Hi, guys, and welcome back to another episode of Life on Card.
I'm Brittany and I'm Laura. And guess who's in my dead Drew.
I think they know it's me.
Brittany is back, Babies.
It's not Jason Momoa, and it's not Laura's hall pass. It is, in fact, just me. It is not Matt either. You know, he's often here in my bedroom. Surprising for everyone. I know, Brittany is back. She's back in old Sydney Town. She's here in the Eastern suburbs. And I know how thrilled you are to be back amongst my dirty laundry.
Truly, nothing has changed.
It's honestly like I never left. Like sitting here, this is our first proper record back together. I actually feel like I never left.
I should have made it a bit fancier for you. Shouldn't like I could.
I've gotten maybe a champagne, but after the weekend that I just had, I never fucking want to see a champagne again.
No, no, do. I we're too old for We both tried to go out.
It was a disaster. I'm too old.
I'm too My liver is gone, my kidneys, everything, it's my back hurts.
I came home at midnight to think with the girls. I went out for dinner. I actually wasn't even gonna go. I said, I have to prep for this episode tomorrow, and then like you have to have a life, and I'm like, fine, I'm coming to dinner, but I need
to go home after that. Thinking in my head i'd be, i'd eat, I'd be home by nine, nine thirty and when midnight rolls around, I've got this We've got to record at eight am that I haven't yet prepped, and I was like, guys, I need to go home and do this record now, to go home at midnight start working.
I woke up and I don't have to wake up to kids. You've got to wake up to kids.
I felt like I had been hit by a semi trailer, not of us, a semi trailer having.
A hangover when you've got children.
It's just the most like masochistic form of torture, Like why would you do it?
It's just evil.
But also I am not used to this, and I think that half of Australia, I mean Melbourn's out of lockdown, you South Wales' is that of lockdown?
Half of Australia. It's not half is it's it's a good chunk.
It's a solid chunk of Australia.
Chunk of Australia who's probably still nursing a hangover. But my hangovers are no longer like one day, and they're also unjustified. I only had a couple of margaritas and a glass of wine, and it's like the punishment doesn't match the crime.
That's how I feel.
You know what your problem is, old, No, that's one two. You mix margarita's with wine.
Oh yeah, it was a good time.
Though.
You have to pick your lane and stay in your lane. You can't just be going willing Nelly with spirits and different cocktails.
I know.
It's like back in the day when I was like eighteen and I'd mix Membora with white wine.
I'd wake up fine. I was like fifteen years ago.
It's like my used to be, like when I was young and had a six pack. My sister's like it was twenty years ago.
Yeah as well. Times have changed, But you know what I did.
This is what okay, this is my first Is it a foray or ferrah foray? What is it when you go out into the world again. I've forgotten because I haven't been out in the world for a while. Okay, what we did on Saturday night was we went to a friend's fortieth birthday party. And her name is Carla. She was the makeup artist on The Bachelor Laura.
Maybe Carla doesn't want all Australia to know how old she.
Is the fourth true Maybe actually, you know what, she's living her best life. She's the best. So she's Osher's makeup artist. And we went to her fortieth which meant that we had dinner with Osha and Matt Agnew and it was just this weird bachelor reunion, but also it was really great.
My boat party too, was also like a weird bachelor reunion. I was on a boat party incidentally with Holly and Jimmy. That was interesting because Jimmy Camappen was like hey.
I was like, hey, did you like we matched on Tinder. I was like hey, I was like hey, so did you tell hollywe matched on Tinder?
He was like yeah, and I was like cool.
And then it was just like this that were really great? Was it was?
It was fine, but I was like this first moment of like cool, like I feel like we know each other, but we've never actually met.
Now we matched.
He's like, yeah, you ghosted me, and I'm like, cool, I did that too, and then she was there and it was an interesting triangle.
How does it feel to have the upper hand to know that I go to the Bachelor you ghosted Australia's most eligible man this year.
I said to him, Look or in hindsight, everything happens for a reason. Imagine who knows what would have happened if we didn't go. You might never have met Holly.
So you maybe have been dating the kinky Captain, could have happened. No, but it's always okay. It sounds I feel like we sound like wankers, being like, yeah, we feel like had Bachelor reunions.
It is always weird.
I find seeing people from the Bachelor franchise outside of the Bachelor environment so weird.
I would never intentionally put myself in that situation.
Yeah, we're but guys, we actually, I mean, we've got an awesome episode for you today. This is a bit of a different one. We're talking about compatibility on this episode, but it was I don't know, it kind of started off that we wanted to talk about how important is compatibility in a relationship, like how do you navigate when
things are different? And then we thought, actually, let's touch on a few different types of incompatibility and to couples who maybe conventionally people might look at their relationship and go, oh, how do they make that work? So in order to unpack this whole concept around compatibility, we also wanted to reach out to you guys, to the listeners and if you're following us on Instagram, we put up some stories
and we did a call out. Basically, we wanted to know who of you are in relationships where compatibility has been a part of the conversations that you had to have early on. For example, if you're navigating into faith or interracial relationships, just two people who have come together from significantly different backgrounds and overcome or made it work. So we do have a couple of people on the
podcast today to tell their stories. We're going to get into that a little bit later and we're going to unpack the whole conversation around compatibility.
But before we do that.
We want to talk about what everybody is talking about. Alec Baldwin, holy shit, holy.
Shit, it's insane and I buy Now. Surely you guys have heard and you've had this conversation with your friends or you're hearing everyone talk about it. But Alex was on the set of one of his films and he accidentally shot and killed somebody. He shot and killed a crew member with a prop gun. So this is a gun that obviously was not supposed to have any live ammunition in it. It is supposed to be able to be shot, and nothing actually happens, but it looks like a real gun.
Everybody in the industry is up in Ar'm saying, I don't know how this could have possibly happened. How could this have gotten through all the checks that was supposed to get to to get to the point that a gun is fired on set and kill somebody.
And there are so many.
Aspects to this that are captivating the world. There are so many discussions coming off the back of this about set safety and how this happened. But I just I can't get my head around it. I tried to put myself in his position. Could you imagine what Alec Bald wanted to be feeling right now?
Oh man?
