You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast.
Mamma Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast is recorded on.
It's a bit like sex as well, like sometimes you just don't feel like it, like the thought of it. You're like, I don't know, I'd hate that. Oh no, i'd hate that, you think to yourself. But then you have a great time.
Hello and welcome to Mom and Mia out loud. It's what women are actually talking about on Monday, the twenty fourth of February. I'm Holly way.
Right, and I am back bitch is I'm meya f.
And I'm Jessees.
They're being cool if you're not watching Severance. Yeah, it's a Severance reference.
Yeah, correct, my friends exactly because we're at work, so we are yes, yef and your Holly is your hollyw W. And we've decided that actually talking about how much we love Severance is just trying to tell people how smummy this.
It's definitely a flex and if you do love Severance, we may be recording a subscript episode about it very soon. But on today's show, the person we're not talking about in the story of the parenting influencer who went to jail. Also, everyone's lonely, but no one wants to make plans. Why we're in the year of the Flake, unless you're mere Friedman, who has mastered the pre flake, and I have some
feedback for you about that. Also why we're all falling over ourselves to book into the White Lotus, even though the stuff might try and kill us there, But first mea Friedman.
In case you missed it, it's rough out there in the news cycle, which is probably why a post about whimsy went viral over the weekend. Whimsy is not a word that you hear very often, and I couldn't refine it myself, so I looked up the definition. It's like a playful, fanciful quality, full of odd or unpredictable ideas that brings lighthearted humor and makes ordinary things feel a
bit magical and joyful. So someone asked women in a video on TikTok what their whimsical little habits are, and the internet responded in a way that felt a little bit like a magical hug. Some of the answers included when my cat clearly wants something and meows at me, I tell her to use your words.
I often say that's shell.
Yeah, very cute.
For my own amusement, I say officers and nod. When I see pigeons, I say, may I take your coat while peeling garlic. I didn't understand that because I don't peel garlic very often.
The garlic's wearing little coats. Okay, paper coats.
I call my to do list, my tadar list, and do jazz hands as I tick things off. That's cute.
I like that.
I kiss my cat on both cheeks, then she kisses me on both cheeks. Then I explained she's European to no one. So can you think of many examples of whimsy?
I think everybody does it with their pets, right, Pets bring out the wims in you. We all have a voice for a dog. I assume I do for a very specific voice. But you know what, I was trying to do the voice before in the toilet, like I was warming up, and I was like, let's do the voice. I cannot do it unless she's there.
Yeah, okay, you can't conjure it.
Cute little face.
Yes, I know what you mean. Clara and I have exclusively spoken through the girls, babies and I've realized, you know, when you look at your your whimsical thing and you go, might actually not be that pc because Matilda speaks with an accent. I'm not going to say what accent, but she actually doesn't speak English English second it's her second language, because she doesn't yet, no, she doesn't. She babbles and we go, well, yes, that is her language. And so
we often text from the girls to one another. Clara and I haven't had a conversation in nearly two years. And the other thing, I imagine.
The twins life is full of whimsy. Yes, yeah, it is sort of magical. Every day little silly things you do.
And I realized that Lucra and I and you know when you tell it out loud and you just sound like the lamest person in the world. Luca and I have one where every night he gets into bed and he says, have you hidden my eye mask? Because he wears an eye mask? And what a ridiculous thing. Why would I hide his eye mask? And we play this whole thing where like I didn't hide your eye mask and then you find it anyway.
That sounds hilarious, hilarious, No, no, no, But.
Because the people's whimsies are hard. But then I stepped up.
It gets funnier.
Yeah, because then I started hiding it and it became a little game, and I hide it every night and then he can't find it, and then we have this little playful thing. And it's like people think we're boring because we have a baby, but here we are looking.
For an ear mask. Oh that's quite good, isn't it. Fun? Vegetables a lot, I asked, you know what I'm saying to them. You're having a hard day. You are on your darling. It's gonna be okay.
I had a thing where I accidentally bought too many packs of tiny snack sized sandwich bags, but like the snack size, you know, the resealable ones. And my children who don't live at home, always come home and like rifle, they go shopping in the pantry and in the fridge and they're always looking for things, and I'm always trying to offload these tiny, little stupid sandwich bags that I've got many packets off and then I want them. So what I do is that I always hide them like
in their glove box. All that's fun, handbag, that's quite fun. And the other thing that I was thinking that was whimsy. Is my jeans today, which none of you have noticed.
