Talking Shit with a Yank & a Brit - 23. True Crime & Jazzhand Pastimes

Episode Date: August 31, 2023

This week we're talking jazz hands, a little dating update, mannequins, and we delve into the true crime phenomenon.Join in the conversation by emailing [e-mail] or @TSYBPOD on Insta, TikTok & Twitter/X

Hello and welcome back to Talking Shit with a Yank and a Brit. I don't know what that was. I don't know what that was. I think you could tell by the way you were making me dance, though, is that it was fire. You were busting some grooves. No, I thought you were going to go like, I thought you were going to do the Brit differently. So I'm going to need you to try it again.

Okay. Welcome to talking shit to where they ain't getting out Brit. There we go. Very, I don't know, show tunes-y maybe? I felt like I needed like a top hat and some jazz hands, you know? It's just all the jazz hands. That is how I will cabaret up my show at our cabaret. Just lots of this.

Lots of this. And feathers. Yep. For people that can't see us, we're jazz handing right now. A little bit of Charleston and flappering and, oh, God, yeah, I probably shouldn't do that. I don't think that would go well. You guys would not be successful.

You wouldn't be a successful business. Oh, okay, well. I can be the matinee show, you know. Okay. When people come midday for the buffet or something. No, i just want you to walk around the venue just going jazz just that's all you do jazz hands just walking up to people and jazz handing them that's all i can say too like i don't gotta say anything else excuse me miss do you know where the toilet is you'd be like jazz hands yep okay review um this place is really great i you know i think a lot of the acts are really

novel and interesting lots of beautiful women and men who are performers but there's this one lady who i'm not sure if she works there i'm not sure if maybe she's just like a special needs relative of one of the owners. But all she does is walk around going jazz hands. So watch out for her. She's a little bit scary. Great. That's going to be my legacy. Very enthusiastic though.

Yeah, she really commits. She committed to the role yeah well what have you been up to i will tell you good tell me before i did um busy weekend i even had one of my friends comment on how many steps i got in because my like activity account is shared with some people so you can see if I'm like medium lazy bitch yeah and I am like normally that's what they see so I wonder if they're like did Kate like put her watch on a dog this weekend or what happened but like Friday we went to the Minnesota State state fair otherwise known as the great minnesota get together and i think we probably have the butter statues that was the iowa one wasn't it that's iowa now and i i'm actually a little surprised that minnesota hasn't attempted to do their own butter situation,

but it's a very big fair with lots of different exhibits and attractions that I honestly don't think they need the butter sculptures to draw any crowds because it's so many people. There's so much food. There's so many things to look at, including the people who are there. It's just nuts, but always a good time. I ate so many things. And I mean, one such thing was like fried cookie dough pie and like birthday cake mini donuts and tater tot crusted hot dog on a stick and cheesecake curds.

So, you know, I did have to go get my stomach pumped at the end of the night. Yeah, understandable. But it was worth it. Good, good, good, good. And, you know, the inevitable clogged arteries that they uncover down the road probably oh that's a tomorrow problem yeah it is you're right and then on saturday i did a just a ton of manual labor for our friends in anticipation of their wedding a lot of labor was very sore well my particular job was to basically mulch and like pull mulch and spread it out and uh it was just a lot of work from like 10 a 10 a.m

to 6 p.m did it oh damn yeah that is a lot of manual labor. Did you get paid or? No, but. Were you slave trade? Yes, yes. It was definitely unpaid work, but I wouldn't have expected that because we wanted to help and they fed us and, you know, provided us with lots of delicious snacks and drinks and stuff. So.

Encour encouraging quotes. Yep. I mean, they stood and were like, great job. Now get back to work, you know, pretty frequently,

but there was some encouragement. Well, they sat on the porch and drank lemonade. Yep. And fan themselves gently. Levi was in town. And so he joined us to help with that and go to the fair. And then last night I went to yet another concert of some bands that I don't really listen to that much except for All American Rejects.

Nice. Who else was there? So it was the Get Up Kids, the Starting Line, New Found Glory, and then All American Rejects was the headliner. And it's a tour and they're like swapping out other bands so it was like the starting lines last night and then motion city soundtrack is like replacing them right but had i known that when i bought the tickets that motion city soundtrack wasn't going to be playing i'm not i'm not sure i would have been as into going so oh yeah was Nigel happy though I know he's quite a fan of all of those yeah he was definitely living his best life

he's like Kate hold my bag I need to get closer yeah pretty much uh and I stood in the back just with like his his purse and his coat and his drink, you know, when he was not crowd surfing. And, you know, looked at my watch inside a lot. No, it was a good show. I mean, that's all music I listened to, even if it wasn't those particular bands. So it was a good time. Nice. Lovely. How's your weekend? What have you been up to? Nice. Lovely.

How's your weekend? What have you been up to? Well, I've been hanging out with my new squeeze. It's time. You heard it first. I am in a relationship, people. I'm off the market, baby. I am so surprised at this news i had no idea tell me everything yeah it's been very nice uh came and watched me sing one of my gigs nice and we just did like nice couple-y things really um i also paid a paid played a prank on him did you give him a heads up that you were going to be telling me and the world about this i think he'll be fine with it. Okay.

Just curious. Won't you? Yes, Grandma. Oh, was that him? Where is he? Under your desk? Died him up. So we have quite a oh oh you say uh

i guess like fun dynamic we like to take the piss out of each other and you know you're straight up mean to each other aren't you yeah pretty much yeah okay yeah and the other night i i know it's disgusting isn't it So I stayed around his the other night And it had sort of come up in conversation That previously that he had a mannequin He had a what? A mannequin

Okay And I realised that this mannequin was Under his bed. Weird. Yeah, so... Well, I guess it's just a handy storage place for this. Okay, let me rephrase, why does he have it? Yeah, that's probably a more important question.

