Mamamia Out Loud: The Kids Of Influencers Have Something To Say

Mamamia Podcasts Mamamia Podcasts 3/13/23 - Episode Page - 41m - PDF Transcript

You're listening to a Mamma Mia podcast.

Mamma Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast is recorded on.

Welcome to Mamma Mia Out Loud.

It's what women are talking about on Monday, the 13th of March.

I'm Holly Wainwright.

I'm Jesse Stevens.

I'm Mia Friedman and I got COVID for International Women's Day instead of a cupcake.

Oh darling, how are you? All the Out Louders want to know because you were not on the show on Wednesday and Friday last week.

And you were pretty poorly by my reckoning. How are you doing now?

Look, I'm embarrassed. Who gets COVID in March 2023?

I agree. She's a very late adopter and it was hard because Mia, you deserved sympathy.

Of course you did. We all do when we're sick.

But then you wanted to tell us the symptoms and we knew. We'd also experienced them and we were saying, has the headache come in?

Are you not sleeping? And it just, it made me so sad that you were so late.

It was embarrassing. I've never been so late to a training.

That was good to say. It's very off-brand for you. You're normally ahead of me always.

You're always going, have you watched this show? Have you seen this thing? And I'm like, no.

Anyway, whenever you get COVID, it sucks. We're just glad you're better. And just so all the Out Louders know, we're all recording in different places today.

In case anyone's anxious about where Mia is. She is looking after herself at home, aren't you?

I am. I am. But I tested negative this morning. It's day six today, but I'm still staying under the office this week.

So I don't have my spicy cough on anyone. Welcome back. We missed you.

On the show today, this weekend, UK television was completely disrupted by a single tweet.

Programs went out without hosts. Others had to be scrapped altogether or cut in half.

So what the hell was said? Plus, can you protect kids from oversharing parents?

One European country is trying to do exactly that.

And the click or clash personality test that will help you find your people.

But first, Mia.

Ladies and gentlemen, your host for this evening, Jimmy Kimmel.

Welcome and congratulations. Welcome to the 95th Oscars.

In case you missed it, the Oscars are happening right now as we record.

And our producers, of course, are keeping one eye on the ceremony.

So if anything huge happens, I don't know, if anyone hits someone, we will jump back in for an update.

But let's talk about the goodie bags because we know they're ridiculous.

They are usually full of things like vouchers for cosmetic surgery and extraordinarily elaborate holidays or crypto currency.

All the things that rich and famous people don't need because they've already got enough money to buy whatever they want.

So they're always worth thousands and thousands of dollars of all kinds of things, often hundreds of thousands of dollars.

But this year, as part of these iconic gift bags, you can walk away with Japanese milk bread,

a three night stay for eight people on a volcanic Italian island and also liposuction.

But the bizarre inclusion that's making headlines is that you can get a piece of rural Queensland, guys.

It doesn't seem right, does it?

It doesn't seem like something you could get across the border.

I mean, I know they're celebrities, but it's also only valued at like $625 or something, which doesn't seem like a lot.

And I think that it's something to do with environmentalism, which I also don't understand.

So look, it's actually probably something that you could almost fit in a bag.

It's only one square meter of land and it's symbolic, of course, but it's being sold by a company called Pieces of Australia.

And they claim that it's all about preservation, as you say.

The Australian Conservation Foundation lead investigator, however, said that evidence suggests the land in question is being exploited

for coal seam gas and the traditional Aboriginal owners of the land to whom it actually belongs have not commented.

No, because like, can you imagine Indigenous people being like, can you not cut up our land and give it to the person who played Elvis?

Yeah.

Like, what is going on?

I used to love the Oscars so much.

I used to have a party at my house for everyone to come around and watch it in the evening.

I'd record it in the day.

I loved it.

I would get dressed up.

I would watch all the movies.

And now my life is very different.

I've only seen two of the films that are nominated.

One of those is Bloody Top Gun.

And I'm like, what has happened to my life?

Who are all these people?

When did I ever have time to watch eight art house intelligent movies in my life?

