Ep 378: Heteropessimism
SARAH: Hey, what's up? Hello! Welcome to Sounds Fake But Okay, a podcast where an aro-ace girl (I'm Sarah, that's me.)
KAYLA: And a bi-demisexual girl (that's me, Kayla.)
SARAH: Talk about all things to do with love, relationships, sexuality, and pretty much anything else we just don't understand.
KAYLA: On today's episode: Heteropessimism.
BOTH: Sounds fake, but okay.
SARAH: Welcome back to the pod!
KAYLA: Hello!?
SARAH: What? Yeah.
KAYLA: Oh. Just what?
SARAH: Just what.
KAYLA: My cat is here.
SARAH: Hi, cat. She's like an accordion. What a lovely creature. What a lovely specimen.
KAYLA: Sit here with me.
SARAH: Okay. Kayla, do we have any housekeeping?
KAYLA: Not that I am aware of.
SARAH: Great. What are we talking about this week?
KAYLA: This week we are talking about heteropessimism, which I forget how it came up last week, it must have been in one of those articles we were reading.
SARAH: It was. It was in one of the articles.
KAYLA: And now we're talking about it.
SARAH: What is it? Well, we're going to find out.
KAYLA: I vaguely know because some of us did some prep for this episode.
SARAH: I was working at my job.
KAYLA: I also have a job.
SARAH: But my job happened until an hour ago.
KAYLA: I had class as well.
SARAH: Okay, you're better than me, we get it.
KAYLA: No, and then I was watching Survivor and then I was watching Ponies.
SARAH: Ponies!?
KAYLA: It's such a good show, on Peacock, I highly recommend.
SARAH: Is it about ponies?
KAYLA: No, Ponies stands for a person of no interest.
SARAH: Oh
KAYLA: It's really good.
SARAH: No interest. Well, I was at work doing work and then I was redacted.
KAYLA: Yep.
SARAH: I personally was redacted, like, I didn't exist.
KAYLA: Yeah. And now you're here. Anyway.
SARAH: So, now we're talking about something. Kayla was like, will you drive? And I was like, uh, I mean, I guess I'll drive.
KAYLA: Shit, I'll be driving, I'll be driving, I'll be driving, that's fine, I guess.
SARAH: Thanks, mom.
KAYLA: Okay, so, I am going to be mostly reading from this article on a website called The New Inquiry and it is written by someone named Asa Seresin.
SARAH: How do you spell that first name? Is it A-S-A?
KAYLA: S-E-R-E-S-I-N.
SARAH: Nope, the first name.
KAYLA: Oh, A-S-A.
SARAH: It's probably Aza.
KAYLA: Aza?
SARAH: Asa.
KAYLA: Asa, excuse me. It's by Them. I think importantly, especially if I read certain parts of this article, to note, this is from October of 2019. So, pre-COVID, which we can discuss, but I think it could be argued that COVID only exacerbated the issues kind of written about in this. And also, importantly, MeToo era also references to the Brett Kavanaugh hearing.
SARAH: Oh, you already did send me this, but thank you for sending it to me again because I forgot.
KAYLA: Mm. Mm. All right, so, we'll start with a definition. Also of note, I think that this is from… I've seen other articles reference this article, it seems like this person may have coined this term or popularized it, it seems like this is kind of like the seminal piece on this and then other people have kind of branched off from it. So, anyway, heteropessimism consists of performative disaffiliations with heterosexuality, usually expressed in the form of regret, embarrassment, or hopelessness about the straight experience. It generally has a heavy focus on men as the root of the problem. That these disaffiliations are performative does not mean that they are insincere, but rather that they are rarely accompanied by the actual abandonment of heterosexuality. So basically, when you hear a woman like, “oh, God, I wish I wasn't straight” or “oh, it'd be so much easier to be gay,” this is heteropessimism.
SARAH: What was that group of people that we talked about like many pods ago about like women who are like, “I will completely divest myself from men?”
KAYLA: Yes, like de-centering men.
SARAH: What is that called?
KAYLA: I don't remember.
SARAH: So, like, it's people who feel this way, but are not willing to take that step to go that far.