Like, I mean, apart from like the complete and utter distress and heartbreak, like he killed somebody, whether or not it was a mistake or an accident, all of those things aside. Imagine living the rest of your life knowing that an accident that was made was altered in you killing someone. And now Alec Baldwin is an actor on this the movie is called Rust. He's an actor on the set obviously, but he's also the producer, so his level of liability in this whole scenario goes beyond just
being an actor who has handed a prop gun. But we went down a rabbit hole.
With this, like really did?
I am stuck deep in the warren because it is just it is so fascinating as much as it is heartbreaking. It is fascinating and there are so many different facets to this story, and every day more information is coming out. But just to give you guys an overview in case you know, maybe you've heard of it or you've seen the headlines, but you haven't actually read the story. The woman's name was Hala Hutchins. She's forty two years old. She has a nine year old son, and she was
a cinematographer on set. And when it comes to movie sets that have guns as part of their props. There are so many safety regulations that are supposed to be put in place, so many that it seems completely unfathomable that something like this would have happened. Now there is there's been some reports of people have come out and said for this to happen, there must have been a great deal of neglect around safety and precautions because it
just doesn't make sense. And there have been a few key players in this story where they're trying to unpack where their responsibility lies. A couple of people that are important to mention are the gun armorer. So they have a dedicated senior gun armorer on set. Her name was Hannah Guziera Read. She's twenty four years old, and she is responsible for checking the guns, making sure that it
has blanks loaded. She's the one that's responsible for calling the safety precautions on set every day whenever a gun is on set. And then there is also another man, and that is the assistant director, Dave Halls. Dave Halls is basically the guy who put the gun in Ali
Borwyn's hand. He was the one that called cold gun on set, and cold gun is basically the term that's used whenever there is a prop gun or any gun that's on set, and it is supposed to identify that it's been through all the safety checks and that there are no rounds in the gun at all, and the rounds that are usually used would be blanks. Ammunition is never allowed on set, so the fact that this even had real live ammunition in it is just a whole other level of crazy.
Then that gets to another level. So this once you started digging, so many things keep coming out. Now there is a woman named Maggie Goll. Maggie Goll is a prop maker and a licensed proto technician. Now, she had filed an internal complaint with the executive producers of Hulu's Into the Dark TV series back in twenty nineteen, and this was over concerns about assistant director Dave Hall's conduct
on set. So this same man that handed the gun that actually had the ammunition in it to Alec Baldwin had already had a complaint put in about him two years earlier about the same thing. She alleged in an interview that Hall's had previously not followed safety protocols for weapons and proto technics when she worked alongside him in the TV series.
So two years ago.
This has already come out saying, look, something's not right. He's not doing what he's supposed to do with his gun safety. Now he is just one person. Then we have Hannah, who Laura just mentioned. So she's the other person whose sole job, that is her job, that is the reason she is on set. She's literally the armorer. That is her whole purpose to be there is to make sure that everything is loaded properly, everything is safe,
the gun's are ready. It's also come out that not that long ago, she was on a podcast herself talking about her experience in her job, talking about what she has to do, and she actually stated that she didn't feel ready to be taking on the level of responsibility that she had been taking on recently. So she's come out and said, like, these are really crazy jobs. I don't feel like I'm really ready for that. But somehow she has ended up on this set, she has ended
up running it. She's a head armorer, she's the daughter of one of the world's best armorers. And this has happened so so far, we've got two to three people where this live bullet, this live ammunition has somehow made it through these people into a gun into the hands Valley Baldwin. How this is happening still is beyond everybody.
And also in regards to Hannah. So I mean when I say we went into a rabbit's born, on this, we went into a rabbit's orn. So Hannah being the gun. She also has a very checkered past. And now she's only twenty four years old, she's new to the industry. As Britches said, she felt completely unprepared and like she didn't have the experience to be put into the position of head armorer. So Hannah previously on another job which only just recently wrapped filming. It was called the Old
Way film. They had to holp filming on that because she was responsible for giving an eleven year old boy a fully loaded gun.
So she has.
Already pied like you've got one job, Hannah, mate, check the gun, Like are we kidding anyway?
So there's just so many levels.
Here where there have been like people screwing up on their jobs, not taking health and safety into consideration. Other crew members had already walked out over concerns of health and safety.
They had already walked out.
Because of thirteen hour work days. And I know the big question that everybody is asking that doesn't have an answer to it yet is how the hell does live ammunition get into a prop gun. But secondly, I think the other big question that people need to ask is what sort of liability does Alec Baldwin have beyond just being the actor who pulled the trigger? If he is the producer of this film, what is his responsibility when it comes to health and safety.
Yeah, just six hours before the actual shooting, a whole bunch of crew members walked off not only for poor working conditions, Laura, but actually because there was actually an incident where a prop gun was accidentally misfired earlier in the filming, So they'd actually already had an incident with gun relations. So there were people on set that were like, this is crazy, we don't want to be here anymore. Six hours before this unfortunate event unfolded.
Now, Britt and I had a bit of a debate about this, Like we had a heated debate on the phone before, because Britt was like, I feel sorry for Alec Baldwin, and I don't think it's at all his responsibility or his fault. I feel very sorry for Ali Baldwin and of course I feel sorry for Alec Baldwin. I feel incredibly sorry for him. But I do think when there is health and safety issues in a workplace and it's already been voiced, that has to be managed from top tier, right like it is the people who
are in charge. It's the CEOs of companies, its producers on set. It is their responsibility to ensure that the safety and the environment that their crew are working in is not compromised. And if you have your staff essentially working extreme hours they're fatigued. How can you then not take some responsibility when people are not doing their jobs properly. And I think the big issue that I have with this whole thing is that people had already voiced their
concerns for it. Now there has actually been some more reports that came out today and this was reported in TMZ. I just want to tell you this because this is a fucking wild guys. The prop gun that killed cinematographer Hala Hutchins on New Mexico movie set had been used by crew members off site for fun, and new report claims the gun, which was fired by Alec Borwan on set of the movie Russ, may have even been loaded with live rounds when it was used for was essentially
target practice. Multiple sources connected to the production and the film told TMZ that the gun was fired at off the clock gatherings, which could explain how round found its
way into the gun's chambers. This is wild, and I think is something huge like this happening in a very public setting doesn't do something for gun reform, and at least gun reform in these sorts of scenarios, I would be very surprised, because it's just devastating that at the end of the day, a forty two year old mother with a nine year old boy has lost her life and a little boy has become motherless.