I think you get all your wimsy out of your clothes.
Actually pretend track suit pants that look like jeanspitch.
Yes turning up, which can't be good for audio.
We all document this on the feed.
Is that whimsy putting on jeans is like a thing that's not very whimsical, But I've made them whimsical because they're actually secretly tracksuit pack.
The other whimsical thing we've been doing is I feel like every time you know you've got Luna or I've got Luna, is we teach her a new phrase that she actually doesn't need. So she got home from the other day gay rights. Someone had taught the nanny had taught Luna gay rights, and we were all just having a laugh about it.
Yeah, it's just a bit silly, very silly. You know what's whimsy? The budgies. The budgies are yes you a producer. Ruth play the little prank on mea a while ago where we were sitting in her office having an important meeting about something serious, and then suddenly we noticed that they were a little pretend Bude and.
I thought it was real. I could just see one and I was like, is that real? On?
Like a pop plant hiding in one of MEA's coat hangers? And the in joke is that, Mia? What's the en joke about it?
It's something about it. I look at a camera and talk to myself.
Yes, yeah, they're very whimsy.
You might have heard about Ruby Frank, a woman who abused her children in front of millions of people, but what do we know about her husband? Let's start at the beginning. Do you guys know much about this story?
I know nothing. It's an all or nothing story. I know she's a YouTuber and an influencer and was while she was you know, had this big channel, was secretly abusing her children, and now she's in jail. That's yeah.
I had no context for when the story came out. I'd never heard of her. So basically, in twenty fifteen, Ruby Frank, she was a mother of six living in Utah, began a YouTube channel called eight Passengers so six Kids, her and her husband Kevin. At its peak, the channel had two point five million subscribers, and the content often in sight into their home life. Her parenting style was
always very strict. For example, her two sons were play fighting in one video, and she told them if they kept doing it, they'd lose the privilege of eating dinner. One of her daughters was cutting things in the house and she threatened to cut off the head of her doll. But things started to become more and more extreme over the course of the channel.
This at the time when those family YouTubers and they sort of documented their whole life. It's not so common anymore, I don't think, but it was huge in the mid.
The kind of yeah, yeah, exactly in Utah because of the Mormon element, there are these big families.
It feels like, not to want to make light of this story, but that Utah really overrepresents in the influencer space. It's like a lot of the traadwives from Utah. Yeah, a lot of the big families are from Utah. It must have a high headcount of it does.
And physically it's a very beautiful face.
A set.
Things then became more extreme. So her older son, Chad, speaking to the said that his mother had taken away his bed for seven months after he played a prank on his sibling, and since he'd been sleeping on a bean bag, and in the video, Ruby Frank was seen laughing. This then launched a petition flagging that there were signs of abuse and neglect where they called on Child Protective Services to investigate. That was from her followers. The channel shut down, and then Ruby Frank kind of went off.
We didn't see so much of her kids anymore, but she launched a parenting advice support program alongside this woman named Jody Hildebrand. Then in August twenty twenty three, this story broke out again because one of Frank's children, reportedly malnourished, climbed out of Hildebrand's house and banged on the door of a neighbor asking for food and water.
I just had a twelve year old boy so up here at my front door asking for help, and he's said he had just came from a neighbor's house. He's emaciated, he's got tape around his leg.
Frank and this Hildebrand woman were arrested and four of Frank's children were taken into care. The eldest two were out of home by that point. Here's what we know about what Frank was doing to her children. She forced her twelve year old son to do hours of physical tasks off and outside. It resulted in serious sunburn that blistered. He was denied food and after attempting to run away, his hands and feet were regularly bound. Similar punishments were
inflicted on her daughter. There are more horrific details that I'm not going to outline here, but Frank was ultimately charged with child abuse and will spend four to sixty years behind bars, which I think it will be around thirty. This has led to a lot of reflection and potential law reform. When we round dad, where is Kevin? I have often wondered this because he has evaded a lot
of scrutiny. They were separated by that point, and he had not been living with Ruby Frank for about thirteen months before this happened, and it is understood that the abuse really stepped up in that time. He hadn't seen the children, and he hadn't seen the children, but a lot of the strict behaviors and also having the children on a YouTube channel.
The YouTube channel involved him exactly right.
But over the weekend Kevin Frank spoke about his regrets and he said that he is petitioning for a bill whereby a child claims a percentage of money made off their image, and also can demand as an adult that the content made of them be removed.
You would assume that that was already the case, but I guess it's just not in law.