Like, I just, I'm sad.

Everybody looks so great.

When I look around this room, I can't help but wonder, is Osempic right for me?

There is only one story in Britain right now.

And it's about a footballer, a tweet and an unprecedented fallout.

Now, why do we care?

Why are we telling you about this?

Well, I would argue that this story is a bit of a cautionary tale.

Now, lots of what we call weeds in this story.

When we say a story is quite complicated, we say we don't want to get stuck in the weeds.

So here it goes.

Don't at me.

There's a sports host commentator in England called Gary Linnaker.

Now, he used to be an absolutely legendary footballer.

That's a soccer player when I was young.

And now for decades, he's been a kind of white bread safe pair of hands host for sports shows.

Most notably, there is an absolutely iconic TV show in the UK called Match of the Day,

which is on every Saturday night.

Here we go again, new season, new titles, new managers, new signings.

But apart from that, nothing much has really changed.

It's a roundup of all the football games that have happened over the day and the week.

And it is so iconic that any English person, if you stop them and I challenge you all to do this,

and you said to them, sing me the Match of the Day theme song, they could do it.

Without question, whatever generation they're from, right?

And Gary Linnaker has hosted that show since 1999.

So a very long time, right?

So that's who he is.

He's not known as a particularly controversial figure.

Last week, he tweeted about UK politics.

Specifically, he tweeted his thoughts about the UK government's new and controversial Stop the Boats policy,

which might sound familiar to us because, indeed, they've stolen Stop the Boats from us.

So the Prime Minister of Britain, Rishi Sunak, stood behind a podium with Stop the Boats written on it last week.

And the Home Secretary released a video that said, enough is enough,

why we must stop the boats outlining their new anti-asylum seeker policy.

Afterwards, Gary Linnaker, sensible, middle-aged, white footballer dude, tweets this,

good heavens, this is beyond awful, which is so English, very English way to start.

He then says, there is no huge influx of refugees, he means.

We take far fewer refugees than other major European countries.

This is just an immeasurably cruel policy directed at the most vulnerable people

in language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s.

And I'm out of order about that.

The BBC, his employer, so like the ABC here, suspended him immediately.

They said that he would step back from presenting Match of the Day

until they've got an agreed and clear position on his use of social media.

But it's what happened next that everybody is talking about.

He's not hosting Match of the Day on Saturday night because the BBC have stood him down.

The BBC bosses get on the phone to all the other dudes who could host Match of the Day on Saturday night,

and they all say no, stick it.

Every single sportscaster and sportsman who would normally take that kind of job

refused to fill in Balinica on principle.

And then it rolls in.

And after an effective strike from lots of other high profile sports people,

they had to cancel the lunchtime football focus TV show that would always go out on that day.

They had to cancel the early evening football show because no hosts would agree to be on it.

Match of the Day eventually goes out, but with no post-match interviews

because all the footballers also said no, we're not going to be interviewed by this show

because we're stand with Gary.

And they had to replace all the football shows with reruns of antiques shows like Barking Hunt.

Wow!

That's my long-winded explanation of what's happened.

Even very unpopular characters in British media who we would have heard of

like Piers Morgan and Jeremy Clarkson have voiced their support for Linica.

And that row is still going on because it touches all the hot buttons of now about free speech,

cancel culture, and who gets to voice an opinion.

Jesse, what do you think about this mess?

I love it. This is exactly what we needed.

And I feel like it goes beyond media.

This thing of feeling as though your livelihood can be taken from beneath your feet at any moment

because you state an opinion is something that I think we all need to be cautious of

because tomorrow it will be us.

And I think that that's what a lot of the other presenters are thinking.

That if I step into his shoes, I will say something in two weeks that also goes against the grain.

The irony of this comment, of course, is that the policy that is being articulated by the UK at the moment

that is directly, as you say, ripped off from Australia, like we're talking Tony Abbott,

campaigns that were put together at the time, has been disavowed by the United Nations.

This is something that people are going, this goes against basic human rights.

Also, and I think that this is what happens when a story like this gets picked up,

Linnaker, he never used the word Nazis, right?

