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SMNTY Classics: Bye Felipe · Stuff Mom Never Told You

0:05
Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha. I'm welcome to stuff
0:07
Speaker 1: I never told you protection of I heart Radio. You know, Samantha,
0:19
Speaker 1: I've learned a lot from you over the years. And
0:22
Speaker 1: one of the things it's about cuffing season, which we're
0:28
Speaker 1: kind of entering right we are. It's happening, right, which
0:32
Speaker 1: if you don't know, if you're like me and you
0:33
Speaker 1: don't know, basically that's like you're trying to nail down
0:35
Speaker 1: a partner. Correct it's cold, you want to like literally
0:40
Speaker 1: come in and hugging each other and cuddle around the fire,
0:43
Speaker 1: and also be prepared to Valentine's Day and all the holidays. Okay,
0:48
Speaker 1: I see, which, as we've discussed before, is a very
0:51
Speaker 1: telling name. But I heard, I read this really interesting
0:56
Speaker 1: piece and I listeners, I am begging you please right
1:00
Speaker 1: in if this is something you've experienced that is true,
1:04
Speaker 1: because this is just something I read. Is that one
1:06
Speaker 1: of the new things that online dating is that there
1:08
Speaker 1: have been so many bots in online dating and so
1:10
Speaker 1: many scams that people have started writing Google docs that
1:16
Speaker 1: are essentially like, here's what I want out of a partner,
1:20
Speaker 1: Here's who I am. Here past references for people I've
1:23
Speaker 1: dated like Google docs, so they're like attaching it to
1:27
Speaker 1: their dating rhythm profile. I like it. I'm honestly like,
1:33
Speaker 1: I'm into it. Seems like a lot of work, but
1:34
Speaker 1: I guess that you could be creative. It doesn't have
1:36
Speaker 1: to be I feel like this is funding so clickal
1:39
Speaker 1: because the old school kind of dating, for a matchmaker,
1:43
Speaker 1: you actually would do these types of profiles and then
1:46
Speaker 1: the person who you would pay money would either set
1:49
Speaker 1: up events for like minded people or like just hook
1:53
Speaker 1: you up one on one. Like it seems like it's
1:55
Speaker 1: going back as where before it was just like all physical.
1:59
Speaker 1: Let me see if we kind of match Let's talk
2:01
Speaker 1: about SACA and then we'll come in into it again. Okay,
2:04
Speaker 1: keep it. Kind of did this with a questionnaire, which
2:07
Speaker 1: I really appreciated, but it feels like it's coming back
2:10
Speaker 1: to the old school. Matchmakers would be making some money now. Yeah, yeah, listeners,
2:18
Speaker 1: you really need to write in because I was reading
2:20
Speaker 1: about this and I heard that some people were right
2:21
Speaker 1: like fifteen to twenty pages of this like talk about
2:26
Speaker 1: you know. What I have seen is the Google questionnaire. Oh,
2:30
Speaker 1: where if after a date of person will send a
2:33
Speaker 1: questionnaire to that person and say what did I do right?
2:35
Speaker 1: What did I do right? I have seen that right?
2:38
Speaker 1: And did we talk about that? Where some of them
2:39
Speaker 1: were so like clearly out of touch, where every answer
2:43
Speaker 1: like A through D was like I was the best
2:45
Speaker 1: sexy favorite. I don't remember this, but it seems about right. Yeah,
2:50
Speaker 1: I believe so. I think people are sharing some they
2:53
Speaker 1: had gotten where it was like clearly there was no
2:57
Speaker 1: other answer than this was the very best person I've
3:00
Speaker 1: ever dated. Well, listeners, we are counting on you, We
3:04
Speaker 1: are depending on you to write in and let us
3:07
Speaker 1: know what's going on. But in the meantime, please enjoy
3:13
Speaker 1: this slightly dated episode about online dating. Welcome to stuff
3:21
Speaker 1: Mom never told you from how supports dot com. Hellen,
3:29
Speaker 1: Welcome to the podcast. I'm Christen and I'm Caroline, and
3:32
Speaker 1: today I'm gonna talk about We're gonna talk about rejection,
3:38
Speaker 1: and we're going to talk about how online dating offers
3:41
Speaker 1: documentary proof. The guys fellas dudes, you have a hard time,
3:49
Speaker 1: couldn't turn down sometimes heck yeah, the Internet is sort
3:53
Speaker 1: of a scary landscape. It is. And should we go
3:57
Speaker 1: ahead and offer a disclaimer that some women have a
4:01
Speaker 1: hard time with rejection sometimes as well, and overreact getting
4:06
Speaker 1: turned down, especially if you're being sexually turned down. Well,
4:10
Speaker 1: rejection is hard. Rejection is the worst. Rejecting is pretty
4:15
Speaker 1: bad too, but I mean it can rejection of any
4:18
Speaker 1: kind can really sting, and and that is not a
4:21
Speaker 1: gendered thing. It's a fact of life. Rejection is the worst,
4:25
Speaker 1: and we hate it, we all struggle with it. But
4:28
Speaker 1: there are some things that put certain people at risk
4:32
Speaker 1: of being a bigger jerk than other people when it
4:34
Speaker 1: comes to rejection. Yeah, I mean this is a particular
4:37
Speaker 1: pattern when it comes to straight dating and especially straight
4:42
Speaker 1: online dating, although it is more of a thing of
4:45
Speaker 1: straight guys dating, I should say, because the recipient of
4:51
Speaker 1: the offer, whether it's to you know, have a drink bought,
4:55
Speaker 1: or a date or sex or whatever. Um, she can
5:00
Speaker 1: be of any orientation whatsoever. It's really more you know,
5:03
Speaker 1: straight guys processing being turned down and what God is
5:07
Speaker 1: thinking about this whole thing was an incident that happened
5:10
Speaker 1: on the internet in late August. Yeah. I was actually
5:13
Speaker 1: on vacation when this happened, and I just remember seeing, um,
5:17
Speaker 1: my internet, my personal internet, blowing up over it. So
5:22
Speaker 1: BuzzFeed writer and comedian Grace Spellman got a series of
5:27
Speaker 1: tweets and Facebook messages from this guy Ben Shane, who
5:33
Speaker 1: is a former Harry Potter podcast host and who's also
5:37
Speaker 1: the co founder of the website fem Inspire. He was
5:41
Speaker 1: clearly trying to charm Misspellman, and uh he, I guess
5:49
Speaker 1: it's an understatement to say that he didn't really charm her. Yeah,
5:53
Speaker 1: the whole incident was kind of bizarre because they had
5:55
Speaker 1: friended each other on Facebook nine years ago when Shane
6:00
Speaker 1: was hosting this podcast called muggle Cast which was super
6:04
Speaker 1: popular um and Spellman was a fan, so they became
6:08
Speaker 1: friends on Facebook, but they were weren't in contact whatsoever.
6:12
Speaker 1: So this time in August was the first time he
6:15
Speaker 1: was messaging her ever, so totally out of the blue,
6:19
Speaker 1: and at first he was full of praise. So in
6:23
Speaker 1: one Facebook message he sent her, he said, you do
6:26
Speaker 1: a remarkable job of making your quirky personality shine through online.