No, it is in some countries. So this is part of the whole reckoning around. You know, this kind of influencing that involves children, and there are some countries where ten percent of the income has to be put aside in some kind of trust for a child, and they want to try and pass a similar law in some of the states in America, which is why this guy has.
Come out has come out. But Holly, I wondered when I saw this a week conflating two issues here because one is the YouTube element. But is this actually a story about vologging or is this a story about something else entirely.
I think this story gets misrepresented a lot because I'm probably typical of some out louders who aren't massively familiar with the Franks in that I've seen these headlines around a lot, and it's been very much cautionary tale about putting your children online, toxic side of influencing and parent influencers. But what we're talking about here some of the abuse that you outlined before, the stuff that Ruby Frank actually got arrested for and is serving a significant jail term for,
as she absolutely should. That was not on the internet. That is child abuse of the highest order. And it's not like she was putting that upon YouTube. There is a world of difference between the kind of stuff that she was famous for, and I think we should be really clear about. One of the reasons why this, I think is so shocking in inverted commons to people is that Ruby Frank, certainly at the time of her fame, she doesn't look like an abusive parent in inverted commerce.
Obviously I'm not saying that, but that's the world's perceptions. She's very well roomed, white lady with the nice bob and the beautiful home and all the beautiful children, and there's that aspirational element that people buy into. But she was known, as you said, Jesse, for being quite strict.
But there is a world of difference between the kind of stuff she was putting up on YouTube, which was stuff like my daughter forgot her lunch today, the teacher called me, But I'm gonna let her go hungry to teach her a lesson let them. Yep, that's a let them. And also some people would say that's you know, that's good parenting, like resilience, content, etc. There is an ocean of difference between that and keeping your child restrained in
a secret room in your house. And I think that in a way, the headlines and the beautiful blonde lady and the parent influencers finger wagging is like almost trying to convince people that that's what was happening and we were all born into it. But they're two different things. I think.
Do you think this has much to do with YouTube and sharing images of your children online? Because it's almost like people are trying to suggest see the type of people that profit off their children. I wonder if there's an.
Element about I wonder if you guys are feeling defensive because you've profited off your children in some of your content. No, I'm joking, but to me, I didn't read it like that. To me, I read it that it was more it's all lies, and we suspected that it was all lies. And that's why I think there's glee, which is it all looks so, whether it's ballerin a farm or any
of the other influencers Narah Smith. It all looks so picture perfect, but underneath the surface there's terrible, dark things happening, and it's like there's a glee, which is we knew it couldn't be as good as it looked.
I think it's also almost a true crime element of there were science, so it's the online detective.
The idea that it was happening under everyone's none.
Yeah, because there were the sort of little things which, as you say, taken out of context, don't look you kind of go, oh, that's a bit harsh, but it's not a crime. But I worry that it will embolden the commenters and embolden the kind of online community that we all know can be. I remember sharing an image of Luna when she was a few months old and a comment basically suggesting that it was my fault she
was so little because I wasn't feeding her properly. And this is the thing about like people watching any of your parenting, is that they're going to have an opinion about it.
But aren't we learning that from this generation of kids who were put on the internet by their parents, And I should say none of us knew what we were doing. It just so happened that my kids escaped that era. Had they been born a few years later, or some of them a few years earlier, I would have done the same thing. Because it's like, if you're someone who lives online and part of the content that you make and monetize is about your life, you can't just pretend
you don't have children. So I get that, but I think that what we're seeing now is that those children are old enough to go, hey, you know that thing that wasn't good for us.
Yeah, But I reckon that we are unable to see as a spectrum. We have become so black and white about sharing an image of a child online that it's like you share an image and you're traumatizing them for life.
There is a spectrum where it's like sharing a family photograph, child appears in video, making your children work full time for your content, and filming them at their worst moments when they're crying or tantruming or whatever, like, they are totally different things, and we seem to not understand that it's yeah, that it's.
Not the same. Ruby Frank's daughter, who has written a memoir and who is also talking in this push to get this bill passed in Utah, which her dad is too, is very vocal about the fact that she feels very exploited, and she said, you know, she was her mum would film her bras shopping and put that online. She'd put
all kinds of very sensitive teenage stuff up there. And I think, without questioning me or you're right, that there is a generation who've grown up and said hey, But as Jesse says, I don't think that's the same as somebody who just sometimes puts a bitture of them. Care no, but we are. I mean, you're right. But to your barber earlier on which is fair enough about you know, do you feel defensive? I think I probably do feel defensive.