I don't know, I think he had it for some Halloween party or something. Some weird sex thing. Okay. Yeah, sex doll. You know. So anyway, I decided to, he went to work. I stayed for a bit and then went home. And I decided to play a little prank.

I've just sent you the pictures of what I did. Oh, no. Okay. So do you want me pictures of what I did. Oh no, okay. So, do you want me to describe what I'm seeing? Do you want to describe my face as I'm seeing them? Yeah, I'll describe your face and then you can... Oh, okay.

Is the book part of this? Well, yeah, I just thought make it look a little more lifelike so i mean first far enough if you don't zoom in you wouldn't necessarily know you're looking at a mannequin just someone maybe with dead behind the eyes glare okay oh god so creepy okay so what i did is i got the mannequin i put it in his dressing gown and i popped it in his bed so that when he came back after work um there was a nice surprise man waiting for him in his bed yeah um so what happened it was quite a shock, I believe. He rung me and just called me the C word.

Oh my God. But in an affectionate way. Right, right, right. I get that it's used way more casually than how some folks perceive it here. Yes. Yeah. But the moral of the story is I'm really proud of myself and it obtained just the reaction I was after. Yeah, I mean, that's a really good prank

and I'm glad you did it. I also just want to comment on his pillow next to him. Okay, yeah. Is that three sheep? Yes. Yeah. I think there's a matching one kind of tucked behind. Okay, well, I'll stop there.

So I want to know more about these pillows. I don't know much about them apart from they've got sheep on them. Could you get some of those details for me? Yes, I will. Alan, if you could give us some feedback. I'm going to call him Alan. Perfect. If you could give us some feedback on the sheep pillows, where they're from, what they represent, and how they make you feel.

Yeah. Treasured family heirlooms, or did you just see them at the shop and you're like, ooh, I must have those. I like them. Let's not get confused. I'm not making fun of those. I like them. Let's not get confused. I'm not making fun of them. I like them. Good. Okay.

I also like the peperomia in the corner. It looks nice and healthy. And the book, you know. Many a plant. I guess I'm curious to know about the book. Like, is it a good book? What do you recommend it? I don't think he started reading it.

It was on the shelf in the to be read section. But I thought Joe the mannequin would appreciate some bedtime reading. Some bedtime story. Yeah. I mean, kind of, I think probably a scary one, but maybe Joe the mannequin isn't really afraid of much. That mannequin's got cracking eyelashes. I will say that.

What? He also sleeps with his eyes open. Oh, yeah, damn. Are we sure this isn't maybe Josephine, the mannequin? Well, I mean, there's sort of a prominent, you know, sort of Ken bump. Ken doll bump. Oh, right, right, right. I forgot.

Okay. bump oh right right right because i forgot okay well you better watch your back because i suspect something's probably coming your way i know and if alan wants to like loop me in to help i would absolutely say no 100 call me alan Call me Alan. Call me Alan. Oh, it's a good song. I didn't think about the repercussions. Yeah, you're fucked. Sorry, dude. Although he did bring around loads of googly eye stickers,

and he stuck them on, like, my little Buddha in my bedroom and a picture downstairs. Some cans of beans and some plants. That's probably Jess's butthole oh probably yeah maybe that's why she's been dragging her ass on the floor the past few weeks check it out let me let me know if there's a cool guy out there i thought her butt was staring at me oh did you ever see the any like ads for those gems that you can like hang on a cat's tail yeah i don't know why that's immediately what i thought of when i started visualizing googly eyes on your dog's butthole so there's that just got a pair of glasses for our ass yep there you

go buddy that's your face now well please keep me posted on the subsequent pranks that either you commit or experience because i do do love a good prank particularly particularly on loved ones, too, because I don't know. Like, they have to kind of just get over it. There's nothing they can do about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, it's a classic Gemma and Kate mess around. Oh. I think we should maybe dip our toes into the water with our respective loved ones and then report back. Yes, let's do that.

I need... Massage ever get mess around. Mess around. All right, I need some fishing wire. 16 tubes of Colgate toothpaste. It's got to be Colgate. That's important. And about 25 yards of sod.

Okay. Just making a – yeah, just, you know, like the fake, like, grass that you can roll out. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Just making a mental note. Okay. I'll write that down.

It's going to be real expensive, but it'll be worth it. Do you know what I love is on New Girl with Winston's pranks. When he marries the girl too. Far too big or far too small. Yeah. Sticks a feather in Cece's mom's shoe. Yeah. Sticks a feather in Cece's mom's shoe or has a badger released in Cece's wedding to Chevron. Like a rabid badger. Oh, God. Oh, it's a good show. Yeah.

Correct. What else? I mean, you had a gig, I know, which is why we're recording a little bit later than normal. Uh, I'm just looking at my camera. Oh, I went to a pub quiz, actually. We went to a pub quiz on Thursday

and we fucking won. Where was it at? Can we go when I come over? What was your team name? What did you win? What were some of the questions? That's a lot of questions. Okay.

I love pub quiz. So, it was at a brewery in tentaton it is like and it was quite cool actually it was like quite fun questions and there were like challenges as well so like they had certain challenges like the first person to give the barman something beginning with f like the first 10 people get a point or something like that did you give them a frog i can't remember a fart a flag and then they had like a true or false round

where everyone stood up and you had your hands on your head if it was true and hands by your side if it was false and if you got it wrong you had to sit down and then it was the last three people standing got either 15, 10 or 5 points. And we got the 15 points which clinched it for us.

