Call Her Daddy - Laverne Cox: Stop Taking Crumbs from Men

Episode Date: February 28, 2024

Join Alex in the studio for a sit-down interview with Laverne Cox. Laverne dishes to Alex about meeting her boyfriend on Tinder and gives her input on the dating app scene. She hypes up all the Daddy Gang members still out there fighting the good fight looking for their perfect match and gives some great first date advice. Alex and Laverne discuss what wouldn’t get you a second date and how some things (like bad style) can get a pass. Laverne opens up about her traumatic past and how much bullying she endured in her childhood and college years. She shares stories for the first time and reflects on what she had to overcome to get to where she is today. Laverne gets real about loving yourself, accepting who you are, and why we should stop putting up with the bare minimum. Then, she and Alex talk about privilege, what it means and how it shows up in our daily lives. This episode is full of wisdom, important themes, and good girl talk… Enjoy!

what is up daddy gang it is your founding father alex cooper with call her daddy laverne cox welcome to call her daddy hey daddy okay i have to ask because i'm obsessed hey daddy i'm obsessed with your outfit and every single time I see you on a carpet or on your Instagram, I'm like, she knows how to dress. Thank you. You've got a vision. I still, at 51, love to play dress up. And I've been collecting vintage Mugler for the past five years. Like, obsessively, I have to.

My business manager is like, you need to stop. Basically, I've done about 15 years of collecting in five years, probably. What the fuck? So I need to stop. It is giving, as the TikTok kids would say, cunt. It's giving cunt through and through. I love, okay, what I love about, so many things I love about Beyonce is that Beyonce, through the Renaissance era, has made cunt mainstream because

cunt is a term as a trans woman cunt has been a part of my you know lexicon since I moved to New York so giving cunt but then when you go into mainstream context it's like people like for many years I was like people won't know what I'm talking about. It will seem kind of like I'm being vulgar. So I couldn't say cunt. But like for LGBTQ plus folks, giving cunt is like you're giving it. It's fish. It's woman. It's everything.

Yes. They try to make all like feminine parts feel so like, oh, you're such a pussy. You're a weak bitch. But cunt gives the same energy where it used to have such a negative connotation. I fucking love that we can now be like, you're such a pussy you're a weak bitch but cunt gives the same energy where it used to have such a negative connotation i fucking love that we can now be like we're serving cunt these are the contributions of queer lgbtq plus people trans people because in my in the trans community pussy has always been fabulous if you're giving pussy it's giving if it's giving pussy you're you, you are, you're lovely.

You're gorgeous. She's pussy. Right. Like next time someone calls you a pussy bitch. There's a song from the 90s. Girl, I'm, see this when you're old, you know. There's a song called, she's giving pussy. She's giving cunt.

She's giving pussy. She's giving cunt. I need that song when I walk into the studio every fucking day, Laverne. What's it called? Serving pussy. Serving. Cunt. Pussy. Cunt. Pussy. Cunt. Pussy. Cunt. Pussy. Cunt. Pussy. song when I walk into the studio every fucking day Laverne okay what's it called serving pussy serving oh cut pussy cut pussy cut pussy cut pussy cut pussy I don't know whose things I have to look at but if you just um YouTube it that needs to be our anthem today I know all the girls watching this are like thank you Laverne because like anytime someone says something I feel like a

lot of times to a woman we can always relate it's like they're trying to put us down they're trying to make us feel small and now we're like pussy cunt bitch fuck off what this is the and this is the sisterhood we can have like from trans women to non-trans women there is a celebration uh for me there's a celebration of the feminine of womanhood and and for a while, I resisted my femininity. But when I started to embrace it, I felt such power in it. It's wonderful. So you grew up in the deep south in alabama mobile alabama mobile alabama you have a twin brother i do i need to ask like what is the best part of having a twin there's a lot of things that i love my brother immensely but having someone who's literally been there my entire life we shared a womb together

which is a little creepy but when my mom my mom and I are really cool right now but my mom was emotionally abusive when we were growing up because she was emotionally abused when she was a kid so I'll say something and I'm like and I'm like it was a month or whatever and I'm like and she's like no it was just a few days and I'm like no it was a month and I'm I remember it as a month and I'm pretty sure I'm right and I'm like and I call my brother and I'm like it was a month right he's like yeah it was a month so like the best thing about having a twin brother at this point is that there was someone else who was there who can confirm that I'm not crazy and that I'm not misremembering right because I think that like sometimes not that my

mother's intentionally trying to gaslight me I think a lot of it is that she I think if she remembered some of the things she did and said she might not be able to live with herself. And I say that with the utmost love and respect for my mom. We've worked through all of that. And I can't believe we have, and we're in such a great place. But I think telling the truth about it is really important. And what I understand now as an adult, as a person who's been in therapy for 24 years now, is that my mother did the best that she could with what she had. And she actually did an incredible job considering. My grandfather was raised on a plantation in the context of sharecropping. If we've seen The Color Purple or watched 13th, we know that even after emancipation in the United States, Black people once incarcerated could be sold back into indentured servitude.

So slavery in so many ways did not end if you were incarcerated. So my great-great-so my great-grandfather ended up in jail. The long, crazy story. And so basically it was slavery 2.0. So they were still beating, you know, the black folks. It was an extremely abusive situation. My grandfather was terribly abusive to my grandmother and to his children. Horrible, like horrible, horrible, horrible. But then he was abused on the plantation. That's what he knew. So it's like, I mean, yes, my mother was emotionally abusive,

but she put herself through college. She has a master's degree. She was a teacher. She raised two brilliant children by herself. She owns her home that is paid off. She's retired now with a pension and, you know, she's set herself up. So this is incredible. My mother's incredible. I appreciate you sharing all of that because you're so right.

Like a lot of us can just at face value describe what we experienced. And we have to start to peel back the layers to understand why our parents are the way that they are. And obviously we've progressed so much as a society. Still so much fucking work to do. But to be able to look at the previous generations and understand what they were going through, we're just in- But that's taken time.

