OUTCAST UK

What happens when the places that helped us become ourselves disappear? A Brummie drag and The Voice UK legend has the answer... Drag artist and musician Fatt Butcher joins Graeme Smith to talk about the dance floors that changed their life—and why losing a gay bar means losing far more than somewhere to drink. Growing up in a small village during Section 28, Fatt watched Queer as Folk with the volume barely on, wondering where a queer life might be possible. Finding Birmingham's gay village opened up a world of first kisses, new identities and possibilities that had once felt out of reach. Now, Fatt is turning that experience into Congregational: a drag funeral for the gay village that attempts to resurrect it, complete with a queer choir, mirror balls, dance music and a decidedly unconventional approach to worship. But this isn't straightforward nostalgia. Graeme and Fatt get into the contradictions of spaces that can save lives while relying on selling us another drink, the loneliness of performing five nights a week, and reclaiming the joy of singing together after a complicated religious upbringing. Plus: smoking-area friendships, poppers and dubstep, turning hate into a badge of honour—and what it actually takes to build a community beyond the dance floor.

During the 1980s, half the patients on some of London's AIDS wards were Irish. It is a staggering fact—and part of an almost-forgotten chapter of queer history. Homosexuality remained illegal in Ireland until 1993. Many queer Irish people crossed the Irish Sea in search of freedom, safety and the chance to live authentically. They created homes, friendships and chosen families in Britain. But as AIDS devastated the community, many also found themselves on London's wards, far from home. At the centre of this episode is Fr Bernárd Lynch, the openly gay Irish Catholic priest who founded New York City's first AIDS ministry in 1982. He cared for people as they died, challenged the Church over safer sex and gay rights, and later continued that work in London, including at the London Lighthouse. Bernárd's testimony—alongside the experiences of others who lived through the crisis—is at the heart of Mammy's House, a new black comedy now running at Upstairs at the Gatehouse in Highgate until 13 September. Graeme speaks to Bernárd and the play's co-creator and star Derek Murphy, whose screen credits include RTÉ's We Watch, You Watch and hit sitcom Killinaskully. Derek explains why he was determined to bring this uniquely Irish story to life, combining humour and humanity while doing justice to people whose experiences were in danger of disappearing. Bernárd has now seen Mammy's House twice. He considers it one of the most profound and authentic depictions of the era he has encountered—and believes it gives this extraordinary community the recognition and dignity it deserves.

It's the last weekend of this year's Edinburgh Fringe and in our time in Edinburgh we've spoken to some of the most interesting new and established artists from around the world. OUTCAST WORLD is live from the Edinburgh Festival Fringe — the biggest arts festival on the planet — meeting some of the queer and queer-adjacent performers bringing their stories to Edinburgh this summer. In this episode, Graeme meets New York performer and musician Joey Jennings, creator of Little Pink Dress — a deeply personal one-man musical about growing up gay, chasing the Hollywood dream, family, addiction, recovery and finding your way back to the person you were before the world started telling you who to be. At the heart of the show is a real little pink dress Joey wore as a six-year-old — sleeping in it, dancing around his room in it and living out an uninhibited childhood love of performance, pop music and dressing up. Years later, it was Joey's mother who suggested that if he was going to tell his story, the dress had to be part of it. Joey talks about spending more than a decade pursuing the “serious actor” life in Los Angeles — and how an industry obsessed with image, masculinity and youth gradually left him feeling increasingly disconnected from himself. He describes auditioning for straight roles, trying to inhabit a more hyper-masculine version of himself and eventually realising that the dream he had chased since childhood was damaging the very part of him that had wanted to perform in the first place. There's also a frank conversation about drinking, getting sober in 2023, therapy, moving from LA to New York and beginning to rebuild his creative life. And then there's his mum. Little Pink Dress is, ultimately, a love letter to the single mother who encouraged the artistic kid she was raising, introduced him to the country and folk music that now runs through the show, and whose voice Joey says has remained in his head telling him to keep going. The result is an unusual collision of country rock, musical theatre, queer identity, childhood memory and autobiography — including a cowboy version of Joey who represents the masculine mask he once believed he needed to wear. They also talk about why Joey stayed away from social media for years, the strange vulnerability of finally releasing songs he had kept private for so long, and what happens when you hand the most personal parts of your life over to an audience. Recorded as part of OUTCAST WORLD's Edinburgh Fringe 2026 coverage. Joey Jennings: Little Pink Dress.

The Fringe changes pace once the last week arrives, the flyering gets a little more frantic, the queues at the good venues get a little longer, and the shows that have built word of mouth over three weeks are the ones worth fighting for a ticket to. Outcast World has been across the city all month checking out the best Edinburgh has to offer. Gareth Waugh: Is Pepsi OK? There is a version of this show that plays as a straightforward hour about a bad gig or a worse manager, and then there is the version Gareth Waugh actually built, which unfolds more like a true crime podcast than a stand-up set, except the person telling it is also the one who got taken. Waugh, an Edinburgh local who has supported Kevin Bridges and John Bishop and taken every strange booking going from cruise ships to the PDC World Darts Championship, was scammed out of money on a podcast job that appeared to be connected to Coca-Cola. The man behind it was someone Waugh considered a friend. What follows on stage is the unravelling, told through a PowerPoint of receipts: email threads, video calls, bank statements, text messages, all projected as evidence while the story gets steadily harder to believe. Outcast World has a stake in this one that goes beyond a recommendation. The same man behind the scam in Gareth's story is one we crossed paths with too, and there are names in that show that have been changed or redacted for reasons that will make sense the moment the lights go up. Go and see it, and see if you can spot who's who. Gareth Waugh: Is Pepsi OK? runs at Monkey Barrel 2 until 30 August. Science Stories for Grown-Ups A gentler close to the evening, and a genuinely lovely one that's queer coded. Giulia and Richard are two scientists turned performers who spend an hour giving the back catalogue of science a personality, atoms with grudges, chemical reactions with feelings, thermodynamics rewritten as something closer to a bedtime story than a lecture. Fire, water, and the Twin Paradox all get the treatment, and there is a book of the stories on sale afterwards for anyone who wants to take the wonder home with them. It is the kind of show built for the people whose science teacher, as the pair put it themselves, crushed the curiosity out of them the first time round. This one gets it back.

