Capítulo 225: Sexology with Bianca Laureano
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From the producers who brought you Princess of South Beach comes a new podcast, The Setup. The Setup follows a lonely museum curator, but when the perfect man walks into his life... Well, I guess I'm saying I like you. You like me? He actually is too good to be true. This is a con. I'm conning you to get the Delano painting. We could do this together.

Listen to The Setup on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, y'all. It's your girl, Cheeky's, and I'm back with a brand new season of your favorite podcast, Cheeky's and Chill.

I'll be sharing even more personal stories with you guys. And as always, you'll get my exclusive take on topics like love, personal growth, health, family ties, and more. And don't forget, I'll also be dishing out my best advice to you on episodes of Dear Cheekies. It's going to be an exciting year and I hope that you can join me. Listen to Cheekies and Chill season four on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Are your ears bored? Yeah. Are you looking for a new podcast that will make you laugh, learn, and say que? Yeah. Then tune in to Locatora Radio Season 10 today. Okay. Locatora Radio is a radiophonic novela, which is just an extra way of saying a podcast.

Season 10 of Locatora Radio is totally nostalgic. We're diving in with a four-part series about the Latinos who shaped pop culture in the early 2000s. But that's not all. Season 10 is also launching in the wake of L.A. wildfires and a new Trump presidency.

As always, we're leaning into community by conducting critical interviews with people leading the efforts to rebuild L.A. and fight back against oppression. Tune in to Locatora Radio Season 10. Now that's what I call a podcast. Love with every listen. Right at your fingertips. Localandia.

Hola, hola, Locamores. Welcome to Season 10 of Locatora Radio. I'm Diosa. And I'm Mala. Locatora Radio is a podcast dedicated to archiving our present and shifting the culture forward. You're tuning in to Capítulo 225.

Last time on Locatora Radio, we talked about the fire recovery efforts in Altadena and Pasadena. Go back, listen to that episode and leave us a review. Now let's move into our check-in portion of the episode, Climax or Cry. In this segment, we talk about our, basically it's our highlight of the week. What was the climax of our week and what made us cry this week? It's our version of

Hill Valley Rose Thorn, Climax or Cry? I'll start. My climax, literally, and I'm sharing this because we are going to be in conversation with Latinegra, who is a sexologist, so I feel comfortable sharing in this space. But I was recently gifted a magic wand. It was a present. And it

The magic wand, like the brand, like the old school heavy duty vibrator, it looks like a robot Q-tip. Like it's big. Does it connect to an electrical outlet? Like is it that old school? Funny you should ask because this version, it is the top of the line. So it can charge and hold a charge for up to three hours, but you can also plug it into the wall if you want to. All right. So you can be hands free, but if you want to plug in...

You have the option. All right. And what was it like? How does it compare to maybe a smaller, more sleek version? So you all, our OG listeners might recall, there was a time where Rebecca at the Bloomy was sending us vibrators of different sizes, different kinds. One that I really loved, a bullet vibrator that you wore as like a little gold necklace. Fantastic. This is a whole different level. This is a machine. This is...

This is like the AR-15 of vibrators. Please don't compare it to an AR-15. What is wrong with you? Of vibrators. It's really, it's taking no prisoners. Truly this thing. Truly this thing. So yeah, I'm literally climaxing so much all the time. Constantly. Constantly.

And that's my climax of the week. The thing that's making me cry this week is that season three, this newest season of White Lotus, is simply not as good as last season. Now, White Lotus as a show, due to the brilliance of Mike White, who writes and directs White Lotus, it's a slow burn type of a show. You know, like you're watching, you're waiting, anticipation is building, and you're like,

And the action happens later. So I'm allowing for that to be true this season. But it just doesn't have the magic of last season. And it's because there's no Jennifer Coolidge. I would also cry if Jennifer Coolidge was no longer in the show that I wanted to watch. You know, she got killed off last season. Oh, she did? I haven't been following. Yeah, that's that quote, these gays are trying to kill me. Yeah. And then they did. Damn, what a day.

