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Aug. 5, 2021 - One American - Chase Geiser
56:09
Katherine Dee Discusses The Future Of Dating In America, Film, Anime, & The Occult | OAP #41

Chase Geiser Is Joined By Katherine Dee. Katherine Dee (@default_friend) is a writer and the Co-host of "After The 0rgy". Episode Links: Chase's Twitter: @RealChaseGeiser Katherine's Twitter: @Default_Friend Katherine's Substack: https://defaultfriend.substack.com/

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Time Text
But because they are hot, Mr. Gorbach.
Tear down this wall.
A date which will live in infamy.
I still have a dream.
Good night and good luck.
Good night and good luck.
All right.
Today we have Catherine D on One American Podcast.
Thank you for coming on today.
I appreciate it.
Thanks for inviting me.
Absolutely.
Um it's a pleasure to have you.
I can't remember how I came across your profile, but I've been uh following you for some time.
I enjoy your newsletter.
I studied that.
And um I just think that you're a great writer and have really interesting things to say.
So I thought it would be fun to have you on the podcast.
Well, thanks.
I really appreciate that.
Absolutely.
So how did you get into writing?
Uh that's a big question.
I've I've been writing a a long time.
Um, in all in all different forms.
I I went to I went to school for screenwriting and playwriting.
Um so maybe that's that's when I started really taking it seriously.
Yeah.
Did you go to UCLA?
No, I went to NYU.
Okay, cool.
How did you like NYU?
Um, I was a little bit of a crazy person, but I I enjoyed the I enjoyed the classes.
Yeah.
So what sparked your interest in screenwriting?
Uh were you just like an avid film lover growing up?
What's this?
What's the scoop there?
Um I so I did a lot of like text-based role-playing.
Um, and the way it's so like a lot of people think of it as like collaborative story writing, um, or like you know, short story writing, but it's not quite that.
It's more like writing for television and the the format.
So uh or or film.
Um so it was really like I was trying, I was wasting all this time doing it.
Um, so it was like, how do I like I've you know, blown a decade of my life on this?
Is there any way I could take a real skill from this?
So I tried writing screenplays, and I remember like one summer I watched like 150 movies or something just to get up to speed, and I, you know, I I ended up falling in love with film and realized that I really liked the format and my brain was already sort of primed to think that way.
Um, and then you know, here I am, or there I was.
That makes sense.
Um, so what's what's one of your favorite movies?
Obviously, like answering what your favorite movie is is almost an impossible question to answer.
So I always like to ask what's one of them.
Like what comes to mind when somebody asks you what your favorite work is.
So usually I have like this like terrible pretentious answer, uh, which is Julian Donkey Boy by Harmony Corinne, but um my other terrible answer is I've been revisiting Judd Avatar movies.
Um in sort of like my quest to dive into um 2000s and 2010s culture.
And I I don't know if I could say in good faith that it's uh you know a great movie or the best movie, but I really love forgetting Sarah Marshall.
Do you remember the first time you saw it?
Yeah, I think I saw it in theaters.
Okay.
What year did that come out?
My guess is 2009.
Sounds right.
It was it was definitely I think it was pre-2010.
Um, I don't know that I've ever seen that movie.
Really?
Travis D. Is that a Travis D for you to hear?
No, I mean it's you know, it's like one of these like throwaway comedies.
Um that that came out, you know.
I feel like there's so many of them um between like 2005 to like 2012, maybe.
Um, and they were kind of like they're like romantic and fun, but they're also sort of like geared towards guys.
Um and I don't know, they none of them are like the the best or sharpest writing, but I I find them really fun to write it's fun to watch, rather.
Um like the 40 year old virgin is another one, also Judd Apatow that I think is just like very fun, didn't age well at all, like would be too problematic for today.
But I just watched it like three weeks ago with my wife, uh, and we enjoyed it.
But you're right, uh some of the stuff they said in that movie.
I was like, there's no way you could get away with that today.
Like the like the whole the classic, you know how I know you're gay, you listen to Cole play, like that she wouldn't fly today.
There's no way.
Well, there's also a whole...
There's multiple race dimensions to that movie that I guess I noticed it the first couple of watches.
Then I watched it.
We were going to do a podcast episode on it, on my podcast after the orgy.
And I was like, shit, this is actually like...
Not only would it be perceived as racist, it actually is kind of racist.
How do you define racism?
because I struggle with that term because...
growing up I sort of always it's it seems like it's kind of morphed right like racism used to be sort of explicitly believing that one race is inherently superior and or inferior to another but it seems like it gets applied to just like general stereotypes and stuff too.
Do you do you do you think that that that definition or interpretation of racism is um is useful or correct or or do you um do you think that uh I don't know maybe it maybe that what the word is overused.
You know, it's kind of like a moving target.
Like, I, you know, I appreciate what was like once said about porn that you know it when you see it.
And the thing about racism is it's, you know, there's explicit expressions of it, you know, like slurs or discrimination or like things that are unambiguously hate crimes, all of that is obviously racism.
But then I think there's like a, there's a subtle, there's a more subtle form of it that can be offensive.
and we live in a time that has like so so little nuance that it's it's really hard to assess that that kind of like more subtle expression of it.
You know, things can't, it's weird because it's like things can still be in bad taste.