Some Fringe shows you have to see to believe, and Final Queen is very much one of them, so this week I sat down with its creator and star Harrison Sweeney to work out how on earth you build a drag circus horror comedy about a queen road-tripping across the Australian outback to audition for Kylie Minogue, getting hopelessly lost, and ending up in an abandoned farmhouse fighting off chainsaw-wielding bushrangers, ghosts and a rolling cast of slasher villains, each one staged as a different circus act. It is, on paper, one of the maddest pitches of the whole festival, and it opened to four stars on its very first preview, which tells you the madness is the good kind. Harrison came to drag during lockdown and to the stage through circus school in Melbourne, where he trained in aerial rope and hula hoops long before he ever put on a wig, and his co-creator Rachel Carey is a horror specialist with lesbian vampires and demonic parodies already on her CV, so between the two of them Final Queen was probably always going to look exactly like this. Underneath the fake blood, though, there is a real argument, and it is the reason this one belongs on Outcast World. We get into why drag is inherently political, why the final girl who survives the horror film turns out to be such a natural fit for a drag queen, and the shared history of three art forms, slasher cinema, queer performance and circus, that were all once dismissed as too low to count. We also cover the far less glamorous reality of a Fringe run, which for Harrison means scrubbing stage blood out of a white dress by hand in the shower every single night. It is funny, it is warm, and it is a proper conversation about what queer survival actually looks like in 2026. In this episode How a year-long game of "what if" turned into the Fringe's most demented pitch Grace Lightning, the love child of the final girl trope, a queer circus performer and a camp Aussie drag queen Why drag is political whether it means to be or not, and what the tagline "who are the real monsters?" is really asking The shared outsider history of slasher films, queer art and circus What sets Australian drag and its larrikin humour apart from the Drag Race UK aesthetic The unglamorous truth about blood, laundry and twenty-four shows in twenty-six days Networking, faith in the work, and missing your castmates when the show is just you A quickfire finish, one Kylie track to die to, one to kill to, and the one thing Grace could never survive Final Queen runs at Big Belly, Cowgate, at 9.30pm nightly until 30 August, with rest days on the 17th and 24th. If you are anywhere near Edinburgh, go, and tell them Outcast World sent you.

Outcast World is back from its summer break — and we're in Scotland for the Edinburgh Fringe. From now until the Fringe wraps up, Graeme is getting immersed in the biggest arts festival in the world, taking in the queer and queer-adjacent culture of Edinburgh and meeting some of the best comedians, artists, musicians and performers in town. And yes, Outcast has brought the campervan. We'll be bringing you new interviews and special episodes from Edinburgh over the next few weeks, alongside some classic conversations from the Outcast Fringe archives. First up, Dan Tiernan. Gay, dyspraxic and ferociously funny, Dan has become one of the most exciting names in British comedy. We head back into the Outcast archives to hear what happened when Graeme caught up with him at the Fringe as his career was taking off. Then we meet Compagnia Bellanda, an independent Italian dance company from Friuli Venezia Giulia in Italy's far north-east. Founded by creative partners Giovanni and Claudia, the company takes Giovanni's roots in breakin' and hip hop culture and pushes them into contemporary performance. They're in Edinburgh with *Il canto dell'assiolo* — *The Song of the Scops Owl* — a 45-minute duet using the haunting, repetitive call of a tiny Italian bird as a metaphor for intimacy, desire, tenderness, control and relationships that never quite resolve. It's the first stop as Outcast World gets immersed in Edinburgh Fringe for the next few weeks. Comedy. Art. Music. Performance. Queer culture. Queer-adjacent culture. Old friends and new discoveries. Graeme is in Scotland for Outcast — and there's a lot more to come.

In the buildup to our Edinburgh Fringe 2026 coverage we bring this uncut interview with one of the funniest Edinburgh Fringe guests we've had on the show. The Edinburgh Fringe is part of the world's biggest arts festival and is famous for up and coming comedians and performers to show their wares. Kuan Wen spoke to Graeme Smith at the last festival about doing the festival, his comedy and his feelings on the security of his country of Taiwan in the face of global uncertainties. Kuan-Wen talks about how in his dating experience... ANDREWS ARE THE WORST! In an interview that had us crying laughing that we're bringing to you uncut.

Recorded for the BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! podcast at a MEETS event in January 2026, this conversation with Liberal Democrat politician Carl Cashman looked ahead to what might happen during a turbulent year in British and international politics. Several months later, it turns out they got a fair few things right. Carl joins Graeme Smith for a candid conversation about whether queer voters should give the Liberal Democrats another chance — and whether the party could once again find itself holding the balance of power. He faces questions about the coalition years, broken promises over tuition fees and why so many voters still feel burned by the Lib Dems' time in government. Carl also sets out the red lines he would want from any future coalition, including protections for LGBTQ+ and trans people and opposition to further welfare cuts. There is plenty of political gossip too. Carl argues that the Labour government is not genuinely progressive, questions whether Andy Burnham is becoming an opportunist and considers whether Burnham could eventually replace Keir Starmer. The conversation also takes in the rise of the Greens, wealth taxes, immigration, Nigel Farage, Donald Trump, Brexit and what defending LGBTQ+ rights should actually look like in British foreign policy. And is it really true that 80% of Liberal Democrat members are LGBTQ+? Subscribe to Outcast World for more queer politics, sex and culture.

On a raft of issues it's becoming clear that a change in the man at number 10 for the UK may not bring the change in policies and direction many had hoped for, despite Andy Burnham's victory over Reform at the Battle Of Makerfield! Yes its great to see Reform on the run and the rise of a new left leaning politician. But will Burnham bring a fresh approach on the most pressing issues of our times. Or will be be another centre left disappointment? The London heatwave has meant Graeme has to host from his living room and not the studio today. But Nick Charles is in the studio in Manchester linking up to talk about his Burnham worries and carry the show for G who is almost demoted to a guest for today on a laptop!

Gabriel Clark joins Outcast World for a candid conversation recorded live at the BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! Gallery in London and originally featured on The BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! Podcast. Best known for his work on Hollyoaks and as one of the stars of Russell T Davies' highly anticipated new queer TV drama Tip Toe, Gabriel reflects on growing up in Bolton in an artistic family, finding his place as a young queer person, and navigating fame after landing a major TV role during the pandemic. The conversation explores everything from queer visibility in the entertainment industry to the importance of speaking out on issues that matter. Gabriel discusses why he chooses to use his platform to advocate for LGBTQ+ rights, trans rights and Palestine, despite the risks that can come with public activism in the media spotlight. He also opens up about starring in the provocative theatre production Jock Night, which tackles chemsex, shame, addiction and queer identity. Gabriel explains why the play sparked such important conversations within LGBTQ+ communities and how it changed his understanding of Manchester's queer scene and the challenges facing many gay men today. The discussion then turns to The Night Larry Kramer Kissed Me, the acclaimed HIV-era play Gabriel recently performed in Manchester. Together, Graeme and Gabriel reflect on the legacy of HIV activism, the progress that has been made since the 1990s, and why many of the themes explored in the play still feel remarkably relevant in 2026. Finally, Gabriel shares what audiences can expect from Tip Toe, Russell T Davies' new five-part drama set around Manchester's Canal Street. Without giving away spoilers, he describes the series as funny, heartbreaking, sexy, political and full of humanity, while offering a glimpse behind the scenes of one of the most talked-about LGBTQ+ television projects of the year. A thoughtful and wide-ranging conversation about queer storytelling, activism, community, HIV history, chemsex, visibility, and the future of LGBTQ+ culture. Subscribe to Outcast World for more conversations exploring queer politics, sex and culture. #GabrielClark #TipToe #RussellTDavies #OutcastWorld #LGBTQ #QueerCulture #CanalStreet #Manchester #Chemsex #HIV #BoysBoysBoys #Channel4 #QueerTV #LGBTQPodcast