6:31
Speaker 1: It's hyperactively beautiful. And to to this, Spellman says, thanks, no, thanks,
6:40
Speaker 1: I've got a boyfriend, wish you well turn him down politely. Well,
6:46
Speaker 1: he was not too happy about that. No, No, that
6:49
Speaker 1: would be also another understatement. He responded with a slew
6:54
Speaker 1: of of not so nice messages, including just because he
6:58
Speaker 1: worked at BuzzFeed, does it mean you're good? Good luck
7:01
Speaker 1: finding meaning and all of that garbage you call content,
7:05
Speaker 1: and he also, I mean, he got more personal than that,
7:08
Speaker 1: and he just wouldn't stop. He was contacting her on
7:10
Speaker 1: all sorts of platforms just to tell her that she
7:13
Speaker 1: was the worst. Basically, yeah, I mean, because it really
7:15
Speaker 1: exploded when she publicized the private, incessant private messaging that
7:20
Speaker 1: he had been doing. And then of course that only
7:23
Speaker 1: fanned his his outrage, and at one point he wrote
7:27
Speaker 1: her an email saying, I was so angry and offended.
7:30
Speaker 1: I wrote a draft putting you in your place, but
7:34
Speaker 1: then he decided against it and wrote her this email instead.
7:38
Speaker 1: But what was interesting to see was this White Knight
7:42
Speaker 1: turn that it took when he issued a press statement
7:46
Speaker 1: touting his fem Inspire cred saying I've done more for
7:49
Speaker 1: the cause of advancing women's rights than any of the
7:52
Speaker 1: people who are criticizing me. Um. Because this is after
7:56
Speaker 1: Grace Spellman publicized this incident to her large Twitter following,
8:02
Speaker 1: and people kind of came out of the woodwork saying,
8:05
Speaker 1: either what a cree but also this has happened to
8:08
Speaker 1: me before, and also yeah, this is why he you know,
8:12
Speaker 1: I left them Inspire or why he is not on
8:16
Speaker 1: our podcast anymore, etcetera. It does seem to be fair
8:20
Speaker 1: that Ben Shane has some personal issues going on that
8:24
Speaker 1: have led him to separate from other people in his
8:28
Speaker 1: professional life, and that perhaps that behavior is why he's
8:33
Speaker 1: no longer with the certain ventures that he had been
8:36
Speaker 1: with before and what possibly led him to be like
8:39
Speaker 1: incredibly creepy with Grace Spellman. But that about face, going
8:43
Speaker 1: from you're brilliant and hyperactively beautiful and charming to you're
8:49
Speaker 1: no good at all. All of your work is garbage.
8:51
Speaker 1: I mean, that kind of about face is something that
8:53
Speaker 1: we see happen so often anecdotally but now documented via
8:59
Speaker 1: online data. And this whole incident prompted Jessica roy Over
9:04
Speaker 1: at the Cut to relate this to the broader pattern
9:08
Speaker 1: of straight guys, in particular fellas we love you, but
9:13
Speaker 1: straight guys not wanting to take no for an answer.
9:17
Speaker 1: She writes, the whole exchange is pretty emblematic of the
9:20
Speaker 1: inherent difficulties of rejecting men, both online and off. Women
9:25
Speaker 1: are frequently made to tow a line between being polite
9:28
Speaker 1: enough not to set off a suitor, but not so
9:30
Speaker 1: polite that their manners are interpreted as flirting. And when
9:34
Speaker 1: I read that, I could immediately relate to what she
9:39
Speaker 1: was saying. It totally resonated. Yeah, and it resonated with Spellman.
9:43
Speaker 1: She agreed. She says, you can't win in these types
9:45
Speaker 1: of situations, even if you're polite in your rejection, they'll
9:48
Speaker 1: demand that you tell them why you did it. It's
9:50
Speaker 1: just a mixture of entitlement and the fragility of ego, which,
9:54
Speaker 1: by the way, as we will get into it a
9:56
Speaker 1: little bit, is backed up by research. Spellman speaks the truth.
9:59
Speaker 1: She goes on to say, because you don't know how
10:01
Speaker 1: they're going to handle it, you don't know if you
10:03
Speaker 1: should be afraid or not. So the result is this
10:07
Speaker 1: catch twenty two that comes up often of guys asking
10:12
Speaker 1: for women to be straightforward and honest with them, which
10:15
Speaker 1: is totally fair. That is a very reasonable request. Who
10:18
Speaker 1: wants to be let on answer nobody unless you are
10:22
Speaker 1: just a sucker for pain. But if she is in
10:28
Speaker 1: fact straightforward, you can then be punished for being too straightforward.
10:32
Speaker 1: Then you're a jerk or a word that we you know,
10:35
Speaker 1: can't really say on the podcast, um, and we should acknowledge. Yeah,
10:41
Speaker 1: I mean some women do lead guys on. Some women
10:44
Speaker 1: do put men in holding patterns of you know, wuying
10:48
Speaker 1: their companionship but not wanting to take it to a
10:50
Speaker 1: relationship level of sort of like I'm gonna, you know,
10:53
Speaker 1: float on you for a little bit until I find
10:55
Speaker 1: a guy that I do want to date. That does happen,
10:58
Speaker 1: and that's not an okay pattern I there. Um, But
11:02
Speaker 1: when I made a YouTube video about this whole thing,
11:07
Speaker 1: the comments were split between guys saying he would just
11:11
Speaker 1: be straightforward, be honest, and girls saying when I was
11:15
Speaker 1: honest and straightforward. I got so much blowback from it,
11:20
Speaker 1: and sprinkled in that too, a lot of anecdotes from
11:24
Speaker 1: girls dealing with guys not taking no for an answer
11:28
Speaker 1: in the sense of if you say you're just not interested,
11:34
Speaker 1: that's really not sufficient. They want to know why. They
11:36
Speaker 1: want an explanation, and typically the only explanations that shut
11:42
Speaker 1: it down completely are I have a boyfriend, or you
11:46
Speaker 1: hold up your hand to show off an engagement ring
11:48
Speaker 1: or a wedding band, and that will usually get them
11:51
Speaker 1: to stop. Which is interesting how the primary way to
11:56
Speaker 1: get a guy to take no for an answer is
11:58
Speaker 1: not for you to say no, but rather for you
12:00
Speaker 1: to present another man next to you, either literally or figuratively. Well,
12:05
Speaker 1: it seems that that's the only way to put a
12:08
Speaker 1: stop to a sense of entitlement to you, access to you.