He talked about the 1930s and he was talking about immigration.

He was talking about the othering of a certain group of people.

And yet if you look at headlines, they're saying he called Blair a Nazi.

No, he didn't. That's not what the tweet said.

He's a lot more careful than that.

He's also a sports broadcaster.

And sports and politics has the most interesting crossover

because we're seeing it at the moment in Australia with Littrell Mitchell

and racist discussions or politics directly inform sport every day of the year.

And so I actually think his opinion is quite valid here.

I think it's quite fair.

The other bit of context is that the BBC, the new guy who's come in to run the BBC

has said that his number one priority is impartiality.

He does not want the BBC to be a place that just shares opinion.

So that sort of explains why this might have happened.

But I think that ship has sailed.

I just don't think that in 2023 you can expect your broadcasters to be impartial.

Am I being naive?

I want to play devil's advocate for a minute here because it's not like the BBC is like Channel 7.

You know, it's the public broadcaster. So the ABC equivalent.

What if you're trying to run the ABC? You're Ida Bartros, right?

And Tony Armstrong, one of your star broadcasters, sports journalists, tweets about our immigration policy.

Now, you are always being criticised.

People will always criticise the public broadcaster for being biased, right?

Because they're not meant to be biased.

Their whole point is to be unbiased.

So what do you do if you're trying to run an organisation and the people that you employ

are giving their opinions about all kinds of things?

So suddenly people say, oh, the ABC is biased because this is what Tony Armstrong said.

Again, I'm not justifying it, but I think, you know,

if you look away from the actual issue that Gary Linnick had tweeted about

and about the idea, I'm not saying if it's right or wrong,

how do you make sure that everybody that works for you is unbiased?

But this is interesting, right? Because in that analogy, that comparison,

I think there's a difference between Tony Armstrong, a hypothetical Tony Armstrong,

tweeting about government policy and, say, a Sarah Ferguson tweeting about government policy on immigration.

Because Tony Armstrong, as a sports reporter, he has nothing to do with it.

Sarah Ferguson is the host of 730. She is a news journalist who interviews politicians

who has to hold prime ministers to account, and it is absolutely imperative that for her

and other news journalists on the national broadcast have maintained their impartiality.

I agree with that, and so I don't think it's true necessarily, Jesse,

that we can't expect our journalists to be impartial.

I think on the national broadcast, you absolutely do expect them to.

But I would argue that if nobody who takes a paycheck from the ABC or the BBC

can express an opinion about anything ever, that is the unrealistic idea.

Because really, Gary Lineker, yes, is a very influential human, so it matters what he thinks,

but he is not a news journal. He is a sportscaster,

and it's what the BBC is coming under a lot of criticism for,

which is kind of the opposite of the ABC in some ways,

is that they reacted here to pressure from the government, they think,

and that they are too in bed with the government in inverted commas.

And it's interesting because it does clearly breach the guidelines,

so they were right to ask him to step back if you consider that.

But the knock-on effect of it in an era where everybody is voicing their opinions

on everything all the time, is everybody's going,

well, I don't think that's fair.

You're cancelling somebody for an opinion that is not relevant to their job.

I reckon, as well, to play devil's advocate, this is the one idea

that came into my head that I went, I wonder how different it would have been

if he presented an opinion that was incredibly conservative, right-wing,

or potentially racist, right?

So if he, and this is where I think we start getting into trouble,

it's very easy to defend him and for his colleagues to defend him

when we agree with what he said.

But if he said something that we didn't like,

then how comfortable would we be kind of feeding him to the dogs

and going, well, you should be made an example of.

But Jesse, some of those people that Holly named, like Jeremy Clarkson and Piers Morgan,

they're not known as, you know, bleeding heart lefties.

So I think that the point, and you would assume this,

of all the people that supported him and joined, you know,

basically boycotted their employer and said, no,

you would assume that they don't necessarily agree with him,

but that it's more that they were doing it on principle rather than the actual issue.

