If I Speak - 96: Why are women choosing looks instead of books?

Episode Date: January 13, 2026

Sure, you look great – but can you spell pharaoh? Ash and Moya start the year with a tough conversation about the beauty regime that rules over us all. Has women’s freedom been undermined by a fixation on beauty? Are men experiencing 2000s-levels of body dysmorphia? Plus: advice for a listener who wants more intellectual conversations […]

Okay, who wants to say the first words of 2026 if I speak? I think those should be the first words of 2026 if I speak. There's a shark in the water. It is not safe because we are back, baby. Back, back, back at it again. How was your festive break? I spent it alone. How alone?

I spent Christmas. Christmas, the run up to Christmas alone and then on the 26th I went to saw someone. But I spent Christmas itself alone. How was that? Ash, it was phenomenal. It was amazing. You're not meant to say that. You're meant to say, oh, because usually when you spend it alone, there's things.

There's reasons, right? And there were reasons in my case with a capital R. And I have obligations, which mean I probably won't be able to spend it alone in and I understand those. But fuck me. It was so good. It was so good. I know this is stupid, but I wish you'd texted me because I was hosting a waifs and strays.

Christmas. I got so many invitations. People were very generous. They were like, come to mine, come to here, come here. And I was like, no, guys, I want to spend it alone. Maybe a future that won't be the case. But I really needed to spend it alone. I needed a whole, I felt like it's been, the December I was traveling so much for work.

I was everywhere, things were happening, new people were coming into my life. I felt like there was no time to breathe. Yeah, you were like the Omicron strain. You were everywhere. I was everywhere. I was everywhere. So are you. So are you too far.

We were very busy. But this was at least two, and I was immediately traveling on the 26th. Like I went out north on the 26th. but the 20th, like the lead up to Christmas, I was working on, I did have to do a tiny bit of work on Christmas Day, but I was working like right up to the 24th as well. And it was like bits and bobs, it wasn't too strenuous. But the 25th, I just felt complete peace.

And I had a steak for my lunch. Didn't have to cook anything else for anyone else. I had a steak for lunch. I went out for a long, dusk, Christmas walk all around South London turns out London is not dead at Christmas at all, everyone's still out,

Morley's is still open the convenience store down my road, do you want to buy a bong? Do you want to buy a yucker? Would you like to buy? You know, what's it called? What is it called? Pomegranate. You can buy all of those things on Christmas Day in South London from one place.

Christmas bong for the lady? Christmas bong for the lady. As Jesus would have wanted. So it was, I had a lovely time and I know I can't do it again because I do think Christmas is not really about you it's meant to be about like the obligations you have to the people around you

that is the true spirit of Christianity like you do have to put yourself in community etc etc you do have to chip in with lunch you do have to do the washing up it's not it's not about you but this Christmas which was about me oh it was spectacular what about you how was your Christmas

well so I can imagine that spending Christmas alone is actually quite a profound experience for good and for ill, right? So if you're spending it alone and like you don't want to and it's not something that you're happy with or at peace with, misery, right? Absolute misery. But if it's something where you feel like either it's meeting some needs

or it's a sort of thing that you want to explore or it's something which you have actively designed, I imagine it feels like listening to blonde for the first time. Oh, it does. Do you know what I mean? It sounds exactly like listening to blonde for the first time. time. Like, that was me at the Christmas dinner table.

Oh, it was spectacular. Wait, do you want to talk about your Christmas or do you want to talk about your, yeah, literally that. Do you want to talk about your Christmas or do you want to talk about your New Year's? Pick your poison. Okay, I'll move on to, I'll move on to New Year's. So I'm not going to say where I went because I'm not blowing up my spot. I'm not blowing up my spots ever, ever, ever.

You put it on your story. I will say. I did. I did. I did. And so, like, it's a, if you know, you know, if you know you know. I believe I messaged you and I don't think I got a reply. Yeah, I don't message people back. I just go, that's nice. I was very impressed.

I'd actually been in that place a few weeks early and saw someone do the most incredible cover of Wuthering Heights by Kate Bush. Your performance was great. So mine was actually the first karaoke song of 2026 in that particular venue. And I did it with a guy who I'd never met before, I don't think. But like, so it was somebody who actually looks a lot like one of my colleagues. So I'd assumed I'd met him many, many times. Not because I thought he was my colleague, but just because there was that feeling of familiarity of like, oh, well, we must have hung out a million, million times before.

And then it slowly dawned on me that like, I don't actually know you particularly well, but we'd signed up to do, I bet you look good on the dance floor by the Arctic Monkeys. And I would say, Paddy, you smashed it. You smashed it. You were an incredible karaoke partner. I did threaten him before because I had it in my head that it could be a prank and he was going to leave me up there alone. And so sort of like got in by the scruff of the neck and I was like, if you punk out on me, I will hunt you down and kill you. Why would you leave you?

What the avoidant was going on there? What in the anxious? What was happening there? But he did. If you leave me. Like my dad did. Yeah. If you leave me.

he's not going to leave you this one of the best character songs for all time he wants to be up there he didn't and he did a fucking phenomenal job and it was a real it was a sort of classic pub knees up there was a conga line

after midnight that went out one of the exits and snakes around the pub and went back in through the other and it's just sort of like circled like a like uroboros for a while which was really great And then the last thing that I did before going home was me and the bouncer talked about wrestling for ages.

Like, talked about Eddie Guerrero, talked about Jeff Hardy, talked about tables, ladders and chairs. And I was like, because I was wearing my Eddie Guerrero t-shirt, which no one else,

nobody else, either picked up on or knew who it was. And then I was waiting for my Uber. The bouncer was like, Eddie Guerrero. And I was like, at last. Your absolute dream date,

which is talking to the bouncer, redacted about wrestling. Yeah. It's funny because it's such a good pub. It's such a good pub. Also, like, after, because I left a little bit before my partner, because I was like, no more drinking for me. I'm tapped out on baby Guinness.

Fully tapped out. If I have another one, I'm going to be sick. So my partner left a bit after me, and he talked to the same bouncer about guitars, and they had, like, a real bonding over. What if this is the bouncer that's meant to live in your house with you two as your next third? This is the unicorn. Do you know what I mean?

This is the sort of intellectual through some partner. I've got questions for you. Okay. first questions are 26. You know what time it is. Of 2026. This is where we have 70 questions, but we lost

no, 67 of them? How many questions? We have 73 questions. This is where we have 73 questions, but we lost 70 of them in the wash. Moya is not a woman in STEM. I'm a woman in femme. A woman in femme.

I wonder if anyone's ever done that before. I'm sure some sort of like mad, Mima Cat has done that. We've got so many things that we need to trademark. Yeah. We need to do Bermay. It was it Bamei Arme. Bameh, which I think about all the time and have told people about it.

That's land race really, but we need to do that. I want that. I'll get that tattooed. I mean it in big looping script. Bame Armée on my arm. And then women in femme. Women in femme. That's very Telisa like 2010, isn't it?