And we won a shitload of ciders and beers. That sounds fun. Like, I really, really love trivia a lot. Do you? Like, a lot. I'm just going to start writing stuff down for when you come over. I only just finally got to go to one in England when we were there last, too.

We went to Riddles Cross, and that's where I learned the game about, like, saying really neutrally song lyrics oh is it yeah actually i'd like to do a little shout out. I mean, we've noticed in recent months that various Instagram ads are using the same music as this podcast. There's now the Emma Mattress advert, which is on national TV, which is using our pod music. And I would file a lawsuit, but it is royalty-free music, so I can't. But I'd just like to say to Emma, if you'd like to sponsor this pod, we could come up with some kind of arrangement.

We could both share the music and help each other out. I scratch your back, you scratch mine, you know. I know you didn't consult with me on this, but I am 100% for it and will try a mattress. Yeah, I also will try a mattress if you'd like to give us a free mattress. And we'll endorse it heavily on this on this podcast let's go endorsaling

i immediately thought of like dorsal fins well you do love sharks we know this. So that tracks, actually. Okay. Okay. So, I don't know whether you saw it recently, but there were a few articles that came out saying, well, that watching true crime is potentially a massive red flag. Massive, even. Not just a red flag, but like...

Massive. The title says massive. Okay. I don't think I did see this, actually. Oh, really? Give me some more details. Okay, actually. Oh, really? Give me some more details. Okay, well.

So a psychologist has warned that tuning into true crime shows to relax is a red flag. Psychologists have suggested that it's a major red flag if you use true crime shows to relax. It turns out that watching these scary or violent shows can actually be the sign of something more serious. Dr. Thema Bryant explains that treating true crime shows as a way to relax before bed could mean the trauma portrayed in the

series is familiar to you. So, yeah. So she's basically saying if your idea of relaxing before you go to sleep is to watch three episodes of forensic files yeah yeah law and order um then she would encourage you to think about why that why is trauma relaxing to me well it's because it's i think she's kind of saying like this seems this is normalized to you because of either your experiences or something and so that it's like a comfort because it's what you know right exactly yeah so it's um if you grew up in high stress situations or have you know been harmed or involved in crime or attacks violation

um it feels familiar to you and so that's what feels comforting to some people when it really shouldn't right no it's probably not a healthy sign. No. I definitely thought you were going to say, like, if it's comforting to you and something deeper is happening, like, you might be a serial killer. That also could be a potential red flag. Okay. So I guess tell me what's your position on, like, true crime, the obsession with obsession with it like how do you feel about it do you are do you enjoy it and then if so was this a red red flag you disclosed to you know all your suitors immediately yeah the whole slew of them as I'm gesturing around my room. Yeah, so I did also get really obsessed with true crime. Podcasts, documentaries, dramas.

And don't get me wrong, I do still like them. But I think I got a little too obsessed. So it started with Ser the podcast yeah me too and my favorite murder yeah and my favorite murder um i think cereal is like probably the one of the first podcasts i listened to i think me too with adnan syed right yeah the first yeah that was actually just a really good series, I thought. It was. And if you haven't listened to it, I mean, check it out because it's great.

Just an investigative dive into the story of, I think it's Hay Min, the girl who got murdered, and Adnan Syed and the case against him. Essentially, he was obviously put away for her murder and it's sort of a delve into whether he did it or not and if he's guilty or innocent and the whole way through it's back and forth and you can't decide and even the journalist doesn't know so it's it's really good really well done um and then obviously making a murderer is kind of oh yeah yep the same thing but delves more into like potential corrupt police involvement and courts yeah courts and things like that so that set me off on a bit of a obsession with it so i started listening to loads of different podcasts on various murders, serial killers, you know, psychopaths, cults, just everything really.

But then I got to a point where I started to, I felt it was affecting me. Oh, okay. Like I felt a bit more paranoid um I mean as a woman anyway when you're walking down the street at night it's you're well aware of your surroundings and on edge anyway yeah but it felt worse I was like getting worried about people breaking into my house at night and attacking me like the golden state killer and things like that do you know what i mean like it started to affect me in more ways than one and i thought i think i need to just take a little step back from the old murder docs and uh listen to something a little bit more funny. Hence why we started this podcast.

To relieve people of their stress and worries. You know, it's funny because I feel like my origin stories are kind of the same as yours. That's why we're friends. Yes, that's the only reason. The only reason, yeah. But then I remember there being kind of a shift in the podcast we were talking about and listening to, kind of away from the dark stuff and the true crime stuff to, you know, the more amusing stuff or like serious stuff that's not about that anyways, you know? that anyways, you know? And I think you and I probably were on that same kind of vibe of just like, okay, I don't know if I need to take a break from it. Maybe I've just kind of lost interest,

maybe desensitized. I'm not sure. But if you can stand back and kind of true crime phenomenon. It's like I can understand it, and I still have to think about, like, what drew me to it. Because I think with Serial, that was just a well-done story that was more than just about this murder, right? Yeah. So, but then like my favorite murder, which has this kind of blend of humor and telling the stories of the victims.