Yeah, and on top of that, I mean that would make sense if those allegations are true that they were using the gun off site for target practice, that would make absolute sense. But what that also means is that the armorah didn't check it again before she handed the gun. So maybe she's checked it a day earlier, maybe she checked it in the morning. But I feel like this sort of thing comes down to when you were physically about to hand the gun over.
I feel like that's when it should be checked. Now in regards to Alec Baldwin.
Okay, yes this is I was like, I have one more thing to say about the Alec Baldwin think I want to know.
In regards to Alec Baldwin, I do not think that he is at fault. I think what has happened to him he could very well be charged for manslaughter, which is obviously when something tragic like this has happened. But there has never been any intent. But it is not his job. And anyone that says it is his job to have checked that gun, that's that's not what he's there for. That is not what he's employed for. He's employed as an actor, and he's employed as a producer.
Now for people saying that it's a producer's role, it's actually not.
It is actually not.
A producer's job to do this.
I want to tell you the difference between a producer and a director. So a producer, which is what Alec Baldwin is, is the person responsible for like finding and launching the project, so they find funding and things like that. They hire the writers, they hire the directors, they hire key members, and they're involved in like the pre production, the production and the pros production.
The director is.
A man named Joel Susa. Now the part we haven't told you yet is Joel Susa was also shot. He hasn't died, but he was injured in this as well, so he's also in hospital. He was shot because he was standing behind. He was shot on the shoulder, Yeah, which is just horrific. But the director, which is Joel, the man that was shot. A director is usually employed to routinely check in with heads of every department to communicate their needs and ensure that their creative vision properly
translate to the big screen. Ultimately, it is the director's job to check in with each department to say, hey, how's it going, what do you need? Can I do anything for you? And make sure it's running smoothly. There will definitely be people saying I'm not saying that what happened was absolutely no one's fault or completely someone's fault.
I'm not putting the blame of anyone.
Obviously, this has gone through so many people and it's beyond me how it made it this far. But I feel horrific. My point is I feel horrific for Alec Baldwin because he's not a trained armorer. In his mind, he's like cool. That's why I have all these people on set. I'm the actor. I'm here ready. It should have gone through two people, at a minimum three people. I'm ready to go. Like he's not trained in that. So I feel very very sorry for him. I feel
sorry for everyone involved. I think it's horrific. He could face charges, he may not. We're not really going to know until there's a proper investigation.
Oh, Like, I.
Agree with so much of what you're saying, And of course it is a incredible tragedy. And like I'm not here saying I don't think him going to jail or him being charged with murder or manslaughter. I don't think that that solves what the problem is here. And I don't know what the right problem. I don't know what the right resolution is. I don't know what would make this okay, because nothing will make it okay. Someone's dead.
But when you say his job is he's a producer, so he gets the team together, do your fucking diligence check. You check the person's references. If that armor has already had complaints against her because she's twenty four years old, she put a gun in an eleven year old's hand and they had to stop filming. You hired her. There's
some responsibility there. If Dave Halls has already had a long checked past with complaints against health and safety and his attitudes towards gun safety on set, you're responsible for hiring these people. And so that's why I feel a little bit more like, as much as I feel so sorry on all levels, exactly like you do, Britt, I do think that there is a greater level of onus here.
Nothing that I have read so far has really put claim to that, whereas everything is putting all the responsibility on Dave Hall's and also on Hannah who was the armorer. And I do understand at the end of the day the buck stops with them. But as an employer, if you employ people who are not good enough at their jobs, or who have a history of not doing their jobs properly, why didn't you check that?
Yeah?
Now did you employ them?
I totally hope you're saying too, But I still don't think the blame is on him, like I think, ultimately this is just it's so so unfortunate, it's so upsetting and tragic, and it's so messy. There are so many moving pieces in this it's going to be really hard to investigate. I'm very, very interested to see what happens at the end of this. And I think what it really comes down to is budget people have tried to take and whether that's Alec, whether that's I don't know who's involved.
And that's the thing we don't know.
We're all just.
Reading news articles that people are vomiting out. Someone has probably cut some corners with budget and tried to keep it really, really low. And unfortunately, when it comes to things like guns on set, it's the last place that you should be trying to cut corners and save money. It's just safety comes first and that's probably what you should be throwing your money out totally.
And if you have your staff working crazy, crazy hours, I mean that is truly a budget issue, right Like when people are worked to the bone or they work sixteen seventeen hour days, it's because they're understaffed. And I think that this has been a conversation that's been happening on a much greater scale in the entertainment industry in
the States recently. So there's so much more to unpack here, and as this story develops, maybe we'll give you guys some updates, But I feel like Brittany and I are quite hated all there.
We're so into.
It, like we were just talking about it and I don't want to say into it like it's bad, but like we're just so enthralled at how this sort of thing can happen.
But anyway, we'll update you as we go.
So our recommendation for this week is to read the news. Ah, great, thanks for coming to Life on Cut. Okay, let's talk about something more upbeat.
Hey, how did we do so? Accidentally? I'm filters? What a segue?
All right?
I am ready for all right, I'm going to give you a really fucking pretty funny and it's we've never had anything like this for an accidentally unfilter.
I'm so I need this in my life.
Okay, that's so gross.
Oh my god, I've missed you so much.
Just seeing the laugh like in IRL, just being right here across from the cackle.
God, it's heart warming. It was worth the way. Oh man, it's been long four months in the desert.
I was eating some pudding. That's not it's just so funny.
I was eating some.
Pudding while sitting on my bed and watching TV.
After that I decided to trip my fingernails, because that's just what you do.
Once I was.
Done, I realized there was a bit grubby to cut my nails while sitting on my bed, and I needed to clean up the clippings, so I scooped them up and just dumped them into my empty pudding bowl. Because because it's lockdown, I'm lazy and the episode was reaching his climax. Obviously didn't want to get up just to put these little clippings in the bin. I thought I
would take them away when I'm done. So after the finished I got up to take my dishes to the kitchen, I decided, you know what, I might just treat myself to another small serving of pudding.
I then happily thought I would save myself some washing up, and I just reused my bowl. Made sense.