Women in Fem. It's very Talisa. Okay. Questions. Question one. Are you more suited to being a trade? or a faithful? I think my face gives too much away,

so I probably should be a faithful. I always think I have a poker face and I really don't. Oh, you do not have a poker face at all? No. No. I think you'd be a good traitor because you love revenge. I love revenge, but also my face does give quite a lot away. I think I would be a good faithful in terms of...

So like when I played Weirwolf with some friends, I like picked up like literally as soon as it had been like doled out what the roles were I'd picked up who one of them was and I was like it's you you're a fucking rarewolf just did just did so I think I'd be a good faithful but the problem is is that I'd I'd probably get banished in the you know the first bonfire of the ethnics I'm out yeah yeah yeah they don't like strong ethnic women at all no the intersection actually really hits Kimberly Crenshaw made some points. She made some points.

Question two. Question two. Pro tips for keeping warm and cozy in this frigid weather. Layer. Currently cursed with. Layer. That's the only tip you have light tights under everything. Doesn't matter who you are.

Where are the thermals? Get the thermals out. Thermals. Get the thermals out. Get the thermals out for the lads. like that is the pro tip once I remember I was in a student flat maybe and I was so cold all the time that I had my hot water bottle constantly and at the end of that term I had like first degree no what's the lowest degree of burns first degree first degree burns which

took about two years to fade on my back in the pattern of where the hot water bottle would have been oh my god so don't do that don't do that but I would say just layer just layer guys like today I'm wearing, also just move to a new build. I'm not going to lie to you. If you want to be warm in the winter, get to your new build. We've barely had the heating, it's sensational. Sensational. So good. You know what? You know what I've noticed, right?

Like, in my sort of studies in heterosexual men, if a straight man is wearing long johns, he will be so happy with himself and compelled to tell you, and they'll hoist up their trouser leg and go, look, I'm wearing long johns. They love it. My first boyfriend will want long johns. long johns a lot because he was Swedish and he would always go on about his long johns yeah men love long johns long john when will they love us like they love a long john they love me quite a lot but maybe not as much as the long johns yeah yeah never as the long john okay final question um if you had to

write your own 12 rules for life what would be one of them yeah always take the high road that is one of my rules for life always take the high road because when you take the low road not to be Hillary Clinton or whatever fuck she said um when you take the low road it was it was it was Michelle Obama oh it was different I knew it was one of the Democrats um it was a Democrat lady I knew that much um when you take very nasty ladies very nasty oh why does he crack me up so much The other day I texted my friend, I went, Will I just like Trump for real? And she was like, this is an insane text receiver, that context.

Because then I followed it up and I was like, when Donald Trump was on the plane after, I shouldn't be sad as hilarious when I'm saying this. But when he was on the plane during the Venezuela operation, and he was like, don't ask me because you don't want to know. And then no one asked him. And he went, well, we're going to take it. And I was like, he's just like, that's for real because it's like,

he's like, don't ask me, don't make me sing. And he's like, gives the information unprompted in great gleeful. detail and she's just like that is an insane text to receive unprompted um but always take the high road because when you take the low road it doesn't matter how good it feels in the moment it will make you feel as grubby as the person you are down there in the dirt with you will all you will end up feeling grubby it doesn't matter it's like post nut clarity it does not satisfy long term the high road satisfies long term it's good for the soul so that's one of mine what's one of yours take a dip in the low road every now and then

to let them know. Like, you gotta let him know. Give him the old razzle dazzle. That's one of yours. Give him the old razzle dazzle. That's another one of mine. Give him the old razzle d'all. Show him there's life in the old girl.

Yeah. I was actually talking about this with a couple of friends over Christmas because one of my friends had had, he's a very keen golfer. And there were these, and he lives in Spain. And then there were these like, you know, very drunk, very belligerent. middle-aged, quite bourgeois Spanish men who were like being a dick to him.

And I think like, he'd gone over, like, intending to just be like, look, that's not on. Like, don't treat me like that. Da-da-da-da-da. And I think the guy said something or did something that was really awful. My friend was just like, I could throw you off a cliff if I wanted to. I'm a younger man. And just like, cut the thing dead. And I was like, sometimes you just got to let him know.

you got on madam no if I wanted to joke a throw of a cliff it's an insane thing to say did you say in Spanish as well because that would have said I don't know that would have been impeccable

I could throw you off a cliff if I wanted oh that's gone straight into the lexicon of like phrases I could throw up a cliff if I wanted I'm a much younger man I could throw off a cliff if I wanted to

oh that's a good one oh I love that oh that really took me so that's the thing is that like you say always take the high road. What I'd say is mostly take the high road. But every so often, let them know that you know where the low road is. You've walked these roads, right? You're king at these

streets. You walked them on the way to the high road. It was a wider path. You walked them on the way to the high road. And you always keep your eye on what's going on on the low road. Oh, that's funny. I could throw off a cliff I wanted. Should I move on? Because I think you've got a big theory. I have a big theory. And you are well excited for this one. I was so excited. I was chomping at the bit. That's good. That's great. I'm glad. I like to provide. I want to provide something that gives you something to chomp on. I think that's important. That's not Pantone, because I've eaten like a kilo of it.

Have you? I haven't seen, because I wasn't at family Christmas, I saw, I've seen like no Christmas food. So I've, I've been, I've been quarantined from Christmas food. So I haven't, I haven't seen a single sniff of Panetone. which is fairly annoying I would love to see some Panetone. I didn't get my chutney. There was not things I did. You didn't get a chutney? No, well actually no.

Someone bought me a chutney because they knew that the chutney I wanted was not going to be delivered to me by a family. So they very sweetly got me a chutney and it was really good, which I really appreciated. Thank you, chutney giver.

See, DESE is a state of mind. Yeah. Not an origin. Fucking love a chutney. Anyway, sorry, right. Big theory. Dun-da-da-da-da-dun. First big theory of 2026

and I fear it will be confronting for a lot of us and it is on the now I need to remember how to say this word nihilism it's on bam bam straight in first time one and done

no misprounciations until the next time I mispronounce something that was it that was a mispronunciation yeah it was wasn't it right nonism mispronounced misproncing

there's been zero minutes since the last incident zero minutes since the last mispronunciation I can't say things and that is one of my things okay the nihilism

of being gorgeous this is my big theory right and this big theory is inspired by a range of things I've seen read and experienced

but recently most of all by this headline I saw briefly on Instagram and now can't find I've looked everywhere for it can't find it did loads of Googles different magazines

can't find it however it was along the lines of this I can't afford a house, so why not be beautiful? If you wrote this article, thank you. Tell us in the comments on Spotify, we'll link to it. Anyway, so I thought about this a lot, right? Being beautiful has always had a premium on it. Premium on it.

