Raquel Willis' resume is long: the first trans lead editor at Out magazine, a TIME 100 awardee, memoirist (The Risk It Takes To Bloom), and co-founder of the group Gender Liberation, whose direct actions at the US capitol calling for basic needs like trans healthcare reverberate far outside the DMV. We discuss the limitations of mainstream visibility in saving trans lives, and her podcast series AFTERLIVES, whose first two seasons cover the lives and passings of Layleen Polanco and Marsha P. Johnson. Raquel's site https://www.raquelwillis.com/ AFTERLIVES podcast https://www.afterlivespod.com/ Episode: Tourmaline on Marsha P. Johnson https://www.patreon.com/posts/129316368

Support the show and get new episodes early on Patreon: https://patreon.com/sadfrancisco

SAD FRANCISCO hats and shirts have landed: https://sadfrancis.co/?post_type=product

The return of Susan Stryker! On this episode: The utopian potential of Trans SanFrisco of the 1990s, and why the new third edition of Transgender History may be her last time editing the classic tome. Transgender History https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/susan-stryker/transgender-history-third-edition/9781541605886/ When Monsters Speak https://www.dukeupress.edu/when-monsters-speak Susan's upcoming book: Changing Gender https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250453921/changinggender/ Episode: Susan on the Compton's Cafeteria riot https://www.patreon.com/posts/jail-at-comptons-79134233

Friends Stab and Trung both texted me when about a recent, very Sad Francisco-coded feature in Wired magazine. Here's a little response, inspired partially by an impromptu reading group a few friends did around the piece.

Mentioned:

Alexandr Wang

Barry's Bootcamp

Gawker.com

Melania's box office

Peter Thiel

Sam Altman

Tim Cook

TW for brief mention of Sam Altman sexually assaulting his sister, and the US war assault on Iran including the AI-assisted murder of kids there.

Zoë Bernard, Wired: Inside the Gay Tech Mafia

https://www.wired.com/story/inside-the-gay-tech-mafia/

Ryan Grim, The Intercept: The Death of Peter Thiel's "Kept" Romantic Partner is Being Investigated as a Suicide

https://theintercept.com/2023/03/23/peter-thiel-jeff-thomas/

Owen Thomas, Valleywag: Peter Thiel is totally gay, people

Blog post that Peter Thiel didn't really love

https://www.gawkerarchives.com/335894/peter-thiel-is-totally-gay-people

Nobody Speak: Trials of the Free Press: documentary on Netflix following Peter Thiel's successful quest to bankrupt Gawker.com by funding a lawsuit related to a Hulk Hogan sex tape

https://www.netflix.com/title/80168227

Episode: Aesthetics of the New Rightwing Tech Intelligentsia with Jimmy Wu

https://www.patreon.com/posts/aesthetics-of-wu-148707467

First episode covering movies set in the Bay!

Starting with: 1971's DIRTY HARRY, in which Clint Eastwood plays a vigilante cop tracking down a gay Zodiac killer clone in a San Francisco overrun with hippie scum.

Jemma on her book "The Aesthetic Character of Blackness: Sounds Like Us"

https://www.patreon.com/posts/146458351

dee(dee) on the 1970s queer zine "Gay Sunshine"

https://www.patreon.com/posts/142696453

Support the show and get new episodes early on Patreon: https://patreon.com/sadfrancisco

Uncover the lore of four masked comrades who meet up regularly to offer aid to unhoused neighbors and teach self-defense.

We talk about the discourse around wearing frog costumes to ICE protests and giving public comment at San Jose City Hall dressed as Batman (that's the clip at the beginning of the episode).

BASH Linktree https://linktr.ee/bayareasuperheroes

BASH IG https://www.instagram.com/bayareasuperheroes

Kai Kai's Linktree https://linktr.ee/kaikaibee

Absolute Batman https://sfpl.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S93C7252448

Episode with Food Not Bombs co-founder Keith McHenry https://youtu.be/d3SmXWz1L38

Sad Francisco is produced by Toshio Meronek and edited by Tyger Ligon. Support the show and get new episodes early on Patreon: https://patreon.com/sadfrancisco

