Another great show! Just a thought on the surrogate sex partners (for incels). I've had this discussion with a few men who haven't had sex in years. There is the option of paying for it but it's not necessarily the PP in VV that we're after. It's someone who wants your PP in their VV. That's where the problem lies.
Sep 28, 2022ยทedited Sep 28, 2022Liked by Sarah Haider
Freshly ensingled mellenial male thrust into the app-dating world. AMA.
It was very interesting to hear more about the female side of the dating app story, it just feels so different to me. What's really interesting to me is I feel like my "value" on dating apps has improved dramatically between the last time I was single and now, giving me an entirely different experience.
The last time getting matches was really difficult. This time I've actually been able to match with good consistency. I'm curious if I've aged up into a bracket where there's just fewer "good" choices, or if I've genuinely increased my attractiveness.
Haha. On further review this makes me sound like I think I'm a sad-sack. I've been assured by all my not-single lady friends that I'm a verified "catch" (good job, own my home in an expensive city, apparently I listen well, etc, etc, humble).
We should be like Canada who pays for a year long maternity leave. I have a lot of Canadian cousins who are really able to be there for their kids in a way that my American relatives havenโt in their first year. Like I think a lot of stuff around marrying early and having kids early is avoided to some extent because we provides a little support for families and thatโs a thing we need to change.๏ฟผ
I had two marriages, one at 23 and one at 42, and I love my current husband (who I met at work) but am so glad that I have my two kids from my first marriage. I never dated online but rarely was without a partner, even when not married. I think there are plenty of people in the world who are funny and smart and interesting and have something to offer, so I donโt really understand why a person canโt just go to the specialty gym cult or church or 12-step meeting or random neighborhood BBQ (like Sarah) or adult softball beer league or a heterodox academy conference (BARPod is doing live shows now!), and find a person they think is great and will be a great father to their future children and friend to them when they have an old lady pillow face.
I think Suzy made a great decision taking a gap year. I wish that were the norm for young Americans, taking a year to work or travel before college, thinking carefully about priorities, including whether to go to college at all.
The only dating app I use is Hinge. If you only use the free version, youโre limited in how many profiles you can like each day, which is a great limit to have.
Ironically, Iโve recently thought one of the problems with the internet is too much of it is free. I wonder if there would be less social media outrage and porn addiction if people always had to pay for those things.
Definitely don't break up the group. I have strict diversity quotas on my podcast feed and I need some left-leaning women that I can actually listen to.
My theory of relationships was a radical egalitarianism. The idea for me was than men and women would line up in pairs based on some comparability in status and complementarity of traits. Half the time the men would initiate relationships, and half the time the women would (and I was definitely looking forward to being in the half of men fortunate enough to have a women get down on one knee and present us with a ring). Some men would cook and clean and do childcare (my father was much this way), and some women would want to work in mines or spend all day in a boardroom downtown. And it would all just aggregate out into a happy harmonious society.
I definitely think the apps are toxic, but I don't think they're the root problem. I think the root problem is that this sort of radical blank slate egalitarianism can't work, because the human animal is so poorly evolved to do it. I definitely think Tinder makes toxic behavior easier, but I don't think that the average woman has any interest in behaving like the average men, whatever positive and negative valuations we might attach to individual behaviors. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for women voting and having equal rights, but they simply are not the same as men, and acting as if they are is a social experiment which has clearly failed.
I also see no obvious solution. Maybe social norms will slowly reach some equilibrium. Right now the pace of technological evolution is so fast we can't keep up with it.
Suzy was great, but my comment will be solely about the bonus content and DJ's coach fucked advice. I think I don't love you anymore. Maybe I do. I paid for the year so I won't quit just yet. Really? Are you so superficial? Or are you joking? Somewhere in the middle? Or is Canada THAT different from the USA?
Stop with plastic surgery. The key to making the world better is being more authentic, not more fake. How is plastic surgery any different than gender transition (with hormones and surgery)? It's exactly the same fear of reality, the same incapacity of acceptance, the same despair that cannot be fixed with a knife or injection, or pushup bra, or any socially engineered lie.
Divorce does not fuck up kids. Fucked up parents fuck up kids. Money obsessed parents also do. As much as I could not stand my kids' father anymore (I was the bad mom quitting him), he is still a great father and we make a great team. Bad parents can be the worst team, married or not. The worst kids I see (and I see many of them because my youngest is in third grade, and I left the father when he was 3, call me Cruella) are the kids of professional parents that want it all, money, material, beauty, social status, and they just don't have any energy left to love their kids and TRULY care for them.
Finally, homeschooling is very hard. As a parent, if you think you cannot be a loving parent AND a teacher, maybe think of just being the best parent you can. This is what can really make a difference.
