Everything Is Content - Black Mirror, Blue Origin & Too Hot To Work

Episode Date: April 18, 2025

Happy Friday, happy Good Friday, happy Easter & happy Everything Is Content Day!This week on the podcast we’re talking about Black Mirror season 7, The celestial sisters who went to space, & ask whether or not you can be too hot to work.Charlie Brooker’s dystopian tech anthology Black Mirror is back for its seven series, and lots of the reviews have been really positive saying it’s one of the most human series yet, and a return to its best form i.e. its first season. This one is star-studded, with Chris O’Dowd, Tracey Ellis Ross, Issa ray, Emma Corrin, Rashida Jones and Paul Giamatti to truly only name a few.Next up, in what sounds like an episode of Black Mirror but isn't... Katy Perry went to space… for eleven minutes. She was joined by Bezos's fiancée Lauren Sánchez and CBS presenter Gayle King, who was reported to have said a highlight of the flight was hearing Perry sing Louis Armstrong's 'What a Wonderful World'. We discuss.And finally, we are talking about t-shirts. Okay, not quite. We’re talking about a debate which was sparked on X, in part, by pictures of two t-shirts. Here’s what happened- on April 8th the writer Ashley Reese tweeted this as part of a wider conversation about women and work. She wrote: “1) women have always worked 2) it's incredible that women are able to be financially independent in ways that were not as common just a few generations ago and I'm not charmed by jokes—especially from other women—about how gainful employment is the worst thing to happen to women.”Is it that deep? Or is it just some silly t-shirts? Listen to find out!Ruchira has been loving Hacks season 4Beth has been loving Who Wants Normal, Frances RyanOenone has been loving Last Of Us Season 2, Broad City and What Did You Do Yesterday?Black Mirror’s pessimism porn won’t lead us to a better future - Louis AnslowKaty Perry In SpaceT-Shirt TweetCartoons Hate Her Substack Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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listening and discover what's beyond the edge of your seat when you sign up for a free 30 day trial at audible.ca. I'm Beth. I'm Ruchira. And I'm Anoni. And this is Everything is Content, the podcast where we handpick the best pop culture stories from the week and analyze them in depth.

From books to TV shows, viral memes to mind-boggling TikTok trends, we cover everything. With the gravitational pull bringing you back down to earth from the infinite and expansive universe of content. This week on the podcast, we're talking about Black Mirror Season 7, the Celestial Sisters who went to space, and whether or not you can be too hot to work. Follow us on Instagram at everythingiscontentpod and also follow us on your podcast player app so you never miss an episode. And while you're there, make sure you're all caught up on our extra Wednesday episodes.

This week we asked you Coachella or Nochella? Okay, so let's begin my loves. What have you both been loving this week? So this week I have to admit, like I've been working so much this week, I've not had time to do my favourite activity, which is consume way too much content. But I did start reading a book called Who Wants Normal by Frances Ryan and full Disclosure. I was sent a copy of this book by the publisher but it's also a book that I had about a month and a half before pre-ordered so I got a free copy, wanted to read this book anyway. I don't know if I have to say that but just in case we get in trouble. It's a nonfiction book, it's like part memoir, part manifesto. It looks at six facets of

life through the lens of disability and those facets are education, careers, body image, health, relationships, and representation. And Frances Ryan is, I'm such a big fan of hers. I got into her stuff on Twitter a few years ago and she frequently writes about disability for The Guardian. And this book is, it's very funny, it's very moving, it feels very important and I think it's probably quite a necessary read for a lot more people than I think would think so. And I say this because I find a lot of people without disabilities or chronic illness or mental health problems can be really in tune and on the ball with a lot of social justice

issues, really on the ball with that allyship and their intersectional awareness, if you will. But then showing up for people who are disabled and fighting for disability rights and access, they may be lacking a little bit and that's not an attack, it's just, I think, the way that these spaces are structured. And even people that I know are really on the ball with other stuff are persisting with these with these myths of like laziness or like thinking that I benefit fraud for disabled people is a huge issue. And a book like this just really gets the heart of it. It's like I said, it's very funny. be in conversation with and to listen to disabled people about what's going on and about genuinely what the big justice issues of our time are. And so I'm really enjoying this book, haven't finished it yet.

I got this copy and then I've got my own copy. So I will, I'll give my copy away. I really recommend buying this book, it's out now. Would love to be coming to you with a bunch more, but I just haven't had the time. That sounds so good. I have actually seen the cover of that and that book has been in my orbit, so it's definitely one that I want to read. I think that's so interesting. You're so right that the conversation around ability and disability is one that often gets shoved in a corner. I do sometimes wonder if it's people's maybe intrinsic fear of their own

mortality. The fact that anyone could become disabled at any point, I wonder if it is why people like to put their head in the sand and not face it, which is kind of the opposite of what you should be doing for that very, not just for that reason, obviously for anyone who is struggling with access and accessibility now, but also for the fact that none of us are immune to that and being clued up to it is really important. And we live, as people say, it's like you're not disabled by your physicality, you're disabled by an inaccessible world, which when I started learning about that made so much sense to me. And it's something we're really quite badly brainwashed about

in society as well, I think. Well, do you know what, because I've got these two copies, maybe I will send this to you. You can send it around to someone else. It can kind of just be like a floating copy, getting people to read it and kind of get the information they need. I love that idea. Can I be third on the list? Absolutely.

What have you been loving, Richera? It will come to no surprise. I've basically just been obsessed with Hacks Season 4 that came out this past week, two episodes dropped and I spent a weekend, a lovely weekend just watching them and just absolutely destroyed that more episodes weren't available for me to binge. It's so good. It makes me so happy. I'm just at such peace knowing that it's back in my TV world. I need to watch it, but as I said about 80,000 times, I still don't know where I've got to

in the previous seasons, but I will one day, I will be up to date with that. Just start afresh, I think. I've started afresh on this series so many times. Just start from the beginning, get in the world. I mean, I'm looking at the winter right now, it's disgusting weather. You've got nothing else to do.

I sit and watch telly. I would love to actually. It's actually quite sunny here, sorry to report. Oh God, I think I'm going to wake up. I was literally about to say that. I was like, actually. It's actually quite sunny here, sorry to report. I was literally about to say that. I was like, oh, not a disgusting day here. Oh, don't tell me this. If it makes fun of you about it, it was horrible yesterday. It does make me feel so much better actually. That's good. Because I'm a hater. Beth, you've been watching the new episodes, right? Yeah. So I got my mum into it, thank God. So I got to watch all of the series again and then she

actually reminded me that it was back on. So we sat and watched those two and agreed. I was like, next one please. Cause we're so used to binging them. I am really enjoying the new series. The first one, I was a bit like, Ooh, it felt different. I think because anyone who's watched this will know like there's an element of tension in this series, an element of like beef that is actually quite hard to watch because I love these ladies and I kind of want peace on earth, but it's so entertaining. I think I was about to say Deborah Mead,

Deborah Vance is just like, I have such a crush on her now. I have, I mean, Jean Smart who plays her as well, but just this character, this mean spirited, she is like a hater from day one. Like she is like an old school hater and it is so satisfying to watch two people just like basically beef. It's such a good show. I know I felt the exact same way. It's making me upset that it's more like Nemesis vibes this season because all I love is when they're just on the

best terms and they have this intergenerational friendship where they just don't get each other for half of you know like everything they talk about, but they're constantly learning about each other through the lens of like, I don't know, sex relationships, comedy, life, all these different things. So at the moment with the beefing is deeply distressing me, but it's still really good. And on that note, what have you been loving Anoni? I have been loving another show, which is back on our screens, which is

last of us season two just dropped. I'm not going to spend too much time on our screens, which is Last of Us, season two just dropped. I'm not going to spend too much time on it. It's only the first episode. Not really much happens because they're kind of setting stuff up, but I will be watching that every single Sunday when it drops. Huge fan, love anything about the end of the world. Love Patrick Pascal.