Well, I think, and this is getting into the weeds a bit,

but the Tories are quite unpopular right now, right?

So in terms of the, let's call them the intellectual elite

or this certain microcosm of media, they probably do tend to agree with him.

Not necessarily sports journalists and sports players, you know?

And not necessarily Piers Morgan, but it's interesting that Piers Morgan has obviously,

you know, one of the things he really cares about is freedom of speech.

But I just think that it's worth us interrogating this and going,

next time someone says something that's happened in Australia,

an ABC broadcaster has said something that we see as incredibly conservative

or at odds with what we believe in, is that something we're willing to defend?

Because then it's not about freedom of speech,

it's just about making sure we can have our voices heard all the time.

Hello, my name is Abelon, I absolutely adore your podcast,

and I just wanted to call, I pretty much picked up the phone as soon as Jesse had finished speaking

at the end of Friday's episode, because the way she spoke about her fears

of being irrelevant and feeling she needed to cram every last bit of everything

into her months before having a baby, particularly career-wise,

and that fear of the change and what that means to you professionally,

I have never felt more seen.

Thank you so much, Jesse, the way that you feel is so normal

and was really nice to hear articulated.

So thank you, Jesse, and thank you guys for always keeping it real

and for covering it just the best topic.

The first generation of kids raised by influencer parents have grown up,

and one in particular is ready to talk.

There was an article published in Teen Vogue over the weekend that was just outstanding,

and it focuses on a now 18-year-old who goes by the name of Claire,

that's not her real name, but this is her story.

So if you were to Google her real name, you would find photos of her as a kid,

you'd find merchandise with her face on it that you can buy,

a YouTube channel that she features heavily in with millions of subscribers

and literally over a billion views,

and over hundreds of videos you can watch her go from a toddler to a teenager.

But if it were Claire's choice, then none of this would exist.

The article is written by Fortesa Latifi, and she says that Claire has never known a life

that doesn't include a camera being pointed in her direction.

She went viral for the first time when she was a toddler,

at which point both her parents realised they could leave their jobs

and do this YouTube thing full-time.

And when Claire protested being turned into content as a kid,

her parents would say, particularly her father would say to her,

well then we're going to have to move out of this house, we're going to have to go back to work

and there will be no money for nice things.

She says YouTube is still all they talk about.

She can't remember a time where her father wasn't also her boss.

And Claire wants people to know how her childhood was overshadowed

by social media stardom that she didn't choose.

She wants her parents to know that nothing they do now

is going to take back the years of work I had to put in.

And this comes at a time that a number of TikTok influencers,

I've noticed this, one that pops up onto my page all the time,

have decided to remove their children's faces and identities from their profiles.

So they still post lots of parenting content, commentary tips, whatever it is,

but they use pseudonyms for their kids and they ensure that their faces are hidden.

And one TikToker said, I've decided to make it my job to entertain people,

but it's not my kids' job and I don't want to make it their job.

And then just last month, France actually unanimously green-lit draft legislation

to protect children's rights to their own images.

That is moving forward and they're basically saying,

you can't be exploited and used by your parents to make lots of money.

And in the US, what was interesting in the Teen Vogue article

is that kids also have no right to the money that's made.

So a lot of parents will say, we're putting it in a college fund.

As Claire said in this article, what college fund I don't know how much money is in it

and I have no legal right to take my parents to court and say, where's all my money?

Mia, are we about to get an onslaught of stories just like Claire's, do you reckon?

I do and I think that there is going to be legal action.

I think that children who are now young adults will take their parents to court

and demand money and demand the removal of images and content that includes their likeness.

And I think that it is the beginning of a big reckoning that we're going to see.

And I want to say that I don't think it's anyone's fault.

I mean, Holly, for example, has always used her children as fodder in her content.

Oh my God.

You're such a bitch.

And I haven't because I'm a better parent than she is.

And I think that to be serious for a second, this is all new.

Like we do not know.

Like I just happen to be lucky enough to have had my children essentially before social media.

Holly's kids are younger than mine.

Jesse, your kids are younger again.

Would I have also put my kids all over social media?

