Bad Gays

Today’s figure is the sort of character who has been extinguished from British public life today, and maybe that’s for the best. He’s a mass of contradictions, the sort of mass that confuses the idea of an easy history of “lessons we can learn”. How did this man manage to be both an avant-garde poet and a gossip columnist, a communist revolutionary and a High Anglican devotee, a labour organiser and a lord? Or perhaps more accurately, how did he manage to inhabit all these roles with a level of seeming sincerity and honest commitment? Was he an honest man, or a devious one? A man driven by fidelity, or by treachery? Perhaps we’ll get to the bottom of it when we discuss the life of Tom Driberg, the Lord Bradwell, journalist, socialist, MP, Chairman of the Labour Party, and cocksucker. Pre-order our book in paperback and get a free e-book! ----more---- SOURCES: Tom Driberg, Ruling Passions (London: Quartet Books, 1980). Francis Wheen, The Soul of Indiscretion: Tom Driberg ; Poet, Philanderer, Legislator and Out

Nicki Minaj once rapped: Drug Lord Griselda, I used to move weight thru Delta. She’s referring to today’s subject, la Madrina, the drug lord of the Colombian Medellín Cartel, Griselda Blanco Restrepo, the Black Widow. Born in 1943 in Cartegena, on the north coast of Columbia, she became the so-called "Queenpin," and adopted all the macho tropes of the gangster. We argue she wasn't the biggest gangster at the head of her cartel, but one of the smallest gangsters in a whole world of cartels that have worked to bring the fruits of South America’s land into the United States market, at the cost of millions of human lives. Pre-order our book in paperback for a free e-book! ----more---- SOURCES: José Guarnizo Álvarez, “Colombia’s ‘Cocaine Queen’ Living in Obscurity When She Was Shot Dead,” EL PAÍS English, September 13, 2012, sec. International, https://english.elpais.com/elpais/2012/09/13/inenglish/1347536945_696771.html Episode 2: Berner Interviews Michael Corleone Blanco (Full Episode), 2019, https://www.youtube

Warning: this episode contains discussions of child sexual abuse. Listener discretion is advised.  This week, we tackle the French author André Gide, a self-styled "immoralist" who oscillated between an austere Protestantism and a sensualism he associated with the so-called "Orient," and who elevated pederasty above sodomy in a way that helps us understand the often-disfiguring influence of upper-class male sexual desires on the construction of the 20th century gay male identity. Pre-order our book in paperback for a free E-book! ----more---- SOURCES: Kadji Amin, Disturbing Attachments: Genet, Modern Pederasty, and Queer History, electronic resource, Theory Q (Durham: Duke University Press, 2017) Andre Gide, If It Die . . .: An Autobiography, New Ed edition (New York: Vintage, 2001) Andre Gide, The Counterfeiters (Vintage, 2012) Andre Gide, The Immoralist, trans. Richard Howard, Reissue edition (Vintage, 2014) Mary McAuliffe, Paris on the Brink: The 1930s Paris of Jean Renoir, Salvador Dalí, Simone de Beauvoi

Today we welcome special guest (and Associate Professor in History at the University of Cambridge) Arthur Asseraf to talk about Mustapha Ben Ismaïl, a terrifyingly ambitious twink who rose from being an illiterate street beggar to Prime Minister on the strength of the king's love for him –– and whose disastrous policies helped bring an end to Tunisia's independence.  Arthur's Twitter. Arthur's faculty page. ----more---- SOURCES: Ramy Khouili & Daniel Levine-Spound, Article 230: A History of the Criminalization of Homosexuality in Tunisia, available online: https://article230.com/en/article-320-eng/…   Marcel Gandolphe, ‘Une figure tunisienne: Mustapha ben Ismaïl’, Revue tunisienne, 144, mars-avril 1921, p.83-87   Khayr al-Din al-Tunsi, Memoirs, (ed. Mohamed-Salah Mzali and Jean Pignon), Tunis, 1971.   Ibn Abi Dhiaf, Ahmad, Ithaf Ahl al-zaman bi Akhbar muluk Tunis wa 'Ahd el-Aman (إتحاف أهل الزمان بأخبار ملوك تونس وعهد الأمان), (1990 edition), Tunis.   Jean Ganiage, Les Origines du Protectorat fra

