creates people who respond, because

(01:03:35):
people like because somebody just loses theircrape and then they have been pointed to
a target, and that target isthose people who are different from you,
and those people who are different fromyou, and those women who want to
have control over their bodies and thoselike And it's really hard. Many people
who are reasonable just hide, likeI don't want to be around that.

(01:04:00):
I don't want to I don't wantto I don't want to argue with the
people. I don't want to havesomebody turn their anger on me, right,
right, And so it's really hardto stand up and go hold on,
ye right. I think it's hardfor people to stay engaged in the
process of defending our rights and ourcivil rights and our human rights. Exhausting.

(01:04:21):
And because it's exhausting, you feellike there's no way and they're counting
on that. So we have tokeep getting the love and the support and
staying prideful. Yes so so,but do so JD Is I know you're
in Florida, Yes, yes,a favorite state of the terrorists. What

(01:04:45):
can we do? How can wehelp what's happening with Pride? I know
you just had a Pride event thatyou played me and yeah, let's talk
about that. I had every intentionof going to Pride, right, And
then a couple of days before Ihad a friend tell me, did you
hear that the Santis is whipping upprotesters to come to Pride? You know,

(01:05:08):
like nobody knows what's gonna go downor you know, if, if,
how it's going to be. Andso all of a sudden, I
was like what So I text Jayand I'm like, I'm feeling a little
nervous about going to Pride because Idon't want to get you know, I
don't want to get blown off forgoing to a Pride festival, and so
I said, I'm gonna do alittle research or whatever, and I like

(01:05:30):
scoured the internet and I could findnothing, nothing, And I had really
heard of that that. She waslike, I don't know, I didn't
hear anything about that. She waslike, but if you don't feel comfortable
by all means like I won't beupset, don't you know? Done,
don't go. And I thought,you know, I sat back and I
thought like, this is so stupid. So I go back to the person

(01:05:53):
that told me, and I'm like, where did you hear this? Because
I'm not talking anything about it,and it's really messing me up because I
don't not want to go, likeI want to go, and I don't
want to be fearful and I don'twant to be nervous and anxious. And
so I think she was like,I think somebody in the office like mentioned
it. And I'm like, soyou're just repeating something without like he just

(01:06:15):
sat around or checking on it oranything, you know. So I just
said, you know what, I'vehad it. I'm going. Yeah.
There was absolutely not one protester there. It was a lovely day. At
no point did I ever feel unsafe, So I was like, I was
really relieved and happy that we went, and Jay like knocked it out of

(01:06:38):
the park. You have to followso many drag queens and the crowd is
so high between. Like the TaylorDane queen was insane. She was so
good, but always had to sharedressing rooms with the drag queens. When
I do Pride events, it's sofunny, like I can't whether she's gonna
come out with like bigay. Theirhair is all bigger than yours. I'm

(01:06:59):
looking from the makeup tips from them, like what do you use that?
What does that think about? Howdo you and how are you not sweating
out here? Like to answer thequestion, like, I think we just
have to keep on doing our thing, like showing up at Pride, not
canceling things, and and just keepingon being who we are. Like sometimes
it's daunting to think what can youdo except show up like we did?

(01:07:23):
Okay, that's the It's the smallestthing and yet it's biggest. Yeah,
it's not nothing. You know,support other like support the drag queens and
support your trans friends and you know, and you know, like you you
have to know that they're going throughsomething that's just like horrific, you know,

(01:07:45):
like knowing that their healthcare and theirand their rights are being you know,
could be stripped away at any moment, and are in other states or
whatever. I mean, what youcan do is just be there for them,
be supportive for them. You know, find groups and organizations that are
you know, the need volunteers andneed help, and that's you know,
that's the way to go. WhenDenise told me about the this thing about

(01:08:06):
maybe there was some problem with securityor some protesters, I'm like, but
I had bracelets made. I havea fifty Rainbow Remix bralet. Yes,
not going. Yeah, she honoredthat commitment. She honored it. Ard
Man, awesome. All right,So where can people find you? We've

(01:08:30):
got a YouTube channel. They canjust search the Rainbow Remix podcast. You
can actually watch our shows and them. We're also on podbeing and you can
go to my lesbian radio feed thereand all our shows are there. We
have a website, it's the RainbowRemix dot com and Rainbow Remixes on Instagram,

(01:08:51):
Twitter, Facebook, all the allthe socials. Fantastic we really having
us on today. This is somuch fun. First of all, just
eighties television alone is the greatest topicever. But I think it's it's amazing
that you're, you know, reallyspotlighting the lack of representation back then and

(01:09:14):
how things were we're being done backthen. Like it's just something I don't
think we think enough about, youknow, and uh when we see where
we're at now and we look backthen, like, I know, I
learned a few things. Ye.Yeah, So thank you for what you're
doing. Thank you, Thank youfor coming on the show. It's been
delightful. Okay, you guys takecare. Thank you by for our audioography.

(01:09:44):
Today. You can find Rainbow Remixat the Rainbow Remix dot com,
check out their YouTube channel and theirpodcast on all your favorite players. You
can also donate in support of LGBTQYouth at the Trevor prece Object dot com.
We hope Eighties TV Ladies brings youjoy and laughter and lots of fabulous

(01:10:04):
new and old shows to watch,all of which will lead us forward toward
being amazing ladies of the twenty firstcentury city and so pretty to the city. Ladies