A Queer POV

🌈 Ever felt like you had to hide who you are just to fit in?

If you walked into my gym and picked out the one person you’d most want to hug, the teddy bear of a man with the huge smile and the big, infectious laugh you can hear across the room, you’d be pointing at Carl. If you’ve been to Steel Gym in Palm Springs, you know exactly who I’m talking about.

I met him about a year and a half ago and we hit it off right away. We’ve had many a conversation about life and love since then, and at some point I realized he was a friend I wanted you to meet.

Here’s the thing about Carl. He’ll tell you he can be a lot. He’s the opposite.

He spent a lifetime editing himself. We all do it, and most of us start young.

For Carl it was third grade, in Española, New Mexico. He was cheering with the girls, S-P-I-R-I-T, let’s hear it, and somebody called him a joto. He was eight years old and he learned in one afternoon that being himself was dangerous. So he stopped. He began to hide the parts of him that got him hurt. A Catholic upbringing told him he was an abomination, and he started praying the prayer a lot of us prayed. Why me.

At seventeen he drove to a Navy recruiter and signed up. He needed his mother’s permission because he wasn’t old enough to enlist alone. And then came thirty-plus years of a different kind of editing. Don’t ask, don’t tell. A straight friend who found out and asked him if he was a little faggy boy. Carl decided it was safer to let his straight friendships go than to live waiting for someone to turn him in. He found his people instead, a gay brotherhood inside the Navy, and some of those men are still in his life today.

The editing followed him into love. He gave his values away in his first relationship because he wanted so badly to be wanted. He spent fourteen years in a marriage where two broken people loved each other honestly and still couldn’t grow in the same direction. And then in 2018, walking home from the clubs in Puerto Vallarta with his husband, someone shot him.

He survived. The relationship didn’t. The marriage ended, the real estate business ended, and Carl walked away from all of it.

He stopped editing. Not because anything got easier, but because he did the slow, unglamorous work of learning to love the one person he’d never really let himself love.

Himself.

He’s 55 now. A couple of years ago he prayed for someone who could actually see him, and not long after, a man named Jimmy sat down behind him at the Episcopal church. Two weeks before we recorded this, they moved in together.

We talk about his childhood, the Navy, coming out, his faith, the shooting, monogamy, and what he wants to build next. And we end with his mother Carol, who took the O out of her own name and gave it to him.

I hope you enjoy this episode with my friend Carl.

Be bold, be free, and most of all, be you.

-- David

A Queer POV: Friends, Loves, & Life with DavidYou can listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Substack, and YouTube.And if you enjoy it, please leave a review—it helps more than you know.

Connect with me on BlueSky

PS: When I’m not podcasting, I also make wedding, birthday, and anniversary cake toppers. (Yes, really.) Take a peek at the shop: Taylor Street Favors Or sign up for my free newsletter here: taylorstreetfavors.substack.com

In this solo episode of A Queer POV, David Begor takes apart what Meta has done to the queer community, with receipts.

It starts with a thought experiment. A friend who notices everything you do, knows everything you watch, and one day leans in and whispers that if you keep posting about being queer, they'll make you invisible. That friend is the Instagram algorithm.

David walks through what's actually happened: Instagram quietly blocking #gay, #lesbian, and #trans for teens for months in 2024. More than 50 LGBTQ+ organizations shadow banned or shut down across the globe in 2025. Mark Zuckerberg's January 2025 announcement that gutted hate speech protections, written in plain English, that now allows users to call us mentally ill, abnormal, and "it." A $1 million donation to Trump's inaugural fund. The end of Meta's DEI team three days later.

He covers the free speech lie, the legal precedent that says private companies are not the First Amendment, and the data the Trevor Project has been begging us to look at: anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideation among LGBTQ+ youth all climbing. The Los Angeles jury that just found Meta liable for $4.2 million in damages. The 2,000 more lawsuits waiting.

This one names names, cites sources, and ends where every solo episode ends. With a choice.

All links and full source list are in the episode's blog post at davidbegor.substack.com.