KAYLA: Yes. So yeah, and it does talk about that. There's… some hetero pessimists act on their belief, choosing celibacy or the now largely outmoded option of political lesbianism, but most stick by heterosexuality, even as they judge it to be irredeemable. Even incels overflowing with heteropessimism stress the involuntary nature of their condition. So that's the definition, much more to say on this.
SARAH: This reminds me of a tweet I saw today.
KAYLA: Oh, okay, speak on that.
SARAH: I'm trying to find it. It was about men who are dating women who say things like men are pigs and like, you know, I hate men, blah, blah, blah, whatever. But these men are essentially bragging about the fact that these women are still doing things for them. Okay, I can't find it. But an example of a tweet like this would be a man who says, “this girl who says men are pigs now is making me lunch. “
KAYLA: Oh
SARAH: Like talking about women that way being like, “well, they say this, but at the end of the day, they’re my bitch,” is essentially the mindset.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And so, the tweets I saw about this were like, you know, this is the way that men think about women. Like, this is why misandry isn't really real. Because if it was completely unfounded… like it's not completely unfounded because they’re…
KAYLA: Because they're saying things like this, yeah
SARAH: Right. And so, it just reminds me of those people of like, someone has to be that girl who says men are pigs, but is still willing to make a sandwich for a sexist man who they're presumably dating in this context. There's another one where it was like, “my girl says that she hates men, but she just gave me a blowjob.” And I was like…
KAYLA: Jesus Christ! All right.
SARAH: It's like, yep, this is how they talk about you when you're not looking, so
KAYLA: Great.
SARAH: Anyway, that just made me think of that and now I can't find the fucking tweets, but relevant, I think, to the…
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: I think it also is important that they say that these disaffiliations with heterosexuality, that they're performative does not mean that they're insincere.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: But as we just said, they're really accompanied by the actual abandonment of heterosexuality. So, like these women who are saying that men are pigs and then also making their sexist boyfriend a sandwich, I believe that they believe that men are pigs, I believe that
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: It's just that it's not, I guess, a strong enough feeling to be accompanied by actual action to make change and I think that also reflects upon how important it is in society to be partnered and to be in a stereotypical hetero relationship.
KAYLA: Yeah. Well, this kind of gets into what I think is kind of the thesis of this article, which is that basically by being a heteropessimist, you are acknowledging that something is going wrong with heterosexuality. You're complaining about it, you're upset about it, but you are not doing anything about it. And so, the point that this article kind of makes in the end is that if heterosexuality is going to continue, which it is, like, there's no signs that it's going away, then some amount of work needs to be done on it.
SARAH: I think it's difficult because I understand on one hand that like one individual woman cannot fix a problem that is with men and so it feels very hopeless. And it reminds me of like black people alone could not fix racism, and they have not, it has not been fixed.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: Like, you have to have participation from the oppressor to undo that sort of thing. And so many men in modern society are perfectly happy with the way things are, that they're not necessarily… even if they agree that like there is a problem with masculinity and with the way that men treat women, like they're not willing to do enough to change it because it's inconvenient for them. So, to make it work, you have to do what was done in the civil rights movement and make it inconvenient.
KAYLA: Yeah. Well, it's interesting, the article actually kind of talks about that, about the individualization of like the straight problem. I'm just going to like read a whole… I'm sorry to this person, we're just stealing their work, but…
[00:10:00]
KAYLA: They say, “quite often framed as an anti-capitalist position, heteropessimism could be read as a refusal of the good life of marital consumption and property ownership that capitalism once mandated. Yet this good life, which was always withheld from marginalized populations, is now untenable for almost everyone. If the couple was the primary consumer unit in the past today, this has collapsed or more accurately been replaced by a new dyad, the individual consumer and her phone.” It goes on to say how big hookup apps, their goal is to keep people single, that Tinder has had ad campaigns that are getting at like being single forever, kind of. It says, “heteropessimism has helped stimulate this individualizing turn, not just by draining the hetero couple form of its appeal, but because dissatisfaction with heterosexuality, despite being sold as universal, always seems to operate on the level of the individual. Collectively changing the conditions of straight culture is not the purview of heteropessimism. In this sense, hetero pessimism actually reinforces the privatizing function of heterosexuality, even as it is mass-distributed through culture as a viral meme. Under a heteropessimistic rubric, women might not view themselves as competing with one another within the cutthroat dating market but in metabolizing the problem of heterosexuality as a personal issue, the possibility of solidarity remains foreclosed.”
