Wednesday With Woody

Funny thing about growing up. The bullies disappear, but somehow they’ve left you doing their job for them. And suddenly you’re 30-something, still policing a little boy who just wanted to belong.

This week on Wednesday with Woody, for #SpiritDay, I’m wondering when the voices of people who hurt us became our own. And how do we finally tell them to shut up?

Because some childhood bullies never grow up. They just move into our heads rent-free.Wednesday with Woody is my midweek conversation about modern life, identity and the wonderfully complicated business of being human.

This week’s little act of rebellion? Tell your younger self something they deserved to hear. Leave it in the comments. Someone else’s younger self might need to hear it too.

Follow @iamwoodywoods on Instagram.

This week, with International Lesbian Day and National Coming Out Day landing within days of each other, Wednesday with Woody is wondering who actually gets to know you’re queer. Because visibility gave so many of us the chance to see what our lives could become, but being seen can still carry consequences. And somewhere between pride, privacy and safety, queer people are making tiny decisions about who gets access to them every day.

Apparently there is no graduation ceremony for homosexuality. Shame. I would have looked incredible in the little hat.

Wednesday with Woody is your midweek conversation about modern life, identity and the wonderfully complicated business of being human.

Follow @iamwoodywoods on Instagram.

Got thoughts? Drop a note in the comments. Your story might spark our next episode.

Personally, I love a red flag. Racist? Homophobic? Generally committed to being a nightmare? Thank you for the signage. At 30-something years old, I simply do not have six months to discover you’re an a**.

This week on Wednesday with Woody, I’m wondering when accepting people for who they are became convincing them to be somebody else. Do I really need to change your mind, or can I just believe the warning and take my good personality elsewhere?

Maybe some red flags aren’t invitations to debate. Maybe they’re directions.

Wednesday with Woody is my midweek conversation about modern life, identity and the wonderfully complicated business of being human.

Follow @iamwoodywoods on Instagram.

I heard a gay man say he sometimes feels stranded in the middle: too gay for straight people, but somehow not gay enough for the gays. He misses the references, doesn’t recognise himself in the stereotypes and feels like everybody received a gay starter pack except him.

I laughed. Then I remembered an acquaintance once telling Ryan and me that we were “too boring for the gays”. Rude. Also… strangely revealing.

This week on Wednesday with Woody, I’m asking what happens when coming out gets you through the door, but nobody tells you where to stand once you’re inside. We’re talking about the unwritten rules of gay culture, loneliness inside queer spaces and why sharing an identity doesn’t automatically create belonging.

Maybe there was never a starter pack. Maybe a few loud people mistook their personalities for the curriculum and the rest of us thought there would be an exam.

Mesh vest optional.

I found out what a canthal tilt is this week, and I really wish I hadn’t. Because I was perfectly happy with my eyes before someone on the internet informed me there was an angle involved.

And obviously I went looking. Bad idea.

I ended up somewhere between looksmaxxing, bodybuilding, skincare, hair transplants and men having “protocols” for things we used to just call moisturising.

And somewhere in there I started wondering when exactly looking good became this much... work.

Because I’m not standing outside any of this judging everybody. Please. I have skincare. I go to the gym. I enjoy catching myself in good lighting. I would like to remain hot for as long as administratively possible.

But something about this feels different.

So that’s where we’re going this week on Wednesday with Woody.

And when you’ve listened, come back and tell me what you think. Or tell me the thing about your own appearance that the internet taught you to notice.

I have a feeling there’s another conversation hiding in your answers.

I watched the trailer for Club Kid, a new film concerning a gay party promoter whose life is turned upside down when the son he never knew he had suddenly turns up. I watched it and thought to myself That sounds nice, then carried on scrolling. In a strange way, that’s exactly how ordinary it seemed.

This week on Wednesday with Woody, I’m thinking about the people who showed us what our lives could turn out to be. The AIDS crisis didn’t merely result in a huge number of gay men, together with their partners, friends and lovers, being lost; it also meant that many queer people who came after them grew up never having seen what those men might have become by the ages of 50, 60 or 80. Who showed us gay fathers? Long marriages? Divorce? Retirement? Grandfathers? Who showed us Tuesday?