Not in any way do I feel like I want to defend a person like Ruby Frank who's abusing her children in the worst way possible. But I do want to be a little bit defensive about the idea that ever involving your children in online content is necessarily entirely negative. I don't think that's true. I think it feeds into one of the reasons why the wear of the dad's question is interesting, which is the people who are consuming very often a lot of parenting content on the internet,
or women they're looking at other women doing it. And although it very often starts off with a I feel seen, thank god, my house is dirty like your houses. My kid won't eat vegetables like your kid won't eat vegetables, it also always morphs into a big stream of judgment, big stream of like, well, you know that child's top does look a bit dirty, and you're not feeding your child probably Jesse and whatever. I think that that's very toxic for the parent involved, and we know that if
the child is exposed to that, that's terrible. But I don't think that everybody who's doing that on the internet isn't considering the outcome.
No, and of course many of them are. You would hope that this is about apple kind of situation. But I think what's interesting also is part of this bill is that when the children become adults, they can request and all that content about them is taken down. And what I think that it speaks to is when we have children, we feel that their experiences are our experiences, and at what point do they become their own experiences?
Like you exactly, you watch people talk about a child's medical condition or their behavior and it's all through the lens of how it affects that person as a mother, which I completely understand. But I think what we're becoming more aware now is that that person didn't necessarily consent to that. I don't mean, you know, when they're in a their photos on the internet, or they're in a little bit of sponsored content. I more mean that kind of vlogging turning your life into a reality show.
It's just interesting to me how this conversation has almost totally excluded fathers like as participants in their children's lives. And I understand it to a degree because it is women who post a lot of this content and women
follow women like that's totally the point. But I also think that we understand women to be in charge of parenting decisions, and so I wonder if this were reversed, it because of our children's will Exactly like, if a child is online, let's assume, unless it's Grimes and Elon Musk, let's assume that both parents have consented to that. But the judgment is always towards the mother, because it's your job to kicks.
I think, I mean, I know what you're saying. I think that's slightly disingenuous in that there is in most households and most families there's divide and conquers. So the Internet and social media and knowing about all of that is seen as moreover something that women generally know a lot more about. You know, men on social media tend to either not be on it or their lurkers men rarely post.
I don't know.
I think that that's a decision that you make and if you're going to the bottom line of the family like this man, Look, Kevin, there is no you know, there's evidence that he had absolutely nothing to do with this Kevin Frank in terms.
Of the abuse of the abuse. Yeah, but he was he was very involved in the vlogging.
Yeah yeah, And he's come out and obviously said that he has regrets. But I just note that at no point did everyone kind of go He was also putting a camera in front of their face and also endorsing the parenting style that they were both practicing.
And there are a lot of Yeah, and there are a lot of dad influences now too. They have a lot of female followers. I think this is the modern example of the stage parent, right, And there have always been extreme versions of stage parenting that have veered towards pushing your kid really hard exploitation and pay the bills for the family exploitation, working them over time. This is like the dark side of that.
After the break, why everyone is feeling a bit aspirational, including Megan Michael.
It might sound like I'm in his studio in Inner Sydney at the moment, but mentally I am replying on a taste for sun loungers Mui.
I haven't started watching White Lotus yet, so is it very kind of pictureque?
Well, you've seen the other two, right, Yeah? So the first White Lotus was a set in Hawaii at the Four Seasons of Maui. The second one was set at another Four Seasons in Sicily in Italy. This one is actually filmed at three different resorts in Thailand, one of which is the Four Seasons Samui and yes.
I feel like a holiday to be beautiful.
Of course, as soon as the first episode of season three dropped last week, google search is for where the hell is that filmed?
And can I go there? Skyrocketed, And the truth of it is it's second only to why the hell did they change the theme music? Which was iconic. But we will move on.
We will move on. We will learn to move on and grow and change. The hotels now in the white Lotus world actually by into that. You can buy Whiteladus packages, you can get deals, you can go online at the moment and you can buy a white Loadus fluffy white robe.
You can buy white Loaders fluffy slippers. There are Instagram accounts with all the shoppable links to all the clothes the resort war that the women wear on the show, and everything in white Loadus land, it seems now is shoppable, which is not unusual because a lot of TV has gone that way. You can buy a appropriately named skinny water bottle from Emily in Paris. You can buy a Stranger Things motorbike helmet. You can buy all that stuff, which.
We were discussing just last week that Netflix is about to get in on this.
