Salacious History

In honor of Women’s History Month, we are revisiting one of our most popular episodes: Prostitution in the Wild West!   Please see the original episode for a full list of sources: Ep20 – Prostitution in the Wild West

Today we will be discussing one of the most controversial women in Chinese history: Empress Wu Zetian, the only woman to ever rule China. Historians have depicted her as a ruthless monster and an ineffective ruler, but was this really the case?

 In honor of Black History Month, we are taking a look back at some of the amazing African American groundbreakers we have covered on the podcast. We will also learn more about the origins of Black History Month!

Juan and Eva Peron are some of Argentina's biggest cultural and political icons of the past century. Eva (AKA "Evita") captured the heart of the nation as a First Lady of the people and President Juan Peron brought prosperity to the working class. In this week's episode, we learn how this couple's love for each other and their country propelled them to new heights.

Apartheid was a system that legally separated the various racial groups in South Africa and kept the white minority in power. Learn how apartheid impacted sex and marriage in SA both during and after apartheid.

No matter if you are pro-life or pro-choice, it’s important to understand the history of abortion rights and what events have shaped our current perceptions. How have different societies addressed abortion in the past, and why is it such a divisive issue in the modern era? 

Nell Donnelly (Reed) was a famous Kansas City resident and business owner who was taken for ransom during the Great Depression. Nell was a badass business woman, but she had a few scandalous secrets that came to light following her kidnapping. This episode is sponsored by: Suggested Episodes: Ep20 – Prostitution in the Wild West...

Today we will be learning about one of the darkest influential figures of European culture: the Marquis de Sade, the man who literally inspired the term “sadism.”

ACT UP was founded to fight for the rights of AIDS patients. They demanded better drug testing, they altered public perceptions of the illness and safe sex, and refused to back down until they won. If you missed Part I of our coverage of the AIDS Epidemic, I encourage you to go back and listen to that episode first. Click here to listen!

Between 1981 and 1987, over 40,000 people died of AIDS in the United States. But despite the obvious health crisis, no one in power was doing anything about it. The U.S. government did not care about AIDS for one simple reason: the majority of the early cases were among gay men, who the government deemed expendable.

Around 1:20am on June 28, 1969, a small police force raided the Stonewall Inn, a popular gay bar in NYC. Little did the officers or patrons known that this raid would spark a series of riots that would inspire people to fight for LGBTQ rights all over the world.

Audre Lorde was a self-described “Black, lesbian, feminist, mother, poet warrior.”

Bayard Rustin was one of the 20th century’s most influential civil rights activists and organizers, and yet many of us have never heard of him. He was the architect of the 1963 March on Washington and a key advisor to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. But despite all his accomplishments, his story has been pushed to the side for one simple reason: he was openly gay.

This episode celebrates the life of trans icon Christine Jorgensen. Christine was one of the world’s first transgender celebrities, and the story of her 1952 transition sparked many important discussions about sexuality in the medical and scientific fields.   Suggested Episodes: Ep23 – Transgender History Ep16 – History of Damsels in Distress   Sources: Barajas,...

The Holocaust is one of the best-documented episodes of mass genocide in history, but for decades, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and trans victims of the Holocaust were left out of historical records. Why were LGBTQ individuals persecuted, and why were their stories left out of the Holocaust narrative for so long?

The gay rights movement began in 19th century Germany with a man named Karl Heinrich Ulrichs. Karl Heinrich Ulrichs was the first self-proclaimed gay man to speak out publicly for the rights of homosexuals. In both written and spoken form, he was the first person to demand the decriminalization of homosexuality as well as the complete legal equality of all sexual orientations. Karl Heinrich Ulrichs was, in many ways, the world’s first gay activist.

Transgenderism might seem like a relatively recent phenomenon at first. But there is nothing new about being transgender. People have been crossing the boundaries of their assigned genders for millenia.

We continue our season of LGBTQ history with the Sacred Band of Thebes: a legendary military unit that was entirely made up of HOMOSEXUAL MEN! Let's journey back to ancient Greece to learn who these men were, how this unit came into being, and what they were able to accomplish.

Salacious History kicks off season 3 with a brief history of LGBTQ culture and persecution. This episode will provide a foundation for the ALL-LGBTQ SEASON that Sarah has planned!

While most types of crime have declined during the COVID-19 lockdown, there is one major exception: domestic violence. Why has domestic violence escalated even as the overall crime rate has fallen? What is the government doing to address this problem? And where can survivors turn for help during these unusual circumstances?