It's so much time. It's taken time. I needed years, particularly when I was like, when I really got into therapy, late 20s, into my 30s, I went through years of just being angry at her. And I needed to be angry

and I needed to get that out. I think that's normal, right? Yeah, I think so. Because I hadn't dealt with, I didn't have the tools to deal with the trauma of my childhood. I was bullied at school. I was chased home from school every day. And then I came home and my mom would be like,

why aren't you fighting back? Why are they bullying you? Like, it's just like, so there was no sense of safety that I had anywhere. And I escaped through my imagination and I escaped with dancing and being a straight A student, being a nerd basically was my escape. And so I'm grateful for all,

I'm grateful for all of it. But like, it took me a minute to be able to like do some of that healing work, start to get into the intergenerational peace and come to that place of forgiveness and understanding and um and even just like understanding now that there's just certain things my mom won't get and that's okay it's it's fine i meet her where i'm meeting her where she is you're right you don't have to take away from the fact that like what you the abuse you endured happened it happened it was real

but when you understand more of the backstory because again each generation does get a little bit better it does help you but first i agree when you went to therapy first you're just fucking pissed because you have to heal yourself yeah you can't have empathy for your mother yet once you get to a better place of actually understanding like i mean let's talk about it for a second you saying you know you were bullied like that completely shaped a child at that age and you talking about being chased off of the bus like what what were they specifically bullying you for? I mean, because I was a really feminine kid. It's so funny. Before I even knew what sissy and the F word were, I was being called them. So like my first interactions with kids in preschool, like I'm three, four, five years old and, you know, I'm in daycare or whatever. And the kids are calling

me sissy. They're calling me the F word. And it's just like where do three year olds and five year olds learn this and so I just was like what is this you know and I learned that it wasn't a good thing and it was there was so much shame around it too because my mom didn't know how to handle it and she her whole thing was like why aren't you fighting her whole thing was like you fight the bullies and I just was not not, there was something, I was not a fighter. I'm a lover, not a fighter. And I, even as a five-year-old, six-year-old, seven-year-old, I felt I was above duking it out in the schoolyard with other kids. It felt, it felt beneath me. And that, and that was another thing. The kids also thought I was better I thought I was better than them and I I talked white and I mean it was a lot of stuff being a black kid from a working class background it was that I was very femme so I was bullied because of that I was

bullied because I talked proper or thought I was um I they said I thought I was white um and just, well, just everything, honestly, just wanting to sort of be more, I don't know. I just, I think because the circumstances in the world around me were so not it. Yeah. And I understood that early on. I lived in my imagination. And when I discovered television, I was like, there is, there's other stuff out there. When I, when I discovered the library and books and reading, there's other stuff out there when I when I discovered the library and books and reading there are other things out there for me and I lived in those other worlds I lived

in like the world that I saw in fame um on television like I was like I'm going to New York I'm going to an art school I'm going to be dance on Broadway I'm going to be an actor like it that was like there is a world out there and so I lived there I lived in that world because what was going on around me wasn't was too traumatizing and I disassociated so I the disassociation was a way of coping the escaping into fantasy and dancing all the time was a way of coping I learned not to even talk about it because when my mother would find out she would blame me and my brother why are they they bullying you? And so it was like my fault. And so I wouldn't tell her about it. But then I remember this one time, it was probably sixth or seventh grade.

We had gotten off the bus and we had to start running. And then the kids caught up with us. And I remember they were kids in band. It's so tragic. It's like the band kids are, like, beating you up. But they had the drumsticks, and they were, like, hitting us with the drumsticks. And so we were getting beaten up, like, really, you know, it wasn't cute. And some parents saw it and called the school. And then the school called my mother. And so my mother then was mad because I didn't tell her about it. And then she was mad that we didn't fight back.

And it just was a whole, I was, it was always my fault. And so it was something I learned not to talk about. And I remember this time in high school, like I said it and then I remember crying and then just kind of like cleaning it up really quickly. And so it wasn't till years later that I think I, when I was in therapy, when I was able to like say this all these things happened to me and it wasn't cool and it was painful because there was no I didn't have any tools to deal with like the trauma of like never feeling safe anywhere because I think in a way

obviously dissociating is a way to survive like there's just no you can't in that moment do anything other than like like you said like go to a different world in your head, watch television, find ways to escape, which breaks my heart because as a child, really the peer dynamics are just so fucking important to like our formative years of like understanding like how to treat people and how you can interact with people. And the fact that you're running off of the bus and you're being scared shitless, like I'm going to get the shit beat out of me. Or even when I did have a friend,

you know, in middle school, there was, I had one friend and then eventually I remember him sort of turning on me and calling me the F word and calling me a sissy. And then I, so I learned early on not to trust people too. My freshman year at the Alabama School of Fine Arts.

Ooh, ooh, ooh. A kid that I thought was my friend, my freshman year at the Alabama School of Fine Arts. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. A kid that I thought was my friend my freshman year, I had never said that. I said it for the first time in therapy. Oh, God. Just literally like a month ago, I finally said what he said to me in therapy. Wow.

I'm sorry. I'm crying. I still can't say it out loud. I can't. I can't. But he called me a racial slur that was so like, Oh, and then there were gestures involved. Um, and it was just like, it was, it was, it was another betrayal. So I learned very early on not to trust people.

And that sucked. It is funny that I'm 51 years old and I still can't say it out loud. It's just so horrible. And I'm, yeah, maybe eventually. When you say that too, Laverne, when you think about that, like, first of all, I'm so sorry. Like, I genuinely cannot imagine as you're saying that. I'm so sorry what you dealt with. And I'm trying to think like, what comes up for you when you're, when you are explaining this? Like when you're, what do you feel when you're like, I can't say it? I feel like, um, that's a good question. Um,

there's like, there's a humiliation attached to it because he did it in front of a group of people and he was like kind of showing off for them. I think it was that we had sort of been friends and I was the black kid and I was also the like really femme kid. So I wasn't, he wasn't cool. And I was a freshman. And so to distance himself from me, he like, he called me a monkey. And he did like, he made eight noises when he did it. And,

wow. It was, um, it's so funny because I had been called everything. By freshman year in high school, I've been called a sissy, a queer, F word. I had been called all these things. It was the first time, like, I had, um, it was, I had been called something, like, racialized. And it just, like, it was so dehumanizing. Um, it was so, um, and it was someone I thought I could trust. And so it was, like, the betrayal of it. It was, um, I still haven't, like, and that's, I get really, I get really, really angry when I see things.

