Tonight, we present another collaboration with Bold Blind Beauty. In this conversation we discuss sexuality, sensuality, vulnerability and consent. Check out www.boldblindbeauty.com for more information about our guests. Also take a look at www.blindlgbtpride.org for more information about our organization.
This week we are collaborating with The Penny Forward Podcast to bring you a great interview with Leena Ann Solusar. She is starting her own business helping people with energy healing.
What is the hardest part of starting a business? For Leena Ann Solusar, it was the fear that it was wrong to charge for her services. We wanted to learn how Leena overcame that fear, so we invited her on to tell us how surviving a sexual assault, coming to terms with her sexual orientation, and grieving the unexpected death of her wife helped her to discover talents that she is now using to help others while helping herself.
Pride Connection airs on ACB Media 1 every Tuesday at 10pm EDT and is available soon after wherever you get your podcasts.
Our very own Randy Reed is guest hosting Pride Connection with an awesome dynamic duo from Sounds Fake But Okay, a podcast where an aromantic asexual girl and a demisexual-straight girl talk about all things to do with love, relationships, sexuality, and pretty much anything else that they just don't understand. Visit their website at https://www.soundsfakepod.com/
Sarah Costello Co-Host & Editor
After 18 years of assuming she was straight (thanks, society), Sarah realized she was aromantic asexual, and it's been a wild ride ever since. A proud Michigander (Go Blue!) who moved to Los Angeles in 2020 to pursue a career in television writing, her interests include bingeing entire TV shows in a single day, spending her life savings on musical theater, and diverse representation in media both in front of and behind the camera.
Kayla Kaszyca
Co-Host & Marketing Manager
Over the course of the first year of Sounds Fake But Okay, Kayla learned that she was not just straight, but demisexual. She is a recent graduate of the University of Michigan and has now moved to Baton Rouge with her partner. She loves long sits on the couch watching musicals and old lady activities such as paint by numbers.
Pride Connection airs on ACB Media 1 every Tuesday at 10pm EDT and is available soon after wherever you get your podcasts.
We are all craving that In-person connection and after careful deliberation Blind Pride International will be holding our Fall Social Networking event. Join us tonight to share memories of Socials past and have all your questions about this years event answered.
BPI’s yearly tradition of the Fall Social Networking Event is back and poised to be the best of the bunch.
Our membership voted to return to Denver the site of our last in-person FSN event The weekend of October 22nd we will gather in the mile high city for the laughs, wine and fun our FSN is known for and this episode, Pride Connection will share memories from events past and tease the exciting things lined up for this year
From very successful Cruises, Las Vegas, New York and other fun destinations we invite BPI members and allies to share some of the fun memories with us.
Pride Connection airs on ACB Media 1 every Tuesday at 10pm EDT and is available soon after wherever you get your podcasts.
Greetings family, I first and foremost want to thank Jessica Tomlinson and Byron Lee for helming and putting together an amazing Pride Connection!
As always our editor Tim is fantastic!
We are currently looking for more blind pride member voices for shows… If you have an idea… If you want to participate… If you want to add your voice to the growing shows please contact Anthony Corona.
Here is tonight‘s subject;
On this special edition of Pride Connection, we discussed many aspects of online dating websites and apps, from accessibility to the joys and awkwardness inherent in online dating. topics we covered including how to put your best foot forward, how to be safe while meeting for the first time, and when to disclose that you are blind or visually impaired. It’s a brave new world out there, so won’t you join us?
Pride Connection airs every Tuesday night at 10 PM Eastern on ACB media 1.
Tonight, Blind LGBT Pride International partners with Bold Blind Beauty to present this fascinating topic. Bold Blind Beauty is a group that strives to find the beauty of living with low or no vision.
This discussion surrounds ideas and attitudes towards LGBTQ, gender non-binary, gender fluidity and other aspects of our community.
We discuss the differences in generations on having grown up with messaging around LGBTQ community and topics. We also talked about how growing up with a new messaging has shaped different ideas towards LGBTQ topics from the community at large.
We focused on the transgender community; on how its members have become targets of violence; and how this has led to activism. In this sense, we pointed out what messaging other communities can take from this activism to help advance the rights of other marginalized groups.
The interns periences growing up with a new messaging; witnessing loved ones coming out; and how all of this has shaped their acceptance of the LGBTQ community.
Plus in a bonus segment, BPI members Chris Snyder and Byron Lee teach us the meaningful terms of the LGBTQ community. Byron also slipped in a song called Everything Possible written by Fred Small and performed by The Flirtations.
