Kosher Queers

This week, we brought it back around to pornoprophetics by talking about Hoshea. Jaz and Lulav disagree about what level of reality to read the haftarah on, but both agree that the plain reading of this text describes a really gnarly dude being abusive to a sex worker and to their children together. Due to discussion of sexual violence, including descriptions of physical & emotional abuse and mention of a book about sexual abuse of a child, as well as just us talking about sex and kink slightly more than is prudent, this episode is marked EXPLICIT.

Transcript available here. Production on this episode ran up to the wire, and only the first 18 minutes of the transcript is available as of release.

This episode's title is based on the acronym "sex-worker-exclusionary radical feminist" — much like TERFs and often overlapping, they disregard the agency and lived experience of the people they exclude from their feminism. Calling Hoshea a SWERP is more of a joke than an actual comparison to SWERFs, tbh.

The Shrieking Shack is a Harry Potter deepread podcast that just finished all seven horrible books, and which we have referenced frankly a lot on this podcast already. Tegan and Sara are sisters, which is not a euphemism, though they are both famously lesbians. Their music is often polarizing to lesbians — Lulav is a fan, but she knows others who are Deeply Opposed. Dean Kamen invented the Segway, which you definitely don't need to remember or know, but you can see both of them in this picture.

Jaz references The Metaphors We Live By, by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson — you can read an overview of conceptual metaphor on this Wikipedia page. Miguel James's "Contra la policía" is translated by Guillermo Parra on his blog here. Jaz promised links about humiliation play, but they are asleep after a long trip so check this space in the future. Lulav references Vladimir Nabokov, who has written several beautifully poetic books about super gnarly dudes, but Lolita is both his most famous book and the one that Lulav chooses to focus on in her comparison. Also, if someone has read the book and still refers to the titular character by the nickname the abusive narrator created for her or uses the word "nymphet", Lulav advises that you run real fast in the opposite direction.

If you're a current or former sex worker and have quibbles with or additions to the content of this episode, hit us up at [email protected].

This week's reading was Hosea 2:1-22. Next week's reading is Judges 13:2-25.

Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Lulav Arnow, and our transcript was written by JJ Jensen, who you can follow on Twitter @pantspossum. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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This week, we were joined by Jill Levinson, Jaz's good friend whose bat mitzvah happened on this Torah portion. We touch on a variety of topics, including BBYO, the nature of man, being a thirsty little desert flower, and cuckoo-lding.

Full transcript here.

Jill's erstwhile band is The Ruach. Also, Jill mentions in passing the School Colors podcast and the season of StartUp about Success Academy. Both of those are good podcasts about New York public schools.

To see the part of the Castlevania: Symphony of the Night intro that Lulav was referencing, check out this video. For an explanation of Jaz's slightly misquoted but very apropos chicken reference, see the Wikipedia article on Diogenes. 

If you missed Isabel Fall’s gorgeous and confounding “Helicopter Story” before she removed it from publication to avoid further harassment, you can catch an archived copy here. “All for the Best” is from the musical Godspell, and you can experience the glories of a production by teenagers in this video. If you heard Lulav singing and it’s gonna bug you until you figure out what the original song was, be buggèd no longer: it’s “Candle on the Water” from the 1977 film Pete’s Dragon.

Finally, the word “erstwhile” doesn’t mean “long-time but idk how regular”, as Lulav would assume from every context she’s seen it in including Jaz’s use up above — it’s just a fancy way of saying “former”.

This week's reading is Jeremiah 16:19–17:14. Next week's reading is Hosea 2:1-22.

Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Ezra Faust, and our transcript was written by Freya Doughty, a fellow at the Jewish community house Next Dor St Louis. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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This week, we talked hereditary leadership, divorce contracts, and illegal sweat. Plus vows in moderation, righteous people that were maybe actually just power-grabbing, and 5D Chess. 

Full transcript here.