I remember it was humiliating. It was degrading and dehumanizing. There was a betrayal attached because I thought this person was my friend. I just want to jump out of my skin right now. It's so funny. And I've dealt with a lot of trauma. I dealt with a lot of stuff. And this was just, it's still like, yeah, this is the first time I've said it in public.

Hey, yay. But I have to say what I'm grateful for, though, is that for better or worse, I have had my guard up most of my life I learned when it's safe to let it down and who it's safe to let it down with and part of why I love being an actor is that that is I've hopefully with the right director in the right context, I can let my guard down and be vulnerable and share these things, even in a podcast context. Hopefully this can be of service by sharing it with people. And that is the gift of sharing things like this, to hopefully be of service. But it made me, I don't let people in easily and honest and quite honestly it has served me so well in my life that I'm not when I arrived in New York and all sorts of things and you know there were some

things that happened that you know weren't great um moving to New York for sure but I kept a lot of I was I was I learned to be very protective of myself and not to let a lot of people in and then becoming famous and dealing with like the Hollywood, all the Hollywood stuff and all the fakery and all that stuff. There was a, I have, and I think being famous later too also helps, but like I haven't succumbed to a lot of things and I don't let people in easily. And I keep my circle very, very small. And I'm grateful that the people I do have in my life who are my real friends, I can be vulnerable with and I can let my guard down with. But I think that's been a really good thing, believe it or not. I think

eventually I had to learn to let my guard down, be vulnerable because that's part of life, part of being an actor, being an artist, but it's also served me very well i was gonna say i think you are damn fucking right for not trusting and opening up and i think from your childhood to then what you're explaining happening to you in college it's like why the fuck would you trust anyone and i think it's so disgusting and disturbing how this still is present today like how have we not progressed enough as a fucking society where there are still nazi marches a few days ago it's fucking mind-blowing but i'm just so sorry because it makes me tear up listening to you i'm like the fuck is wrong with people I loved that you wanted to do some fun dating stuff I love talking about dating because I have

I was talking to a girlfriend and she just started therapy and she's you know trying to date and I realized like how much work I've done around myself around dating and I have a lot to say that's very useful okay I'm I love this in my humble opinion here she comes I'm 51 years old I started internet dating in 2000. So I've been online dating, dating apps for over 20 years. Give us the tips. All the girls that are like, okay, Laverne. But I met the love of my life on Tinder and it is possible. It is tricky though. And what I've learned, I think the biggest piece about dating apps, but dating in general, what I just said to my girlfriend is like, she just came out of a really rough relationship.

He was emotionally abusive. He was a gaslighter. And so she's in therapy to try to heal from that. I'm a huge advocate of making a list of all the qualities that you want in a partner, getting really specific. I've done this multiple times, getting specific and learning from the last relationship.

All the things that didn't work, okay, he was emotionally abusive. Okay, I want someone who's kind. I want someone who's loving. I want someone who's working on themselves. I have a height requirement. Sometimes that works out. Sometimes it doesn't. All the things that I've listed, it's really funny. Everything, the current boyfriend does meet the higher requirement. The previous one did not, but I went for it anyway. I was open. So making a list and then everything on that list, are you that person? Are you, do you meet all of your requirements?

If these are the things you want in a partner, they need to be the things that you have in yourself. Because what I learned dating on, being on dating apps on and off for years, being in a relationship, breaking up, getting back on the apps, learning from that relationship, processing it with the therapist, is that after a certain point, I was vibrating on a different level. And the fuckboys, they couldn't hear the frequency i was on a level by i was vibrating so high that the fuck boys couldn't hear the frequency and this it's it's

a beautiful thing and what i mean by that is that like i there's just certain things that became unacceptable in those first few messages i mean when i was on when i was on dating apps so i was i've been on tinder hinge was i only met one guy on hinge hinge was never the app for me um hinge I did okcupid I met a boyfriend there tinder two different boyfriends raya was a total bust for me such a shit show um hinge and then there's trans specific dating apps I've been on match I was on jaydate for six months because I was for a minute I was I lived in I've lived in New York most of my adult life I was dating a lot of Jewish men like for whatever reason they were just I literally years ago I was on Chelsea and I said I'm America's premier black transgender shiksa goddess um I was dating a Jewish man at the time but for whatever reason I was just Jewish men I was

finding myself dating a lot of Jewish men a A part of it's being in New York. I don't know what was going on, but for like a good 10 years, like every guy seemed to be Jewish. I don't know what was going on anyway, but like, we love that. I liked,

um, I'm happy Shabbos. I got to do, I finally, after all these years, I got to do, um, Shabbat dinners with,

um, with two exes ago. I did Hanukkah, you did something. We love it. Okay. Need your opinion on this. So someone goes on a date and this is what happens on the first date. Tell me if you would go on a second date with this person. Okay. He on the first date admits he's cheated before, but he'll never do it again. I would need more information. I would ask him why he cheated. Has he done work around why he's cheated? What's different about the dude that cheated and who he is now?

How did he feel after he cheated? And did how he feel change the behavior? I need more information. I would need more information. And then I think that would, you know, people tell you who they are. If you cheated before, I've cheated before in the past, but I have not cheated on my current boyfriend and I would never, but I have worked on myself and I've learned from it and there were things missing in the relationship. So there were a lot of reasons why I cheated. Right. And I thought, thought about it and I did the work around it. So I would need more information.

