The Out Crowd Laudable

Proud Rovers, as it says in the name, are proud to represent LGBTQ fans of Blackburn Rovers Football Club. Formed in 2019, the supporters group is both an advocacy and social group for the community and its allies.
Their chair, Chris Lofthouse, joins fellow Rovers fan Daniel J. McLaughlin to chat about the experience of queer fans on match days, what needs to improve in football, and whether campaigns like Rainbow Laces are effective.
You can find out more about Proud Rovers here: proudrovers.co.uk
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The Out Crowd is a Laudable production for Reach, in partnership with inclusion network ReachOut. It is presented and produced by Daniel J. McLaughlin.
The title music is Sunny Travel by Nico Staf.
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Max Macmillan is a man of many talents. On screen, he has played Timothy Turner on Call the Midwife for the past decade; and off the screen, you can see Max play brilliant, epic songs in music venues.
He’s an actor, musician, photographer, and filmmaker. Whether he’s in front or behind the camera, on or off stage, Max is insightful, fascinating, and an amazing storyteller.
In recent months, he came out publicly as gay - and this is his first chat since that moment. Welcome to the podcast that chronicles what it is like to be LGBTQ today. This is the Out Crowd.
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The Out Crowd is a Laudable production for Reach, in partnership with ReachOut. It is presented and produced by Daniel J. McLaughlin.
The title music is Sunny Travel by Nico Staf.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Five years ago, the government, under the premiership of Theresa May, pledged to ban conversion therapy - the insidious and psychologically damaging practice of trying to suppress a person’s sexuality or gender identity.
Half a decade later, the LGBTQ community is still waiting.
Back in 2021, the then-minister for women and equalities Liz Truss reiterated that the government would ban conversion therapy in England and Wales.
She wrote: “There is no justification for these coercive and abhorrent practices and the evidence is clear that it does not work: it does not change a person from being LGBT and can cause long lasting damage to those who go through it. We are committed to building a society in which conversion therapy no longer takes place.”
Well, that commitment has been wavering from the government. The conversion therapy ban was scrapped at one point, and then reinstated but excluding the trans community, and then another U-turn saying that all forms of conversion therapy would be banned.
Again, we are still waiting. On this episode of The Out Crowd, the LGBTQ podcast from Reach, Daniel J. McLaughlin speaks to Gemma Byrne from Mind, the mental health charity, about the dangers of what they call conversion practices - and their demands to the government to protect all members of the LGBTQ community.
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The Out Crowd is a Laudable production for Reach, in partnership with ReachOut. It is presented and produced by Daniel J. McLaughlin.
The title music is Sunny Travel by Nico Staf.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

'Coming out of the closet' - or telling someone about your sexuality and gender identity for the first time - can be a scary experience for those in the LGBTQ community.
Opening up about your identity to family and friends is a massive step in your journey as a queer person, and sometimes you can feel very alone.
But this is a path well trodden by many before you, and some of those stories have been shared on the Coming Out Stories podcast and book.
Author and podcast host Emma Goswell joins Daniel J. McLaughlin on The Out Crowd to discuss what she has learned since launching Coming Out Stories, as well as chatting about her own experiences as a lesbian mother.
The award-winning broadcaster, who has worked for the BBC, Gaydio, Virgin Radio Pride and more, also shares her tips and advice for those who feel that the time is right to tell their family and friends about their true identity.
You can find out more about Coming Out Stories here: https://comingoutstoriespodcast.com/
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The Out Crowd is a Laudable production for Reach, in partnership with ReachOut. It is presented and produced by Daniel J. McLaughlin.
The title music is Sunny Travel by Nico Staf.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello there. You’re looking very well - I love what you’ve done with your hair. Oh yes, thanks for noticing - yes, indeed, we have had a makeover too.
Welcome back to The Out Crowd - the podcast from Reach that speaks to members from the queer community about their experiences in the past and the present, and their hopes for the future.
We are FINALLY back for a second series - just in time for Pride Month in June. But as we always say: “The LGBTQ community is not just for Pride – it’s for life.”
This time, The Out Crowd has linked up with our friends at ReachOut, the LGBTQ inclusion network at Reach - the UK’s biggest publisher. And on today’s episode, you will be hearing from the committee about what Pride means to them.
From the co-chairs of the committee to the allies in the network, Daniel J. McLaughlin speaks to Kate Allen, Ben Craven, Emma Oakley, and Corretta Kears about the important work that they do to support their LGBTQ colleagues. 
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The Out Crowd is a Laudable production for Reach, in partnership with ReachOut. It is presented and produced by Daniel J. McLaughlin.
The title music is Sunny Travel by Nico Staf.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alexander Pemberton, aka Elta Avelon, is a 24-year-old drag artist and resident queen at the Creative Arts Gallery in Burnley, Lancashire.Since playing the part of young drag queen Angel Dumott Schunard in Rent the Musical as a teenager, and discovering RuPaul's Drag Race, Alex developed the character of Eltariel Avelorn, part-elf, part-kink, part-femme fatale.Now in the third generation of the character, Elta Avelon joins The Out Crowd host Joe Ali to talk about the development of their drag persona over the years, performing as a queer artist in Burnley, how they hope to inspire future drag queens, and how the kink community helped them embrace their sexual identity.The Out Crowd - An LGBTQ podcast is a Laudable production for Reach. It is presented by Joe Ali, and it is produced and edited by Daniel J. McLaughlin.The title music is Sunny Travel by Nico Staf. The photo of Andrew Moffat is by Darren Quinton/Birmingham Live.
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