Andy Burnham, the King of the North, just won Makerfield in a landslide. He's back in Parliament, he's coming for Keir Starmer's job, and the whole country is asking the same question: is this the moment British politics finally changes? We check the lay of the land right now - do you think things can only get better? Are we doomed to disappointment again? Or has he pulled off an incredible feat - united the left and fractured the right? But what if the problem runs deeper than which leader is standing at the despatch box? Metin Pekin thinks so. His book Breaking Democracy's Chains argues that it doesn't matter who wins, who loses, or who challenges whom for the Labour leadership, because the party system itself is the mechanism that keeps real power out of reach. Not just for working people. For minorities. For queer communities who have spent decades depending on whichever party happens to be sympathetic this week. What replaced the parties when Section 28 was repealed? Who fights for trans rights when there's no whip to call in? Where does organised resistance live when you've dismantled the scaffolding? This is the conversation British politics needs to be having today. Not who leads Labour. But whether the whole game is rigged from the start.

A Fox News regular runs a company that sells paid protesters to the highest bidder. We sat him down and asked about the bodies, the lawsuits, and the crowds he says he can manufacture for anyone willing to pay. Adam Swart is the founder of Crowds on Demand, a Beverly Hills firm that supplies actors and paid demonstrators for protests, hearings and PR stunts. He has spent the past year on Fox News, Newsmax and OANN telling conservative audiences that the protests against Donald Trump are organised, funded and fake. The catch is that manufacturing protest for money is, by his own account, the entire business. This drops the morning after Trump turned his 80th birthday into a cage fight on the White House lawn, while millions took to the streets in a fresh round of No Kings protests. So we dug into the real history of Crowds on Demand: paid actors posing as Hurricane Katrina survivors at a council hearing, a federal racketeering lawsuit settled with a published apology, a recruitment drive for people hired purely to intimidate, and an unverifiable claim that someone once offered Swart millions to fake an anti-Trump crowd. It is not a hit job. He comes with some genuinely interesting anecdotes, including work his company says it did for people who use PrEP, and the conversation finds real common ground before it asks the harder questions his usual bookers never do. Outcast World is an independent, queer, left-leaning interview show. Broadcasting that does not pull its punches. Subscribe and stick around.

In 1998, eight months into Tony Blair's government, seven gay and bisexual working-class men from Bolton were convicted at Crown Court of buggery and gross indecency for having consensual sex together in a private home. No victim. No complaint. Some went to prison. All were placed on the sex offenders register. The laws used against them dated back to 1895, and in one case to 1533. Greater Manchester Police, the same force that prosecuted Alan Turing, pursued this case with a fervour no other police force in the country was matching at the time. Almost nobody knows this happened. Hugh Sheehan is the writer and audio producer behind Criminally Queer: The Bolton 7, the five-part BBC Sounds documentary series that spent years in the making and is referenced in Russell T Davies' Channel 4 drama Tip Toe, starring Alan Cumming as a gay bar owner in Manchester's Gay Village. Davies made Tip Toe because, in his words, the fight is back on. He's right. And the Bolton Seven are a significant part of why. In this episode of Outcast World, Graeme and Hugh cover the full story: the centuries-old laws that remained quietly on the books after partial decriminalisation in 1967, the two-man rule that made consensual group sex a criminal act regardless of what straight people were doing, the class dimension that meant working-class men from Bolton had no legal defences that a wealthier man in a privately owned home might have had, and the Chief Constable whose fundamentalist homophobia had shaped Greater Manchester Police for over a decade before the Bolton Seven were ever arrested. Criminally Queer: The Bolton 7 is available on BBC Sounds, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.

As a wave of safeguarding scandals hits the Married At First Sight (MAFS) shows around the world and the former head of Channel 4 and OFCOM says he would never have commissioned a show this potentially hazardous for participants we ask is this a good moment to call time on the controversial reality series. Former MAFS UK star, Liverpudlian Thomas Hartley returns to Outcast World a different man from the one who last sat in our studio. As Married at First Sight UK brings one of the biggest scandals to TV in years, he gives us the rarest thing in the whole story, the view from inside the format. Back in 2022 he was going viral for his antics on the show's 10th season, but now he says he was out of control at the time and was drunk for most of the recording. He is unsparing about ten years of daily addiction and the queer pain underneath it, but generous about the welfare team who looked after him, and unflinching that the format itself is dangerous and should be redrawn by the very people who have lived it. CONTEXT: A BBC Panorama investigation set out allegations from former contributors that two women were raped by their on-screen husbands during filming, and that a third was subjected to a non-consensual sex act. The men deny the allegations, and the Metropolitan Police have asked anyone affected to come forward. Channel 4 has pulled every episode and a major sponsor has walked, and the regulator is reviewing the broadcaster's own welfare report. Thomas is neither an accuser nor one of the accused, and throughout this conversation he is speaking only about his own experience. Other contributors, and the reporting around the show, have described aspects of the production, including alcohol, differently to Thomas. If anything in this episode affects you. For drugs and alcohol, Talk to Frank, 0300 123 6600. For emotional distress, Samaritans, 116 123, free and round the clock. For sexual violence, the Rape and Sexual Abuse Support Line, 0808 500 2222. Outcast World is an award winning platform for queer politics, sex and culture. Subscribe for the full conversations and the weekly drop. Listen everywhere you get your podcasts and read more at outcastworld.net Follow us on TikTok @thisisoutcastworld #ThomasHartley #MarriedAtFirstSight #MAFS #MAFSUK #OutcastWorld #Sobriety #LiverpoolPride #RealityTV #QueerPodcast #DutyOfCare