I agree. I think that's a really great answer too, because listen to everyone listening, like if you have cheated in the past, I don't believe in the once a cheater, always a cheat. It's just such a immature statement. People grow, people can change. And again, you need more information. So have they grown and have they changed? Because unfortunately, I wish people worked on themselves, but a lot of people don't. Oh, you'll be able to tell the minute you ask like your first question, why'd you cheat? You'll they'll show the true colors. Most men would be like, I don't know. Like, okay, bye. If he's like, this is what happened. This will if if you can tell they care and they've grown. Yes. But more information. But still, that's useful information. Okay, he's a 10. But more information. Absolutely. But still, that's useful information.

Okay. He's a 10, but his friends absolutely suck. How do you handle that? That's rough. I think it depends on how much his friends are in his life. I, you know, I had my Jewish ex. He was in his late 30s and all his friends were married with kids and they were all lovely people.

But I remember hanging out with them New Year's Eve. And all of them were talking about their kids. And that's the tricky thing about being 51. A lot of women who I love, who are amazing in my age group, who I would have great friendships with, they have kids. They're married. And it's like kids are a whole thing. So friends, it just depends on. The dynamic.

It depends on the dynamic, how close are his friends. But friends aren't everything because I love my ex's friends. So true. And he's out of the picture anymore. And he's out of the picture. Yeah. Okay. He gets way too drunk on the first date.

That's a red, that's a major red flag. That's probably, that's a deal breaker. I didn't listen to those signs when i the alcoholic abusive alcoholic i dated for four years he was really drunk and he was mean to the cab driver i think those kinds of mean to cab drivers mean to service people i worked in restaurants for 19 years those are deal breakers great absolutely don't put up with it okay he's hot but has horrible style i would see him again i honestly i fuck that i mean how does he look naked i'm like i yeah i'm like my boyfriend my boyfriend like he you know he doesn't care about my boyfriend he looks good in anything right so

he's but he's not a fashionista but a girl like when he's making me breakfast shortlist i could give a fuck about his style i completely agree also it's like you can help a little bit if you really get in there but like insanely superficial it is i think it's really superficial and it's like you are that's an immature shit i agree who gives a fuck if they're a good person and also like again if he's hot like who cares and And he, you know. You don't like his sweater? If you want to make him. I don't even.

I'm not even into giving a guy a makeover. Like, some women are like fixer. I don't believe in fixer uppers either. Right. Like, you don't need to change out his closet. Like, if, again, let him be him. Yeah. And honestly, maybe it's a good thing that he doesn't spend too much time on his style.

Like, there can be one person in the relationship, okay? Clearly. I spend enough time in a closet for, like, seven people and your bank account does too bitch i know okay extremely into pda on the first date it depends it did i mean it has to be it's at this stage when i in his in my history when there's a lot of PDA on the first date it's not gonna go anywhere usually and it just feels like a boundary thing like if he's hot enough and I'm into it maybe like when I was younger maybe not now yeah I would go with it but like I wouldn't necessarily think that that was a guy. And I might if it was fun and good, I might go out with him again. But I might not. I would keep my

options open. I agree. It's like, that's a great answer. It's like, if the vibes match it. Yes. Like sometimes you go on a date, you're like, holy fuck, that was electric. Like the vibes are flowing great. But I think like for a first date, like if it's already going so fast, so physical, like if that's what you're looking for, I guess. I think what my experience is when it gets hot and heavy really quickly, it fizzles just as quickly. That has been my experience. And it's really borne out over the years. I'm 51.

I've dated often and a lot. And when it's hot and heavy from the jump, it fizzles out quickly. That's been my experience. Amen. When I was single, I was like, I dated this guy before I met my current boyfriend. And I was like, I met him on the first date. He was so like into me, but he was like pulling out the chair and opening the door. And I was like, whoa, this is opening the door and i i was like whoa this is

probably a mom this the treatment is cute it's this i'm i'm feeling this but we probably got a mom because this is it's he's just it's it was too much little under a month he showed his full crazy and it was it was done but it was fun it was fun while it was a fun like three and a half weeks yeah like a little life thrill being clear about that it's fine like i was like okay i can do this for three and you know for a month and get it for me it's about the treatment and this is what i say to my girlfriends it's like you have to get used to being treated well we really do because so often we'll find ourselves out there with men giving us, for many, many years, I took crumbs and acted and treated them like a six course meal. I would take crumbs

from a man and make that a six course meal. And this is what we must stop doing. We must get used to abundance. And I mean, you're laughing, but girl, how many of us have done that? No, me, everyone in this room were like, fuck. And so we have to get used to being treated well and loved on. And it's not about money. It's about care. And that looks different. I mean, honestly, like, just like, babe, do you want coffee?

Do you want some coffee this morning? Can I you some breakfast can i rub your feet oh bitch girl like girl please just care you're so right it's like there's we get little crumbs and what's so bad is if you get used to little crumbs then when they give you like a little bit more you get hopeful and you're like oh my god God, it's like, you shouldn't be scrounging around. Like it should be consistent. And I think consistency is the key to knowing. Consistency is so crucial because that really separates the keepers from the non-keepers

because most of them are not going to be consistent. So really like check for that. I think that's one of the big things when you start dating someone, when you get to that phase, how consistent are they? Do they show up? Are they booking the next date? Do you even want another date? And so much of it is how they show up in their work, too.

So much of it is like if they're not organized in their work and their lives, they're not going to be able to be organized with you. Yeah, that's a good point. When I was on the apps, literally it was auto-saved in my phone. This is for me. So my profile would say in the first paragraph by itself, I'm a proud transgender woman, because as a trans woman, guys don't read profiles.

Even when it's in bold, all caps, a sentence as a paragraph, I'm a proud transgender woman, they still didn't read. So my first sentence, it was literally auto saved in my phone. It was,

you know, when they would finish the sentence for you, did you read in my profile that I'm transgender so that was like the first thing whenever ever matched with the guy did you read in my profile that I'm transgender that was the first sentence out of my mouth out of my that I would text and then like either they did or they didn't sometimes they were like oh I did they were cool with it sometimes they weren't and then have you dated a transgender woman before? That was always the second question.