Big time with with Love Megan, which widely assumed is that you're going to be able to buy a lot of the things that are in that show. But I have a question specifically about the white load of thing, but broadly about aspiration, because if you watched any of the white loaduses, particularly the first one, but any of them, you'll know that actually, although it's very lovely to look at, it is actually a high level social satire about how rich people going to fancy resorts around the world are
actually very problematic. It gives both perspectives to the people who work there and the people who stay there. And very often the people who work there, I hate truly awful people who are staying there. Sometimes there's murder involved. And in the first one there was a lot of commentary about the impact on Indigenous communities. There's always a lot of social commentary in those shows, and I find it really interesting that we love all that and then we go, yeah, yeah, yeah, but I just want to
go there. This spar looks amazing. Where can I book? It's like our aspiration completely overrides the context.
We want their holiday, but we don't want to be.
Them, but we will be them when we're on their holiday.
Oh no, because we don't see ourselves as the leisure class. We do not see ourselves as that, And in fact there's this contrast between even like I keep thinking about the Kim Kardashian of the world, right keeping up with the Kardashian ended. I think last year I can't even tell.
Them it's on again against It's not called keeping up the it's just called the Kardashians on at the.
Moment, totally fizzled out in terms of interest.
Cultural in terms of cultural.
Relevance, it has totally fizzled out because I think there's something very on the nose about the Kardashians right now, the conspicuous consumption of it, that luxury goods. I don't think that that's what we aspire to anymore, and there's a real kind of revolt against it.
I don't think you're right. I wish you were right about that, But I think if you look at the culture in America at the moment, there is a lot of aspiration towards extreme wealth. There's a lot of it.
I think the ratings of the Kardashians tell us something. I think the fact that they are not cool. Like if someone told you that they were a massive fan of Kim Kardashian, you'd be very confused.
Yeah.
But also that show, I think it's just morphed because the Kardashians has died for lots of reasons, one of which is that you're now expected to watch like with baited breath to see Kim Kardashian go to that fashion show that you've already seen her go to fifty five times on your socials by then. And I think there is some truth to the aspirational thing, but I think it's kind of just shifted a bit because now it is this we want to buy all the things that
all the famous people have. One of the biggest obviously shows on YouTube is about giving away lots of money, making people into millionaires. Everybody wants that, Like, I don't think the hunger for money status things has gone anywhere. In fact, I think that something like the White Lotus and how we kind of love to be in on the joke of laughing at the rich people, but really we just want to be on their holiday kind of says that we haven't moved on.
I don't know. I don't think it's as complicated as that. I think it's just like that looks like a really nice place to go and have a massage, or to go and have a swim, hopefully without any bodies in the pool. But that idea of there's no longer a barrier between what I see and I want to buy it, and that's what influencer culture is right because it's affiliate. I can just click on whatever this influencer is wearing,
what products they're using. This is just an extension of that, which is why Netflix is actually a really logical partner for Megan Markle in terms of you watch it and then you click straight away.
You say that there's no barrier. But the massive barrier that exists in a way that it didn't even ten years ago is the cost of living adress, and I think that that is kind of the ghost haunting all of this.
But that's the whole point. So that you can't go to the White Lotus, you can't go to Thailand, but I can buy a little robe, or I can buy that little kaftan that she's wearing all the sandals, or a scented can.
So I reckon that the aspiration has morphed, and I think it's smaller, Like I do think that there's a smaller world, Like I'm thinking about the tradwife because that has become very aspirational, but that's cooking your own sourdough, Like there's also something that is doable. Of course, they're all.
Like that's about the aspiration of time, having a lot of time, exactly. And there's something called the Lipstick index or the Maine index, which is when the cost of living is high and people are struggling or there's a recession, the sales of small luxury goods will go up. So lipsticks used to be magazines, little things that you can buy. And that's why it's no accident that tmu's slogan is
shopped like a billionaire without spending much money. And it's the same reason why the big designer houses like Chanelle or Duck Chaange, Gabana, they have fragrance businesses because ninety nine percent of people could never buy anything from Chanel, but they can afford a fragrance. So this idea of being able to buy a little bit of jam from Megan Markle, of being able to buy a white Loatus candle, or you know, in succession, it was about the stealth wealth.
I can buy a little bit of that lifestyle that I could never afford.
It's interesting because and I was listening to you talk about Megan last week, of course because I was off the show, but I was like, oh my god, what did you mean?
Can we just break to ask what you thought about her? Announcement.