Finally, maybe I am an angry 40 year-old woman. I am not hot, not enthusiastic in bed, I won't do plastic surgery or botox, I have a business with my partner (who failed the same maths class twice in university and ended up a fantastic woke engineer whom I met at work when I was playing the professional woman), I don't have friends because people around are just too superficial to my taste but I am a good mother, fucking smart and I am convinced the sole problem of our society is money and beauty oriented, because those are lies and just like any other obsession, it does not have an end game, which makes it a social disease. I am done.
About the bonus section, I agree you should have Penelope Trunk on. I've followed her blog for > 10 years and she has such a unique perspective on stuff.
One correction: a "lifestyle business" has nothing to do with a "lifestyle brand". A lifestyle business is, quoting wikipedia, " business set up and run by its founders primarily with the aim of sustaining a particular level of income and no more; or to provide a foundation from which to enjoy a particular lifestyle." So this is in contrast to a "proper" startup which tries to grow as much as possible to get an enormous return on investment.
I enjoyed the podcast. Meghan's snarkiness plus Sarah's chill is a winning combination!
I want to push back on one comment that was mentioned - by whom I do not remember: Men are not meeting women's level of success (It was not quite stated that way, but that was the apparent meaning) because they are not attending college in the same numbers.
In defense of men, there are plethora of middle-class employment opportunities for men that do not require bachelor's or master's degrees. In some instances a two-year, community college program will suffice. Men are over represented as police officers, firefighters, sanitation workers, electricians, truck drivers, plumbers, electricians, carpenters, construction workers, etc...
Yes, some women work work in these fields, but they are a small percentage. On the other hand, there are limited professions women dominate that pay reasonably well that do not require a college degree.
So in a way, perhaps many college educated women do not refuse to date men in traditionally blue collar professions because they are classist. Rather, out of jealously that so many men did not have to spend 4+ years accumulating student loans while studying in a library.
Since this is my area of expertise, I can comment on the cosmetic surgery piece. (1) you absolutely must have a facelift, but probably Sarah is right that you only get one good one. This is related to my second point; (2) the celebrities who have had bad outcomes - this was probably not due to choosing a surgeon unwisely. There are variations in the way that people heal that even the best surgeon cannot control for. One example: Nicole Kidman got a very obvious facelift sometime before Big Little Lies and healed so poorly from it that they had to style her hair such that the part of her face right in front of her ears was covered. It was a really bad outcome, but I doubt that she chose a bad surgeon - sometimes bad outcomes happen for reasons beyond the surgeon's control. Her breast implants, on the other hand, look pretty good. (3) Sarah is right about pillow face with injectables. Lip filler is so common now but it is so obvious and people overdo it and look like ducks or fish. I visited a doctor who did aesthetic procedures and she had so much filler in her face that she was unrecognizable compared to her (15 year old) picture on her website. (4) I think one thing that PT might have been referring to in that blog post is correcting an unattractive feature such as a nose or chin. A nose job and/or a chin implant, depending on one's starting point, can make a huge difference in one's profile and attractiveness and I can tell you from experience that people absolutely treat you better if they are not fighting their disgust response at an unfortunate facial characteristic. Chin implants are the most underutilized cosmetic surgery imo. Lower facial structure is so important to attractiveness (sorry to sound like an incel, I don't take measurements, but by observing who is found attractive versus not/less, it is obvious that facial structure and these distances (length of the midface, for example) are critical to attractiveness. A lot of things cannot be changed, for example the size of one's eyes, women with bigger eyes are at a tremendous advantage, but why not change what you can.
By the same token I completely think that cosmetic surgery is unethical on both the provider and consumer side. So lots of cognitive dissonance but I can't undo the past, so ๐คทโโ๏ธ
On my drivers license is a lie. It says I'm 5' 11", but I'm actually 6' and a bit. I always say that I'm 5' 11", because if I say that I'm 6' everyone will assume I'm actually 5' 11" or 10" or 9" or lower, because the vast majority of men who say that they are 6' are bullshitting! I'm wondering now if this is drastically reducing my dating pool, so perhaps its time to think again!
Yโall should definitely have Penelope on. She had a few viral moments in the 2010s but has been less active in recent years. I imagine itโs because heโs been focused on home schooling her kids. I used to read her obsessively back then. She still publishes occasionally at https://www.patreon.com/penelopetrunk
Another great show! Just a thought on the surrogate sex partners (for incels). I've had this discussion with a few men who haven't had sex in years. There is the option of paying for it but it's not necessarily the PP in VV that we're after. It's someone who wants your PP in their VV. That's where the problem lies.