And I know there's people out there who kind of feel strongly against some of their work and there's people who really love it. I really kind of, I've kind of stopped listening to that podcast as much too. But I think there's something to be said about the fact that like finding humor in kind of some really dark stuff as much as that could really kind of be initially horrifying to people. There's something, what's the word I'm looking for? There's something to it in terms of like processing it I guess you know what I mean yeah I think it's a it's I think I can't speak

for men but I think for women at least it's like it's a way for us to learn especially obviously in relation to serial killers and because most people that get murdered are women and I think it's a way of learning how to potentially

avoid those situations how to protect ourselves and like signs to look out for in the real world. I think that's why people are drawn to it so much. Yeah. Have you ever with any of your friends or just like in a discussion with anyone talked about like a, a true crime thing and discuss like you

know if that were me this is what i would have done or yeah you know like or now i i i'm gonna think twice about walking down a dark alley in the middle of the night you know something like that heavy and it almost feels like it's a way for people to when you're kind of talking about these things with your friends like share information in a way to're kind of talking about these things with your friends, like share information in a way to like kind of give a heads up and also discuss ways to like be safe. Yeah. You know what I mean? Though, like if I found myself like chloroformed and put in a trunk, I'd be like,

I'm very much the type of person who's like, I just hope my death is fast. I just give up. So there is that. There was a study I was reading about in an article I saw kind of related to this, where it was that for women in particular, it's kind of linked to the fear of victimization. was that for women in particular, it's kind of linked to the fear of victimization. And I also think for some of it, a part of it is like, we want to know the why. Maybe this is, this is maybe more what it is for me. Like for example, the let, let be case. Yep. let be case. To me, it's the why of how someone could do that and wanting to, I guess,

seek meaning behind their actions in a way that isn't just like just anybody is capable of this. There's something genetically, biologically wrong with this person. They have a mental health issue. They've had a brain injury. They had something doesn't just like make any person a risk to us because I think we as a people have a hard time accepting that you for example Gemma just one day could decide to be a monster that's it and there's a very big difference between a passion killing where someone has got angry and lost their head and potentially snapped and accidentally killed someone yeah and then premeditated murder where it's what am i trying to say so, there's various different reasons why people kill. And some of it is, like, sexually driven. Some of it is because they're... Trauma driven because of a thing.

Trauma driven, yeah. There's so many different reasons, but it's so alien to us as, quote unquote, normal people. as quote-unquote normal people um and especially cases like the letby case where you know she it would appear she is guilty of killing and attempting to kill numerous premature babies yeah like what's gone through her head to make her want to do that why is she doing it what was she thinking it's such a crazy

thing to even consider I'm too scared to steal a sweetie out of a shop oh come on now i know but i am like i feel extreme guilt doing things like that for someone to kill children or you know break into people's houses and sexually assault them

in front of their partners and then kill them. It's just an absolutely horrific and terrible thing to do. And it's fascinating to learn how people get into that mindset, what happens to their brain. Well, we want something to have happened to them i feel like yeah the most scariest thing is when nothing has happened they're like we can't like the parents are like i you know they had a great upbringing and yeah and no tbi no trauma and it's just like this is just who they were. And I think, you know, you can probably go through a bunch of different like big killers in history. And some of them have some of those things. Some of them had like a really traumatic upbringing or experienced head trauma

too or something. And then kind of became known as, I can't't I could probably name several serial killers but I can't say I would recall that their actual background but like Ted Bundy I think is one where people are still like yeah not really sure why bro was like that you know that's it and interestingly I you know a while ago I went to that talk on serial killers oh yeah and she was talking about there was a guy that was doing a big study into it um because as you said like a lot of them have childhood trauma or were assaulted themselves or um had a head or brain injury but there's some killers that just kill for apparently no reason so he started looking into the brain scans and brain matter of various murderers and serial killers and discovered that there's a certain part of the brain that's um i can't remember whether it was overfiring or underfiring, but it basically found that killers all had this particular brain anomaly in common.

Oh, okay. So they could potentially pick that up in people, and it's basically related to empathy. Like, they don't have empathy for other people, basically. Oh, that's sad. for other people basically and he ended up doing loads of brain scans um with serial killers and murderers loads of normal people um and then loads of just like random people as well and found that a lot of serial killers had it, and then also came across one of the random test subjects had it.

Okay, so someone who's supposed to be in the control normal population group? Yeah. Looked up who it was, and it was him. Bum, bum, bum! Wait, sorry, it was who? it was the scientists oh it's his own it was his own brain he's like when am i gonna start killing that's it um so then that like prompted more research and they obviously found that you know you can have this abnormality but it's how you deal with it and his particular lack of empathy made him a good scientist because he was very logical and sort of unemotional in that sense um but he also said you know i had a really good upbringing my mum was incredible and I never had any knocks to the head so maybe that also affected it so it's kind of fair to say there's a correlation

amongst people who kill and this brain abnormality but that doesn't mean everyone who has it is going to be a killer because it probably is a vulnerability that needs some other thing to kind of trigger it, right? So because he didn't have a difficult childhood, he had a good upbringing, lots of support, probably didn't experience a lot of things that a lot of the other ones did, it didn't almost like cue that abnormality in a way and that's true about mental health um issues as well because you think about certain mental health issues mood disorders personality disorders and we talk about like are they genetic is it nature

is it nurture and i think like for the most part there's it a bit of both. We don't know for sure, but there is like a genetic predisposition to certain things. If you have family who has depression, for example, you're more likely to or bipolar. Doesn't mean you will, but you're more genetically predisposed. But you also kind of need like a catalyst a little bit to kind of spark it. a little bit yeah to kind of spark it so for him what made him like particularly successful was because of perhaps some of this plus his nurture his environment whereas those people who did kill didn't and it sent them down you know a different pathway i guess interesting yeah i think he was like the great grandson of some prolific murderer as well that he found out through this oh um so it seemed to be a genetic

thing i'm not talking very well today you had the day off it's okay yeah um i also think one of the reasons i've kind of i've not gone off true crime i'm just not as obsessed with it anymore yeah it's because one i think the market's been like just absolutely saturated with it like there's so much shit out there now it's true and i think some things have gone a little bit too far like some people in a way glorifying serial killers not respecting the victims like the stories are always more about the killers and not the poor people that lost their lives. You remember the Dharma show on Netflix? I don't know.