Well, I guess I can't watch now. You spoiled it for me. I'm so sorry. But it's really good. It's really good. So that's what's making me cry. I really, it makes me so sad when a show from season to season can change so drastically in like the quality and the watch, whether that's because of like the cast

the casting or who's writing it or directing it. But, you know, there are those shows like Law and Order that it's just it's the same every episode, every season. There's a formula. There's a formula. This is not that. So that made me cry a little bit. That made me cry a little bit this week. How about you? What's your climax? What's your cry? I'm not climaxing at all. I think I need a magic wand. You can borrow mine whenever you want. I have like like figuratively. I'm not climaxing.

And that's making me think literally I need to climax. You feel me? You feel me? Of course. And so I have nothing to share. This feels like

a blah week so i'm not there's no climax to share there's lots of cries lots of tears to share some serious some some some funny let's see um i'm crying because i'm learning a new technique in tennis this is super niche so i'm not gonna get into it but you know it's one of those things where like you're learning something new and you're like i got this i'm getting so good at this and then you're taught

another way to do something and you're like fuck I'm starting over and it sucks and that makes me want to cry because I'm like I was feeling myself like I was like I knew what I was doing and now I'm like I don't know what I'm doing I'm starting over you like mastery yes that's where you thrive that's where you're comfortable I'm very intense as a person yes and like for our listeners I need you to know she's like wearing a turtleneck and a sweater vest I'm very intense as a person yes

With my sweater vest. I'm trying something new. I'm trying to discover my personal style this year. It's very cute. You're giving office siren. Mala has named that as my look, as my perpetual evolving look, I guess, is office siren. It's right now because it's the combination of gold jewelry, the beat, the

The lashes. It's the you of it all. But then you're throwing on a sweater vest. Yes. You're wearing an oversized blazer. Yes. You know, there might be a loafer. I'm wearing loafers today. Currently right now. But you're making it you're making it siren. But you are kind of giving it still like a little 90s vibe.

A wee bit. You're also giving, like, glam. Yeah. So, yeah. I see Office Siren. I see that. Or, like, 80s It Girl in a rom-com. Also that. You're dating me. No. It's just... But I think that what you're doing, though, like, your look... Because it's not like... It's not like...

TikTok shop looks. No. These are classic silhouettes. Yes. Yeah, I think that's what I'm learning as we get older. It's like actually everything is always in style if it's your style. Like nothing is actually out of style.

You feel me? It's impossible. It's impossible because it's like, sure, maybe it's not on trend anymore, but like some things that they're called classic for a reason. Exactly. You know? And like a turtleneck sweater vest combo will never leave us. It will always be classic. I've never worn a sweater, sweater vest before. I love it. I think it's so cute. Yeah. You know, I've learned also as I get older that it's hard to be a baddie when you're always cold.

And I run super cold. And obviously we live in LA, so it's not that cold, but it's very cold for me. It's chilly. It has been chilly. It has been chilly. And so when you're trying to be like a baddie, a hot girl, but you're always cold, well, you have to dress like you're always cold. Yeah. So that kind of like, it's just up for interpretation. Can a baddie wear a crew neck? Yes. Can she wear a turtleneck? Yes. Yes.

It's encouraged, in fact. Yeah, exactly. I'm also crying because I have this very terrible habit of watching my comfort shows.

So that I'm late to like a lot of the things and I know that I'm late to a lot of the things like White Lotus. I didn't know Jennifer Coolidge was killed off. Yes. But I run that risk because I don't keep up with them because I'm watching Ugly Betty for the millionth time. So real. Instead of the new stuff, let's rewatch. I'm rewatching a show from the mid 2000s because it gives me everything. They don't make them like that anymore. Right.