I was very excited about the announcement. I think that a lot of the nitpicking about the copyright stuff is typical Meghan bashing, but also just astounding that they continue to apparently keep kicking such own goals. But on Meghan World, you said on that on the show last week, and you're very right that the esthetic. I know I say
it wrong, but I can't help it. Just just go with me, just becol people like you that the esthetic that Meghan Michael is flogging or it was apparently going to be flogging on with Love Meghan and with as ever feels a bit dated now. She posted a vision board. Speaking of aspiration, she posted a vision board this week, and I'm just so happy she's back on Instagram. But I may have already say that, I'm sorry, I'll stop talking.
You'll never get boring.
One of the things that she posted this week is her vision board for we assume for with Love Meghan, right, and it's just a whole lot of it is just a whole lot of Easter eggs. So there are a lot of literal memes or what memes used to be from her tig days of like these kind of nafts.
Like you can't please everyone, You're not a Jarrevan.
That's all exactly that kind of stuff with a cursive font and then a little tig thing she like, it's twenty fifteen. But I think it's back. This is my point, right because also on the corner of that vision board, because don't think I haven't seen it many times, what else is on it? There's a flat lay or what else is so a pancake with a face made from
bacon and bananas. This is very exciting. There are fabrics, watches so whimsical that are definitely not from clothes because she's not allowed to sell those allowed to sell clothes as per copyrights. There's a very cute illustration of her and her man friend Harry and English coats. There's a flat lay of a lot of what are presumably are going to be the recipes from the show. They could be from the whole pantry, from the app, the Bell Gibson app that we've.
All just seen, yes again around that time.
So beautiful, looking, healthy, gorgeous. I mean, there's only so many ways to food style, right, but they look very much of the time, and I just think it's back. I think that level of aspiration, and probably for a lot of the reasons that you two were just discussing, like a bit of accessible joy, a little bit of trying to hold onto a portion of control in an uncontrollable world.
Stewart two point zero that that kind of.
Domestic aspiration as well, as you know, the white Lotus level is kind of back in fashion. Is it whimsy?
Because you talk about the things that you'll be able to buy? I assume you probably won't be able to buy the ice cubes with the tiny little flowers.
But anyone can make that tis isn't it. You can go out in your street, steal.
Some flowers from someone else's guarded.
Forage and put them in some water, and I will be free.
My neighbor has a sign saying do not steal my hydrangers. I've thought about it.
She's like, I know what you want to do with these pedals. I have one more question though, for me, a business brain. Back to the white lotus right, there would have been a time where an amazing brand like The Four Seasons would not want to be associated with a show where their staff were depicted taking drugs, sex, beating up people, getting murdered, where a fancy brand would have been like not near my brand, please. But the four seasons, obviously after the success of these shows, are
leaning in I'm going, fine, we'll go with it. Very savvy marketing, but a bit of a shift.
Not really when you think of that, these are basically like infomercials because the whole point of the show is to show when we check the plot out, it's just an infomercial. Turn off the volume, and it's just looks like a fantastic ad for you please find the murder,
which are absolutely sold out. And I think the other thing about why everything's shoppable is that it's really expensive to make TV and film and there are so many challenges and by doing that, not only is it an extra revenue stream for the creators and there's money to
be made, but then there's also product placement. And apparently that I was reading that the White Lotus they were talking about season four was going to be in Norway, and that's just fallen through because one of the things that they demand from the countries is massive tax breaks and grants and all of those things, because those are expensive shows to make and you need all the help that you can.
Get in case he missed it. Last Thursday, billionaire Clive Palmer, former head of the United Australia Party, launched a brand new political party. Did you guys say this?
I did. I saw the hats, shoppable shoppable hats.
I did not know that Clive Palmer was still a thing.
Okay, So it is called trump Et of Patriots.
Trump Trumpet, Trumpety Trumpet the the oh did there? Yes?
Can you see what he did?
What a genius?
Yeah?
It promises to make Australia.
Trump again, great gaat again, My goodness.
Sorry, he wants to drain the swamp of Canberra. What was his last party called United Australia. He's had a few now.
It's like, we're not even going to pretend to United Australia. Were Actually that's going to lean in to dividing every country.
What actually happened is that he lost a high court bid to reregister United Australia. So I needed a new net. Okay, bitlight megants who.
He's calling it the as I'm quite far.
He wants to ban transathletes from women's sport. Basically, all his ideas are imported from Trump's America. Is this something we should be worried about, like, are we about to turn into what's happened over there?