SARAH: I agree with that, because even as I was saying what I was saying before, as I was saying, like, what is one individual person going to do? Okay, you could say that about anything.
KAYLA: Sure, yeah.
SARAH: Humans have enacted change by banding together, one individual cannot necessarily solve the problem, but as a group, we can. It's just getting past that mindset of like, “oh, I'm just one person, what am I going to do?” And then also just the personal inconvenience of doing what you need to do to change the system and the culture.
KAYLA: Yeah. Well, and I think that's kind of what the heteropessimism like this critique gets at is that by separating yourself from the issue, by saying like, “oh, my God, it's so embarrassing. Oh, my God…”
SARAH: There is no call to action.
KAYLA: Yeah. You're just saying like, I hate this. And this article kind of talks about it as like an anesthetic of sorts, it like separates you from it, it numbs the pain a little bit. And so, you're not going to be as motivated to do something about it.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: It's kind of just pushing it aside and saying like, all right, well, I'm not going to look into like why I feel this way or why I think it's bad, I'm just going to like put that over there.
SARAH: Yeah. I'm going to say this, so, I have it, you know, tattooed on my forehead that I have it on the record.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: But then I'm still going to desire this type of relationship, this type of interaction with men in this case, because we're mostly talking about women doing this.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: Because they think that they need that to have a fulfilling life or they have been convinced by society that they have to do that. And so, listen, if we all got a little bit more aspec about it
KAYLA: This would all go away
SARAH: And we all accepted that having a single, monogamous, romantic and sexual relationship with one person in a hetero way is not the only way to find fulfillment and we built our society such that those people don't have extreme amounts of privilege, then this would be less of a problem, but that is a big ask.
KAYLA: It is a big ask. But I also think that in saying that, I think that is like not helping the problem. Like, I think something really interesting that this article gets at, and I've looked a little bit into… well, how did you say you pronounce her name? Asa?
SARAH: Asa
KAYLA: Asa. He's actually a PhD student at Penn and like doing a dissertation on heterosexuality. And he makes the argument towards the end of the article that like queer theory has ignored heterosexuality as like queer people looking over their shoulder and being like, “oh, God, glad we're done with that.” But the fact remains that like heterosexuality is and will always be a thing. Like, it's just like people are going to have different sexualities.
SARAH: It is asexuality on the spectrum of sexualities.
KAYLA: Right. Like, it's just there and by dismissing it and saying like, God, I wish I wasn't straight or like, oh, I wish everyone was like even from a queer perspective saying, oh, I wish everyone was gay, you're ignoring the fact that like this is here, it's going to stay and so, if it's going to be there, we should try to fix it rather than just like ignore it.
SARAH: Yeah, I agree. I think in saying what I said, I was meaning more of if we unlearn this assumption that we must do this thing, then the pressure to do that thing will not be there.
KAYLA: Yes.
SARAH: And then these people who believe that men are pigs may not feel that pressure to get into those relationships. And as a result, it will be easier to change our cultural understanding of what acceptable masculinity is.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: Because if people understand like, oh, this is not the end all be all, I don't have to chase it in spite of my hatred of it, then there might be a generation in between.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: But like, you know, it's I think it would be easier to eliminate that that problem or lessen it, at least.
