"Prolonged Divorce" w/ Torrey Peters

Podcast starts. Now, what's up everyone around the globe. You're listening to Stradio Lab from a windowless room in Times Square.

That's right. Welcome to TRL.

Welcome to TRL. I can hear and sink A bumping their new hit downstairs.

So this is our final day of a full week of Stradio Lab content.

Yeah, and a NonStop I feel wistful. I know.

We've recorded four episodes, We've done a live show. It was our first ever Lesbian Lab live show, all queer woman lineup, and instead of straight topics, they brought lesbian topics. Yes, and we learned about we can say what the three topics were to say them? Okay, self cancelation. So this is when you are a lesbian and you start a small business sort of with the intention of being canceled for having bad labor practices.

You get like one complaint and then decide to go on, I'm sorry.

To that's right. And it's also like starting a business is actually more of a means to an end, the end being getting a conversation going. Yeah, so you want like a Reddit thread, you want people saying, like thread the truth about you know, black Cat coffee. So that was one. Hats was a second topic. So we learned about flat rim hats and about hey Mama lesbians, and about how different hats the further back in your head of bean egoes, the less queer you are. That is

It was porn. This was Ntalie Robert Lightman, and it was porn as a lesbian export, as pizza is to Italians.

So she was yes, and so you.

Know, it's not necessarily always made by Italians, just like lesbian wan was isn't always made by lesbians, and yet it's how most people interact with lesbian culture.

This was fascinating to me because I am so you know, liberal arts pilled that. I thought the topic was like feminist.

You're you're I have to say, your Ivy League education was showing pejorative. I was. It was very I have to say, it was like rich, it was sort of cam. It was Kamala coded.

Okay, thank you for the class analysis. First of all, I really liberal. I appreciate it, and I'm self canceling in a lesbian way for my privilege because.

I heard porn as our greate sector. I said, I know exactly what you're talking.

And in retrospect, I completely understand what she was saying. She was saying the sort of male gays lesbian poor and literally the poster of two women kissing them guys have in their dorms. Yeah, that is like, I mean, that's like an art cultural export of lesbianism that people

It was really funny. You were like, oh, porn stars, you know, like people that do talks at colleges university And it's like, I really don't think that's what it is.

Yeah, but I love that.

It's a beautiful it's a beautiful perspective that you bring.

Yeah, and you know what that also is a lesbian cultural expert. It's just as like a less successful one because it hasn't really reached the heights of the sort of more male gayzyya.

Yeah, it was in the pizza metaphor you were forgetting sort of about dominoes.

I was thinking more like Roberta's kind of a hot honey and sage, whereas Natalie was saying like pep baroni.

Yeah, I want to say and I.

Do want to actually shout out. So our friend Andrew long Cheu was supposed to do the show ended up not being able to make it. But her topic was going to be hands as a lesbian topic, which I think is so rich.

Well, it's very rich, and I would love to know where she was coming from.

You but you like get well you.

Get that they have hands.

No, but it's like, you know, hands are much more of an important part of lesbian sex. I think is where it's coming from.

March. We're in Times Square.

And like as a it's like hands. I think this is what she was going for, hands as a sex organ.

Oh well, we'll have to ask, because I don't want to make assumptions because I don't know. Yeah, maybe that's not what she was going for.

Okay, maybe I'm once again thinking too academically.

You know, maybe she was like the lesbians work with their hands. Oh, that's also probably true.

You know, who knows it could be any I'm not here to make assumptions. I'm here to listen.

We were being so respectful and open minded last night, but we had one like cheap joke that we did with the U haul, which, by the way, yeah, I'm.

Ready to be defensive. Here she goes, I'm ready to be defensive. We put the U haul joke in the slide show because we were like, it's time to talk about this classic classic stereotypes.

But then all three of them are like Jesus Christ, like why.

Would you put this in? And it was like, because I'm curious, how are you thinking about classic stereotype? Because gay car stereotype? It is like it's both embarrassing and annoying and true. And so I'm like, how do you guys feel about it?

Yeah, but say love.

I want to say that. As our string of records in New York comes to a near close, that's right. I feel a little bit. I have that thing where I'm like, did I say everything? And even though we slept two recordings today, I think back and I'm like, you know, when a little kid is like really excited to do their dance for the parents, and then the parents are like, okay, dance and they don't move at all.

Don't you think though, that the concept of the big moment is like a straight thing. And actually the more queer sensibility is that it's just all of performance.

Well, that's your last your theory life is a cabaret.

Right, It's like life is a cabaret. It's not that life is preparation for the big.

The stage doesn't end when samas not end exactly.

So it's like if it's like the director yell's cut, that doesn't mean you're like, fuck, I didn't do what I was going to do. It's like, I'm going to do it now. I don't give a shit if the cameras are going to catch it.

Yeah. I think that's true.

And we have to bring in our guests because we are absolutely edging her as always.

As always, this is truly exciting.

I'm really excited I'm excited.

I'm nervous. I feel that. You know, we have prestigious guests sometimes, by the way, all the time, all the time we are.

We love having prestigious guests, and they love doing the podcast. Let's just want to start there. It's actually like.

And not to be sort of animal farm coded, but some persigious guests, some more prestigious than others.

That's true. And I would say this one's like in the top tier being prestigious.

Yeah, and so while all are prestigious, some are more presigious than others, and this is our most prestigious.

Yeah, oh my god. Okay, Well, you know her from her debut smash hit novel Detransition Baby, you know her from her new book stag Dance, and you know her as the guest of this episode of Straighter Lab. Please welcome Tory Peters. Hi, Hi, what do you think of her intro?

To be honest, I was very interested in your interpretations of lesbian culture.