12:14
Speaker 1: I UM. I had an awkward moment in college when
12:18
Speaker 1: a friend of mine told me that he had feelings
12:21
Speaker 1: for me, and when I responded compassionate, I mean, he
12:29
Speaker 1: we've been friends for years. When I responded very you know,
12:31
Speaker 1: compassionately that like, I understand, and I'm really sorry, but
12:35
Speaker 1: I don't feel the same way, like I love you
12:38
Speaker 1: as a friend. We've been friends for so long. I
12:41
Speaker 1: just am not on that same romantic wavelength. He got
12:45
Speaker 1: very upset. I got very upset. We talked, and we
12:49
Speaker 1: I thought made up, but then when he offered to
12:52
Speaker 1: like take me out to dinner for tak us to
12:55
Speaker 1: let things blow over, I was like, oh, good, like
12:57
Speaker 1: things are back on track. It was actually ruse because
13:01
Speaker 1: he had taken me out for tacos to demand an
13:04
Speaker 1: explanation of why I would not date him, saying that
13:07
Speaker 1: everything we do and we hang out together is the
13:09
Speaker 1: same thing that couples would do, or that a girlfriend
13:11
Speaker 1: and a boyfriend would do, So why can't you just
13:13
Speaker 1: be my girlfriend? And it made me really sad because
13:17
Speaker 1: it made me realize that he must be feeling really
13:20
Speaker 1: powerless in our friendship if he's telling me that I
13:25
Speaker 1: need to change the way that I feel and change,
13:28
Speaker 1: but I'm doing to come over to his viewpoint of things,
13:32
Speaker 1: the old Taco Ruse, Caroline Taco Ruse. And the thing is,
13:37
Speaker 1: so many of us have stories like that of having
13:43
Speaker 1: to deal with what happens when when someone catches feelings.
13:48
Speaker 1: But this whole conversation, especially when we look at in
13:51
Speaker 1: the context of online dating and more of the hook
13:54
Speaker 1: up culture side of things, it's not so much catching feelings.
13:58
Speaker 1: It's more wanting to catch bodies. And if you cannot
14:01
Speaker 1: catch that body, then you will said a series a
14:05
Speaker 1: very mean text messages or okay Cupid messages that completely,
14:11
Speaker 1: you know, turn your attraction on a dime, and suddenly
14:14
Speaker 1: this woman is just the worst thing. Ever. It's so
14:18
Speaker 1: weird to look at these messages because there are plenty
14:22
Speaker 1: of blogs and things like that that now post them
14:25
Speaker 1: for all to see, and it's so weird to see like, Hey,
14:29
Speaker 1: you're so hot, I want to date you. I'm being
14:31
Speaker 1: very euphemistic with what I say. Um, And the minute
14:35
Speaker 1: the woman's like no thanks, so she doesn't respond, the
14:39
Speaker 1: guy goes immediately to well, you're ugly and fat anyway,
14:42
Speaker 1: and I don't want to date you, and nobody else
14:43
Speaker 1: wants to date you, quote unquote date you, so just
14:47
Speaker 1: never contact me again. It's like, whoa were you just
14:49
Speaker 1: having a completely different conversation than I was. Wait, I
14:52
Speaker 1: thought women were the crazy ones, Caroline, what happened? Yeah?
14:57
Speaker 1: The fact that the Daily Dot published guy lines for
15:00
Speaker 1: dudes getting rejected on Tender that included quote once someone
15:04
Speaker 1: makes it clear they're not interested in talking, do you
15:07
Speaker 1: stop talking to them? Kind of points out that this
15:11
Speaker 1: is something that happens now. I'm sure that your patients,
15:15
Speaker 1: if you are a straight dude in these kinds of
15:18
Speaker 1: online dating, scenarios can wear very thin because it is
15:22
Speaker 1: more of a woman's game, a street woman's game with
15:25
Speaker 1: online dating, because of the whole narratives, the broader social
15:29
Speaker 1: narratives of men as the pursuers, women as the recipients
15:35
Speaker 1: of a gentleman's attention um, and a lot of times
15:38
Speaker 1: guys do have to deal with a lot of rejection,
15:41
Speaker 1: which we're going to talk about more in just a minute. Um,
15:45
Speaker 1: but it's Alexandra. Tweetings by Philippe Instagram account illustrates repeatedly
15:51
Speaker 1: the reactions to this online dating rejection are so severe.
15:59
Speaker 1: So any times, yeah, and I mean yeah, that might
16:03
Speaker 1: come out of a place of anger or online anonymity,
16:08
Speaker 1: making it easier to be like, well, screw you, lady,
16:10
Speaker 1: but that doesn't make it any less horrifying. Uh. Tweeting
16:14
Speaker 1: writing in Miss magazine says that since creating by Philip,
16:17
Speaker 1: which of course is a takeoff of by Felicia from Friday, Uh,
16:22
Speaker 1: it has become a parent that a standard trajectory of
16:24
Speaker 1: discourse with men online is this man hits on woman,
16:28
Speaker 1: woman rejects or ignores him. Man lashes out with insults
16:32
Speaker 1: or even threats. Now we should say that this Instagram
16:35
Speaker 1: account is one of those social media accounts that displays
16:40
Speaker 1: in full glory, uh, the interactions online between men and
16:46
Speaker 1: women on dating sites tender. Okay, keep it, what what
16:49
Speaker 1: have you? Um? Basically showing screen grabs of these text
16:55
Speaker 1: or email conversations that more often than not are completely
16:59
Speaker 1: one foul in percent. Gross. Yeah, they don't. They don't
17:02
Speaker 1: end well by Philip, they don't end well at all.
17:05
Speaker 1: There was even one where a guy was sending messages
17:09
Speaker 1: to a girl young enough to be his daughter, and
17:12
Speaker 1: she was like, Hey, I am fourteen, you have to
17:15
Speaker 1: leave me alone. Granted sub question what side is she
17:18
Speaker 1: on that she's fourteen? Anyway, He was like, oh, well,
17:21
Speaker 1: my bad, Like no disrespect, have a nice day. He
17:24
Speaker 1: immediately comes back and it's like, well, you're going to
17:26
Speaker 1: be fat when you grow up anyway. So just yeah,
17:28
Speaker 1: like what what, why do you need to do that?
17:32
Speaker 1: I don't know? What's people the power grab um yeah
17:35
Speaker 1: tweet and writes that she started it to one commiserate
17:39
Speaker 1: with other women who are dealing with this so commonly too,
17:43
Speaker 1: to show guys what it's like to be a woman online.
