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Happy Hour #80: 90s, WTF? · Stuff Mom Never Told You

0:05
Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to stuff
0:07
Speaker 1: I've never told you protection of iHeart Radio, and it
0:18
Speaker 1: is time for another happy hour, which as always means
0:23
Speaker 1: drink responsibly if you decide to do so, and also
0:27
Speaker 1: whatever you're doing, do responsibly listening to this podcast. We're
0:32
Speaker 1: speaking of very quick content. Warning. I don't think we're
0:35
Speaker 1: going to get into any details, but you know it's
0:37
Speaker 1: just a warning. Um, we're we are going to talk
0:40
Speaker 1: about some sexual assault stuff. I think today we're going
0:43
Speaker 1: to be digging into some tropes from the nineties, so
0:46
Speaker 1: that might give you a taste of what we're going
0:48
Speaker 1: to discuss. Uh, Samantha, what are you sipping on? So?
0:52
Speaker 1: I am making a play on figs because we in
0:58
Speaker 1: my new house have a job giant fig tree in
1:01
Speaker 1: my backyard and they're now blooming and we are quite
1:04
Speaker 1: excited about this. So we picked several figs, so I
1:07
Speaker 1: try to see if I can make like a fig
1:09
Speaker 1: type of gin and tonic lessons learn. I need more
1:13
Speaker 1: fig But if you wonder what, it's very sweet. M
1:16
Speaker 1: I didn't realize how sweet they were, and they're just
1:18
Speaker 1: nice and very delicious. But so I put a metal
1:22
Speaker 1: fig with basil, because we all have a little thing
1:24
Speaker 1: of basil and I love herbs and everything with some
1:28
Speaker 1: gave it. Don't judge me for the gave. We've had
1:31
Speaker 1: it for a while. I need to use it up.
1:32
Speaker 1: Won't buy it again. And muddled it up together and
1:36
Speaker 1: then added gin, shook it up, put it in my drunk,
1:41
Speaker 1: added some uh tonic water because I couldn't figure out
1:45
Speaker 1: what exactly I wanted. I might have to play with
1:46
Speaker 1: that a bit um. But yeah, and now I have
1:50
Speaker 1: a fig gin and tonic with basil, so it has
1:53
Speaker 1: to be something different, I guess. And delicious, you have
1:56
Speaker 1: definitely mixed it up with this one, and you've got
1:58
Speaker 1: a lot of fresh ingredients. I'm very jealous. I canta
2:01
Speaker 1: figure it out. What what you do again? I am drinking.
2:05
Speaker 1: As I told you, Samantha, I had some very kind
2:09
Speaker 1: friends who hung out with me recently, and uh they
2:13
Speaker 1: went to buy me drinks because it was the anniversary
2:16
Speaker 1: of my father's death and I drink vodka on that day,
2:18
Speaker 1: and they drank all my vodka. I love you all.
2:20
Speaker 1: I didn't judge you, but anyway, they went to go
2:22
Speaker 1: replenish my stock and they came back with an assortment
2:27
Speaker 1: of drinks that I associate with like early drinking as
2:32
Speaker 1: and they don't match very well. But one of those
2:35
Speaker 1: things they got was actually not alcoholic. But it's like
2:38
Speaker 1: this fancy lemonade from Italy. I mixed that with some
2:42
Speaker 1: vodka and some sparkling water and it's quite refreshing, freshing
2:47
Speaker 1: like a good lemonade. Yeah, essentially that's what it is. Yes,
2:52
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, I've recently learned, and I would love
2:55
Speaker 1: for listeners to write this in. We did lemonade as
2:57
Speaker 1: a topic on Savor, the other podcast I do read,
3:00
Speaker 1: and apparently lemonade is not a very big deal outside
3:05
Speaker 1: of the South in the United States, So I would
3:08
Speaker 1: love if people wrote it. I mean, it's some yeah,
3:12
Speaker 1: I feel like that's a very Southern thing. But also
3:14
Speaker 1: it has a kid child things, so I wonder if
3:17
Speaker 1: that's part of it. It's not very sophisticated, fa you know,
3:24
Speaker 1: and outside of South, you guys to be sophisticated. Is
3:28
Speaker 1: this your Southern because I have one without having to
3:31
Speaker 1: do one, so detending like I'm Southern building is not me.