Argentina, 1942: a scandal breaks. Tabloids scream about newly discovered photographs –– taken by the amateur photographer Jorge Horacio Ballvé Piñero –– at homosexual orgies in Ballvé's apartment, photos allegedly depicting young cadets from the national military university in compromising positions. 29 cadets are expelled, discharged, and/or punished, Ballvé thrown in jail, and the government collapsed, toppled by a right-wing coup promising moral cleanup.  Pre-order our book in paperback for a free E-book! ----more---- SOURCES: Demaría, Gonzalo. Cacería. Primera edición. Buenos Aires: Planeta, 2020.   ———. Jugos de Amor e Guerra. Buenos Aires, Argentina: Centro Cultural de la Cooperación, 2019.   Encarnación, Omar Guillermo. Out in the Periphery: Latin America’s Gay Rights Revolution. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016.   Espinoza, Lucas E, and Rosalva Resendiz. “Los Secretos de La Redada de Los 41 (The Secrets of the Raid of the 41): A Sociohistorical Analysis of a Gay Signifier.” In NAACS Annual Co

She's an icon, she's a legend, and she is the moment: today’s subject caused such a scandal in her life that even its fictionalized depiction in a novel was banned by the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice. The Mozart of bisexual drama, sword-fighting crossdressing opera singer Julie D'Aubigny burned through a dizzying series of lives, loves, husbands, mistresses, swordfights, operatic performances, lovers, and successes at the Paris Opera before dying in a convent in her early 30s.  Pre-order our book in paperback for a free E-book! SOURCES “Biographical Sketches and Anecdotes: Julie D’Aubigny.” In The Dublin University Magazine, 408–10. William Curry, Jun., and Company, 1854. Blackmer, Corrine, and Patricia Juliana Smith, eds. En Travesti: Women, Gender Subversion, Opera. 0 edition. New York: Columbia University Press, 1995. Carlton, Genevieve. “Meet The Sword-Fighting, Bisexual Opera Singer Who Broke All The Rules In 17th-Century France.” All That’s Interesting, March 3, 2022. https://allthatsint

We're starting off Season Six with George Santos, who rocketed the pathological homosexual narcissism we've spent much of our show discussing to the halls of Congress. In gay bar, there is at least one delusional queen who can't stop lying about his life. If you give him firearms and crystal meth, he turns into Andrew Cunanan. If you elect him to Congress, he turns into George Santos, who we argue is as likely as anyone else to become the first gay President of the United States. Pre-order our book in paperback for a free E-book! SOURCES: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/19/nyregion/george-santos-ny-republicans.html https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jun/27/pete-buttigieg-police-shooting-south-bend-indiana https://gothamist.com/news/listen-george-santos-eviction-tapes-show-him-begging-to-feed-pet-fish-mulling-public-assistance https://forward.com/fast-forward/529798/george-santos-jewish-american-republican-congress/ https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/george-santos-9-11-attacks-

Happy Christmas! It's Bad Gays Live! Relive our reading of the Jack Saul chapter – covering the life and times of the Victorian sex worker and pornographer – from our book BAD GAYS: A HOMOSEXUAL HISTORY at Foyles in London, with the inimitable Shon Faye reading out the saucy bits (maybe use headphones if you're spending today with Grandma, unless you and Grandma like joking about delicious frigging up the rear), followed by a conversation with her and the audience about the project.  Bad Gays: Season Six - Coming January 2023! Thanks for listening! SOURCES: Chandler, Glenn. The Sins of Jack Saul. Surbiton, UK: Grosvenor House Publishing, 2016. Hyde, H Montgomery. The Cleveland Street Scandal. New York: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan, 1976. McKenna, Neil. Fanny and Stella: The Young Men Who Shocked Victorian England. London: Faber, 2014.  Saul, Jack. The Sins of the Cities of the Plain. London: William Lazenby, 1881. Our intro and outro music are, respectively, Arpeggia Colorix, by Yann Terrien, and a tu

It's the Magnus Hirschfeld episode. We invited Laurie Marhoefer – Jon Bridgman Endowed Professor of History at the University of Washington, and one of our most-cited historians ever – to discuss their new book on Hirschfeld, called Racism and the Making of Gay Rights: A Sexologist, His Student, and the Empire of Queer Love. On the episode, we touch on Hirschfeld's life story as a pioneering doctor who helped invent modern homosexual identities and worked on some forms of trans-affirming health care –– while also discussing the ways he integrated racism into the homosexual identities he was creating, collaborated with eugenicists, and was often willing to accept more rights for some at the expense of others.  Our intro and outro music are, respectively, a tune written for us by DJ Michael Oswell Graphic Designer and Arpeggia Colorix, by Yann Terrien

Our UK tour has been fun -- and the US is next! Ben (sadly Huwless) will be stopping in San Francisco, LA, Chicago, New York City, and Boston in the back half of June. All the events are available for RSVP and booking –– many with great discounts on copies of the book and swag included! –– so visit badgayspod.com/book to get your spot before they're gone, as most of our UK events have sold out!