And is this our republican part I don't think so everyone keeps saying that, and it's like, Oh, Dutton's going to go so Trumpian and he's going to do culture wars. He's already said he's not. Now politicians are politicians. But we've spoken on the show before after we all freaked out when Trump got back in that the reason that Australian politics will never become as extreme is because of
compulsory voting. And this sounds really nerdy, but it's not that people don't care as much or that there aren't as many people here that will be attracted to extreme things. But in countries where voting isn't compulsory, it's like the algorithm. It's literally the same thing. The issues and the policies and the vibe that gets people out to vote has to be extreme.
It's what I remember Holly saying that it has to be presented as existential as this is the last election, get off your bum.
And whereas in Australia, in most countries the vast majority of people are in the middle are basically centrist. They're not extreme left or extreme right. We also don't have everyone vote.
Yeah, we also don't have the far right component. We don't have fifty states. I think that that totally changes our like we're obsessed with American politics culturally, I think. But it is naive to suggest that it is going to sort of infiltrate. I think how this.
Election is run.
I think that this not so sure. You know, you know what it might infiltrate. It doesn't work. I do not think it works. And let's remember that Clive Palmer, who has already run on make Australia great Again since twenty sixteen, are worked for Trump. He spent more than one hundred and twenty million dollars to secure one seat in parliament.
He's just not the vibe.
He's not the vibe.
The most Trumpian thing about Clive Palmer in many ways is his exaggeration of his own success right because he is a very rich man. He is a proper billionaire. He's not pretending. But he has been trying to win serious Australian political influence for a decade and he has failed. Clive Palmer, Yeah, Clive Palmer has, and so he would have to go much much harder at it than he is at the moment with his trumpet whatever, I mean,
god trumpet of patriots. But I'm a very strong It's so funny because when I came here from England, which is a very long time ago now, and I thought that mandatory voting was unbelievable, Like my head nearly fell off. I was like that it was bad. Yeah, I've never even heard of it. I've never heard of such a thing. There aren't very many places you to have it.
An American in this horrified and.
I actually thought it was probably quite bad for politics because I used to think, oh, you know, people aren't informed, but they have to vote. You know, they don't care, but they have to vote. And now thirty years down the line, I've been here nearly thirty years, I'm like, that's great. The fact that you don't have to exercise the edges exactly how you just explained it is brilliant. But I don't think there is any argument that there is a lot of hate to be made from dividing people.
And in Australia we do have similar divisions between the metro people and the regional people. Country Australia, which is the real Australia. Who are the real Australians? And we saw it in the campaign for the Indigenous referendum. Voice to Parliament working those divisions can be quite successful. So, although I agree with you, Jesse, I don't think that Palmer's the vibe. I'm not quite so optimistic that we're not susceptible to that division.
The election is set to be announced soon. There's been rumors that it's going to be announced any day and that maybe the election will be before Easter.
You know what I'm worried about very selfishly, Well, if it's on the day we do one of our shows, I mean we will have time to go and vote. What if the result comes in while we're on stageh that not just be fun?
Okay?
Could we be likely sales out of bell Crab like on the stage calling it Yeah, yeah.
We will bags you be Anthony Green Jesse.
In a moment. There are seven different types of Flakes, which one is.
Maya one unlimited out loud access. We drop episodes every Tuesday and Thursday exclusively for Mamma Mia subscribers. Follow the link at the show notes to get us in your ears five days a week, and a huge thank you to all our current subscribers.
Counseling plans is so hot right now. Last week I tried to cancel a dinner because it was raining.
How did that go?
The person I tried to cancel told me that I was pathetic and did you go? I went good and I had a great time. Glad I didn't cancel. Everyone's lonely. But when it comes to actually leaving the house, how come nobody can be bothered to follow through on the arrangement they made in a flood of social enthusiasm last
week after their second coffee. Stylus dot com recently posted a story by writer Shahed Azadi about the psychology behind the seven different types of flake, and I guarantee that you will recognize yourself or the flakes in your life from the following list. First one, the relationship flake. This is the kind of flake that cancels because of reasons or plans with their partner. Their partner will always come first.
I find that flake very annoying.
Yeah, strange.
Second type is the work flake. They're always working in. Work will always be prioritized.
I'm sure we've all been that.
The last minute flake. This is my jam. They have something called present bias, so they commit to plans when they feel excited and like it's a good idea, but then they struggle with those plans when they're faced with the immediate cognitive load of following.