3:36
Speaker 1: I can't do that. I can't do a Southern accent either.
3:40
Speaker 1: I got called into an audition once where they're like,
3:43
Speaker 1: we want your Southern excent. And what I've discovered is
3:45
Speaker 1: what they what they meant is they want their very
3:47
Speaker 1: over the top Southern accent that exists in TV. He's
3:51
Speaker 1: an actually reality Well you've heard us. Uh what movie
3:55
Speaker 1: were we watching that? I kept getting worse and worse
3:58
Speaker 1: x NT Yes, I hope so yes, So that was
4:05
Speaker 1: real bad um because yeah, they're supposed to be be in Texas,
4:07
Speaker 1: and of course Texas accent is different from uh Southeast accents.
4:12
Speaker 1: Every accent is different. We know this, uh deep South
4:15
Speaker 1: accent is different from Antebellum accents. Like it's it's vary um.
4:21
Speaker 1: But yeah, it gets worse when we try truth truth.
4:26
Speaker 1: I am currently trying to cast Samantha among other people
4:31
Speaker 1: in our spenty fiction series, and there's there's a part
4:34
Speaker 1: of me that would like revel and being like, do
4:37
Speaker 1: your your best worst Southern accent, I mean, knives out
4:44
Speaker 1: disagree as well well all of Walking Dead as well. Yes,
4:49
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, yes, yes, no offense to the English.
4:54
Speaker 1: I'm sure the English really hate when Americans, specifically Southern Americans,
4:58
Speaker 1: are trying to do English accents. But like having English
5:01
Speaker 1: actors due Southern accents as a whole different conversation. Yeah,
5:07
Speaker 1: it was what happens with X. Yes, that frequently happens, um.
5:11
Speaker 1: And as someone who once did a whole monologue and
5:14
Speaker 1: what I thought was great British accent, I apologize. And yes.
5:19
Speaker 1: Also also yeah, I feel like also the show True Blood,
5:23
Speaker 1: so many English actors trying to do in New Orleans accented.
5:29
Speaker 1: Oh no, indeed, Amantha, And this is coming from a
5:33
Speaker 1: place of love, which is where this episode is coming from. Actually, yes,
5:37
Speaker 1: So I did want to ask you because we are
5:40
Speaker 1: going to be talking about some nineties tropes in here. Um, Samantha,
5:44
Speaker 1: what's your favorite nineties accessory that's no longer? Oh I
5:49
Speaker 1: was see now I'm trying to remember because I will
5:53
Speaker 1: hit to the late nineties because that was my coming
5:57
Speaker 1: into my own fashion year. So butterfly clips, which have
6:03
Speaker 1: come back I've seen, um as well as do you
6:06
Speaker 1: remember the little spiky band headband things that if you
6:10
Speaker 1: put it back, it looks like it makes your hair
6:12
Speaker 1: streak and then it kind of poofs up. I forgot
6:16
Speaker 1: whether it was like the stretchy bands, but it's plastic
6:19
Speaker 1: and it's all just like sharp comb looking ones. I
6:23
Speaker 1: loved those two things. They made me feel glamorous without
6:27
Speaker 1: having to feel glamorous. The butterfly clips when you just
6:30
Speaker 1: rolled it on top of your head and put little clips.