Mr. Estes is one of BPI’s founding members and Pride Connection is thrilled to have him helming another musically themed show. Part 2 of this fascinating interview will air on Pride Connection after Convention.
Wayne has also given us some recordings of his talented playing that you will hear during this and the second half of the interview. Questions or comments for Pride Connection can be sent to [email protected]
A message from Dwayne Estes
This weeks Pride Connection is special for me. I get the opportunity to chat with Wayne Pearcy. Wayne is a new member of BPI, my friend and colleague, and trumpeter extraordinaire. He also is a composer, arranger, and has a passion for the natural trumpet. He is all about music played on period correct instruments.
Hear how Wayne participated in the marching band while in high school and found his way to the Berklee College of Music in Boston. Completing his studies was by no means an easy feat but, his obstacles carved a path for other blind musicians.
Wayne’s parents were blind. It was their encouragement and their total belief in his talent that propels him forward as a professional musician. He survived NFB and found BPI. I met Wayne through Friends in Art.
BPI welcomes Wayne with all his skills and enthusiasm. This guy is the real deal, has lots going on, and is even willing to play music with me.
Stonewall sparked the Pride Month celebrations…. However Stonewall wasn’t the prologue or even the first chapter. Join BPI and AIRA as we celebrate, experience and describe Stonewalll and the Historic NYC West Village in telling the story of Pride Before, during and after Stonewall.
Tonight on ACB Radio Mainstream and on all podcast catchers shortly after.
AIRA describes slices of my life in Pride and Beyond.
By Anthony Corona
The Iconic Stonewall in NYC’s historic West Village, the statuary that represented over a decade of advocacy to the Alice Austin House on in my hometown Staten Island Aira with Blind Pride International went on a journey that had me re-living so much of my life.
When I lost my sight 5 years ago I had not a clue about Audio Description or Visual Interpreting Services and thought life would be bleak from now on. I began to learn to live as a blind man and as I navigated services I learned so many things. One of those important discoveries was AIRA. Now a few years later they literally brought me back to so many scenes of PRIDE in NYC where I was born and spent the bulk of my life.
Jeanine Stanley with Agent Alexandra invited Myself and BPI President Gabriel Lopez Kafati to participate with NYC LGBTQ Historical Preservation Society as they walk us through the Historic sites of Stonewall and the surrounding area all while educating us all on the histories of the movement with beautiful description from Alexandra.
My mind recreated the images as the descriptions flowed. Down to using an ATM in a Bank of America at one of these historic sites the memories of my life played across the giant movie screen in my mind. Countless spring and summer afternoons reading and picnicking at the Alice Austin site and of course the many times I ordered a libation at the bar of the Historic Stonewall Inn. I can’t describe the feelings of both PRIDE and being almost able to see these sites in person again.
As an advocator for both of my intersecting communities to bee involved with this presentation means so very much to me. I am so proud to help educate and entertain our communities and beyond about all the brave persons and movements that have led to the LGBTQ community really having a place at the table of life in our great country. It is so important to know our History and to advocate for it to be a part of the national tapestry.
June is LGBTQ Pride month and as Blind Pride celebrates and educates all month long with AIRA this presentation will inspire others to document slices of their own lives and community history. Please take the virtual walk through LGBTQ history as we all virtually visit Stonewall and NYC’s West Village Thank you to Amanda Davis for the incredible lesson. Thank you to AIRA for recognizing how important it is to make our history come alive and thank you to Blind LGBT Pride for being my home and family.
Please join us tonight at 10PM Eastern, 7PM Pacific on Pride Connection where guest host Chris Snyder brings you an exclusive, in-depth interview with queer author TJ Klune!
TJ Klune is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling, Lambda Literary Award-winning author of The House in the Cerulean Sea, The Extraordinaries, and more. Being queer himself, TJ believes it’s important—now more than ever—to have accurate, positive, queer representation in stories.
Visit Klune online: tjklunebooks.com Twitter: @tjklune Instagram: tjklunebooks
Van Halen expressed it best. "Might as well jump!"
Sometimes,it's a gradual jump over time; in some cases, it's a dive from 14,000 feet above the ground. Whatever the height or intensity, this show is about making a leap in to the unknown. Listen to some BPI board members share stories of coming out and gaining pride in themselves as well as community in BPI. And Celebrate Pride month with Sarah Chung, Leah Gardner and Byron Lee as they take the leap of a lifetime.