Yeah, I could see you. We were really like torturing you because we were saying all these things that we want your toe.

I wanted to jump in on. Yeah. Okay, thoughts, Well, I think you're correct.

About Hans Okay, do you think.

Yeah, I think it was a sex thing. I don't think I don't think anyone's gonna be a funded by that. You don't have to self cancel.

I have to say it was as I'm currently you know, we unpack the podcast as we record the podcast, that's part of it. As I sit in the middle seat, I was finding myself not able to look at you for approval and reactions, so I had no the whole time. I was really flying blind.

I was being very supportive. Yeah, thumbs up, big smile.

Yeah, it's really helpful to know, because I was like, what if we're bombing and I can't I.

Was wondering why you weren't making eye contact. I was waiting, ignoring me.

I was really focused in on George.

And then what do you think about generally self cancelate, like the idea that the lesbian small businesses started from THEE I mean.

As you were saying that, I was like, oh, actually that is something that I think about, like this, I'm wearing this jacket, for instance, and it's I don't know if the owner of the company is a lesbian. I don't want to assume, but there's something kind of lesbian Kamala about the marketing of this it's an argent.

Jacket, what was the marketing of it?

And well, actually, Kamala, I think is one of their I think like a pink power suit. And I was like, I want I want exactly that to be like I want to blend in on my book tour. So I got like I was like what. I asked some some fast people like what should I get and they're like, well, this is the this is the thing in which nobody will have an opinion about your suits, and then.

Being like, yeah, you don't want to be marked as like anything.

I want like nobody to notice.

It is your t shirts. Does your T shirt say tea for tea? It does, And you don't want to be you don't want to be worked as other in anyway.

That was saying that was an air dressing air today. Yeah no, But I felt like like I want everybody to use my press photos. Basically I have good press photos and I found if I wore interesting clothing my last tour, it would be like these terrible candids that for whatever reason, especially Italian photographers, love taking awful photos of me.

There was a conspiracy photographers want.

I was just chased by like untalented Italian povers taking terrible candidates and then doing SEO optimization on their terrible pictures. And I think it was because they were like, oh, this is the this is a different outfit than the press outfit than the press photos, so we'll do this.

They felt like they were being unique.

Yeah, exactly, So now I want to wear something that's like super bland, and if you were like, what's a good photo, they go with my press photo that is just available rather than you know, how bland in my bland terrible candidate.

I did notice that in the photo on the jacket of the book, you are wearing a white pantsuit.

I got rid of that one in the second printing to.

Wait. So you thought that, because that, to me is very like Hillary Clinton meets like Annette Benning doing actors on acting.

Yes, I was, that was like kind of what I was going for. And there's like such a such a history of like writers wearing white suits like Tom woll Well, Steve Martin's not really those are those are my two loads stocks in dressing. But I was like, yeah, I think this is going to be my suit era. But I've had to like have a couple of like restarts on what I want the suit to do.

Okay, you, so then what is the new photo.

The new photo is going to be my bland suit. I switched it out. I mean it's a good photo of me. But you don't really even notice a suit.

That one is very suit you notice.

Yeah, it's like your walk. You're You're doing a suit thing in the photo, and I'm sort of secondary to the suit.

This is You're bringing up something I find really interesting, which is when you're launching sort of a new personal era, you have to make at least three missteps. First. Yeah, like I've been trying to go cowboy and I'm not doing it today. But I was like I leaned in way too hard. At first. I was like, I'm going full cowboy, Like I'm wearing like wranglers, cowboy boots, tucking the shirt and wearing a belt. And then it was like it was like confusing, and then I pull back, Yeah,

I feel that way about about the white suit. I mean, I'll do that very occasionally. I think it's like a special thing, but I think it's like the first printing is a white suit, and then we we pull back.

You got to see how far you can go? Yeah, take one thing off.

Yeah, but that was like the I think they were like, we're doing a reprint, and I was like, I have a new author.

Fun does the idea of a book tour? Is that stressful or fun?

It's it's fun for the first three weeks, and then you're it's not so much as stress as you're tired

Also self perpetuating thing where like the people that are interviewing you do their research, hear what you said in other interviews, and then they're like, we heard when you were a kid, you had like a favorite doll that you played with, and so then you have to tell the story again and again.

Yes, oh that's so interesting. I also realized talking about the podcast, when we make the podcast, me asking is it fun or boring to go on book tour, it was so like little kid.

Reporter, you're doing like Nicola, like use for kids, Nicol.

So what's your favorite candy? Like it was so.

But that was this is like that you were just saying in the intar, the big moment where you're like do you like blue or gay? You know, it's like you're just doing it. This is part of the process and now you're doing it. And I relate to it because when I was like eight years old, I got a chance to interview Jane Jane Goodall, the famous primatologist, and I panicked and I said, so you like monkey

I found that as an interviewer, you know, my child like wonder can be really charming, but as an interviewer, it can also be quite confusing. I think it's sort of like what are we doing here? You know?

But I sort of think I think someone being interviewed ultimately, not to project us on to you, but generally speaking, someone being interviewed just wants to talk about what they want to talk about, sure, and so giving them the most like nothing question is like the best thing you can do, because then they can just like monologue.

Yeah, that's the advanced interviewing.

It's yeah, exactly, super So what we've learned so far is don't do your research because you will ask the same questions, and in fact, don't ask questions because that is boxing the interviewing in.

Yeah, I felt your first ones fun or no was? I was like, well, this is my moment to just monologue.

The word fun is so funny to ask like an author is writing fun.

Okay, here's a final, final stupid question for you.

I have a second final stupid question.

We're doing such a good job. Yeah, okay, so my question for you is, like, I'm sure people are asking a lot of annoying questions. So my question for you is, what is like the question you wish someone would ask you that no one ever would.