And I think there's this like kind of reactionary impulse or like knee jerk response to sort of be, you know, be so open because everything's become so repressed in the mainstream.
But it's weird.
It's like you can't really, you can't really draw the line anymore because we've kind of, we've cried wolf too many times, I think.
Yeah, I think you're right.
Tell me a little bit about your podcast after the orgy.
Yeah, it's a culture commentary podcast.
Originally, we were going to like sort of hone in on like 2009 to 2014.
But we want, and we still kind of are doing that, but we've wandered away from it a little bit.
But we got like some really great responses on some short story and film analysis we did.
And I think we're going to try to do that.
do more of that um I you know I I hope we still keep the frame of like how our attitudes kind of changed in those like very pivotal years and media that informed it like a little bit before and a little bit after um right now right now we're calling ourselves a podcast about desire while we well while we figure out out the the final you know the the final form.
Maybe there is a journey, not a destination, if you will.
Yeah, I know exactly how that goes in terms of what I've been doing with this podcast the last couple of months.
So it's an exciting thing to launch a podcast.
And it's fun to see how I've noticed that I've changed.
And maybe it's because I went a year without having a conversation with anybody because of the pandemic.
And then now suddenly I'm having conversations with all my favorite people several times a week.
But it's a fascinating process to start to create something and then interact with an audience in a meaningful way.
And to see how it changes your influence as much as you influence your audience.
Yeah, I experience that especially with Twitter.
My account has shifted so much.
And it's been difficult to communicate that.
I do want an audience for my writing.
And I'm very, very grateful for it.
But also part of it is my Twitter is really like a one-for-one translation of the changes I've made in my life.
I started off as like an anime av who posted about local issues and my family life and a lot about coast-to-coast AM and paranormal stuff.
And then it evolved as my interests and what was relevant to my day-to-day life evolved.
Have you seen the new UFO Netflix docuseries that I've ever seen?
that just came out no is it just came out.
I it I think it just came out because it was in like the trending category on Netflix, so usually it's the new stuff.
I watched the first episode today, and I thought it was really good, but the I'm not a good person to ask because I am not someone who has um like done any sort of extensive research or study into things like Roswell.
So if you're a person that has, then it may just sort of be redundant for you.
Um I can't remember what it's called.
I think it's called Project Blue Book or something, something like that.
But um, I I thought they did a really nice job uh putting it together, but I like all the Netflix original content.
I think they're they're awesome at producing uh new content.
Yeah, then they and they're they're good at like getting a lot of it out too.
They're really prolific.
Yeah, and I'm I'm so glad to see that they had the foresight to know that they needed to make that pivot as a business.
Just because they could have kind of done the blockbuster thing, right?
And just sort of leaned on streaming existing content produced by major studios, and the fact that they had the wisdom to know that in order to like compete in the future, they're gonna have to make their own content.
Um, really position them to uh make stuff that I don't think anybody would have otherwise seen and take risks that I don't think other people would have otherwise seen.
Yeah, I I think I think you're right.
Um I wonder what would have happened if Blockbuster produced their own content.
That's kind of an interesting thought experiment.
Yeah, I don't know.
Uh maybe maybe it would have been like Netflix.
I don't know.
I I mean well, I think in retrospect it's easy to see that they should have made a streaming platform and they just didn't do it in time.
But I don't know.
Uh did you watch the uh last blockbuster uh show on I think that was Netflix too.
No, I I worked for a place that wanted to do some kind of like event or project with them.
Um but I I didn't I didn't end up seeing seeing the the show.
Yeah, it's I grew up in a very small town in Illinois and my best friend worked at the Blockbuster.
So it particularly resonated with me to watch that because it's like a it's a cultural phenomena, and I think it's like a millennial generational thing.
I don't know if you had this I don't know where you grew up, I don't know if you had this experience, but Blockbuster was like the only form of entertainment for a hundred miles.
And so it was super nostalgic for me to go and watch a show sort of dedicated to what Blockbuster meant to so many people.
It I I loved Blockbuster.
I I also kind of loved it.
I I thought of like Blockbuster and EB games as sort of like the same genre of store or like even Hangout Spot because they were it they were like in my mind connected to the internet and sort of this like connection to the outside world.
Like I like when I was growing up, like anime was rare, for example.
Like no one knew what it was, and it was like really hard to find offline, and like being able to see like, oh man, like vampire hunter D or like you know, one episode of Sailor Moon on a VHS was like really really exciting.
Yeah, I um I know very little about anime, but I absolutely adored Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball growing up.
Uh does that even count as anime?
Yeah, yeah, of course it does.
Yeah, yeah, I take it that it does, but it's kind of hard to find that stuff now.
I I bought the Dragon Ball Z um seasons on Amazon.
I don't know if you can find the Dragon Ball ones though when Goku was a kid, those are my favorite, just because they're more comedic.
I'm sure I'm sure you can.
It's like it's it's so it's so weird.
Like the stuff became like so like mainstream that a lot of stuff I remember, like I don't know, like begging my mom to like go on eBay and like look for it for me, like is now just like readily available at like any store on Amazon.
It's like there's no sense of like this there's a barrier of entry to get this media.
Do you think Pokemon is kind of what kickstarted it for our generation in terms of exposing people to uh uh anime culture?
Um, you know, weirdly, no.
Um I think like I I feel like there's there's there's always been like these one off programs that get like a cult following, right?