Like, I was watching Ugly Betty. And do you remember this time in TV where, like, the cameos were everything? Yes. Where it's like it broke the fourth wall without breaking the fourth wall. So I was watching Ugly Betty. And America Federa plays Betty Suarez. We've talked about this in previous episodes, so I'm not going to go that into it. But there's a cameo where the actress that plays Betty La Fea

comes out in Ugly Betty, the American version. And that just like was so good because the cameos from the mid 2000s, like I don't think that they do them anymore because everything is like for streamer. And we're not having that unique experience unless maybe it's HBO where you're like watching week by week.

And so there's just something so delicious to me about like watching a show from that time where there's a cameo and you know that everyone was freaking out or like laughing at that moment. And I just feel like there's just something about that that can be recreated now.

No, like the moment that surprise guest pops up on the screen. Yes. And that episode is only available at that exact moment on that day to watch. Yes. And we can rewatch it now, obviously, but unless you were watching it at that time, you might miss it. Or back in the day, the Disney Channel shows used to do it where all of a sudden Destiny's Child is on an episode of Taina. Yes.

Yes. Right? Yes. And everybody's freaking out and then they bust into a musical number. Exactly that. Yes. Perfect. They used to really do something with TV. There was something there. There was a magic moment there. Yeah. And where it's like, I think there was also like,

The actors are acting, you know, in the TV show. And now this pop star who we love is just going to do a drop in. Yes. But we still know they're a singer pop star. They're not being introduced as a season regular. Right. And it's sort of that, yeah, breaking the fourth wall without breaking the fourth wall because this famous person who's famous for us is also famous in the world of the show. Yes, exactly. Which made it really fun and like meta. Yes.

Yes, absolutely. What a time. Yeah, that's my cry for the week. I don't keep up with enough TV, but maybe that's okay. Maybe it's not. Who knows? There's so much TV. There's so much TV. There's a lot of television. Yes. What I am watching that's kind of current, or at least like there's a new season and I'm watching it actively, is like Yellow Jackets. Ooh. Yeah. Now that's an intense show. That's an intense show. I'm an intense person. I love it.

I read and watch a lot of intense things. So I need the ugly Betty for some levity. Yes, of course. Well, you're cerebral. You're thinking about the human condition. Right. I can appreciate that. Somebody has to do it. All right. Well, that's our climax and cry for the week. Don't go anywhere, Locamores. We'll be right back.

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Hey, kids, it's me, Kevin Smith. And it's me, Harley Quinn Smith. That's my daughter, man, who my wife has always said is just a beardless, dickless version of me. And that's the name of our podcast, Beardless Dicks.

Listen to Beardless with me on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey y'all, it's your girl Cheeky's and I'm back with a brand new season of your favorite podcast, Cheeky's and Chill. I'll be sharing even more personal stories with you guys. And I know a lot of people are going to attack me. Why are you going to go visit your dad? Your mom wouldn't be okay with it. I'm going to tell you guys right now, I know my mother and I know my mom had a very forgiving heart. That is my story on plastic surgery. This is my truth.

I think the last time I cried like that was when I lost my mom. Like that, like yelling. I was like, no. I was like, oh, and I thought, what did I do wrong? And as always, you'll get my exclusive take on topics like love, personal growth, health, family ties, and more. And don't forget, I'll also be dishing out my best advice to you on episodes of Dear Cheekies.

Okay, where do I start? That's not love. He doesn't love you enough because if he loved you, he'd be faithful.

It's going to be an exciting year and I hope that you can join me. Listen to Chiquis and Chill season four as part of the My Cultura podcast network available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back with more of our episode. And now, now we have the immense pleasure of bringing to you one of our favorite segments, Oye Locas. You are now listening to Oye Locas.

So this question was submitted by our very own producer. And she asked, how do I balance my creative dreams with my nine to five? She felt that that was a question that our listeners would resonate with because we're

A lot of us have creative dreams, but are maybe balancing a nine to five at the same time. Yes, that used to be us. I don't really know what that's like anymore because I haven't had a nine to five in years now. Yeah. Just wild to think about. Yeah. I never actually thought that I would be that person who can say like, oh, like I'm a creative and I do this and I do that. But no, I don't have a nine to five.