Absolutely.

Would have I turned them into content?

Absolutely.

I just happened by virtue of timing, not quite being in that.

So I just don't think that we can retrospectively blame people for what they've done,

but I think we can now listen to those kids and I think that we can learn

and maybe rethink the way we handle this as parents.

But Holly, don't you reckon there's a difference?

And this is what I want to get into.

The difference between having a social media profile

and we're talking about everyone, whether you're an influencer or not,

sharing a photograph of your kid because they are an integral part of your life

and actually making them central to every piece of content you make every day.

That's different, right?

I think we have to acknowledge a scale of extremes in this, right?

And this story about this woman, she is at one very far end of the extreme.

Her parents made a YouTube channel about her and she was the central focus of that

and they used her to make money.

So that's their choice.

That's what's happened.

Now she's complaining and rightly so and all the rest of it.

I don't think that means that every parent who's ever shared pictures of their children on social media

or every influencer who's ever put pictures of their children on social media

is in the same bucket as Claire's parents.

I don't, right?

And neither do I.

Of course.

You're saying facetious.

Yeah, I know.

And Mia and I have had this conversation lots of times

because I do put pictures of my kids on social media.

Not as much now that they're older, but I do still sometimes do it.

And I do also, cards on the table, sometimes do paid social content.

I do.

It's an income stream.

Again, I don't do loads of it, but it's a part of what I do.

And sometimes that might involve the kids if they want to do it.

I think that the idea of somehow making money from your children

is necessarily a bad thing in black and white.

I've also always pushed back on the idea that your kids will be mortified one day

that there are pictures of them on the internet.

I think that ship has sailed, right?

Like there are 20 million pictures of absolutely everybody in the universe on the internet.

Hids as soon as they get a phone in their hands will just endlessly put pictures of themselves on the internet.

And I know there's a distinction there because they're choosing to do that.

They don't always necessarily understand the implications of doing that.

So I kind of have always pushed back on that idea of, oh, their boss one day will Google them and they'll find a picture of them.

And I've always thought that's nonsense.

What complicates this is commerce, as Jesse's pointed out, it massively complicates it.

People have very strong thoughts about, for example, Pixie Curtis,

Roxy Jacenco's daughter in Australia to use a local example who has been a brand.

And I've noticed that actually Roxy's retired a couple of those brands in recent times.

And now Pixie Curtis manages, well, appears to manage her own socials in a different way.

People have always had very strong opinions about that because commerce definitely confuses this.

If you are especially on the level of success that it sounds like Claire's parents were at

and a child like Pixie Curtis would be at where you really are making serious money,

who is earning that money, who is making it, who does it belong to, are really, really good questions.

But I would say that I don't think this should mean that every parent

who's ever put a picture of their kid on social should feel guilty about it.

I agree. And my discomfort, we've talked about it on the show before,

has been that this disproportionately attacks and vilifies mothers

because this is the stuff disproportionately of women's lives.

And so if you look at the critiques on TikTok and Instagram of people sharing their families,

you'll often find that it's calling people a bad mother.

And what happens when we decide that that sphere can't be shared publicly is that we hide women

and we hide the stuff of their lives. And I don't like that.

In saying that, this article changed my mind a little bit in a way that I didn't expect it to.

And I don't know if it explicitly said this, but I was thinking about having a child walk down the street

at four or five and being recognized and her not knowing why she's being recognized.

And that made me uncomfortable because I thought, okay, if I walk down the street

and, you know, it doesn't happen often, but every now and then someone will go,

I love the podcast or I'm listening to it.

I opted in for that. And my face is synonymous with my work and I'm an adult.

But if that was my child, I don't know if that visibility is something I'd want to give them.

And again, I think that's also about frequency because it's about how often your child's face is appearing, right?

So it's like, and again, there's lots of parents I know who share their kid.

But if I walked past them on the street, I wouldn't recognize them, you know what I mean?

Like I think it is about how much we're seeing them and how much that can actually be avoided.

Yeah. And I find that really hard.

I think the word content can be quite inflammatory for some people.