It has always been framed as some sort of work, right? People of all genders have since the rise of a lifestyle economy, not since the dawn of time, but since the rise of a lifestyle economy, been bombarded with tricks, tips, guides on laboring to be beautiful. I'm not even sure that the morality that we now afford being beautiful is new. I think a lot of the current fixations on beauty

are old, pretty old. Because I can't speak for men, but I know this is happening to all genders. But as a woman, it definitely feels like we're seeing a reversion to this sort of pre-feminist idealisation of beauty as the beal and end-all because back then, let's go back to like the 1700s.

Beauty was a passport, right? It was seen as a passport for women. It could, if we all did correctly, yield better circumstances, a good marriage, a slightly higher social position. This, of course, does not equal security. Beauty fades, trophies lose their shine, which is why my pre-mothers

campaign for material rights. Well, I actually don't know what my pre-mothers were doing, but some people did, such as political say, equal pay, education, protection from discrimination in the workplace. But now in the year of Our Lord, 2026,

we are back on beauty in a big, big way. And as the elusive headline that I can't find suggests, I think this is a symptom of nihilism. I think generations have been told that we are economically screwed, that everything is fucked. We can't afford.

houses, the infrastructure is creaking, jobs are disappearing. Meanwhile, meanwhile, what is valued culturally are extremes, both of wealth and consumption, which are totally our reach for most people, as they should be. And if you're politically conscious, then you get suffering just beamed into your eyeballs 24-7 and your voice is lost. Attention spans are also shot, you know, reading and thinking critically takes effort. It's much easier to try and like regulate ourselves by just scrolling on our phones because that's what I think a lot of scrolling is about. I think it's about regulation. It's not actually even about the dopamine hits per se. They're just not doing the regulation that people think. So instead of working on building lives for themselves, people are

turning inwards. They're saying, why not just be beautiful? So the body becomes a site you can control with nips and tucks and restrictive diets. And there's so many tools now on hand to allow that. I see it in both myself and I see in people around me. Instead of books people are choosing looks and I guess what I want to choose books I chose I chose looks and I guess you know people say like I choose both but I want to discuss that framing is it a fair one what are the other options where do you want to begin we're talking about beauty as nihilism where do you want to kick off should I should I start with a thing that's probably going to get me in most trouble everyone's going everyone in the audience who's listening now on various

tubes trains walking around their city or town or rural space. It's going to go, yes, start with the thing that's going to get you most trouble. Because this is something which has been on my mind for quite a few weeks now and I wasn't going to say anything

because I didn't want to make anyone feel gotten at. And then I saw it happen again this very morning and I thought, no, something has to be said. So a few weeks ago, I saw that somebody for whom I've got the most profound political admiration, whose work I think is really important, who publicly describes herself as a socialist and a feminist, doing an advert for Botox.

And I was stunned by it. I was sort of stunned by it, because I know that there are all these conversations about, having Botox and other kinds of cosmetic procedure. And to what extent is that an expression of bodily autonomy? To what extent is that a sort of compromise that women are having to make with existing under patriarchy and the intense pressures of not just misogyny, but, you know, all the intersections which compound that, right?

racism, trans misogyny, etc., etc., all of these things. You know, is it fair to sort of hold, you know, getting Botox or not getting Botox to some kind of political line? I think that this extends way beyond it, right? You are now advertising it to people and people who have an explicitly political relationship with you because you're known for being a somewhat political person. And so I felt like this was a real, like, you know, what are we doing here? Like, what are we doing?

What are we doing? Have our, our own sense of political obligations and bonds and ties become so weakened that someone will, whilst maintaining their sort of public political identity as socialist and feminist, advertised Botox. You know, it's a bit like me being like, oh, I'm an anti-imperialist, but this podcast was brought to you by BAE systems. Like I know that's maybe a bit facetious, but I do see some parallels.

And then I saw this morning another socialist woman for whom I have nothing but the most profound admiration, someone who's like critiques and interventions and contributions to the movement I found really stimulating, challenging in some ways, doing like a little list of ins and outs for the years. and under inns was Botox. And I just think this isn't about condemnation and it's not about firing brimstone. I certainly don't want people like going out

and trying to work out who this people are because that's obviously super unkind and shit. Like don't do that. But I'm just like, it's one thing to sort of go, all right, this is part of my own compromise with the social forces under which I live. And another to be like, okay, This is aspirational for others.

This is something that other people should be doing. You know, not just a choice, but a kind of norm, right? It's a kind of norm. Botox only really becomes a thing from 2002 onwards. And it becomes normalized really in the 2010s, right? 2002, it's, you know, the same way any new kind of cosmetic treatment is, is somewhat restricted to, you know, elites, the very rich, the very famous. 2010s, it becomes normalized.

And after that point, what is seen to be, you know, a much more normal part of someone's beauty routine or beauty regime. I like the word regime because I think that it says something about the kind of coercion under which you all live. Botox, fillers, you know, all these more intrusive things become become normalized. You know, so many of my friends were like getting fillers

and getting other things injected into their faces. And I just think that it's, if you are a socialist, if you are a feminist, you cannot advertise for these predatory industries. You cannot chill for these predatory industries.

They are engines of misery and exploitation. And every time you say, well, this is a norm. This is aspirational. You are telling every single person who is born with the face God gave them, that face is not good enough. Right. You are telling every woman, or not just women, right, because, you know, men are increasingly getting these procedures as well.

But in particular women, any woman who is going through the process of aging, right, which happens to us all if we're lucky, right? If we don't, you know, get hit by a bus at the age of 27, aging will happen to us all. you are saying there is something about that which is disgusting right which which should be held at bay which should be fought back and I know that you know people are going to come back and say oh well ash like you you moisturise your face are like oh ash you you put makeup on I've said this before of course there's a degree of arbitrariness about what I'm choosing to do and what I'm not choosing to do needles right are my line but we all have an arbitrary line somewhere so I think if any of these women are listening, the thing that I would say is like,

it's so easy for a tide to take you out further and further from the shoreline. And I don't blame anyone for that happening. It happens to us all. We can get decoupled from our values, particularly, I think, because of the way in which social media wraps us around with a series of, of images and discourses and pieces of content, which make it harder and harder to adhere to your own principles. Because the thing that keeps you close to your principles

is like generally other people in real life. And so if you've got like in particular a digital world in which all these things are made to feel normal, like it does drag you out. But the thing I would say is like, can we come back to some sense of like collective obligation and responsibility to one another in which shilling for Botox is,

out. And the thing I'd leave you with is this, is that if I did a little list of like ins for 26 and I put skin lightening, right, ooh, maybe skin lightning, bleaching my skin, trying to look white up, maybe that's part of my compromise with like, you know, living under late capitalism or whatever, watch everyone shit themselves. And rightly so. And rightly so. I would hope that if I said, well, I lighten my skin, here's where you can do it. And and in fact it's in, I hope people would give me fucking hell for that.

How do I respond to this? Because you put me in a tight spot, actually put me in a tight spot. Especially as I will probably get Botox one day. I don't think I would sell it. I can't sell it though. I wouldn't sell it. It's not fair for me to sell it.