Did you watch it? I'm guessing not. It's the guys that called gay guys. Oh, Dahmer. Okay, your accent threw me there. I thought you said Dharma, like as in Dharma and Greg greg i was like yeah i have seen that show what's that got to do with this but yeah jeffrey dahmer okay yeah and people really i think we're like because of the actor too but we're like i love him jeffrey dahmer yay and then it turned out that they didn't contact any of the victims' families before releasing it.

Or, you know, that's bang out of order. If you're going to depict them in a drama series, you've at least got to get their permission or just give them a heads up that it's happening. Did you watch it? I did, yeah. So did I. And did you feel... It made me uncomfortable because at some point there was and I I think this is probably closer to like the true life than not but like at some point I'm like

this the way this is being portrayed almost makes me feel kind of bad for him you know so you're starting to have like some empathy for this person it's and I was like I often do yeah some intentionality with that but again i think that is kind of the nature of it because a lot of these people when you do look into their backstory have a fucking terrible upbringing yeah and there there have been certain docs or shows that i've listened to where I am like fucking hell like I can not understand why they're doing it but I can understand how they've got to that point like they've had the most terrible life no chance in hell really a functional human right that's it no and I think that's the other reason too that we try to seek motive and intent behind such horrible things

because it's just even if we can't understand why we can't understand why this this nurse did this to all these babies and like it seems like she put herself in a position to have access which is even worse right like but like I would it would make me feel a little less uneasy, upset, confused about it if I knew for sure that it was because of, I don't even want to make excuses or give examples, that could be her motive, but you know what I mean, I think. Yeah. Right, just where it's like, I guess those things made her snap.

Yeah, it would, would yeah not understandable but it would make it it's an answer to what otherwise yeah otherwise kind of like senseless thing right it makes no sense and we need to have order and labels kind of in order to be able to process things which is why people go to therapy you know yep um to kind of identify the things that you know dictate our actions and what why we are who we are and I think I don't think any of these people could have like I don't think this let be person could have gone to therapy and probably had have that change her but who knows no and i think the the scariest thing with her is that you know she was clearly uh she's been described as very intelligent very

conscientious um and i think for me the thought of killers being very intelligent and very aware of what they're doing, even scarier. Like, like Ted Bundy, like he's described as good looking and charismatic and charming and, you know, not your typical serial killer. I i mean i don't know what a typical serial killer looks like or is meant to look like but right that makes it all the more scarier because it's like a wolf in sheep's clothing well and i don't you think that there's probably people out there who are a little bit nervous about like giving birth and they're side-eyeing their nurses now like she went under the radar for long enough that she was able to do that it would make me wonder you know you put a lot of trust in to people I put a lot of trust into you know strangers all the time that they're not gonna to be monsters who do something horrible.

Like I let people come do service work at my house and just hope for the best, you know. Just hope I don't get murdered. Yeah, which is kind of, I think that's probably why we see, I think we kind of said this at the top, why we see it's like a lot more female audience in a way for some of these things because of, I think just it's kind of our day-to-day life and maybe there's a little bit of like education and preparation, but also maybe some comfort in knowing that like we're all in this together. There's women out there who've suffered and, you know, we remember them and we think about like them when we, you know, try to protect ourselves and our female friends.

I also think that like a lot of them are like single women who have maybe the unfortunate reality of having to be a little bit more protective of themselves because they don't have support you know in home or something like that yeah 100% and there seems to be like a massive rise in the popularity of toxic masculinity yeah which is making it even worse that for like the women who are constantly having to take measures to protect themselves right exactly like did you hear they've actually had to send like psychologists into schools because like the boys are being brainwashed into this, like Andrew Tate mentality from like TikTok and stuff. And so they're actually having to send people into schools to be like, boys, this isn't right. You can't actually treat women like that. And this is how you should treat them as equals

because it's not actually acceptable and it's very dangerous and harming and like what why has it gone so backwards and why is it so popular that that's now happening that was happening in the uk i remember you telling me about this like that was happening a while ago but i i don't think that's happening here because I actually don't think that like as a society we care as much here in America. No, yeah, it's unfortunate. and fragile masculinity for a long time because, you know, we see really horrific things happening to women by men, either like men they knew or strangers because of entitlement and like gender roles and like kind of I think some of the expectations we put on men and women. I think some of the expectations we put on men and women.

And I think we talk about like the shame that it is that it's happening, but we never actually talk about why. So if there are people sending psychologists into schools here, then that would mean like we actually care about something. Oh, poor little America. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, little America. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, God. So did you see any follow-up about that? Like is it effective or were the boys like, no, we want to be toxic? We want to be toxic.

One thing that I think about is, is it this like idea that men can't be emotive, men can't have feelings, men can't, men have to be X, Y, and Z. That leads to like this kind of repression of themselves. And then like the only acceptable form of like emoting from a man is anger. Right. Yeah. Because that's very masculine and fighting. Oh, boys will be boys, you know. And that's why I think one of my we talked about this a while ago. The ick for me is when I see this kind of like over display display of anger and machismo and masculinity and like you want to go bro like i fucking hate that

so much but i think that's like men think that that's like they're maybe they don't think but subconsciously that's how they are taught to act yeah i think it's um as you say, like boys are told not to cry. Boys don't cry. And that's actually your body's way of releasing trauma and releasing emotions. So if they're holding all that in for 20, 30 years, the only way they can act out is aggression and violence yep and then you know there's people pushing it like andrew tate yeah tell me what you read about him um well to be honest i've like stayed away from him. Obviously I saw that he was arrested for human trafficking. Yeah.