6:33
Speaker 1: I wore that as a prom Do do you have
6:38
Speaker 1: a picture? I'm sure I do. I'm not sure, but yes,
6:42
Speaker 1: I'm sure I do. It's also during the time of
6:45
Speaker 1: corset dresses, so I loved loved those because as a
6:50
Speaker 1: thick girl with thick legs, and I was trying to
6:52
Speaker 1: hide them. Not only where I was I able to
6:54
Speaker 1: like suck it in with the corset dress, but it
6:57
Speaker 1: fluffed out with too or whatever, and it was space spinny,
7:02
Speaker 1: princess like that was it was, and it was light
7:05
Speaker 1: yellow that was very spring with butters lovely. I would
7:11
Speaker 1: have loved that to you, to be honest, I'm not
7:12
Speaker 1: even being Jesus's absolutely something I would have loved. I
7:17
Speaker 1: also loved the butterfly clips. I was discussing with my
7:20
Speaker 1: friends the other day. I went through a big Claire's
7:23
Speaker 1: phase and I would just like save up money and
7:27
Speaker 1: go to Claire's and I would get like the lip
7:29
Speaker 1: gloss that had like the stars and hearts in it,
7:32
Speaker 1: which was so uncomfortable, but like that I can have
7:35
Speaker 1: sticky things. M Well, I mean the discussion we're having,
7:39
Speaker 1: I feel like the nineties fashion was all about being uncomfortable.
7:43
Speaker 1: You've got like a spiky head band, You've got that
7:46
Speaker 1: bracelet that was yeah, slat basis for genius. But you
7:51
Speaker 1: know they also had the skater pants. That's true. That
7:55
Speaker 1: was very very like the bigger the better. It was
7:58
Speaker 1: ridiculous and hilarious. They also had air walks, which we
8:01
Speaker 1: just I just talked about my partner. He's like, I've
8:03
Speaker 1: never had that as a kid. I was like, I
8:04
Speaker 1: don't think I did either. I think I borrowed my
8:06
Speaker 1: friends who had everything. But those were the most comfortable,
8:09
Speaker 1: ridiculously clown looking shoes that I was like, yeah, this
8:13
Speaker 1: is these are amazing timber as well. Yeah, the nineties
8:19
Speaker 1: was an interesting fashion time. Overalls there are also as overalls.
8:26
Speaker 1: You saw me wear a pair recently because I saw
8:28
Speaker 1: my friend Marissa, Hello Marissa, she wore some and I
8:31
Speaker 1: was like, yes, I want to wear them. Yes, you
8:33
Speaker 1: were very cute. Uh Flannel. Flannel was huge, Oh my god.
8:39
Speaker 1: That was the era of me wearing three layers all
8:41
Speaker 1: the time, and one of it had oversized, unbluntant flannel
8:45
Speaker 1: shirts because I was cool like that. I'm not me too.
8:50
Speaker 1: I loved the flannel and I was made fun of
8:53
Speaker 1: in middle school because I would wear many layers frequently
8:56
Speaker 1: and I had a friend stand up for me once
8:58
Speaker 1: and she was like, that's what she's comfortable with, that
9:00
Speaker 1: you leave her be. I still think about that. Thank you,
9:02
Speaker 1: Elizabeth her sticking up with my quite eclectic fashion. I
9:10
Speaker 1: have to say. I have to say also highways of
9:14
Speaker 1: jeans very popular. Okay, all of this I so recently,
9:33
Speaker 1: I was on this podcast called Tossed Popcorn, which is
9:37
Speaker 1: about movies and watching the a F I best, the
9:41
Speaker 1: one top movies. Uh they they watched through them and
9:44
Speaker 1: they have things called minipops. So I was a mini
9:47
Speaker 1: pop guest and I came up pretty hard against movies
9:50
Speaker 1: from the eighties, which I like to make the point,
9:54
Speaker 1: there are plenty of eighties movies that I love, but
9:56
Speaker 1: I feel like if you miss the nostalgia factor of
10:00
Speaker 1: some of them, then you missed it. Um and yeah,
10:05
Speaker 1: and there are plenty of like eighties things that I like.
10:07
Speaker 1: Like I like eighties music a lot of times, like
10:09
Speaker 1: eighties style a lot of times. And then in that
10:12
Speaker 1: I contradicted myself because I said, like, the most overrated
10:16
Speaker 1: movie that I could think of was Top Gun and
10:18
Speaker 1: then the most underrated was Returned the Jedi, and they're
10:21
Speaker 1: both from the eighties, so whatever. But but I was
10:25
Speaker 1: thinking about that, and uh, in lieu of that episode
10:28
Speaker 1: coming out, I would just want to be clear that, like,
10:31
Speaker 1: the nineties are extremely problematic too when it comes to movies.