Freshly ensingled mellenial male thrust into the app-dating world. AMA.
It was very interesting to hear more about the female side of the dating app story, it just feels so different to me. What's really interesting to me is I feel like my "value" on dating apps has improved dramatically between the last time I was single and now, giving me an entirely different experience.
The last time getting matches was really difficult. This time I've actually been able to match with good consistency. I'm curious if I've aged up into a bracket where there's just fewer "good" choices, or if I've genuinely increased my attractiveness.
Haha. On further review this makes me sound like I think I'm a sad-sack. I've been assured by all my not-single lady friends that I'm a verified "catch" (good job, own my home in an expensive city, apparently I listen well, etc, etc, humble).
We should be like Canada who pays for a year long maternity leave. I have a lot of Canadian cousins who are really able to be there for their kids in a way that my American relatives havenโt in their first year. Like I think a lot of stuff around marrying early and having kids early is avoided to some extent because we provides a little support for families and thatโs a thing we need to change.๏ฟผ
I had two marriages, one at 23 and one at 42, and I love my current husband (who I met at work) but am so glad that I have my two kids from my first marriage. I never dated online but rarely was without a partner, even when not married. I think there are plenty of people in the world who are funny and smart and interesting and have something to offer, so I donโt really understand why a person canโt just go to the specialty gym cult or church or 12-step meeting or random neighborhood BBQ (like Sarah) or adult softball beer league or a heterodox academy conference (BARPod is doing live shows now!), and find a person they think is great and will be a great father to their future children and friend to them when they have an old lady pillow face.
Haven't had a chance to listen yet but 27 is a young millenial, not a zoomer.
I think Suzy made a great decision taking a gap year. I wish that were the norm for young Americans, taking a year to work or travel before college, thinking carefully about priorities, including whether to go to college at all.
The only dating app I use is Hinge. If you only use the free version, youโre limited in how many profiles you can like each day, which is a great limit to have.
Ironically, Iโve recently thought one of the problems with the internet is too much of it is free. I wonder if there would be less social media outrage and porn addiction if people always had to pay for those things.
When Sarah mentioned the OK Cupid blog post about races and who messaged who on their site, I totally remembered reading that myself. It's archived! Here it is. Definitely interesting stuff. Sarah's recollection was also quite accurate. Some of their other posts are great too. https://web.archive.org/web/20100821055448/http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/your-race-affects-whether-people-write-you-back/
Definitely don't break up the group. I have strict diversity quotas on my podcast feed and I need some left-leaning women that I can actually listen to.
My theory of relationships was a radical egalitarianism. The idea for me was than men and women would line up in pairs based on some comparability in status and complementarity of traits. Half the time the men would initiate relationships, and half the time the women would (and I was definitely looking forward to being in the half of men fortunate enough to have a women get down on one knee and present us with a ring). Some men would cook and clean and do childcare (my father was much this way), and some women would want to work in mines or spend all day in a boardroom downtown. And it would all just aggregate out into a happy harmonious society.
I definitely think the apps are toxic, but I don't think they're the root problem. I think the root problem is that this sort of radical blank slate egalitarianism can't work, because the human animal is so poorly evolved to do it. I definitely think Tinder makes toxic behavior easier, but I don't think that the average woman has any interest in behaving like the average men, whatever positive and negative valuations we might attach to individual behaviors. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for women voting and having equal rights, but they simply are not the same as men, and acting as if they are is a social experiment which has clearly failed.
I also see no obvious solution. Maybe social norms will slowly reach some equilibrium. Right now the pace of technological evolution is so fast we can't keep up with it.
Suzy was great, but my comment will be solely about the bonus content and DJ's coach fucked advice. I think I don't love you anymore. Maybe I do. I paid for the year so I won't quit just yet. Really? Are you so superficial? Or are you joking? Somewhere in the middle? Or is Canada THAT different from the USA?
Stop with plastic surgery. The key to making the world better is being more authentic, not more fake. How is plastic surgery any different than gender transition (with hormones and surgery)? It's exactly the same fear of reality, the same incapacity of acceptance, the same despair that cannot be fixed with a knife or injection, or pushup bra, or any socially engineered lie.
Divorce does not fuck up kids. Fucked up parents fuck up kids. Money obsessed parents also do. As much as I could not stand my kids' father anymore (I was the bad mom quitting him), he is still a great father and we make a great team. Bad parents can be the worst team, married or not. The worst kids I see (and I see many of them because my youngest is in third grade, and I left the father when he was 3, call me Cruella) are the kids of professional parents that want it all, money, material, beauty, social status, and they just don't have any energy left to love their kids and TRULY care for them.
