Love in a F*cked Up World – Details, episodes & analysis

adrienne maree brown joins Dean Spade for the first episode of Love in a F*cked Up World. adrienne and Dean talk about collectivity, working in fractals to overcome feelings of overwhelm, pleasure, and letting go of ownership and possessiveness to build abundant support systems.

Transcript available at https://deanspade.net/podcast

Books, podcasts, and more from adrienne maree brown: 

• https://adriennemareebrown.net/ 
• @adriennemareebrown 

adrienne maree brown's books:

• Loving Corrections (AK Press, 2024)
• Holding Change: The Way of Emergent Strategy Facilitation and Mediation (AK Press, 2021)
• We Will Not Cancel Us And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice (AK Press, 2020)
• Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good (AK Press, 2019)
• Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds (AK Press, 2017)
• Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements (AK Press, 2015) 
• Grievers (AK Press, 2021)
• Maroons (AK Press, 2023)
• Ancestors (AK Press, 2025)

adrienne maree brown's podcasts:

• How to Survive the End of the World (with Autumn Brown)
• Octavia's Parables (with Toshi Reagon) 

Also mentioned in this episode: 

• WALL-E (film, 2008)
• Fumbling Towards Repair: A Workbook for Community Accountability Facilitators by Mariame Kaba & Shira Hassan (AK Press, 2019)
• Woman on the Edge of Time by Marge Piercy (Knopf, 1976)
• SURJ: A home for white people working for justice
• Catalyst Project: Anti-Racism for Collective Liberation
• Movement Memos podcast by Kelly Hayes
• Daniel Hunter (educator and activist) 

For over 25 years, Dean Spade has been working in movements for queer and trans liberation and to end police, prisons, immigration enforcement, and war. His new podcast, Love In A F*cked Up World, offers concrete tools and conversations about how we can build and sustain strong relationships, because our connections to each other are the building blocks of all of our movements. 

Morgan Bassichis joins Dean Spade to talk about how to deal with hard feelings–like jealousy, possessiveness, and control–when they inevitably come up. Morgan and Dean talk about how it doesn't help to shame ourselves for having feelings that don't align with our principles, and how we can use humor and curiosity to find playful ways to engage these emotions and get the emotional satisfaction we desire.

Transcript available at https://deanspade.net/podcast

Don’t miss Morgan's new show, Can I Be Frank? at Soho Playhouse starting July 24! Tickets are available at https://www.sohoplayhouse.com/see-a-show/morgan-bassichis-can-i-be-frank

Tourmaline and Morgan Bassichis join Dean Spade on this episode of Love in a F*cked Up World. Tourmaline, Morgan, and Dean talk about how sites of capture and violence, like sexuality, romance and love, are also sites of pleasure and freedom, and how complex that tangle can be in the day to day. They also talk about what it means to support each other and the many lessons they’ve learned from each other over the course of multiple decades of friendship, collaboration, and trans abolitionist organizing.

Transcript available at https://deanspade.net/podcast

For more Morgan:

• Can I Be Frank? - Morgan’s show at Soho Playhouse starting July 24! 
• https://www.morganbassichis.com
• Questions to Ask Before Your Bat Mitzvah
• The Odd Years

For more Tourmaline:

• Marsha: The Joy and Defiance of Marsha P. Johnson
• @tourmaliiine

Also mentioned in this episode:

• Critical Resistance
• SONG
• CUAV
• Laraaji
• Joanna Macy, World as Lover, World as Self
• Jessica Fern, Polysecure / Polywise

When we're fixated on something, it may be helpful to ask ourselves What Else is True? Morgan Bassichis joins Dean Spade to walk us through this tool for getting perspective when we're tied up in knots.

The What Else is True? worksheet that Dean describes is available here (PDF)

You can watch this episode on YouTube.

Transcript available at https://deanspade.net/podcast

Don’t miss Morgan's new show, Can I Be Frank? at Soho Playhouse starting July 24! Tickets are available at https://www.sohoplayhouse.com/see-a-show/morgan-bassichis-can-i-be-frank