You are born in the south, raised moving from small town to small town because your father is a minister in the church, you’re gay and you know it but you can’t come out, and all you hear from your family is how homosexuality is a sin, an abomination. You’re stuck, at least it feels that way. So you get married, your wife knows that you have sexual inclinations towards the same sex and she loves you so she’s open to it. But ultimately that’s not enough, love can’t overcome your intrinsic character. So you escape your life in the south, your family, your upbringing and you come to California, adopt a new name, create your true identity and help others do the same. That’s the story, in a nutshell, of Finn Deerhart who moved out to California to find out who he is. Today, Finn helps men face the shame they carry inside around their sexuality and dispel it so that they can accept themselves and have healthy, sexy, long-lasting relationships. He’s in this to get people to feel proud of who they are and what they want. Guess what, so are we.

Finn Deerhart - Ain’t no shame in gay

SHAMEBOOTH is a podcast about getting proud. 

Through recordings from our art installation, interviews with brave people doing brilliant things and chock full of other sneaky peaks and goodies, we help you answer the question what if? What if I was enough, what if I could feel proud even about the things I thought were mistakes, and what if I did it with playfulness and joy. What if? Come on, what’s the story you want to tell about yourself to yourself. Here’s your chance to flip the script.

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Emmy-nominated filmmaker, renowned public speaker, and writer Tiffany Shlain is no stranger to technology. Not only is she founder of the Webby Awards and co-founder of the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, but much of her work interweaves humanity’s relationship to technology. Not to mention her husband, Ken Goldberg, is a roboticist at UC Berkeley. And part of technology’s power, Tiffany says, is our ability to turn it off. So, she does turn it off - her phone, her computer - every Saturday with her family, in what they call a “Technology Shabbat,” and they’ve been doing this for the past 10 years. She even wrote a book about it, called “24/6: The Power of Unplugging One Day a Week.” And let’s be real: turning off technology feels more important - and also harder to do - NOW more than ever before. In this episode of SHAMEBOOTH, Tiffany details the impact her childhood has on her current path and mothering approach, how “Tech Shabbats” have transformed her life, and why you might want to follow suit and do the same.

Unplugged with Tiffany Shlain

Nadia Bolz-Weber is a bad ass: A Lutheran pastor and the founder of House for All Sinners & Saints in Denver, the author of three (!) New York Times Bestsellers, she has a podcast, a huge following and she just doesn’t look like your typical pastor. One of her books, Shameless, got us running to her because we know how deep the connection between shame and religion can be and we want to get that shame right out of the way! We spoke with Nadia from her home. We spoke about her early days in the church, the paths she took that led her in other directions, and how she found her way back.

Shameless with Nadia Bolz-Weber

Eve Ensler is most well known for The Vagina Monologues, a play she created that has been performed around the world countless times. She’s also a feminist, activist and author. We spoke about her groundbreaking, heart wrenching book, The Apology. Written by her, channeling her father, it is an apology, one she never received from him but that wrote in his voice, for the years of sexual and physical abuse he inflicted upon her. Unflinching, healing, excruciating, revelatory, bold, brutal, and written with, as Anita Hill states, with unflinching candor and immeasurable grace. I had the honor of speaking with Eve Ensler. It was right before Covid hit and she was at home in the woods. We spoke about feminism, genocide and the power of calling men in instead of calling them out.

The Apology with Eve Ensler

Debbie Millman’s resume is impressive, to say the least: Designer, artist, brand consultant for some of the most recognizable companies, author of six books, host of the first-ever and longest-running design podcast, Design Matters. It’s easy to think someone this accomplished had it all handed to them. But with Debbie, you’d be wrong. She struggled through and survived a deeply challenging childhood, which she first revealed, candidly and unexpectedly, on the Tim Ferris podcast. Her healing process has been a long one, and perhaps her most impressive quality is her courage in the face of it all. Time and time again, she has proven that’s she’s not afraid to reinvent herself, to evolve. Exhibit A: After being married to a man for a number of years, Debbie came out of the closet in her fifties and is now engaged to woman… but not just any woman: author Roxane Gay.

Courage with Debbie Millman

New York Times bestselling author and journalist Peggy Orenstein has spent a good part of her career focusing on girls and young women in groundbreaking books like Cinderella ate my Daughter and the infamous, Girls & Sex. As the #metoo movement was ramping up and boys and men were being taken to task, Orenstein wanted to hear from them, to better understand what boys were feeling and thinking and how was this movement, and our social climate, shaping the way in which they were understanding their sexuality and expressing it. She interviewed dozens of boys, from young adolescence to young adulthood, and realized that they were ready to talk and what they had to say may surprise readers and listeners. Boys & Sex was just published and Orenstein shares the insights she gleaned from the research and one big take away: Talk to your kids about sex. They’re ready. So should you be.

Finn Deerhart - Ain’t no shame in gay

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