It wasn't until the scraping the cream off the bottom of the bowl I felt a fingernail in my mouth and I remembered what I had done.
I might be the grub of a century. I ate all my fingernails in my pudding. The only thing that makes this.
Like remotely better, he said, it was your fingernails and not your toenails, because if there was your toenails, I would I probably would go make myself ump it.
It's like the best ax ellely I felt it.
It's so innocent a lot because you've just done it to yourself. There were no witnesses.
You never had to share that.
Imagine if you were sharing it, though, would have made the story better. Imagine if your fingers ate it up on your boyfriend's mouth. No, just like a first date, you're like, you have some pudding.
Oh my god? Do you know what my life consists of?
Walking around telling Molly to get her finger out of her nose now, and every time she's like, yeah, Mummy, my boogers are green every day. Yeah, it's the same conversation. We have a lot of the same conversations with my toddler. Wow, do you have an accillent im filter? I? Okay, I do, Guys. Something mortifying happened to me today. I was in the office speaking to a coworker who is in a specialized at bougie program and I would die to be in
this program. She holds a lot of sway due to being quite a senior member, and I've been trying to impress her for the last couple of months. As my other coworker and I have chatting to her at our desk, I try and act casual and I put my hand in my back pocket and feel something soft in there. I thought, you know what, it's an antibacterial white. We used to wipe things down on the desk and the phone and everything else. So I pull it out, and as I'm pulling it out, I'm standing there holding it
in my hands. And then after about twenty seconds, I look down to find that there I am holding my worn, silky undies that I wore all day yesterday and overnight.
I had grabbed them off the bathroom floor. This morning after showering, I had grabbed podfort that's what you do with your dirty undies. She says.
She lives in a sharehouse and she didn't want to leave them on the floor, so she just absent mindily put them in her pocket. Anyway, Apparently the woman had been looking at them, and that's why she looked down, and then she.
Just tried to carry on and pretend like nothing had happened. No, like you have your uneasying your hand. Do you know what this reminds me of?
This reminds me of that girl that accidentally took her well, I mean she didn't accidentally. She purposely took her tampon out when she went home on a date and she was like and she she didn't have anywhere to put it, so she's like, oh, just put it in my jean's pocket, her black tampon, her used tampon. She put it in the back of her black jeans pocket, wrapped up in toilet paper because it has been it was not wrapped up.
She whipped it out. She was about to have sex with this.
Guy and she wanted to pretend she didn't have a period, so.
She just whipped it out and put it in her jean pocket.
But no, but that gets worse because the next day she's like, she put a jeans on and left. She's like, I better take the tampon out, and she realized it wasn't there. She put it in his jean pocket. So he had the tampon in his jean pocket. See, Irapy, you were dead, you are dead. That is still one of my favorite accidently on filters. It's ever happened, but this just makes me think of you know, how small kids have a comforter or a little bit of a blankie.
I'm just imagining.
I'm outing Keisha I producer, Keisha has one. She's staying in my house, so I know, I'm just imagining.
I'm imagining her standing there, talking to her boss and pulling it out and like holding in her hands, playing with it like she's playing with the confident, just playing with a pair of dirty underse.
Or like a stress ball, like rolling in between her fingers.
Hey, guys, that is it.
Let's get into the chat around compatibility and how important it is in your romantic relationship. Well, you know what, is it compatibility or is it chemistry?
What?
I don't know? I think they go.
I mean, I do know that was I've done the research. Compatibility in chemistry, they do go hand in hand. You do want a little bit of both. But I think people often confuse the two. I think when there's a really high level of chemistry with someone, like when you just meet someone and you're like I want to oh, and you're like let me sit on you.
Yeah, and you're like this.
Is so sexy and there's so much heat and passion, I think people confuse that chemistry with compatibility. But by saying like we're just so men for each other, like we can't keep our hands of each other. Then what happens is you date for a little while and you're like, whoa, this person's actually boring as fuck. They're breathing annoys me, Like nothing about you.
I want to hang out with, but I still want to rip your clothes off.
See.
I don't know if people confuse I think that like for a lot of us, you would expect that it's intuitive, but I just don't think it is. I don't think people confuse chemistry and compatibility. I think they will force it. If you have insane chemistry with someone, you will try and make yourself believe that you're compatible, even if all the red flags and the warning signs are there to
say that you're not. We have done a whole episode around chemistry, But I think compatibility is a really interesting kettle of fish because it's kind of like you're more reliable brother of chemistry, whereas chemistry brother Chemistry is a liar. Right, Chemistry is what we can become infatuated with, and compatibility
is its more reliable friend. Now, when I think of compatibility and one of the things they think is really interesting about this conversation is that for men, compatibility is twofold. You need to be compatible in what you're doing now, as in like your morals need to align, and like when we say you need to be compatible. Firstly, I just want to preface this with compatibility does not mean that you need to be the same in every single facet of life. We all know that opposites can attract.
We all know that you can be very different in many ways to your partner. However, there has to be an undercurrent of core values or beliefs or something that binds you. Whether it's it's your views on the world, whether it's the fact that you're both vegans, whether it's how you treat other people, whether it's just because they're a really nice person and that's what you value at the end of the day. Like, there has to be some deep seated level of compatibility, and then you can
have all your other varying factors around you. Know, maybe you do have different religions that you believe in, maybe you are from really different upbringings, Maybe your perspectives on money different. There can be so many different parts of a relationship where compatibility comes into play. But the other really really important thing about compatibility is that it has direction. So not only are you thinking about, well, what do you and I have and share in our core values?
But where is this a relationship heading? And is this relationship like do we want to have kids in the future, how are we going to raise our kids? Where do we want to live? How many times a week do we have to see your mum? These are the sorts of things that can really dictate whether not just a relationship works now, but whether a relationship is compatible in five, ten, fifteen years time.
Now that might have sound like a lot of information, but to break down compatibility, just to put it at a really base level, it's just the ability to live and work together in harmony, to want the same things, and to have a really good, solid calming environment. And like Laura said, it's to move forward directionally, compatibilities directional. So you do want to have this environment that you can not only live in in the now that is happy, but in the future.
Before we go any further with unpacking this, I'd love to know what are your opinions on opposites attracting.