But I can't say I might never get it. Why not hold a line of like, no? Well, I wouldn't sell it. But this is my question. Why has there been such a premium? input on beauty as both a moral obligation as the thing that will keep me both relevant and give me purpose. This is something that I was this is kind of what I want to discuss as the wider thing. Beauty has become purpose again and it's not like it was never. We've seen this, you know,

every women's magazine when I'm growing up has so much space dedicated to beauty. But it does feel like there's a new push. And when I say beauty, I'm just using it as a catch-all term for all of the different things you do to fit into a convention. I guess it's all of the different practices and the regime that you said

that people take up. And the thing about lots of these beauty techniques, practices, tweaks, surgeries is they don't actually make people more beautiful in the way that I would look it down the street and I think that's a beautiful person. that's a, you know, any gender, like that's a beautiful person because I think when I see someone I consider very beautiful,

in real life, 99% of the time, they are not people who've messed with their faces in like a distinct way. And that is the beauty, like, it kind of shines out of them in a different way. Whereas people who've tweaked their faces to the degree that I'm talking about or engaged in the practices of beauty to this degree, there is an naturalness there. But I guess what I want to discuss, is why this is now resurging as such like a key focus of purpose.

Like I see, it's like the idea that you cannot be lovable if you're not beautiful. You are not working hard enough if you're not trying to be beautiful. That beauty is the all-encompassing passport. And I see it all the time on social media. Like there's memes going around being like when a, you know, like someone will do a crashing out sort of head in their hands video with doom music and the text on it will read. when a five three mousy, thin girl

with tattoos and sharp features likes the same guy as you and it's like this idea that you were just totally unworthy because you would not look like this particular thing or when people are like here's how you can level up here's how you grow up in 2026 I always remember a video by this one girl

who got absolutely shat on at the time when she was like looking in the mirror looking in the mirror all the time and going I'm the most beautiful I'm the most beautiful who cares spell pharaoh. I think about spell pharaoh constantly, but spell pharaoh kind of lost the battle. People don't want to spell pharaoh. They see more, and it's not everyone obviously, but a lot of people are putting far more stake into the beauty because the beauty is almost easier. And I want to understand how we got to the point where that became easier as a purpose than putting the work in to kind of address all these different pressing factors of like the help.

And I think it's the existential despair. I think existential despair, the same thing that drives us to regulate through scrolling is the same thing that drives us to regulate through, you know, consumption like me buying new clothes or sticking things in my face or buying another lipstick or, you know, spending hours learning a makeup technique. For what? For what? Why? This is my questions. Ooh, I mean, look, there's so much in there. Right. To answer your first question, which is how did we get here? I think you're completely right when earlier you said, well, a lot of this stuff is really old. I think that what's new is the expansion of this to men. So, you know, beauty, sort of, you know, enhancements, and I'm using air quotes for that,

you know, this idea of enhancing one's physical appearance. I think that there are some biological origins to it. It's a part of mate selection. and it's something that you sort of see in all species, right? Or social species anyway, it's sort of like preening. But the thing which happens because we are the most social species on Earth is then that also becomes part of, you know, what you might call a technology of governance or a tool for oppression.

The reason why you end up with such a gendered division of the lay. of beauty, particularly after the 18th century, I'd say. So sort of like 19th century onwards is because you have a societal shift towards very rigid gender roles and, you know, women are supposed to do this. They're not supposed to be working. They're not supposed to be, you know, participating in the economy. They're certainly not supposed to be participating in politics and governance. And so the thing which they're supposed to take up, their sort of sole interest is looking beautiful and men who do that become disparaged rather than men doing that as in previous centuries being like, okay, that's what you do to display your

status, right? The ways of which male status is supposed to be displayed, you know, works in a different way. You know, I don't think that's a sort of surprise that that also coincides with the mass production of cosmetic goods for the first time. You know, you have to create a market for those goods and the way, you know, gender becomes, I think, a part of doing that. And I think where we are now is that that sort of market creation of being like, well, this is what you have to do if you want to get anywhere in life, if you want a partner, if you want a job, if you want respect, blah, blah, all of that is being applied to men, right, in a way which is like, kind of, kind of kind of mimicking what has happened to us as women.

So, you know, rates of disordered eating, you know, intermittent fasting is, you know, eating disorder for men. That's what it is. It's a way of packaging it and marketing it for men. You know, looks maxing is a way in which, you know, body dysmorphia is packaged as a project of self-improvement for men specifically. And there's one study which showed that 54% of men, so more than half and rising,

are displaying signs of body dysmorphia. And I think that there are lots of reasons for that, like I said, that there is a sort of, you know, creation of a market, an expansion of, of sort of predatory capitalism into men and their subject. in their bodies in a way that hasn't always been the case. But I think the sort of death of social mobility is also part of this story.

So Gary Stevenson in an interview with our colleague, Aaron Bastani, said that why do so many young men want to go to the gym? Well, it's because it's one of the few areas in their life where they can experience progression. And you don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Like, I've started lifting weights. Guess what? It feels fucking sick. You know, going up a kilo, I'm like,

God damn, am I a muscle mommy? Like, you know, it feels great. Don't throw the baby out with the bath water. But the sort of fixation on the body that men are experiencing and, you know, the misery that can come with it and the comparisons that come with it. I mean, it's just, it reminds me of growing up in like, you know, the 2000s, like, what's happening to men in their psyches. And I think it is deeply, deeply wounding.

What do you make of that? Well, I totally agree the social mobility point. I think this is also the thing that I want to get at as well, which is I said in my intro, this idea that the normal passages of social mobility, we're told they're shut down. Obviously, there is evidence to show that they're shut down. And the idea is like you can buy a house, you can do this, you can do that. We're told all the exit routes are being closed.

Is this the case, though, in actual reality? because I think there's a mix of things. So yes, it is probably harder in a lot of ways to be a young person today. You know, like, but in other ways, we have a lot more freedom

that we're not exercising. And I think about that a lot, you know, like, especially, I think a lot of this also is underpinned by the search for love. I think a lot, even if we're not unaware of like the economic push behind it, the way we're told, the way beauty is communicated to us is that if you,

if you follow the rules and regulations of being beautiful and you go on the regime, you go on the journey, that you have earned love, people will love you. And it's very sad, there's a very good bit in a book I read recently called Rejection. And one of the stories is about a man who becomes blackpilled because in the words of one of the characters, he can't get any pussy. But it's actually due to his terrible personality.

It's nothing to do with him as physically. It's because of his personality and how off-putting he is in the way that he moves to the world. And this is the thing about the spell fairer. It's like neglecting the internal development. We're told all this self-care stuff and all, you know, but it's not actually internal development.

It's just therapeutic speak than therapeutic modalities that don't really work when you're in tandem with other people. they're not going to get you close to goals so people turn to beauty because they're like why am I not connecting with people why I'm not doing this and it's like this is the worst time to date

this is the worst time ever this is the worst time I don't think that helps us that much it's not the worst time for a lot of things especially if you live in a country like Britain yes in some ways the state is failing us in ways it didn't uphold

in some ways the state is failing us in ways it wasn't before it's crumbling and cracking in lots of different ways however in other ways it's not like women have never had as much liberation as we have right now that doesn't mean we are liberated but it does mean we're at a point in history where we do have more autonomy than ever before which is showing in like education levels in salary levels in the ability to move around freely to have to have the choice not to get married and procreate That is a choice that more people are taking up.