But that is our reality. That's where we are. The podcast is our job. We do other gigs. Like we have a lot of other things going on. We don't have all of our eggs in one basket. It took working nine to fives to be able to step away from the nine to fives. And only when we had something very secure and in writing and contractual and looked over by our attorney. We didn't like throw all caution to the wind and just...

quit the jobs and step out on faith. We did not do that. No. And we never encourage anybody to do that. No. Keep your job for as long as possible. As long as possible. Because you do not want to be in a situation where you leave your job, you leave your stability, and you don't have something lined up. Yeah. You cannot focus on your creative work if you are struggling to survive. I think that it's okay to have a nine-to-five.

As I've been in this full-time creative space for two years now, officially, I can say that

It's okay to treat your nine to five like your nine to five. Let yourself clock in, clock out. And if your aspirations are to have your job be your job, your stable income, maybe where you get your benefits or you're paying for your 401k or your retirement, what have you, that's cool. I don't think that everyone needs to step out into entrepreneurship because it's really hard and really scary. There's something to letting your creative projects

your little like side hustles be just that and I think that whenever we feel like super pressured to monetize we can kind of lose the spark the love that we have for something I don't think that's always the case but I do think that that can happen and so I think that it's

fine to like do your your hobby your art your writing your paintings whatever this creative endeavor may be like after your nine-to-five on the weekends take time off to work on it but it also doesn't have to be like your creative full-time job either I think that like we should support both I feel like in this age of social media it's like

You know, there's like a lot of kind of pressure to make it be your whole thing. Yes. But it can just be like that, you know? Yeah. You don't have to be a full time working artist in order to be an artist. Yes. I think that some of the most talented people likely have nine to fives and they work on their craft and they cultivate their art when they're not at their jobs.

And the art is just that for them. It's their art. And it's not necessarily what's paying their bills, but that's okay. I also think that there's maybe, I don't know if this is like a global thing or if this is very American, but I think there's this emphasis on like,

Your job being your passion and your calling. Yeah. It also does not have to be that. No. It's very much OK if your job is not your passion. Mm hmm. You know. Yeah. I think there's so much emphasis in finding fulfillment through your job. But that's also why I'm saying like let your job be your job. Like if it's just there to pay the bills and like.

Like everyone has to do something. You know what I mean? Like we live in a world or in a culture where like everyone is doing their little thing, their contribution. Yeah. Whether that be art or whether that be like through their job. And like every job is crucial, literally. It's true. We need someone for everything. For everything. I mean...

Imagine if there were no janitors, everything would go to shit. Literally, you know, I mean, we would not be able to function if we had one day, just one day where people were not, you know, managing the trash. We would be like buried in filth and garbage. Like every single like you're like, like you're saying, I agree completely. Everything that you do has some type of a positive impact, even if you don't feel that it is in the moment or at the time.

So, yeah, I agree. Take all your vacation days also. Yeah. And take your sick days. If you don't use them, they just get lost. You know, don't be such a team player that you are shortchanging yourself of your your hard earned time off.

And artists need time off. Artists need to explore and rest and think and plan and experiment. So take your weekends for yourself. Take your sick days, you know, use them. They're yours to use. And then you use that time how you see fit, maybe towards your creative endeavors. This has been Oye Locas. Don't go anywhere, Locamores. We'll be right back.

Hey, what's up guys? This is Cheeky's from the Cheeky's and Chill podcast. And you know, I was thinking, buying a home used to be a huge headache. You had to go to a bunch of different places for listings.

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Hey kids, it's me, Kevin Smith. And it's me, Harley Quinn Smith. That's my daughter, man, who my wife has always said is just a beardless, dickless version of me. And that's the name of our podcast, Beardless Dickless Me. I'm the old one. I'm the young one. And every week we try to make each other laugh really hard. Sounds innocent, doesn't it? A lot of cussing, a lot of bad language. It's for adults only.