17:46
Speaker 1: We have talked a lot on the podcast before about
17:49
Speaker 1: online harassment targeted at women and three to quote expose
17:54
Speaker 1: the problematic entitlement some men feel they need to exert
17:58
Speaker 1: over women in general. And she did also note in
18:03
Speaker 1: an interview with BuzzFeed that Yeah, online dating is often
18:07
Speaker 1: wretched four guys because they do have to often message
18:11
Speaker 1: a lot of women you got, you gotta swipe a
18:13
Speaker 1: lot to get a match, and even if you do
18:15
Speaker 1: get a match, it doesn't guarantee that that attraction is
18:17
Speaker 1: going to be sustained. Well, I mean, I think I
18:21
Speaker 1: think it's wretched for for everyone involved, because there's plenty
18:25
Speaker 1: of anecdotes about guys setting up accounts pretending to be
18:32
Speaker 1: women and men. There was one guy interviewed in one
18:35
Speaker 1: of these articles we read where he was like, I
18:36
Speaker 1: set up five women and five men as fake accounts,
18:41
Speaker 1: and before I could even log back off, the women
18:44
Speaker 1: had already received hundreds of messages, many of them gross,
18:47
Speaker 1: many of them going straight to sex and like freaky
18:51
Speaker 1: scary stuff at that, and like most of the men
18:54
Speaker 1: had just received absolutely nothing. And so he's like, I
18:56
Speaker 1: can see how it's demoralizing for everyone involve, because he's like,
19:01
Speaker 1: some guy might have just emailed one of these women
19:04
Speaker 1: to say hi, and if I responded as the woman
19:06
Speaker 1: being like hey, what's up, where do you live or whatever,
19:10
Speaker 1: it immediately was like super sexual, super here's what I'm
19:13
Speaker 1: gonna do to you. And so yeah, it it immediately
19:18
Speaker 1: went to like I want to come over and read
19:19
Speaker 1: Judith Butler together and drink some tea, yeah, and do
19:24
Speaker 1: you have cats? Yeah. The more the merrier. Let's put
19:28
Speaker 1: on our stretchy pants and let's read poetry. Ironically, though
19:33
Speaker 1: this is a little bit of a tangent, but ironically,
19:37
Speaker 1: Tinder like the people who run Tinder had a bi
19:41
Speaker 1: Philip level meltdown in response to this Vanity Fair piece
19:46
Speaker 1: that came out a couple of months ago on Tinder hookups,
19:50
Speaker 1: this whole Tender hookup culture by Nancy Joe Sales, who
19:54
Speaker 1: did not paint Tinder usage, I should say in the
19:59
Speaker 1: most pause ative light. It was made a lot of
20:02
Speaker 1: guys who use it come off very smarmie, and it
20:05
Speaker 1: was a, you know, one of those bigger pieces about oh,
20:08
Speaker 1: what are we doing with this hookup culture and ruining everything?
20:12
Speaker 1: And women are just being dragged along in the mud essentially.
20:15
Speaker 1: And in response though to this very buzzed about vanity Fair,
20:20
Speaker 1: Peace Tender spouted out thirty tweets in quick succession, including
20:27
Speaker 1: one that said quote, if you want to try to
20:29
Speaker 1: terrace down with one sided journalism, well that's your prerogative,
20:33
Speaker 1: which is sort of reminiscent of the kinds of Bi
20:37
Speaker 1: Filipe style post rejection messages that women get I mean,
20:41
Speaker 1: and in folks, if you haven't seen this, I do
20:44
Speaker 1: recommend you google it because it's incredible to watch this,
20:49
Speaker 1: this Tender by phileep melt down happening on the internet.
20:52
Speaker 1: It almost felt unreal. Well, okay, then maybe you can explain.
20:57
Speaker 1: There have been plenty of things online or in the
21:01
Speaker 1: media about how, like, you know, apps like Tender or
21:04
Speaker 1: Signify the end of Times that basically like no one's
21:07
Speaker 1: ever going to fall in love and have families again
21:09
Speaker 1: because Tender is ruining life for everyone. What was it
21:13
Speaker 1: about Nancy jos Sales? Do you know that that caused
21:17
Speaker 1: Tender to get so upset? As I say Tender like
21:19
Speaker 1: it's a person, but the Tender Twitter person to get
21:21
Speaker 1: so upset because she painted because Tinder was positioned in
21:28
Speaker 1: her piece as instigating a post dating apocalypse essentially, and
21:35
Speaker 1: you know, talks a lot about how these guys that
21:38
Speaker 1: she interviewed in her story manipulate Tinder to basically get
21:44
Speaker 1: as much sex as they want and treat women in
21:47
Speaker 1: real life very very poorly. And it's just that insta
21:51
Speaker 1: sex hookup culture that is even more troubling. It seems
21:57
Speaker 1: like to Sales than the analog hookup culture, where I mean,
22:02
Speaker 1: at least you're meeting at a party and one of
22:05
Speaker 1: the things tender, or at least this person treating on
22:08
Speaker 1: behalf of Tinder. Was most upset about was how Sales
22:13
Speaker 1: did not interview anyone with Tinder for the piece, to
22:17
Speaker 1: which Nancy Joe Sales on Twitter got the last word
22:20
Speaker 1: in this whole tender Twitter melt down, saying, ha ha,
22:25
Speaker 1: this piece wasn't even about Tinder at all, So you're
22:31
Speaker 1: saying that, um, Miss Vanity Fair hurt Mr tinders feelings
22:36
Speaker 1: and Mr Tinder just lashed out. It was like, Miss
22:39
Speaker 1: Vanity Fair, you can go you aren't my type anyway. Yeah, yeah,
22:44
Speaker 1: I mean it really, it really was like that. And listeners,
22:47
Speaker 1: we will be posting a link to that Vanity Fair
22:49
Speaker 1: piece over at stuff I've never told you dot com
22:52
Speaker 1: on the podcast post for this, So if you haven't
22:55
Speaker 1: read it, I highly recommend you go check it out.
22:57
Speaker 1: If you are familiar with it, um and want us
22:59
Speaker 1: to do a podcast, look at it. Just let us
23:03
Speaker 1: know because it's I mean, there's a lot to talk
23:06
Speaker 1: about in there. I love these weird personified, anthropomorphized versions
23:11
Speaker 1: of websites of dating as yeah, because I feel like Tinder,
23:14
Speaker 1: who's obviously the hipper millennial on a smartphone tweeting things,
23:18
Speaker 1: whereas e Harmonies at home on just on like a
23:22
Speaker 1: rotary telephone calling you up, wondering why you're not answering. Oh,
23:28
Speaker 1: we're gonna get so many letters from the Harmony users.
23:32
Speaker 1: And this is all it's all funny to joke about,
23:35
Speaker 1: you know, if you if you can't laugh, you'll cry,
23:37
Speaker 1: that kind of thing. But there is a darker, more
23:41
Speaker 1: serious side to all of this, because it's not as
23:44
Speaker 1: if this behavior and this language and these reactions are
23:48
Speaker 1: limited to the Internet, to the online world. This is
23:53
Speaker 1: very real stuff. This, this aggression, this masculinity threat, all
23:57
Speaker 1: of this is very real. And the website, when women
24:01
Speaker 1: refuse around Tumbler, highlights that yeah, I mean this Tumbler
24:06
Speaker 1: is essentially a collection of stories and graphic images trigger
24:11
Speaker 1: warning of women who have endured domestic abuse from either
24:18
Speaker 1: partners or strangers, you know, especially in context of rejecting
24:26
Speaker 1: them in one way or another. And and it really
24:29
Speaker 1: does get to that quote problematic entitlement that tweet says
24:34
Speaker 1: helped inspire by Philip I mean and and to that
24:39
Speaker 1: kind of darker, darker, darker entitlement was also echoed in
24:46
Speaker 1: the manifesto written by Elliott Roger, who murdered women partially
24:53
Speaker 1: because he was so angry that he could not sleep
24:58
Speaker 1: with them, he did not have access to them him
25:00
Speaker 1: in the way he felt like he should. Yeah, he
25:03
Speaker 1: felt that women should be afraid of him, or that
25:06
Speaker 1: women should be afraid of men and should be submissive
25:10
Speaker 1: to them completely. And obviously that is a worst case
25:14
Speaker 1: scenario kind of example. But ultimately it is all connected
25:17
Speaker 1: because there are these common threads that run through that.