Happy Pride! We invited Ruby Hann, who completed her MA in History in 2020 and her MSc in History in 2021, both at the University of Edinburgh, to talk about Eugen Sandow, the bodybuilder who spread the cult of muscle around the world. Her research is focused on masculinity, sexuality, and the body in early twentieth century Britain. Ruby is not currently in academia, but she still occasionally writes, lectures, and attends conferences. You can follow her Twitter @RubyVolunteers to find her work.  Our book is available at badgayspod.com/book along with tour dates in the US and the UK! SOURCES: Budd, M. A. The Sculpture Machine: Physical Culture and Body Politics in the Age of Empire. New York: New York University Press, 1997. Chapman, David. Sandow the Magnificent: Eugen Sandow and the Beginnings of Bodybuilding. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1994. Dyer, Richard. White: Twentieth Anniversary Edition, 2nd ed. London: Routledge, 2017. Waller, David. The Perfect Man: The Muscular Life and Times of

Our book, Bad Gays: A Homosexual History is now available for pre-order from Verso –– and we're making many, many stops across every corner of Great Britain (Northern Ireland, we're sorry and we'll be there soon) to promote it, including three stops in London and stops in Oxford, Cambridge, Edinburgh, Manchester, Glasgow, Bristol, and Cardiff. All the events are available for RSVP and booking –– many with great discounts on copies of the book and swag included! –– so visit badgayspod.com/book to get your spot before they're gone.

For white, suburban, heterosexual middle America, Jeffrey Dahmer, like AIDS, was the natural, even the righteous, consequence of homosexual promiscuity. He remains one of the exemplary constructions of the supervillain serial killer, the perfect subject of a true crime story. Today’s episode is about Jeffrey Dahmer as man and metaphor: about the phenomenon of the serial killer-monster, about the ways in which homophobia, racism, and the various true crime myths Dahmer helped reify ironically impeded his arrest and enabled his crimes, and about the twisted, slap-happy identification with Dahmer pursued by some gay men. ----more---- SOURCES: ABC News. “Jeffrey Dahmer Hero Charged With Homicide.” ABC News. Accessed March 15, 2022. https://abcnews.go.com/US/jeffrey-dahmer-hero-tracy-edwards-charged-homicide/story?id=14853608. Barron, James. “Milwaukee Police Once Queried Suspect.” The New York Times, July 27, 1991, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/1991/07/27/us/milwaukee-police-once-queried-suspect.html. AP

It's a dog day afternoon: today's episode profiles the bank robber John Wojtowicz, who infamously (and as memorialized in Sidney Lumet's 1975 film DOG DAY AFTERNOON) held up a bank in 1972 to pay for gender-affirming surgery for Elizabeth Eden, his trans girlfriend. Or did he? We take a look, using the story to think through 1972 as a fault line for emerging attitudes about homosexuality and trans femininity, Wojtowicz' surprising involvement in early gay liberation activism in New York City, the DOG DAY AFTERNOON phenomenon and what it says about growing distinctions between gay men and trans women and how they were represented and compensated, and the ethical complications of Wojtowicz as a figure in history and in historical memory. ----more---- Update: Thanks to listener Ziz for pointing out that trans actress Elizabeth Coffey –– one of the legendary ensemble of Dreamlanders who starred in the films of extremely good gay John Waters –– was up for the role of the character in Dog Day Afternoon based on

Unusually for this show, which normally focuses on long departed historical figures, today we’re going to talk about someone who’s still very much in the news. Until last week, she was the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, London’s police force, and was the first woman and the first LBGTQ person to hold the rank, Dame Cressida Dick. Today, part two of two: we discuss Dick's tenure at the Metropolitan Police, the extrajudicial murder of Jean Charles de Menezes, Dick's cynical deployment of her identity to deflect critique, the spy cops scandal, the botched investigation into gay serial killer Stephen Port, the Met's dismal record on race, and the protests that finally forced Dick out. ----more---- SOURCES: Ramzy Alwakeel, “I Covered Stephen Port’s Murders. I Know Cressida Dick’s Departure Isn’t Enough,” OpenDemocracy, accessed February 22, 2022, https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/cressida-dick-resignation-met-police-stephen-ports-murders/ Anonymous, “Gangs Violence Matrix and Black Lon