And then I remember writing in my Tinder profile set, I have high hopes and no expectations. I'm open to a relationship, but I'm not necessarily looking for one. And unfortunately, I feel like for women, we have to put that in our profiles. I feel like guys freak out on a whole. I don't want to generalize, but most guys freak out if you say you're looking for a relationship.

If you say you're dating and you're open, it's a little less pressure. I agree. There are guys who are actively looking for a relationship who wouldn't be scared by that. But statistically, most men will be afraid of that. So I always recommend that women don't put that they're looking for a relationship, that they're open to one if they meet the right person. But they're just seeing what's out there. I think that's a better way to message it, too, because it's like you don't want a relationship with anyone.

You want it with the right person. So, yes, you're open to things. And if the relationship presents itself with the right person, yes. But not just gonna go fucking date joe schmoe because he was like a good date and you just get more you get you know ideally you still you know there's a screening process after that but then you just get more traffic to screen and then so then ideally you want to get off the apps too you don't want to message endlessly i literally like there is a guy that i met on like i was on yahoo chat like in like 2006 or something and chatted with this guy we never met literally like last year he texted me out of the blue no he texted me out they always come back last year hey what's going on still have never met him you if you if you are

texting for longer than a month if you're busy like now that i'm busy it's so tricky but when i before i was famous and i had a little more time i tried to when i was single i would try to go on you know three or four dates a month just to practice sitting across from someone and making small talk and if you meet someone in a dating app, the first meeting is not a date. It is a screening. I suggest never doing dinner. I think coffee or drink is the way to go. If you can put a time limit on it, it's great.

I have 45, oh, I'm really busy. I have 45 minutes or even half an hour. So you can go if it's not going well. And don't be afraid to end it. In my experience, guys stand trans girls up a lot. Probably stand, I don't know about non-trans women. They stood up a lot. But like I got stood up a lot.

So I would not leave my house until they were there. Text me when you arrive. Be like, oh, I'm here. Where are you? I'm two minutes away. And I was, but I hadn't left my house yet. Because I'm not sitting around waiting at a bar for you to stand me up this

is the wonderful thing about it being a drink or a coffee you can peace out if it's not going well if the chemistry's off whatever if it is going well oh my god let me just move my meeting you know right if it's going well let me move my meeting because i'm because i'm just having so much fun but then you can get the f out. So true. Okay, you're so right. I think, ladies, we like linger too long. And like, I have personally been on dates where I'm like, I'm in fucking pain right now. Leave.

Just leave. Save your fucking time. Because what happens is we don't want you to get burnt out by dating. Speed date. Like, you're so right. You don't have to go to a dinner. Just quickly test it out.

And then if it's like super quick and you still want to see him again, then see him again. But I just feel like we have to protect our energy because what I hate is when the girls get like so depleted and they're like, I can't keep fucking doing this. And it's, and it's depleting and it's,

it's annoying. And that's, and that's in the, even the process of getting to the date has to have an efficiency as well. Ultimately you want my, my most recent ex, but that's you know the ex before the guy i'm currently dating he was like what can we meet he was trying to get

off the app and that was i was busy i wasn't sure he was short uh it was so funny because i the first message i was like have you need to read i'm trans he's like yes have you dated a trans woman before he's like no i haven't but that's usually where you know I've matched with other trans women before and they're not usually into that and I'm like honestly I'm fine that you haven't dated a trans woman before the height is an issue for me he was 5'8 I'm I'm an honest lady and then you're too short bitch and then he said he then he said something really funny I don't remember what it was and I was like well short men do try harder and they do. This has been my experience.

And he was so charming and respectful over the course of like a week. I was like, I'll give this dude a chance. And so much of it is about the treatment. And so for me, I had to shift my shift in dating after what I learned. Because for a long time, I was dating men. I was dating investment bankers. I was stockbrokers and and real estate guys because it's New York and there's like a plethora of them and after a while I found I was not being treated well by those men that there was um it just wasn't the energy was off and I just was like and I ultimately what I realized is I had a thing for assholes. I had a thing for men who treated me badly because that they were a reflection of how

I felt about myself. And so I was consistently choosing men who would reject or abuse me, who would treat me horribly. I dated an alcoholic who was emotionally abusive for four years from 2001 to 2005. And that was a reflection of how I felt about myself. One of the most important things I can say about dating is getting therapy and then getting a group of people. What I just said to my girlfriend is getting a friend group, getting a therapist, getting someone who can reflect back to you how beautiful, amazing,

and powerful you are. And you can start practicing being in an intimate relationship with friends, maybe repair stuff with family if they're that kind of family. But then you get used to being seen, being vulnerable, being intimate, and having the beauty of who you are reflected back to you. So that is what you get used to instead of the other stuff, like the gaslighting, the abusive stuff. And then that is what I had someone in a group therapy situation tell me, I'm going to, you don't even know how amazing you are. I was struggling in a time in my life. You't even know how amazing you are I was um I was I was struggling in a time

in my life you don't know how amazing you are I'm gonna love you until you learn how to love yourself and they did and I and I had people who saw me and saw the beauty in me that I didn't see in myself and we have to learn to surround ourselves with those kinds of people so that we get used to it. Because when the intimate relationship emerges, when it's time to be in a relationship and to show up and be vulnerable and intimate, that shit's scary. That shit is really scary.

And if you have not practiced that, if you don't know how to do that, that's like weird. I remember with my ex he was so available and so cool and i just it freaked me the fuck out i was like what is this you know and you have to get used to it and friends are a great way to do it relationships are too you hopefully will pick people who help you who see you and and and and understand and treat you as the queen that you are. But you actually have to be in that energy. You have to see it in yourself first.