#AQueerPOV #FriendsLovesAndLife #QueerPodcast #LivingOutLoud #ShadowBanned #MetaCensorship #LGBTQYouth #TrevorProject #DeleteMeta #QueerCommunity

Kenny Patrick and David go way back to 1983. Life separated them, but reconnecting a few years ago gave David a front-row seat to someone living with extraordinary depth, honesty, and humor.

In this conversation, Kenny opens up about living with HIV since the age of 21, nearly 28 years of sobriety, a relapse in 2025, and getting sober again. They talk about identifying as non-binary after more than five decades, what community actually means and what it cost to lose it, and the surprising places where grace shows up, like a lesbian named Cosmic Carla who didn't let Kenny keep the lie, and a former Marine named Jer in a halter top and a huge smile.

This one covers a lot of ground: the AIDS crisis as a 21-year-old, a doctor who said four months, trauma and the two paths survivors tend to take, forgiveness that has nothing to do with the other person, and a God who looks like a Black woman in a Chanel suit saying "welcome home" to a man no one else would touch.

It's one of the most honest conversations David has had on this show.

Mark Tammaro didn't plan to start over at 62. After a 16-year marriage, a career he set aside to support his husband, and an HIV diagnosis that's followed him for 35 years, Mark found himself single, starting fresh, and, for the first time in a long time, building a life that's entirely his own.

In this episode, Mark talks about what it means to reinvent yourself after 60. He shares the story of losing his first partner to AIDS in 1992, surviving a diagnosis that was supposed to be a death sentence, and the slow realization that the comfortable life he'd built wasn't making him happy. He opens up about going back to school to become a certified personal trainer, the freedom and fear of being on his own, what dating looks like at this age, and why he's more excited about the future than he's ever been.

This is a conversation about loss, resilience, faith, and the stubborn refusal to stop growing.

In this episode:

Reinventing yourself after divorce at 60

Living with HIV for 35 years and what survival really looks like

Losing a partner to AIDS in 1992

Going back to school and becoming a certified personal trainer at 62

What dating, intimacy, and relationships look like as a single older gay man

The courage to give up safety and comfort for something real

Faith, gratitude, and why humor matters

Connect with A Queer POV: Substack: davidbegor.substack.com YouTube | BlueSky | All @davidbegor

We’ve Always Marched: Why We Protest, Why It Matters, and Why March 28th

In this solo episode of A Queer POV: Friends, Loves & Life, host David Begor traces the full arc of LGBTQ protest, from the first Annual Reminder Day pickets in 1965, through Stonewall, Harvey Milk, ACT UP, and the fight for marriage equality, to the No Kings movement happening right now.

David has attended Pride marches for forty years. In this episode, he makes the case that every single one of those was a protest, and connects that personal history to the largest nonviolent demonstrations in modern American history.

This one is personal. It’s also a call to action.

In this episode:

→  Why Pride has always been protest, even when we didn’t call it that

→  Pre-Stonewall heroes: Annual Reminder Day and the Mattachine Society sip-in

→  Stonewall, Harvey Milk, and the White Night riots

→  ACT UP, the AIDS crisis, and what happens when the government looks away

→  The 1993 March on Washington, Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, and DOMA

→  The fight for marriage equality: Prop 8 to Obergefell

→  The No Kings movement: from five million to a projected eleven million

→  Why anger matters, and how to aim it

→  March 28th: how to show up safe and smart

→  Harvey Milk’s Hope Speech and why it’s still the assignment

Sources & Show Notes:

Full sources, links, and show notes at davidbegor.substack.com

Connect With the Show:

If this episode resonated with you, share it with someone who needs to hear it. That’s how we take care of each other.

Find David:

Substack, YouTube, and Bluesky — all @davidbegor

They're Coming for the Ring: The Fight to Overturn Marriage Equality

In this solo episode of A QueerPOV: Friends, Loves & Life, host David Begor takes on one of the most urgent threats facing LGBTQ Americans right now: the coordinated effort to overturn marriage equality.

From a Waco judge who handed same-sex couples handwritten refusals, to Jonathan Mitchell — the architect of Texas' abortion ban — now filing federal lawsuits against Obergefell, David traces the full strategy: who's behind it, what they're building, and what it could mean for your marriage.