KAYLA: Yeah. I would really love to see like an updated version of this article or like more work from this person with an aspec lens, because I think adding things in like amatonormativity and like single privilege and things like that into it would be really interesting.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: Because I think it does go along with something they talk about in this article about how to begin transforming heterosexuality. And he talks about beginning with an honest account of which elements of heterosexuality are actually appealing. So, saying like the house is on fire, what is worth saving? And they reference there's a podcast called Why Do I Like Men? And this host has people on and like they just talk about like, oh, God, why do we like men? And it's like tongue and cheek funny but it's also like, you know, through conversations, there are sometimes like real things that come out about like, yeah, I am attracted to men and like, these are things I like about men. And I think you're right, if that pressure was removed, that we don't all have to get into these normative couples, we can step off the relationship escalator and only do things because we want to. Then you could take an honest look at, yes, I'm attracted to men, these are the kinds of men I'm attracted to, this is what I get out of a relationship with a man and I'm only going to get into one if it matches with what I actually enjoy about it rather than feeling like I have to and so I'm just going to like take any man.
SARAH: Yeah, because when you said like what's worth saving, I was thinking about that, I was like, okay, what could possible answers be? And most of the possible answers that came to mind were the far-right conceptions, gender roles, you need a protector, you need this or that that just falls into these gender roles that we've completely invented.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And so, I was like, okay, stripping it of that, let's take the tack from the left, like, what is worth saving about heterosexuality from the left? Looking at it genuinely, not being like, oh, nothing.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: But like looking at it genuinely and engaging with it with an open mind, like what is worth saving about heterosexuality? And like that question was harder for me to answer, granted I am not a heterosexual person.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: But like, I guess ease of having children, if and when that's what you want to do, I don't know. But like, I think if people actually start thinking about like what is worth preserving in heterosexuality and it'll make us think about like what we value in relationships of other identities, other combinations of people, I think that would just benefit all of us if we just thought more about that. But asking people to think more is a really big ask these days.
KAYLA: A tough one, I know. No, but even from my perspective, thinking about my relationship, like I am in a hetero relationship, I'm a woman in a relationship with a man. And so even thinking for me like, okay, heterosexuality or a heterosexual relationship, what is worth saving? And that is a hard thing for even me to think about, because when I think about my relationship, it's not like I think about like, oh, these are the parts I love about my partner and it's because he's a man. Like, that's not…
SARAH: It's because he is the person that he is.
KAYLA: Right. Like, it doesn't really like have much to do with his gender to me. Like, yes, there's like a certain attraction there, like because of like how he presents and looks and identifies and whatever, but like that's… and maybe part of this is me being demi, but like it's more in the personality for me than like other stuff.
SARAH: I think personally, my opinion, again, this is me as an aro-ace person, so, like I'm not going to have the same experience as all of these people who are making these choices and choosing to date men, even though they hate them, blah, blah, blah, et cetera, you know. I think that I rambled for so long that I forgot what I was saying.
[00:20:00]
KAYLA: Mm
SARAH: Oh, I think what it comes down to is that in my personal opinion, if you strip everything out and you say objectively what is worth preserving about X, Y, Z type of relationships, hetero versus same sex versus whatever, I think at the end of the day, the answers are going to be completely separate from gender, I think they're going to be completely devoid of actual… like if we're ignoring gender roles, like gender actually does not play a role in why we should be preserving these types of relationships. And I'm an aro-ace person, so like that is my opinion. But I think the difficult thing then is like, you're not going to convince everyone of that. So, you have to then look at be like, okay, what is worth preserving in hetero relationships? You have to be like, we're not ever going to get the burn it all down start over.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: So how can we make do with what we have and think about what we have? And I mean, you can't do that in a way that's going to make everybody happy but I…
KAYLA: No. I mean, I'm thinking of it as… like, thinking about what I think is great about like same sex relationships, I think that's a lot easier to think of because they're not the norm and so it's much easier to compare. Like, to me, one of the great things is like…
SARAH: You walk into it with equality.