My second thing, I've randomly started watching Broad City re-watching, not randomly, it's a perfect thing to do. So just to re-highlight that if you've forgotten that it's still a perfect show. But the thing that I've been having that I really want to highlight this week, which I'm absolutely obsessed with, is I started listening to What Did You Do Yesterday with Max Rushton and David O'Doherty. Have you guys listened to it? No, I've not even heard of that. No.

So it's a podcast and it's literally they just asked their guests, what did you do yesterday? And if it didn't happen yesterday, you're not allowed to talk about it. So like even if it's the best day of your life, everyone just goes through their day and they've had some amazing guests like Ahmed Dullali, Lou Sanders, Bill Wang, like everyone from comedy, but Max Rushton and David Doherty together are so funny. David Doherty is a comedian. I think Max Rushton is some kind of sports commentator. I've listened to him on like Parenting Hell or something, but those two together are like my dream husband.

I can't explain it. It's their mixture of the flavor of their sense of humor is so funny to me. I've been really like guffawing, laughing out loud and binging that series. So if you just want another podcast apart from this one, because I imagine this is the only one that you listen to, of course, but if you did want another one and you really wanted to lol, it's just, and there's so many episodes now, it's been a long while since something's made me laugh that much. So that's my recommendation for this week. I don't know how you're on top of the podcasting world in the way you are. You're my source of podcast news, truly. I just, I listen to them all.

Do you, because my dad would walk around the house with like one airport in, I assume, because he just doesn't really want to, you available to engage with me. But is that what you do? You must be listening around the clock. You must have your little whatever you've got in, I don't know, the airports. Just constantly listening, because otherwise I don't know how you'd have any time. Well, I listened when I go on a long run for the first hour, if it's really long, I'll listen to a podcast. And also I walk Astrid every day, so I listen to a podcast when I go on a long run for the first hour, if it's really long, I'll listen to a podcast. And also I walk Astrid every day. So I listen to a podcast when I do that. If I take the bins out, a podcast is going on. Unless I'm really concentrated, I kind of have a podcast on at all times in the background. You need to be entertained at all times.

And also this kind of podcast is one that you can kind of zone out of. So like whenever I'm talking about doing it, if I'm writing or doing something that really needs a lot concentration, then I won't. But other than that, I think it's probably quite a bad psychological sign because I think it does mean I can't move my own thoughts. But to go back to your dad with that AirPod in, my dad does one matter. He just walks around with it on speakerphone either in his back pocket or holding it directly, his phone directly to his ear, just walks around the house holding his phone to his ear. It's so annoying. No, we need to talk about that. Well, sometimes he has the radio on in the kitchen

and also from his back pocket, it's playing like five live or something. And it's like, how are you not having such bad sensory overload right now? There is two radio shows playing at the same time. It's just so distressing. That's another species. Truly, the mountain that I will die on

is the fact that it's not young people blasting out their phones on public transport. It's literally boomers. Like my dad is exactly the same. The sound quality, the sound levels are just completely out of this world. It's too much. It's too much. They need Asbo. Can I ask a question about this podcast? Because I love the idea, because actually I'm so nosy. I love to know what other people are kind of getting up to. I have that thing, I have the condition where if someone asks me like, how's your day been or what did you

do yesterday? Blank. I haven't got a clue. I think I'd end up lying. But like, is it entertaining to just hear about the minutia of someone's day? Like the admin or whatever? They obviously tell them to write it down. Everyone's really honest, but like Lou Sans is so funny. She basically does nothing all day. She wakes up really early, then goes back to bed, then strokes her cats for like five hours, and then hers is really, really funny. And so everyone's written it down. So it's really granular.

They just make it really funny because they ask really specific questions about everything. I don't necessarily normally think Joel Domet is that funny, but Joel Domet's episode is absolutely hilarious. And there is the most wild story about how him and Max Rushden met years ago when a famous celebrity actress who at the time was appearing in 90210 apparently was like clearly looking for a British boyfriend and they'd both met her on different talk shows and one night they were invited to a dinner and everyone at this dinner were just all these kind of like handsome at the time quite famous British men and her and it just descends into this oh my god which

actually was it Adriana I don't know which one it was. I think they at one point, I need to keep meaning to check to see if someone said to us. One of them has got a British husband now. I can't remember her name, but maybe that maybe that was a character name. Okay, God, I'm sorry. The story is so funny. Yeah, it is because that's what makes it so funny. And also the two hosts are just hilarious. Like it is, I can't explain it. I think what's so enjoyable about it is no one really is having that much of an

interesting day and that is what just makes it really funny. So you need to listen and you will fancy both of them, Beth. Rachira, I don't know, because you've got your slightly higher threshold for crushes than me and Beth. Yeah, I just literally look at a man too long or a woman. I look too long and I go, you are a bit of me. You're a menace on the streets, Beth. Their pictures are on the picture thing, but I hadn't even really looked at the picture.

It was just after listening to enough episodes, I was like, I want to marry these men. That's so funny. I think I know David O'Dowd, the other guy, not a clue. He's actually quite hot to be fair. They're both married, I think, with kids, but anyway, either way. Doesn't stop me. No, it does. Don't say that.

No, it does. I mean, crush wise. So, I like, married men are cousins to me, the world over. I will talk to them like we're in a business meeting, but what goes on up here, you can't police that, okay? Oh, well, can you? Should we move on to our first segment? Not me, homewrecker.

I think we should for my sake. Speaking of policing the mind, Charlie Brooker's dystopian tech anthology, Black Mirror is back for its seventh series. And lots of the reviews have been really positive saying it's one of the best and America's dystopian tech anthology, Black Mirror is back for its seventh series. And lots of the reviews have been really positive saying it's one of the best and most human series yet and a return to the show's best form, i.e. its first season. This one is star studded with Chris O'Dowd, Tracy Ellis Ross, Issa Rae, Emma Corrin, Rashida