We really enjoyed 5D Chess. Here's a pretty good overview page on Zadok, and here's a good example of a ketubah text with a halachic prenup from Geek Calligraphy. There are a bunch of other options on ketubah.com if you're looking for one. Also, if you're trans and Jewish, check out the Trans Halakhah Project from Rabbi Becky Silverstein and Laynie Solomon and take their survey! Also, here's a dictionary definition for the word Lulav asked Jaz to define.

This week's reading is Ezekiel 44:15-31. Next week's reading is Jeremiah 16:19–17:14.

Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Ezra Faust, and our transcript was written by JJ Jensen, who you can follow on Twitter @pantspossum. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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This week, we have a special guest on the show, Jaz's friend the Hawk, to talk about ghosts, patriotism, and big parental disses.

Our transcript will be delayed this week unfortunately, but will be up as soon as possible.

The poem Jaz quotes that opens the episode as an epigraph is "You've heard of Ritalin, now what if I told you governments make bodies into crime scenes for no reason at all," by Ray Filar, found in We Want It All: An Anthology of Radical Trans Poetics edited by Andrea Abi-Karam and Kay Gabriel. The gif Lulav describes in context is from this video. The Hawk's youth movement is Habonim Dror and the camp she works at was Gilboa. You should also definitely see the musical Six by Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss if you have the opportunity to, and credit goes to Jaz and the Hawk's roommate, Tori Burstein, for introducing it into our lives.   

This week's reading is Amos 9:7-15. Next week's reading is Ezekiel 44:15-31.

Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Ezra Faust, but if you're like "hey what's with this part where Lulav says 'Yehuda' as though recorded later on a different microphone", that's all Lulav. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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This week, Jaz has hot takes about major Jewish community events, Elijah's boyfriend says some unnecessarily cryptic stuff, and there are problems with magic systems. Also, there's discussion about magic and then different literary genres for a loooong time, so enjoy that. It even segues into a discussion about the nature of truth, which is always fun. 

Full transcript here.

If you were also at the Trans Jews are Here Convening and would like to share your thoughts about it with the organizers, it looks like their feedback form is still open. You can also check out Xai, How Are You? and Sefirat HOMOer or see the announcement for Uncommon Charm by Kat Weaver and Emily Bergslien. Also, you can read about the lesbian nun,  Benedetta Carlini, who Jaz's mothers owned a book about, in Immodest Acts: The Life of a Lesbian Nun in Renaissance Italy by Judith C. Brown. Plus, if you want to read more about how objective journalism isn't real, you can read The View From Somewhere by Lewis Raven Wallace and subscribe to the newsletter The Objective. 

This week's reading is II Kings 7:3-20. Next week's reading is Amos 9:7-15.

Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Lulav Arnow, and our transcript was written by Reuben Shachar Rose. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union. 

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This week, we discuss the holiness of workplace safety guidelines, the numerous possible interpretations of a woman with too little few lines on-page, deciding not to create a family with an incompatible partner, and suggestively dancing for G-d. 

Full transcript here.

We played five dimensional chess and you can too. Here's "Freedom" by Langston Hughes, which someone brought to our seder. Here's the thing where conservatives claimed monarchy was key to democracy. I thiiink the novel referenced in this episode that includes the retelling of David and Michal's story is The Secret Chord by Geraldine Brooks. 

This week's reading was  II Samuel 6:1–7:17. Next weeks' reading is II Kings 7:3-20.

Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Ezra Faust, and our transcript was written by Reuben Shachar Rose. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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On this week's episode of "where jewing it man.", the very real podcast about the webcomic Homestuck that we have definitely been running since September 2019, we're talking about if gender is the same as species, why the Statue of Liberty lasts for billions of years, and as always, what on Earth or Alternia is going on? Anyway, happy April Fools y'all, and thank you for joining us in an alternate universe in which we made a queer Jewish Homestuck podcast instead.