This one is personal. David got married in 2016, and he's not willing to look away.

In this episode:

→  The Hensley case and her December 2025 federal lawsuit to overturn Obergefell

→  Justice Clarence Thomas's written call to reconsider marriage equality

→  Project 2025's specific language targeting the Respect for Marriage Act

→  The Idaho House committee's 2026 attempt to overturn Obergefell

→  What the Respect for Marriage Act actually protects — and what it doesn't

→  What you can do right now

Sources & Show Notes:

Full sources, links, and show notes at davidbegor.substack.com

Resources:

Lambda Legal — free legal resources for LGBTQ rights: lambdalegal.org

ACLU — LGBTQ rights resources: aclu.org/lgbtq-rights

GLAAD — advocacy and news: glaad.org

Connect With the Show:

If this episode resonated with you, share it with someone who needs to hear it. That's how we take care of each other.

Find David:

Substack, YouTube, and Bluesky — all @davidbegor

Randy and I met in 1989 while doing laundry at the Chateau des Fleurs in Los Angeles. I had just moved to LA to work at Bullocks Wilshire in visual merchandising. Randy was working as a graphic designer at Exposure Magazine—the same publication where a young Ryan Murphy was working as an editor. Through Randy, I discovered the world of graphic design, typography, and the creative possibilities that would shape my career.

In this episode, Randy and I reconnect again to talk about creativity, loss, and what it means to sustain an artistic life across time. His career spans art direction roles at The Advocate, Genre, Hero, Home Magazine, and YM, plus 18 years teaching graphic design at FIDM. But more than credentials, Randy brings wisdom about the creative process—particularly his mantra that mistakes aren’t just acceptable, they’re essential.

Our conversation moves through the excitement of 1980s New York, where Randy worked alongside brilliant designers and editors, many of whom were lost to AIDS. We discuss his philosophy, and obsession, on typography (he once took type specimen books to lunch), his experiments with AI in music creation, the invisible burden of aging as a creative person, and why he wishes he’d gotten a business degree instead of relying solely on talent.

Randy is candid about regret, honest about ego, and generous with the lessons he’s learned. He talks about being fired for arrogance, the magazines that died around him, and why he still believes in doing things differently, even when it’s uncomfortable.

This is a conversation about craft, survival, and what it takes to keep creating.

I hope you enjoy my conversation with Randy. -David

RandyDunbar.com

#AQueerPOV #RandyDunbar #GraphicDesign #QueerPodcast #Typography #AIDSCrisis #CreativeLife #LGBTQHistory #DesignPodcast #QueerCreatives

A Queer POV: Friends, Loves, & Life with DavidYou can listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Substack, and YouTube.And if you enjoy it, please leave a review—it helps more than you know.

Connect with me on BlueSky

PS: When I’m not podcasting, I also make wedding, birthday, and anniversary cake toppers. (Yes, really.) Take a peek at the shop: Taylor Street Favors

We don’t talk about aging in the gay community nearly enough. We’re great at celebrating youth and reinvention and whatever’s shiny and new, but we don’t slow down enough to actually listen to the people who lived through the experiences that made our community possible in the first place.

This week I’m talking with 81-year-old Sean McCormick. He’s funny, he’s honest, and he’s got this huge heart that comes through in everything he says. I met Sean about three years ago, and we’ve become friends. When I started thinking about doing an episode on aging in the gay community, he felt like the perfect person to talk to.

Sean came out in the 1950s and 60s, way before being gay was something you could just say out loud. He remembers the coded looks, the piano bars like Kitty Sheehan’s in Chicago where he’d sing after a couple gin and tonics, the police raids, and the constant need to stay careful: to protect yourself and the people around you. He navigated being gay in the military during Vietnam, built a career as a deputy clerk in the appellate court, and found community in spaces that existed mostly in the margins.

He and his late husband Kent were together for 35 years: a relationship full of loyalty, adventure, travel, and deep companionship. After Kent died in 2019, Sean didn’t think he’d find that again. But then he met Arturo, and here he is at 81, still pursuing love. Still showing up. Still trying.