Jones and Paul Giamatti. Truly, truly just to name a few, there are so many more. And this season sees the first ever follow up to a previous episode from season four, the USS Callister into infinity episode. The first episode from this series, Common People, I think has been the most talked about one. And for most people it's their favourite, which is the one with Chris A. Dowd and Rashida Jones as a couple, whose life is truly turned upside down when she's diagnosed

with a brain tumour. To save her life, he signs her up to a new technology that copies her mind into something basically akin to the cloud and reinstalls it back into her. The problem is that this is on a subscription model and an infuriating but so funny Tracy Ellis Ross steps in as the sales rep who's having to inform them that their perks are no longer part of the package and the costs keep going up and the cost for basic human rights essentially keeps increasing. It's so bleak but bizarrely moving too and yeah truly I guess a sign of what you'll do for love. It's an allegory for private healthcare and enchantification as The Guardian puts it. We're also treated throughout the series

to workplace nemeses and gaslighting, thronglets and reboots gone wrong. So what did you guys think of this season and what were some of your standout episodes or moments? I've only managed to get three, I've just started episode four, but I'm three episodes in. The first episode I watched it and I was like, that has taken my breath away. I thought it was so beautiful. It was so distressing. I completely agree about Tracy Ellis Ross. They really tread an

amazing line there of making it so deep, so dark, so poignant. It felt like such a good metaphor for what we're going through right now, the way that people are being completely cut off from access to things which we should definitely have access to. And the most dystopian bit about that was the fact when they're talking about the network of minds they have all stored in the cloud that when you buy like the premium package, if you want to increase your levels of one sort of like emotion, it's actually draining it from someone else. I was like, oh, this is so sickening. Then I watched the second episode and I was like, damn, this is even better. I found the

second one because the gas is basically just like gaslighting constantly, the distress that that caused me. Because I think that is kind of like a nightmare I've had, like a recurring nightmare where you're trying to tell people things and no one believes you. So that tapped into something really good. And then the third episode I also have watched and loved because I think what's nice is they're all very different but they're all beautifully done. I think the acting especially is impeccable and I'm really hooked whereas the last series of Black Mirror I was watching the episodes dipping in and out. I don't think I finished it. I wasn't that interested. So I'm excited to see where it goes and I found it really beautiful but also beautiful in a dark way, obviously. But also I think it still

has that thing where it just feels so close to home. And so it's like enjoyable to watch at the same time as making me want to freak out. What about you, Beth? I agree totally. I think I agree with that line from The Guardian that this is the warmest and most human series or certainly compared to the last one, which I really enjoyed performance wise and the actors who were in it were great, but I think it felt a little bit more supernatural and that's not why I watch Black Mirror. I watch for the kind of tech dystopia and I think this series more than the last was connected

very much to this present moment in time and the things about this present moment in time which are really hurting people and it kind of skews the bad guys and that is Black Mirror at its best I think skews the bad guys even if it is very on the nose like not for everyone I think this is what we look to Black Mirror for this kind of twisty storytelling a message a solid cast and it feels like a return to form in that sense. And yes, episode one sickening is the word for it because I think there's the element of the endless extraction of privatized healthcare that, I mean, yes, also of subscription models, the intensification, all of that as well, but it kind of hit on the nose. Like actually people's lived realities.

I think maybe sometimes it was almost too real. And I was on a Reddit thread about this and some guy was like saying of this episode, like it's hard to watch because his girlfriend was just diagnosed with something which even with insurance that's 300 extra dollars a month. I'm like, oh, this is, it's not actually that far a leap from reality, but with all of these kind of like shiny tech added to it, which is just all of this stuff

essentially exists bar the brain technology that draws it all together. So I think it grapples with those issues. It really shines a light on the healthcare model that actually like America lives under, looks like it's kind of going that way for us. I will say on Tracy Ellis Ross, the most eerie performance, I can't remember the name of the character, but just like this uber enthusiastic sales rep who is saying from her mouth things which are so hideous, but saying with the cadence of like, I've got some great news for you, which nailed it. I do not see her in enough stuff, I think because she's

basically just living my dream life. She always seems to be kind of like on a great project and then back in the swimming pool with a Margarita. She is in this that kind of effervescent sales rep working for a big horrible corporation in Kana. Absolutely amazing. I do want to talk about the second episode with you both. Would you say that, what was it called? Beth Noir. Beth Noir. Thank you for saying that because I was struggling. That was both my favorite and my least favorite because I think the

idea and the premise and the performances of it, nightmarish, amazing, being gaslit by your own brain, this idea of the Mandela effect. I read that the Black Mirror actually put out two separate versions of it. One part of this is the main character is struggling with her grip on reality. No one else seems to know the things that she. And there's one where she's adamant that this chicken shop is called one thing. Everyone else is adamant that it's called a different thing. And apparently Netflix put out two different versions where one, it's called Barneys, but she thinks it's called Bernies. And then the other, it's the other way around, which I think I really love when Black Mirror does this. I think it rewards, it's like fan service. It rewards close viewers because they've

got all these Easter eggs, all these little things. And I really enjoyed that. But I was a bit frustrated with the ending of, I forgot the name, Benet Noir. Benet Noir. Which one, what happened for, was it called Bernies or was it called Bernies in yours? It was called Bernies in mine because I remember the cap, like I remember noting, oh, that's a weird name. So when it got to the end and she was gaslit by this woman, a former school friend, well, not even friend, a person she knew from school in her office, who is adamant that it's called Barneys, I felt like I was going crazy

and losing my mind. Oh my God, mine was the other way around. It was called Barneys. And I also remember when they put the cap down because they obviously did the, I knew it was an important thing because they went on the cap for ages and I was like, I must remember this. Like there's a reason they're showing us this cap, said Barney's and I was like, every time that something escalated more, where you were like, it's okay, because she's going to Google it. It's okay, because they've got video evidence. And then it was like, no, I can't, the levels of stress and anxiety in my body just made me feel, because I hate that feeling of just, oh, that is so, that was such a nightmare incarnate to me. I do agree about the ending. That also went for me a little bit too farfetched.

I like it when you can kind of believe it and see how the sausage is made. In that one, I was like, I don't know, this is kind of like mind washing people, is that? It feels a bit far-fetched. I mean, I know. I think it could have benefited from the 90 minute episodes that we got for some of the other episodes. Not that they should have been shorter, but I think a few of the episodes were like 90 minutes long and then this was just 50 or 45. And I was like, ah, this really could have benefited from another third, which just maybe would have given it scope to do something to land it. Cause I think the performances from the two lead, the female leads was just like out of this world.

And it was very layered. It had to kind of like, she was being accused of kind of aggression in the workplace and being, and I think there would have been, you know, her as like a non-white woman and it's a white woman who's at the center of this gaslighting. I think that could have been an element that would have been really interesting to see play out a little bit longer. But I think just because I liked it so much, I wanted more, but I did love that episode.

I feel like it was a palette cleanser after the first one. So I think they probably went quite light and silly and absurdist with it, which I get because I binged those two, I think back to back. Obviously not in the way you should probably absorb this kind of TV, but I think maybe they're slightly aware of that. So they went for something a bit sillier in tone, but yeah, I agree. Also, I have a question for you. Immediately, right from the beginning, before any gas lighting happened, the concept of somebody from school turning up in your workplace to go for a job on your desk immediately made me feel so stressed out and so disturbed and so uncomfortable. So even from the beginning,

that upset me. How would you feel if that happened in your life? That's so funny. You said that because I was like, she's being so weird about this. It's obviously because she did bully her. I'm sure there's someone in my life, if they turn up at my work, I would feel a huge sense of like, oh my God, you're going to come and take over my life. But it felt a bit too random to me for her to have such an immediate reaction, which obviously then does get explained. So no, I don't think I necessarily would. I guess if it was someone I knew and they didn't tell me, then they turned out that might wrong fit me. But if it was someone I hadn't seen for ages, hadn't spoken to, I'd just be like, well, that's a random coincidence.