Like um Speed Racer and Sailor Moon and Tenchi and Dragon Ball Z as you mentioned and Pokemon, Digimon.
But I I'm that's a kind of a good question though.
Like I wonder like what is it that you know took it from there's these individual series that everyone knows and become like big products to like you could find a bunch of different anime and it like maybe it was like crunchy roll got more popular or something or it was streaming platforms like Netflix.
I don't know that's actually that's a really good place to sort of poke around I think I don't know if this is true or not but I believe the original Power Rangers series was uh all in Japan right do you know anything about that?
Um I I don't but that's that's that sounds right and I believe that the uh fight scenes in the series are actually the original footage to save time.
So when they're like doing all their those hand motions and stuff and they're in like the full Power Rangers uniform in the original series it's still it's actually the Japanese actors and they just overdubbed all the English uh audio that's yeah that's very that's very believable.
I feel like that that's those sort of like a strategy in the 90s lots of like makeshift sort of edits there.
Sure.
Well and obviously it was a major pain to edit back then but I I wonder if uh the reason I thought of Power Rangers is just because I was trying to like think of how Japanese create creative culture somehow got into US culture.
And um you know I was thinking about that as well as just generally like with Nintendo and video games and stuff you kind of saw um the like the business opportunity there I guess from a from a creative production standpoint.
So maybe it actually started all the way back with Nintendo or something.
Yeah, and it's probably super old, right?
I would have been surprised if it went back to the 60s.
But I think, and I'm just speculating here, maybe what changed is there is a thing where people felt they needed to reposition Japanese media properties, which they knew would perform really well because there's always been this weird symbiotic relationship between American pop culture and Japanese pop culture that they needed to reinterpret it for an American audience.
But I feel like, and again, I could be wrong, but something happened where there was just an understanding that weeaboos exist and American teenagers just like anime as is and it doesn't need to be remarketed in any way.
I might be making this up, though.
It just feels like it's just so much more, like it was just so much more like rare and like, you know, it was very exciting.
You would like there is I remember the sci fi channel would had acquired some anime series and like, you know, you waited and waited for like certain movies to air.
And that just says that I mean, of course, the landscape altogether has changed.
Streaming changed everything.
But I think also it's possible that like something else about the way we consume foreign media must have changed.
That is divorced from the whole streaming thing.
Yeah, that's interesting.
Do you have you ever seen the documentary dig?
No, what is it about?
So dig?
I don't know what year came out mid 2000s.
I think 2005 maybe.
And it's by a director.
I believe her name is Andi Timiner.
But I could be butchering that.
And I think it won the Sundance Film Festival one year.
And it features two bands, neither of which have any sort of fame at the beginning of the documentary.
And they're like sister bands, best friends.
And one of them is the Dandy Warhols, who you may be familiar with.
They had some hit songs mostly in Europe, but their big hit is We Used to Be Friends.
I think it was the theme song for some major TV show here when we were kids.
But anyway, it features the Dandy Warhols and a band called the Brian Jonestown Massacre.
And basically throughout the documentary, these two bands, you see like one take off and become super famous and then you see one sort of devolve because of like drug problems and
mental illness but the band that devolved the Brian Jonestown massacre in um in the documentary did tour Japan it was like one of the only countries they toured outside of the United States and um it was interesting to me when I watched that documentary because all of the Japanese people at this like huge concert for them were like huge fans of this band and you know when they played in the United States maybe like 17 people would show up, right?
And it was I just I wondered, I was like, what is going on where there's like there's like this gap where an act like this can totally break in Japan randomly, but not resonate with like any sort of zeitgeist in the United States, you know.
Yeah, you know, it it's so weird.
It feels like fame functions very differently in Japan than it does in the United States and like also like South Korea to some extent, I think.
Um it's you know, it's it's something I I wish I knew more about.
I remember like and I I don't know if this is as much of a thing anymore, but like when I was growing up, it was sort of like this well-known thing that there was certain, you know, like people will will do certain hacks to become like let's say like Twitter celebrities or in you know, Instagram celebrities.
Well, there was like this, it was like well known that you could position yourself in a certain way and do certain things to become an American like internet celebrity who is big in Japan, and that would, you know, best case scenario, open up doors for you to be flown out to Japan and then be sort of like a micro celebrity within Japan.
Yeah.
Uh it's just like no one talks about it anymore, and I don't know if I like aged out of it.
Um, you know, it's just because like I'm more concerned with like adult things and not like you know, YouTubers and uh you know tumblers, but like or if it just if it just sort of stopped happening is sort of like the demographics shifted.
It reminds me of that show, and I don't want to just keep like throwing Netflix shows at you, so stop me if it's irritating.
There's a show called Huge in France.
Uh I don't know if you heard of it, but I don't know, I don't think it did very well, but I thought it was my wife and I thought it was absolutely hilarious, and it's basically about this guy who um is like a huge comedian in France, very famous stadiums, like Kevin Hartlevel famous.
And um he comes back to the United States in the very beginning of the series because he's trying to re rekindle his relationship with his American son, and nobody knows who the hell he is in the United States.
So he's like going around like I'm huge in France.
It's just it's just like one of those funny things that are uh reminded me of that show to talk about that because I I I thought about that too, because I um I own a small advertising agency, and it's a lot less expensive to advertise overseas than in the United States because there are there's less competition, there's less there are less businesses bidding to reach the same audience, so the cost for advertising is lower.