Or listen to it with your kid. Could be a family show. We're not quite sure. We're still figuring it out. It's a work in progress. Listen to Beardless with me on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Sonoro and iHeart's My Cultura Podcast Network present The Setup, a new romantic comedy podcast starring Harvey Guillen and Christian Navarro. The Setup follows a lonely museum curator searching for love. But when the perfect man walks into his life...

Well, I guess I'm saying I like you. You like me? He actually is too good to be true. This is a con. I'm conning you to get the Delano painting. We could do this together. To pull off this heist, they'll have to get close and jump into the deep end together. That's a huge leap, Fernando, don't you think? After you, Chulito. But love is the biggest risk they'll ever take. Fernando's never going to love you as much as he loves this dog.

Trudito, that painting is ours. Listen to The Setup as part of the My Cultura Podcast Network, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back with more of our episode.

And now for the interview portion of today's episode, we are so excited to bring to you all an interview that we did with Bianca Loreano, also known as La Pinedra on Instagram and on social media. Bianca is a sexologist. She's an educator. She's a curriculum writer. She is a speaker. And we've been following her for years. So we are thrilled to

to have Bianca on Locatora Radio today. We talk about sexual health, how she became a sexologist, and an anthology that she has helped put together which centers the voices of queer people of color in the sexology space. I am Bianca Laureano, and I am a sexologist, sex educator, and curriculum writer. And I'm a sexologist,

And my background is my parents are Puerto Rican, grew up on the East Coast, and now I'm in the Central Valley of California, which I never imagined I would be at, doing a lot of work around training sexuality professionals. I've been an abortion doula for over 10 years, now it's 13 years.

And supporting people who are pregnant, seeking information about all their options as well as doing some activism to include more people of color, disabled people, queer and trans people becoming sex educators.

Amazing. Thank you so much for sharing a little bit about yourself. And we have been following your platform, your page called Latin Negra for many years. So can you tell us about the platform that you created when you created it? Because it's been some time and just tell us a little bit about it.

Yeah, you know, I'm Gen X, so the internet is very new for me in certain ways. I've had it as an adult. So I'm at Latinegrasexologist on Instagram. And that started, you know, a while ago and really me just figuring out what is this new, you know, platform that's using images and photos. So if people look at how I started several years ago, it looks very different.

than what it looks like today, where it was a lot of like me documenting my life and my everyday things and what I was doing as a sexuality professional. And now it's a little bit more specific on the types of courses that I'm offering, being transparent about like book publishing and what it looks like when you get a check after you've published a book.

How much does that check include? How do you figure out what that's going to look like? As well as just talking about a variety of different topics. But I'm very much the person who people come to because they want to get trained to do their work better. So I'm not one of those people that's always producing content for a general population to learn a little bit more. I'm training the people who do that work.

um so i'm not surprised if people are like i have no idea who you might be in this moment or i totally know what you're doing because i train a lot of people um to do their work better i know i was trained in 1996 and it really frustrates me that people are still being trained the same way i was um 30 years later so things need to change

And so I'm really focusing on supporting communities of color, communities of global majority who want to do this work and are all over the world. So my page kind of reflects that kind of activism, reminding people how the intersection of reproductive justice, disability justice, gender justice impacts all of our lives all of the time in so many ways.

And you, sexology, you're a sexologist. For our listeners who maybe are not familiar with the field, can you define it for us? And how did you become trained as a sexologist? Yeah, it's so interesting. This is it's kind of like the term Latino or Latinx or Latine. It's a term that so many people have a different definition of. And for me, I like to encompass all of us.

So for sexologists, I define it as people who do sexuality education, who do sexuality research, and who are also guided by a knowledge of the historical creation of sexuality as a field, whether it's in the United States or abroad. So it welcomes in a variety of different forms of knowledges and also knowing.

which I think is really important to create. And some people will say, oh no, just people who can offer a diagnosis or people who write research in academic papers can call themselves sexologists.

I don't think that's true. So I definitely want to expand our understanding of that term. And I went to my training is very, very traditional. So I do want to say that front, I went through the US academic system. So I went to a state college, which was University of Maryland College Park.