I'm not even talking about it being like a source of malevolence. I mean, just like somebody from your past having like a clear position in your current life. So for me, I feel like school and university are two distinct periods and apart from the people I have in my life, I think I'm quite weird with the fact that I don't like memories of the past infiltrating the like new life I've built because I feel like a really different person and I feel like all those memories can be quite tinged with, I guess, like poor mental health and all those kinds of things. So that is what I felt like, oh God, memories of the past infiltrating your present. It is. It's like you, I think it's that almost when you spend a lot of time around certain

family members, it's that like you become who you were when you were lost in that, like you kind of regress almost. And I think that's it. It's everyone has that right to reinvention. Whereas when somebody does come from the past, I think it can draw you back then to when you're a bit more immature. When even if you weren't doing things, I just think it interrupts our constant need for being like, I know who I am.

This is why I'm in this moment. I've grown as a person, anything from the past, you think almost like I'm going to be exposed as this person again, even if the person you were was just younger, bit more naive, I like to keep facing front. When people come from the past, I am very, very susceptible to, I think, a little bit of regression, which I've got work on,

but I wouldn't like it either. Yeah, and I don't know if that's something that I need to get better at, because it's not necessarily a good or bad thing. But this episode made me realize I am really boundaried with the past and not wanting it to come into my current life. And you're exactly right. This idea of who I am now, I feel like possibly this episode made me feel like maybe I'm a bit shaky about that, that any kind of infiltration of past memories and people makes me feel like that's a jeopardy when it doesn't need to be.

I wonder if it's because I've been so online and so visible for the last 10 years. I can't even quite imagine what you guys are saying. I think that's because people probably watched me grow up since I was like 21. That was already out there that like I'm so used to being perceived that like I can't quite, I don't really know what you mean, but I appreciate, I do know, I do know, I do know what you mean, but I don't think I feel that way, but I was trying to work out why and I think that probably is part of it. It's like, I've been so splayed out on a platter for everyone to watch for so long that the idea of being like perceived by someone at school, then like, well, they're definitely watching my stories anyway.

No, that's a good point. And knowing you, the person you are online is also the person you are in real life. You aren't actually doing a big performance online, which I think I probably do to an extent, or I think my image of me online, because I don't probably give away as much, is splint and fractured through that that I wonder when people meet me I'm like who do you think you're meeting whereas for you I think there's you get what you what you give really. I think you're really authentic online. Thank you. I agree.

I'm a bit dramatic but. Ruchira you're much more mysterious than us classically in coming through here. Yeah the two posts I post a year really give away who I am. coming through here. Yeah, the two posts I post a year really give away who I am. One thing I was going to say is as well, so Black Mirror's obviously had all those accusations of the minute it went onto Netflix and got that fat paycheck, it's lost the feeling of the first two series when it was, was it on Channel 4? Was it a Channel 4 drama? Yeah. Yeah. Channel 4, 2011. I remember it well.

Good old days. And yeah, do you think that this series challenges that very kind of mainstream opinion about the show? I think it definitely still feels more glossy. I was actually, I was thinking it would be really useful to rewatch that first series because I think the other thing is the format now is we're so familiar with it. And even though they did manage to add twists and turns that shocked me, which I'm always quite skeptical that Black Mirror is going to be able to kind of do something that makes me surprised. But actually I found that these episodes really did. That first series I think was so shocking. It felt so much more British as well in a way. And it was just a different time. I just think it's that thing of like, you can never recreate a perfect first series because once the concept was

out there, you're immediately always going to lose. It's a bit like, I love using an analogy about a car I've never driven in my life, but I've heard that when you buy a car, the minute you drive out the dealership, it completely devalues. And I think there's something about this series, which is similar. It's like the minute that first series left the dealership, you were never going to get a full reimbursement on the idea. Okay. Was that? Car drivers, shut your mouth. Don't say a word. It's like when we said, put your pedal to the metal. What do we say? That was literally what I said. I remember. I agree with that. I think there's something to

be said for this did come out in 2011. It was a different world. And I remember that first episode, like people were talking about it at work. It really made an impact. I was getting messages on Facebook just to age me further, like to be like, I'm really forgot to watch this. People were really into it. And I think nowadays there may be more television events.

There's a much online talking about everything. In 2011, I think the very first episode I believe is the one where the Prime Minister shags the pig, which I really struggled to watch that episode, which also ended up having eerie times with our own former Conservative leader. Anyway, whereas I think now it's not that it's losing its essence so much, although I do believe that it did go through its necessary transformation as that budget increased and as it got, you know, kind of Americans came on board. But I just think it's being broadcast to a different world. Although I think a lot of people will really staunchly disagree with

that. And I wonder, Rucho, what do you think? I think you're both right. And I also think TV in general has become a lot more provocative. So thinking about the white lotus and the incest adjacent scenes, something like shagging a pig at the time was so insane for that to be broadcast to us. I don't think that TV had really gone to those kind of wild corners in a mainstream way, and I think it really did push the boat out in terms of the storylines, the topics, the kind of angle towards tech. Whereas I feel like all of those things generally have become some things that

are just more normalized to us on screen. And even something like a severance is adjacent to a black mirror. There are kind of those TV shows touching the same topics. So I think you're right. Basically, I agree. So there was a piece in The Guardian called Black Mirror's Pessimism poem won't lead us to a better future by Louis Anzlow. And he kind of argues in it that Black Mirror is a kind of modern science

folklore that is shaping public opinion of tech and of this shared future in a way that's maybe unduly scaring people. And there's a quote in it where he writes, Black Mirror fails to consistently explore the duality of technology and our reactions to it. It is a critical deficit. While Black Mirror explores how humans react to technology, it too often does so in service of a dystopian narrative, ignoring Isaac Asimov's observation that humans are prone to a rationally fear or resist technology. Black Mirror is more pessimism-poor than Plato's parable imparting to its audience tacit lesson, fear the future more than the past. And I mean, as listeners will hear in some exciting upcoming episodes,

I don't entirely agree with this, but I think it's a really interesting perspective that actually Black Mirror is maybe accelerating a fear of tech at a time when maybe we need to be more unified in understanding tech and actually seeing its kind of positive possibilities for the future. I mean, I think there's probably ways to read Black Mirror that aren't necessarily totally anti-tech. They're more kind of anti-individualism and anti-authoritarianism. But I don't know, I'm starting to see that there's maybe that side to it. I really liked reading that piece as an alternative kind of challenging opinion because the first thing that came to mind is San Gennaro, the best

Black Mirror episode of all time, which I think is very complimentary of tech and its ability to offer you an alternative reality. And in some cases, that can be a beautiful love story between two women who in their real day-to-day life have been limited by aging and their bodies, essentially just kind of, I think one of them is paraplegic, if I believe, and then the other woman in real life is just getting older. And then through the fact that they can, I don't know, put basically like a memory stick in their brain and exit to San Junimpero, they fall in love and live a life that is so much more beautiful and tender and loving

than the one they can live through in the real world. That was such a shocking episode because it's one of the few love stories of Black Mirror. There is that side of his series where he has gone there, not as much, but he has gone there. And then I think also, I agree with you. I think Black Mirror isn't strictly anti-tech, it's anti-extraction, anti-devaluing of human life and resources. And I think it's more kind of a comment on the uberification of society and the fact that we are constantly, you know, trying to devalue human labour and kind of extract the most effort from people that we can. It's more that side of things rather than the tech itself. That's kind of what I was just getting to when we were talking about it. Because when