Russell T Davies is back with Tiptoe and it has left viewers shaken. In this episode of Outcast World, Graeme Smith and Topher Taylor unpack the first two episodes of Channel 4's most talked-about new queer drama and ask why it feels less like fiction and more like a warning. From the brutal opening scene to Melba's now-viral speech about queer life in 2026, the conversation explores whether LGBTQ+ people are witnessing a genuine backlash after decades of progress. Has the optimism of the Queer as Folk era been replaced by fear? Are queer people becoming political targets once again? And what happens when online hate starts spilling into the real world? Graeme and Topher discuss the rise of anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric, attacks on queer spaces, social media radicalisation, Reform UK, Donald Trump, trans rights, community resilience and the uncomfortable feeling that many rights once considered secure may no longer be guaranteed. The episode also features the debut of "Topher's Slag Bag" as listeners send in questions about sex, relationships, toys, threesomes and navigating intimacy. A funny, emotional and sometimes unsettling conversation about queer life, community, sex and politics in 2026. In this episode: • Russell T Davies' Tiptoe and its cultural impact • The legacy of Queer as Folk • LGBTQ+ rights and political backlash • Reform UK, Trump and the rise of reactionary politics • Canal Street, queer spaces and community • Social media radicalisation and online hate • HIV, memory and generational trauma • Topher's Slag Bag: sex toys, anal prep and threesomes Outcast World is the global queer group chat — covering LGBTQ+ news, politics, sex and culture from London around the world. Featuring: Graeme Smith and Topher Taylor. #LGBTQ #Tiptoe #RussellTDavies #QueerAsFolk #GayPodcast #OutcastWorld #LGBTQRights #CanalStreet #QueerCulture #DonaldTrump #ReformUK #GayLife #QueerPolitics #Channel4

Her off of Loose Women was there. So was Jane McDonald. And so, four ownership layers up, were the financiers. Graeme is joined by Loud Brown Gays host and Outcast alumnus Nick Charles to talk about the contradiction at the heart of the best weekend of the queer calendar. Mighty Hoopla is owned by Superstruct, owned in turn by the US private equity giant KKR, a firm that backs weapons manufacturers and holds stakes in Israeli corporations tied to the occupation. We waved Free Palestine flags at a festival whose money flows straight up to it. This is not a call to boycott and it is not a pile-on. It's a confession, because we were all there, and an honest look at why our anger lands on the rainbow logo while the people with the actual power stay invisible. Plus: queer club night DILF was deleted from Instagram overnight. Who will be silenced next? #OutcastWorld #MightyHoopla #QueerNightlife #LGBTQ #Palestine

The UK's new EHRC guidance has triggered outrage, confusion and fear across the LGBTQ+ community, but what does it actually mean in practice? This week, Graeme Smith is joined by journalist Jamie Wareham, founder of QueerAF, for a sharp, urgent conversation about the Supreme Court ruling, the EHRC's controversial code of practice, and the wider political shift happening across Britain. They discuss why this debate no longer affects only trans people, how gender policing increasingly impacts butch lesbians, feminine gay men and anyone seen as “not masculine enough,” and why many activists believe the UK is sliding backwards on LGBTQ+ rights at an alarming speed. Also explored - Wes Streeting, the Cass Review, media hostility toward trans people, Britain's collapsing international LGBTQ+ rankings, and why local communities and businesses may now become the frontline of resistance. This is OUTCAST WORLD

Nigel Farage has revived one of the most controversial arguments of his political career: that migrants living with HIV should be denied NHS treatment. It's a position he first promoted during the 2015 election campaign. At the time, HIV charities, clinicians and public health experts condemned the claims, arguing that treating people living with HIV protects public health, reduces transmission and ultimately saves lives. Now, more than a decade later, the same rhetoric is back. The difference is that Farage is no longer a fringe insurgent. He is leading one of Britain's most successful political movements and could conceivably find himself in Downing Street. The question at the heart of this debate is not really about immigration. It's about who deserves healthcare. Who deserves treatment? And who gets left behind when politicians decide some lives are more worthy of care than others? That question sits at the centre of filmmaker Matt Nadel's remarkable documentary Cashing Out. He talked to us in a long form chat for The BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! Podcast Oscars special. Here we listen to an extended cut of the chat about a dark moment in queer history. The film tells the story of an extraordinary industry that emerged during the AIDS crisis in America. Thousands of people living with HIV sold their life insurance policies while they were still alive in order to pay rent, buy medication and survive with dignity. Investors collected the payout when they died. What makes the story even more extraordinary is that Nadel later discovered his own father had been one of those investors. In this conversation, Graeme Smith speaks to Matt Nadel about HIV, political memory, healthcare, capitalism, family secrets, queer history and why the lessons of the AIDS epidemic still matter today. Because history doesn't always repeat itself. But political rhetoric often does. The BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! Podcast is available everywhere now and is out every fornight, hosted by Graeme Smith and it's the home of intelligent queer conversation - the intersection of ART, QUEER, CULTURE. #HIV #NigelFarage #ReformUK #LGBTQ #AIDS #Healthcare #Politics #OutcastWorld #MattNadel #QueerHistory

Labour looks like it's eating itself alive, Reform councillors are combusting in real time, the manosphere is getting dismantled by Louis Theroux with the energy of a disappointed supply teacher — and somewhere in the middle of the collapse, Leila Navabi joins Outcast World with the genuinely incredible story of how making a baby with her friend as a sperm donor somehow became a full-blown musical. Yes. Really. Graeme opens this week's episode by wading into the increasingly bizarre state of British politics: Keir Starmer's apparent slow-motion leadership death spiral, Wes Streeting's endlessly rehearsed Westminster energy, rumours of Andy Burnham positioning himself as Labour's northern saviour, and the growing sense that Reform UK's rise could eventually force Britain into electoral reform whether the establishment likes it or not. There's also the small matter of Reform councillors dropping like flies under public scrutiny — including allegations surrounding extremist online content and another candidate exposed over explicit gay OnlyFans material involving sex in public places. Different allegations, different levels of seriousness, same recurring problem: a party obsessed with presenting itself as the guardian of “traditional values” repeatedly finding itself consumed by scandal. And then there's HS Ticky Tocky and the collapsing manosphere ecosystem, following Louis Theroux's documentary and the increasingly surreal online fallout around Grindr, burner accounts, fake alpha masculinity and influencer culture built almost entirely on performance and contradiction. Then Leila Navabi arrives and the entire show takes a gloriously chaotic turn. The comedian, broadcaster and writer discusses the DIY IVF journey with her friend that inspired her musical, the absurd realities of queer parenting logistics, and one of the funniest theatre reviews imaginable after falling over on stage during a performance — with Time Out delivering a line about it so brutal it's become legendary in her own personal history. There's also a very direct message from Leila to gay people supporting Reform UK, alongside a wider conversation about identity, community, culture-war politics and why some queer people appear determined to align themselves with movements that fundamentally do not like them very much. Smart, filthy, political and properly funny. This is Outcast World.