There is more choice. Go on, Nash. I mean, there's a theory about that, which is when women have more choices, more rights, that's when ultra-thin body types become, like, hegemonic and dominant, because it's a way of, you know, reinforcing the cage in one side when one bit of it has been sort of weakened. So, you know, there's a sort of theory that it's a way of reasserting

patriarchal norms. I've seen that theory. I don't think it's wrong per se. I think it's too simplistic and I think it doesn't reckon with how we also do it to each other. And I think it also doesn't reckon with what I'm trying to get at, which is that a lot of this is, we have a lot of freedom without purpose. So there's the search of purpose, which is why it leads us to like these, but we're still looking in like neoliberal space is all like consumerist spaces is to find that purpose, we're still at that church,

which is why then we go to like, oh, maybe I'll just make myself as thin as possible. Maybe I'll make myself as tweets as possible. Maybe I'll buy as many things as possible. I still don't feel happy, because you still can't spell Pharaoh. Well, it's not just about, like, being able to spell Pharaoh. That's my standard.

I always try to spell Pharaoh by going, Farrow, because I think that's how you do it. But spelling Pharaoh is just my metaphor and her metaphor for... Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I can spell Pharaoh, but I'm still tapped in the head. But like, I'd get what you're saying. I think the thing that I would shift towards is not about what's your metric for being an attractive person

or having value or, you know, whatever, whatever. It's actually about what are the sort of behaviours and preoccupations that bring you into community with other people? Because when I think about that which is freeing, sure, there are forms of individualised freedom, which are really important. Birth control, love, love what you're doing, big fan. Like that's probably one of the most profound bedrocks of my freedom that I experience. You know, there's financial freedom all the rest of it.

But then when it comes to flourishing and feeling like a person, feeling like a person with value, I can't experience that by myself. And I'm not talking just about romantic love and partnership, but I'm talking about forms of community. When we had this discussion last about, you know, should we say something when someone is, ultra thin. I was talking to a friend of mine who is a devoted listener to this podcast.

And he was like, no, this is a really important discussion because in every choice is a norm. And he cited Aristotle, which is, he's a smart fucking guy. And he cited Aristotle and he said, a knife tells you how to use it, right? The shape of the handle, blah, blah, blah. So in every object and everything are a set of norms. which are attached to it and you can't fully displace. And so when you're thinking about a Zen pic,

and you're thinking about ultra-thinness, or you're talking about buckle fat removal, or whatever else it might be, and there are a whole bunch of attendant social norms that come with it. And I said something which started out as a joke, and then I realized I was serious, which is how all of my intellectual work goes. I'm like, ha, ha, ha, I'm so stupid.

And I'm like, wait, is it stupid? I was like, well, I really want to, like a, you know, a phenomenology of butter. Like, you know, what is a way of thinking about life and norms which emanate from butter? And I was like, well, actually, you know, the thing which is really important to me is food and the sharing of food. Because in every culture, a table laden with food is a symbol of plenty and it also exerts a kind of gravitational force.

people gather around it. They are compelled to surround this table. Like eating, sharing, conviviality. It is something which brings you into contact with other people. Starvation, a Zempic, thinness, you know, caloric restriction. All of this has like an inherent social isolation to it. And so it has, I've been thinking about it particularly over Christmas because, you know, I'm not going to lie.

I do get self-conscious about like, how much am I eating and how much weight am I gaining, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I've been trying to, like, look at my belly fat and look at my thigh fat and go, like, all of this is the love that I have experienced with others on my body. Like, that's what it is. Like, that's the norm. That's my norm. I'm not saying normal.

I'm not saying that's the norm in terms of, like, that is what is normal. But it's like, that is the norm that I am trying to convey with my body. And I suppose on the flip of that, what is the norm that has been? conveyed by people who have participated in every beauty every time I see someone with like

the lip stain and extreme Botox I think what to me is that a symptom of like what is the norm being communicated to me here and to me it's that you need to log off social media but then if I can play the Uno Reverse back to me you know you said that one day you're probably going to get

Botox because I'm on social media too much But my question for you is like, why not, even if you don't manage to uphold it, why not aspire to not? Because it's easier for me not to do it if I say I could do it. When I set myself very hard rules, like you're never going to do this. That's when I tend to U-turn. I've noticed this about myself. When I'm like, I'm not going to do this.

I'm not going to start dating this person. I'm not going to do this thing. I'm not going to say this. I'll do that immediately. Whereas if I have the option of like, yeah, there's some leg wiggle room, like maybe one day I'll get Botox. I'm actually less likely to do that because I haven't set myself this hard rule, this moral rule, which I'm going to then break. And I think that's really, instead I check in constantly like, do I want to do this yet? No. Do I want to do this? No. And that actually has worked me a lot better. Like with drinking, it was never like, you've got to stop this now.

It's, I don't want to do this tonight. I'm not going to do this tonight. Actually, I'm going to have a drink tonight. not, but you don't want any more, rather than say when I'm like, I'm not going to eat sugar. That's when I'm going to eat the whole pint of Ben and Jerry's. You know, that's when I binge or I do a U-turn. I've said this before in the podcast. It's a really, it's one of my worst traits, but also biggest tells. If I say I'm not going to do something, you can bet your bottom dollar, I'm going to do that thing. And the question is, when does that become a lie?

Like, at what point am I just lying? and so now I'm like, well, I'm not going to, I'm trying not to say that anymore. I'm trying to set my love hard nose even if I don't particularly want to do that. And I don't think I want to get Botox, but saying I might one day makes it less likely. I will even though that sounds really convoluted and strange. Okay, so you're hacking your brain. I'm hacking my brain. I'm hacking my brain.

By leaving the possibility open, I can then be like, actually not stay. I'm not going to do that. See, for me, I'm like, you know, because I do feel, like, I'm not coming at this being like, I feel so gorgeous all the time. I'm never going to do it. I feel fucking hideous a lot of the time. And that's because people tell me every single day. Like it's hard.

Like, you know, if I start thinking about my body, I'm like, I don't like anything about it. Like, that's where my head goes. And the reason why I articulate, I am not doing this. Like, I'm not taking a Zen pic, even though every single day, I have the thought of what if I did it in secret? And I'm not going to do Botox. I'm not going to have, like, the fat sucked out my cheeks.

I'm doing it because I need people to help me be accountable. to that aspiration. Like, I'm relying on other people to tell me, don't do it. So there was an essay that went around on Substack, which you might have read, which was all about anti-cosmetic surgery and lots of different people were like,

this is very mean and this is that. And I read it and I was like, you know what, we need to be a little mean. We need to be mean and we need to be honest with ourselves. And in this essay, the writer talked about this term that was coined by a 1970s philosopher called Sandra Bartki. And it was about feminine narcissism.