25:21
Speaker 1: And we're going to talk about those threads and the
25:23
Speaker 1: academic research that's been done on them when we come
25:26
Speaker 1: right back from a quick bread. So we don't have
25:40
Speaker 1: just Instagram accounts and anecdotes from our dating lives to
25:46
Speaker 1: base this whole conversation on. There has actually been a
25:49
Speaker 1: ton of research on romantic and sexual rejection and how
25:56
Speaker 1: that often is processed through gendered lenses, as as most
26:02
Speaker 1: things are eventually processed through. Yeah, there was study called
26:06
Speaker 1: the Prevalence and Nature of Unrequited Love, and it pointed
26:11
Speaker 1: out that unrequited love and crushing on people was four
26:16
Speaker 1: times more frequent than quote unquote equal love, that deep, actual,
26:22
Speaker 1: real relationship where two people know that they're in a
26:26
Speaker 1: relationship with each other and love each other. Um. Researchers
26:30
Speaker 1: said that unrequited love was not a good simulation of
26:34
Speaker 1: true romantic love, but an inferior approximation of that ideal.
26:38
Speaker 1: And then it's more common among people with an anxious
26:41
Speaker 1: or ambivalent attachment style. And this is to establish the
26:46
Speaker 1: fact that rejection is gonna happen. I mean, this is
26:52
Speaker 1: more the rule than the exception. Love and relationships are
26:56
Speaker 1: the exception. Otherwise, I mean, how would we really get
26:59
Speaker 1: on with our lives that we didn't have rejection happening
27:02
Speaker 1: all the time. Yeah, But in calling it not a
27:04
Speaker 1: good stimulation of true romantic love, they're sort of explaining
27:08
Speaker 1: the fact that it's so much more common than that
27:11
Speaker 1: equal love, and it can be so much more intense.
27:14
Speaker 1: It can stir up all of these feelings of inferiority
27:17
Speaker 1: and anxiety. And so I think that it's absolutely important
27:21
Speaker 1: to talk about that in relation to online dating, where
27:24
Speaker 1: so much rejection happens. Yeah, And these similar kinds of
27:28
Speaker 1: studies have found that men do tend to experience romantic
27:34
Speaker 1: rejection more often than women, quite possibly because again of
27:39
Speaker 1: this heteronormative role social role as the pursuer, men are
27:44
Speaker 1: more expected to put themselves in positions where they could
27:48
Speaker 1: be rejected compared to women. But the thing is, while
27:53
Speaker 1: rejection is no fun, getting rejected is no fun. Of course,
27:58
Speaker 1: studies have also shown that it's also painful to do
28:02
Speaker 1: the rejecting, and this goes back to a study published
28:07
Speaker 1: in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology that looked
28:11
Speaker 1: at both sides of unrequited love, of the person who
28:14
Speaker 1: was having to process receiving it in the person who's
28:18
Speaker 1: dolling it out, and the authors wrote that rejectors depicted
28:23
Speaker 1: themselves as morally innocent but still felt guilty about hurting someone,
28:30
Speaker 1: But they also depicted the would be lovers persistent efforts
28:35
Speaker 1: as intrusive and annoying, and in an article about this
28:40
Speaker 1: in The New York Times, one of the study authors,
28:43
Speaker 1: Roy Baumeister, described this experience of doing the romantic rejection
28:49
Speaker 1: as agony, and also that if you're looking at rejecting
28:53
Speaker 1: versus being rejected, that it's actually the people doing the
28:56
Speaker 1: rejecting who remember that incident more than the people who
29:00
Speaker 1: were rejected. I mean, obviously that depends and then other
29:03
Speaker 1: factors go into that, but it seems like that strange
29:06
Speaker 1: experience of having to that strange and painful experience of
29:09
Speaker 1: having to tell someone who's being very persistent that you're no,
29:13
Speaker 1: I'm not interested, it really kind of sticks with you.
29:17
Speaker 1: And so it's interesting to read about how people on
29:20
Speaker 1: either side of this experience process it differently in order
29:24
Speaker 1: to sort of justify their own behavior. And there's also
29:28
Speaker 1: to this issue of rejectors, especially if there's an established
29:34
Speaker 1: relationship between two people. This is probably happening more in
29:38
Speaker 1: real life versus online dating um, but rejectors being expected
29:43
Speaker 1: to not only do the rejecting but also comfort the
29:46
Speaker 1: other person's wounded pride. But speaking of online dating, though,
29:51
Speaker 1: that can explain this common demand for an explanation because
29:57
Speaker 1: that is a source of comfort. That's their closure. Tell
29:59
Speaker 1: me why I'm not good enough? The old taco ruse,
30:02
Speaker 1: the taco ruse. Caroline Bombster also found that men are
30:06
Speaker 1: more likely than women to fall in love with someone
30:09
Speaker 1: who does not return their feelings. And that's also in
30:12
Speaker 1: a like real life as supposed to online thing um
30:16
Speaker 1: and echoing that is Philip Shaver at the University of
30:18
Speaker 1: California Davis, who said that the people who are particularly
30:23
Speaker 1: prone to falling in love with people who will reject
30:26
Speaker 1: them are people who are so anxious about being loved
30:30
Speaker 1: that they drive their partners away through being too clingy.
30:34
Speaker 1: That anxious attachment, that anxious attachment that the person who's
30:38
Speaker 1: doing the attaching sees us normal and just love me.
30:42
Speaker 1: I just want to be loved, and the rejector feels like, God,
30:44
Speaker 1: you're being a creep. I've been that person. I've been
30:47
Speaker 1: that creep before, Caroline, I will own that and that
30:50
Speaker 1: creep though issue is something that we could do an
30:55
Speaker 1: entire podcast on because I feel like, especially in today
31:00
Speaker 1: is um dating landscape it seems like, and also from
31:05
Speaker 1: what I've heard from guys directly, that being rejected also
31:11
Speaker 1: comes sometimes with this underlying panic of of yeah, okay,
31:17
Speaker 1: I'm not going to be able to, you know, ever
31:20
Speaker 1: get with that person. But also, oh my god, does
31:22
Speaker 1: she think I'm a creep? Being labeled as a creep?
31:26
Speaker 1: I feel like, is so so so triggering, you know,
31:30
Speaker 1: of anxiety and panic for for dudes, because that's almost
31:35
Speaker 1: the worst thing that you can be called. Well, yeah,
31:38
Speaker 1: and it's also the frustration and fear of being misunderstood,
31:41
Speaker 1: like no, no, no, I was just trying to compliment
31:43
Speaker 1: you and ask you out and and be nice and
31:46
Speaker 1: kind and I just you know, you're beautiful enough. But
31:48
Speaker 1: I don't want to be considered a creep. I'm not
31:50
Speaker 1: a creep. I'm just I just like you, just like you.