I think opposites do attract I don't think you can be too similar for someone like for me personally, I look at all my relationships in the past, and the most disastrous relationship I ever had was with somebody that was too similar to me in terms of the way we our argument style, which I think is a really big one because I think argument style and things like that, like if or I don't know what the right word is, not argument style, but the way we thought. We were
both too passionate about it. We wouldn't let each other win. We're too stubborn. And maybe that's an age thing too, like I was a bit younger and I always wanted to be right. But for me, I think opposites do attract. And the people that I have been attracted to in the past Jordan, now they're very different to me in terms of being introverted and extroverted, and I think that this is a really key factor in dating now. We
have spoken about this in the past as well. You don't have to be an introvert, doesn't have to be with an extrovert. An extrovert can be with an extrovert, but you have to be able to meet in the middle on certain things. For me, I say that I'm an introverted extrovert because I am. You guys know what I'm like on the podcast, Like I am loud, I don't have a filter. I laugh a lot at my own jokes, but other people's jokes touper mainly my If I'm at the party, I like to be the life
of the party. Getting me to the party is the hard part. Like I do have this part of being introverted. When I'm there, I'm great for somebody. I'm dating someone like Jordan, and you guys will hear from him soon.
But he is the opposite. So he's very shy, he's very quiet. He's very happy to.
Let me tell my jokes and be the energy between us. But he's also really happy to have that introverted side with me as well, so he'll be happy to then sit at home watch a movie as opposed to going out partying. And I think that is why we work, because we're not one hundred percent opposite. We just have enough to compliment each other. But we want to do the same things in life, and we want to hang out and do the same things on the weekend. So the rest of it, he's like, you go party and
then we'll do something fun together on the weekend. So it's about finding that balance. So I think one hundred percent for me personally, I'm more attracted to people that are opposite to me.
It's interesting, isn't it, Because I would have said back in the day that like, opposites don't attract. I would have really I found it really hard to get my head around it. And I think the more the we have done this podcast, the more that we have spoken to so many different couples, the more I realized I was living in an echo chamber of my own thoughts. Like Matt and I are so similar. Sure, there's things that we don't like. I hate football, he loves football.
There's some stuff that we don't align on. But when it comes to like who we are at our core, we are exactly the same. And that's why we fight exactly the same.
Yeah, like, and.
Sometimes it's a really bad thing, and sometimes it's a really really great thing. But I think it's so interesting and like we will get into a couple of conversations we had in a little while with some of you who have come from like fundamentally different paths and fundamentally
different backgrounds and upbringings. However, there's still this base. And I think the really interesting thing about this conversation of compatibility is even if you aren't compatible, as in, even if you have different belief systems, whether like I said, whether it's that one person's a vegan one person's a meat eater, so long as there's respect for the other person's belief that's what defines compatibility.
I think.
So you can be you can not align on a lot of things in your relationships. Maybe you have very different political views. But if you respect each other's political views and it gives for like interesting debate and interesting discussions,
then that's a really healthy relationship. But if your political views are so important to you that you cannot respect someone who has a different political view to you, or you cannot respect someone who has a different religion or whatever it is, that's where compatibility is a huge part of why relationships break down.
There really is a strong argument from a lot of professors and a lot of professionals that argument and conflict is actually good in relationships. And it's exactly what you just said, Laura. You're never gonna have a relationship where you don't argue, But it's about how you argue and about how you disagree.
So if you can disagree and.
Debate each other with a lot of respect and in a really calm way, then that's healthy and that's encouraged. And it's like Laura and I like prime example, Laura, I would like to think that you and I are very compatible, but we had we just completely disagreed about Alec Baldwin. But that doesn't mean we're not going to be able to be podcast host because we disagree respectfully.
We listen to each other's opinions. We're like, I get what you're saying, but I think this, and I think that that's a really like that's a prime example of cool. We don't agree on this, but we have so many similarities and so much respect for each other in every other aspect that this makes it a compatible podcast hosting thing that we've got going on here.
We are but also on that I mean, and this is one of the this is one of the research studies that we pulled out for this because we can talk about compatibility and how important it is all day, but like I said, it is this huge undercurrent of respect that plays into it. And there is this quote psychology professor at the University of Texas. His name is
at Ted Huston. He conducted a longitudinal study of married couples, and he claims that maybe compatibility is a little bit overrated, right, and maybe we put too much focus on the need for everything to align. He says, my research shows that there is no difference in the objective level of compatibility between couples who are unhappy and those who are actually happy in their relationships. But the unhappy ones think compatibility is important to a good marriage, but they don't think
that they have it in their own marriage. People over emphasize the effect of personality or values, and they underemphasize the extent to which easy congenial temperaments aid marriages. So basically what he's saying then, is like, if you're a nice person to get along with, if you're a kind to your partner, if you have mutual respect with your partner, if you love each other and you seek to better understand each other, that is more important than being compatible.
That is more important than having like for like. You can be really different to your partner, but if you respect who they are, where they come from, and why they show up in the relationship the way they do, you guys can make it work out.
Some of the big hurdles that we want to talk about, and the biggest hurdles that couples face in a relationship in regards to compatibility are things like race, religion, and politics now.
And philosophical views. I think that's a big one as well, philosophical views one hundred percent.
And also, like we will get into this in a minute, the big things like race and religion and culture differences, they are very big driving factors, unfortunately, because it results in the way you want to, for example, raise your children. If you have very different ideas on how you want to raise your children that comes from your religion, it's going to be a big wedge in your relationship.
It's not just about how you want to raise kids, it's also about how you navigate your relationship in the now. Obviously, if you're from a Christian background, sex before marriage can
be a huge conversation. And if you're somebody who's not religious and maybe you have had quite a free and exciting sex life in the past dating somebody who's reserving themselves for marriage, that's a huge conversation to have, and that is very different and a very unique situation that requires a lot of respect and requires so much communication to make that work.
And that just comes down to what you know you want in a relationship and who you are. So there's no right or wrong. If you want to save yourself a marriage because that's what you're believing, that is absolutely, that's one hundred percent amazing, But you can't probably expect to go and date somebody that really wants to have sex. Now, I personally, when I think about compatibility, I if I met someone on a date, like first date, I'm talking, I don't know them, so I haven't got to know
their soul and who they are. I've gone on a date with someone and they're like, hey, I don't want to have sex. Before marriage was like girls gonna eat? I was like, do you mind grabbing the bill? Like I gotta get home, Sorry, I have a guy.