Because if someone is telling me how amazing and how awesome I am and I don't believe it, or if I'm talking negatively about myself in front of them, then my partner might start thinking and questioning, right? And loving myself more too also means that I have to set healthy boundaries for myself so that I don't become enmeshed in some dysfunctional stuff that I take care of my 50%, my side of the street that I don't get in, you know, into business that's not mine. Loving myself means setting healthy boundaries right that like the self-love and it's in itself love it's like people don't talk enough about that so you know i was in the friend i was talking to recently we had a long talk this is probably why i want to talk about this because people always i love rupaul love yours how you can love somebody if you don't love yourself but what does that mean it's how we treat. And it's our self-talk. What are the things,

the subconscious things we say to ourselves about ourselves, becoming aware of that? How then do I replace that negative self-talk with affirming self-talk? And it's tricky because it's like, sometimes you feel silly being in the mirror. Laverne, you're beautiful. Laverne, you're amazing. Laverne, you're smart. You're talented. Laverne, you deserve beautiful. Laverne, you're amazing. Laverne, you're smart. You're talented. Laverne, you deserve love. You're lovable because everybody deserves love. And like that's the piece for me. That's the empathy piece.

It's like not that I'm special. I've been very blessed and grateful, but I deserve love because everybody does. Yeah. Because everybody does. I think that's such good advice. I'm thinking of everyone listening, driving to work or at work, writing this down because it is so helpful. And that's such good advice. Like I'm just, I'm thinking of like everyone listening, driving to work or at work, like writing this down because it is so helpful. And it's actually tangible advice. If we treated a child and said the things to a child that we say to ourselves, the department of children and families would come and take that child away. And the reality, the reality is that all of us have a little child inside of us who needs nurturing and that for far

too long I abandoned that girl I abandoned that little girl inside me I had to let the hot hot man go for a minute because I needed to I needed to go with the treatment with the better treatment and so I was like let me date this nerdier guy and we have to try to date differently too because if we keep dating the same person and getting the same result we have to try something new so I went with like attractive enough to him but like he treated me well and like I felt safe because for a long time I was choosing unavailable men because I wasn't available emotionally because I wasn't I didn't love myself enough I hadn't done the intimate work I wasn't available so I was choosing unavailable men and I was choosing men who treated me badly because I treated me badly. And so then it's

like, okay, to break that cycle, I needed to choose kind people who would treat me kindly and people where I felt safe. And I remember this one dude, when I first, when Orange first came out and I thought he was safe, he was a comedian though. And I can't believe I'm going to tell this story. After we had sex for the first time in my then 315 square foot apartment, he said, this does not look like the apartment of someone on a hit show. And I had lots of shame about, you know, not being poor most of my adult life. And I had shame about the apartment. And I'm naked, girl.

And he says to me, I just felt so unsafe. But I had done enough work on myself to know this does not feel safe. Like our bodies are talking to us all the time. Does this situation feel safe for me, for my inner child, for the person who needs to feel safe in the most intimate of situations? And listen to that. Learn to listen to that voice and get the fuck out. If you, the second I don't feel safe with somebody.

Done. And can I tell you, my boyfriend is hot as fuck. He is physically like everything I've ever thought I wanted. And I let that go. I let that go. And luckily he's not just hot though. The treatment is there, the love, the care, the safety, all of that is there too. Like that, Hey, it's like jackpot. Um, but you know, he has his, he has his issues. He's not perfect, but like all of that's there and I feel safe and he's beautiful and he's amazing. So it's like, Hey, he's hot and he treats me so it's like hey he's hot and he treats me well so like hey like

wow cool um it's great and i think the biggest thing once you start dating someone how consistent are they i think the biggest thing especially in big cities is that guys are flaky as fuck and they ghost and like the inconsistency is infuriating but it need not be because they will show you who they are pretty much right away. So the inconsistency, clock it. If they're not showing up regularly or if they're not getting back to you in a timely, respectful way, then move on. And it's not about like these boundaries are not like a man must do this and must do that it's to protect you to protect your energy and protect your safety and your time so if he's like being flaky i think you should you know until something serious you should have a roster you should be

dating a few people you know you should have like a few few people you're dating to see what cream rises to the top if it does you know i think there's i hit my hay day well then i once upon a time i was a hoe so i had um a slut i was i was friendly i was friendly and i had a you know i had a little rotation going and you know you gotta do what you gotta do so when you're until you have that committed whatever have a little rotation going so that like you just have options so for people that are becoming bigger fans today or fans today what do you hope that they like take away from this and learn about you through this interview it's so you know Laverne contains multitudes I I contain multitudes it's so weird like what's what the most fun thing about my own podcast is I get to like I get to be this Laverne I I the wonderful

thing I think about being 51 is like I give myself permission to be all the aspects of who I am. I, you know, I love opera. I sing opera, not really well, but I do. I love classical ballet. I'm an actress. I'm really into healing. I've done a lot of dating and learned a lot from it. I think about politics. I'm like, I'm complicated. And I think that I would want people to like take away that like people can be complicated and people are. And I think that like my I want to whenever I come into a context like this, I just want people to see my humanity and hopefully have the humanity that they hopefully see in me transfer to trans people that they might encounter in their real lives or when they think about you know legislation about trans people and that they may rethink um a misconception or or an idea that they might have about trans folks like to see my humanity and then begin to imagine the humanity of other trans people that's always what I want when I go into particularly, you know, diverse to maybe an

audience that might not be a core fan base of mine. That's always what I want for them to see my humanity in hopes of them seeing the humanity of other people who might have a similar experience to me. As a white woman, like I can't even express how much I understand my privilege and it's and why I'm so happy I'm getting to speak to you is like I want to understand more. And I want to hopefully use this platform to even if there are a bunch of fucking white people like listening or whoever it is, it's like understanding what you've been through is it's just the beginning because we need to continue to talk like this. And I'm sorry, it's not your obligation though. And I want you to know that like, it's not your job to come on and you know that. Can I, but you know, and we all, the thing I want to say about privilege, privilege does not mean that you haven't had struggles. It doesn't mean that you haven't like