KAYLA: Yeah. Like to me, one of the things is like, okay, you're on like more of an equal playing field, you are in a relationship with someone who like understands… say it's like two women, you both like understand what it is to be a woman and like share that experience. I think you could very… I think it's a very real thing to say that a benefit of a heterosexual relationship is that you're bringing two people with very different backgrounds together and you can learn from each other's experience and you can like understand more what the other type of person is experiencing and being more like empathetic to the other side.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: I think there's a lot of things like that like are a benefit to heterosexuality, but you don't think about that because it's the norm. And so, trying to put yourself in the mindset of like, okay, some of these things cause conflict, like the fact that you're coming in from different backgrounds and perspectives, but in a healthy relationship, that could actually be a really good thing.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: I think the problem also is that when we're thinking about straight relationships, it is very easy for your mind to just go to like the worst ones and like the men that are terrible and why people hate... like why people feel heteropessimistic, but like that's not everyone. I think if you were to think about like very healthy, straight relationships, it would be a lot easier to be like, okay, here's the parts we should keep and that we should try to like lift up. But no one talks about that part because it's not like fun to talk about like your friend's super healthy, straight relationship.
SARAH: Right. I think for me, the thing that I still struggle with so much is… I think you're right about the different experiences, bringing a diversity of experience to a single relationship is good and helpful. And it doesn't have to be because it's hetero, it could be because you're a different race than the person, it could be, you know, there are all sorts of different ways to do that. But I think for me, the thing that I'm really struggling with divorcing from this question of like what is worth saving in the heterosexual, whatever, is that everything, I guess, aside from that, that I can think of is so deeply connected to gender roles that like it's almost impossible to think about it devoid of gender roles. And so, then if you're just looking at it as like gender, then it's like, well, then it's not really about gender, it's about sex at that point.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: You know? And so, I think that's why my brain is just like, there is nothing, like, there's nothing. Because when I'm trying to strip away the stuff that our society has forced on to us, that is not innate or inherent to any type of person or gender or whatever, when you strip that away, you don't have much. And I mean that in like a good way, like…
KAYLA: A good way, yeah.
SARAH: But like, what is there that's specific to hetero relationships that is different from same sex relationships when you strip all of that away? The only fucking difference is the genitalia.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And I guess the experience of the world, but that also depends on…
KAYLA: How you're presenting
SARAH: How you're presenting and like the how sexist and misogynist the world is that you get treated differently.
KAYLA: And like you said, that comes down to… like you could very easily have that dynamic in a lot of different ways with a lot of different identities, it's not like only straight relationships have that.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: Honestly, the thing that I keep coming back to in my mind is like, well, it's worth saving because it's something that people experience and feel and want, you know? Like, at the end of the day, there's always going to be straight people and they're going to be attracted to people. And to me, like, that's enough to save it. Right?
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: Like, if people want it, then we're going to save it.
SARAH: Right.
KAYLA: And that's how I feel about any type of relationship. But it's hard to build from just like, well, it's there, and so, it'll be there.
SARAH: I agree. However, I think that there is no need to save the institution of hetero...
KAYLA: No, no
SARAH: So, like, I think any sort of relationship that y'all want to have that is safe and consensual by all parties, great.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: But like, I don't want to be like, well, we have to save heterosexuality because heterosexuals exist, it's like heterosexuals are going to exist whether the institution of like our conception of modern heterosexuality exists or not.
KAYLA: Yes
SARAH: So, like, I understand what you're saying on one hand, on the other hand, it doesn't mean anything.
KAYLA: No, that's fair, you're right, it is the institution of it that is causing the problems, not the individual.
SARAH: Not the existence of…
KAYLA: Which again gets back to the point of like, this is not an individual problem, I mean, in some ways it is of like this individual man fucking sucks or whatever, but like, it is not…
SARAH: Yeah, that's always going to happen, there's always going to be some individual person who fucking sucks, that's just how humans are.
KAYLA: Yeah. The problem is that we have built up heterosexuality and coupled them and all of these things to be what they are and now we're stuck in it.
SARAH: And we are raising men to fucking suck.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: It's not just that sometimes they fucking suck, it's that we are teaching them to fucking suck and that's making it difficult for women to exist in their orbit, but those women feel like they have to exist in their orbit. And it's all… like, it's so easy to say, like, well, we just need to start over. But if we started over, it wouldn't be any better, we would find another way to fuck it up, we would find another thing to discriminate about. This is why we have fiction where we like imagine all of these, like other alien races where it's like they’ve figured it out. But then, you know, at the end, they've never fucking figured it out.
KAYLA: They've never done it.