Looks like. Real good role model boys. Nice. Well done. Looked like he ran like a webcam business. Gross. Employed like 70 odd girls and loads of them have accused them of being held captive and being forced to do certain things. Non-consensual things, yes.

Non-consensual things, yeah. So I just had a quick look at some quotes that he has made. It seems he doesn't like poor people. He doesn't like women. He seems to think that in order to be successful, you just have to have lots of money and drive a Lambo or a Ferrari. And don't be beta. Don't be beta.

He doesn't think depression is real. It's when you're beta. So he said here about men crying, he said, oh, real men cry and women can cry and men cry too. There's nothing wrong with it. But there absolutely is something wrong with it. Life as a man is far more difficult than life as a woman. Okay. The most important thing anyone can do in their life is have children. When I speak to some of these feminists who are like, I don't want kids, I think you're the most miserable, stupid bitch in the world. I feel seen by him now.

It's all about like rejecting weakness. He says, reject weakness in any form. You don't need to be handsome. You just need to be scary. How? Get big in the gym, have status, make money and be competent and dress like a mafia boss.

Got cancer, bro. That's just weakness. Yeah. So did you ever see the Barbie movie? No, I haven't yet. Okay. I will refrain from discussing that further at this juncture.

Okay. Hold that thought. I just wanted to do some on the women ones because these are exciting. So I was getting on a plane and I could see through the cockpit that a female was a pilot. And I took a picture and said, most women I know can't even park a car. Why is this woman flying my plane? And they banned me. Okay.

Females are the ultimate status symbol. People think I'm running around with these hoes because I like sex. That's nothing to do with the reason why I'm running around with these bitches. I've got these bitches so everyone knows who the don is. Okay, so like objectified but we're also like the worst.

There's such hypocrisy sometimes. Yeah, I'm so confused. But okay. Yeah, so essentially he's a twat. Yeah, so essentially he's a twat. Yeah, big time. Far from what I can work out.

I just like, it seems to me like probably he got his rise because he was like maybe rejected when he was younger. Maybe he was small. Maybe he was kind of a nerd or a loner and felt like he didn't get enough attention from women and became sort of like have you heard about like incels yeah you know like that whole group where it's like i hate women they don't want to fuck me and fuck them but then like all they want like as soon as they get a girlfriend like something it's just like it's such a nag like well if you don't like me then i don't like you fuck you then and i just i don't understand how no i guess that's just it i just don't understand no i don't understand either. I don't get it. Can someone explain it to us? Yeah. If we could get some alphas on to explain what crack is.

I think, yeah. I mean, here's a quote as well, which sort of sums it up. I think the women belong to the man. Mm-hmm. So they feel like they own us. And maybe they're threatened because historically and traditionally the woman did belong to the man and and we relied on men for you know our money our food you know historically we had to get married to a man because otherwise we didn't have anything when we couldn't work and that was how you kind of carried on like supporting your family as a woman right

yeah so maybe it's like like an ancestral trauma as well yeah but they're not all men are like it are they there's no there's lovely men out there there just seems to be a weird little bunch that can't get over it well and I think hearkening back to kind of like your days on the dating apps i'm assuming you encountered some of them right like you maybe didn't respond fast enough or you were kind of like no you know thanks but no thanks or didn't laugh at a joke and it was kind of like well you're ugly anyways it's, you swiped right on me though. You know? So, but yes, it seems to me like it's like with anything, there's the bad apples that ruin the whole bunch, so to speak. Yeah. But they're always like the most vocal too. So, and I just, you know, we hear about feminism almost sometimes as if that's a dirty word too. But I think a friend of mine said this to me after we saw the Barbie movie about kind of the point is that the patriarchy and like masculinity actually is really not working for men either.

And it's really kind of harmful for not only women but also men. Yet it still exists and gets, gets you know it seems like it's kind of resurged and i think part of that is to do with trump and some of his bullshit too yep um and making it kind of more acceptable to say things that perhaps people didn't want to say or like say that they believed in so they at least faked it which is why you know i think there are so many women falling for kind of like that fake persona. And then it's like, oh, it turns out that this person was an abusive piece of shit, you know. And then we see the issues like the kind of prevalence of intimate partner violence and like, you know,

sexual assault from someone you know, whether it's a long term partner or a short term partner or a friend because of this kind of entitlement. partner or a friend because of this kind of entitlement. And like, I, you know, maybe one day we can talk about our own experiences kind of, um, with horrible relationships or having to, you know, have just terrible encounters with men. But I often joke about this, even though I shouldn't, um, for a couple of reasons, but just like, I, there was a serial like groper molester rapist thing going on when I was in college. And to the point where like the school and the local law enforcement basically created little shuttle buses for people at the end of the night to get rides home,

men and women, it wasn't exclusively women. But like primarily for the women because they were the ones who were getting attacked. And I was like, no one's going to molest me. Look at me. I'm fine. I'm going to walk home by myself. No biggie. And I did. And yeah, thankfully nothing happened to me.

But like that was how I think also because of society problems, I was like, how like I would be very arrogant to assume that someone would want to attack me. Oh, God. But there was like, yeah, I think it was actually a couple different guys doing it. But just like basically waiting for drunk females walking home or just alone, maybe not drunk in the middle of the night and like basically jumping out of bushes and like groping them I don't think anything went much further than that but obviously scary and like disgusting and what the fuck like we can't and then it's like we'll walk home in groups or get a ride home why do I have to moderate my behavior for you you know let's teach men to not do that instead. Yeah, exactly. I once had an experience on a bus.