And this is a quote from the piece, which is, it describes the process whereby women, and I don't think it's just women now, I think it's extended to every gender, but I'm encouraged both directly and covertly to become so excessively preoccupied with their appearance that it leads to a perversive self-elionation, a sense of shame, and a greater awareness of one's own deficient body. So the inferiorization, this essay continues, is not inherent, but it's a product of societal pressures. So basically, the more that you look at your self-examination, and laser in on yourself, the more that you will become, you will see the deficiencies in yourself and the more that the work of beauty has to continue. So this, it's a Sisyphian quest

and we've said it before, but like, as soon as beauty becomes your purpose and you're pushing that boulder up the hill, you will never stop pushing the boulder until you opt out altogether. There will always be something else wrong. It's why people who start getting different surgeries continue on and on and on. It's why first you're like, oh, that tweak looks great. And they're like, two years ago, what the hell have they done to their face? What the hell have they done to their body? Because you actually can't stop the more that you notice these things. People, it's like, as this essay says,

if its entire purpose social media is to foster an endless cycle of watching and perceiving, one that constantly besieges the participant with images of their own face and body and contradictory images of what they are not. So it's like you're being fed all these images of what you're not constantly, and that becomes your purpose rather than like reading a book. I mean, so this was something which I wrote down in my little book for things I want to talk about, which is ocular centrism. So the sort of like dominance of seeing and, you know, what that then means for how people think about their appearance. So you talked about dating.

Dating where dating apps take up, you know, an inordinate amount of space and social room and become a really important part of how you, you know, attract people who might be interesting. what's the means of attraction? It's the photo and how are you looking at it. So obviously that beauty and physical appearance and to what extent do you resemble the sort of conventional model of attractiveness becomes more important. But also because, you know, dating apps are perpetual motion machines of endless disappointment. And the only means he has, have of attracting someone, that's your photo. Obviously it connects your desire for love, disappointment that it's not happening and your physical appearance in this ever tightening knot. I mean, you know, it's incredibly, it's incredibly predatory. And I think about this, you know, sometimes, you know,

when like you say to someone you're seeing, you're like, would you still love me if I raise a worm? And they're like, I would never say that. I'm never going to say that. I hate that question. Oh my God. I do it all the time. I'm like, you know, would you still love me? if I was a Soviet tank. Like, you know. Yeah, that's funny, but like the worm thing, guys, pack it up. Pack it up.

Like, either make your own tailored version like the Soviet tank, but the worm thing is over. That's another thing that pisses me off. Another episode, get your own original bits. Get your own original fucking bits, guys. I said that down the camera. Put this on TikTok.

Get your own original bits. I'm fed up of hearing the same fucking bits again and again. We know you don't care about pigeons. Okay, I'm done. Which used to love me if I was a T-34. That's tailored to you. That's great. I wouldn't personally go for it, but that's tailored to you.

The only correct answer to that would be, I would love you more mighty beast of the Soviet battlefield. Oh, right. See, tailored to you. Taylor to you. But like, it's sort of in that vein, you know, like in my head. And it's that sort of thing that my partner thinks is completely point. pointless, you know. I was like, oh, like if you traveled back in time, you know, what would

you say to your younger self by ending up with me? He's like, no, I wouldn't. I would say, don't let Labor take a, you know, pro remain position. I've got bigger fish to fry. I'd be like, find Jeremy. Tell him. Do you know what I do? Tell him, Sacks Dahmer now. You know, I'd be like John McDonald's who ran for the leadership in 2015. That's what I'd do. Well, I mean, that's like, you know. He's like, I do use time travel for much more important purposes. But like one of the things I sort of, I think about and almost ask is, you know, would you have matched with me? Like if all you saw was my photo.

And he's got enough self-preservation to say yes to make the conversation end. But, you know, but the real, the real answer. The real answer is, I don't know. Exactly. You don't know. Someone I'm dating. was like, I don't think you'd have matched with me and I was like, I probably would have done

but also there's loads of people I didn't match with that I then met in real life and was like, I fancy you ten times more than a person I've matched with. So again, I don't know and it's actually irrelevant and it's probably a compliment if I didn't. Well, I think it's also that thing about like the way in which sort of like focus on one's appearance is inherently alienating. The other thing is that like it is really alienating from your own desire.

So I felt completely flummoxed by dating apps because it's not really how I fancy people. And so I think this, you know, what you describe is like a nihilistic fixation on beauty. I suppose like nihilism for me maybe isn't quite the right word because nihilism is sort of like, well, if nothing matters, I'll do this. Yeah. I think maybe it's an expression of, well, this clearly really matters

and everything else is broken and fucked. So, you know, this is the most rational place for me to, you know, put all of my chips. Right. So I think it's maybe something a bit more like that. The thing that I would say in terms of what do you need to get out of it is like, I think you can take the practical steps of like be on social media less or not at all. Like actually, for me, the thing that works is like setting some red fucking lines and articulating them because I want to be held accountable to those those aspirations.

And I think there's another thing. And I think that this is the thing that I would say to like, you know, not just the the individual women who are in my head who've, you know, shield for Botox, but also our listeners who have quite a strong sense of political identity are also having to struggle with things internally, like really struggle with, with the pressures to alter your appearance and and dealing with feelings of low self-worth. Capitalism is for resisting. Do you know what I mean?

Like if you're going to call yourself a leftist, if you're going to call yourself a Marxist, a communist, whatever, you know, if you're going to talk, big talk about radicalism and horizons and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, you know what, that shit will take something of you. It will take you being, better, stronger, more resilient, more determined and more disciplined than you currently are.

And that's why I think that movements of liberation are so important. It's not just the sort of end result of liberation happens. It's how we liberate ourselves through the process of doing. And I think that one aspect of that liberation is to be like, fuck no. No Botox, no needles, no scalples, no buckle fat removal, no BBL, no nothing. Right? And yeah, it's hard. It's hard. You know what's harder?

Freedom. You know what's harder? Liberation? No, it's harder at the end of capitalism? To freedom! She left the slaves. To freedom! But like, it's fucking hard.

Like, you can't... Like, you want to have cost-free politics. Be a liberal. be a liberal no one's stopping you be a lib I mean for me I guess I think your appeal is obviously like politically grounded and it's good to some you're bringing back shame in 2026 you're bringing back shame run the track for mine I guess I'm concerned with it just across all political lines and how much attention is wasted on the pursuit of abuse that actually renders you

less, both less interesting as a person and ultimately will destroy even what you have whether it's beauty or just a face. Because this, do you remember the Scott Westerfield novels? Uglies, Preeties? They were like sci-fi dystopian about how at 16, everyone

undergoes a procedure which makes them totally beautiful but they get a total lobosomy at the same time. I fear that hath come to pass. And that's what I think. I think, from what I've learned about beauty, and I say this is someone who is considered quite conventionally beautiful. Like people come up to me a lot and tell me.