SARAH: So
KAYLA: This makes me really want… I wonder if he's finished his dissertation, just like looking at Asa's like bio on the school that he goes to, his dissertation traces the emergence of modern heterosexual identity in American fiction and film. Like a lot of his work is on heterosexuality. And now that I see that and read this in this article, it makes so much sense to me that it's like, why are we not studying heterosexuality in queer and gender studies? Like everyone is just ignoring it because it's the norm, which I get, no one wants to talk about it because we're sick of it. But at the same time, that's an experience that's happening and the institution is shaping everything else. So, it's like, why aren't we critically engaging with it?
SARAH: Yeah. Asa Seresin Work in Progress, “Is Heterosexuality Normal?” He did a talk.
KAYLA: I was just looking at that. I want to read the dissertation, when will you finish it?
SARAH: Dissertation awards. He received SAS Dissertation Completion Fellowship… Oh, this is to complete it. It supports the final year and it was 2025 so he's probably finishing it this year.
KAYLA: He has a book coming out in 2027. Oh, my God, they posted, he has an account called Heterosexuality Updates for his book at progress.
SARAH: Oh, he posted eight hours ago.
KAYLA: I just said that to you.
SARAH: I didn't hear the eight hours part.
KAYLA: Maybe I didn't say it.
SARAH: Anyway, I think it's interesting. Do you think heterosexuality studies… I guess it falls under like sex sexuality studies, but so often it's called like queer studies.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: Should heterosexuality studies be allowed to be under the umbrella of queer studies? But I think, yes, not in the context of they are queer, but in the context of you are studying sexuality and this is one of them.
KAYLA: Yeah. I mean, if it's called like queer studies, like, yeah, it's not queer, that's like not the best word for it.
[00:30:00]
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: But like in the same way that to understand gender, you have to not only study non-binary and trans identities, you have to study the cis identity to understand them all in perspective. Yes, we know the most about it anyway. And so, you have to study it differently and there's going to be different attention that needs to be made. But if you're studying sexuality and you want to understand how it works and you want to make sexuality, I don't want to say make sexuality better, but to like make relationships better, you can't just ignore one just because it's the norm, you have to study them all in context of each other.
SARAH: And it's also about, we think we know a lot of things about being cisgender and heterosexuality because we assume them, because everyone is like, oh, everyone is this, therefore this is a universal experience. But when we study them, we find that it's not nearly as universal as people think, there are definitely some universal experiences that most people do have some level of experience of, but it's not nearly as specific as we think it is.
KAYLA: No, I think… it reminds me of there are so many studies on, I think it's like alcohol usage maybe in like college freshmen. They've done so many studies on… they'll ask freshmen like, how much do you drink? How much do you think your like classmate or the average freshmen drinks? Or maybe it's like having sex or something, I don't know, whatever it is, some like cool kid, whatever. And they always vastly overestimate how much other students are doing. And it's like that, like across the board all the time.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: And if we studied heterosexuality, we understood how people are experiencing it, what they actually want and shined a light on that, we could probably realize like, okay, we all assume this is what happens, none of us are happy about it, let's talk about it. And then maybe we don't have to fucking do that anymore. But instead, we're all just assuming that everyone feels this way. And so, we feel peer pressured to do it.
SARAH: Yep.
KAYLA: I can't believe I'm planting my flag on let's talk about straight people more, but like I really, the more I talk about it, the more I'm kind of feeling really strongly about it.
SARAH: Yeah. I think we should just be studying more things all the time and we should be putting our money towards studying things.
KAYLA: Science
SARAH: And the social sciences are also very important to study.
KAYLA: As a social scientist, I'm not… as someone with two social science degrees that I don't know how much I use, yes
SARAH: As someone with a passion for 30-minute YouTube videos, but no deeper about things, you know? You have to do the research so that someone can make that 30 minute YouTube video and then I can watch it on 1.25 speed.
KAYLA: Girl! After you were just like, oh man, getting people to think more is such a problem, you are people
SARAH: No, but like, at least I'm engaging with it at all.
KAYLA: I guess.