I was coming back from college. And funnily enough, I sat at the top of the double-decker bus. And there was like a homeless guy walking up and down, like clearly on crack or something. And I was really scared of him. on crack or something and I was really scared of him and this guy then got on the bus and sat in the seat opposite me on the other side of the aisle and I thought oh my god yeah okay yeah so like parallel to me yeah and I thought oh thank god he's got on like at least I'm not going to get attacked by this homeless guy now and halfway into the journey I like noticed out the corner of my eye that he had undone his trousers and whacked his dick out and was just sitting there oh my god

with his cock out and I was like it like the normal guy not the homeless yeah the normal guy my savior normal quote-unquote guy yeah and he was like smirking and it made me feel physically sick and I was you know I was quite young at the time I was I must have been 16 17 to be fair right even so like no skills whatsoever to like protect yourself ask for help respond because like at that point you're like just don't make any noise and be polite exactly and that's exactly what i did um and just sat there and tried not to look at him until i got to my stop and then ran off and ran to my parents and told them about it and called the police but the police then

didn't get in contact with me for another three months and I then had to go into the police station and they did like a photo lineup where I had to try and pick him out oh three months later three months later of I think it was 60 mugshots when you were more nervous about the homeless guy and then really probably as soon as you saw the other guy's penis chose not to look at him again exactly yeah yeah yeah and it turned out I heard through other people that there had been this guy who had been flashing school kids on the bus for a period of months and nothing seemed to have been done about it and bear in mind as well we have cctv cameras on buses so if if they had wanted to look into it they probably could have you know at least

pinned down where he was getting on where he was getting on, where he was getting off, what times he was targeting people, things like that. But they didn't do anything about it. And by the three months point, I could not remember what he looked like. Got any pictures of his penis? Because maybe. But that's the kind of behavior that escalates as well. It starts off with flashing. Oh, yeah.

Then it escalates to something else because they don't get a thrill out of it anymore. And it could have, you know, potentially have escalated into something much more serious. But it didn't seem like it was being taken seriously. Do you think that that's something you could have, like, maybe said to the driver at all? think that that's something you could have like maybe said to the driver at all like a part of me just is like that would have been something i would have considered in those shoes in your shoes but maybe not but then i'm also like that's what i should have the driver even equipped well is the driver even equipped to like deal with it like other than get a fucking good look at this guy right well i i think i did speak to someone about this and they said yeah what you should have done was

speak to the driver when you were about to get off and what he should have been trained to do is to stop the bus not let anyone off and call the police oh yeah

and get him arrested there and then so that's what I should have done but yeah I was so I was just so like just wanted to get out of that situation

I was like I just want to get off the bus it goes back to like this kind of debate about should we be teaching kids younger you know in in school like here's what to do if this happens here's what to do if this happens and some people are like yep we gotta teach kids how to like know what to do to stay safe and then it's like other people are like no let's teach little boys to not be fucking perverts yeah you know and it's like not to rape that's it's probably both it's a conversation about both right um but i like i said i don't know if i would have thought of that either and you know depending on how the bus drivers are trained like putting like imagine if it was just

like a little old lady would you want to put her in that situation like this guy's showing me his junk upstairs he's kind of scary and she's like okay dear let me just go have a chat yeah yeah and you don't know how you're going to react in that situation until it happens really no and nothing quite like that has happened to me though my own experience is um more involved people I knew um yeah but similarly no clue really like other than blame myself some for some reason um like I'm the reason this happened to me so um I don't know it It's really frustrating too because I feel like even it's

like a spectrum. We have Andrew Tate kind of on this one end and then we have kind of people, men on the other end of the spectrum who probably are to the extreme non-toxic masculine or whatever you want to call the other end of the extreme but then very like normal people men we know who we would never consider to be problematic but still have kind of some of these belief systems or ideals because of what are what society says like and they don't even just make like inappropriate jokes when they're with the lads and things like that, which they'll say is bants, but would you say it to your daughter? Just like also kind of not perpetuating, but like giving, normalizing or giving a pass to things that then other men take to the next level yeah so like lads night they're all kind of making jokes about things but then one of the guys

decides to go to the next level and he's like no my boys thought it was you know she shouldn't have been wearing that then yeah she was asking for it well I think this is an ongoing conversation, but I am curious to hear what the audience at home, you know, think about true crime, toxic masculinity, the influence. Like if you are a big lover of true crime, tell us why, if you've thought about it, if you're not, tell us why. If you think that there's an answer to how to address this kind of issue, if you think that there's an answer to how to address this kind of issue. Please do that. We'd love to hear it. Yeah, because that's what we're doing on this podcast,

solving the world's problems. Yes, obviously. So get in touch by emailing talkshit2us at gmail.com or get in touch on social media, which is tsybpod. Nailed it that time. Nailed it. Crushed it. Thank you.

I had to look at the keyboard just to look at the letters. You just highlighted them. Yeah, do get in touch. Join the conversation. Send us any stories or tales that you have that we could discuss or help you with because we are more than qualified to do that am i the asshole you know you are baby yeah that's very high-pitched, that one.