31:56
Speaker 1: So we already have this complicated stew on this to hope.
32:00
Speaker 1: But then when you add a dash of this thing
32:03
Speaker 1: called masculinity threat, you have an emotional powder keg really
32:09
Speaker 1: waiting to happen. So masculinity threat is a sociological term
32:14
Speaker 1: referring to some men's expectations of how they should fulfill
32:20
Speaker 1: hegemonic masculine roles. So masculinity threat is a sociological term
32:26
Speaker 1: referring to when a guy feels like his idea of
32:32
Speaker 1: what masculinity is and his role in that is being
32:36
Speaker 1: challenged in some kind of way, his masculinity being threatened.
32:39
Speaker 1: I guess you could say, yeah, so that idea of
32:42
Speaker 1: I'm the breadwinner, I am strong. I must be strong
32:45
Speaker 1: and stoic for my woman. And of course I have
32:48
Speaker 1: to and am entitled to have access to women's bodies sexually.
32:54
Speaker 1: So what happens when masculinity is threatened, Well, you tend
33:00
Speaker 1: to get over compensation, which is not that surprising. Um.
33:04
Speaker 1: There was a study in social psychology that found that
33:08
Speaker 1: when men's masculinity is threatened, they go overboard and distancing
33:14
Speaker 1: themselves from femininity or feminine attributes or women and end
33:18
Speaker 1: up amping up the masculinity the browishness. Uh the study
33:23
Speaker 1: authors right. Additionally, threatened men claimed more stereotypically masculine attributes
33:28
Speaker 1: such as height, number of past sexual relationships, and aggressiveness,
33:34
Speaker 1: which is interesting because your height is just your height.
33:38
Speaker 1: And when these men's masculinity was threatened or when they
33:42
Speaker 1: felt threatened, they said that they were taller than they
33:45
Speaker 1: actually were. And so masculinity is this sort of social power,
33:51
Speaker 1: and when that power is endangered, men who are threatened
33:55
Speaker 1: will react, oftentimes in an aggressive manner. Now all of that, too, though,
34:00
Speaker 1: is predicated on how closely a man identifies with hegemonic
34:07
Speaker 1: masculine roles, because there are plenty of guys who where
34:12
Speaker 1: this masculinity threat is not going to be as big
34:15
Speaker 1: of a deal for them because they don't see their
34:18
Speaker 1: role in this, you know, kind of hegemonic box right there. Um,
34:22
Speaker 1: But for the many, many men out there who do
34:26
Speaker 1: this is a very real thing. And studies have also
34:29
Speaker 1: found that provoking masculinity threat also diminishes men's perceptions of
34:36
Speaker 1: sexual assault and violence as well. So again we start
34:40
Speaker 1: to see these common threads along the spectrum of just
34:44
Speaker 1: you know, feelings getting hurt that's totally understandable to violent outrage. Yeah. Well,
34:50
Speaker 1: there was also a study in the American Journal of
34:53
Speaker 1: Sociology that found that the more testosteron a man had,
34:58
Speaker 1: the more overcompensating be behaviors he exhibited when told that
35:02
Speaker 1: his survey answers indicated femininity. In this particular study, Uh,
35:08
Speaker 1: when men had less testosterone, they didn't really exhibit any
35:13
Speaker 1: real overcompensation behavior to speak of. But key to that
35:16
Speaker 1: threat is that men with more testosterone aren't necessarily walking
35:20
Speaker 1: around being macho and aggressive of the time, twenty four
35:23
Speaker 1: hours a day. It was it was the threat, It
35:26
Speaker 1: was the telling, hey, you your your survey answers, when
35:30
Speaker 1: we asked about attributes of your life and behavior, there
35:33
Speaker 1: they really indicated femininity. And that's when the guys with
35:37
Speaker 1: a lot more testosterone than the other men went into
35:40
Speaker 1: those overcompensating behaviors, like why would you tell that to
35:44
Speaker 1: a six ft five men? Impossible? And this can also
35:49
Speaker 1: happen with women in terms of femininity threat where, uh,
35:55
Speaker 1: if you identify with those feminine role and you feel
36:00
Speaker 1: like that is being threatened, which would be people thinking
36:04
Speaker 1: that you are too strong or aggressive, then you might
36:06
Speaker 1: minimize yourself or your role in some kind of way
36:10
Speaker 1: to compensate, which equally is not all women, right, Um,
36:14
Speaker 1: It's just a particular subset of women who would react
36:17
Speaker 1: negatively being told that they're too strong or too masculine.
36:21
Speaker 1: So where though, is all of this coming from if
36:24
Speaker 1: we're talking about masculinity threat um? So Michael Kimmel wrote
36:30
Speaker 1: a whole book about this um and he has built
36:33
Speaker 1: a whole career actually on on studying masculinity UM. And
36:38
Speaker 1: in his book Angry White Men Masculinity at the End
36:41
Speaker 1: of an Era, he refers to the erosion of white
36:45
Speaker 1: male privilege, particularly in the US as a quote aggrieved
36:51
Speaker 1: entitlement basically of guys today not benefiting as much from
36:56
Speaker 1: the privileges bestowed to say their dads or their gray
37:00
Speaker 1: and dads. Yeah. And in the same article that was
37:02
Speaker 1: looking at Michael Kimmel's research, sociologists Tristan Bridges and Terrely
37:09
Speaker 1: tober So that men are likely to turn to violence
37:12
Speaker 1: when they perceived themselves to be otherwise unable to stake
37:16
Speaker 1: a claim to a masculine gender identity. And of course
37:18
Speaker 1: this article is very specifically talking about gun violence in
37:22
Speaker 1: the United States as it relates to masculine aggression, but
37:28
Speaker 1: it does seem to relate back to the aggressive responses
37:32
Speaker 1: that can happen when rejection happens online or in dating scenarios, right,
37:37
Speaker 1: because again this does seem to echo common demands for
37:42
Speaker 1: those explanations as to why a girl doesn't want to
37:45
Speaker 1: talk to you, go on a date with, sleep with, etcetera.
37:49
Speaker 1: Them And the fact of the matter is some guys
37:52
Speaker 1: are just jerks, just like some women or just jerks.
37:56
Speaker 1: But there does seem to be something too the relationship
38:02
Speaker 1: between masculinity threat and this pattern of rejection and how
38:08
Speaker 1: we all process rejection, and also how that relates to
38:14
Speaker 1: to this headeronormative dating dynamic that has really not kept
38:20
Speaker 1: up with gender progression and which does no one any good.
38:26
Speaker 1: It does well, I mean I say that, but of
38:29
Speaker 1: course the people who benefit from being on the top
38:31
Speaker 1: of the heap. Of course they benefit from that, but
38:36
Speaker 1: for I mean, I would argue that most people would
38:39
Speaker 1: be better served if we weren't desperately clinging with our
38:43
Speaker 1: fingernails sunk in to these ideas that men have to
38:47
Speaker 1: be a certain way and women have to be a
38:49
Speaker 1: certain way, and that men deserve x y z and
38:53
Speaker 1: women need and should give x y z in response. Yeah,
38:58
Speaker 1: and it just seems like they're something fundamentally broken too,
39:02
Speaker 1: with this structure that we've built up in terms of
39:06
Speaker 1: straight you know, attraction, sex and pursuit, because as far
39:13
Speaker 1: as I know, we don't see similar patterns. I mean,
39:17
Speaker 1: of course there are incidents, but similar patterns happening with
39:21
Speaker 1: LGBT dating. There's not the bi fleape grinder version, you know.