SARAH: Listen, I just mean the social science. Like when I start getting… like any sciences, not just social sciences, regular science, not regular science, I don't want to say that.
KAYLA: What's happening?
SARAH: Science, hard sciences, even worse, my brain… like, you ask me to get into the… okay, here, let me describe… let me tell you.
KAYLA: I have actually no idea what the fuck you're talking about right now.
SARAH: I'm interested in linguistics.
KAYLA: Great
SARAH: I took a linguistics class in college and the really nitty gritty, like this is where the tongue is for this, this is that, that I'm not interested in.
KAYLA: Mm-hmm
SARAH: I'm interested in the like bigger picture. I'm not interested in doing the science, I'm interested in the result of the science.
KAYLA: That's fair. That's fair.
SARAH: That's what I mean.
KAYLA: I'll take it.
SARAH: I'm not the type of person who will be doing this research, but we will all be benefiting from it. I will be writing my silly little stories.
KAYLA: I'll be over here.
SARAH: Me in the corner, watching you kiss her.
KAYLA: Ooh.
SARAH: Oh.
KAYLA: What the hell?
SARAH: Um, okay, anything else?
KAYLA: No.
SARAH: All right. What's our poll for this week?
KAYLA: Are we like stanning straight people now or?
SARAH: No. Is it still okay to say you hate men? Yes.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: No, I think… I meant to like ask you this at the very beginning when we were defining heteropessimism, about like how you felt when hearing straight people be like, I hate being straight, I just wish I was a queer person, but.
SARAH: Honestly, I don't have any problem with it because I don't blame them.
KAYLA: Yeah. I mean…
SARAH: I definitely feel, it gives me a different feeling if it's a straight woman saying that versus a straight man saying that, if it's a straight man saying that, I'm like, “okay, sit down.” But I encounter many a straight woman saying that, I believe, I most recently heard a straight woman say that perhaps yesterday.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And I completely understand. So, I get expressing heteropessimism, I do.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And also, it's like on the question of like, are you going to do anything about it? Like, you still might meet a man who is not the fucking worst, who is not the kind of man who's going to go on Twitter and tweet about how you say men are pigs, but are making him a sandwich. Like, you might find someone who is great and doesn't fall into this category.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And like, do you have to quit dating him to make a point, you know, to serve the greater, you know, I don't know, yeah.
KAYLA: Yeah. I mean, y'all know, I am manhater number one and I'm marrying one. So, yeah, I mean, I think the only time it really bothers me is when… if a straight person is like, “oh my God, my life would be so much easier if I was gay.” I’m just like, “mm, probably not.” Like, I don't love that. It never like irks me, but at the same time, I see the points of this article of like, okay, if we're just going to keep saying that, but we're never going to sit down and think about why that's happening.
SARAH: I think the answer is that everyone just wants the freedom to be able to do whatever they want and not be judged for it. And that is what you learn when you put on your goddamn glasses
KAYLA: Jesus Christ!
SARAH: God damn aspec purple-colored glasses you put them on.
KAYLA: We should really get… I don't think either of us have any like purple tinted glasses. I'm like, what are we doing?
SARAH: What are we doing?
KAYLA: Like your little blue ones that you have, we need that but purple.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: What are we freaking doing? That, but purple. Exactly. And we could sit here every week and wear them while we record.
SARAH: And this is not a video format, so no one would see.
KAYLA: I would see and that’s enough.
SARAH: I can't even see you right now because you had to turn your camera off because it glitched every time you turned it on, I'm just talking to myself.
KAYLA: Hello! I tried to turn it back on.
SARAH: I know, I know you did, and then it glitched again. Okay, right, what was our poll? It doesn't matter. Kayla, what's your beef and your juice for this week?
KAYLA: My beef is that I've been sleeping like fucking shit this week.
SARAH: Oh no
KAYLA: Like it's actually fascinating. My other beef, I mean, it's a gravy maybe, I saw The Bride, don't go see this in theaters. I was not bored, I will say like it was entertaining.
SARAH: You found it entertaining
KAYLA: It was not good.
SARAH: It was like an ‘are you not entertained?’ situation
KAYLA: Yeah. I mean, it was, you know
SARAH: Did it make you angry?