We talk about what it actually feels like to get older in a community that worships youth. Sean doesn’t sugarcoat it. He talks about feeling invisible at mixers, about the “cheerleader tables” that form even among older gay men, about how hard it is to put yourself out there when you’ve been rejected. But he also talks about the stuff that surprised him about aging: the confidence that comes with it, the clarity, the freedom of finally just being comfortable as yourself. “I’ve never felt so comfortable with myself,” he tells me. “Be me. Very simple. Be me.”

At the end, I ask Sean what he’d tell his younger self: that kid in the Army, or the guy just figuring out who he was. His answer comes fast: “It only gets better.”

This conversation reminded me that we’re strongest when we actually see each other across generations. When we listen. When we make room. Sean’s story is about perseverance and joy and the fact that becoming yourself doesn’t stop at any particular age. It just keeps going.

I’m really glad I got to share this one with you.

-David

#GayAging, #LGBTQElders, #QueerPOV #QueerStories #AgingWithPride

A Queer POV: Friends, Loves, & Life with DavidYou can listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Substack, and YouTube.And if you enjoy it, please leave a review—it helps more than you know.

Connect with me on BlueSky

PS: When I’m not podcasting, I also make wedding, birthday, and anniversary cake toppers. (Yes, really.) Take a peek at the shop: Taylor Street Favors

In this episode of A Queer POV: Friends, Loves, & Life, I trace the journey of the rainbow flag, from a small sewing studio in 1978 San Francisco to a global symbol of pride, protest, and belonging.

We meet Gilbert Baker, the artist and activist who stitched color into our collective soul, and explore how his friendship with Harvey Milk turned a simple idea into a lasting emblem of queer identity.

Along the way, I share stories of AIDS-era activism, the meaning of visibility, and what the flag has come to represent in my own life, especially as a gay parent raising a child in today’s world.

This isn’t just queer history.

It is a reminder that Pride began as protest, and that our strength has always come from showing up together.

🎧 Listen now and rediscover the beauty, defiance, and hope sewn into every color of the rainbow.

Hope to see you out in the streets this weekend at Palm Springs Pride!

-David

Resources:

Clip 1 - soundcloud.com/brainpickerClip 2 - cbc.ca/radioClip 3 - Outcast MediaClip 4 - cbc.ca/radio

ArtPalm Springs Pride Monument, Created by jimisermann.comArenas District Landmark Flagpole

Mentioned at the top of show:Out of the Blue by Robert TregoningFletcher’s Ice Cream and CafeHailey Bieber Unbothered

Today, I’m talking with someone whose name you might already know if you love beautiful spaces, Dann Foley.

Dann’s been designing for almost four decades, and his work has this incredible mix of style, warmth, and personality. He’s an award-winning interior designer, a TV personality you might’ve seen on NBC’s American Dream Builders or Showtime’s The Real L Word, and the author of It’s All in the Mix: Designs for Living Well — which, honestly, sums up his whole approach to life.

From his early days surrounded by travel and creativity to now leading major design brands and creating hundreds of products, Dann has stayed grounded in one simple belief: that great design should feel personal, welcoming, and accessible, not intimidating.

He’s been named to Designers Today’s Power List and recently stepped into a new role as president of Harp & Finial, all while continuing to grow his own lifestyle brand. But what I love most about Dann is his energy, he just loves what he does, and that passion shows in everything he touches.

So today, we’re diving into his journey, how it all started, what keeps him inspired, and why “living well” is something we can all design for ourselves.

I hope you enjoy my conversation with Dann Foley.

-David

dannfoleylifestyle.com

Book: It’s All in the Mix: Designs for Living Well

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#DesignInspiration, #LivingWell, #DannFoley, #InteriorDesign, #LGBTQCreatives

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A Queer POV: Friends, Loves, & Life with David

You can listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Substack, and YouTube.

And if you enjoy it, please leave a review—it helps more than you know.

Connect with me on BlueSky @davidbegor

PS: When I’m not podcasting, I also make wedding, birthday, and anniversary cake toppers. (Yes, really.) Take a peek at the ETSY shop: Taylor Street Favors