And like for you can pay like a penny a click for you know at running ads in uh India, for example, that in the same ads would cost maybe a dollar fifty a click here, right?
And I was like, man, I could run ads and just become a major celebrity in like you know, a random town in India.
But like what use is that to me?
Yeah, I mean it it's like I I feel like something similar happens, you know, online, like you become you find product market fit in like these weird online niches.
Um, and it they don't always like align with um your beliefs or your desires or even the spaces you hang out online.
Um and it's kind of the same as like being big in Japan or big in France or big in, you know, some random village in India.
Yeah, absolutely.
So what would you say are your goals in terms of what you're trying to do with with your newsletter and your writing?
Um that's a good question.
I so I I use it sort of as a place where I can explore like different things I'm interested in or like flesh out theories that I have.
Um and also I post like a little bit of fiction, uh, which usually relates to whatever I'm like deep diving in.
Um, I I guess just to keep writing to become a become a better writer.
Um I like I like having an audience.
I like knowing, you know, people care about what I have to say, and like especially, you know, when they when they comment and we can have like a conversation about um you know what I'm thinking about.
Uh so I mean it's it's a simplistic answer, but it's just I don't know, it's just kind of fun to have a blog.
I mean, it's really the the long and short of it.
Have you written any novels to completion?
I I wrote one and it may I maybe it's all right.
I you know, I might be too close to it.
I but I I did I did write one and then I like told people I was gonna you know post it on Substack or like release it in some capacity, and I just I don't know.
I like it, I'm I'm I haven't gotten the guts to do it yet.
So uh when did you write it?
2019.
Okay.
So right before there was a pandemic and you had all sorts of time to write a novel.
Yeah, yeah, pretty much.
What's it about?
Um, it's so it's sort of about like different subcultures in the Bay Area, but the sort of the overarching story is um like a woman's like journey through like rising in the ranks and in tech, um, which it's you know terribly like uh uncanny valley also came out, which they're they're different pieces, but they're similar in spirit.
So you know, maybe this works best as an exercise.
But anyway, so the the start of the the novel, like this woman goes to like this tech brose apartment and he has these floor to ceiling windows, she's like really impressed by it, and like the whole book is like a quest for her to replicate his yuppie lifestyle, and then sort of at the end realizing like you know,
really what like the whole journey really was about getting like this you know, sterile apartment that overlooked a city, and you know, you could buy all your groceries in one hit and have all the nice appliances, and then you know, it's like to what end, you know, you have there's always someone richer, you there's always some other thing to aspire to.
Right.
That's really interesting.
Well, I would love to read it.
You should publish it one day.
Uh may maybe, maybe I'll maybe write something better though.
Well, if you yeah, but if you always operate on that philosophy, then you'll never publish anything.
You'll wind up like Challenger.
Yeah, that's it's just a feedback loop of multiplater.
It kind of reminds me of um uh I like Kerouac a lot, uh, especially in high school.
I liked Kerouac a lot.
And he wrote a great book called Tristessa.
I'm not sure if you'd read it or not, but um in that book, the main character, and it's been so long as I read it, I don't remember any of the names, but the main character is in love with basically a heroine addict in Mexico.
And the whole entire book, he's just trying to like help this woman and connect with her and get her off drugs and you know, be with her, and then in the end, it's just sort of like gone with the wind where he's just like, fuck it, I quit.
But you know, it just reminds me.
It's funny how we we we envision this life for ourselves, and then you know, if we're fortunate enough to attain it, it's not what we expected.
Yeah.
Um, you know, I think that I think that's like one of these lessons that you hear all the time and then you don't really appreciate it until you experience it.
Like, you know, you're it's it's uh it's a piece of like, you know, it's like an always an inspirational quote or something.
There's always like the version of you that you are now, you for most people is like the like an older version of you wanted to get there, but you're still striving.
Um I saying this out loud now, it feels sort of like disconnected because like people's lives do get worse, and you know, not everyone is leveling up all the time.
But there I don't know, there is something to it, like what really is important.
Yeah, that's that's interesting.
I um yeah, I wonder what it would be like to be totally content.
I can't like I can't imagine a person reaching self-actualization because I can't picture that person doing anything other than sitting still at that point.
It's like if you've got it all if you if you've got it all dialed in, then wouldn't you just stop everything?
You know, if you if you reach that level of just everything is set, like there always has to be some level of discontent that you know, you see like figures like Elon Musk, for example, and Jeff Bezos, for example, as controversial as they are, but you see him and they have what you know seems like everything to um us plebes, but they you know work 20 hours a day, and it's because it's not a it's I don't know, it's there's something else driving them.
Yeah, I you know, I I kind of have the opposite reaction sometimes.
Like, what's you know, what's the point, right?
Like I was having a conversation with a friend of mine today, and she was telling me this like sort of like horrifying story about like a director who um his his wife's father died or something, and he was in the middle of um, you know, he was in he was in the middle of working on this great romance film, and he kind of shrugged her, he shrugged her off and didn't comfort her in that moment because he was working on this film that is all that's all about like the depths of like human relationships and and love.