That they need to text and there's Brittany writing a you up text.
But for me, sex in a relationship is important, Like it's for my values and my beliefs. The intimacy that comes with sexual relationships, that's what's important to me. And I think that So if I met somebody that wasn't really on that wavelength. It's just not gonna work. And I think that's a big driving factor for compatibility. When I write down a list of what I want.
I think sexual compatibility is huge and actually it's probably one of the biggest paradigms on this. Like we didn't mention it before, but you said, you know, religion, race, philosophical, cultural sex is a huge one as well. Are you compatible in the bedroom?
Yes or no?
I so this can I actually be a really interesting time to get into the conversation with Kurt and Daisy. Now Kurt and Daisy we got to interview them. We did put the call out to everybody to try and garner these really interesting relationships who have come to the table with very different backgrounds. Daisy is from the UK. She identifies as agnostic. She has no religious preference really and I guess she describes herself as a little bit
more spiritual. Whereas her boyfriend Kurt, he is an evangelical Christian. He has been very much brought up as very integrated in the church, an extremely proactive member of the church, and his family are devout Christians. They talked about what it's been like navigating dating when they come from such different belief systems when they have such different ideas around sex and what that conversation.
Is like, I think because with the church, like it does from an outside point of view, it's obviously like a really tight knit community and Kurt's families really involved, and it kind of just felt a bit like I was on the outside of something in some weird ways. I felt like I was almost corrupting you.
You probably were, which in all honesty, she did, Yeah, in all honestly, Like I had to come to a point where I was like, well, what are our values? Like do we have the same values? Now that's kind of the core thing that I lent on, but rather what do we actually care about? Like what we what's the bigger things that we care about? And that's why I moved the conversation personal question.
But was their compromise so like, Kurt, were you no sex before marriage? Were you not wanting to drink? Like how strict were you in your faith? And then was a compromise on that when you guys met?
Yeah?
So for me, yeah, like I was waiting for a marriage, like to have sex, and I guess I'd always had this kind of open mindness about it as well, so I wasn't just like this is just a way that it would go.
I was like, if I.
Really fall in love with someone, we build a really solid relationship, I would be open to it. But the kind of idea was marriage.
I remember when Kurt told me that, and because I'd obviously known about like the faith and everything before, and then when that came up, and I think, because we've had drinks together and this sounds like maybe a bit ignorant, but I was like, oh, he seems so normal, like surely not Like surely that wouldn't be the case. And then when I found out, I think there was part of my mind that was like, can you really call someone your boyfriend if you haven't slept with them?
Yeah?
To me, that was like crazy because from the culture that I come from, you can build a really great connection and relationship without sex.
When you're brought up in the church and your life is centered around your beliefs, that also is mostly very much ingrained in your family values as well. How has it been navigating for both of you, essentially the in laws, like meeting each other's family, being accepted into each other's family, knowing that you both have different faith and different belief systems.
I think that's still the tricky one because of COVID, Like our relationships have kind of been built on like this crazy time of not really getting to connect with one another's friends. We've spent a lot more time together. One of the things that my mum actually did say was when I first told mom about Daisy, was like, oh, does she have the God factor?
And what is the God factor?
I know, it's pretty much it's pretty much does she believe in God? Is she a Christian? It's like kind of like you know, slang by saying is does she believe what we believe?
And I was like, no, she doesn't.
It was Daisy that in the beginning of the relationship, and it was a terrible thing. I've told her because it's pretty much at the time and didn't think about it. Pretty much told her, hey, like, my family won't accept you if you're not this, But that wasn't the case. It just that's how it came across. My family ended up coming to Sydney for a bit and Daisy didn't meet them briefly. It's kind of like how Daisy spent time with me the first time. She just seems normal
because like, my family are normal. They just have this yeah but like sometimes oh no, like they're religious and are scary, but my family are very normal. They just have this very cool thing that brings them together and that is part of convers station. But my dad actually pulled me aside after they were just about to go back and just said, hey, if you love Daisy, that
we love daisy, you know. So for me that was really important and yeah, I was, like, I guess a really moving moment for me because even myself I was kind of like there's a lot of shame and guilt and like, this isn't what I think the quick cutter thing that my parents would want for me, but it's just not how it's happened, and that's just had to accept that.
What do you think of the biggest challenges that you guys have, knowing that you both come from these different backgrounds.
I feel like one of our biggest things actually has just been trying to overcome fear of judgment from like our different friendship groups or family. That's probably been one of the biggest things. And weirdly, COVID has been quite good for that because we have just spent a lot of time in our own bubble.
How is that presenting itself? And is it more from your friends or your side or like whose side is this judgment coming from? All these feelings of inadequacy?
It was definitely both because I think, especially around the sex thing, for my friends, like that's like really weird, like if you're seeing someone for a certain amount of time and you haven't slept with them, And for Kurt's friends, it would be like really weird the other way. So it wasn't any like really negative judgment. It was just almost this otherness like between our friendship group.
Yeah, and then I guess when we kind of moved through that, Like for myself, it just it doesn't seem.
Like the biggest thing.
If I could be honest, I think that in a relationship, sex is a great thing, but there's so many other things. Communication is like I think if you're gonna have good communication, you can build a good relationship. There's just so many different layers, and I found that that's a great way, like for intimacy, but even just like good conversation and being open and being willing to like compromise and listening
to one another. Those things. I found those things are more richer and better for me than the physical side of things.
This whole idea the opposites attract. How do you find that impacts your relationship? Like do you find that, yeah, we had that these things that are opposite, but who we are and what we want is aligned.
I think actually, all the things that came with like Kirk growing up with a religion are all the things that have given him like really good values and like ability to communicate. We were saying on the walk here when you know, I was kind of considering, oh, is religion Is that the red flag at the beginning of
the relationship. And if I think about other people that I've dated, and I've kind of been okay with their things, like you know, people smoking weed every day and like doing like not so nice.
Like I'm not preparing religion to weeds.
Snow No, But it's like, oh, like I'm okay with things like that that like you know, and I'll put up with things like that. But then it comes to religion and it's like, oh, that's that's a red flag.
That's a no.
I think, yeah, like why is the religion the red flag as opposed to the drugs?