Then sorry, that question I get like every time.

George, I was gonna be a bit I was about to say, I bet you get really.

Yeah, and then it's really hard because I'm like, I'm like, well, that question is actually a very common one. And then also you have to like calm up each time my new question that that because well last time that I got asked this question, which is, you know, a few days ago, I came up with like this as the

It's the theory. And maybe this is completely wrong. Do you think it's because people are like uncomfortable with asking about big quotes trans issues that they don't want to say the wrong thing, and so then they want you to tell them what to say.

Maybe that's it. There's two things that happens. And the other thing that happens is that people are very proud to have not asked about TRANSI shoes for an entire interview.

It's like checkofs, check offs, check offs, trans representation. It's like is it going to be brought up?

Yeah?

Wow, okay, so what was your stupid question? And then we'll go into smart Yeah this is a smart part.

Then we'll go into the smart section. I love the book, you know, I was. I think I didn't expect how horny it would be. To be honest, I was so I thought it was so horny.

I would agree, but I felt, did you read my first book? It was not?

I think was on here. I'd be like, no, but you I did read?

Yeah?

But no, that that's interesting because I feel like the first book was hornier, like you know, like they she she gets like our ribbon tied around her junk, and maybe maybe you were just like that was sad.

I did not like it, like the bag dance in particular, like the big guy like being like being like treat me as the woman. I was like, yeah, yeah, that's like so hot.

Yeah, I mean I think it was just the horniness that like you related to more than more.

I was like literally, I was like, oh, this is why I like to hook up with bye guys, because they're like treating they're.

So and then it's so like like they're so titillated and excited by like look what I'm doing now. Yeah.

So, and then my dumb question was, do you think writing is the horniest medium?

Yeah, ranked.

Horning.

If it is horny, it's like a masturbatory horning. It's like a very like you're like alone, kind of pleased with yourself, you know, and what you're like, I did it, Oh, I liked it. You know, Like that's the the scene maybe that you're thinking about in the Lumberjack thing where where the babions the o fish Lumberjack is hooking up

Are you ever like, Okay, this is too horny? You have to pull back, Like it's not it's it's too horny, it's too hot.

No, like usually usually it if it is. If it is that, then I am happy. And it's like maybe in like later edits, but like anything that's like too much, I like to sit with the too much for a while. Yeah, and have somebody else tell me that made them uncomfortable. Yeah.

I loved it.

I felt like, Yeah, a lot of the horniness I was relating to and the sort of like being like why am I doing this and then being like but I can't stop.

Yeah, I mean that that is that's for me, is like the kind of horness, like the confusing horniness I think is like a go to uh both something I go to, I guess emotionally confused horniness. I'm just very comfortable there. And and I also think it's like like I like characters who actually like don't totally understand what's happening to them, you know. Yeah, And I feel like hornedness is is a it is something that like happens to you sometimes rather than something you do.

Yeah, it's a curse. Then it's terminal.

There are times when I've done like I'm walking to do something and I'm like, turn around, turn around, don't do this. Yeah, And it's like, but I have to. I won't rest until I go do this. I'm too horn I have to put my life in danger to go do this.

Yeah.

No, it really feels like you're in train spotting, but it's instead of heroin, it's horniness.

It's not right.

Yeah, there's also I think similarly how your characters deal with their horniness. I also think the way they deal with their own cruelty is kind of been the same way. Like it they almost can't help it and can't understand where it's coming from, and they're half conscious of it, and they're almost like just conscious enough to feel guilty and self loathing about it.

Yeah, I think we've entered the smart smart question.

It's like, are you yeah? Was that something like was the almost like the relationship between cruelty and horniness something that was in your mind?

Well, I think cruelty is very intimate, right, Like I think that like when you don't know somebody and you do something like awful to them, that's just like sort of brutality. But that like when you know somebody and you like know their like vulnerabilities and there and and like the like the soft parts of them, and then you like kind of can't help yourself maybe because like you know them so well and you're just so like frustrated or irritated or no, that you just like go

My cruelty is finding the emotional g spot.

Yes, exactly.

I'm going to borrow that for when I go on tour. I'm going to the UK. I think that I'll still love it.

Oh my god. Yeah you were telling me that, I you know what, You're gonna have a lovely time in London, go to the West End, see some plays. What a time.

The other thing, this is more more of a reflection of my stupidity rather than a question. Okay, you know confidence, Well you know that meme.

It's a good start.

Yeah, you know that meme. That's like me as someone who has only seen Trolls two World Tour watching you know, The Godfather. Wow, this is just like it were totally. I feel like the only like books that I read like that are about like like hard like fiction books about gender are like Ursula kay La Gwinn. So the whole time I was like, like, especially like the first one, I was like, wow, this is just like.

I will take it. I mean as opposed to Trulls too. If you're like, this is just like Ursula Gwinn, Absolutely.

Yeah I was.

I liked I felt like it was fun that you were going so big and like sci fi with it.

Like yeah, so like I was. I I wanted to do the promise for people haven't read it is that's each piece is like in a different genre and and that one. The first one is like a speculative fiction

Yeah right, Oh so that was written free.

I'm sure you've talked about this, but yeah, it was written pre pandemic.

Its pre pandemic. Yeah, which, like I think is people are always like, why don't you expand that one into a full novel. I don't think you want me to do that, Like, I think you've kind of gone through it.

Yourself totally totally. Although we were saying, how now it's been long enough. Actually Harry was saying this, right, someone was saying, like it's now been long enough that people are craving narratives about twenty twenty, not just the pandemic, but like even just like where the culture was in twenty twenty, and how we were also unmoored from reality because we were, you know, just like undergoing this like

Yeah.