Finally, homeschooling is very hard. As a parent, if you think you cannot be a loving parent AND a teacher, maybe think of just being the best parent you can. This is what can really make a difference.
Finally, maybe I am an angry 40 year-old woman. I am not hot, not enthusiastic in bed, I won't do plastic surgery or botox, I have a business with my partner (who failed the same maths class twice in university and ended up a fantastic woke engineer whom I met at work when I was playing the professional woman), I don't have friends because people around are just too superficial to my taste but I am a good mother, fucking smart and I am convinced the sole problem of our society is money and beauty oriented, because those are lies and just like any other obsession, it does not have an end game, which makes it a social disease. I am done.
I still love you (like it has any impact).
Thanks for another great episode!
About the bonus section, I agree you should have Penelope Trunk on. I've followed her blog for > 10 years and she has such a unique perspective on stuff.
One correction: a "lifestyle business" has nothing to do with a "lifestyle brand". A lifestyle business is, quoting wikipedia, " business set up and run by its founders primarily with the aim of sustaining a particular level of income and no more; or to provide a foundation from which to enjoy a particular lifestyle." So this is in contrast to a "proper" startup which tries to grow as much as possible to get an enormous return on investment.
I enjoyed the podcast. Meghan's snarkiness plus Sarah's chill is a winning combination!
I want to push back on one comment that was mentioned - by whom I do not remember: Men are not meeting women's level of success (It was not quite stated that way, but that was the apparent meaning) because they are not attending college in the same numbers.
In defense of men, there are plethora of middle-class employment opportunities for men that do not require bachelor's or master's degrees. In some instances a two-year, community college program will suffice. Men are over represented as police officers, firefighters, sanitation workers, electricians, truck drivers, plumbers, electricians, carpenters, construction workers, etc...
Yes, some women work work in these fields, but they are a small percentage. On the other hand, there are limited professions women dominate that pay reasonably well that do not require a college degree.
So in a way, perhaps many college educated women do not refuse to date men in traditionally blue collar professions because they are classist. Rather, out of jealously that so many men did not have to spend 4+ years accumulating student loans while studying in a library.
Since this is my area of expertise, I can comment on the cosmetic surgery piece. (1) you absolutely must have a facelift, but probably Sarah is right that you only get one good one. This is related to my second point; (2) the celebrities who have had bad outcomes - this was probably not due to choosing a surgeon unwisely. There are variations in the way that people heal that even the best surgeon cannot control for. One example: Nicole Kidman got a very obvious facelift sometime before Big Little Lies and healed so poorly from it that they had to style her hair such that the part of her face right in front of her ears was covered. It was a really bad outcome, but I doubt that she chose a bad surgeon - sometimes bad outcomes happen for reasons beyond the surgeon's control. Her breast implants, on the other hand, look pretty good. (3) Sarah is right about pillow face with injectables. Lip filler is so common now but it is so obvious and people overdo it and look like ducks or fish. I visited a doctor who did aesthetic procedures and she had so much filler in her face that she was unrecognizable compared to her (15 year old) picture on her website. (4) I think one thing that PT might have been referring to in that blog post is correcting an unattractive feature such as a nose or chin. A nose job and/or a chin implant, depending on one's starting point, can make a huge difference in one's profile and attractiveness and I can tell you from experience that people absolutely treat you better if they are not fighting their disgust response at an unfortunate facial characteristic. Chin implants are the most underutilized cosmetic surgery imo. Lower facial structure is so important to attractiveness (sorry to sound like an incel, I don't take measurements, but by observing who is found attractive versus not/less, it is obvious that facial structure and these distances (length of the midface, for example) are critical to attractiveness. A lot of things cannot be changed, for example the size of one's eyes, women with bigger eyes are at a tremendous advantage, but why not change what you can.
By the same token I completely think that cosmetic surgery is unethical on both the provider and consumer side. So lots of cognitive dissonance but I can't undo the past, so ๐คทโโ๏ธ
On my drivers license is a lie. It says I'm 5' 11", but I'm actually 6' and a bit. I always say that I'm 5' 11", because if I say that I'm 6' everyone will assume I'm actually 5' 11" or 10" or 9" or lower, because the vast majority of men who say that they are 6' are bullshitting! I'm wondering now if this is drastically reducing my dating pool, so perhaps its time to think again!
Yโall should definitely have Penelope on. She had a few viral moments in the 2010s but has been less active in recent years. I imagine itโs because heโs been focused on home schooling her kids. I used to read her obsessively back then. She still publishes occasionally at https://www.patreon.com/penelopetrunk
Dearest Meghan,
According to Hollywood, 52 year-olds are very welcome at the FBI Academy.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt18076310/
Great episode, gals!