Introducing — Smart Girl Dumb Questions

Hi, I'm Naima Raza.

Like all of you, I have been living for Curse of America's Next Top Model. So to help with your and my withdrawal from season one, Bridget invited me to share a little bit about my weekly show, which is called Smart Girl Dumb Questions. We'll play you a taste of a recent episode I did with Astair Perrell, the renowned psychotherapist and relationship expert, as we unpack why love

Pleasure to be here.

For those of you not familiar with Ustair's work, She's written two international bestsellers. She's given ted talks that have been viewed over fifty million times. She's a keen observer of what's happening in our relationships, not just in our love lives, but at work in all the ways that we relate to one another. I think you're really an expert on humans on.

What humans do to eat, children, experience sweety children, and long from each other and.

Long from each other. I want to know what you long for. We're going to get there. I have questions for you about why is it harder to fall in love as time goes on. I can't tell if it's age, or if it's this modern life, or if there's something about me. And I also want to start, though, with something a little bit nostalgic, which is the first time we met, because we're also friends Estherah and I.

I have an image of us walking out of a building on the street. But what were we doing in that building?

Was that the Spotify building?

Yes? But what were we doing this?

We were chatting, and we were chatting off the record, and yet I wanted to buy some tape from it today. Is that okay?

Of the records that you recorded me?

Well, I remember, I asked you for your permission, but it was for my own notes. It was for my own notes, and I kept it and if it's okay, I'll play it for you or if you don't like curiosity is odd? I know that this is the whole point of the show, Smart Girl, Dumb questions.

We are wanting something that is at the opposite of where we are living. When you live in Pakistan, when your mother lives in Pakistan, because you're already the generation moving and so you are super rich and fascinating and fucked up because you are constantly negotiating. It makes you the most pertinent global citizen and an amazing journalist, but

The rules were clear. The rules weren't clear. The norms are clear, the expectations are clear. There's a lot of certainty here, very little freedom. There's a lot of freedom here and very good consurdity because everything now has to be negotiated. Everything that was a rule has become a conversation.

Everything that was a rule has become a conversation. What do you think hearing that, I still like that.

I think that one of the most interesting shifts that has taken place in the realm of relationships is the shift from relationships that are defined by duty and obligation, by loyalty and community, to relationships that became defined by feelings rather than values, and by personal authenticity rather than loyalty. And I think that the majority of the world is still living with the very first model. But there are so many people on this planet. You are one of

The reason you told me unfact.

I said, I mean confused, it is probably better. It's rich, it's very layered, it's it's you know, it's because that same weekend you were going to Washington to visit your father, and I said, how much do you live between these two worlds? You know, the world where you had very little freedom, with a lot of clarity and certainty, and the world where you have a ton of freedom. But you are often written with self doubt and with uncertainty, as we are today here in the way, especially when

I love that, and I love that you still think this way. Because this was seven years ago. I was like, here's esther prow this. You know, you were really on up at that time as well. I think your career was like you still are, but that was like you were taking off in a way, and that was the first year. Yeah, the first year of that takeoff, and I thought, I really appreciate it. Was like, oh, she basically diagnosed me, But she also diagnosed a lot of

I absolutely wouldn't say that it has sucked us up. I think that that's not a way I think. I think it's an extremely important movement in the history of people of humankind, for men and women and everybody included. So, but I do think that change happens in multiple phases. You can make a declaration, you can change the law, you can open doors, but what follows in terms of the intricacies of the experience takes more than one generation.

I don't even think eighty percent of people in their thirties are married.

But that means that, you know, our parents' generation saw marriage as a cornerstone experience. I meet you, and together we build the foundation of our life. We have developed the capstone experience of marriage, marriage or committed relationships, it doesn't matter. But the capstone thing means I've already developed. I've already built myself. I'm already on a certain track. I have an idea of what I want where I stand in the world, and you come as a confirmation

And so much of our culture is like self help, self life, self.

Too much self in front of every word.

Yes, yes, what word would you put there instead of self?

Other?

Other others?

You know, I think that the the over index, the over emphasis on the self at a detriment of our ability to actually think about others, is not necessarily helping us at this point, right.

I see the shift you're talking about from the other to ourself, and I think about it a lot, especially because of my cultural words. As you said, I want to visit my father, and after my father passed away, I wrote a whole piece about how obligation gives doesn't just take. It gives a lot. But I also think that there's this realness story.