I mean I felt actually like the other day when when Trump announced all of his teriffs, like and I felt the world kind of stopped for like a day. I had like a real like what does this feel like? What does this feel like? And then I was like, oh, it feels like March twenty twenty, where everyone's like is the economy crashing? Do I have a job?

Like?

Should I stock like fill up my bathtub or whatever weird shit we were doing in twenty twenty. I had like a real like I called it like a snow day, like I don't remember what it was last week was like it was like a pandemic snow day, where I was like, is the world over? And I kind of wish that, like, yeah, that that had there had been like more culture about that weird feeling, because I feel like, apparently we're gonna just keep on having.

Well that's the thing. I think microdosing March twenty twenty. It's like every few days you just go through like a less intense version of it, and it's it's like, yeah, shorter and more painful rather than this like long drawn out thing. Okay, I'm like so eager to get on the topic. We should do our fst SEC. What's our first second? Okay, Tori Sam, do you want to Our.

First segment is called straight Shooters, and in this segment, we're going to ask you a series of rapidfier questions to gauge your familiarity with and complicity and straight culture. It's basically this thing or this other thing. And the only rule is you can't ask any followup questions or we'll scream at you.

Can I ask a pre question?

I think that might be a follow up question. And while you I wanted to say yes to, I have to be no.

I was and real yeah, I also attempted to say yes because I was like, well, she's an author.

Yeah.

I was like, well, if I'm putting as much gravitas as I can to get away with to break the rules of your podcast.

Should I sorry? Okay, We'll start simple being the goat or sinking a boat.

Sinking a boat, okay, a dream come true? Or a steaming pot of stew.

A steaming pot of stew does.

Sne within reach? Or a headline that says impeach, I.

Like design with's in reach?

A task that's the sophician or a rash that's cyphilician.

Oh, probably a taskian, Yeah.

Thank you, okay, being queer and in stem or drinking beer but being fem Oh.

Oh wow, I'm gonna say drinking beer and being.

Fum Okay, okay, Lou tove Lou or mama rou What was the middle one?

I don't know what that blows?

Actual pronouncing of the name you answer to follow up? Got here? A constitutional crisis?

This is this is twenty twenty all over again.

People are hitting the streets.

Well, I'll now, Lou, let's see which one do I want to do? The taming of the shrew or defaming Lucy.

Lou face card never declines, Oh my god, that's Ray Fines.

I like Ray Fines. I'm excited to see Ray Fines. Oh my god, it's Refines.

I'm actually excited to see Ray Fines as well. Whenever I see him, I'm like wow, that's very fine.

Yeah.

And also there's you know what ray Fines is to me. You know how people when you know how to say luev right, you get to have like a step up over like sixty percent.

Yeah, well yeah, like that's you and rape.

Literally like I see that name and I go, I know how to say that.

Okay, so because it's not spelled like it's spelled ralph, but it's rafe.

Yeah, it's spelled Ralph Fiennes. And you say, you say rain.

Yeah, you're in the no.

Yeah, so Jory, we rank each gets performance on a scale of zero to one thousand doves and or zero to one thousand. We have decided based on based on two Gaga songs to songs. I have to say. Here's what I'm struggling with. I'm like, do we reward the boldness of asking a followup question because she beat us at her own game? Or do we punish because because she did the one thing that.

Well, you know, I believe a wise man once said that cruelty is the g spot.

So oh my god, you did that to us. You like found you found our one weakness and used it against us.

I made it pleasurable.

Yeah, yeah, literally, I think we should punish.

Oh, okay, we should punish. Okay, So I would say, without the follow up question, it would have been nine hundred and thirty doves.

Yeah, that's fact.

But with the deduction of six hundreds, six hundreds, it's gonna go ahead and be three hundred and thirty five duffs. I'm so sorry, Tori. That's not a passing.

But what is that? And what is that in blades of grass?

Okay, So there's inflation when it comes to places of grass, the grass I get it's more closer to like six fifty.

It's more closer to six fifty.

Yeah, that's a good change. You're like in other countries. I'll do all right.

When you're in the UK, you can pay. Yeah, you're actually somehow making Yeah, certainly have more than a I'm.

So glad I did this podcast before I went over.

Oh my god, horse, should we get into the straight I would love to hear so behind the scenes. George knows the topic. I do not, and I'm so excited to hear what street topic is and what's straight about it.

So it's a working theory. But my straight topic is prolonged divorce and my theory is that you don't know if you're in a gay marriage or a straight marriage until you get divorced, and it is how long how prolonged your divorces that determines how gay or straight you're you're your.

Marriages, and the more.

The straighter is, the more prolonged your marriage that you can And it doesn't really matter your gender or how you identify. It's like it's like when you don't know and then you get divorced and if it goes on like two years, you were in a straight march of all time.

Because the queer thing is being like I don't I take my possessions, I don't care, Like.

No, I don't think it's even like that, Like I think like but I think it's like I think it's like you just can't let go. And I think it's just like you can't let go because like of you're just like have ended up very headot in your thing where like one person knows how to cook, one person knows where like the drain on the sink is, and you can't leave each other because you're like, how am

Don't you think it has to do with like the more you buy into the institution, for lack of a better word, the more violent it is to break it apart, because it's like, yes, the more you believe in marriage, the more difficult it is to step away from it, like you have literally it's all been leading to that.

Yeah, yeah, And I think that's actually what drives me crazy about this is like every like just get away from each other, like just you don't need this, like you'll be happier and like, and they just can't see they can't see that like it needs to end. You're torturing each other, and there's something like I'm just like, just like this what is happening is like straightness is torturing you all rather than you know, even each other

I actually, I think more broadly gay you know, since gay people have been able to get married, there are there is a spectrum of on the one side, gay people almost like wanting to emulate straight people and on the other side being like excited to do something new with this new right, you know what I mean. And so it's like there's a spectrum of straight to gay marriage within gay marriage.