39:26
Speaker 1: I mean, it just seems to be so so particular
39:30
Speaker 1: to how men and women get together that just gets
39:35
Speaker 1: my brain turning about what it really means, because clearly
39:40
Speaker 1: this is not just about tender or online dating. This
39:45
Speaker 1: is a bigger thing about how men and men and
39:49
Speaker 1: women relate to each other, I think. Yeah, And the
39:52
Speaker 1: idea that still that persists that people don't believe that
39:58
Speaker 1: no means no. And in culture too, we have loved
40:03
Speaker 1: stories of the underdog guy who finally gets his reward
40:08
Speaker 1: at some point for you know, hanging in there with
40:12
Speaker 1: the girl who's dating the you know, the rich guy
40:15
Speaker 1: who's more handsome but ultimately he'll win her, or just
40:18
Speaker 1: wearing a woman down, which really only feeds into this dysfunction. Well,
40:24
Speaker 1: one researcher quoted was it in the New York Times
40:26
Speaker 1: article about this, pointed to all those movies and said, like, listen,
40:31
Speaker 1: statistically speaking and scientifically, people date and have relationships with
40:38
Speaker 1: people who are of equivalent attractiveness and life status. And
40:44
Speaker 1: so that's kind of where you get this idea of
40:46
Speaker 1: the nice guys of okay Cupid, for instance, who voiced
40:50
Speaker 1: their entitlement to like a you know, like a gazelle,
40:53
Speaker 1: like a freaking Cindy Crawford on okay Cupid, that they
40:57
Speaker 1: just deserve to have this woman pay attention to them,
40:59
Speaker 1: and to why won't you answer me as to why
41:01
Speaker 1: you won't date me? But so, how do we change this?
41:05
Speaker 1: How do we go from here? I mean, I I
41:08
Speaker 1: don't know that you and I sitting here in a
41:11
Speaker 1: podcast studio are going to do it. What is it
41:15
Speaker 1: going to take or will this ever change? Well, i'd
41:21
Speaker 1: i'd like to think that one day it might change
41:23
Speaker 1: and that we can all treat each other like human
41:26
Speaker 1: people who have feelings, um, and respect each other's decisions. Um.
41:32
Speaker 1: But I don't know. Maybe it it's if women talking
41:36
Speaker 1: about it isn't gonna work. Maybe it's going to take
41:39
Speaker 1: men talking to each other about it. Yeah, I mean
41:43
Speaker 1: that brings up a quote from Kimmel and Angry White Men.
41:47
Speaker 1: He said, American men define their masculinity not as much
41:51
Speaker 1: in relation to women, but in relation to each other. So, guys,
41:58
Speaker 1: what's it going to take? And also, Okay, folks, I
42:01
Speaker 1: feel like we have a lot to learn from you,
42:03
Speaker 1: so please please give us your wisdom, because I know
42:07
Speaker 1: we've heard from, for instance, some of our lesbian listeners
42:11
Speaker 1: in response to our division of household labor episode that yes,
42:17
Speaker 1: there is sure there is a division. Somebody might like
42:20
Speaker 1: to mow the law on, somebody like might like to
42:21
Speaker 1: load the dishwasher Kristen, Um, guilty, um, But that there's
42:28
Speaker 1: no stereotypical gender role to fall back on, and so
42:33
Speaker 1: I would imagine it's the same in terms of dating
42:36
Speaker 1: with the approach versus the approach e um that there's
42:40
Speaker 1: no real script or schema for who should do the approaching,
42:46
Speaker 1: who should do the rejecting or the accepting. And also too,
42:49
Speaker 1: in terms of hookups gay men to take such a
42:53
Speaker 1: more straightforward approach to it as well of sex being
42:58
Speaker 1: sex do you want it? Or not? Done? And done
43:01
Speaker 1: as well, we'll share because when it's a straight man
43:04
Speaker 1: and a straight woman looking for each other on Tinder,
43:07
Speaker 1: for instance, Mr tinder Um, you also have to deal
43:12
Speaker 1: with all of the social stuff that says women who
43:14
Speaker 1: just want sex on Tinder are gross or that they're
43:17
Speaker 1: you know, sluts. So you've got all sorts of layers
43:20
Speaker 1: of social grossness um putting pressure on everyone. We got
43:26
Speaker 1: some baggage and talk about some relationship baggage will help
43:30
Speaker 1: us start through it. Folks. We're really curious to hear
43:33
Speaker 1: from women who have experienced this online. Does this issue
43:37
Speaker 1: resonate with you, especially in your online dating experience and
43:41
Speaker 1: just generally everyone, what are your thoughts on this? Mom
43:45
Speaker 1: Stuff at house stuffworks dot com is our email address.
43:47
Speaker 1: You can also tweet us at mom stuff podcast or
43:49
Speaker 1: messages on Facebook, and we've got a couple of messages
43:52
Speaker 1: to share with you right now, and I've gotta let
44:00
Speaker 1: her here. Caroline from listener Andy, who writes, thank you,
44:06
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you for doing an episode on Asian fetishes.
44:10
Speaker 1: Is this something I deal with from time to time
44:11
Speaker 1: and it's hard to explain to others why it's an
44:14
Speaker 1: issue or why it's creepy. You guys mentioned in the
44:17
Speaker 1: podcast that having an Asian fetish is similar to merely
44:20
Speaker 1: having a type. This is an argument I hear a lot.
44:24
Speaker 1: The difference between having a fetish and a type comes
44:27
Speaker 1: down to whether you can see the person as an
44:29
Speaker 1: individual or merely as a member of their group. For instance,
44:33
Speaker 1: Kristen said she's only dated white guys. But Kristen, do
44:36
Speaker 1: you immediately hit on every white guy you meet because
44:39
Speaker 1: he's merely white? Answer? Yes, it's exhausting. I'm totally kidding,
44:45
Speaker 1: She says, Do you quis him on his white cultural upbringing?
44:48
Speaker 1: Do you ask him where he buys his silverware? I've
44:52
Speaker 1: been asked where I buy my chopsticks. Everyone has a type.
44:56
Speaker 1: Mine is lanky, pale, nerdy guys, but that doesn't mean
45:00
Speaker 1: I find them interchangeable. Once again, I appreciate you doing
45:03
Speaker 1: an episode on an Asian issue. Since we are the
45:06
Speaker 1: quote model minority, it's sometimes hard to convince people that
45:10
Speaker 1: racism against Asians exists or matters. While it's true that
45:14
Speaker 1: in America, racism against Asians tends to be less violent
45:17
Speaker 1: than racism towards other minorities, that doesn't mean it's not
45:20
Speaker 1: a problem and that it shouldn't be examined. Thanks for
45:24
Speaker 1: making this world a better place. Um, thank you, Andy.