KAYLA: It didn't.
SARAH: Okay, that’s good
KAYLA: It made me confused. It made me baffled.
SARAH: Baffled. Confoundment.
KAYLA: I don't know that it's like worth… I would maybe watch it in your home if you're interested in like watching a bad movie, I get that vibe, but…
SARAH: Maybe you don't pay for it?
KAYLA: Yeah. Juice is, it has been warm, it was like 70 yesterday, amazing.
SARAH: Wow
KAYLA: I think it's about to get cold again though, booo! And other juice is that, I listen to podcasts when I go to sleep and I have this like these sleep headphones, it's like a headband with headphones in them, I think people use them to run, but I use them to sleep
SARAH: Sleepy
KAYLA: But my pair has… I've had it for years, so they're like very stretched out and it just like falls off my head when I sleep, and so, I got a new one today, but it's also an eye mask. So, it's an eye mask, but it's one of the fancy ones that's like 3D so you could open your eyes in there and it has headphones in there and it's Velcro, so it's adjustable.
SARAH: You can open your eyes in there?
KAYLA: I'll send you a picture, but it's like… it's like padding around it. So, there's like… in your eye… it's not like pressing down on your eyes uncomfy.
SARAH: I can imagine it, I just never thought about the concept.
KAYLA: It's the truth.
SARAH: Wow, okay. So, my beef is… so, I actually had two different beefs prepared, one from yesterday, one from today that I have to not say because they're making me too mad.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And also, anxious. Oh, I forgot to take my anxiety medication.
KAYLA: Wow
SARAH: So, for my mental health, I'm not saying those, those are nixed. Instead, my beef is that I can't find my sunglasses case, it has been missing since Sunday afternoon.
KAYLA: Oh no
[00:40:00]
SARAH: I don't understand where it could be. Yes, that's my beef. My juice is that today, the very today of recording is my one-year addieversary since I got Ms. Adderall.
KAYLA: Huzzah!
SARAH: She lives in my house. She's a creature. Happy Addieversary. Happy Adderall Acquisition Day to all who celebrate.
KAYLA: Mm-hmm
SARAH: You can tell us about your beef, your juice, your favorite thing about Addie Acquisition Day on our social media @soundsfakepod. We also have a Patreon, patreon.com/soundsfakepod. Our $5 patrons who we are promoting this week are Lily, Lindsay, Lowe, Mark Cornick and Mary S. Our $10 patrons who are promoting something this week are SongOStorm, who would like to promote a healthy work-life balance. Val, who would like to promote just never finding out what Val wants to promote. Alastor, who would like to promote the podcast 'Shadows and Shenanigans'. Ani, who would like to promote the importance of being kind to yourself and others. And Arcnes, who would like to promote the Trevor Project. Our other $10 patrons are Benjamin Ybarra, Clare Olsen, Danielle Hutchinson, Derick & Carissa, Elle Bitter, Eric, my aunt Jeannie, Johanna, Kayla's dad, KELLER Bradley, Maff, Martin Chiesl, Purple Hayes, Quartertone, Barefoot Backpacker. That's it. Our $15 patrons are Ace, who would like to promote the writer Crystal Scherer, Nathaniel White who would like to promote NathanielJWhiteDesigns.com. Kayla’s Aunt Nina who would like to promote katemaggartart.com. And Schnell who would like to promote accepting that everyone is different and that's awesome. Our $20 patrons are Changeling & Alex, who would like to promote their company, ControlAltAccess.com. Dr. Jacki, Dragonfly, my mom, and River, who would like to promote bug facts.
KAYLA: Bug facts.
SARAH: Bug facts. None of them in this podcast episode. Thanks for listening, tune in…
KAYLA: Check the comments though, girl, they'll be there on Spotify.
SARAH: They’ll be there
KAYLA: I can't guarantee it, but I believe it in my heart and soul.
SARAH: Good. Tune in next Sunday for more of us in your ears.
KAYLA: And until then, take good care of your bug cows.
SARAH: Woo.
[END OF TRANSCRIPT]