gone through stuff. It just means there's certain things you haven't had to think about and i i had a wonderful uh opportunity many years ago i was doing a college talk in um south carolina and i got to speak with a group of um young people before the um lecture i was giving and um we were sitting at it like in a conference room and they had sat themselves at this round table and ironically it was like white as Asian, Latin, and then black. That's how they sat themselves. And I go around and I ask the kids, you know, the students, I should say. They were all, you know, freshmen to seniors, you know, who they were. And most of them were with the LGBTQ group or with the Black Student Union

or the Women and Gender Studies group on campus or whatever. And so the president of the LGBTQ group is there or whatever. And then so we get to the last student, and he's a Black guy. And he's just like, you know, I'm really frustrated here on campus because at the Black Student Union and the student government, I feel like I have to choose my Blackness over my gayness. And when I'm in the LGBTQ group, I feel like I have to choose my blackness over my gayness. And when I'm in the LGBTQ group, I feel like I have to choose my gayness over my blackness. And I'm like, and he's just like, it's really frustrating. And I turned to the president of the LGBTQ group. I'm

like, well, what do you think? He said this, what do you think about that? And he said, you know, I had never thought about it. And I said, that's privilege. That's privilege. It's about myself um as a black person as a woman as a trans person because we live in what bell has caused imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy we live in a culture that celebrates whiteness over blackness devalues blackness you know celebrates men over women has all these we live in a culture and we all learn that and our work if we want to come to critical consciousness is to become aware of that and unlearn it and so i think we're all racist i think we're all sexist and you know and i think that that puts us all in the same boat so it's not like saying and i don't like calling someone

racist or calling someone transphobic. I like to say this behavior is consistent with a history of transphobia or this behavior is consistent with a history of racism. Like Brene Brown would say a focus on behavior and not the person, right? So shame is, I'm sorry, I am a mistake and guilt is, I'm sorry, I made a mistake. Guilt is adaptive. Behavior, if we focus on the behavior, we can say that behavior, that language is consistent with a history of dehumanization of Black people, comparing them to apes and monkeys is consistent with a history of dehumanization and racism in this country. So whether you are racist or not, this language is consistent with that history. And if you are interested in evolving and not continuing that history, then you may

want to think about not using that language. And then to take it a step further, what does accountability look like? Because we don't really know. We don't really know in this country because we don't see people really held accountable. This whole cancel culture thing, and people say it's accountability culture, but no one actually models it.

And accountability is acknowledging that, that you did something wrong and then taking the steps to make it right. One of the best examples I can think of, of this happened a decade, Lord, it was a decade ago. I was on the Katie Couric show when she had a daily talk show with the model Carmen Carrera. And Katie had asked Carmen about, she said, well, you have different private parts now. And Carmen is like, I don't want to talk about that. I want to talk about my modeling. That's personal.

It's private parts that are private, you know. And then I was backstage when this happened. And I come out to talk about Orange is the New Black. And then Katie asked me, well, Carmen doesn't want to talk about this. What do you think? And then I, you know, I had a whole spiel. People can Google it. But I was like, you know, a focus, I said a focus on surgery and transition objectifies trans people. And we don't get to talk about the real lived experiences because that becomes the takeaway. And so many of those portrayals, even when they were humanized, whenever there was a focus on transition, hormones, surgery, even if they were humanized portrayals, I found that the takeaway for most of the non-trans audiences were, can you believe what they do in that surgery? And oh my God, they take hormones. And this is what happened. And so it becomes all about transition, this physical thing. And it sensationalizes us and it doesn't it takes away from our humanity. And so I've consciously chosen not to talk about the details of my medical transition because I'm more interested in our humanity. you know, multifaceted and as human as I always try to, you know, be whenever I show up somewhere, that becomes the takeaway. And to Katie Couric's credit, she aired the episode because it was a

pre-tape. She could have scrapped the episode. She kept that moment in when I was like, we should be focusing on other things. Then she invited me back and said, if we shouldn't be talking about this, what should we be talking about? So I went back on her show and we had, you know, Chase Strand here. I met him for the first time. He was a lawyer for the ACLU, my friend Teek Milan. And we talked about the real lived experiences and issues of trans people. And then a few years later, Katie reaches out and says, I just did this documentary called Gender Revolution where I interview all these trans people. And I'm like, what? And she's become this amazing ally for the community. And that is what, that's what it's about. That's what it's about. Like being, and it's uncomfortable because there were many people who were calling her out. This is 2014. So it was really one of

the first times, it's the first time actually trans people that push back against those that line of questioning on television so Carmen and that was that I knew about and I've watched a lot of these interviews the first time I'd ever seen a trans trans people push back against that line of questioning and to her credit people were very mean to Katie online and she absorbed the critique she and I had a lot of conversations, you know, offline and, you know, personally, and she, it's just incredible. And I, there's just so few examples of people holding themselves accountable, allowing themselves the vulnerability of being publicly shamed too, and then rising above that because it's actually bigger than my public humiliation at the end of the day.

And then so that, so then the uncomfortability, right? Because then there's the moments of being uncomfortable because you've been called out and the vulnerability that's required there. And then the amends piece and the accountability is like, what is the amends? What is the life amends look like? How do I live my life differently how do I and everybody you know maybe isn't going to become the fierce advocate for trans rights that Katie has but what can you do you know what are the little things you can do to be accountable and this is across the board how do we begin to model that you just said so many truly brilliant things Laverne no like literally I'm fuck, I should have had a pencil. I do want to.

I do this a lot. I go all over the place. I love it because you just gave a fucking TED talk, truly. Like I wish I could just clip that. I will. I'll clip it and just put it on fucking YouTube because everyone should hear what you just said. Back to the first point that you were talking about with what is privilege, right? And I think when you are talking about everyone's struggle is a struggle and it's all relative. Like there is, I'm sure like a white

kid in their house that's getting it, that's trauma, right? But there are different levels of trauma that, yes. And maybe I don't have to think about this. Like you, you, like my boyfriend has had his struggles and has been through things. He doesn't have to think about, you know, I'm always like, whenever I'm in a store as a black person, I always make sure my hands are visible and everything's cool. So people don't think I'm stealing. I still do that, you know, at this stage of life. Absolutely. And what I think is important is like, of course, we all have our struggle. However, there is a different level when you are talking about race and when you're talking about sexuality, because there is a complete different scope of hate and abuse and hate crimes that have been specifically targeted toward race and sexuality so like gender we would be remiss to not yes bring

this up so when you when you say that about that professor i thought it was so interesting and you're so right of like how do we start to acknowledge of people of maybe more privilege? Like, Katie Kirk is a perfect example. I love that you brought that up. It's like, wow, what an interesting dynamic for it is. We can all acknowledge with everything going on now that we are more progressive. I think people can be nervous to be like, Laverne, like, what am I allowed to ask? And I think there's a way to go about it so respectfully.