45:27
Speaker 1: That last line to escape me goose bumps. Well, I
45:31
Speaker 1: have a letter here from Elizabeth in response to our
45:34
Speaker 1: Samurai Women episode, and I just want to say, first
45:38
Speaker 1: of all, Elizabeth, thank you. Her email is a six page,
45:43
Speaker 1: essentially really super well written list of corrections, and I
45:48
Speaker 1: wish I could read the whole thing that I can't,
45:50
Speaker 1: so I want to pull out some points of clarification
45:53
Speaker 1: that Elizabeth makes, So here we go. She says, I
45:57
Speaker 1: posted this on Facebook as well because I felt it
45:59
Speaker 1: was too husguely important to be glossed over, and I
46:01
Speaker 1: was really hoping other fellow listeners would see it and
46:04
Speaker 1: catch that the switch from Shinto religion. Two more disparaging
46:08
Speaker 1: views of women came from Confucianism and not Buddhism. Both
46:12
Speaker 1: were introduced into Japan at the same time and had
46:15
Speaker 1: long been tied together in China because of the Chinese
46:17
Speaker 1: traditional religion, which really meant that Taoism, Buddhism, and Confucianism
46:22
Speaker 1: were all simultaneously believed in and work together in unison
46:26
Speaker 1: to form the belief of the Chinese people. Because of
46:29
Speaker 1: the strong relation and tied to Confucianism, a lot of
46:32
Speaker 1: the misogynistic ideas about how evil women were and whether
46:36
Speaker 1: or not they could obtain enlightenment bled very heavily into Buddhism.
46:40
Speaker 1: It's possible that there may have been some not very
46:43
Speaker 1: accepting ideas about women in general and Buddhism, but at
46:45
Speaker 1: its core that's not really part of the Buddhist doctrine.
46:49
Speaker 1: She goes on to say, Historically, the more firm that
46:51
Speaker 1: Confucianism took root in Japan, the less rights women had.
46:56
Speaker 1: Every negative thing you mentioned in your podcast as a
46:58
Speaker 1: cultural belief about women, those are all Confucianist beliefs. For
47:03
Speaker 1: the hay On period. Women being behind closed doors then
47:06
Speaker 1: was definitely a Confucian thing in part, but Confucianism didn't
47:09
Speaker 1: have as strong of a hold then. Women had relatively
47:12
Speaker 1: a lot of power in the hay On period and
47:14
Speaker 1: a lot of social mobility if they were able to
47:16
Speaker 1: get the means or attract the attention of the right person,
47:19
Speaker 1: and being indoors was kind of more of a luxurious
47:22
Speaker 1: choice for all parts of the aristocracy because, as I
47:25
Speaker 1: mentioned in my Facebook post, it had to do with labor.
47:28
Speaker 1: If you're tanned and go outside a lot, it's because
47:31
Speaker 1: you're poor and you tend to the fields, your skin darkens.
47:35
Speaker 1: Men were allowed to darken a little because they had
47:37
Speaker 1: to run the country, so they went out to court.
47:39
Speaker 1: Men were also the administrators for the property of the
47:42
Speaker 1: women in their lives, since at this time period women
47:44
Speaker 1: were allowed to inherit residences, property, and obtain income in
47:47
Speaker 1: the form of rice. They held title and core positions.
47:50
Speaker 1: But because you didn't literally live in the fields, you
47:53
Speaker 1: had to send someone to go get your rice for you.
47:55
Speaker 1: That was the job of the men, although the most
47:57
Speaker 1: elite of men would still have people to do that
48:00
Speaker 1: for them. If you are low rank, you probably have
48:02
Speaker 1: to go do that for yourself because you'd have no
48:05
Speaker 1: other vassals. Low ranking women wouldn't do this just because
48:08
Speaker 1: it'd be hard, and honestly, they'd have a better life
48:10
Speaker 1: if they tried to become a lady in waiting for
48:12
Speaker 1: some prominent figure. So as a social construct, they would
48:15
Speaker 1: be encouraged to be indoors more often as well. And
48:18
Speaker 1: of course there Elizabeth is explaining our discussion about how
48:21
Speaker 1: over certain periods in Japanese history, women were basically quote
48:25
Speaker 1: unquote like not allowed to go outside, that they it
48:28
Speaker 1: wasn't social acceptable for women to like be out and
48:30
Speaker 1: about um, so she's explaining the whole like women staying
48:34
Speaker 1: in their rooms thing. She goes on to say, Oh,
48:37
Speaker 1: and as a general note about loyalty and stuff, it's
48:39
Speaker 1: been noted through different parts of Asia that women are
48:41
Speaker 1: often believed to be more loyal than men, which is
48:44
Speaker 1: also kind of an odd side effect of Confucianism as well.
48:47
Speaker 1: Confucianism teaches that while you should respect the leaders and
48:50
Speaker 1: people above you for their ultimate decision, if you believe
48:53
Speaker 1: that they're doing wrong, you're allowed to attempt to set
48:55
Speaker 1: them on the correct path. In terms of a leader
48:58
Speaker 1: vassal type relationship, if your leaders a jerk, you're allowed
49:01
Speaker 1: to quit and find a new allegiance. In China and practice,
49:04
Speaker 1: I remember from one course that a scholar had apparently
49:06
Speaker 1: remarked about the citizens in a town facing the attack
49:08
Speaker 1: from an army, the men ran away while the women
49:11
Speaker 1: valiantly killed themselves. Women were also thought of as more
49:14
Speaker 1: willing and able to kill themselves because of the social
49:16
Speaker 1: pressure put upon them by Confucianism. So because they were
49:19
Speaker 1: subjected to so much and expected to be loyal to
49:21
Speaker 1: the men in their lives, it was easier for them
49:23
Speaker 1: to die for a greater cause, like an incoming enemy
49:26
Speaker 1: or even in the case of going into battle. Plus,
49:30
Speaker 1: you know, women cheating and all that was highly frowned upon.
49:32
Speaker 1: But because men didn't have to adhere to loyalties day
49:35
Speaker 1: to day, they would change allegiances easily or would run away.
49:39
Speaker 1: So Elizabeth, I'm really sorry I couldn't read your whole email,
49:41
Speaker 1: but I do want to thank you for ending it
49:43
Speaker 1: with anyway. Still love the podcast and thanks for talking
49:47
Speaker 1: about all of these subjects, and thanks to all of
49:50
Speaker 1: you who are written into us. Moms Stuff at House
49:52
Speaker 1: Stuffworks dot Com is our email address. You can also
49:55
Speaker 1: find links to all of our social media as well
49:57
Speaker 1: as all of our blogs, videos, and podcast us, including
50:00
Speaker 1: this one with links to our sources so you can
50:02
Speaker 1: read all about that tender melt down we can't get
50:05
Speaker 1: enough of. Head on over to stuff Mom Never Told
50:08
Speaker 1: You dot com for more on this and thousands of
50:14
Speaker 1: other topics. Is it how stuff Works dot com