by tim parks –
Little did Jordan Power know that when he and his best friend Brad Price were lamenting about their shared experiences of the shame being hurled at them for being gay would lead to something more than commiserating over cocktails. It was more a case of ladies who launched, rather than those who simply lunched.
The Toronto, Canada-based duo turned a lifetime of feeling less than into the decidedly 180 degree turn that there was more to their lives than other people’s perceptions, which had affected them for years. And the vehicle that they chose to drive away from that barren landscape was their podcast, Shame on You. And the extremely popular platform has afforded them to be brutally honest, albeit with a healthy dose of levity, and to inspire their listeners to join them in their quest to “spark a revolt against society’s norms” and how they too can give zero f*cks.
The Rage Monthly spoke with one half of this dynamic duo, Jordan Power, about the podcast, his upcoming book My Therapist Sent Me Nudes, and his anus.
Scratch that, I was referring to the writing titled Musings from a Famous Anus that he does for his website. And much like the doses of truth that he and Price dole out on a weekly basis, Power is a sterling example that “honesty is the best policy.” He talked a bit more about the lowdown regarding the impetus for airing his dirty laundry publicly, which involved his on-the-down-lowboyfriend at the time.
“I was in a very toxic relationship with a closeted man and I got out of it,” he said. “And I reflected back on a lot of the pain that my best friend and I experienced, when we first came out in Toronto. We got in the gay community and it seemed like there was just a lot of residual pain. And I also thought simultaneously about this guy and how, instead of being angry about the whole situation, if I could work to better the world that I’m in, there would be less of him in the future.
“And why we called it Shame on You is we thought can we fully wash out that residual shame that still lives deep inside us? And by doing that with extreme vulnerability on a microphone, that’s how the podcast started.”
“And why we called it Shame on You is we thought can we fully wash out that residual shame that still lives deep inside us?” Power recollected. “And by doing that with extreme vulnerability on a microphone, that’s how the podcast started.”
The topics on Shame on You have included subject matter in episodes like, “You Don’t Have to Blow Us,” “Why Won’t You Sleep with Us?” and the who-hasn’t-been-there question of “You Pooped on a Plate?” Seeing as his life is on display, both on air and with the written word, it begged the question if there was a subject that they didn’t want to broach?
“No, and I think that’s what we signed up for,” Power said. “That’s the secret sauce to the podcast. And I think that’s why we’ve crossed half-a-million downloads in less than nine months, is because we practice a level of radical self-disclosure that was unprecedented. I like that we’ve created this open dialogue where we’re imperfect advocates and two normal guys. And we just talk on a microphone in a way that, at times, is really going to annoy people and invoke strong reactions. But with entertainment, it’s about invoking a response.”
One response they hadn’t factored in was flippantly saying during the first episode that listeners should send them nude photos.
“I don’t really mind getting them and we got a bunch,” he said, laughing. “Because I talk very openly about my sex life on the podcast, as Brad does, people took that as an invitation to sexually harass us. I think I underestimated the maturity of the audience and this is less than 1% of the audience. But the best thing is we’ve had hundreds of people come out because of the podcast and I’m truly overwhelmed by that.”
Power also feels fortunate to have found this particular avenue to walk his inner demons down, stating that prior to having the podcast that the effects of being shamed “created an elevated trauma response,” which made him feel like “a malformed adult,” as he explained.
“Because I talk very openly about my sex life on the podcast, as Brad does, people took that as an invitation to sexually harass us. I think I underestimated the maturity of the audience and this is less than 1% of the audience.”
“I’ve only now begun to examine it and I go to psychoanalysis three days a week,” Power added. “And the overriding emotion that I always had was anger and I was extremely sensitive to any kind of criticism. And that came from the decades before when I was relentlessly bullied. I became a chameleon and was really good at hiding. I came out and thought everything would be OK after that, but I had this fight or flight response. And you start dating and interacting with people and you’re a little bit intolerable and people don’t want to be around you.”
But that was then, and this is now, as Power and Price effectively share their foibles with listeners with the podcast becoming “incredibly successful in a short period of time.” Not one to rest on his laurels, Power has also taken to writing about his life with honesty and what he called “the silver lining” of humor, both on his website and his upcoming book, My Therapist Sent Me Nudes.
“My book is a comedy book, and you become adept at comedy, now you have this skill. But looking at the core of comedy, a lot of times is pain, you know, that tears of a clown sort of thing,” he said. “I found that as my mental health improved, my comedy is a lot smarter and not as biting. My book is just longer form versions of what we touch on in the podcast and the title is based on one of the stories in the book and was one we talked about. A couple of people in Toronto e-mailed me that they had also been sent nudes by the same therapist and now he’s currently under investigation.”
Another offshoot of Shame on You has been trying to get people to live their best zero f*cks given lives, and Power had some advice in how to accomplish that.
“You look at gay shame and how we think we’re unworthy of love and belonging and this fear of connection with society,” Power said. “The largest lesson that we’ve learned is that shame lives in silence. And, so, I think a lot of us are just faking it. What I would say to people is to live an open, honest life authentically, and that’s been the basis of the entire podcast.”
Check out new episodes every Thursday at stitcher.com/podcast/shame-on-you and Jordan’s website at jordanpowerwrites.com to keep up with his Musings From a Famous Anus writings.