And I then, that was 1996 that I went to UM. And then there was only one program that was attractive to me on the East Coast around human sexuality. So when I graduated in 2000, there was really only one program and I applied to it. That was at NYU, New York University. And they had a master's degree in human sexuality education.

And so I signed up for that one and they had early admission. And so I knew before the end of the year that I was selected to participate in the program. I got a full scholarship that I didn't even apply for. I learned later why, but I was there for two years. And I like to tell people that it wasn't a hard program, like intellectually hard, but it was hard because I was the only one. I was the only Latina in the cohort.

Everybody was white except for me and one other black woman. And all of our training was focusing on whiteness and white people and white contributions. And when I look back at my notebooks, all my notes were the things that were missing. How would I bring this into a conversation with Central American immigrant families? How would I talk about this topic with people who are translating for their parents?

right? Like making things a little bit more accessible. So it's not that I didn't learn anything. I learned what the white people wanted us to learn and I had to fill in the gaps for supporting our communities. So, um,

That's a little bit of my background there. I then went into, I was heavily recruited into a women's studies PhD program at the University of Maryland. So when Bush Jr. was reelected, I very much was like, there's going to be no funding for sex education. There's going to be no funding for young parents, HIV AIDS stuff. So I was like, let me look into a PhD program. So I went into a PhD program for three years and

And like many, I think of your listeners, I had no idea what a PhD program was supposed to be, but I knew nobody would listen to a bushy haired, light skinned Puerto Rican who talks the way that I do about sex and sexuality without having letters behind my name. So I knew I needed the letters, but I had no idea what...

that meant after that. And so in that PhD program, I was trained to be a researcher and I was trained within like an intersectional framework, which is very popular in women and gender studies.

And I realized I don't want to be a researcher. I'm better as an educator. And it wasn't a teaching college. So I left that program after three years. I had full funding also for that. And then I just started to do the work that I really wanted to do, writing curricula. I was working in the public school system. I was also working in public charter schools because I wanted to work specifically with black and brown children.

And as many people are noticing today, the first thing to get cut when people are tightening up their budget is sex ed. So when that started to happen, I started to look into other ways to do the work that I wanted to do. So I became trained as an abortion doula, supporting people who were having in-clinic abortions at the time in New York City. And I started building a variety of different classes that I wanted to teach.

And I had been teaching at a variety of different universities in New York City. And I started to build something of my own that I wanted to see and that I knew was needed. And so through that and a lot of activism, and one of the co-founders of an organization called the Women of Color Sexual Health Network,

which is a membership organization really to retain and support us as we do this work. And because of that activism, I was then awarded an honorary doctorate five years ago from the California Institute of Integral Studies, which is wild because when I hear, when I think about people who have received honorary doctorates, it's like celebrities, right? It's never like a community organizer or educator. It's usually like Missy Elliott. Yeah, Celia Cruz. Yes, exactly, yes.

Um, you know, when I got that call, I was like, okay, well, how are my parents going to understand this? So I literally asked them, I said, what are the honorifics that I can use? Can I say to my dad, I was awarded a PhD and now you can call me doctor. And they were like, yes.

So that's what I've been doing to make it clear to people. But also I'm like, it's an honorary doctorate. I did the work. That's how I got the degree. But also I was in a PhD program. So I've been trained to do that work too. It's just not in a more research-based way.

focus. So yeah, it was a very traditional route. And today when people ask me, do I have to go back to school? Should I go to college? What route should I do? I usually first encourage them to use their public library card and see what books are available and what films you can watch. Because a lot of my graduate work was me filling in the gaps of what I wasn't getting from the classroom when I was supposed to be getting this training.

So yeah, I had to build it the way that I wanted it to work for myself. And today there's a lot of different programs focusing on human sexuality. If people are interested in going a formal route like I did or something a little bit less formal, they're all available. So I'm really excited to support people in figuring out what is their best path to do this work within our communities.