And for Katie to acknowledge like, fuck, maybe I didn't approach it the right way so now let me take accountability and let me do the fucking work to make sure I can understand so the next time I sit across from you I am giving you the space to feel comfortable because also you are the one that's living it and this is your experience I have no fucking understanding what it is like to be a trans black woman but I would like to hear from you and I think we can do better as a society instead of canceling people like you said i completely agree let's welcome conversation instead of closing the door on something like oh you fucked up you fucked up you said this why did you say this and you're so right we all are born with internalized misogyny and racism that's a fucking fact and i think what you said is so

brilliant it's like if you can acknowledge that then we can have progress That's a fucking fact. And I think what you said is so brilliant. It's like, if you can acknowledge that, then we can have progress. There's a lot of fucking people in this country that cannot acknowledge it. And that's where there's a moment to there's like this backlash against it, too. And I think for people who are interested, though, what I when you get out of the when you get off the Internet and start watching television and get out of, you know, our phones and the algorithms, there are people out there. And when you get off the internet and start watching television and get out of you know our phones and the algorithms there are people out there and when you interact with people what gives me hope um is when i interact with different people from different backgrounds who are beautiful loving who might be from a very conservative background and had all these ideas about who i might be because i'm a black trans woman and then we just

get to sit down as human beings and then like you my experience has been it's been all that melts away my experience has been when I sit down with people you know like the meeting the parents of the boyfriend you know I've done that many times at this point like all of the it's so nerve-wracking every time even at 51 it's still nerve-wracking but like all of it just we get to sit down and be human beings and this all of the ideas that we might people have about that they think they might have about a trans person it's just it's like oh no she's just she's just a she's just a person she's just a woman it's all good you know I'm not here to like I'm just here to try to live my life

you know 100 i think something again that when everyone's listening to this it's like i was i'm asking you about your life and your life experiences and what you have been through and i believe there's going to be some people that can relate and some people that can't relate and that's what the fuck the point of this is is to talk and understand and through your experiences in childhood and through your family's intergenerational trauma you have gotten to a place where like there is so much still to work on and discuss and so like who who the fuck is anyone to tell you not to speak about this yeah um let's talk about your new song i was watching the music video and i'm like i just have to i just have to hype you up for a minute of like the it's like a trilogy right it's like

it's a second in a trilogy it's so weird i'm like i'm so weird i'm such an i'm like i am an art school kid to the core i've we have this called gretchen a trip opera part two it is a german lead or song written in 1814 by franz schubert schubert wrote the ave maria that everybody sings at the weddings we remixed it with this trap beat and in the video i'm giving like it's based on the story of faust to um gretchen at the spinning wheel is what it's called in english and in the the video, I'm like giving this guy a lap dance. And then I'm also like this robot, fem bot that glows in the dark. And it's sort of set in the future.

So like, I'm weird. I'm like really weird. And I love it. And I love how weird I am. I love that I'm like an artist and I have things to say I fucking love it I love that you're like I think so many people just try to conform and be like cool and like do whatever the fuck I mean like the first song truly I don't know if anybody cared about it but I like have what I I'm like being like i said before with the what's great

about the podcast is just me and i love getting i directed this video i assembled the edit myself every like frame of the video is like i put it there if we repeated something or something sped up or slowed down i did that um my My editors had a great title card and ending, but everything else is me. And they put it together beautifully, the editors. It's an invitation if people want to, you know, think about like so many men find themselves attracted to trans women through sex work, through porn.

And we often associate lap dances with sex work. It doesn't have to be. I've given many lap dances, you know, out of the context of sex work. Doesn't have to be. I've given many lap dances, you know, the context of sex work. It's really funny when Lil Nas X came out with, call me by your name, Monteiro, call me by your name. He gives, of course, the lap dance to the devil. I was like, I've been doing that for years.

I can do that and even better. I wanna do that in a video. So Lil Nas X gave me permission to like, you know, to step out of my respectability politics and like, you know, bring some of the things I've done in private, public. And I'm 51 and I can, you know, if I can still do this, like we should record it. So part of it was that, but it was also like this meditation on like, how do, is there a way for men who find themselves

attracted to trans women, sometimes in the context of sex work, for that to like move out of that context. And Gretchen in the song, the original song, Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel, Gretchen has been seduced by a fowl. She's 16 years old. She's a virgin. And she's tormented by these sexual feelings. This is like sort of this sexual awakening is what the song really is about.

And I remember when I realized I was attracted to boys being tormented by my sexuality when I was in high school and I discovered this song when I was in high school. And I thought, what an interesting reverse lift. Like Gretchen is the seductress in this context and Faust, I call him Fausto in my trip opera, is the one tormented and struggling. And so it's a way to sort of have a conversation about straight men who find themselves attracted to trans women. It's just a cool visual.

It's a fun opera remix, re-imagining. It's fun, hopefully, and cool looking. And yeah, it's something to unpack. It's something to unpack. It's something to unpack. It's something to unpack. Period. Period. Period.

With love and empathy. Yes. Laverne, thank you so much for coming on Call of Duty. Holy shit. I knew this would be the place to spill tea, to go in. I was ready. I came ready. Did I not come ready?

You slayed. I came ready. You I not come ready? You slayed. I came ready. You came so fucking ready. You left no crumbs. No fucking crumbs. Done. That was fucking amazing.