Welsh-Iranian comedian, writer and rising theatre menace Leila Navabi joins Outcast World for one of the funniest and weirdly moving chats we've had in ages. You'll probably know Leila already from writing on Bad Education, Never Mind the Buzzcocks and Deep Fake Neighbour Wars, or from voicing Claire in Don't Hug Me I'm Scared. She's also become a major name on the UK live comedy circuit, supporting comics including Nish Kumar and Jessica Fostekew while quietly building a reputation as one of the sharpest queer comedy voices working right now. But this episode is really about the project that might push her into another league entirely: turning her real-life queer DIY conception story into a musical. After being told in her twenties that having children might not be possible, Leila and her wife ended up rejecting the expensive, sanitised “acceptable” version of queer parenthood and instead built a family the way queer people often build everything: through friendship, improvisation, emotional honesty and an alarming amount of admin involving sperm. This episode dives into the now-infamous DIY conception setup that inspired her show Relay: spare rooms, a sperm donor who was already one of their closest friends, syringes quietly bought from Boots under the pretence of “having a big dog”, and the deeply surreal ritual of everybody washing their hands and heading out for brunch afterwards while pretending this was a perfectly ordinary Sunday activity. At one point, Leila describes sitting in a café fully aware that her partner is technically “dripping with your best mate's sperm” while everyone politely orders eggs and coffee. Which honestly tells you almost everything you need to know about the energy of this episode. Underneath all the chaos though, this is really a conversation about modern queer family life, chosen family, emotional honesty and why comedy so often becomes armour for people trying to survive complicated lives in public. There are also cats named after Joan Rivers, emotionally repressed gay people using humour to avoid vulnerability, and a genuinely fascinating discussion about why queer family stories are still treated as niche when they're often far more emotionally intentional than traditional family structures.

The results are in — and they're pretty damning. Across England in particular, a right wing populist surge is reshaping British politics in real time. Reform UK is rising fast, Labour looks increasingly fractured, and for the first time in decades, the idea of Nigel Farage entering Number 10 no longer feels impossible. It's clear Reform is not the natural home of queer politics. So why are so many gay men getting pulled into its narrative online? On this episode, Graeme Smith is joined by two of the breakout stars of the BBC's I Kissed A Boy and I Kissed A Girl — Gareth and Amy — for a chaotic, funny and surprisingly political conversation about identity, masculinity, cancellation, internet discourse, dating, queer infighting and what it means to be young, queer and online in 2026. The conversation moves seamlessly between reality TV gossip, Green vs Reform politics, TikTok radicalisation, social media algorithms and whether parts of LGBTQ+ culture are drifting towards a genuine ideological split. Outcast World — queer politics, sex & culture.

The BBC made history with I Kissed A Boy and I Kissed A Girl. Then they cancelled them.In this episode of Outcast World, Graeme Smith is joined by Gareth Valentino and Amy Spalding, two of the standout names from those shows, now launching their own podcast It Started With A Kiss.What starts as a conversation about queer TV quickly turns into something else.We get into what it actually felt like to come out on national television, the reality of sudden visibility, and why those shows mattered more than the BBC seems willing to admit.Then it shifts.Gay men being brutal to each other. Lesbian solidarity. Open relationships, when they work and when they really don't. Chemsex culture. Internalised homophobia.And a story about a relationship that went very wrong, involving secrecy, betrayal, and HIV disclosure, that says more about queer dating than most people are willing to say out loud.This is part one of a two-part conversation.In part two, we go further into the politics, Trump, trans rights, the UK, and why queer culture feels like it's moving forward and backwards at the same time.CHAPTERS00:00 Why I Kissed A Boy and I Kissed A Girl mattered 02:30 What it felt like to come out on TV 06:00 The reality of sudden queer visibility 10:00 Gay men vs gay men 13:00 Lesbian solidarity vs male toxicity 16:00 Open relationships, reality vs fantasy 20:00 When non-monogamy goes wrong 24:00 Dating, sex, and honesty in queer cultureFOLLOW / SUBSCRIBESubscribe for full video episodes of Outcast World Part two drops in 48 hours