And I was thinking like, what's the point of creating anything if you don't first foster like your family or your immediate relationships or it like it seems like one sort of reflects the other, but you often have to sacrifice one for the other, which is like it feels really really weird when you think about it, especially with I mean, I guess with like tech it's a little bit different, but with like art, right?
You're creating art about emotion or relationships, um, and you have to sacrifice your relationships to opine on relationships it seems like this really weird thing that is super common but there's something about like to like why like what why do you need to express yourself if it's not something that's you're also cultivating or or even just a having gratitude for in in your own life do you think that in a lot of instances like like
Let's just take, for example, genius level people, savants, whether it's artists, writers, entrepreneurs.
Do you think that for that type of person, it's incredibly difficult to meet someone and feel a deep, genuine soulmate level of connection?
So what may happen is they find someone they're compatible with, but not necessarily ecstatic about.
And then they dive into their work.
So I could fathom someone who's a brilliant director or a very serious director getting married, having kids out of a sense of duty, or this is the stage in life I'm at.
And then when you need to be there for your family, if it's somebody that you're with just sort of because it was convenient, then you might be genuinely more interested in your work.
And it's not because you don't seek love or relationships, but it's because the relationships that you have aren't the fulfilling ones.
ones that I I mean I think that could be true too I I think that for I I think for if you know a very small you know number of people um it's it's hard to connect with others but I I also kind of think that's a cope.
think that uh often you know when you meet people who say that kind of thing it's like they they aren't maybe they're not giving people enough leeway i think this is like a common problem people have with dating too right like there's i don't want to say their standards are too high but it's more like they're too unforgiving um and there's like a lack of understanding that you you need to you need to compromise a lot to have fulfilling friendships and
romantic relationships that i don't think people quite know how to do and i don't even think it's like a we you know we have unlimited optionality or whatever i don't even think that's really the problem i think it's like a sort of it's just a a level of empathy maybe that's missing so when I was in high school I was in a in a cult and literally in a cult.
Really?
Yeah, unwittingly at the time.
And, you know, cult is a little bit of a strong word because it was a very small, intense denomination of Christianity.
And cult isn't really the right word because there was no cult leader.
But it had all of the workings of a cult.
It would be like Jim Jones, his church, the People's Temple, without Jim Jones.
And, you know, I had a really good experience in that cult in a lot of ways.
I learned a lot.
Of course, you know, I'm not part of it now.
But one of the things I was at, like, a Bible study two-week camp in Canada.
And they, like, divided the boys and the girls up.
And we had, like, the talk.
And one of the leaders said, or the guy leading the group of teen boys, which I was in, was like, what is marriage about?
And, you know, people raised their hand and said different answers.
Some people said love.
Some people said, I don't know, honoring the Word of God.
You know, just the stereotypical stuff you'd expect it, like an intense Bible study.
And the guy said, it's about commitment.
And I'd be interested to hear what you think about that because that is something that stuck with me, even though I'm totally not religious in the sense that I was, you know, 15 years ago.
But I have found that if you prioritize the commitment, a lot of the other stuff comes.
Like, people think that they have have to fall in love and then commit but I think that you fall in and out of love repeatedly if you're in a long term relationship with someone and that through the commitment and the loyalty that it it catalyzes that love and fosters that you know sort of inverted, but I don't know.
What do you think?
No, I think that's true.
Um, and I think that's also what keeps people in uh bad relationships or abusive relationships.
Yeah, obviously there's a line, but yeah, no, I mean just because you don't like the fact that she chews with her mouth open, you know, it doesn't mean you should break out.
I I I mean I yeah, I think I I but I think that's I think that's right because it's you it becomes difficult to know, you know, what is she choose with her mouth open, but she's my wife and I love her, and then what's like you know, she's constantly gaslighting me, or I suspect she's cheating on me, but I don't have proof.
You know, there's like all there's all sorts of random things, but I I think but I think it's precisely because like if you do enter a marriage with that mindset of like commitment is the most important thing, you do find yourself falling in and out of love with your partner over and over and over again, and the intimacy you build once you know you allow them to be their full selves is you know really difficult to replicate, and you don't really want to.
Um, and I think that's what makes marriage so serious.
You know, it's not even from like a religious perspective or um, you know, like a social order perspective, but there's like some there's like an emotional bond there that is really hard to break.
Um, and it of course happens in any long-term relationship.
So what are your thoughts on monogamy just as a as a concept generally?
Um, I mean, I'm I'm I'm pro monogamy.
Um I have like pretty like uh conventional conventional views on on that.
Um, I I I think I I sort of have a problem with polyamory, um, especially like the culture of polyamory.
I feel like it's it's a it's a cope for like a lot of different things.
I think there's a select few people who like really, you know, a really small number who do it well.
Like I have a you know at this point, a lifelong friend who for as long as I've known her has been in two relationships, and I I never thought it was a like a lifestyle that I would endorse or like think works, but I think it works for her.
But I also think she's like one of like a hundred people in the country for whom it's like a legitimately uh good choice.
And I I don't think my my issue more like comes down to like she's she's in that like the extreme minority, and like we should like chill out with like the Jezebel articles instructing people on how to live that life because most people would be happier making compromises and sacrifices and like a pretty like vanilla monogamous relationship than they would, you know, having contracts and rule books and trying to finagle some alternative model.
So what do you think the what do you think the future of dating culture is gonna look?