I agree with you. Wow, I agree with that, And I mean I even think like you were you were saying that like on a previous show that you had you had classified what.

Was it, divorces Lesbian marriage is straight, and like staying together without getting divorced is gay male, right because they're like.

But like they don't hook up anymore.

Yeah, Like staying in an happy marriage basically is gay male because they're all open, so they don't feel the need to escape because they just like can't escape every night basically, yeah, but just like come home and resent their husband. And of course the classic thing, my favorite thing when it's a gay couple and they're like in a fight, another person enters the room and one of the husbands goes, oh, look there's your boyfriend.

But see, to me, that is like that even Okay, So let's if you just take that, like gay couple not having sex together forever, that is either like the most kind of like oh you've like solved marriage, like you are like the most enlightened thing, or it's actually like you are the you have like reverted to such straightness that yeah, or even like the Catholic church in like the fifteen hundreds, like divorce does not exist for you.

It is interesting. It's always like obviously there's no right answer, but I'm sort of like is that better? Like there's so many guys Ryan, like could you just break up? Like let's call it, Like it would be so much better if you just broke up.

It is interesting how that is almost the default for long term GI guy relationships. Yeah, where then everyone under their breath is like yeah, they're always like this.

It's it is and like the even the bickering that you that you just said that there as your boyfriend or whatever. It's like that you just stage that with like slightly different actors and you're like, oh, this is this is the most conservative like yeah, like British period that we're watching, you know.

Yeah, you know, I'm finding this really interesting because Okay, so basically is finality gay or straight? I think it's like a larger question and out of go ahead.

Well, I think finality is more straight, to be honest, and I think that's why they make it last longer, because they know when it's over it's actually over, whereas when gay people are breaking up, they are like, we're divorced, it's over, but we still get lunch every three months.

Rare, right, So finality is straight and that there's a gravity to it that straight people are afraid of. They're like, I will do anything but finality. Yes. Yeah, So in their fight against finality, they are like hurting themselves.

Yeah when they could, they could. Sort of life is a cabaret thing, you know. Gay people know when the cameras are off the stage, you're still on stage, and so you know, when the marriage is over, you're still gonna have a relationship with a person. It's just a different relationship where the straight people are like when the cameras are off, I'm off stage.

God.

But I also think that the willingness to be final would be gay, like a willingness to like to lean in and be like, I'm breaking ties and I'm changing everything.

To make a stag I am.

Yeah, yeah, exactly, like everything's new about me now, Like that that is that that well, it's.

Like I'm wearing the They're literally debuting like a I'm divorced era, and then they're like, actually, I'm pulling back.

I'm not fully out.

Well, there's also something I think like gay people, because they kind of have this reverence for like a diva, a straight woman who like a divorce a. I almost think like to be divorced is so fabulous, whereas like for a sort of like a straight woman who married her high school sweetheart, it's such a sign of failure.

It is a real sign of failure. I mean, to be divorced in like the Sexlent City universe is fabulous. Well that is, of course, but I do think in like normal world it can be quite difficult.

What do you think of the recent And you cannot answer this if you don't want to comment on your peers, But there's been sort of a recent rise in like divorce literature. Yeah, mostly from women. I would say, yeah, in my experience, Like, what do you think that is about?

Well, it was like, I mean that was like the detransition. Maybe my first book was dedicated to divorces women. Oh yes, yeah, So it was like I felt like I was very much a part of this like divorce thing, and like you know, kind of what I was saying is like divorce is a transition in the same way that like you know, because you you live your life a certain way and then you and then you make a decision and then you have to like go forward and not

Than I want Like yeah, Like.

So you're sort of you've turned on divorce as an optimistic Yeah yeah, kind of.

Yeah, like and I don't know what replaces it, but but sort of like oh, you can just kind of like go through this ritual take stock of like what you want and who you are, and that's going to

Well that was the plot of Amelia Perez.

Ye, that's actually not the plot of Amelia Prez if you remember the ending.

But well, I think, but I think what she's saying is the plot where it's like you think you can.

You yeah, the critique is the plot of Amelia Press Yeah yeah, yeah yeah.

And then you I haven't seen that. I've only watched like clips of it, but I understand that somebody falls down the mountain.

Go ahead and fall down the mountain and explode.

Yeah.

She explodes the best way for any movie to end. And I actually think more movies should end that way.

It's so complicated. I've spent so much time thinking about Amelia.

Perez from I started watching it on a plane, and I was just like, this isn't the place, yeah, for this movie and for me, and like and I got when it started this tour, I got so many again not to be like so many questions are the same, but I got a lot of them, like what you think of Amelia Prez. And I was like halfway through watching on a plane, kind of not understanding what was going on, and I was like, and then I'm going to go in like a pine about this movie, totally

I have to say, it's interesting that there's this idea of trans backlash against Amelia Press, because every trans person I know has opted out of seeing it, and they've been very much like you know, I'm not at a place where I can watch that right now, Like it's I actually think the backlash is almost like manufactured by sis people who are guilty about watching it or something. And then like imagine an imaginary like mob of trans people that are mad at Amelia Press.

Yeah, I think there's something to that. Yeah, there the backlash is like I'm like, okay, like it does ye are doing here.

It almost reminds me of my favorite topic, which is the women that got sent to space and how we're at a place where like something like that, which in twenty sixteen and twenty seventeen would be like the big news of the day. No one cares enough either to be empowered by it or to be angry about it. Yeah, it's just a numbness. It's just like a numbness. Like don't can't you imagine like a time in like twenty fifteen where like every website would be have like a

No, I mean, it's just like but it's it's sort of like also like we've seen this grift so many times. Yeah too, It's like we've seen it with like a deep water submarine. We've seen it.