Full transcript here.

Here's Judaism Unbound Episode 261 - Canaan Unconquered. There's some more information about Marranos here if you're interested in learning more.

Okay, here are links about some of the things in this episode which we didn't explain on air! Fair warning that these explanations... might make things more confusing, honestly. Here's a ~ATH (pronounced "till death") manual, the characters Calliope and Caliborn/later Lord English and their room, John (the first person in the comic), fetch modus, Andrew Hussie (the creator of Homestuck), blood colors, Seer of Light and other classes, Rose Lalonde, Gamzee, Problem Sleuth, Planet of the Apes, Red Miles, Lil Cal, bunnies, Dave's Bro, and more, unfortunately, but there's not room for all of it. Also, here's the Calliope fic. 

This week's reading was the Homestuck pages that came out during the two weeks of June 18th, 2012, to July 1st, 2012, which is pages 5098 through 5237. Next week's regularly scheduled Kosher Queers reading is II Samuel 6:1–7:17. 

Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Our music is "Black" by Toby Fox and "Hungry Yid" by Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Lulav Arnow, and our transcript was written by Reuben Shachar Rose. Our logo is by Lulav Arnow, Jaz Twersky, and Lior Gross.

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This week, we talk parallels between guillotines and ritual sacrifice, wrestle with ideas of Messianics and also a messianic age more generally, and point out that we apparently all have the power to rob G-d. Plus, there's a 300 year old prophet, and never a golden age.

Full transcript available here.

If you're interested in hearing more about brin solomon's nonbinary siddur, you can follow brin on Twitter @nonstandardrep, where, as a bonus, you also get to hear its thoughts on daf yomi, or you could check out its website. Here's a source about French revolutionaries dipping handkerchiefs in the blood of guillotined people.  You can listen go check out Scam Goddess, and Jaz was wrong; the host, Laci Mosley, is on Twitter @DivaLaci, though they were correct that she's not a blue check. Here's the Xai, How are You patron episode about the Hebrew word for slave. Here's the article about haftarah from the UK Reform movement that Jaz references. Also, small correction: Jaz said that a vav could indicate "and" or "or," which is not accurate; it can indicate "and" or "but."  Here's the listicle about what different emoji hearts mean.

This week's reading is Malachi 3:4–24. Next week is a special Pesach episode.

Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Ezra Faust, and our transcript was written by Reuben Shachar Rose. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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This week, we talk about how God needs to give humans scaffolds to learn, holy princes are turned to evil nonsense, a Jewish dude gets a tattoo, and there are some rad name shenanigans. Also, craftspeople are literally magical, but then you gotta take responsibility for the things you create.

Full transcript available here. 

The first couple seasons of "Ink Master" are available on Netflix. The Shrieking Shack podcast is cool and can be found here. The bit that Lulav quotes from the Quran is surah 22:5. The other older text that Jaz pulled from for an alternate translation was printed for the British and Foreign Bible Society. Also, Lulav notes that the first of the ten commandments resembles the Muslim statement of faith. Also you can follow @woolen.honey on Instagram. 

This week's reading is Isaiah 43:21–44:23. Next week's reading is Malachi 3:4–24.

Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Lulav Arnow, and our transcript was written by Reuben Shachar Rose. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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This week, we talk scent sensitivity, princes who are separate from the people, and which parts of gender are worth salvaging. Plus, pet peeves around new gender trinaries and special days in the calendar where the haftarah has literally nothing to do with the parsha (including this week)!

Full transcript here.

Lulav negatively reviews Rubyfruit Jungle by Rita Mae Brown. Jaz has a new part-time job at Yente Over the Rainbow, where you can go if you're looking for a queer Jewish partner. 

This week's reading is Ezekiel 45:16–46:18.  Next week's reading is Isaiah 43:21–44:23.

Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Ezra Faust, and our transcript was written by Reuben Shachar Rose. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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