Join our Patreon for less than a cup of your favorite iced coffee and unlock 25+ full-length bonus episodes, ad-free weekly episodes, mp3 downloads of our original songs, exclusive Discord access, and more! 

Welcome back to Lez Hang Out, the podcast that is currently crying over a gay novel in an internet cafe. 

This week, Leigh (@lshfoster) and Ellie (@elliebrigida) are hanging out with journalist and editor Yi-Ling Liu (@instalingers), author of The Wall Dancers: Searching for Freedom and Connection on the Chinese Internet. This debut narrative nonfiction follows the lives of five individuals across the past three decades as they push for social change while navigating within the walls of China’s Great Firewall. We talk with Yi-Ling Liu about online censorship in China and the life-altering importance of representation and access to community for queer people everywhere. 

In the early days of the internet, there were significantly less built-in systems of censorship and surveillance. Internet cafes were cropping up in every town, and globally people were experiencing a newfound freedom that did not exist outside of the confines of their screens. In China and the United States alike, homosexuality was still considered a crime and classified as a mental illness. However, on the newly created, not-yet algorithmically controlled internet, queer people could find one another, form communities and subcultures, and share their stories long before it became acceptable to live openly in daily life. A gay person living in a small city thinking they’re the only one in the world who feels the way they do could stumble across a queer novel in an internet cafe and have a truly transformative experience. 

Nowadays, things have flipped, especially in China. While being gay is generally more accepted and younger generations think nothing of coming out, the internet has become a much more restrictive and monitored environment. Gay couples in China can openly live their lives; but if they try to share those lives on social media, they have to do so covertly with language that won’t trigger the firewall. Words like ‘lesbian’ and ‘gay’ are automatically censored; so queer people have had to get creative, inventing a shared lexicon that keeps their content off the government’s radar. As we watch our own cultural landscape change through algorithmic censorship, increased government surveillance, book bans, and legal challenges, we can’t help but see China’s firewall as a very possible blueprint for our own near-future online ecosystem. 

Get your own copy of Yi-Ling Liu’s, The Wall Dancers: Searching for Freedom and Connection on the Chinese Internet. 

Don’t forget to show your support for our tiny podcasting team by shopping small at bit.ly/lezmerch & picking up Lez-ssentials songs on Bandcamp. 

Give us your own answers to our Q & Gay on Instagram and follow along on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and BlueSky @lezhangoutpod. Email us @[email protected]. Connect with us individually: Ellie Brigida (@elliebrigida). Leigh Holmes Foster (@lshfoster).

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Welcome back to Lez Hang Out, the podcast for childless cat ladies everywhere.

This week, Leigh (@lshfoster) and Ellie (@elliebrigida) hang out with graphic memoirist, professor, and podcaster, Nicole J. Georges (@nicolejgeorges), and talk about why the 1990 children’s fever dream, The Witches, Should've Been Gay. If you saw this movie when you were a kid, you just might have a thing for dark haired high femmes with impossibly purple eyes. 

Children’s movies in the 80s and early 90s really went all in on nightmare fuel, and The Witches is no exception. This “baby’s first body horror” delivers everything from Animorphs-style transformations to traumatized kids trapped in paintings, plus a convention full of witchy femmes casually peeling off their wigs…and then their faces.

The story kicks off with Luke’s grandmother basically issuing a public service announcement about suspiciously stylish, childless cat ladies in sensible shoes, and then immediately kills off Luke’s parents in a tragic accident. With his parents gone, Luke goes to England with his grandmother, where their hotel just happens to be hosting a witch convention led by the highest femme we’ve ever seen, Grand High Witch, Miss Ernst (Anjelica Huston). Luke accidentally stumbles into the convention, overhears Miss Ernst’s extremely chill plan to turn all the children in England into mice, and is immediately turned into a mouse himself alongside his new buddy Bruno. Together with his grandmother, Luke and Bruno set out to stop the witches for good.

Witches, and villains in general, have always been queer coded, but in The Witches it barely even feels like subtext. The queerness is so loud it might as well be canon. We get into the chosen family of cults, the oddly sexual energy of fish paste on cucumber sandwiches, and the most important question, are all mice gay?

We know one thing for sure, The Witches Should’ve Been Gay.

Nicole’s latest book, Emotional Support Animals, featuring therapeutic animal illustrations, worksheets, and grounding exercises is available now. Hear more musings from Nicole on her podcast Sagittarian Matters. Nicole also co-hosts The Gaymazing Race podcast alongside author and professor Karen Tongson. 