It's normalized because it's like someone smoking weed or like taking drugs, like it's normalized. But it's been like, even though we are opposite in that way, we're really really similar in values. And I think that's like the common threat.
It's just this ongoing thing, like a relationship is just going to be ongoing, and that's what makes it kind of fun because it is hard, but that's what makes it worth it for me.
One of the really interesting parts of this conversation was this idea that compatibility is not static. It's a constantly shifting thing. And I think the more conversations that were had in Daisy and Kurt's relationship, the more that they realized how compatible they really were. And this idea that you can work towards something and have conversations and communicate towards something, and it's the understanding of where somebody else
is coming from. It's this understanding of their background that can also build compatibility.
That it's not just a static thing.
It's compromise, and that in that sense, compatibility has changed because now you're far more compatible because you've decided to make some compromise in your relationship. So one hundred percent if you do meet someone and there are so many aspects that you were just like thurrothing on and you want them in your life, but there's something that you deem not compatible. It could be worth having the conversation.
Yeah, And I think it also just lends itself to this idea that sometimes we think we know what we want, Like sometimes we have an idea.
Don't make me laugh, but do you know what I mean?
Like, sometimes we think we know what we want. We think we know that we have a checklist, or we have this idea of the type of person that we're going to meet, and then somebody comes into our lives and we're like, wow, I didn't expect that it was you, but it's you, you know. And I think that sometimes that can really bowl us off our feet. And if we get too hung up on I want someone who matches all my checklist in every single way, we kind of can go into relationships with a little bit of
a blinker. Now when we say when I say checklists, like, I'm actually not against them. I think it's kind of good to have some idea about the person that you want. And I think it's really good, especially if you're someone who it's really shitty people who are really poor for you, I think it's really important to have some sort of checklist or some sort of idea. But the thing is is like, you don't want that checklist to be so rigid that you're drawing and drafting up a Ken dole.
You want it to be more based around value as to who that person is at their deep core and does that align with what you want and what you love in life as well. Now, when we did the call out to you guys, because we wanted to get and we wanted to hear your stories. We wanted to know who in our life on cut community is living and navigating what might be deemed by other people as an unconventional relationship. We understand that there is no cookie cutter,
There is no one size fits all. Even the conversation between Daisy and Kurt. There are millions of other people navigating similar relationships and doing it very differently. But we wanted to make sure that we did our due diligence, and we also spoke to an interracial couple who's one of our listeners. Amelia has been with her husband Brian for five years. Amelia was born here in Australia. She's Caucasian and her husband was raised Buddhist and he was
born in China. Amelia speaks a lot about how being in this relationship has made her very aware about microaggression and racism within Australia. It also became evident to her that a lot of the judgment that she felt was from their families and from their in laws, because their
families had expected or wanted something different for them. As I said, Amelia and Brian are happily married and it was so great to speak to someone who has successfully overcome some of the initial hurdles in regards to compatibility that I found at the beginning of the relationship.
So, Amelia, what were some of the issues that you did face early on in your relationship due to the fact that you do come from different cultural backgrounds.
There haven't been many issues between us, but it's been our families that have been the biggest issue. His mum especially was particularly concerned that I was Caucasian and therefore I wouldn't have the same family values as they did, and she often made very unfair assumptions about me, especially at the beginning of our relationship. Seems like, oh, she's Caucasian, so therefore she's not going to want the children to learn Mandarin. But these were all assumptions that she made,
essentially without getting to know me. And if you'd asked me, I would have thought it was a great idea for our kids to learn another language. Well, I wouldn't I want them to learn another language. I guess the biggest issue we had was other people's assumptions about each other.
And so, you know, for example, my parents would say things like, oh, he's he's all right for a Chinese guy, or his English is really good, and those sorts of comments are actually quite racist when you stop and you think about them, like, oh, somehow, it's this extraordinary thing that this person whose Chinese can speak English with an
Australian act. We would walk into a Chinese restaurant and people would just stare at us, or we would walk into an Italian restaurant and people would just stare at us, because somehow, in people's minds it was completely baffling to them that I could be Caucasian and he could be Asian and that we would love each other. Our particular relationship dynamic really confuses people because it's not that common but yeah, I definitely had no idea that racism still occurred,
and now I'm much more aware of it. I realized like those microaggressions that ethnic minorities face, and you just kind of go like, gee, they just put up with this, and they just kind of laugh it off because that's what their sort of conditioned to do, because if you call it out, then you bring more of an awareness to the problem and you can embarrass the other person. So they'd rather not embarrass the other person.
How did you overcome some of the cultural differences that you were face with and at the time did that involve a lot of compromise from the two of you.
So I think at the beginning, we possibly didn't quite put enough time into sort of educating me about Chinese culture and what was expected of me. And so as a result, the first actually like eighteen months of knowing his parents were really difficult because again of this sort of like preconceived idea that his mum had about me being white and how that would change or affect my values as a person, and therefore like it was just not compatible with their culture. And so actually it required
a lot of education. I had to speak to a lot of other Chinese people and kind of go like, what am I doing wrong here? The thing in Chinese culture is you're never outwardly discussing with someone what issues are, but it will be sort of like danced around, beating around the bush essentially, so I wasn't meant to talk
about things that I didn't like. If I had to address something that I didn't like, it had to be through him so he could essentially then like translate it to his parents in a way that they accepted it. Whereas I'm very open and very honest, and so I had to really learn to kind of keep my mouth shut and kind of talk to them through him. All I could do was just educate myself. So I just had to learn from other people what to do. How do I show respect to these people? How do I
show that I'm he is big with their son? And as I found out, my in laws are quite traditional. But this is like how you should treat your elders. Pour them tea, serve them food, give them the last bite of the food on the table, open doors for them, pull back the chair for them. I had to learn to do all these things, which obviously as a white person I'd never poured tea for someone before. It's just
like if you want tea for it yourself. One of the differences is that Brian doesn't celebrate Christmas at all, has never celebrated Christmas in his life, and I am big on Christmas. He was trying to weasel his way out of it because I've also got a birthday of December. So he was like, what do you mean I have to buy a birthday present and a Christmas present.
Like briant on board this ship, and.
