Queer histories, herstories, personalities and issues are explored with humor, insight, and sensitivity each week on Out in the Bay. We've been called “the gay Fresh Air” and even "the gay Tavis Smiley."
World’s first Drag Laureate shares joy, art, and politics of drag
A yearly "Day of Drag" and a drag mall? While many states are restricting drag, San Francisco Drag Laureate D'Arcy Drollinger is spreading the humor and "sparkle" of drag to make positive change in the world.
5/25/2024 • 52 minutes, 44 seconds
Writer Dwayne Ratleff on ‘Dancing to the Lyrics’
Dwayne Ratleff grew up poor, Black and gay in 1960s Baltimore. As a youngster, his loving grandma taught him: “Don’t explain yourself, be yourself.”
2/16/2024 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Peers connect on Pacifica Pier in ‘Spell Heaven’
As we await the reopening of the Pacifica Pier — now closed due to recent storm damage — we bring you poet Toni Mirosevich's stories of connection on this historic pier.
1/14/2024 • 28 minutes, 59 seconds
Pagans at Xmas? Making holidays queer-comfy
Just in time for holiday gatherings, tips for getting along joyfully with differences. Our guest says "nosy" questions can grease the turkey!
12/23/2023 • 29 minutes, 29 seconds
25 years since Matt Shepard, how are queer civil rights?
In December 1998, soon after its namesake's savage murder, his parents launched the Matthew Shepard Foundation to erase hate-based violence. We’ve seen big advances since then — and big setbacks. LGBTQ+ leaders discuss where we are now.
12/2/2023 • 53 minutes, 26 seconds
Matthew Shepard – in his mother’s words
25 years ago, a gay college student was savagely beaten, tied to a fence post, and left out to die on a cold Wyoming night. His grief-stricken mother worked to expand hate crime laws. Hear her story.
10/22/2023 • 28 minutes, 45 seconds
'Funeral Diva' Pamela Sneed: 'We can heal'
Pamela Sneed’s prose and poetry can reach out and grab you. They did me.
10/20/2023 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
25 years since Matthew Shepard: where are we now?
In October 1998, a gay college student was savagely beaten, tied to a fence post, and left outside to die on a cold night in Wyoming. Matthew Shepard's murder shocked the world. Where are we now with LGBTQ civil rights?
10/6/2023 • 51 minutes, 31 seconds
Burning Man – art and queer exploration
Why do tens of thousands of people trek to a temporary tent city in an alkaline Nevada desert every August? Is Burning Man worth the heat and dust? What’s queer about it?
8/25/2023 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Burning Man – art and queer exploration
Why do tens of thousands of people trek to a temporary tent city in an alkaline Nevada desert every August? Is Burning Man worth the heat and dust? What’s queer about it?
8/25/2023 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Drag Storytime – VERA! reads to preschoolers
Should drag story hours be banned? With so much fuss, we thought you'd like to judge for yourselves. So we bring some to you! Here’s #3 in our series.
7/28/2023 • 29 minutes, 29 seconds
Drag Storytime – Panda Dulce, Lourdes Rivas read to kindergarteners
Should drag story hours be banned? With all the fuss, we thought you'd like to judge for yourselves. So we bring some to you! (Episode 2 of 3)
7/21/2023 • 29 minutes, 29 seconds
Drag Storytime – The One & Only Rexy reads at book fest
Why ban drag performers? Why all the fuss over drag story hours? Hear some for yourself ... then you decide!
7/14/2023 • 29 minutes, 29 seconds
Transgender rock band Lipstick Conspiracy reunites
Pump up the volume! In part as a “joyful antidote” to the escalation of anti-LGBTQ laws across the USA, San Francisco’s all-transwomen rock band is back together after 12-plus years.
6/16/2023 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Author Dwayne Ratleff on ‘Dancing to the Lyrics’
Dwayne Ratleff grew up Black, poor and gay in 1960s Baltimore. As a youngster, his loving grandma taught him: “Don’t explain yourself, be yourself.” The long-time San Franciscan has written an impressive, insightful, award-winning novel about his childhood.
5/5/2023 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Learning from asexuals about sex and relationships
Quick, what’s your sexuality? Most of us know roughly where we fall on the Kinsey scale that goes from zero (totally straight) to six (flaming fag or butchest of dykes). But have you considered another continuum, the asexual – allosexual one?
4/21/2023 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
‘Doubting Thomas’ probes false accusations
What would you do if falsely accused of molesting a child? And you see your career crumble. Matthew Clark Davison’s novel “Doubting Thomas,” about a gay school teacher, challenges assumptions about guilt, innocence and more.