I initially read this piece, I was like, oh, I don't know if I agree with this. I am also quite technophobic, technically illiterate and just generally scared of the future. But the more I was watching the series, I was thinking the first episode is about like the privatization of healthcare. In fact, all of these episodes I've watched so far could actually just be read as a direct commentary on what we're already living through, but presented to you in a way that's different enough that you can see its shockiness. Because I think when you live through something and it's your status quo, it can be quite

hard to critique it. So when he's like twisted your arm slightly to view it from through a different lens, it makes it more clear just how dystopian our current reality is. So you have the first episode, which could have been about the privatization of healthcare. The second episode, as Beth pointed out, could be about, you know, white women's crocodile tears and their ability to manipulate and control a narrative against someone who's perhaps a person of color Also, probably could be read in other ways about the ways that we can manipulate like media through deep fakes or whatever the third episode Which I just watched with Issa Rae and Emma Corrin, which is I guess it could even have be about, you know Like ABBA and hologram. I don't know. They're basically there's loads of ways that you could read these to be just literally

I don't know, there's basically, there's loads of ways that you could read these to be just literally fables for the time that we're living in, not even necessarily about the tech. And I think maybe actually that is more where they sit. That actually is when I really think about it, more what happens to me when I watch a Black Mirror episode is it does make me more conscious of my current reality because I'm already scared of all those tech things anyway. It definitely, I feel like it acts as a mirror. Oh, what a surprise. But for the world we're living in. That was beautiful. I've got a tear in my eye.

You sailed beyond the horizon in search of an island scrubbed from every map. You battled Krakens and navigated through storms. Your spades struck the lid of a long-lost treasure chest. While you cooked a lasagna, there's more to imagine when you listen. Discover best-selling adventure stories on Audible. So this isn't an episode of Black Mirror, but this week, her story, as people like to say, was made. On Monday, 14th of April, Katy Perry went to space for 11 minutes and she was joined by Bezos' fiance Lauren Sanchez and CBS presenter Gail King, who was reported

to have said that a highlight of the flight was hearing Katy Perry sing Louis Armstrong's What a Wonderful World. And after landing back on earth, Perry said she felt super connected to life and so connected to love, and then she proceeded to kiss the ground. Also on board were former NASA rocket scientist Aisha Boe, civil rights activist Amanda Winn, and film producer Carrie Ann Flynn. Now the last all-female spaceflight was over 60 years ago when Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman to travel into space on a solo mission aboard the spacecraft Vostok 6 and since then there have been no other all-female space flights. So the six

women on Monday crossed the internationally recognized boundary of space reaching altitudes of 43 to 56 miles above the surface and just in contrast commercial airliners typically cruise at around 5.9 to 7.2 miles high. So they had a few moments of weightlessness, most of which Perry seemingly was just filming herself holding objects up to a camera whilst floating around with the literal earth beautifully poised outside the window. The company owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos doesn't publicly list its flight prices, but it's known that Blue Origin requires an £113,000 deposit to secure a seat, and

previous auctions for seats on Blue Origin flights have reached £21 million. According to Jeff Bezos' company, the rocket had no carbon emissions and released only water and water vapour. Eloise Morais, a professor of atmospheric chemistry and air quality at the University College of London said that water vapor alters the chemistry of the stratosphere, depleting the ozone layer and also forms clouds that affect climate. And experts say that as more rockets are launched, the risks of harming the ozone layer increases. Speaking from a different angle and from the viewing platform, Chloe Kardashian said, she

didn't realize how emotional it would be and that it was hard to explain. She had all of this adrenaline just standing there. However, other celebrities have been less gushing. Olivia Wilde commented, billion dollars bought some good memes, I guess. Emily Raskowski said the mission was beyond parody and Olivia Munn called it gluttonous. Many users on X have also chimed in with disdain. At Silver Arctic Fox wrote, it's crazy how Katy Perry and Lauren Sanchez going to space for 10 minutes is supposed to inspire women, but the women who already worked at NASA are checks notes getting fired and getting their bios removed from the site. And Sophie at Darling Oub wrote, Palestinian women are weeping over the lifeless corpses

of their children every single fucking day. But I'm supposed to feel female empowerment because a rich pop star got flung into space for 11 minutes by the billionaire selling AI weaponry to Israel. So those are quite serious responses. There were some very funny responses as well. I wanted to ask both of you

if you did have any favorite responses, but also what do you make of this trip? And also kind of separately, do you think that it's quite cool that the lay public, there is a possibility for space tourism to exist for people that aren't astronauts? If you forget about like the astronomical costs, is that something you think is cool in general? Over to you both. I have been watching it like as much as I really don't you know I felt everyone else is kind of fury at this and just being like what on earth is going on I have really enjoyed the Twitter coverage. There's a few things that have just really made me laugh

I quite like the absurd one. So I saw a tweet by someone called at Corey Snierowski in response to a photo of Katy Perry returning to earth kissing the ground after after the mission, mission, I'm not going to call it a mission, after the joy ride. And Corey wrote, that's not her, something happened up there. And I'm really enjoying that kind of the silliness and for what it's worth, I agree. I think that's not her, let's run with this. There was another one that I saw, which was someone called at Uncle Duma, quote tweeting a New York Post tweet showing, and I think this is real, Jeff Bezos falling over outside the shuttle while rushing to greet Lauren, his fiancee.

And Uncle Duma said, my wife getting the ick, seeing me trip and fall while rushing to greet her after she lands in the spaceship I paid for, which just made me how because I get so few kicks these days and I do get them from billionaires looking goofy. There were so many things to actually laugh at as well as to read and be like, yeah, fuck, this is actually quite fucked. I saw a post from Nikki Peach, a writer for Grazia, and she wrote, the Blue Origin

mission, one self-indulgent step for the rich and famous, one giant leap nowhere for feminism. I just thought that was so perfectly put. It's just, couldn't say it better. I think it's so stupid. I think it's so dumb. And also seeing Katy Perry say that she's putting an astronaut and they were gluing their eyelashes to make sure that they didn't fall off while they were weightless. I just found the whole thing so beyond condescending. It is just the claim that this is empowering for women is so embarrassing. And the fact that they're all talking about, you know, the makeup they're going to wear while they go off. I don't understand how they don't see how even if this trip was empowering anyway, the conversation that they've created around it is absolutely mortifying. You know,

FEMA, Aerosmith, scientists, people working in STEM, all that kind of stuff, that is really interesting shit and they're just being reduced to, oh, I wonder if my eyelashes are going to fall up when I go up to space. It's just embarrassing. It's so mortifying. Have you seen the video where Katy Perry's like, I just can't wait to learn more about STEM. I love astronomy. I love astrology. I love astrophysics. And she's just reading off all of these words that make no sense in a sentence together. And you're right, it is a massive shame because actually space travel is fascinating. And I would love to hear from astronauts and female astronauts alike.