And I know you wrote an article about this, so I'm trying to tee it up because I want to want to hear your thoughts about it.
But what do you think the future of dating culture is in the in America over the course of the next 10 years?
So I I have um I my my theory is definitely that we like ping-pong between reactions.
Um we have like long periods of like building up, you know, more and more progressive and then more and more conservative.
And I think that we've sort of reached like peak sort of fluidity with relationships, and we're gonna start becoming a little bit more regressive.
And I've called this sex negativity, and I know that that actually you know refers to very like specific um school of thought.
Uh, but I don't really I don't really know what else to call.
I mean, I the the always brilliant uh Mary Harrington referred to it as a sexual counter-revolution, and I think that's actually um but maybe a more concise way to put it, but we're definitely we're definitely gonna have some kind of backlash to this anything goes attitude.
People, I mean, people feel hurt by it, and there's we've like pretty much eroded all of the structures and uh systems to have you know that allow people to make sense of dating, and people who can offer that are gonna be seen as novel and offering and you know, they become natural leaders.
Um we're I I think we're entering we see you see it online a lot, but I think we're and we're gonna enter a period of um like a new kind of moralizing, like the you know, the the woke stuff is kind of getting played out.
Um, and it's I it's gonna it's gonna flip.
That's interesting.
Now I'm not uh I'm not versed enough in cultural American cultural history.
But did we see something similar happen after sort of like the summer of love, hippies 60s revolution?
Obviously politically, there were a lot of conservative leaders elected, but I I'm I wasn't around to like see what was really happening culturally because you know there's sort of this anything goes late 60s, early 70s things that had that happened, and I'm not sure that when that happened, there was like a hyper conservative backlash on a cultural level.
I mean, we saw it politically, but not necessarily culturally.
I guess they're related.
So you you sort you sort of see it like bubble up, but I think I mean I think the mistake is people, you know, people assume that these are like 10 year long periods, right?
I think it's I think the issue is there it's much longer, right?
Like it's it's not necessarily like you know, it could be that we've been in sort of one fluid movement since 1968.
Um and you see these little and you always see like these little reactions sort of like come up and then fall, you know, fall down, but they're not really anything.
Um my sense is that it's it's we you know, we've we've been experiencing a prolonged uh sexual revolution and now and now we're we're we're coming, we're sort of coming upon the moment where it's gonna be flipped on its head.
It was interesting to me in your article how you associated it at the very beginning with you know, during the next financial crisis or after the next financial crisis.
Why was it that you linked linked the sort of sex negativity cultural the sex counterculture uh revolution to a financial crisis specifically?
Because like if you look at Germany, you know, when the Third Reich came to power, it was sort of like a hyper conservative movement, hyper German traditional movement that happened, and it was it was in light of you know of 30% unemployment and financial crisis.
So why is it that you've linked it to I mean if it's it's pretty much the the same the same logic, like as people like become, you know, we we've had a lot of financial hardship, but I don't think we've had you know, at the level of like 2008, for example, like I think that we you know it's it's it's possible that we'll experience something of um you know similar similar magnitude.
Um and it you we've there's no there's no sort of support systems or for social or you know social systems to for people to fall back on.
Um and this, you know, so naturally people are gonna be looking for something, some kind of support.
Interesting.
So in times of it's kind of like um I remember uh when I first started flying on airplanes, which was when I was in college, I like never prayed in college, but I was scared, you know, the first five or six times I was on a plane.
And I remember like praying when like there was too much turbulence and thinking to myself, like, why the hell am I praying?
I never pray.
And I wonder if there's just some sort of like psychological phenomena where you the closer we get to like a moment of desperation, the more inclined we are to just immediately default to like core values or like um, you know, I don't know, some some some foundation that even if we consciously have moved on from it, um, it's still it's still like our operating system, you know.
Yeah, I mean, I I I think that you know the more the more desperate people get, and uh also it's I mean the other thing is you know, we don't there's no there's no sort of communities that are that people can seek refuge in.
And you you see it a lot with like the most sort of disenfranchised people that there's all these different expressions of wanting um community and structure.
Uh one you know, one kind of interesting example is um, you know, people often people who are like in poverty or like they you know they really need to feed their family, they'll get sucked into um multi-level marketing schemes.
And um, you know, on the surface level, it seems very obvious.
It's like they're not thinking straight, they're being duped by these scams.
It seems like quick cash.
But what I think gets missed in that story a lot is MLMs are like usually very Christian.
Um they're very ordered, they're they're almost they're they're a little bit fascist, kind of, you know, there's there's something about it that's like very very strict, and you know, it's not simply like sell, you know, sell these knives and they'll make uh you know quick buck and you'll become a girl boss or you know whatever thing you know you know you'll finally be able to get out of your situation another piece of it is like you there's a clear uh you know set of goals you have built-in friends you have built-in mentors
you, you know, you live in a certain way, there's rules.
And it's kind of, it's kind of like, you know, why you mentioned you're in a cult, like why people get sucked into cults, or what, you know, why certain ideologies appeal to people, it gives you, it, it, you know, imposes order on a chaotic life.
That's really interesting.
Order ab kale.
Yeah, that's, man, so...
I'm scared about when the next financial crisis happens because I think that we might be on the precipice of um some very interesting things to happen politically if if that were to take place.