Morgan Bassichis brought the 1977 queer cult fairy tale "The Faggots and Their Friends Between Revolutions" back to print and stage a few years ago. Its messages about how to live under patriarchy feel extra prescient in 2026. The Faggots and Their Friends Between Revolutions By Larry Mitchell and Ned Asta With essays by Morgan and Tourmaline https://nightboat.org/book/the-faggots-their-friends-between-revolutions/ Morgan's website https://www.morganbassichis.com/ Can I Be Frank? - Morgan's show, coming to New York this summer https://www.canibefrank.nyc/ Morgan's Instagram https://www.instagram.com/morgankindof/ Love in a F*cked-Up World Podcast (with Morgan and friend of the pod Dean Spade) https://www.youtube.com/@Dean_Spade/podcasts Episode: "Marsha P. Johnson Beyond Stonewall with Tourmaline" https://www.patreon.com/posts/marsha-p-johnson-129316368

Mama Ganuush is back home in San Francisco after hosting the first JAHA Film Festival in December in Lisbon. The festival features all trans-focused films from the Global South, and begins screening online starting this Friday, Feb. 14.

JAHA Film Festival

https://www.jahafilmfestival.com/

Trans Liberation Film School

https://www.jahafilmfestival.com/transliberationfilmschool

Trung Nguyen teaches Asian American and ethnic studies at San Jose State. His presentation at the last American Studies Association conference covered how the interests of US empire, Airbnb.org, and refugee landlords market property ownership as a humanitarian act. Trung's site https://tpqn.org/ Iyko Day: The Yellow Plague and Romantic Anticapitalism (Monthly Review) https://monthlyreview.org/articles/the-yellow-plague-and-romantic-anticapitalism/ Eric Tang: Unsettled: Cambodian Refugees in the New York City Hyperghetto https://sfpl.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S93C3280280 BDS Movement's BDS Guide https://bdsmovement.net/Guide-to-BDS-Boycott Toshio's 2-minute explainer on Balaji Srinivasan's Network State https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8fRrpxF/ Related episodes: Urban Alchemy with Brooke Lober and Norma Azucar https://www.patreon.com/posts/urban-alchemys-f-109662919 Silicon Valley Imperialism with Erin McElroy https://www.patreon.com/posts/silicon-valley-f-103189183

"Meet the New Right-Wing Tech Intelligentsia" is Jimmy Wu's recent piece for Bay Area Current, a new publication covering labor, culture and politics based in East Bay. In it, Jimmy beautifully describes some of the aesthetics and icons preoccupying the tech elites and their media mouthpieces right now. "Meet the New Right-Wing Tech Intelligentsia" https://bayareacurrent.com/meet-the-new-right-wing-tech-intelligentsia/ Related: Soleil Ho on anti-poor influencer Michael Shellenberger https://www.patreon.com/posts/michael-thinks-f-97015564 The AI industry must be stopped, with Stop AI https://www.patreon.com/posts/end-agi-before-127632638 Garry Tan must be stopped, with Emily Mills https://www.patreon.com/posts/stop-garry-tan-90552668

Sad Francisco is produced by Toshio Meronek and edited by Tyger Ligon. Support the show and get new episodes early on Patreon: https://patreon.com/sadfrancisco

In 2022, rightwing influencers began using the term "doom loop" to paint San Francisco as a crime- and fentanyl-ridden hellhole that whose downfall was due to too much woke progressivism. It didn't matter that the doom loop narrative wasn't based in reality: the media took it and ran with it. The narrative has since lost its resonance in San Francisco, but it's now being deployed in several other cities. Jeremy Mack is back to talk about the Phoenix Project's most recent report, "The Rise and Fall of the San Francisco Doom Loop." The Phoenix Project: Rise and Fall of the San Francisco Doom Loop https://www.phoenixprojectnow.com/doomloop-report SF Mayor Daniel Lurie celebrates Blackstone and private equity https://youtube.com/shorts/1MsExVGa5sY Andrew Cuomo's racist anti-Zohran Mamdani ad https://youtube.com/shorts/y4yqFFDD650 Related episodes: TogetherSF (RIP), with Jeremy https://www.patreon.com/posts/togethersf-wants-114226580 5 Rich Guys Trying to Buy the Bay, with Jeremy and Julie Pitta https://www.patreon.com/posts/5-rich-guys-to-f-104982980

Garry Tan, with Emily Mills

https://www.patreon.com/posts/stop-garry-tan-90552668