And I think that we need more people in that sense, like you, you know you, it's very natural for you to write that piece, but in fact it's not a natural piece for others who know you to read, and it puts them in front of another dimension. You know, Obligation is not hot at this moment, it's not popular. Authenticity and personal truth and honesty is much more, you know, and we will forego our relationships at this moment in

I think, like you said, like you diagnosed the first time I met. It's extremely challenging because I have this other orientation. I want to be, you know, dutiful, and I want to in many ways model parts of what my mother has done. But I also have this real tension and expectation and experience of being a highly independent, individualized, you know, person in this world with a lot of freedom, a lot of choice. So that's why I ask the

Correct, it needs to metabolize. But I think if you're asking about the foundations of changing the dynamic between the roles, you know, I mean you. I came to hear you do a leader dialogue or a debate recently about masculinity.

Do you think they've had it? Have men had a revolution yet? Like a feminist revolution?

But from me, I think that women have had about fifty sixty years of examining their lives and their position in this world, and their aspirations and rights and narratives, and I think that men have not had it in a systematic a way. There are pockets, but they have not, And I think that in that sense, the restrictions are much stronger on the men.

Does there need to be a masculinity revolution?

I don't think if it as a revolution, I think that that everybody stands to gain from revisiting taboos, rigidities, set norms, and constraining and constricting narratives and roles. What's wrong? I mean, that's kind of an obvious thing. Why would why Why wouldn't we? And I think that it would change the lives of many. But that's the point of view, right right? Is status quo something that must be preserved or is there something inherently good in revisiting social norms?

Well, right now it seems like we're in a moment of reckoning with social norms, because I mean, I'm sure you've read a lot about the tradwife revolution or the kind of interesting it's not a revolution, yes, okay, the trade wife trend, yes, the tradwife trend, yes, the kind of women looking for a guy and finance sex five, et cetera trend. Do you see any of these as like, are these extremely nostalgic or they reactions to our time? How do you make sense of these gender role like reassertions?

Every time you go to see an exhibit on the generate.

Art every every Tuesday for me, yes, I.

Mean there have been amazing exhibits of that. You get a sense as to what was considered degenerate. And one of the first things that was considered degenerate is gender roles that become more fluid, And what was considered degenerate was kind of a blurring between fiction and reality and

That makes it sound like it's something that's happening, But I think women are lasting for something. I think there's a sense of like, I kind of think.

They may participate in this the same you know, it's not that it is imposed on them, but it is related to a recreation of a certain social order that is broader than just gender, and it comes with authoritarianism autocratic regimes. The same thing happens around sexuality.

You know.

I had a conversation with you. Never forget the first question he asked me is why does every authoritarian regime come with an instant repression around sexuality. It's messy, and authoritarianism doesn't like messy blurred lines, blurred roles.

And all of that.

Trad Wives is very clear. You know, you've defined it to me. The way she dresses, she cooks, she bakes, she's, she's she can mean, you know, the whole, and that art exists. I mean, it's very interesting to look at it historically because it brought a sense of structure order. Everyone knows their place, isn't it.

Also, like about what you said, what is considered degenerate at the time is like an opposition to whatever.

The generate is always considered the same thing. The blurring is considered degenerate. The blurring of genders is the general. The blurring of higher chides the general.

So it's not like it's not like child wives are degenerate because they're pushing against the current. It's always know, what.

Is considered not okay is kids who think that they have too much importance, rather than there are little ones that are very nicely, obedient and dressed and stand by you like this. You know, I wish everybody else wishes their kids would stand like that, nice nicely next to them. Everybody is in their place, which makes it easier for others to move them.

Right, to control the system. So there's also this other narrative right now that men are being commoditized. Did you watch them? You watch the movie Materialists? Yes, okay, what did you think of the Materialists as a concept the relationship, not the film, but the idea for this.

It's all in the math.

Yeah, it's all a transaction.

It's all in the math.

Yes, you agree that that's how our culture looks at it.

I think that there is something about that in our culture. Yes, I think this is consumerism marrying romanticism becoming romantic consumerism. Yeah, that's it's it's you know, it's emotional capitalism.

So the idea, I mean, the way the film for people who haven't seen it came out.

He's a ten, he's a ten, he's a unicorn, she's a six, Yeah exactly.

I mean, it's just amazing everyone has a number. And then to promote the film, they put a stock price ticker literally at the you know, the New York Stock Exchange, that had men and their height and their salaries, and they were running them up and down as if it was a exchange. It is terrible do you think, do you think that sex has become commoditized these days? Or not sex the act of sex, but relationship has become commoritized, consumerized, you say, And then yes I do. And who is

Everybody, people are the commodity. I mean, you know, the concept of emotional capitalism is an interesting crossover, right because what happens is that on the one hand, you have all these psychological terms that have entered the business world, and we talk about psychological safety, and we talk about

And as soon maybe there won't be a human being. People are having romantic relationships with their ais now they may yes, would you all things equal? Rather date in nineteen eighty five or twenty twenty five? Oh all right, Chris of ANTM Family, a little cliffhanger there for you.