You do find out. I've seen it happen. It happens. It happens a lot, guys. I know you might not believe me. I might not be your cup of tea, but it does happen. What I have learned is... You're my cup of tea.

You're my cup of tea. You're my soul really. You're my old fashion. No, I'm just going to say, like, I'm considered beautiful. And that's fine. What I have learned is it is not... The more I've leaned into that, he has brought me no peace. And it has brought me no satisfaction.

It has brought me... only further stress and anxiety because when you focus on the idea of being beautiful and that is your, that is what makes you valuable, then you will never be the most beautiful in the room. You will never be the most beautiful in the street. You will never be the most beautiful in the train. You'll be scouting around constantly to see who matches you, who goes toe to toe. Because if you put all your value in this thing, which is also transitory and will fade, which is why things like Botox, etc. is there because the fear of losing. that beauty and losing what you think makes you legitimate as a person, what makes you

able to get up and have rights and in the morning be worth listening to, losing that will destabilise you to a horrible degree, which is why I now have to be like, no, I need to read some books and maybe I should probably shave my head. I think this is the thing about beauty and the thing which is like so horrible about it, is that those who feel that they don't have it are miserable, and those that feel that they do are terrified of losing it and are therefore also miserable. Like, it is a regime.

Like, it is a regime that constrains and chokes the imagination and the body and all the rest of it. And I think that one of the things that we should definitely mention is that when we're talking about beauty and we're talking about thinness and we're talking about, you know, cosmetta procedures and blah, blah, blah, blah. what we're actually talking about is a regime of homogeneity. Exactly.

It's not beauty. When I talk about this word beauty that we're using, we're talking about conformism. We're not talking about what actually makes a person beautiful or what marks them out. And I see, like I see so many people blame a lack of beauty and desirability, which is part of the commodity.

Desirability is part of conformity. You can be very beautiful and be low on what Amirsa Rassian calls the like desirability hierarchy. because it works in like social, works with social structures, there's all these different things into like interlocking. But I saw a video the other day with this, you know, woman who was very attractive,

but she wasn't, she wasn't thin, she was fat. And she was saying that her fatness was the reason for her poor dating experience. And she described her dating experiences. I know, and myself included, had the exact same dating experience. And we blame it on different things.

I know women who are considered so conventionally beautiful who talk about their dating experience, and they will be the exact same as someone who is not considered conventionally attractive. There are lots of people who don't fit into the conformity of beauty, who have amazing dating experiences or career experiences because they're not pinning it on this one thing. But I think the beauty has become the be all and end all to pin our misfortunes and our successes on. And that's where we're going wrong.

It needs to be it needs to be decentered. You decented men, women dissented men. Now we're already to de-center beauty. But then also how do we do this? that like how do we do it it's so hard it's so hard i mean i mean this is kind of why i think immersing yourself in a network of relationships of people that will hold you like kind of ideologically accountable is really important so funny you say that literally i got challenged on something i was like i don't like this i don't want to be challenged just call me pretty got to be done anyway anyway i think

i think there's also like one one last thing that i'd like to sort of like round up on and like end on is that like, you know, one day, hopefully we'll all be really old and we'll have that wonderful sense of freedom that can come with being really old. And it's like something which, you know, I recognised from my grandma when she was still alive and stuff like that. Like she did not give a fuck to the extent that it was like really funny. She'd like sit there like drinking her whiskey eating raw chilies because she was a gangster and like just saying outrageous shit. Like, And I don't want to only experience that kind of freedom of the imagination when my body is too old to be able to do much about it.

Do you know what I mean? Like, you know, this thing about like aging being this thing that we have to fight. And when we were talking about aging, it's like facial aging, right? Like, you know, looking older on the body is like, you know, you know, in that aging is a kind of freedom. And so embrace it. Embrace those changes. Embrace that freedom of the imagination.

Because I think that when she was in her 70s, she was having way more fun than when she was in her 20s. Yeah. And in fact, I know that. I know that. And that's because when she was in her 20s, it was all about like, how do I look in relation to men and, you know,

the constraints of the relationships that she had. Yeah. Once that pressure's removed, you're like, oh, I've let our breath. I didn't even know I was holding in. Anyway, we need to do. Dalamas. So this is our regular segment. I'm in big trouble.

And if you are in big trouble, medium trouble, little trouble, grande trouble, venti trouble. Email us if I speak at navaramedia.com. That's if I speak at navaramedia.com. And if you don't have a circle of ideologically aligned comrades, we will do it for you. We will do it for you. I will yell at you not to get Botox. Right in.

I'll stop you. Shall I read this one? Yeah. Or should you? Well, I kind of want you to answer first, so maybe I should read it. Maybe I should break a convention and read it. Okay, cool, right. Dear Ash and Moyer, love the podcast.

I listen every week because I take away so much from your discussions. and it's also my little window to the UK where I sadly no longer live. I write this because I'm in big trouble. I've been in a complicated relationship with my now husband for over 10 years. This relationship has not been easy from the start, as we come from different backgrounds culturally and pursue different hobbies and interests. Our communication has not been great, as I tend to be more confrontational, whereas he rarely talks about what bothers him, unless we're already mid-fight,

and only then does it become clear to me that there are things he has bottled up. However, there are also many moments in which I feel we are loving companions who navigate life together. He's very supportive and caring, an amazing cat dad, and cares about my family, which is important to me. I sometimes question whether I would have been able to graduate uni or deal with my father's passing had it not been for his support. So in many ways, these are just two ways, I'm incredibly grateful for this relationship. However, I do find myself thinking a lot about what makes a happy marriage and whether or not the good stuff makes up for the problems we have had from the beginning. In some ways, I believe many of the issues we have

can be found in other relationships, and there's no such thing as a perfect marriage. But there is one particular aspect that is frequent cause of unhappiness, and I'm not sure how to bring up or navigate. To me, real intimacy is achieved the exchange of ideas, deep thoughts and discussion of theories. I find intelligent debate incredibly stimulating. My husband, on the other hand, is more practical and pragmatic, qualities that have brought him success. When it comes to philosophical debates, it's not that he's not interested, he only likes to hear me ramble on, but he rarely offers a different perspective, and he never challenges me when I share a thought or idea. I know it sounds horrible when I say that, and I want to make clear I admire him in so many ways.

I'm ashamed to admit that sometimes, and this will happen every time Ash shares talks that she has with her husband on this podcast, I feel this is something missing in my marriage. If I'm completely honest, I feel lonely because of this. Maybe I'm asking too much of this one relationship, and this is something I should seek out in friendships. It's probably not healthy that I've turned away from so many people over the last two years. I am half a Garz and Palestinian and many interactions have been hurtful, and I rely on my husband in too many ways. Please help. What do you think I should do? Best wish is, special one. Ooh.

