Isn't It Queer

Jonny and Heather offer an overview of trends from 2025, linking the hard lessons learned about AI to the hard lessons learned from the first year of Trump 2.0. In the back half of the show, they turn a prophetic gaze toward the future and make some broad predictions for 2026. They dare to hope that after all of the suffering the world might actually be learning to be a little less phobic toward human diversity.

Jonny assembes a mix tape of 2025's contributors to IIQ as well as a sampling of some of the strange stories he and Heather have discussed in the past year. The show may be queer but the year was just downright WEIRD!

Jonny and Heather lean into the holiday season to see the various factors affecting LGBTQ+ communities as gifts--some are gifts we never wanted, some are incomplete, some come from Secret Santas, and some are true charitable contributions to the community. In the podcast, we mention our Flipboard magazing where you can find lists of good LGBTQ+ Nonprofit organizations to support this holiday season. Go here for the lists: Isn't It Queer on Flipboard.

Jonny and Heather take a deep dive into what "community" means when we reference the LGBTQ+ community and the idea that leanng into community is how we protect ourselves from the abuses of power that threaten us. In the back (not quite) half of the show, they demonstrate how the current infighting and boundary breaking of the MAGA community is a real indication of what can happen when community fails.

Jonny and Heather prepare for a pending brutal cold streak by diving into the heat of ongoing culture wars. It's not just political power that forms authoritarian states; despots gotta change the culture! So far, that aint going so well for our would-be dear leader. Where his cult brings on the pressure, many are pushning back--and not just in this country. Queer and trans folks are definitely increasingly targetted, but we ain't takin' it lying down. It may not be easy as pie, but at least our awards are well earned!

Jonny and Heather discuss a host of current event stories that indicate the political winds are shifting. Ultimately, this is good news for the LGBTQ+ community, even if the current turbulence is still causing us torubles.Real evidence emerges that MAGA is breaking up and the Trump Administration's iron grip of the GOP is crumbling.

Jonny and Heather welcome Thanksgiving with gratitude built on how things are and how they are not. In looking at a few recent stories in the news, they frame them through the lens of "what if things had been different?" In the back half of the show, they share a scene from the recent performance "At a Crossroads" presented in the Marion Kleinau Theatre and directed/compiled by Dr. Shelby Swafford. In the scene, Jessica Paxton, Maddison Marshall, and M Kamara interweave pieces they devised for the show responding to a prompt on alternative histories, contemplating the world and the country at a crossroads and choosing a different path.

On the other side of auroras in Southern Illinois, Jonny and Heather dive into some weird stories--like the aurora, things they thought they would never see, at least not down here. In the front half of the show they review the more typical good and bad news for the LGBTQ+ community under the current regime. In the back half of the show they dive into the truly strange, not all of it having to do with more released Epstein information.

In the front half of the show, Jonny interviews Junara, Grace, M, and Shelby--the director and some of the devising cast from "At a Crossroads," a performance in the Kleinau Theatre opening this Thursday. They discuss the crossroads metaphor and how the show leans into LGBTQ+ themes. In the back half of the show, Jonny and Heather discuss the crossroads we are currently at, following last week's off-term elections, SCOTUS decisions, and the apparent possible ending of the government shutdown. They also pause to celebrate Veterans Day, noting that LGBTQ+ people have always served in the military and always will. See our Facebook and Webpage for a link to a schedule of events for Trans Aawreness Week leading up to the Trans Day of Remembrance.

Jonny and Heather hike into the landscape of major media stories dropped in just the last week. We know President Trump saturates the airwaves in order to both benefit from the attention economy and distract from his administration's more nefarious moves. Using Heather's background in Army Intelligence, they look for patterns across the stories, and they find evidence of severe vulnerabilities. In the back half of the show they examine the two main competing strategies in the opposition and which they think is likely to be more successful and better for the LGBTQ+ community.