This week Topher is back on, and on the last episode we found out about "felchgate". The perfect Valentines Day treat where a regular hookup was given a treat from a donor. If you know you now. The DL bad boys can be the kinkiest sometimes.This time it's news on one of his all time faves, fresh from a decade in prison taking Topher on a cute date in Soho.And we're talking about The Baftas Incident. Did we need to pitch people with disabilities and people of colour against each other? After a week to digest it we're talking it through.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Graeme and Topher meant to record a serious episode but then got side tracked on a half hour series of glorious tangents. The best of which is right at the start:Valentines day has been and gone....What did you do?Topher had a date pop round and he had a very specific request ... (googles F3LCHING....)It's one of those episodes. Enjoy.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You may already know Carl Cashman as the Liberal Democrat politician who keeps making headlines for being ridiculously in shape and unapologetically shirtless on Instagram. The “world's hottest politician” label follows him everywhere.But what happens when the internet crush turns out to be smart, likeable, politically ambitious — and fully aware that the gays love him?Recorded live in front of an audience at the BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! Gallery in Fitzrovia, London, Graeme sits down with the 34-year-old leader of Liverpool City Council's Liberal Democrats to talk trust after the coalition years, immigration rhetoric, trans rights, a possible hung parliament, and what the UK does in a world shaped by Farage, Le Pen and Trump.In a political era dominated by culture-war strongmen, is a pro-EU, openly progressive politician who actually enjoys queer support… such a bad thing?This is the political half of a longer live conversation. To hear the full interview, head to the BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! Podcast.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Drag has never been more visible, but for many performers it has never felt more complicated.In this episode of Outcast World, Graeme Smith speaks to Crystal about what it's really like to be a drag artist in 2026. They talk about the idea of “quiet quitting drag”, the rising pressure on LGBTQ performers, and why staying visible now comes with real personal and professional risks.Crystal joins the show while still involved in an ongoing legal dispute with Laurence Fox that is due back in court this summer. She tells us whether or not she would say it all again... after 6 years of legal battles.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We're joined by Kevin Guyan — one of the UK's most compelling thinkers on queer life, power and systems. Kevin is a leading academic at the University of Edinburgh and the author of Queer Data and The Rainbow Trap, two books that have become essential reading on how LGBTQ+ lives are shaped, sorted and managed by institutions.It's about data. Not as numbers, but as power.Kevin asks the question most of us never think to ask until it's too late: what actually happens when queer people are counted? Because being counted doesn't automatically mean being protected. Sometimes it means being exposed.We unpack the seductive promise of visibility — the idea that if the state knows we exist, we'll be safer. Kevin explains why data is never neutral. Every statistic hides decisions about who felt safe enough to answer, who stayed silent, who was answered for, and who disappeared entirely. Once those numbers exist, they travel — into headlines, policy, algorithms and systems far beyond our control.Using the UK census as a starting point, Kevin shows how queer communities globally are trapped in a brutal bind: counted badly, our numbers are weaponised; not counted at all, our existence can be denied. Either way, data doesn't just describe us — it acts on us.The conversation darkens as we look at history and the future. Data collected in one political moment doesn't vanish when politics change. It waits.We also explore the algorithmic systems already deciding who you are without asking — sexuality inferred from clicks, gender guessed from behaviour, profiles built silently while you scroll.What happens when the system knows who you are — and you can't take it back?---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Since around 2020, a lot of queer people were finally let in.Into institutions that had ignored us, sidelined us, or treated us as a liability for decades. Suddenly we were wanted. Asked to advise. Asked to represent. Asked to sit on panels, lead staff networks, front Pride content, help “shape culture”. It felt like progress. It felt overdue.And then something shifted.The tone cooled. The questions stopped being curious and started being cautious. Budgets disappeared. Projects were quietly killed. People who had been welcomed for their visibility were suddenly treated as awkward, political, or risky. The same doors that had opened so loudly were slammed shut — and we were left standing on the outside, marked as “other” again.In Part 1 of a two-part interview, we're joined by Kevin Guyan — one of the UK's most respected thinkers on LGBTQ+ inclusion, power and systems. Kevin is the author of Queer Data and The Rainbow Trap, books that don't flatter institutions or offer easy fixes. They ask harder questions about what inclusion actually costs the people being “included”.We talk about what it really feels like to work inside organisations that love queer visibility but fear queer demands. The exhaustion of unpaid emotional labour. The pressure to be grateful just for having a seat at the table. The quiet expectation that you'll soften yourself, simplify yourself, make yourself legible to straight managers who decide — consciously or not — which versions of queerness they're comfortable digesting.We ask the questions that don't usually make it into DEI strategy documents.Do queer people have to perform a role to survive at work?What happens if you don't “read” gay?If you're trans but don't fit the image people expect?If you're a lesbian who doesn't behave the way they think lesbians should?If your identity is complicated, political, messy — or just inconvenient?Kevin talks about the trap of being invited in on someone else's terms. About “gratitude politics” — the idea that we should be thankful just to be tolerated. About how quickly inclusion turns into extraction, and how easily queer people become window dressing for institutions unwilling to change anything structural.This isn't a conversation about rejecting opportunity. Most of us can't afford to. It's about learning how to move through powerful institutions without losing your spine. How to recognise the red flags early. How to tell the difference between real support and rainbow garnish. And how to protect yourself when the political winds inevitably change.Part 2 takes this further — into how inclusion becomes classification, and how data and bureaucracy are now being used to formalise who belongs, who's manageable, and who gets erased.But this first part is about the emotional reality. The whiplash. The silence. The moment you realise the door that opened so confidently can close just as fast.And what you do next.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on Outcast World, Graeme and Topher accidentally kick a hornet's nest on TikTok and Instagram and get absolutely swarmed. Bots, right-wing bedwetters, and people arguing with total confidence that red is actually blue. A proper deluge. Where do they all come from, and why do they all sound the same?There is one bright spot: Green Party deputy leader Zack Polanski shares the post on TikTok, which helps restore some faith in humanity. But like everyone else, we're still drawn to the worst comments — so we read them. All of them. Then we start replying.What follows is a scorched-earth comments policy. Bots get called out. Bad arguments get dismantled. Unhinged profiles get gently (and sometimes not so gently) mocked. We end up trolling the trolls so efficiently it becomes a full-time job — and, weirdly, a great day out.Along the way we get into why Topher will always hire and promote sex workers, and why on earth a certain Mr Yaxley-Lennon publicly complained about being served gay Grindr ads by the algorithm… then chose to post about it. The highlights are here. The comments are unhinged. And yes — we replied to pretty much all of them.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We start today's episode with an explanation from Topher Taylor, our cohost and tart with a heart, on why the original podcast recording had to be pushed back...The reason is entirely on brand... A last-minute OnlyFans shoot with a man he simply couldn't turn down took priority. Sometimes work is work. And we respect the Hustle.Then in today's interview we chat to the gorgeous, charming Kyle Pritchard, who has a soft South Wales accent to die for and after being on reality dating show, The Bi Life back in 2018 has spent the last few years in the gym and studying Psychology in London and Bristol.Now as part of his masters research he is lifting the lid on sexual assault in LGBTQ+ community and how there is an avalanche of this stuff going unreported with as many as half of queer people impacted in some way. Queer spaces sometimes operate differently and those in charge need to know what sexual assault looks like in a more sexualised environment and how the fear of shame or not being believed puts many off reporting.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Legendary Queer photographer and the man behind the Attitude uncut Kink edition front page, Charles Moriarty joins Graeme Smith to talk about Brock — his new photobook following actor and filmmaker Brock across four unstable years, from early ambition to the completion of Brock's debut film Test. What started as a DM in 2017 became a stop-start collaboration shaped by distance, lockdown and uncertainty. Charles breaks down how Brock holds multiple threads at once, Brock as subject, Brock as filmmaker, the photographer's role in shaping narrative, and the thin line between lived reality and performance. Since its release, the book has been quickly picked up by queer press in the UK and US.The conversation then moves into politics, and the tone hardens. Charles is clear about his anger at the current Labour leadership, arguing that its stance on trans rights and immigration has consequences that extend far beyond messaging. He and Graeme talk about how far-right ideas are normalised through misinformation, how fear is monetised online, and why many queer people no longer feel protected by mainstream politics. ---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