Like it's one kind of also ended in Amelia Press with Yeah, that's true, I remember that.

That's it. If it I guess if that if they had fallen down a mountain and explodage, Yes, the space hip full of Katy Perry and gay okay and stuff, people would have talked about.

Nory but that's what we need committed to sending a message. They should have.

Committed to be creating a Melia pressed that would exploded. But also it's almost like Ameili Prize is like the transrepresentation version of women in Space for Girl Boss, where it's like we've now gone through the conversation and not just transrepresentation any kind of like representation politics. We've now gone through the debate of like is it good is

Yeah, including even like the trans backlash, right, Yeah, like the imagined mob of like of like somehow trans people who all have the same opinion. Yeah, it's like you have to you have not met trans people if you think there's a mob of them that are somehow in lockstep or like can I even like not just be like cats like batting at each other if you put them together, you know, like that is you that's imagined. It's totally imagined situation that they can chant the same thing at the same.

Time honestly goes back to the lesbian own business that's doomed to fail. It's like they're not agreeing in those meetings.

I mean also in the Mask or the last story of the book, it was that was very that where it was like this is everyone's like, it's a meet up, but everyone's on such a different page.

Yeah, I mean sometimes it's like the when I talk about that, it's like it's like we're all kind of we're all kind of like standing in the same public square, but like we we all came from like all four cardinal directions, And if you'd be like, how do you get here, it'd be like I came over that hill and I saw a coward's like, I have no idea what journey you took. I have no idea the landmarks on your way. Like everything you're saying is alien and

Yeah, it is interesting. I do feel like there's a push to try to like make it seem like almost like trans people are the like like gay guys, where it's like the culture of gay guy is and it's like it does it's not one to one.

Yeah yeah, yeah, But but I also think that like that ends up being like the useful thing is it, Like let's let's let's pretend that all trans people like are out here in a mob telling telling us what we can or can't say, and it's like, yeah, thats just it's.

Not And they were all appointed by Biden.

But yeah, exact.

It was Biden appointed the trans mob.

The head of which was the Suitcase Steeler my favorite.

Oh yeah, yeah, that was a good Biden appointing.

That was that was like Biden kind of ate with that one.

Yeah, that was that that. I was just laughing picturing that person and picturing also like the protests like that that the way that that person protested, like that I did steal suitcase.

But like wearing the outfits all over so genius. I Also, now there's a thing I feel very conspiratorial around internet backlash in general, because it feels like like websites are basically like we need to find four tweets and then we can say there's a backlash, and it's like it's not about thought.

Also, but also I have become so conspiratory. I mean I've become so conspiratorial about literally everything being paid bots, which is I remember in when people were like when I'm whatever, like the kind of stereotypical center lib, you know, fifty year old post Trump was like the Russians Russian bots, like it's Cambergenolytica, and I was like, oh god, you guys need to get it together. Now I have become that.

But that is a very appealing worldview in Summay. That actually makes you sound very chill like, even though it makes you sound like you're like wearing. It's like also like you're like the chilliest to netwhere you're like, it's just it's just the bots to chill out. Everybody loves.

It's actually, yeah, it's kind of beautiful. You're even like, no one's mad.

Yeah, but then I'm also like the most well, I'm like, no one's mad. But then I'm also like we're living in like the last of Us post apocalyptic world because no one knows what's real or what's fake.

Yeah, but soon it'll all be over.

Oh that's true, kind of cheerful.

Who cares? They love you based podcast. I find it to be a really powerful mantra.

You know.

I find it there's a silliness to it. There's a sort of detachment to it. Yeah, And I think both of those are really important right now, Tori, I want.

To give you a challenge, which is, you know, for each of these stories, you experimented with a different genre. I would love to see you experiment with the genre of middle brow humor, essays of the type that you find at airports. And I want you to write a book that's called like, you know, someone's on my seat, not.

Me, writing a book for you to read on the airplane and other concerns.

I would. I mean, I feel like that's actually like the dream, yeah is it like you know, you get like you get like a I feel like actually a lot of like really great writers get to a point in their life where they're like offered a cruise, you know, and then cruises. Oh yeah, like the famous like David Foster Wallace, like a supposedly fun that you've never yeah where never done whatever it.

Is, I'll never do it again.

I'll never do it again. Like it's like it was like he basically just like I get to go on like a carnival cruise or whatever, and I'll like try and elevate it. And then he was like riffing on like Frank Conroy going on a carnival crew on some other cruise where you get any st just did it? Ger Steiner? I mean Gary Steiner loves to go on like a paid travel thing like.

I know, but I'm also like I stand like.

I know absolutely, like I would love to hear him like in dubibing like I'm eating chicken hearts and like whatever it is. It's like and you got paid ten thousand dollars to do this and like you don't care, like the way I mean, I love the way that Gary Steiner doesn't care that it was like I just wrote an entire novel about roll Axis. You know that's like that's just I have a nice watch. I like

You know when you said writers go on cruise, I was thinking about like how comedians going.

I was.

Like, they're performing.

I mean it's sort of similar though, like Lauren Oiler went on the Goop.

Cruise this podcast.

Yeah, Lauren Oiler did it and did like and did the same you know, very very funny, but did the same thing. Where it's like, now that I'm on a cruise as a writer, I'm going to reference every other writer who is on a cruise as a sort of like way of like this is a literary tradition and also I got a free cruise, Like.