Maybe progress isn’t only about finally seeing ourselves represented. Maybe it’s about having enough queer lives around us that eventually, they stop needing an explanation.

Wednesday with Woody is my midweek conversation about modern life, identity and the wonderfully complicated business of being human.

For more, follow iamwoodywoods on Instagram. And if this episode leaves you with a thought that keeps coming back to you, put it in the comments. Some of the best episodes begin there.

I saw a HYROX athlete casually call himself a power bottom in a sponsored Instagram post and, naturally, I had questions. Not about the porridge. About why those two things together caught my attention at all.

This week on Wednesday with Woody, I’m wondering what being a bottom has to do with being a man. Somewhere along the way, we decided bottom meant submissive, submissive meant feminine, and feminine meant… less masculine. But none of those things actually mean the same thing. So why do we keep treating them like they do?

Maybe this isn’t really about who does what in bed. Maybe it’s about why masculinity needs so much proof. And why femininity is still treated as evidence against it.

Wednesday with Woody is my midweek conversation about modern life, identity and the wonderfully complicated business of being human.

Follow @iamwoodywoods on Instagram for more. And if this episode leaves you with a thought you can’t shake, leave it in the comments. Some of the best episodes start there.

I was standing in Woolworths buying the same groceries I’d bought the week before when I had a slightly ridiculous thought: Did I actually choose any of this? The tofu. The coffee. The route home. The music in my headphones. The first app I opened that morning. It made me wonder how much of my life is actually mine, and how much has quietly been handed over to habit, algorithms, work, fear, or a version of myself that no longer exists.

This week on Wednesday with Woody, we take a gentle wander through modern life, identity and the tiny choices that shape us. Because maybe the biggest question isn’t whether we’re living well. Maybe it’s whether we’re still choosing the life we’re living.

Wednesday with Woody is your midweek conversation about modern life, where storytelling, culture and self-expression meet. Hosted by Woody, each episode explores the beauty, absurdity and wonderfully complicated business of being human.

Follow @iamwoodywoods on Instagram for more from Wednesday with Woody. And if this episode leaves you with a thought you can’t shake, leave it in the comments. Some of the best episodes begin with something one of us couldn’t stop thinking about.

This week on Wednesday with Woody, we ask a deceptively simple question: how are men making friends in 2026? Inspired by a TikTok about how difficult male friendship becomes with age, Woody explores the friendship recession, marriage, emotional labour and the strange social rituals men use to stay close without ever quite admitting they need each other. From gym nods and group chats to loneliness, “mankeeping” and the quiet pressure placed on partners, this episode looks at why men are not just losing friends, but losing the spaces that taught them how to be known.

Wednesday with Woody is your midweek dive into modern life where storytelling, culture and self-expression meet. Hosted by Woody, each episode explores the beauty, chaos and truth of how we live, love and create in today’s world.

Got thoughts? Join the conversation on Instagram @wednesdaywithwoody or drop a voice note in the comments. Your story might spark our next episode.

This week on Wednesday with Woody, we look at what happens when hate arrives dressed as love, concern, faith, family and protection. In “When Hate Calls Itself Family: Pride, Fear and the Politics of Protection,” we unpack the softer language often used to make queer people smaller: “I love you, but…”, “family values,” “protect the children,” and all the suspicious little phrases that sound gentle until you notice the knife has manners. Drawing on current Pride Month backlash, anti-LGBTQ+ politics and lived experience, this episode asks why real love never requires someone to disappear, why queer people are not a threat to family, and why Pride still matters when fear keeps trying to call itself protection.

Wednesday with Woody is your midweek dive into modern life where storytelling, culture and self-expression meet. Hosted by Woody, each episode explores the beauty, chaos and truth of how we live, love and create in today’s world.

Got thoughts? Join the conversation on Instagram @wednesdaywithwoody or drop a voice note in the comments. Your story might spark our next episode.