All right. I am not going to address this as a should I stay or should I go question. No, it's not that. And the reason why I'm not going to do that is because ultimately you will know in your heart whether or not you're looking for an excuse to leave. And I can't tell you that because that is knowledge which exists within you. The thing that I'll instead talk about is maybe how do you deal with the sense that there is something missing from your relationship and from your marriage? item one, there is always something missing in relationships and there is a question of can it be cultivated or can you do without it? At the beginning of my relationship with my partner, I maybe think the thing that was missing was him really understanding the sort of

enmeshedness that I had with my family and the feelings of responsibility and stuff like that. And that's because, you know, he's a boy and was allowed to healthily individuate. And I'm a girl and I was trained for this. And that really took time. Like that really took time, like his understanding of that. And how that change occurred was me saying, this is really important to me. Like, can you come with me? Can you be with me while this thing is happening?

And slowly, over time, he has been able to volunteer that. without me asking for it. But it really took me saying, this is really important to me, I really need this from you, asking for it. And then over time, he was able to sort of develop that muscle.

And I still find it incredibly moving, right? Anytime he sort of offers to like step in and like help me out with this thing, which I found incredibly difficult, and especially found difficult and it didn't exist in our relationship, I feel like moved to tears by it, like every single time.

So if that's, that's a course of action that you want to try, right? Can we develop this muscle together? Can we develop this aspect of our relationship together? There are actually some practical things that you can do. One is you can read together, right? You can suggest a book or an article or a thing. So you're not consuming something by yourself and then bringing it to him for his comment. You're experiencing something together, right? And you can make a sort of date night out of it if you want, right? There are lots of ways in which this can be fun.

You know, you read an article, you go out for a nice dinner or a nice drink or something, and you talk about that stuff. And he may not ever like doing that as much as you, but he seems like an overall very caring and loving person. And it seems like he has the capacity to, reach an understanding of he's doing something for you because it's something that you need. And it's something that like we all do in relationships. There's so much stuff where it's like, I'm doing this for you. Would that be enough for you is a question. Would him doing something

out of love for you rather than love for the thing itself? Would that be enough for you? Again, I think you've got to think about that. The second thing is that you talked about having turned away so many people over the past two years. You know, because interactions have been hurtful. I think that's, I mean, Moja, you always say this, is that people often add the most important context right at the end. No marriage, no relationship can be totalizing. Like, there will always be things that you have to get from other people.

That's not to say that you can't work on things within a marriage and say, well, this thing is really important for me, that it takes place within the marriage. But it will never be able, to bring you fulfillment. And certainly actually when it comes to intellectual fulfillment, my partner does not give me all of my intellectual fulfillment. It gives me quite a lot of it.

But I need other people. Like, you know, I need all these other people. Because also it means that I bring him ideas which are fresh and interesting. And when he's not interested or he's tired or he wants to talk about like some lame fucking guitar thing again, you know, I can, I can take that somewhere else. So I think that there is a piece here which is like you really need to reconnect with your community you really need to reconnect with friendships

where you can discuss intellectual things I think before you can really get your head around what is and is not a happy marriage like so much of like you know there's so much stuff that I've had to deal with external to the marriage which has then led to me being happier within it

and it's stuff that had nothing to do with my partner at all. But yeah, what do you reckon? Honestly, I feel like there's little for me to add. You're just such a good comprehensive job of breaking down, all of those things. What I would say is something I see with quite a lot of relationships now, actually, that's not fair. That's too broad generalisation. I think a downstream from our therapy culture chat is the instinct to bring therapy culture chat

into relationships as the way we talk about things. So rather than using the stuff that you might learn through therapy to then frame and shapes and discussions, you bring it directly in. So every kind of like discussion in the relationship becomes about the dynamic and it becomes quite weighty. And there's no room for lightness and fun. And even when you have a conflict,

that conflict becomes this weighty thing that bears the history of all the conflicts that have come before rather than just maybe something that's about one specific incident and then you move forward. So it becomes much bigger than it needs to be. And I wonder within this relationship, where is the space for light and fun? And you say, oh, I want to bring these discussions, but do you have a foundation for being able to bring these discussions? What is the day to day of your relationship like? Is it, you know, practical things and then big relationship discussions?

Because all you've talked about is these sort of like three tenants, which is support. fine but that is a weighty practical thing and then conflict which seems quite like it hasn't you don't feel it gels very well and then this thing that you desperately desire which is chats about humanities there seems to be disconnect between the languages there and it doesn't sound like you have a created environment together where you can have those like light chats or where is play

where is the play and that's something I'm thinking about more and more in my relationships which is you know you want people like, I want to laugh with this person, I want to have fun with it. You have to create the play. You have to create, you know, you have to like, sometimes let things go and not just bring down the paranoia

of, does this person love me? Is this a good relationship? Because there's no room for play when you're always fretting about whether this is a good relationship. And it might not be, but you won't have the space to discover that if you don't create room for potential play

and potential lightness and potential fun. And that doesn't just mean, we're just going to go out on a date and hope that it works itself up. You have to try. When you have a dynamic baked in that is so weighty, you have to really work hilariously to create the play,

which is just like, actually, I'm going to lighten up today. I'm going to do this thing. I'm going to tease them. We're going to play a game. We're going to do this thing. Take it back to that child state rather than the child's state of like, does this person love me? Do I love them?

And they give me the right things. Are we having intellectual discussions? That's just my take. It might be totally wrong. There might be loads of play in your relationship. But the letter that you sent us doesn't sound like it's got much room for the lightness. and play that you, that would be able to beget discussions because it might not be that you're able to meet and have big discussions about philosophy,

but you could be having discussions about, you know, does this, does a bear shit in the woods? And that can turn it to discussion about philosophy. Like I was having a discussion the other day about, um, that turned quite like a weighty one, but it started as a fun one and then it went back to a fun one, you know, like it was, it was about a cultural product that then turned into a discussion of whether you should, like, should you break a cultural. boycott and then you should do something else.

And it was like we went back and forth because there was the ability to have the play. Also, what about mutuality? So what if you establish, okay, we're going to go on this date. We're both going to dress up to the nines. You know, we're going to put that little bit of like umph into being attractive for our partner, right? You ask him, like, actually, like intellectual stimulation for me is a kind of foreplay, right? So I want us to discuss this thing, right?

And you can choose something, you know, it doesn't necessarily have to be, can the subaltern speak, right? Like you choose something which you're both going to talk about. And ask him, is there something you want me to do for you? Is there something you want me to do for you? Is there some way in which I can contribute to this game of doing something for your partner because your partner finds it exciting and stimulating and fulfilling? Like, it doesn't, I think you've made such an important point,

which is like finding lightness. because I think sometimes when you find that lightness things can change right things can really really change once you like tap into that spirit of play I totally agree we've now found the darkness which is the end of the show oh look at that transition smooth as ice I thought it was terrible I thought it was a terrible one but it's okay we got there in the end um wow great show back guys I'm sure you're thrilled but we've now returned to your earwaves. Earwaves?

What the fuck am I saying? All right, bye. Bye for Moya. Get those lights off. Get those lights off now.