I I don't anticipate the reincarnation of an old fascist system but I think that if some sort of like tyranny or ther or or authoritarianism were to take hold in the United States it would be very novel in its uh form.
But maybe that's just all speculation, but it seems...
Yeah, I mean, I agree with you.
I'm definitely not one of these people who thinks that there's some specter of fascism always around the corner or that it'll happen.
We're going to turn into Nazi Germany the minute our economy starts to cripple.
And I think that's ridiculous.
But I do think the kernel of truth in those kind of predictions is sort of like the low-hanging fruit of people seeking safety in something.
I think it's sort of more likely that we're going to have some serious problems with tech.
And if we do have some kind of authoritarian problem, it's probably going to be under the eyes of large tech companies or something to that effect.
And kind of the problem of needing technology to survive in the world.
world and there being like you know and an anti-tech counterculture tech sort of controlling us and then there's like a techno optimist movement of like smaller tech companies um but that's anyway that's where I get into sort of crazy people talk but that's kind of that's take crazy people talk is welcome I when the when reality is crazy uh the truth sounds crazy.
Yeah I'm I I mean I I I think like you know you see a lot of anti-tech people sort of confuse um you know like the big tech companies with uh you know like startup people or even you know crypto people and I think those are two like very different populations.
Um and you know sure like you if you're afraid of uh like AWS hosting every website under the sun or you feel you know threatened by uh that you know not to pick on Amazon but that you can uh now pay with your palm in brick and mortar Amazon stores I I don't think that's so absurd.
Um but there's a difference between like those behemoth you know of companies and the small very optimistic startups that might be like annoying or like kind of you know they might be yuppies in their own right but uh there's there's a real there's a real difference in spirit there.
And then there's even like another group, there's sort of like the grifters who aren't in it for like some optimistic, crazy worldview or the love of tech or whatever.
It's they're in it for, you know, the cash.
And they're all there, but they're all different kinds of tech people.
And I think we're going to see like more tension with that as those like continue to get conflated and as big tech becomes more present and maybe more oppressive in our lives.
Well, yeah, I think ultimately what it boils down to is that the tech isn't the problem.
it's how it's used in the influence.
Like I I have no problem with innovative technology or software solutions.
But the question to me is all right well if you know single entities consolidate enough power then it could become problematic.
My biggest concern today is simply censorship.
I don't even care that Google has an astronomical amount of data on me to the point where every ad I see I want to buy it.
That That part doesn't bother me but it does bother me that you know if if if you know a number of people report me on Twitter, then I could be just banned forever.
You know, and I I hope that we can get past that but I I don't know what the solution is.
I'm not I'm not an expert in that.
Yeah it's you know it's it's difficult.
Um it I do think Google having enough or you know if not Google then TikTok or you know Facebook having a lot of data on you so much data that they can kind of you know predict what you're thinking or so it seems is kind of problematic because then if like a certain disposition or affinity becomes you know becomes problematic then they already know that you what you slot into and there's no kind of hiding from it and there's no opportunity to like role play as something else.
And I hadn't considered that either until a friend told me.
And he was like, look, you might not be hiding anything in the sense that you're ashamed of the emails you send or what your Google search is.
But if they collect enough data where this can create a composite of a type of person who somehow becomes maligned or maybe is considered more likely to commit a certain type of crime, then you have no opportunity for privacy.
privacy um or you know maybe if you you are that maybe you did commit a certain crime or you are a certain type of person and you it really is malicious you there's something to be said about having the freedom to like clean up your act or change who you are you know hide from your actions in some sense.
And then of course the more obvious issue is like innocent people being convicted for you know crimes or being stereotyped in ways that aren't necessarily true and you know whatever whatever uh iteration of this issue.
Yeah that makes sense um you know didn't they don't they have laws in Europe where you have the right to be forgotten.
Yeah it it's too bad they don't have them in the United States.
Yeah I wonder I wonder why I wonder if it would I wonder if it would be like a constitutional violation like a freedom is is probably a freedom of speech violation to force a company to delete information.
I don't know seems to me like a very reasonable thing to make a law I'm not I'm not much for following in Europe's footsteps by any means but I uh I you know sometimes they do things that I think make a lot of sense.
I mean it's it's interesting is like it's really hard to like sue for libel also like there's you really like it's in the United States and I don't I'm not I'm not an expert on the law by any by any means at all.
like this is again just like me sort of peanut gallery speculation and I don't know anything about Europe either but it feels like it's very possible um to just I mean like gossip is to some extent like legally protected um you know we think like oh libel and slander but it's like incredibly hard to to prosecute and get things taken down which I think you know it's probably part of the reason why the whole
gawker lawsuit was so um you know magnificent in a sense because it it's finally there's some like justice for this like impossible crime.
Yeah, Peter Thiel is a, he's certainly a dynamo.
Yeah, you know, no, you know, no, no, like, moral or like value judgment on the outcome or the strategy.
But just sort of from a perspective of like, shit, this is really hard.
And he accomplished it.
Yeah, I did you read Ryan Holiday's book on that conspiracy?
Yeah, I really liked it.
I love Ryan Holiday.
He's such a talented guy.
And I really love Robert Greene.
I'm not sure if you read any of that, but of course, you know, Ryan Holiday was Robert Green's research assistant for a number of years.
Yeah.
Yeah good stuff.
Did you read um I guess since you read about relationships um maybe you've read the Art of Seduction did you read that book?