Unusually for this show, which normally focuses on long departed historical figures, today we’re going to talk about someone who’s still very much in the news. Until last week, she was the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, London’s police force, and was the first woman and the first LBGTQ person to hold the rank, Dame Cressida Dick. Today, part one of two: we begin telling Dick's life story and then delve into the history of the Met, its relationship with LGBTQ people, and the conflicting strands of LGBTQ politics that emphasize conflict vs collaboration with the police. Next week: more on Dick herself and her checkered career in the force. ----more---- SOURCES: Many of the sources we used to research this episode will be cited in next week's show notes. For this week: Matt Houlbrook, Queer London: Perils and Pleasures in the Sexual Metropolis, 1918-1957 (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2006 Moya Lothian-Maclean, “Lords of the Manor,” Human Resources, accessed February 15, 2022, https:/

For a time, one of the world's most famous rock stars – singer of stadium rock anthems that still signify foot-stomping machismo – existed as an avatar of the most exuberant, feared, liberation-era forms of homosexuality: going from a 1970s long hair in skin-tight leotards cut to the navel to a Castro clone with a handlebar moustache who wore fisting T-shirts in his music videos. If the legacy of Mercury and his music often seems to smooth his work, and that of his band, Queen, into a sort of middle-aged, KISS FM everyday normality, here we lean into the contradictions of the charismatic man and the nuances of queer life in the 1970s and 1980s. ----more---- SOURCES John Harris, “The Sins of St Freddie,” The Guardian, January 14, 2005, sec. Music, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2005/jan/14/2 Jim Hutton and Tim Wapshott, Mercury and Me (London: Bloomsbury, 1995); Lesley-Ann Jones, Bohemian Rhapsody: The Definitive Biography of Freddie Mercury (London: Touchstone Press, 2012) Matt Richards and Mark Lang

A very special opera queen episode profiling an opera queen gone wrong: the Italian opera and film director (of 1968's famous Romeo and Juliet) who fought fascists as a partisan in the hills over Florence, mingled with Visconti and Cocteau and Marais and Chanel, and directed Callas in many of her mid-career triumphs before beginning to harden his style from lush realism to a celebration of set decoration above all. Zeffirelli, born at a time when the last composers whose works still fill the grand opera repertory were dying, faced, like all practitioners of the operatic arts in the 20th century, a choice between making living theatre or dead, ten-ton museum pieces. He chose the museum-piece approach and in so doing did tremendous artistic damage. CONTENT WARNING: THIS EPISODE DISCUSSES CHILDHOOD SEXUAL ABUSE AND RACIST LANGUAGE. ----more---- See Callas in Tosca in 1964 here. See Leontyne Price's costumes for Antony and Cleopatra here and  here. See Zeffirelli's MET Opera Turandot set here. See Waltraud

Are you ready to have your timbers shivered and your mainbrace spliced? Today’s subject is a mysterious one, a historical figure whose life and reputation are confused by propaganda, romance and mythology: the Irish pirate Anne Bonny. We'll use her story to discuss gender, race, and class in the Golden Age of Piracy. Visit www.badgayspod.com for an episode archive, a link to pre-order our book, and more information about the show. ----more---- SOURCES: B. R. Burg, Sodomy and the Pirate Tradition: English Sea Rovers in the Seventeenth-Century Caribbean (New York: New York University Press, 1995) David Cordingly, Women Sailors and Sailors’ Women: An Untold Maritime History (Random House, 2001) Philip Gosse, The History of Piracy (Mineola: Dover Publications, 2012) Charles Johnson and David Cordingly, A General History of the Robberies & Murders of the Most Notorious Pirates (Guilford, Conn: Lyons Press, 2010) Ulrike Klausmann, Marion Meinzerin, and Gabriel Kuhn, Women Pirates and the Politics of t

The "Eulenberg Affair," a series of media scandals about homosexual behavior at the highest levels of the German Imperial court, dragged on in the press for years as it made and broke careers in journalism, sexology, and the court while helping define both Imperial Germany’s relationship to masculinity and the emerging homosexual emancipation movements. Plus drag ballet, Wagnerists, extremely racist paintings, songs about roses, and moustaches with names. ----more---- SOURCES: SOURCES: Robert Beachy, Gay Berlin: Birthplace of a Modern Identity (New York: Vintage, 2014) Miranda Carter, “What Happens When a Bad-Tempered, Distractible Doofus Runs an Empire?,” The New Yorker, June 6, 2018, https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/what-happens-when-a-bad-tempered-distractible-doofus-runs-an-empire Norman Domeier, “The Homosexual Scare and the Masculinization of German Politics before World War I,” Central European History 47, no. 4 (2014): 737–59 Norman Domeier, “Scandal & Science – The Power of S