Amazing. I want to ask you because you are an educator, you wrote curriculum, and you also authored the People's Book of Human Sexuality. So in that book, would you say that that's where you were filling in the gaps of what you weren't seeing? And if yes, can you tell us what were your findings? What did you write about? Yeah. So it's so interesting because this book was something that when I was invited to

to consider it. I wasn't even thinking about writing a book. I got reached out to by the editor at a major publishing house, Rutledge. And she had said, Bianca, you've written so many chapters for so many of our books. Why don't you have your own book? And I was like, that's such a great question. I don't know. Why not? And so from there, she's like, well, what kind of book would you want to create? And I said, you know, I grew up

as a kid who was exposed to like encyclopedias and like volumes. And, you know, and I was like, I just imagine having like volumes of books that have all of our brilliance as people of the global majority, people who have often been silenced. And I wanted to just be there in its fullness and have this really thick,

archive that people can no longer say, well, we didn't know anyone with this background or this knowledge or who spoke this language because we're going to be there clearly, prominently displayed. And so I really pitched the People's Book of Human Sexuality as a volume. So my hope is that this is volume one. And the goal with that was really to reach out to people who I knew had been doing this work for decades and decades and

And yet were the people that were never being reached out to, to contribute to a chapter or to collaborate on some writing. And it was people that had a lot of important things to say and a lot of knowledge that often gets excluded or questioned.

And so we, it's not just filling in the gaps, but it's really creating a whole other space that we've always been in, but bringing it closer to the center of what our worlds look like. And it really is a gift to white people and non, you know, people who are Latino or who aren't black or indigenous. It's really a gift for those people because they get to see what it's like and experience our work

from our perspective. So I know it really disrupts the way that they learn and understand. And that's the goal. I really wanted to create something where someone who didn't want to go to college, but wanted to be a sex educator could just pick up a book and find some lesson plans, find some ways to help build their own curricula or workshop,

And that's really what we created with the 14 contributors. Is there something, a story, a lesson, something specific from the book that you feel is really just adding something to the space that just didn't exist before that really stands out to you?

Yeah, you know, I think one of the things that I think is really wild right now and is one of the reasons why I teach what I do is that, believe it or not, there's no requirement that if you want to become a sexuality educator that you need to know about abortion.

And it's so wild to me that that is not a core component, especially after the Dobbs decision several years ago that led to abortion bans. And even today, you have to seek that out on your own. But there's a ton of information in classes that talk about sex and pregnancy, right? So we're already seeing, even within spaces that consider themselves quote unquote sex positive, we're still seeing this very much

embrace of building families by pregnancy versus hearing from communities that are building their families because they're choosing an abortion and they're choosing how to create their families. And so I created a class on abortion for sex professionals who really don't know how to answer questions like, when can I have sex after my abortion? Those are really common things that people ask. So there's a chapter about abortion from a good friend

who is at a very high position at a big nonprofit doing reproductive healthcare work. And she writes about her conversation with her 10 year old daughter at a time when they were passing in a car, they were passing by an anti-abortion protest. And her daughter was able to read the signs. And so she was asking questions about like, what does this mean?

And it's just this really beautiful narrative of how this mom is like, this is how we talk about it in our family. This is how we value people's decisions about their bodies in this way in our family. And it's really just this beautiful narrative of how it's not hard to talk about abortion. It's really about getting comfortable

And then there's a lesson plan after each chapter. So part of the lesson plan there is encouraging participants to look into where you find the information, how are you using media literacy skills to really determine false information or propaganda that's negative versus actual useful medical information. So I think that really fills a huge gap, which to me is still wild. It still exists.

But unfortunately, in the sexuality field, people have to go into maternal child health or specifically into abortion spaces if they want to get any training or information on abortion. So I think that really fills in a huge gap that still remains that I've been trying to fulfill for like at least eight years now. And so now I want to ask you about the Ante Up program.

that you facilitate. Can you tell us more about that and what you hope this provides for the community? Absolutely. You know, Anteep is really a program for people who do this work already and want to do it better, who realize, why am I still using these words to talk about

female assigned at birth body parts and it's all these old white men's names right like people who are really coming in with a critical lens and yet have no place to really have these conversations or be with other people who also want to grow and be challenged and push to think in a different way

So it's really a certificate where people leave with not just more knowledge, but really building skills on how to incorporate that into the work that they're already doing. So I'm not trying to change people's minds or like reimagine their niche.