Join our Patreon family for as little as $5 per month to unlock 25+ full-length bonus episodes, ad-free weekly episodes, mp3 downloads of our original songs, exclusive Discord access, and more! 

You can also support the show by shopping small at bit.ly/lezmerch & picking up Lez-ssentials songs on Bandcamp.

Give us your own answers to our Q & Gay on Instagram and follow along on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and BlueSky @lezhangoutpod. Email us @[email protected]. Connect with us individually: Ellie Brigida (@elliebrigida). Leigh Holmes Foster (@lshfoster).

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Join our Patreon for less than a cup of your favorite coffee and unlock 25+ full-length bonus episodes, ad-free weekly episodes, mp3 downloads of our original songs, exclusive Discord access, and more! 

Welcome back to Lez Hang Out, the podcast that truly believes lesbians can save the world. 

This week, Leigh (@lshfoster) is once again holding down the fort without Ellie, but she’s far from lonely! We are excited to present an intergenerational panel of talented filmmakers from the Cinema Systers Film Festival (@cinemasystersfilmfestival), the ONLY all-lesbian film festival in the United States, as they join Leigh for an inspirational discussion about finding “systerhood” and the power of sharing our stories in community. 

Leigh speaks with Laura Petrie, the founder and producer of the CSFF, about planting her acorn by bringing her vision for a lesbian film festival to life in her beloved hometown of Paducah, Kentucky. Next, we hear from Nicole de Meneses (@darkrainbowfilms), a freelance writer, producer and director who was introduced to the CSFF through a documentary on the festival (available on Lesflicks). She has had several films now featured at the festival, including the mermaid romcom, Fishy, and the vampire horror short, Last Bite. Next up is Jennifer Trujillo, the Senior Managing Director of the Gilbert Baker Film Festival (@gilbertbakerfilmfest), who faced serious anxieties over trekking to Kentucky (and subsequently fell in love with Paducah) to represent Last Bite in 2025 as a Supporting Producer. Last but not least, we are joined by Krissy Mahan, a working class film maker (and lesbian of a certain age), who has been documenting our stories since the AIDS crisis of the late 80s and is now well-known for her “dykeumentaries”, a visual record of queer people living as themselves during times when the official record may not reflect that reality. At this year’s festival, Krissy and Jenn will be leading a workshop titled "Accessibility is for Every Body”, aiming to liberate films from ableism from the pre-production stages forward. They dream of creating a cultural shift where films are truly accessible to all people regardless of their bodies' unique sensory inputs. 

Together we can normalize our stories, break free of the patriarchal, homophobic, racist, ableist world we’ve inherited and celebrate one another while using film as a mechanism for thought experiments on how to create a better world where we can all survive. Stick around to the end to hear an impassioned debate (ie. dyke fight) over the lesbian Christmas classic, Carol. 

We hope you’ll journey to Paducah, Kentucky for the 10th Anniversary celebration of the Cinema Systers Film Festival taking place from May 21st to the 24th, 2026. In addition to a full roster of films, the festival provides tons of events to take part in throughout the long weekend including panels, musical performances, and workshops. Find out more about the festival, see the line-up, buy tickets, and book your stay at cinemasysters.com.  

Looking to experience even more of our stories in community? Check out the Gilbert Baker Film Festival, an accessible, virtual worldwide film festival returning in late June 2026 and running through August. 

Don’t forget to show your support for our tiny podcasting team by shopping small at bit.ly/lezmerch & picking up Lez-ssentials songs on Bandcamp. 

Give us your own answers to our Q & Gay on Instagram and follow along on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and BlueSky @lezhangoutpod. Email us @[email protected]. Connect with us individually: Ellie Brigida (@elliebrigida). Leigh Holmes Foster (@lshfoster).

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Welcome back to Lez Hang Out, the podcast that is also obsessed with couch time.

This week, Leigh (@lshfoster) and Ellie (@elliebrigida) hang out with return guests and friends of the pod, co-hosts Kris and Shana of Bad Queers Pod (@badqueerspod), and talk about why the international sensation, K-Pop Demon Hunters, Should’ve Been Gay. 

We are really loving this new trend of all the animated kid’s movies with blatantly queer undertones becoming instant hits. From Frozen to Nimona, there has been a large push to teach kids to embrace differences and be true to themselves. With half of us being introduced to K-Pop Demon Hunters thanks to our own small kids, looking at all the gay angles wasn’t top of mind. But after an hour and a half of absolute bops (Golden is written by the same gay man that wrote the musical adaptation of The Devil Wears Prada!), the on-the-nose queerness of having a secret identity, the forbidden love between Rumi and Jinu, and Rumi’s coming out story being the core of the entire plot, we knew we had to do an SBG right away. 