So Nora Efron, the very famous writer, once said, everything is copy.

And it was something that her mother had taught her.

And by that, it means that if you're a creative person, if you're a writer, particularly,

the stuff that happens to you, even the bad stuff, can be turned into a novel, an article, whatever.

The Internet has made us all content creators.

Now, whether you monetize that content or not, I think for many women, the drudgery of childcare

and being at home with little kids and not every day is drudgery, but there are a lot of aspects of it that are.

Creating it into content is a creative outlet for them and gives them a way to turn the stuff of their life

into something meaningful, into something that makes other women feel seen,

into something that makes them feel seen.

And so I think that when you bring money into it, it makes people uncomfortable

and when you use the word content, it makes people uncomfortable.

But really, social media is just a new version of sharing stories around the campfire or over the back fence.

The problem is that now we can't do that without a face.

That's true.

We used to be able to do it without a face.

And as someone who is going into that stage, my whole TikTok is breath-feeding, sleep training, sleep is advice, right?

And I can't tell you how helpful I'm finding it.

But I'm also finding it increasingly that faces of babies are obscured and that that parenting content can be shared

without necessarily having visibility of the child.

The only thing I would add to this is that I think we have to also be mindful of whether or not we're concerned

trolling a bit on this, right?

Because as I said at the beginning, there are obviously extremes in this.

But I know quite a few influencers, what people we would term influencers who do feature their children.

Every single one of them has thought really hard about it, has really considered what they're doing.

I think we should be careful about making, and I know none of us necessarily are in what we're talking about,

but making kind of blanket assumptions about people and the choices they're making.

And the other thing I'd say about babies, Jesse, is that even though your baby is going to be very special,

they all look the same, put their bloody faces on the internet.

If you want to make out loud part of your routine five days a week,

we release segments on Tuesdays and Thursdays just for mum and me out subscribers.

To get full access, follow the link in the show notes and a big thank you to all our current subscribers.

Because I've had a little bit of time on my hands over the last few days in ISO,

I did a personality test.

I love doing tests that tell me what I already know about myself.

And the latest one that's doing the rounds is about click or clash.

And this is based on the idea of, you know, when you meet someone and you immediately think,

well, we've hit it off just so well, or they're just not my kind of vibe, this person.

There's this theory that's been developed by Dr. Allie Walker.

She's a connection scientist and author of Click or Clash,

a book that looks at how by knowing our connection types, we can transform our relationships.

And on this week's episode of Fill My Cup, a podcast that we do,

hosted by Alira Potter that is about sort of self care.

She spoke to this author about first impressions and why we might click with some people instantly and clash with others.

Here's a little bit of what Dr. Walker said about the click or clash personality test.

I've just written this book called Click or Clash and it's got all this research in it about how we relate to each other.

And I think that because we don't know the science,

we didn't know much about why we react to certain people as we do.

What we tend to do is we make up really simple stories about what's going on.

And we say things like, oh, we didn't like each other or it was awkward or that person was rude.

And then we kind of leave it at that.

And in our minds, we sort of say to each other, that's it, we're not going to go further in that connection.

But what my research shows is that actually we click with people who match or mirror our needs in belonging.

And we clash with people or we don't get on with people who don't mirror or match our needs.

So it really doesn't have much to do with a personality necessarily.

It's got to do with what we go out into the world asking for and whether someone can provide it for us.

I met someone recently who I have clashed with and I haven't been able to articulate why.

And it's not even a clash. I just am not warming to them.

They're not warming to me on paper. I can't explain it.

But this would totally make sense.

There is something going on here about our intensity or our ability to read each other that is just not working.

She says that there are two key elements of every human connection.

The first is frequency and the second is intensity.

So frequency is exactly what it sounds like.

It's simply how much human connection that you like in your life.

So, you know, we've heard of the ideas of introverts and extroverts and frequency is actually related to that.

So everyone is either high, mid or low frequency.

And Dr. Walker says that you can determine which of the three you are with a simple question.

You ready?