But the classes really fill in the gaps that still exist in the US sexuality field. So if people are looking for a training program that's not attached to a university, those are usually a little bit more affordable. They're following the exact same outline. And so the classes that I teach are like, "Oh, that outline doesn't include this." So my theory class is about intersectionality as the Black feminist gift it is.

explaining to people this is how it's used, this is what it means, this is how people are misusing it. This is how you will know the person using it doesn't know what they're doing because this is how they're always misusing it.

My class on abortion also fills in that gap. And then I have two professional development courses that I think are really, really important because I train a lot of therapists and social workers who work with queer or trans communities or with sexuality problems. And a lot of their training encourages them to see themselves as a clinical expert versus a collaborator with their clients, especially when offering a diagnosis or a plan for care.

And so they never think of themselves as people who could possibly cause harm. And I noticed that that was a big gap in our field where a lot of people were causing some harm and didn't know how to apologize, didn't know how to take accountability. And so I literally have two classes about accountability for our communities, which is all about how do we prepare for when we do mess up? Because we're all going to, especially if we're focusing on justice work.

we're going to mess up because we have to. That's how we learn better and learn how to move together. And then also having an intentional apology workshop that really goes into

what types of apologies are useful and what kinds are not, and how can we make sure that we apologize with the intention of repair versus just to like get it out of the way and keep moving. So really encouraging people to think through how do you need to offer an apology to someone that maybe you haven't offered yet

And what might that look like and how can we build that together? So it's definitely a workshop, but nobody's talking about failure in our field unless they're trying to say, see, this person is horrible. They're such a failure. And I just think that that's not accurate. It's not useful. We all fail in so many ways. And I want us to get really comfortable talking about it. So those are just a handful of some of the classes that

that I teach, a lot of people who are interested in the program come from a variety of different fields of work. So yes, some therapists, but I also have some sex workers. I also have people who are writers. I have other formal educators like myself. I have yoga teachers. You know, there's a range of people who are attracted

to the content that I'm creating because they've never had a class like that before. All my classes are also live. I think that's a really important thing to bring in. And it's weird for me to say that because I grew up having to go to class in person. But now a lot of classes are like webinar style where you can buy the video and just watch it and then you're done. I just don't think that that's a useful way to learn all the time. So all my classes are live.

They're not recorded intentionally because I want people to be able to ask their questions. So, yeah, so that's a few ways that our program stands out. We really are trying to shift the way that people are learning and the way that we are together as we do this work.

Fabulous. If there are listeners out there who are interested in learning more about, for example, the Women of Color Sexual Health Network or the Latin Negras Project, they want to get involved, they want to learn more. How can they?

Yeah, so I'm intentionally accessible online. So people can literally type my name or any of those words that you put together and literally find us very easily. I have an open Instagram account. You can find me on Facebook as well. I have a professional account there. And then I have my own personal websites. And each of those projects also have their own websites as well. The Women of Color Sexual Health Network also has like a closed Facebook group.

just for people of color who are interested in joining. And they have like a public facing group on Facebook too and a website. So we're easily findable, easily able to be identified. And so I encourage people to, you know, go on the internet, find us. Thank you, Bianca, for joining us today. And thank you to all of you for listening to Locatora Radio. We'll catch you next time. Besitos!

Locatora Radio is executive produced by Diosa Femme and Mala Munoz. Stephanie Franco is our producer. Story editing by me, Diosa. Creative direction by me, Mala. Locatora Radio is a part of iHeartRadio's My Cultura podcast network. You can listen to Locatora Radio on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Leave us a review and share with your prima or share with your homegirl. And thank you to our Locamores, to our listeners for tuning in each and every week. Besitos.

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