We talk about our experiences with the movie, expose Gwi-Ma as a petty Log Cabin Republican, break down the lyrics to Soda Pop (which is definitely about poppers), and discuss our favorite ships (Polytrix forever!). 

We know one thing for sure, K-Pop Demon Hunters Should’ve Been Gay.

Join our Patreon family for as little as $5 per month to unlock 25+ full-length bonus episodes, ad-free weekly episodes, mp3 downloads of our original songs, exclusive Discord access, and more! 

You can also support the show by shopping small at bit.ly/lezmerch & picking up Lez-ssentials songs on Bandcamp.

Give us your own answers to our Q & Gay on Instagram and follow along on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and BlueSky @lezhangoutpod. Email us @[email protected]. Connect with us individually: Ellie Brigida (@elliebrigida). Leigh Holmes Foster (@lshfoster).

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Join our Patreon for less than an iced coffee and unlock our growing library of full-length bonus episodes, ad-free weekly episodes, mp3 downloads of our original songs, exclusive Discord access to hang out with us, and more! 

Welcome back to Lez Hang Out, the podcast that is hearing wedding bells. This week, co-hosts Leigh (@lshfoster) and Ellie (@elliebrigida) hang out and talk about the many differences they’ve observed between gay and straight weddings. Getting married and getting “gay married” may look the same on paper, but the actual weddings themselves tend to be significantly different. 

As most of you know by now, Ellie is getting married soon, but what you don’t know is that her brother is also getting married this year. This would be a nightmare with two straight weddings, because they can be so much more involved and require a huge time commitment. Straight weddings are by nature steeped in heteronormative culture and bogged down by the traditions of patriarchy. It feels like there is a standard formula that most heterosexual weddings follow (except of course for our allies, the straight nerds). But for our gay weddings, the limit does not exist!

There is no one-size-fits-all way to have a queer wedding. Does the concept of a Daddy/Daughter dance make your stomach turn? Would you rather pass away than let your father walk you down the aisle? Don’t want to ever hear another super outdated ball-and-chain speech again? You’re in luck! We don’t have to do any of that nonsense. You were already breaking the mold by simply being your beautiful queer self, you might as well throw the mold all the way out for your ‘wedding gay’. 

Don’t forget to show your support for our tiny (and mighty!) podcasting team by shopping small at bit.ly/lezmerch & picking up Lez-ssentials songs on Bandcamp. 

Give us your own answers to our Q & Gay on Instagram and follow along on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and BlueSky @lezhangoutpod. Email us @[email protected]. Connect with us individually: Ellie Brigida (@elliebrigida). Leigh Holmes Foster (@lshfoster). Leave a review wherever you are listening to this episode to help others find the pod! 

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Join our ⁠Patreon⁠ family for as little as $5 per month to unlock 25+ full-length bonus episodes, ad-free weekly episodes, mp3 downloads of our original songs, exclusive Discord-channel access, and more! 

Welcome back to Lez Hang Out, the podcast that has a huge lesbian crush on Anne Hathaway. 

This week, Leigh (@lshfoster) and Ellie (@elliebrigida) hang out with comedian, singer, and writer Sydney Kane (@sydneymorgankane) and talk about why the 2009 smash hit, Bride Wars, Should’ve Been Gay. If watching Kate Hudson and Anne Hathaway roll around on top of each other in wedding dresses was your gay awakening (like it was for Sydney), you’re in the right place. 

For those of you who are somehow unfamiliar, Bride Wars tells the incredibly queer story of two childhood best friends, Emma (Anne Hathaway) and Olivia (Kate Hudson), who have been planning their Pride month weddings at The Plaza since their dress-up, house-playing days. When the two do finally get engaged, their weddings end up accidentally booked for the same day in June and chaos ensues as both women proceed to lose their minds. With the wedding date rapidly approaching, Liv and Emma commence an elaborate game of chicken and petty sabotage in the hopes of getting the other to cancel before finally deciding to attempt to share the venue. 

Since Bride Wars is about two heterosexual couples getting married, we expected to see a lot more of Liv and Emma’s fiancés. Instead these guys are rarely on screen, even during the wedding planning stages. There is not one ounce of romance or desire shown between the couples. In the end, Emma even leaves her own wedding to go wrestle Liv, ultimately choosing to call off her entire relationship. This would’ve been such a prime set-up for our childhood sweethearts to end up together, but of course it’s 2009 and gay marriage isn’t legal nationwide yet, so we get Emma marrying Liv’s brother as a stand-in instead. Classic. 