If you were designing your perfect weekend, would you want to be around other people for,

A, more than 50% of the time?

B, around 50% of the time?

C, less than 50% of the time?

Just less, about 45, 40-ish.

I'd go 30, 30%.

I'm probably 50, mid or low frequency.

And she says that the problem is that we often stop there.

Once we understand our own frequency needs and the frequency behaviour in others,

we think that we've cracked the code.

But she said that we could actually be overlooking connections and potential relationships

because we don't understand the intensity component of human connection.

Here's what she had to say about that.

So people sort of think about how much do you want to text?

How much do you want to speak on the phone?

How much do you want to hang out?

And that's where we stop with human connection.

It's just, do you like as much as me?

But there's this really other important element that's been overlooked up to now.

And that's called intensity.

Intensity is how you bond and how you feel comfortable connecting with someone else.

So it's what type of connection you like.

I see.

So you'll be really shocked to hear that I am high intensity, high frequency.

You are.

And that means that I'm called a sunlight connector.

And it says I'm a visionary with great potential to inspire others.

Your challenge is to overcome the intensity and power of your mind

to convert your intensity into light for others.

Oh, wow.

Yes.

Holly, are you, I'm quite high intensity and low frequency.

I'm not high intensity.

I'm like minus one intensity.

It doesn't that mean that you quite like a bit of small talk, I think.

I'm apparently a shape shifter, which apparently is a good thing.

Which doesn't sound like a good thing.

But it says I'm a universal human connector able to adapt to the dynamics

of any group or relationship.

Now that is true.

Not that I don't mean I'm able to adapt, blah, blah, but I think that's true.

I go into a new situation.

I look at it and I will very often change how I am and how I behave

and how I speak depending on it, you know.

So it said my challenge is to make sure I don't lose myself in that.

So there you go.

But it's interesting because and Mia and I tease joke about this all the time,

but like we get along very well.

But there is no, it's not a surprise to me that our intensity scores are very

matched.

It's like when we get into a texting discussion, which we do and regular

listeners to out loud will know there's an attention that I'm not active

enough in the WhatsApp groups.

It's often I'm like, oh, I can't too much too intense too much.

I need to focus on what I'm something else.

I'll go quiet and retreat.

And it's, yeah, there you go.

It's in action.

We don't clash.

So do we clash?

Is that actually the secret to our success that we're not all the same type?

So we clash in that way, but it's, it's a good thing.

Yeah, you get the science.

I think that there is an element of clashing because our frequency

and our intensity is different.

So in fact, what we want to talk about is different.

So if you're a super intense, if you're on the furthest end of like your

intensity is high, you want to talk about dying.

Oh, no, I don't want to talk about that.

And you want to talk about really spirituality and big ideas, right?

And then the one that's a little bit further down from that is things like

politics, world events, ideas, the one that's a little bit down from this.

Yeah, this is your, your favorite is emotions and how you're feeling about

things, but also how other people are feeling about things.

I like all that.

But don't you see, this is why I'm a shape shifter.

Clearly I only like talking about those things in certain situations.

There is nothing I hate more than being in a situation with people who I

don't know or who I can sense are going to have very different opinions

about stuff.

And somebody goes, so what about those asylum seek?

Like that is my least favorite conversation.

Oh, no, that makes me feel alive.

No, I like, I like that.

I like to discuss big things with certain groups of people, emotional stuff,

personal stuff with certain groups of people, but not with everybody.

And that I guess is why I'm a shape shifter.

Mine is apparently that I like to be in the company of others half the time.

And then I like to retreat into my inner world.

And there was a question about connection with non-human things basically,

which can be like your phone, blah, blah, blah.

But also your doc, if you get a lot of satisfaction from that,

which I absolutely do.

But I have found this mismatch with people in my life where my intensity is

to get in and have a discussion about what is the biggest news story of the week.

And I've had people I'm very close to say, that's not something I want to talk

about.

It makes me uncomfortable.

I find it useless.

And that's, that's not where I get any form of human connection from.

And we've had to like pivot on that a little bit.