I read a really good book earlier this year called Orbital, which was a really fascinating, very short book about a group of astronauts traveling in space. And that was just, it kind of did make me quite fascinated by it. And there have been some people, because I was reading, there's a lot of people taking this quite seriously and saying, you know, does this empower women? And there were some people, some academics being like, well, maybe it's good because it might highlight to certain generations or demographics, the possibility of going into this kind of thing. And I guess we can't always be so negative to not realize, recognize as we love to do the power of pop

culture in the wild and maybe there is something to be said for, you know, they're bringing attention to it. But I also think that's a very generous take. I did also, actually something that also made me laugh was PopBase tweeted that Katy Perry revealed the set list for her Lifetimes tour while she was in space and Tyler Oakley replied saying an all-timer could have been an email. I can't believe that that's what she did. They were all up there. She was obviously just doing a neat bit of promo for, I think she needs, from what I read of the tour and the album, quite necessary to do this. But to be clear, I don't think that this... My criticism is never like space travelers silly or like we just... It has to come at the cost of investing on Earth, even though a lot of what this

feels like is like a slap in the face because this is a vanity project. This is money being spent on no advancements, just on good PR for what will eventually be Jeff Bezos' wider rollout to send really rich people to space. They just won't be the richest. They'll be almost the richest. Space programs are necessary. And I've seen a lot of critique and I think that's maybe kind of anti-intellectual, anti-science. A lot of what we do in space is very helpful here on earth, especially as this planet gets hotter and things get a little bit more dicey down here, like GPS, weather prediction, global communication systems. We have those as we have those because of space travel, because we create that technology for use up there and also because of what

we know about this population and this planet and the expansion of it. It's not outside of the realms of possibility that listeners, your great, great, great, great, great descendants will maybe live on a planet that's not this planet. And so I'm not dissing space, but I am dissing, I think using resources, time, money to send Katy Perry to space, which is useful for Katy Perry, her wealth manager, and Jeffrey bloody Bezos. It does not have wider utility in the way that actual space programs do. I think there's a bit of space washing, if you will. I've never considered that Jeff Bezos' full name is Jeffrey. I've literally never called him that.

No, no, no. Sorry. I like Jeffrey. I am actually going to call him Jeffrey Bezos. It was quite undermining. There's something about that that is just, that's really good. That's really got me. I really like that. Thanks. Also, can I do a disclaimer?

I think I said Aerosmith. I obviously mean it. I actually have a space. And I was like, that is so interesting. I didn't know that was the term. What is... I'm just, I'm putting my hands out. I'm putting my hands out.

I'm putting my hands out. I'm putting my hands out. I'm putting my hands out. I'm putting my hands out. I'm putting my hands out. I'm putting my hands out I didn't know that was STEM. I'm putting my hands out there. I think I thought you did a booboo. I'm learning new words. There was a word that I didn't know that Katie Berry said, which maybe she did a similar sort of Aerosmith vibe. I don't know what she said. Anyway, Aerosmith works. I think it shows that I'm definitely not a woman in STEM and I really respect them.

I think the fact that also all of the people who went on this trip, as soon as they came back, when they were giving testimonies of what they experienced, it was so rampantly individual. They just spoke about how they felt at peace. It made them appreciate the earth. There was nothing, they couldn't vocalize anything about how this bettered society at all. And the fact that Jeff Bezos' trips have so many celebs lining up and, you know, Cameron Diaz, Leonardo DiCaprio, Pete Davidson was going to go on one at one point, all of these people.

There is just no clear path to this being any kind of point for society or culture. It is just, as you said, vanity projects. And I think generally speaking, the kind of take that, as you say, nothing done in space has any worth, I think that's the wrong place to go. But also I think this is so clearly just completely pointless. It really did remind me of like the Submass. I have to say it's kind of these like absolutely crazy. It's also really quite scary, I think, to be honest. But I also know shade to Katy Perry, well, a little bit of shade to Katy Perry, but I don't want to feel like I'm being

like individually just really mean to her. I think the whole concept is very strange and I do think that once you reach a certain level of wealth, you maybe just completely lose sight of normalcy. But the anti-take that I saw that started to come out was not to be the friend that's too woke, but I don't think it's funny when the internet unanimously decides to gang up and try and tear a woman down when problematic men never get treated this way. Do you think that that's an overcorrection of what has happened? Do you think that Katy Perry, because she has actually been in the fire, she kind of got in the fire line with this album, Woman's World, which I have to say

that song has really grown on me actually, I quite enjoy it when it comes on. It's very 2016 pop feminism. I still can't believe how much they weren't looking out the window at the world and were like, I don't know what they were holding up to the camera, but it was a lot of little random objects. Do you think we're being too mean? Well, not us, never us. I did see actually though brands were getting involved in this or one brand, like mocking Katy Perry specifically, which Wendy's, the American fast food. And I think that's maybe where I draw the line. Like us kind of proletariat, all equal on the internet, we are allowed to do that.

But I think when brands get involved in it, I remember this from a few years ago, it was one of the many news cycles about Hailey Bieber and Selena Gomez. And I think it was Duolingo, a few other places were really getting involved in the harassment saying that Hailey was copying Selena. Like Duolingo did like a little PowerPoint presentation about it on TikTok, I think, Life360, Facetune. They were also getting involved. It was very uncouth.

And then yes, so Wendy's this time has said, she replied to a tweet about saying Katy Perry has returned from space saying, can we send her back? And I just think silencio brand, you know, like, you're also part of the problem. So don't you pipe up. I think that's when it tips into harassment. And sometimes a lot of the time, as I said, a few weeks ago, it's bloody sexism, girls. It can be both. I agree. I didn't find that funny. I found that really cringe and actually quite offensive. Like, please stop trying to pretend to be our friends. Please stop trying to pretend that you're one of us. The Wendy stuff,

I think also strayed into just actually being kind of rude and quite cruel. Just, yeah, not, not funny. I think it is right to call out this stuff. I think it's right to call out this quote unquote mission. That is not a mission. I don't think it's cruel. I do think Katy Perry is getting a mission. I don't think it's cruel. I do think Katy Perry is getting a lot of the shit, which is interesting. And I think that probably is worth interrogating. I think you're right. It's because of her last album and this kind of branding of being very counterculture, whilst also just parroting back to very basic white feminism.

And also all of her quotes are just so not with the current times, that it really feels like she is just such an easy target for frustration because it's so confusing why she hasn't moved to our kind of current discussions around empowerment and feminism and not just calling back to stuff that is so basic and could be a tile on an Instagram in millennial pink with like white font. That's what it feels like with her. So I think that's the problem. She does get a lot of shit, but also she's an easy person for us to vent out for this. Also, if we'd heard more from Aisha Bowen and Amanda Wynn, and actually if the whole

trip had been female rocket scientists or NASA employees and stuff, I would have been a bit like, oh, wow, I don't love Jeffrey Bezos. And, you know, but actually it would have been fascinating if someone made a documentary with women in STEM, traveling into space, giving us their experiences, talking about what they were seeing. It's the fact that all of the coverage has been Katy Perry, has been this kind of joke. From the moment it started, because it just doesn't sound real. So from the moment it started, it is a joke. It does make me wonder if it is just going back to this attention economy thing, and they've done what they needed to do.