3/24/2023 • 29 minutes, 29 seconds
Grandma inspired California’s first lesbian supreme court justice
As a young girl, future Supreme Court of California Associate Justice Kelli Evans was more excited about the bookmobile coming through her Denver neighborhood than the ice cream truck.
3/9/2023 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
1960s 'pulp fiction' spurred LGBTQ rights
While a young housewife and mom in the 1950s and ’60s, Ann Bannon wrote lusty lesbian love stories. Scorned by the literary elite then, her and other authors’ “pulp fiction” paperbacks helped advance queer rights and now offer a glimpse of gay and lesbian life in those times.
2/10/2023 • 35 minutes, 53 seconds
Hats off to Pauli Murray!
On our last Out in the Bay of 2022, hear about the amazing life and accomplishments of a Black queer civil rights pioneer left out of history books: Pauli Murray.
12/30/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
‘Grin and bear’ curious holiday questions
Just in time for potentially awkward holiday gatherings, we present a holiday fave: Author and civil rights lawyer Abby Dees tells our allies to go ahead, ask LGBTQ relatives or friends your burning questions.
12/16/2022 • 29 minutes, 29 seconds
Remembering The Cockettes
While they weren’t around for long, the Cockettes left an outsized legacy that we explore this week with exclusive recordings and interviews.
12/2/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
‘Doubting Thomas’ probes false accusations
What would you do if falsely accused of molesting a child? And you see your career crumble. Matthew Clark Davison’s novel “Doubting Thomas,” about a gay school teacher, challenges assumptions about guilt, innocence and more.
11/18/2022 • 29 minutes, 29 seconds
Veteran Lauren Hough: ‘Leaving Isn’t The Hardest Thing’
In our queer nod to Veterans Day, we bring you Lauren Hough. She grew up in infamous Christian cult The Family, which her father had joined to dodge the Vietnam War. At 18, Hough fled to the Air Force, where she got anti-lesbian death threats and her car was set ablaze.
11/11/2022 • 29 minutes, 29 seconds
Inequities In Bay Area MPOX vaccines
What happens when members of our Bay Area LGBTQ community pay to skip the line? Reporter Corey Antonio Rose has that story, plus a chat with the Oakland LGBTQ Center on Out in the Bay.
11/4/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
‘Changeling’ sings about gender transition
Hear about the transgender experience from singer-songwriter Nick Lawrence, a family coach and former foster-parent educator on LGBTQ topics. His new album, I Am A Man, is about his own transition.
10/28/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Black Queer Women Get Mighty Real
The latest production of ItsQwere is inspired by ’90s-era comedy TV like In Living Color, All That, and SNL.
10/21/2022 • 29 minutes, 28 seconds
‘Bad Hombres’ skewers Latinx stereotypes
In “Bad Hombres” at San Francisco’s Theatre Rhinoceros, sole actor Rudy Guerrero plays seven characters that comically skewer stereotypes of queer Latinos.
10/14/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Breaking Mental Health Stigma with Stories
It’s Gunawan’s hope that through PRESS PLAY: Exhibition, he can reach people who are struggling and tell them, “you are good.”
10/7/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Passion for politics in 'Paul for Pete'
Crucial midterm elections are little more than a month away. How can individuals make an impact? “Paul for Pete” author Paul Mason Barnes lays it out in his book and gives tips on how to get involved on Out in the Bay Queer Radio + Podcast.
9/30/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Race Bannon: Queer & Kinky
The leather activist, author, sex educator, and kink afficianado is Christopher Beale’s guest this week Out In The Bay.
9/23/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
How many ways can you ‘Spell Heaven’?
How do we find human connection? Being “in with the out crowd?" Author and poet Toni Mirosevich finds peers on the pier.
9/16/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Project Open Hand: 37 years of 'Meals with Love'
Ruth Brinker, a grandmother and retired food service worker at the time, started cooking and delivering nutritious meals to San Francisco gay men debilitated by HIV/AIDS in 1985. Soon after, Project Open Hand, the nonprofit she founded, became a model worldwide.
9/9/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Born Perfect: Don’t try to ‘pray away the gay’
Despite clear evidence that conversion therapy doesn’t work and harms LGBTQ people — with high rates of suicide and other mental health impacts — the practice of trying to conform one’s sexual orientation or gender identity to societal norms continues.
9/2/2022 • 29 minutes, 29 seconds
Wrestling with Monogamy
This week, we are tackling two oft-misunderstood subjects on Out In The Bay. Open relationships, and professional wrestling.
8/26/2022 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
Author Dwayne Ratleff on ‘Dancing to the Lyrics’
Dwayne Ratleff grew up Black, poor and gay in 1960s Baltimore. As a youngster, an older Southern neighbor and his loving grandma both told him: “Don’t explain yourself, be yourself.”