YOUR BI WEEKLY DOSE OF QUEER POLITICS, SEX AND CULTUREOn today's episode, Graeme and Topher are joined at the start by Nick Charles — Trinidad-born Loud Brown Gays podcaster, music producer, and part of the original Outcast team — for an episode that opens on an awkward realisation: Graeme's just seen a video on X of someone being bummed, and slowly works out the arse belongs to the man now sitting next to him.From there, the conversation moves into Heated Rivalry — why it's landing with gay men right now, and what it gets right about desire, masculinity and intimacy without sanding things down.Politics follows. Nick talks about growing up in Trinidad, living next door to Venezuela, and having Venezuelan family, and why Trump's renewed interest in the Caribbean feels unsettling from that position. Watching the scale and cruelty of ICE deportations in the US sharpens the concern.The episode closes back in the UK, asking whether Reform are serious about their promises — and what a real deportation drive would actually mean.P;---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In 2009, Graeme went to LA to work and make TV industry contacts but was exposed to a darker and more underground world than he could ever have imagined.The intersection of tinseltown, people seeking fame and the allure of meth and sex has been the ruin of countless promising careers and Graeme tells Topher about how the career highlight of working filming TV shows in LA, led to the discovery of a dark and destructive world just beneath the surface.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this first episode of our sixth season. Hot on the heels of our shortlisting as Best Interview Podcast at the prestigious British podcast awards, the team are back with the global queer group chat.Today Graeme Smth is joined by regular Topher Taylor and fellow queer Irishman in London Charles Moriarty. The theme is our memories of Amy Winehouse, the queer icon and British music icon, taken too young.Charles was the photographer who took the images of Amy that launched the image we remember today for the album "Frank" with the iconic Bee Hive getting its first outing on a photo shoot in New York with some of the images displayed at The National Portrait Gallery in London.Topher talks of the time he was saved from homophobic abuse at a bar in Soho back in the late 00's by non other than Amy.Please leave a rating and comment on this show to help spread the word---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A brutally honest look at grief, addiction, and finding a way back to life.After almost four years and 130 episodes of Outcast World, the mic finally turns towards its own creator.This week, the show takes a personal turn as The Divorce Social host Samantha Baines — known from BBC Radio London, The One Show, The Crown and Call The Midwife — interviews Outcast World's Graeme Smith, an award-winning broadcaster and podcaster, about a story he's never shared publicly before.Recorded in late 2023, the conversation explores the loss of his partner after a decade together to a traumatic drugs death, and his own struggle with mental health and addiction. In 2012, Graeme ended up in rehab on a mental health ward after a total breakdown. And not the nice private rehab you see celebrities go to, but the gritty kind that usually cleans up drug users straight from prison. He had lost his job, his mind, his home and all his self worth.But within the dark time on the rehab wards of a mental health trust specialist detox unit, The Chapman-Baker Unit, in North Manchester he felt like her was remade. His self worth realised again after putting the pieces together, with nothing, not even the laces in his shoes after a suicide attempt earlier in his rehab stay.Then not long after, came the death of his ex fiancé, Darren Williams, to drugs at just 35 years old on a night out in London in February 2015 under circumstances that will never truly make sense. A healthy 35 year old man just died at a party with friends. Tearing apart the lives of so many people forever.It's a raw and honest look at grief, love, and starting over — from someone who's spent years helping others tell their stories, now sitting on the other side of the mic.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of OUTCAST WORLD, Graeme Smith sits down with Jaxon Feeley, author of "Fear Proof" out this week. Jax is here to flip everything you've ever believed about fear on its head.Jaxon Feeley is a British TV personality, presenter, speaker and advocate known for his work around trans inclusion, authenticity and mental-health awareness.Originally working as a prison officer, he began his transition in 2021 while still in post and has since leveraged his experience to inspire others to live their truth.This isn't another “feel the fear and do it anyway” chat. It's a raw, smart, and beautifully vulnerable conversation about what it really takes to become Fear Proof — to live a life that's honest, messy, and fully awake.Jax opens up about rebuilding from the ground up, grieving past identities, and finding courage in the quiet moments. Together, they unpack how fear can be a compass, not a cage — and why you don't need to be fearless… you just need to do it scared.Get your copy of Fear Proof:https://amzn.eu/d/6UF0dSw---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

He kissed a boy. Then told the villa — and the whole country — he was living with HIV.Adam Williams went on I Kissed a Boy looking for love — and ended up schooling the nation on HIV and therapy.On Outcast World this week, Graeme Smith gets the goss straight from the masseria:Coming out (again) — this time on reality TV and ultimately the entire internet.Therapy, trauma, and trying not to cry on national telly.The truth about undetectable = untransmittable.Dating apps, reality TV edits, and managing a mental health.Adam's not here to be your poster boy — but he is here to talk about what happens when you stop hiding and start making noise about who you really are. It's impressive. Listen.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Junaid Ahmed is one of the most visible queer Muslims on British television — and he's doing it on one of the UK's most-watched reality shows.As The Only Way is Essex returns to ITV2 and ITVX on Sunday nights at 9pm, Junaid sits down with Graeme Smith to talk identity, faith, fame and the reality behind the reality TV.In this candid conversation, Junaid reflects on:Coming out as a British-Pakistani MuslimNavigating fame, faith and familyThe pressures of visibility in both the LGBTQ+ and Muslim communitiesLife behind the scenes of TOWIEMental health, resilience, and staying true to yourselfJunaid speaks with honesty and clarity about what it means to take up space as a queer person of faith — and why authentic representation on mainstream TV still matters.Watch TOWIE every Sunday at 9pm on ITV2 or stream anytime on ITVX.

On this week's Outcast World, Graeme Smith is asking the big question: should we finally ditch the dating apps? Author and broadcaster Daniel Harding joins the show to talk about the impact of his best-selling book Letters To My Younger Queer Self, and his new project hitting the streets to find out how queer people really feel about swiping, hookups, and love in 2025.Then, it's music time with UK Eurovision girlband Remember Monday, back with their summer anthem Happier and a Desperate Housewives-inspired music video.And stick around for a teaser of next week's exclusive with one of the breakout stars of I Kissed a Boy, opening up about HIV, mental health, and going public on national TV.NOMINATED BEST INTERVIEW PODCAST AT THE 2025 BRITISH PODCAST AWARDS - THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Outcast World goes live from Manchester Pride 2025 with Graeme Smith and Nick Charles right at the heart of the action hosting a podcast and radio show from the site on the afternoon of Graeme's stag doo in the city!As well as speaking to some modern Manchester queer icons and old school pop legends, we're essentially hosting the entire podcast outside on the street whilst getting ready to go "out out". For one of the last Big Pride's of the season we're headed back up North.Singer and Manchester broadcaster Jsky opens up about being refused entry to Village venues as a queer person of colour — for reasons still unknown — and reflects on the power of finally performing on the Pride stage in his home city.We also sit down with trans masculine legend and Kerrang! Radio host Paris Munro, who calls out companies for paying lip service to trans rights and questions the growing commercialisation of Pride, with festival-goers often forced to pay for multiple tickets.Graeme and Nick share their own emotional stories of queer awakenings in Manchester before revisiting the 90s classic Queer as Folk, the Russell T Davies series that put Canal Street on the map.And yes — we catch up with B*Witched on the phone from their dressing room (how 90s) Keavy from the band gets into the essential stuff like whether they ever imagined double denim would be their legacy. She also has an important take on Pride and its impertinence in the current climate It's Pride, politics, and pop all wrapped up in one very Manchester episode.