Through on the You know what's great about the last minute flake is that sometimes if I'm at a social event where me is meant to come, I never think she's gonna come. I think she's going to last minute flake, and then sometimes she just turns up and it's like a wonderful surprise. I remember when we were going to something at the Opera House and we were having dinner before and I was like, Mia is never coming to
this restaurant. Too many steps, too many steps, too much, she will never find a park, it's not going to happen. And then she just materialized.
It was like a little tree. I have a lot of stern words with myself because I'm trying to deflake and I'm trying to be more present, so I've got like a show up thing anyway. Number four this is also sometimes me the forgetful flake. This flake relies on the other person either forgetting that you've made the plan, or hoping that the planned hangout is forgotten so that no excuses are necessary. Preemptive flake is someone who's so proceeds of bailing a few days out they start complaining
of feeling tired, run down, or busy at work. That's not me, because that's someone with a lot of just say no yes. I think this is possibly you two definitely number six the people pleasing flake, and this is people who say yes to plans to make everyone happy, but there's no way they can do it all, so they have to flake.
Yeah. So I will say yes in the moment. Two plans on Monday night.
Yes, and then I go, hmmm, something to work that.
So you'll say yes because you don't want to disappoint someone in the moment. And sometimes do you always know that you're going to cancel before it?
Yes, you do.
I know that I've got to and then ultimately you just let them down ten times more than you would have in the first place.
Yeah, which is your fear.
And the last one, seventh type of flake is the upgrade flake. This is a flake you'll see a lot around news eve. They say yes to plans with you, but they keep an eye out for better options always.
Ye, Mia, I've got a bone to pick with you. A bit of feedback about your flakiness. It's not actually about the flakingness. It's about because MEA's she's the opposite of the people please a flake.
Right.
So Mia wrote a newsletter recently, maybe I was feeling sensitive. I was like, fuck sake, Maya. When I read.
Anyone that I had that reaction.
It was I've got a new way to say no to plans, to things I don't want to do. And I think the subject line would have been better than that, because you're a good writer. But it was basically that when someone asks you to do something, you just say, oh no, I'd hate that.
Yeah, oh know, I'd hate that.
That is so offensive and so very levels.
Because can I explain I got a liverit that that's highly advanced. That's highly advanced preflaking.
That is like an aggressive, aggressive flake because no, it doesn't just say I don't want to do it. It kind of says you must be crazy for wanting to do that and for thinking, even for a moment, that I want to do that.
Yeah, it's very hard because there's a bit of shame in that place. Yes in that response, isn't there?
And then the other part of my worry is like, I've got some concern trolling about it for you. What if you think you'd hate it but you wouldn't, because I worry that sometimes when you were very rigid about I don't do those things, like I don't do Monday night drinks or I don't do you. She used to be I don't do red carpets.
I don't.
Then she went to the logis, yeah, she did a red carpet every week, but I hate it still. But you went to another one and you were like, actually that was fun. So what about breaking out of rigiditity?
You're right, and sometimes you need to just get over yourself and show up. Sometimes you just got to show up when it's hurtful to someone else, Like I think it's important to show up.
Twice yesterday I tried to convince people to come to an escape room with me. She's different social situations, and twice they said along the words of oh, no, i'd hate that and starting a movement. Guys, I found myself becoming a paid sponsor of escape rooms. And I got home and I went.
Because it's then you take it as a challenge and you're like, I'm going to convince.
You escape rooms are actually really fun.
Have you found anyone to go to an escape room? Only? Luca?
And it's just too sad. I am actually reformed for like I have managed to reform it.
You go out a lot. That's true because what changed.
I was in my I reckon early twenties, so unreliable, so like, and that was the I realized that that was a reputation I was getting, letting people down with something I did all the time because of the people pleasing element. I wasn't organized in a diary and I saw it seriously people's feelings and someone who needed to hang out because something was going on in their lives. I wasn't there, and you don't come back from that.
It's a bit like sex as well, like sometimes you just don't feel like it, like the thought of it. You're like, I don't know, I'd hate that. Oh no, I'd hate that, you think to yourself, But then you have a great time.
I want what I want us to find this many ways to answer the question with oh no. This week's challenge for everybody.
Involved with that loud Okay, massive thank you to all of the out louders who didn't say oh no, I'd hate that when it came to pressing play on today's show, and of course to a fabulous scene for putting it together.
We're going to be back in your ears tomorrow. Goodbye bye.
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