Sorry to all the dogs and people listening too loud with their AirPods. Okay. I'm out of the arsehole for telling my fiancé that if he expects me to contribute 50-50, we have to make some serious lifestyle changes. My fiancé sat me down yesterday and gave me a long talk about how he feels like I don't contribute enough to the household, particularly in the financial sense. I was a bit caught off guard by this, but was willing to hear him out since he wasn't wrong. He makes a lot more than I do, and we've always split bills accordingly, which end up being about 80% him. I asked what he wanted me to pay now, and he was adamant about it being 50-50. I asked if everything was okay with his job or if he needed to take fewer hours

and he wouldn't answer me. I honestly wouldn't have gotten upset if there seemed to be an actual reason behind it but he just said he'd been thinking about it a lot over and over. And every time I asked what brought him to this conclusion and what is going on, eventually he just said, this is how it's going to be, take it or leave it. Those exact words in response to literally everything I said, full shutdown, no explanations. I told him that was fine. I'll take it. And asked if he'd made a Zillow account yet or expected me to. Now, I don't know what a Zillow account is, but I think it's like a house. Spell it. Z-I-L-L-O-W.

Yeah, so it's like a real estate platform. Okay, cool. He looked confused and asked why he would need a Zillow account. I explained there's no way I can afford half our rent in our current place, so we'll probably have to move into a one bed apartment. He got mad and asked why I didn't have savings. I told him that I do, but I'm not paying rent out of my savings because that's a terrible and unsustainable idea. I also began to go over what our new food budget would be, our new entertainment budget, and that we probably would have to sell the cars and get one less expensive because I can't afford half the payments on an Audi and

a Land Rover. I then explained that date nights would probably have to be reduced to um but we could still do things like buffalo wild wings or something and i prefer thursday nights because you get two orders of boneless wings for one oh the gourmand do you remember when we went there we took you guys there it was the it was the place we went to with the wings i guess oh really when you guys came for the wedding yeah i do not remember that it's not good okay um okay so basically if he wants me to pay half we're living within my means not his anymore he kind of agreed to it but since then he's been incredibly angry he's not saying or doing anything but it's like he's walking around the house in a cloud of piss. Sorry, a cloud of pissed off-ness. I sent him six Zillow listings, all of which he's called uninhabitable for various reasons, some of which I think were valid, some I disagree with. He's now

saying that I'm being unfair and manipulative and that he tried to come to me with a serious concern about our relationship and I'm making it impossible for him to talk to me and bulldozing all over him. Am I the arsehole? No. No. I have a couple comments, observations, if you will. Hit me. Well, when he was like, take it or leave it. And she's like, so I took it.

That is, I'm impressed because to me with that, it's my question would be, how is this a partnership when you sit me down to say, this is what I decided, this is what's going to be happening. And I'm telling you that based on what I earn, that's not possible. And he's like, take it or leave it. So like, I think this person's actually really smart because then she's like, I take it. And now let's talk about how things are going to change in order for this to be achievable. Yeah. And did so in a really kind of reasonable and mature way. And his reaction, I'm not sure what he was hoping for. Like, her basically contributing every cent she earned outside of her savings to cover her 50 portion and then being like i don't have any money left over i guess you're gonna have to pay for all the fun things we do now i'm not sure if he was trying to like

come up with like get her to leave him or break up with him or kind of like restrict her financial like security i guess i i would be questioning this guy's motives yeah time and so no like his response is what makes him the asshole yeah i mean i'd get it if if they were earning equally fair enough but they've gone into this partnership he's fully aware of how much he earns and he's obviously created a life for them or they have together where he's fully aware she can't afford to pay 50 of the rent and the cars and you know their lifestyle so i think a few things could be happening here like you said i think he was trying to break up with her but without actually doing it yeah yeah um he's trying to find an easy way out but she's

called his bluff and now he's like oh i'm mad because she won't do what I want her to do. If she realizes that, though, then, Bebe, leave him. He doesn't want to be with you. But anyway, yes, go on. Or potentially something's happened in his life. Like he may have lost his job. Yeah. Gambling debts or something gambling debts yeah something

like that and now he's panicking about money but he's not willing to actually be honest about it um or he's been speaking to someone friends family yeah maybe a little bit of toxic masculinity glad handing going on, little circle jerking going on. Your woman needs to pay 50%, but also women are objects. Yeah. And worthless somehow. She should be pulling her weight unless she's going to stay at home and service your needs. I don't know. But yeah, I agree that maybe there's a little bit of like, why isn't your woman paying 50 they want feminism and equality yeah i can't believe you're paying everything for her

you need to fucking make her pay off get the beers in son lots lots lots so yeah uh no i don't think she's the arsehole and um he either needs to explain what the fuck is going on or be a man and dumper yeah that's what he wants like grow a pair mate yeah yeah probably shouldn't be allowed to say that should i you know i'll let it slide this time. Okay. Thank you. Well, that was a good one. I hope she is thriving on her own, paying her own bills and living her best life because she can afford exactly what she needs and wants and got rid of the dead weight. Yeah, girlfriend.

Get it. Well, there we have it we've delved into true crime, toxic masculinity and finances all the important things all the important things that's what we do here

right well we'll catch you all next week and in the meantime if you've got any questions dilemmas problems stories anything funny you want to share any soup recipes soup recipes pictures of your animals um your favorite thing that happened to you this week. Your favorite pair of socks. Yeah. Um, good pranks that you've committed.

Yeah. Share your pranks. Give me some tips. Give me. Yeah. Ideas for pranks. Ways for Gemma to not be pranked by Alan. How I can protect myself, please.

All right. Cool. I hope the best for you. Thank you very much. I'll keep you updated and hopefully don't sort of get trip-wired down a set of stairs or anything too serious like that.

I also hope you don't get home alone because then I'm going to have a problem. Needs to be non-painful pranks, please. Anyway, it was good to see you and you have a good one I'll speak to you soon Bye. you