No it's it's one of these books that I keep buying copies of though and I'm like shit I should I should I should read it.
There's like a a few books like that um but no I haven't it's um it's awesome.
I mean I I really like uh Robert Green because he's sort of figured out like a template that works for him and he just keeps making new content in interesting categories using that that that setup.
And um the thing, like when I was younger, I used to I used to like endeavor and have ambition to read as much as many books as possible.
But as I've gotten older, I've sort of started shifting to instead of reading new content as much as possible, I try to reread the the good stuff over and over again, you know, because I change.
So it's almost like I'm reading it again.
And Robert Green is one of those authors who I really appreciate because you can go back and read the 48 Laws of Power and it speaks to you differently.
Every time yeah, you know, what I what I find uh like particularly interesting about him is also sort of like the um like the the the meta story, like he always seems to be spoken about as like a soothsayer somehow like having like more like more in like an almost supernatural amount of insight on the human condition, which is like really well they probably had something to do with that.
Yeah, I mean it's impressive.
Yeah, it's really impressive.
Um I wish I could figure out how he did that.
I I love Ryan Holiday's book, uh Trust Me I'm lying.
It's a little dated now, but it's got some classic principles in it, and based on what he wrote in that book about marketing, uh and sort of his Machiavellian approach, frankly, to mark to um branding and marketing.
I could see that he may have had a heavy hand in um either directly or inadvertently, and and Robert Green becoming the sort of suitsayer.
I mean, it's like one of the number one books read in prisons, 48 Laws of Power.
And so it's just funny how it's like, how do you tap that market?
I mean, is it like my question is that like is that even true?
Like it feels like that's like one of the most important things.
Right, and that could have just been made up for you know, for for for guys like me to be like, I gotta read this.
Well, that's what kind of got it, you know, got got me interested because I you know, I heard that somewhere, and it's like I don't know if it's true, and like I don't know if it's just like one of these these things that like just gets said, but like that there could be sort of a rumor like that about someone who's like pretty recent is right is really impressive.
So tell me a little bit about your fascination with the supernatural.
Uh I know very little about it, I just said it exists.
Um fascination that is.
Yeah, I don't know.
I I'm I'm really into the occult.
Um I was like really into like paganism and um different, you know, different like occult expressions when I lived in Texas.
Um I don't I oh I I used to live in Austin.
Very cool.
Yeah.
Um I it and Ryan Holiday is also just I think he's in Bass Drop.
Um but I think I'm I'm slightly more interested in the people it attracts.
Um but I you know I do think there's like something to the idea of like manifestation.
Um I you know, I I I like uh I like fables and stuff and fairy tales and uh particularly like stories about fairies um quite a bit.
Uh you know, the the aesthetics of of both of these things.
Uh um I I mean I I think my my fascination is just because it's it's enchanting.
Um it's I think it's probably similar to like you know, someone's interest might be in like video games or to circle back to an earlier topic, anime.
It's like a very nice uh place of fantasy.
Um that you know, like maybe there's something to it, but even if there isn't, they it's it's really interesting to like conceive of a world where where things work differently.
Have you ever dabbled in magic?
Yeah, totally.
I mean this I I used to talk about it a lot more.
I just again like speaking of cults, I was in a coven that you know was maybe a cult, maybe wasn't.
Um down in Austin actually, um, and we did like all sorts of like rituals and stuff.
And it was, I mean, it was uh harmless stuff.
It was like enchanting a necklace or honoring um a certain, you know, like time of year, things like that.
Um, and whether or not it was like real magic, what I thought was really striking was like how powerful like people coming together um and focusing their energy on one thing is um and like how you can really trick your mind or like you know, maybe it's magic, um, into believing something.
Um, and it's I mean it's it's crazy.
Did it work?
Yeah, I mean it it worked to the extent that you like you at least believe something's happening.
You you know, like you believe that uh you know, like your divinatory uh practice is really speaking to you, or you believe uh that you're really shielding yourself from negative energy and you feel it.
And I think part of the reason that you feel it is because everyone else feels it.
Um so again, like you know, who knows if it's if it's real or not, but it is it is powerful for everyone to be on the same page in such an intense way.
I'm getting the impression that you've distanced yourself from it some uh since then.
Uh what why is that?
I don't know if I have.
Um, I just I I mean I just don't know if I if I um believe it or not.
Uh I I think you know, I I'm maybe this is part of what I'm I'm known for.
I'm I've like perpetually a tourist in things, and I don't know if I I'm I'm very like agnostic to everything.
Like it might be true, it also might not be.
Um, but I'm you know, I'm here for the experience.
Um and I I you know fine with the occult um and also like supernatural things in general, like even um, you know, like cryptids and aliens and ghosts and things, things of that nature.
It's I I have moments of like real true belief, but I you know, I I couldn't say definitively one way or the other if I if I really buy it, because um there's so much power in just being around other people who believe it that it's it becomes hard to tell.
Yeah, I know I know exactly what you mean.
So where can people find you?
Um usually they can find me on Twitter.
I tend to like spontaneously deactivate, uh, but never for long at default underscore friend, and then on Substack at default friend.substack.com.
Thank you so much for coming on.
I really enjoyed having you.
You're a great guest.
Thank you.
Um, thanks for the invitation.
I really appreciate it.
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