I think it's great. I know that people do roll their eyes at that genre, but I'm like it's fun to it's fun for something to be like a thing you revisit. I'm trying to think of like what an equivalent thing is for It's like even honestly Chelsea Pretty and her special when she's like every comedian, every male comedian fucks the stool, like doesn't act where they fuck the stool, and so Chelsea.

How do you make it yours?

Yeah, I mean yours? And so Chelsea's thing is like I want to sort of riff on that by doing For me, it's I'm passively taking it from the stool. She's just like is like right by the stool, and she's just like sitting there and then she's like and then things got crazy and she turns around in her butt. She's just sitting there. But it's like, yeah, that's actually what culture is.

No, it's it's how you interpret it and reference it. Yeah.

I mean, if someone offered me a cruise at this point, it's like got such a tradition that I wouldn't just be like I would of course be like I'm a little bit selling out and I'm taking the cruise, but I would also be like like sort of like I'm in that camp, like I'm more an oiler you engouraged. Yeah, kir Stein guard camp like that's quite uh, I'm quite honored to be to be offered the chance to sell out for a cruise, and I mean I would Yeah.

No, you don't, well, cruise directors, Yeah, this is mags mm hmm.

Although you know, cruises are actually really scary because did you read that New York mag piece about cruises about the people that got left behind and then could not make their way back. So there are these people on a cruise and they like they were dropped off at one of the stops and then we're like running to get back on the cruisehip, but the cruise ship left without them, and then it describes this they weren't Basically cruise ships have no liability whatsoever, like no laws applied

It's like the law of the sea applies, is like maritime law.

Yes, it's a combination of that and also some version of basically cruise company lobbying such that they're very loosely regulated.

And I guess I sort of hear about that this sort of like weird ghost ships of like cruise cruise ships for everybody has neuro virus at the same.

Time, and like, and the most scary thing is that cruise people like people that because the thing with cruise people is that most people on a cruise our serial cruise ship go right. It's like a cult. And so when you raise these points to them, it's like you're

That is very religious sort of.

Yeah, well this is maybe a point to we need to sort of lower the bar for the type of like the writer that can go on a cruise ship. You shouldn't. It shouldn't be like sort of you've made a really successful career and now you get to do cruise ship. They need to get beginning journalists out there. It should be an unpaid on paid internership, because we need more journalists on cruise ships to uncover what is going on.

Yeah, yeah, that's true enough sort of.

Language about what it means to be on a cruise and more about like the crimes that are being committed.

Actually, I have a question for your toy. We were talking about this at some point, what with the contemporary version of specifically David Foster Wallis in that era going on a cruise should be like, yes, the writer going on a cruise is a tradition and everyone does it, but at this point it's so referenced, it's so referencing past cruise ships that it's barely about like it's not really about like what it says about society that we

Okay, well I have two thoughts on that.

Yeah.

One is that I feel like this, like one of the things that's happened is that this genre has been like sort of exhausted, like we're going to find the lynching thing so like even and it ends up becoming like depraved in the practice of it. Yes, Like I feel like the number of writers who are like I'm going to like a right I'm going to go hang out with like right wing influencers and try and like make them interesting to us, Like I'm the it makes me like sick.

It's like a Morley bankrupt project.

It's like this this this idea of like, oh, we're just going to find out what the what the you know, we're gonna find out what the fascist think, you know, at their little and their little fashion like oh they wear this hat or they wear this shoe. Ooh interesting. It's like that's we're no longer like at the State Fair with David Foster Wallis where like we're laundering something

No, this is so good, Yeah, that would like I feel like it's not not a thing in life, but like that there's like whole like cultures that like I need somebody that are like that are like not like, oh, it's like a great place you go to, but like the like I didn't know about Discord Gooning until like last year, and then I was like fascinated with discord gooning, and.

Can you actually explain what it is?

So like you have like whatever your fetish is, right, it's like there's discords, yeah, right where your thing is. You sign under a discord and there's like there's like thousands of other people on these discords and that like then you like spend all day gooning, you know, like but but like it's it's like so it's like it's like I knew about this basic thing from like chat when I was like okay, they're like, oh, like you know asl like age sex, and then you're kind of

I never know where you never know what people are going through. I'm so glad you brought this up. I learned about discord like jerk off groups recently, yeah, and I have it. Luckily I'm technically untalented, so I haven't found my way in. Yeah, but I was like, well, I've got to check that out.

There is a level of tech to do it that is like that is like like I wanted to. I wanted to see it, And I'm like, you have to really be invested. But I feel like once you're invested, like it seems that the payoffs are hot. It's like it's like once you're in, you're like I'm set, Like I don't need the real world anymore.

It's great that people are getting weirder in a way that I am finding myself curious about. Like I am like I follow a guy on porn Twitter that like like puts his full id up and it's just like just to humiliate me. And I'm like wow, he puts his phone over. He's like just text me and tell me I'm pitiful, and I'm like this is weird.

Yeah, And I just don't think that like real life can can achieve that level of like like dopamine sensory humiliation. Like if it's like I I was weird, you know, like on the street and like some people are just like and like you know, a few people snickered and you're like I was mildly humiliated. But when you have like twenty thousand people on the internet damn doing that, it's like you're the sensory overload that is possible for this kind of thing. Now is is so fascinating, Like.

Well and then that needs me over like becomes the point like I've seen so many things of like porn is my life, Like I will, yeah, like quit your family and watch porn and like it's like crazy where it's like the like religion of porn becomes like the new thing.

And I need a respectable writer who's not part of this to like get I want like Barbara King Solver just like doing you know this is the culture of gooning. I've uncovered it.

That's so genius. You know, we started this horny and we're ending in horn I really appreciate that.

I want them to like uncover the big goon.

Big the big goon has not been exposed.

