Many of us grow up in families and communities that never once acknowledged the existence of queer people: no exposure to queer authors, filmmakers, artists. Pornography is often the first media we see that acknowledges queer sexuality. In this episode you will hear stories of pornography found under rocks, in dumpsters, behind medicine cabinets. Grainy, distorted porn that emerged from scrambled cable channels. Porn that validated feelings that may have been impossible to articulate. Porn that provided a starting point to begin deciding what turns us on and what doesn’t.

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Now we’re getting down to the nitty gritty. For this first episode we’re going back to the beginning of our coming of age when we had no clue what sex was or what it even meant. Maybe we heard about it from our parents, our friends or maybe we even went to a library. Many of us got the wrong information or maybe it just didn’t make sense but whatever we learned we definitely wanted to know more.

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Femininity and queerness go hand in hand; that’s the conventional wisdom, anyway. So it follows that our mom’s should be supportive, non-judgmental, embracing of our idiosyncrasies and accepting of children who don’t conform to conventional expectations of gender. But it doesn’t always work out that way. In this episode, Dave introduces a collection of stories about moms who teach us, disappoint us and, occasionally, surprise us.

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There are as many cliches about fatherhood as there are about queer people. Dads are little league coaches, the leaders of prayers, the final word in family debates, trusted voices of wisdom who guide their children through adolescence and prepare them for adulthood.  Join Dave as he introduces a chorus of queers who describe their complex relationships with their fathers and what they did (or didn’t do) when they found themselves in charge of kids who drew outside the lines of the typical heteronormative behavior.

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Welcome to Season 5 and a new episode format! Instead of just one person’s story, Season 5 episodes will present a variety of different stories and anecdotes from the Fruitbowl archive centered around a common theme. In this inaugural episode we focus on stories about families and hometowns.

1. Adam describes being bullied and what happened when he eventually allowed himself to enjoy masturbation. Originally recorded in Oct. 2019. Find Adam’s full episode HERE (S2E3).

2. Elliott reflects on the process of emancipating themself from their parents when they were still an adolescent and the process of discovering their trans identity. Originally recorded in June 2021. Listen to Elliott’s full episode HERE (S3E11).

3. Joshua was raised by his mom in Texas and felt the pressure to adhere to popular ideas about Texas masculinity, Latino machismo and family who were devout Christians. Originally recorded in Oct. of 2019. Listen to the full interview HERE (S3E1).

4. RC was a self-described Army brat who got some simple instruction from their mother regarding boys and was outed by their brother in high school while in Guam. Originally recorded in July of 2019. Full interview HERE (S2E8).

5. Mike is part of a first-generation Vietnamese American family and it took him awhile to realize he could take his own path instead of just fulfilling his family’s expectations for his future. Originally recorded in Sept. of 2021. Listen to the full interview HERE (S3E19).

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