So like I had to say to him, like, we're going to go buy a Christmas tree and we have to buy ornaments, and you know, you've got your big ornaments and then you've got like your little fillow that make the tree, you know, look nice as full. And then I have to tell him, you can't just give me the present in the packaging that it came in, Like you have to wrap.
It and you have to write a card, and you have to leave biscuits out for Santa.
You have to do a lot of stuff and you have to put it under.
The tree, like there's a process here and take take the price tag off.
Yeah, And so he was like, what do you mean, I have to wrap it, and so I was like, look, we'll buy some Christmas paper, like wrapping paper. This is sort of how do you write the present? He doesn't still doesn't wrap presents particularly well, but he's getting better at it.
So you guys, fully compromise on this in that now you celebrate Christmas, which is something that previously in his upbringing he never would have done. Yea. And are there any cultural ceremonies that you now celebrate that are Chinese that you obviously would never have been exposed to prior to Chinese Year?
Chinese New Year is like Christmas, New Years, every big event that we celebrate in the one event. And the think about Chinese New Year is that it changes dat every year, so it never falls on the same I'd like to keep your guessing. So it's usually at the beginning of the year February, but it changes every year.
With the relationship with your husband's family, when was it that they finally became more accepting of you?
It eventually it just shifted. I think they realized I wasn't going anywhere. They realized I was making an effort. I was doing the best I could, you know, like I don't have a background in this. I don't I wasn't brought up like fears and doing my best. And I think eventually we realized, like as a family, that I wasn't going anywhere, and therefore we all have to make an effort to make things more pleasant because we weren't going to be able to continue to move forward
in the manner that we had been. And so certainly there were more attempts at speaking English at the table. You know, often they would say something in Chinese and then one of the family members would then translate it into English for me, or we would have a conversation in English and then if someone didn't know a word, they would say it in Chinese, so then my husband
could translate it to me. So they certainly started to make the effort because I think we all realized that we just want what's best for Brian, and we you know, we all loved him, and essentially the way we'd been acting was we were like asking him which handy wanted to cut off, which we then realized we didn't wanted to cut off any hands. We wanted to be able
to move forward together. Brian, he realized he also had to kind of educate his parents about what I was like and what my family was like, and what my upbringing was like, so they could have a bit more context and understanding around why I was the way I was.
What advice do you have for anybody who is listening who might be navigating relationship that has cultural differences.
I think the biggest thing you can do is to educate yourself, and if that means even talking to people of the same race outside of your partner, to understand what the cultural dynamics are, to understand how does respect work, how do I show respect? And I think you know, being really frank with your partner going this is really tough. And if your partner can reciprocate that and go, I know, but you know, we'll figure it out together, then I
think you're on the right track. I think it's about being open and honest and realizing you don't have all the answers, and also realizing sometimes you have to swallow your pride. It's really difficult when you pride yourself as an independent, you know, open minded person that speaks the truth, and you're suddenly being told you can't talk too much or talk about things that will upset other people because
you know, you've got to keep the peace somehow. So I think part of it is is swallowing your pride. I know that's maybe not the nicest thing to hear, but just going like, this situation is difficult, and I need to make this peaceful somehow. I think there's no point trying to like be right in a situation all the time. Sometimes you've got to just let the waits or show over you eventually, you know.
Well, I absolutely loved these chats today. And the fact is there are so many different factors when it comes to compatibility in a relationship. There's no right or wrong, but there is a lot you need to think about. There's a lot you need to negotiate with your partner if you do have these fundamental differences and you do want a long term relationship, there is no two ways
around it. Unfortunately, if you do not have compromise in the relationship, you can never have a successful relationship where the compatibility seems too divisive.
Yeah, and I guess the big like take home message for me, especially after speaking to so many of you as well, is just like, and we say it every week, but the conversation around communication, you know, the more that you better understand your partner, the better you understand where they come from and how they show up in life, the easier it is to support them and to figure out whether or not you are actually compatible long term.
And I know for some of us, it's so fucking hard to ask those questions because it's not the questions that are scary, it's the answers that are scary. And I think sometimes we avoid it and we skirt around it because we're too scared of being disappointed and maybe having to try again.
But it's just so.
Awesome to speak to people, especially from our own little life, uncut family and community who we love. It's just so amazing to speak to people who have come from these different worlds and they're making their relationships work.
Okay, time for our suck and sweet. You know, we never finish an episode without it.
That highlights in our low lights are you can go.
First, you are back, my suck and my sweet, my sweet, my suck is you.
Were I did it around the wrong way?
No, my sweet, my sweet, is that your home and that we get to record together and that we're no longer having to look at each other on zoom and I can touch you and kiss your face.
It makes you give me the wrong idea of what happens, and you're suck.
And my suck for the week is that I had a fucking dirty hangover on Sunday.
Okay, this is unheard of, but our mind's exactly the same. My sweet has been back with you, and my suck is that I had a dirty hangover. The only good part about my dirty hangover is I didn't wake up to a trial. Oh I woke up to two of them. You could have had one of mine.
I had a spare.
We've never had the same sucking suite in life. That What a way to finish.
We're so compatible, We're so compatible. What a perfect end of the episode. Also, I'm going to check another suite in there. I just got to see some friends.
And god, it felt good.
And I put on makeup, but I will high her shoes and you look smoking. Oh man, do you know what it's Sometimes it's nice to like put makeup on and be like.
Remember, you're still hot. That's what my face can look like. I still haven't. That's that's better than what we thought. It's better than what I thought we were at we're working with something here. People. Guys, thanks to everyone that in.
We absolutely loved reading all your stories. We loved reading some of you weren't so successful in your relationships, but so many of you were, and that's really what we wanted to take home from this, so thank you to everyone.
Totally.
We didn't even touch on the fact that a lot of you guys were like, yeah, actually it didn't work out.
We just talked about the success stories.
Yeah it doesn't Maybe we can do another episode on the failures. But we you know, we love love here, so we wanted to highlight the successes and what the relationship that you can have. Just because you're from different parts of life. Please keep your accidentally unfilters coming in your confessionals any other awkward, embarrassing story.
Please. If you're eating pudding.
And cutting your toenails, don't put the toenails, cutting the pudding, and guys.
You know the drill, Tell your mom, tell your dad, tell your dog, tell your friends. I don't know, just tell everybody and share a lout because we love love.
I'm about to wear
Bakababao takaba bababa karabeo