But I suppose if I meet people where their intensity is so low

and so like small talky, then maybe that's when I clash with them a little bit

because I think they're boring.

Yeah, I wouldn't even call it clash.

I'd just say fizz more.

But also the frequency is interesting because I've got friendships in which I

have to moderate the frequency.

Because for me, it's like all day, every day is, is a good communication rhythm.

But then I've got some friends who I'm incredibly close to who might not text me

for months.

And I've had to understand that frequency, like my, what I'm comfortable with

is not necessarily an indication of quality of friendship or deepness of friendship.

But the question is whose frequency, for example, and whose intensity is the,

becomes the default in the relationship, whether it's a romantic relationship or friendship.

Yeah, yeah.

It's so funny because I, I guess this is why I got the score I got.

But like, as I said, Jesse, like I love those conversations with some people,

but there are other groups of friends where I would never discuss any of that stuff.

So it's like, yeah, I guess that's why I'm a shapeshifter.

What I really liked about this quiz as well, and we'll link to it in the show notes,

is that all the questions, it really makes you think because it's about what you do,

but then it asks you the same question, but what you would like to be, like what you would like to do.

Yeah.

So for example, I'm with people, maybe 50% of the time, or I like to be with people all of the time,

but am I happy with that or am I not happy with that?

Would I prefer to be more satisfied at a lower level of intensity and frequency?

And for me, it was mixed.

So I'm a sunlight connector, but I want to be a coral connector,

which means I want to have a little less intensity and a little less frequency,

because even I'm too much for me sometimes.

Mia, you've got a recommendation for us before we go.

Oh, I have been finding it very hard to find anything to hold my attention with all the TV I've been watching,

but a show that I've absolutely binged and adored is shrinking on Apple TV.

I'm worried about you, kid.

I'm in grieving right now.

You've been looming.

Stop. You're doing sad face.

This is just face.

I have resting dead wife face.

He just kept on going on and on about how dumb I am, but he loves me.

Your husband is emotionally abusive.

He's not working on it.

He doesn't intend to just leave him.

Okay.

It has Jason Seagal, Harrison Ford and Jessica Williams,

who play three therapists who work in a practice together.

And it's a comedy.

It is so well tightly written.

It's just, it's about grief, but that makes it sound sad and it's not,

but it's just stunning.

I've absolutely loved it.

It's so funny.

It's laugh out loud, funny.

All the actors are fantastic.

I think I watched eight episodes in about a day or so.

And there's more to come.

So I think now they're dropping every week.

But I just absolutely adore it.

Highly recommend shrinking.

I started watching it too.

It's great.

Apple TV.

Oh, I'm Kane.

I watched the menu on the weekend.

I'll stop it.

Double recommendation.

Which, which TV you want.

I loved it.

Absolutely loved it.

Luca loved it.

Luca got his food fix.

He was so excited by the food and I loved the stabby stabby murders.

So it was perfect.

So good.

Why is it that, that should be in the Oscar gnomes today.

Oh, I know.

That's all we've got time for a Mamma Mia out loud today.

Thank you for listening.

This episode was produced by Emma Gillespie with assistant production from Susanna Makin.

Bye.

Bye.

Bye.

Shout out to any Mamma Mia subscribers listening.

If you love the show and you want to support us, subscribing to Mamma Mia is the very best

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Over the weekend, UK television was completely disrupted by a single Tweet. Programs went on without hosts, others had to be scrapped or cut in half… So what was said, and why should we care?

Plus, can you protect kids from oversharing parents? One European country is trying to. 

And, the ‘click or clash’ personality test that will help you find your people

The End Bits: 

Listen to Fill My Cup 

to hear Allira's conversation with Dr Ali Walker, about why we click with some people immediately and why we might clash with others. 

Take the Click/Clash Connection Test here!

RECOMMENDATIONS: Mia wants you to watch Shrinking on Apple TV+ 

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CREDITS:

Hosts: Jessie Stephens, Holly Wainwright, and Claire Murphy

Producer: Emma Gillespie

Assistant Producer: Susannah Makin

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