We know one thing for sure, Bride Wars Should’ve Been Gay.

If you are in or around L.A., you can catch Sydney’s musical comedy special, Wife Material, live on April 21st at the Roxy. Tickets are available now. 

You can support our little show by shopping small at bit.ly/lezmerch & picking up Lez-ssentials songs on Bandcamp.

Give us your own answers to our Q & Gay on Instagram and follow along on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and BlueSky @lezhangoutpod. Email us @[email protected]. Connect with us individually: Ellie Brigida (@elliebrigida). Leigh Holmes Foster (@lshfoster).

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Join our Patreon for less than a boba tea and unlock 25+ full-length bonus episodes, ad-free weekly episodes, mp3 downloads of our original songs, exclusive Discord access, and more! 

Welcome back to Lez Hang Out, the podcast that wants you to gay-se your voice!

This week, Leigh (@lshfoster) holds down the fort without Ellie for a delightfully nerdy and fascinating conversation with founder and speech-language pathologist Nicole Gress, MS, CCC-SLP. Nicole took what they learned from their medical training, lived experience as a genderfluid individual, and years of interacting with gender diverse clients in the Bay Area and founded Undead Voice (@undead.voice), an online, community-driven platform dedicated to eradicating the voice dysphoria experienced by 85% of the trans population. The platform is open to people of all gender identities and ages, so whether you are 9 or 90, you can take the steps toward reclaiming your voice. 

Imagine feeling overwhelming discomfort every single time you speak and the impact that would have on your ability to participate in the world and show up as your full self. This widespread detrimental impact on mental health was one of many reasons why Nicole was inspired to create something new, outside the restrictions of the medical system. With the coaching, curriculum, and community support of the Undead Voice Lab, gender diverse individuals can discover their most affirming voice in about 4 to 6 months of training.

We get real nerdy with it as Nicole breaks down exactly how the program works. They discuss the 3 influences that create a voice: environmental, cultural and physical, along with the 5 pillars that you can learn to master: tilt, weight, resonance, pitch and dynamics. Since environmental and cultural influences are intrinsic to who you are and help to showcase your personality, the program leaves those alone and focuses on the physical aspects of voice, teaching participants how to shift and control the size and shape of their vocal instrument. Leigh and Nicole also talk about voice transition as a form of accessible, non-invasive gender affirming care for trans youth.

You can learn more about Undead Voice at www.undeadvoice.com. Registration is open right now for the Jumpstart program, a free 3-week intro program designed exclusively for trans and gender diverse people looking to begin or refine their voice transition journeys. Jumpstart participants are eligible for a $1,000 tuition credit toward the full voice training program, Undead Voice Lab. 

Download this free Trans Voice 101 Guide if you are interested in learning more about voice transitioning. 

Don’t forget to show your support for our tiny podcasting team by shopping small at bit.ly/lezmerch & picking up Lez-ssentials songs on Bandcamp. 

Give us your own answers to our Q & Gay on Instagram and follow along on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and BlueSky @lezhangoutpod. Email us @[email protected]. Connect with us individually: Ellie Brigida (@elliebrigida). Leigh Holmes Foster (@lshfoster).

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Welcome back to Lez Hang Out, the podcast that hopes you find your queerest happily ever after. 

This week, Leigh (@lshfoster) and Ellie (@elliebrigida) hang out and talk about why the animated fairytale, Charming, Should’ve Been Gay.

One thing Charming does have going for it is a wildly stacked cast. We’re talking Ashley Tisdale, Demi Lovato, Avril Lavigne, John Cleese and Sia all in one place. Unfortunately, even a big name cast couldn’t save this film from receiving a 22% on Rotten Tomatoes. We’re pretty sure the only way to save Charming from a fate worse than choking on a poison apple is to make it gay. And judging by the amount of reviews that say things like, “Does anyone else think Prince Charming is aro/ace?”, we’re all on the same page. 

Charming is a queer story from the jump, starting with the Prince’s curse. This man is cursed to have every woman he meets fall in love with him. We’re pretty sure that if you, a man, view hot women constantly throwing themselves at you as a curse, you might be at least a little bit (very) gay. Charming laments being unable to find his one true love while juggling simultaneous engagements to Snow White, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty. He appears doomed to be a player, unable to find his true love amongst a sea of unlimited suitors. That is until Lenore, who is mysteriously immune to the Prince’s charms, takes a page out of Mulan’s book and disguises herself as a man. While the movie doesn’t explain why the curse does not work on her, we think there’s two simple explanations; 1. Lenore is a lesbian and/or 2. Lenore is trans/nonbinary. Since the curse is predictably heteronormative in scope, Lenore being gay and/or trans creates a loophole that we think could explain her immunity. 