10:36
Speaker 1: I think they were problematic in a different way. There
10:38
Speaker 1: are similarities but also differences. A part of this is
10:42
Speaker 1: also from an argument I had with my brother's fiance,
10:45
Speaker 1: who was like, the nineties are so great in the
10:48
Speaker 1: eighties basically suck, which whatever, But I was like, let's
10:53
Speaker 1: hold on now. I feel like there's still some issues
10:57
Speaker 1: in the nineties. Um. And we have talked about this
11:00
Speaker 1: before when we talked about like Britney Spears, Um. I
11:03
Speaker 1: think we cut the Lindsay Lohan bit eventually, but we
11:07
Speaker 1: did have a bit about Lindsay Lohan as well and
11:09
Speaker 1: our treatment, our toxic treatment of women from that time.
11:14
Speaker 1: But I also just to be clear, I do love
11:18
Speaker 1: a lot of like nineties shows and nineties movies. But
11:21
Speaker 1: I do think there was a very specific form of
11:24
Speaker 1: toxicity in the nineties because, as we've discussed, that was
11:29
Speaker 1: when there was like third wave feminism, um, and we
11:34
Speaker 1: were seeing you know, happy which is unhappy witches and
11:39
Speaker 1: vampires and vampires, layers and all this stuff. But it
11:43
Speaker 1: still seemed to come in this idea of women have
11:47
Speaker 1: to look a certain way, often involving crop tops, tight
11:50
Speaker 1: crop tops, and jeans, which is if you want to
11:53
Speaker 1: wear that, fine, But I felt like it was very
11:56
Speaker 1: put upon women, and also just I was watching these
12:02
Speaker 1: nineties horror movies and so many of them were the
12:06
Speaker 1: woman due to her sexuality, which I think is a
12:10
Speaker 1: commentary on oh you want to be sexual, well, then
12:13
Speaker 1: you're going to get a stalker, you're going to get
12:16
Speaker 1: somebody trying to kill you, You're going to bring some
12:19
Speaker 1: negative thing onto you by being this feminist sexual woman.
12:25
Speaker 1: So it felt like a very big backlash to me
12:27
Speaker 1: a lot of the stuff I was watching of feminism.
12:31
Speaker 1: I don't know if you have a similar experience, you know,
12:35
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, I would agree to a certain extent
12:37
Speaker 1: for sure, that it felt like it was trying to
12:39
Speaker 1: regress back into being like Okay, you can't be this
12:42
Speaker 1: with these other going to be the backlash. I feel
12:44
Speaker 1: like I always saw them for me, they were always secondary.
12:47
Speaker 1: Even in the movies that they're supposed to be stars of,
12:51
Speaker 1: there were secondary and because they're trying to find that relationship.
12:54
Speaker 1: So for wo men it could be redemption or you know,
12:58
Speaker 1: father figures. For women, it was mainly like, um, it's
13:00
Speaker 1: always gonna be about finding a partner a man, always
13:03
Speaker 1: a man, and or they're dying so therefore they have
13:07
Speaker 1: to be avenged and all you see is a memories
13:09
Speaker 1: and or yeah, they're spinsters all their life, and who
13:14
Speaker 1: has to get attained by a man? That's what I
13:16
Speaker 1: feel like. I remember Clueless was one of them because
13:19
Speaker 1: I did love it, but it was kind of that
13:21
Speaker 1: like finding that perfect match that was for a whole deal.