It's got loads of eyeballs. People are talking about this. But the fact is, again, there was, I think, a missed opportunity for a really interesting conversation, and we do not hear enough about women in STEM, and that is an ongoing issue, and there's not enough women going into STEM. And as someone tweeted, more and more women

in those environments, especially in the US, losing out and it's bloody sexism girls. One thing I would like to say, I think this is probably the last thing I've got to say on this. I am actually really happy to hear criticism from the other celebrities. I mean, it's mostly been women leading the charge because I just feel like lately they have sort of abdicated their responsibility as people with influence. I mean, they've been overwhelmingly silent on Palestine. They seem weirdly quiet on Trump's second term. So I think hearing from the Olivia's and Emirata, I think they're doing what they should be doing, which is speaking up about this bullshit in the public realm. And I've enjoyed that. And as a lot of people are pointing out, a lot of the coverage of this, and you said this at the

top, is it's quite stereotypical, quite misogynistic. And I saw a tweet from the comedian Sydney Battle who wrote, every single element of this seems to be in service of doubling down on misogynistic stereotypes about women in STEM slash high pressure scenarios, mics capturing screaming, full glam in space, ass in astronauts, skin tight flight suits, et cetera, gluttonous, dumb and insidious. And I think there is something there. It's very much like girly pop, dress the nines. I mean, I saw an article from People magazine about how Katy Perry's setting spray had managed to hold up in orbit, you know, all of them like testing out their hairstyles to make sure that they lasted.

And I just think like, it's a spectacle. It's a spectacle of self-promotion and it feeds into all of these really like girly pop in space. The PR on this has been absolutely dire. For this last segment we are talking about t-shirts. Okay not quite t-shirts. We are talking about a debate which was sparked on X in part by pictures of two t-shirts. So here's what happened. On April 8th, the writer Ashley Reese tweeted this as part of a wider conversation about women and work. She wrote, quote,

one, women have always worked, two, it's incredible that women are able to be financially independent in ways that were not as common just a few generations ago. And I'm not charmed by jokes, especially from other women, about how gainful employment is the worst thing to happen to women. In response to this, a user called Claire replied, in agreement with Ashley, mocking this sort of talk, writing, I'm too pretty to have to use Microsoft Excel and this is who you're asking to work 40 hours a week with to write ZipGif. Ashley responded to her agreeing again and said, of women who've talked like this, this

shit isn't funny anymore, especially when men are literally nodding and going, yeah, you're right, financial independence is so important. And this is where the t-shirts come in. A user called at Plastic Dyke Band posted a photo of one tight pink t-shirt from a shop called Tilly's, which read, too pretty for a job in red font. And another t-shirt being sold at Urban Outfitters which said too hot to work. At Plastic Dyke Band wrote of this, going to the mall and seeing shirts like this being sold for teenage girls in a time when right-wing ideologies are spreading fast and women's rights are being taken away and yet when you bitch about it you're being called too woke. So at time of recording

this post has around 67,000 likes and nearly 8,000 retweets and quote retweets. The replies are predictably a bunch of people engaging with it thoughtfully and also the usual ex right-wing chuds. This topic was also covered on the at cartoons hate her sub stack which incidentally I really enjoy have started subscribing quite recently and I'm really enjoying. If you somehow haven't heard of her or read her stuff, I think she's great and we'll link this and other pieces in the show notes. And she first wrote about this way back in August with a two-part piece called Too Pretty to Work in which she mused on the tide turning away from the girl boss and

how many young women are placing less and less value on careers. And then again, much more recently, she wrote a piece called, You're Not Too Hot to Work, which centered around this set of tweets. And while those first two pieces are great bits of writing, I think this just nails the issue to the wall. She writes, quote, If these young women really thought the girl boss narrative was a lie, they are free to get taken care of by men with a decent income and not much else to offer.

Trust me, there are plenty of unremarkable men with decent jobs who can't seem to find a wife. San Francisco is full of software engineers pulling 200k or more who have never had a girlfriend. Go date them. They might be a bit old for you, you might not find them attractive or interesting, but you want to be taken care of, right? You want to go back to before women's liberation, right? The opportunity is there. While you're at it,

maybe sign a pre-note that ensures you don't get anything if you divorce. You don't want to be a girl boss, do you? So to you both, I want to ask, is it just silly t-shirts? Is it that deep or is there something here that like bubbling behind the surface is actually incredibly sinister? It's difficult isn't it because on the face of it is just some t-shirts but also I do think that there is something insidious about it and This kind of normalization of anti-work rhetoric on the one hand. It's just an easy entry point to those really old-school gender norm ideas And the fact that we are seeing the kind of mainstreaming of, you know, tradwife content and the kind of political atmosphere

at the moment, the rolling back of female reproductive rights, the kind of attack on trans rights, all these kind of huge political issues, they don't happen in an ecosystem. And I feel like these t-shirts on the face of it, small issue, but it is the mainstreaming of a wider political looking back nostalgia for old times that essentially means just looking back to when women had less rights. They didn't complain, they were taken care of and didn't have their own finances to build their own kind of wealth and power and agency in a modern world. So say if something went wrong and you were a victim of domestic abuse, already difficult enough to escape that situation, but it's even harder because you don't have those assets to make a path out of that even

possible. So I do think it is insidious. I do think it is worrying. And I do think the kind of normalization of, oh, why should we work? You know, it's just, isn't it easier just to be taken care of? Is a joke, but I don't really love that we are just seeing so many signs of it just kind of becoming less of a joke and more of just a normalised idea, normalised kind of aspiration. I totally agree.

I think so many people that said it in the beginning were actually joking, but the problem is that that's kind of accelerated and proliferated into an actual concept, an idea that people subscribe to. One thing I thought when I was reading at Cartoons Hate Her sub stack is at one point she says everyone hates work, like of course you do, everyone would much rather be on a beach sipping on a pina colada. And she's caveats that with, you know, unless you're doing something that you'd want to do even if you won the lottery. I actually don't necessarily

agree with that. I think work does bring us some kind of intrinsic purpose and joy. And I think that like even thinking about when you've had a long holiday, sometimes you might be like, actually, I'm really excited to get back to work. It breaks up your day. It gives you a sense of purpose. But I think right now, work doesn't have the same result it used to where you could potentially be working in a coffee shop a few nights a week, maybe studying your drama school on the side and be able to pay rent to live in a nice flat with your friends. Now it's like you've got to have a full-time job and a side hustle, probably a bit of family inheritance and then you might be able to just scrape by. So I don't think it's the

work that we don't want to do. I think it's the fact that we aren't compensated for work in the same way that we were as we've spoken about so many times, like the ability to get housing and whatever. So I think the drop off from I'm too pretty to work is much easier to reach when work is so dissatisfying and so unsatiating. Like we cannot, it's not like you can work in a job for 10 years, probably buy a house, get married and have kids. Because all of that is gone, I do also understand why people that perhaps before wouldn't have have conservative ideology would just then think, well, maybe it is easier because this way is actually really hard. Working to get to a