We know one thing for sure, Charming Should’ve Been Gay.

Join our Patreon to unlock 25+ full-length bonus episodes, ad-free weekly episodes, mp3 downloads of our original songs, exclusive Discord access, and more!

You can also support the show by shopping small at bit.ly/lezmerch & picking up Lez-ssentials songs on Bandcamp.

Give us your own answers to our Q & Gay on Instagram and follow along on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and BlueSky @lezhangoutpod. Email us @[email protected]. Connect with us individually: Ellie Brigida (@elliebrigida). Leigh Holmes Foster (@lshfoster).

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Join our Patreon for less than a cup of your favorite coffee and unlock 25+ full-length bonus episodes, ad-free weekly episodes, mp3 downloads of our original songs, exclusive Discord access, and more! 

Welcome back to Lez Hang Out, the podcast that wants a hot, older lesbian to step on them. This week, co-hosts Leigh (@lshfoster) and Ellie (@elliebrigida) hang out and discuss their feelings on age gap relationships.

When we think about an age gap relationship, it isn’t so much about the specific number of years that separate the couple. While there are of course certain gaps and scenarios that give us the ick right off the bat, ultimately we define an age gap relationship more by differences in life stage than by years apart. A 20 year old college student is most likely in a very different life stage than a 35 year old whereas that same 15 year gap might feel like nothing to a couple who get together at 40 and 55.

We can’t talk about age gaps without talking about the power dynamics and patriarchal ideals they are often rooted in. So many celebrities are in significant age gap relationships and the media has normalized older men being attracted to younger barely-not-children women since the dawn of the patriarchy. But it isn’t only men who are into the gap. When we take a step back and really look at lesbian media, there is a major romanticization of the older, dominant lesbian and the younger, typically less experienced woman who is obsessed with her. From The Devil Wears Prada to Carol to Hacks, lesbians on a whole have a “mommy” problem. If you’re creeped out by a 40 year old man pursuing a 22 year old college girl, you should be just as creeped out by Carol pursuing Therese. 

Don’t forget to show your support for our tiny team by shopping small at bit.ly/lezmerch & picking up Lez-ssentials songs on Bandcamp. 

Give us your own answers to our Q & Gay on Instagram and follow along on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and BlueSky @lezhangoutpod. Email us @[email protected]. Connect with us individually: Ellie Brigida (@elliebrigida). Leigh Holmes Foster (@lshfoster).

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Welcome back to Lez Hang Out, the podcast that would lovingly hand-feed you a churro. 

This week, Leigh (@lshfoster) and Ellie (@elliebrigida) hang out and talk about why the 2024 box-office smash hit, Challengers, Should’ve Been Gay(er). Honestly, we went into this movie assuming it was going to be so much gayer than it actually was. All of the promos hyped the threesome and made the story sound super queer, which made us all the more disappointed when it just did not deliver. Luckily, we have plenty of ideas on how to fix Challengers so that it can be the gay movie we were advertised.  

For a film by the same director as Call Me By Your Name, the queerness is way too subtle. Sure, there’s a threesome; but the film doubles down on both boys being into Zendaya’s character, Tashi, rather than each other. And beyond that one intense make-out, Art and Patrick never get together. There’s not so much a love triangle as there is a beard triangle, with each character equally in-the-closet. Between cringing at the poorly crafted CGI tennis balls and overly on-the-nose suggestive subtext, we couldn’t really understand why this movie got so much gay buzz. We get that everyone is desperate for queer crumbs; but the characters are not even likeable, there's barely any on-screen queerness and they somehow made Zendaya unattractive! While the film does provide an interesting take on sex and power (and on paper looks to be the tennis-equivalent of Heated Rivalry), it falls short on delivering any resolution to the sexual tension between Art and Patrick and never touches on Tashi’s sexuality at all. 

We know one thing for sure, Challengers Should’ve Been Gay(er).

Join our Patreon to unlock 25+ full-length bonus episodes, ad-free weekly episodes, mp3 downloads of our original songs, exclusive Discord access, and more!

You can also support the show by shopping small at bit.ly/lezmerch & picking up Lez-ssentials songs on Bandcamp.

Give us your own answers to our Q & Gay on Instagram and follow along on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and BlueSky @lezhangoutpod. Email us @[email protected]. Connect with us individually: Ellie Brigida (@elliebrigida). Leigh Holmes Foster (@lshfoster).

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