13:25
Speaker 1: The movies like uh even the Matrix, like She Takes
13:28
Speaker 1: a back Seat seven was one of those as well,
13:32
Speaker 1: Like I remember that clearly good will hunting was that
13:35
Speaker 1: competition that you talked about, Like that was always just
13:39
Speaker 1: secondary to me, And and it was even the ones
13:44
Speaker 1: that they were supposed to start, and it still was like, yeah,
13:49
Speaker 1: they don't really exist for being an individual person. Yeah,
13:53
Speaker 1: and to reiterate if I haven't, there are plenty of
13:57
Speaker 1: like nineties movies I love, and there are plenty of
13:59
Speaker 1: things that we like and are problematic. We know who
14:01
Speaker 1: they are. But I just feel like it was a
14:03
Speaker 1: specific type of like faux feminism where male writers and directors,
14:12
Speaker 1: we're tapping into this movement and we're like, okay, well
14:16
Speaker 1: put you know, a woman front and center. But by
14:19
Speaker 1: being front and center, they were kind of taking this
14:22
Speaker 1: messaging of oh, it's empowering for her to want to
14:28
Speaker 1: dress this way and do this thing and find this
14:31
Speaker 1: man because she's a woman, which can be true, but
14:35
Speaker 1: I feel like they were just doing it as a
14:37
Speaker 1: front to continue to do what they had been doing
14:42
Speaker 1: under like the the pretend. Oh but I can check
14:47
Speaker 1: that feminist checkbox, right, I've we've done the thing, and
14:51
Speaker 1: then you know, I just there's something about it that
14:54
Speaker 1: I was watching it. I'm like, I don't think this
14:57
Speaker 1: is as empowering as you think it was. Right, Well,
15:00
Speaker 1: like absolutely, Reese Weatherspoon would have been the top tier
15:04
Speaker 1: of the nineties. Girl in Fear was her growing up
15:07
Speaker 1: movie for sure, Although have you ever seen Men in
15:10
Speaker 1: the Moon? I have but I literally only remember the
15:12
Speaker 1: part where she's kissing her hands. Yeah, of course you do, um,
15:18
Speaker 1: but yes, uh that so that was her first movie
15:21
Speaker 1: from what I remember, I think like first or second movie. UM,
15:25
Speaker 1: and she was coming from being you know, it was
15:28
Speaker 1: the coming of age for her. Um. But like she
15:33
Speaker 1: had to strip that off to be because also she
15:36
Speaker 1: was very cute and cute see, so they were trying
15:38
Speaker 1: to kind of make her see be seen as sexual,
15:41
Speaker 1: which we've talked about before. You have to fit these
15:44
Speaker 1: categories in order to fit the mold. And if you
15:46
Speaker 1: get too old, you're not going to have a career
15:48
Speaker 1: because that if you can't hit that mold, you're gonna
15:50
Speaker 1: miss out. So I found that interesting. But yeah, she's
15:53
Speaker 1: definitely one of those actresses as well, although we know
15:57
Speaker 1: who she is and how amazing her repertoire is and
15:59
Speaker 1: like her her skills and abilities and we know it
16:02
Speaker 1: goes beyond that, but it does set up especially young
16:06
Speaker 1: women at that point in time. But I was trying
16:09
Speaker 1: to look through as you were talking about this, the
16:11
Speaker 1: uh top ten movies, and so a recent list came
16:15
Speaker 1: out from on Parade with a top ten nineties movies
16:18
Speaker 1: and honestly, it's not as bad as I thought it
16:21
Speaker 1: would be. Of course, as a predictable pulp fiction who
16:24
Speaker 1: we know whom A Therman's character is almost the beginning
16:27
Speaker 1: of the pixie manic girl. That what we see later
16:30
Speaker 1: in the two thousands, which we've talked about before. But
16:33
Speaker 1: like we have the movie Silence of the Lambs, which
16:36
Speaker 1: Jodie Foster plays this very different character that we don't
16:40
Speaker 1: typically see in these gritty movies, but she becomes a
16:44
Speaker 1: herold like her own heroin in this movie is like, okay,
16:48
Speaker 1: that stacks up differently. We see al Fargo, which I
16:53
Speaker 1: forgot about, and she like she's a different character altogether
16:57
Speaker 1: in general. Darmage like she just kind of has her
17:02
Speaker 1: own role in this and she they defied it, which
17:04
Speaker 1: is why it won so many awards at that point
17:06
Speaker 1: in time. But yeah, I don't remember, Like, yeah, I