“This feeling I was nurturing… was punishable by death.”This week on Outcast World, Graeme speaks with writer and doctor Majid Parsa, author of The Ayatollah's Gaze — a compelling story about growing up queer in the Islamic Republic of Iran.We explore forbidden desire, the underground queer scene in Tehran — full of joy, glamour, and danger — and what it means to party knowing your social gathering at home with friends could be raided at any moment.Majid opens up about gender performance, state surveillance, religious expectation, and the power of queer intimacy in places where even the word “gay” is unspeakable.A conversation about shame, courage, exile — and the quiet ways queer Iranians keep finding each other.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we're going full cultural yin and yang.First, Harry Eric Derbidge (The Only Way Is Essex, ITV2 & ITVX) spills on the brand-new TOWIE season kicking off this Sunday at 9pm – expect sun, sea, and classic Essex drama.Then, we swap spray tans for sculptural blooms with Hamish Allan Powell, the Instagram-famous florist making waves in high-end floral design. This conversation comes from The BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! Podcast – for all things ART, QUEER.CULTURE.From reality TV to floral fantasy – two very different worlds, one episode.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Kuan-wen Huang is a queer, Taiwanese comedian, writer, and actor based in London. He's appeared on Comedy Central, BBC, and Channel 4, and has become a standout voice on London's comedy circuit. Now, he's bringing his brand-new one-man show Andrews Are The Worst to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.In this episode of Outcast World, Graeme Smith sits down with Kuan-wen to talk about heartbreak, hookup disasters, Fringe burnout, and the suspicious pattern that every villain in his life seems to be called Andrew.They dive into Kuan-wen's experience growing up gay in Taiwan, how his mum reacted when he came out, his time doing mandatory military service — and his fears for Taiwan's future in its increasingly tense standoff with China.He also reflects on why he's sworn off Grindr during the Fringe!---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Church of England just met to decide the future of LGBTQ+ people in the Church — again. Still no equal marriage. Still no full acceptance. Still a fight.This week, Graeme speaks to Phillip Baldwin — a gay man, HIV-positive, and one of the few openly queer members of the Church's General Synod. From inside the Church's governing body, Phillip takes us behind the scenes of a system still struggling to recognise LGBTQ+ lives with dignity.It's a raw conversation about faith, identity, and what it means to stay in the room when the institution you serve refuses to fully welcome you.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What happens when you gather some of the most fabulous, fearless minds in queer media around a breakfast table? OUTCAST WORLD takes you inside the BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! Breakfast Club — with legendary Attitude Editor-in-Chief Cliff Joannou front and centre.Cliff is a defining voice in queer journalism — shaping the stories, covers and controversies that have marked a generation. In this candid and wide-ranging conversation, we talk about:

In this episode, Graeme Smith is joined by Stu Oakley and Lotte Jeffs — co-authors of Do Ask, Do Tell, the bold, funny, and radically honest new book that lays queer life, love and culture bare.Stu is a film publicist who's worked on Star Wars, Harry Potter, and Jurassic World. Lotte is a genderqueer journalist, novelist, children's author, and former ELLE editor. Together, they're also the co-hosts of the award-winning podcast Some Families — the UK's leading LGBTQ+ parenting show.In Do Ask, Do Tell, they take on everything from sexuality and gender to body image, mental health, HIV stigma, open relationships, queer parenting and faith. And yes — they explain what a darkroom actually is. ---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Bob Vylan at Glastonbury sent the outrage machine into overdrive.We've scoped 24 hours of GB News to bring you every pearl-clutching reaction from the self-declared defenders of free speech.But here's the twist: our guest, sex educator and writer Topher Taylor, actually knows someone from Bob Vylan personally — and brings rare, real-life insight into the kind of person behind the noise.THIS EPISODE CONTAINS AUDIO OF RECENT NEWS EVENTS THAT SOME PEOPLE MAY FIND UPSETTING.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As the Glastonbury Festival heatwave rolls on, the political outrage is just warming up. Graeme and Nick Charles unpack Kneecap's headline-grabbing set and the pearl-clutching reaction from MPs and a media desperate to censor a culture they don't understand. Did The 1975 let us down with the announcement mid set they didn't want to do politics.. to only then go and sing a load of inherently political songs. There's also Bob Vylan and the stage chants that got police attention. Are we all compelled to comment on the issues tearing the world apart, or is it ok to sit things out like The 1975 tried do?Then it's onto porn in crisis: with gay adult performer Austin Wolf facing child porn and sex offence charges, we ask why mainstream porn is getting darker, more extreme, and frankly bizarre. And as if on cue, a Tory peer wants to appoint a Minister for Porn. We'd just call them what they are: the Minister for Wanks---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Reality star Jordan Burrow won hearts on I Kissed a Boy—the BBC's flagship queer dating show hosted by Dannii Minogue—but his story goes beyond the groundbreaking global hit show.In this episode, Jordan opens up about using his platform to start real conversations: from coming out in a remote rural village, his love of football and sports, to his bold message on the biggest billboard in Manchester UK, dedicated to his dad during Men's Mental Health Week. The powerful image, featured in Attitude, made headlines—because saying “I'm doing okay” shouldn't feel radical, but it often does.Also how many queer footballers are there in the top leagues? We try the quick maths. But where are they all?---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Graeme Smith sits down with UK drag royalty Kitty Scott-Claus, who opens up like never before.As a finalist on worldwide TV show - RuPaul's Drag Race Global All Stars, Kitty is riding high — but the past year has brought huge personal change. She speaks movingly about her friend and fellow queen The Vivienne, and the impact her tragic passing had on the drag community. Kitty reflects on Viv's strength, visibility and vulnerability — and how her loss underscores just how much pressure drag performers are under right now, both on and off stage.We also dive deep into Kitty's remarkable transformation — losing over eight stone through swimming, running and cutting out booze — just before the world went wild for Ozempic. She's honest about why she's glad she did it the “old-school way,” and how she navigates the often shallow world of queer dating and body politics now that she looks, in her words, “more socially acceptable.”Expect laughter, brutal honesty, and a little bit of glitter!

Cute lil catchup with Topher and Graeme. Topher is the sexual freedom awards writer of the year 2025 and a longstanding OUTCAST alumni.Once again his services have been in demand on various podcasts to talk about him dating downlow guys, it's worth unpacking what the appeal and issues are.And a chat about coercion and bribery in the chemsex scene, how criminal gangs are getting people into compromising situations in order to exploit them.---THIS IS OUTCAST WORLD ---Like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a review. This helps us become easier to discover. Please take time to rate the show and if you're enjoying the podcast then take time to comment about it wherever you listen. //////// Check us on Insta, Youtube and TikTok @thisisoutcastworld ///// Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.