certain goal is very resistant. And so even if we know and we're smarter than believing in this idea that a man can support you and that that's always going to be safe and happy and just a life of Riley. It's also like, well, this life we're living is so hard. So I think, does any of that make any sense? I think in the context of the situation we're living in, it's the one hand where you have the right really propping up traditional values. But then also it's like, it's not that great to work right now. I actually do love my work, but I still find it very hard to get job security in the same way that previous generations did. That is something that isn't a given. Everything is so damning. It does worry me. I think it's really bad and dangerous of us to

even make jokes about this in a culture like this. But I also do understand why people would fall for it because the options aren't great, to be honest. I do enjoy anti-work sentiment. I do enjoy the idea people are discussing out loud their exploitation, their frustration with being cogs in machines, not getting properly financially compensated for it, having their labor extracted when I think most people agree we were not put on earth just to work, but it is having purpose and it is that there is balance to be had and none of us really have access to it. I think that a lot of white collar workers, laptop slash email job workers both feel,

okay, work does suck and this is, I'm really getting screwed here. But also I am luckier in a lot of ways than someone who's doing my job maybe 10, 20 years ago. Just because that payoff is shrinking because the social contract is not being honored, you know, everyone is underpaid, pension shrinking if you've got one, you know, HMRC is still taking the piss quite a lot. They'll get theirs even if you're not getting yours. I think there are a lot of ways that I think it can almost feel like, am I even allowed to hate work because of advances in remote work technology? I can work from home. It's not that same culture of acceptable sexual harassment at work.

And I think that it's never knowing, am I the snowflake that a boomer thinks I am with this cushy job just complaining? Or is work actually as difficult and as increasingly intolerable as we think it is? And I think that's part of the appeal of these t-shirts. And in that sense, it's not necessarily harmful, but because it's marketed to younger women, this is an overcorrection from the days of the millennial CEO, the girl boss, and that myth of hustling and having everything. But also, too hot to work as a slogan. It's self-defeating because it doesn't change the material reality for women who are working. It just packages us

as sort of powerless infant girly worlds in a world where we are anything but and also will have to increasingly be anything but because things are getting harder in a lot of ways in terms of cost of living and work culture. I think this leads on so perfectly to the Blue Origin mission because it is just infantilisation of women and women in STEM are reduced to eyelashes that need to stick on or setting the spray that needs to work in space. And here being too hot to work or like being too pretty, too cutesy to like have a job. It's just so condescending. It's so annoying.

And it is a joke, but also at the same time, it's not a joke because that mission literally was using that kind of rhetoric for real women going up in space. So I don't really think it is just separated from culture or society. We are seeing those same kind of messaging reproduced on one of the biggest events of the year on mass scale. So yeah, I don't know, it is translating into all these different ways, this infantilization of women, and perhaps even the reduction of them in spaces such as science, technology, workplaces, all of these arenas that already have a problem with diversity of people in there. The fact that there's a pay gap across multiple industries, these are real issues in the fact

that it's just getting reduced to too hot to work, too pretty to work. Eyelashes that might float off in space is really, I think it's really dangerous and I think it's really something that we should interrogate. One thing from the piece that I really loved was the point, very simply put, men have a very clear anti-work discourse, but it never reduces them to too cutesy, too fun to have a job. They're able to have that discussion without it being reduced to the infantilization that is happening to women. And I think that's the problem in and of itself.

Why is it that we can't have that discussion or why at the moment we can't have that discussion without it just being this baby talked version of it? That's the problem. I think why is it that everything's reduced to girl trends or being. I think why is it that, you know, everything's reduced to girl trends or being too cute for this or it just, it doesn't do us any kind of service when we're having real discussions around capitalism taking advantage of us. I think the silent partner to that is that men do feel a huge, immense sense of pressure and stress that they still need to be providing and earning a lot of money and that that does fall on them. Even in a world where it's often, you know, you will have

couples where the woman is earning more money, men still report feeling like they should actually be bearing the brunt of being the breadwinner. And so I think that it plays into those very gendered ideas that yes, men aren't walking around saying, I'm too cutesy, I'm too demure to not work, but they are also shouldering some kind of ideological burden that they actually should be raking money in. And actually the silly side of this is I often see tweets from men being like, I'm working 21 hour days at my corporate finance job so that my girlfriend can frolic in the field and be a socialist. Do you know what I mean? There is kind of like a married humor to the joke about the women, which is equally balanced with equally gendered language around men. And so I think we both do kind of lose in this rhetoric and they both, they amp each other up. You know, as we step away,

men have to step up and often we frame the men, I guess, in these traditional roles as maybe being these controlling men or like, I guess, in these traditional roles as maybe being these controlling men or like, you know, the very dangerous side of being financially dependent on someone is that if that person is, you know, not a kind person, you could end up in danger. But also it does create this environment then where men might feel like that they have to overwork themselves, overexert themselves, not live a balanced, like I'm not saying, you know, men are the people that are the victims in this, but I do think there is also that side of things where every time there's push and pull, both sides get affected equally-ish.

And I wonder whether that is because of this, there is that in the culture, this very clear, I mean, it's problematic as hell, but a very clear image of man equals worker, here's all the history to back it up. Whereas the history of women's labor and access to traditional workplaces and workplace protections is thornier and it's more complex because contrary to what your local trad man and incel wants you to think, there's been no point in the history of humanity where women were not workers, where women were not working, whether that was domestic labor, whether that was on farmland with families, whether that was in factories. I mean, that was happening hundreds of years before a lot of people will want to admit it, women are workers. But because we had

that fight to enter the workplace, to have some kind of choice about what kind of work we did, what protections we got at work. I mean fight for equal pay, which is depressingly ongoing and fair treatment at work. I think it feels loaded to say, you know, no work for me I'm too itty-bitty pretty and I think that is to do with these clouded ideas of what labor has looked like for a woman and the line that you reference there Ruchira and actually both of you from the piece and she says Well, plenty of men hate their jobs or hate the fact that they have to work for a living. They generally don't prance about talking about being just a sexy little boy

who shouldn't be forced to write Jira tickets, which is just a hilarious line. I think it just comes down to this element of identity tied to work. And also the fantasy ingrained in all of this is, well, let's go back in time and I won't have to work. And also the fantasy ingrained in all of this is, well, let's go back in time and I won't have to work. Unfortunately, yes, you will have to work, but it will be a less protected labor. You'll be always on the clock. And yeah, your boss may be your spouse and that's just, there's all kinds of complications in that, by which I don't mean stay at home moms or domestic laborers are employed by a husband, like not at all. But I mean, in that really

traditional sense, it would be. These are the dynamics. You don't have a bank account. We can't fetishize that. And I think it feels like in this long arc of history, I can't really believe that we are having to explain to anyone that actually, no, it is preferable always to have your own money, your freedom to work or not work, that even as imperfect as working is, it's always preferable to any kind of servitude. Like, you know, how on earth are we having this conversation again? I feel like I feel spooked by it. Thank you so much for listening this week. Don't forget to listen to Everything in Conversation. Wednesday's episode was on

Coachella discourse and also a reminder that next week's Everything in Conversation is book club where we'll be talking about all fours by Miranda July. So do keep reading or get your copy ASAP. Please also leave us a rating and a review. It helps so, so much to get others into the podcast, which then helps us keep making it. You can also follow us on Instagram and TikTok at everythingiscontentpod and on X at EICpod. See you next week. Bye! Bye!

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