Yeah, And you know what's actually sick is like so many people are hypocrites and are so sex positive in their writing and then their adages and whatever, and they would absolutely cower the night of the Big Goon. They would not have the bravery to look at the.

It's like strap on their pith.

Damn.

Barbara King Solver, if you're listening, this is yours.

This is your moment.

It's great that you got the pulitzer, but can you can you face the big good? Yeah?

Wow?

Wow, Well that was amazing.

I think we should we do our final any final thoughts on on prolonged divorce as a straight.

No, I just just just rip the band off, like I think. I'll just say, I think it should be a four month process.

Oh wow.

I think if we're going to do an arbitrary thing, I think from proposing your divorce to filing it, four months is reasonable. That's real and you can still be it's a gay marriage if you're if you've been doing it in four months, anything after that, you're in a straight marriage.

Wow. Wow, yeah you heard of your greatest marriage, Brandelina. Yeah, they're still going. Oh I think they're still divorcing. Am I wrong?

Yeah? Yeah?

Yeah, it's like it's been years. I had no idea, and they are actually, if you think about it, sort of the archetypal straight American couple. Yeah, of this generation.

I think like you don't have to like have everything settled after four months, Like if you're like them and you own like a rose wine thing, it's.

Like who gets the rose?

It's that is like that's difficult to me.

That's different paperwork, and that's the lawyers.

Yeah, but you know you have to like settle that we are gonna split up the Rose ey yes, yeah, yeah.

They finalized December. We're getting word that they finalized December twenty twenty four.

We have once again spread misinformation and December twenty twenty four, huh huh still pretty recent.

You know, the rose is not bad. Oh I tried it recently. Anyway, Let's do our final segment.

Okay, Tori. Our final segment is called shout outs. In this segment, we pay homage to the grand straight tradition of the radio shout out, shouting out to anything that we are enjoying, people, places, things, ideas. Imagine it twousand and one. You're at TRL shouting out to your squad back home, and we have to think.

We have to think about it on the spot, which is why I have my thinking base.

On here's okay, I have one, I have one?

Okay, what's up freaks, loss and perverts around the globe. I want to give a shout out to listening to different music in different locations and having it hit different.

I you know, this is sort of a basic concept, but sometimes, you know, as I've been living in Los Angeles, some music I'm like, seeing it makes sense more, and some music I've been like, I know this is good, and I know that I like this, but it's not hitting as hard as I want. Today I was walking through New York City and I was taking the subway, and I said, it's time to put on Okay, Lou and guess what. It was hitting harder than it's hit

My version of this so my dad's favorite musical artist when I was growing up with Shade. Now, Shade famously is like sexy music, and I think I will finally be liberated when I can recontextualize Shade as something sexy rather than something that reminds me of my father.

Yeah, I mean, I find myself like and I can't like I I it's you'll get there. Yeah, you just need new context.

I need, I need, I need smoking, I need, honestly discordgooning, but for shaphones.

Yeah, I've I'm finding myself listening to him constantly in LA because I'm like, well this is makes sense, that.

Does make sense and now that yeah, it's like st sunny.

Yeah. And today I was like should I put on a hem? And I was like, why not? It's cool? It doesn't make any sense.

Okay, what's up, fashionist does? I want to give a shout out to the brand Marrow, the shoe brand Marrow. It is so difficult right now to shop for shoes because of the sort of constant TikTok semi ironic reappropriation of every floating signifier that constantly exists. It is impossible to know whether something you are wearing signifies that you are basic, that you are young, that you are old, that you're all trying to be young, that you are

Nautical decorations. Yes, I was in a what I went with a bunch of gay people to a restaurant that was I was. I was staring at it the whole time, was like, what is this restaurant? Why does it look this way? Like I couldn't name it because I was with gay people, so it didn't occur to me that I could be in a nautical restaurant. Like they were

Wow, that is so powerful.

Do you think nautical?

I love nauticle.

Will come back, like yes, like in the way that people fetishize cowboy work, where all that stuff like will we get to a sailor moment?

Nautical is incoming. I also think we all have this thing where our parents' bathrooms had like a seashore theme and it's like hack. But now we're like almost at a place where we're like, well, I'm my parents' age, like maybe I want to find my way into the sea.

It was a time for some shells around the mirror.

Yeah, I think there's something where you're like, well, I'll do it, but it'll be like a STEMI ironic and I'll find a way to play with it.

The thing is it immediately becomes like that, that just becomes like you're a thing like I like in Florida. When I'm in Florida, i am like excited to see like manate seemed.

Totally like not in a sort of alligator stuff.

Yeah. Yeah, I'm in Maine.

When I see those damn booies everywhere, I'm like perfect, You're.

Like, yeah, I'm in Maine.

I'm like, in fact, yeah, all I want is a damn main bowie.

Toy. This has been an absolute delight.

It's been a pleasure for me so much for doing it.

When for doing it, please purchase the book stag Dance on Bookshop dot Organ not Amazon. That's right, I said it. Wow, makes political statement. Making a political statement or Amazon, you know or whatever. I have no moral backbook. And if you're in the UK, you know, look look where you're going to be.

You're going to be it's gonna be like eight stops in the UK and then including West Kirby. I don't know that that is the probably the most obscure, but apparently it's a nice place outside of Liverpool. Doing an event in Brighton with Sean Fay who probably your listeners know of Shaan Fay. And then I'm doing also Sydney Literary Festival, Auckland Literary Festival and Melbourne let Literary Festival.

So I'm doing We actually do have a lot of Australian listeners, that's true. Australians love old Gate comedy.

Yeah.

Actually, well this is It's perfect that because I've been sort of remiss and promoting those things.

Yeah, you know, if you're an Australian listener, please please look that up.

I'll be there.

Amazing.

Wow. Well bye podcast and.

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