17:09
Speaker 1: did define but they had to be almost a sexual
17:12
Speaker 1: or masculine character. Yeah. I found that fascinating of course,
17:17
Speaker 1: as as we know. But then they also had another
17:20
Speaker 1: one outside of the pulp fiction, as we talked about
17:22
Speaker 1: Titanic and her character in general, like the whole whispy fighting,
17:28
Speaker 1: like she's exactly what you're talking about. She's trying to
17:32
Speaker 1: be independent, but she can't be independent. But because she's independent,
17:35
Speaker 1: she becomes uh an old maid but has a very
17:42
Speaker 1: nice necklace that she throws into the ocean for some
17:44
Speaker 1: unknown reason and ridiculous reason. Yeah, we should talk about that. Yeah,
18:07
Speaker 1: many strides were made in the nineties, but it felt
18:09
Speaker 1: like it was still only within these parameters. You can,
18:16
Speaker 1: but you can't be all of these things, right. It
18:18
Speaker 1: was a very slow moving forward and there was a
18:21
Speaker 1: lot of toxic stuff that we've talked about where it
18:24
Speaker 1: felt very I mean, Britney Spears was a great example
18:28
Speaker 1: of you have to be the innocent, innocent like childlike Madonna,
18:35
Speaker 1: I guess, or the whore like you. You can't be there,
18:38
Speaker 1: and it felt very just a lot of the clothing choices,
18:42
Speaker 1: which again, if that's your choice and you want to
18:44
Speaker 1: wear it, then I'm all for it. But it did
18:46
Speaker 1: feel like a lot of stuff we saw in the
18:48
Speaker 1: nineties was very tailored to the male gaze. And also,
18:53
Speaker 1: like like you said, I mean, I was recently stunned
18:56
Speaker 1: by that interview with um Laura Dern. I didn't know
18:59
Speaker 1: she was three in Drassic Park and he was like
19:03
Speaker 1: forty five plus, like that age difference. Like I remember
19:07
Speaker 1: watching Entrapment with Katherine c To Jones and Sean Connery
19:11
Speaker 1: and being like as a as a young person, like no, right, no, Well,
19:18
Speaker 1: is it during the nineties that we see the tropes
19:20
Speaker 1: of like the women hooking up with the both the
19:22
Speaker 1: father and the son or has that always been a thing?
19:25
Speaker 1: I can't remember because I'm thinking about also like the
19:27
Speaker 1: later as you talked about Sean Connery, the later series
19:31
Speaker 1: in Indiana Jones where Sean Connery father and the woman
19:35
Speaker 1: character is checking them both like it's just like and
19:39
Speaker 1: I remember seeing that as a twist on all the
19:41
Speaker 1: things like why is this always a thing? Right? That's
19:44
Speaker 1: a good question. I feel like we've opened a lot
19:48
Speaker 1: of boxes for future episodes, and I yeah, I mean
19:53
Speaker 1: there's so many nineties movies I love, and some of
19:56
Speaker 1: we've talked about on our feminist movie Friday, like The Mummy.
19:59
Speaker 1: But I just was after I did that episode, and
20:02
Speaker 1: I was thinking about the eighties and nineties, and there's
20:06
Speaker 1: plenty of things left to unpack then and still now,
20:11
Speaker 1: right and still now, And it felt like a very
20:14
Speaker 1: particular brand of like you can have this much women,
20:18
Speaker 1: but only this much, and then we're going to sell
20:22
Speaker 1: it as something that's very feminis and empowering. Anyway, it's
20:26
Speaker 1: just been on my mind and I'm sure we'll return
20:29
Speaker 1: to this in the future, but in the meantime, cheers, cheers, yes,
20:34
Speaker 1: and to you listeners. As always, if you have any
20:37
Speaker 1: suggestions for future topics or movies or whatever we should cover,
20:41
Speaker 1: please let us know. You can email as a stuff
20:43
Speaker 1: and your mom Stuff at I hurt me dot com.
20:45
Speaker 1: You can find us on Twitter at mom Stuff podcast
20:47
Speaker 1: or an Instagram stuff I've never told you. Thanks. It's
20:49
Speaker 1: always to our super producer Christina. Thank you Christina, and
20:52
Speaker 1: cheers and cheers and thanks to you for listening stuff
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Speaker 1: and I told you his protection. But I hear radio
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Speaker 1: have a podcast or whatever. You listen to your favorite shops,
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