Mamamia Out Loud: The Onstage ‘Failure’ That Sparked An Epic Act Of Kindness

You're listening to a Mamma Mia podcast.

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

So has anyone actually got Taylor tickets?

Oh, I haven't checked my phone to see if I do.

I had the last drama at her.

You could only get one.

And everyone was panicking.

I can't get one.

Wait, did you get tickets, Mia? You said you did, right?

I did, but I got them pre-sale Monday.

I got the AmEx tickets.

Nice.

Have many people in here got tickets?

I think only like one or two.

Mamma Mia Out Loud!

Hello and welcome to Mamma Mia Out Loud,

what women are actually talking about on Wednesday, the 28th of June.

I'm Mia Friedman.

I'm the co-founder of Mamma Mia,

and I am doing my best Holly Wainwright impersonation.

She is usually driving this show,

but she is on holidays for a little while longer,

and so I'm in the driver's chair.

I'm Elfie Scott.

I'm executive editor at Mamma Mia.

And I'm Claire Stevens, also an executive editor at Mamma Mia.

And on the show today, a viral Glastonbury sing-along.

It's been popping up in a lot of group chats

and in a lot of feeds, absolutely heartwarming.

But what does it mean for disability and mental health awareness?

Plus, what is camel mode?

Not camel toe, camel mode.

Are you in it?

And you might not even realise it.

And what a reality TV show actually tells us

about the kind of men women cannot stop dating.

But first...

In case you missed it,

this year for the first time,

Wimbledon has updated its women's uniform policy

to relax the rule of wearing all white.

So from the 2023 tournament onwards,

it starts on July 3rd.

We'll still see all players wearing all white outfits.

However, women can now wear coloured shorts under their skirts.

The move has come after female players expressing anxiety

about having their period during Wimbledon

and leaking through the white undershorts.

And obviously white undershorts can result in pretty obvious stains

during a highly televised event.

So it didn't used to be as much of an issue

when you didn't have cameras following your every move.

Yeah, up your clacker.

Exactly.

And so last year...

Well, this is progress, isn't it?

For the women?

Well, last year, Australian player Daria Savill

said she wants her to skip her period while playing Wimbledon

because she was so anxious about this.

There's been players who say they couldn't focus on tennis

because they knew that they were leaking.

However, not all players are completely sold

on the new dress code.

Tunisian player Onze Jabert told the Mirror,

isn't it just going to be a way for everyone

to know you have your period?

Ooh, I didn't think about that.

If you're wearing bright green undershorts...

I think everybody should agree we will all wear coloured.

Yes, totally.

I think there has to be some sisterly solidarity.

I say all black.

Can we also agree that maybe it's not just periods

because if I was playing Wimbledon,

I would be terrified of shitting myself a little bit.

So Louis Capaldi, for those who need a reminder,

is a 26-year-old Scottish singer-songwriter

who is written hits like Someone You Loved

and Before You Go.

And last weekend in Glastonbury,

Louis Capaldi made headlines

because he basically admitted

that he was struggling to finish his set.

And what he did was he asked the audience

to help sing the songs for him.

So we actually have a clip of this.

This has sort of gone viral.

It's in all my group chats at the moment.

It's very affecting to watch, isn't it?

Because he twitches and he has these Tourette's ticks

and he keeps trying to sing,

but then he stops and the audience just picks it up.

And it goes on for most of the song.

Yeah, it's a really stunning moment.

And Capaldi has been diagnosed with Tourette's syndrome.

He's shared intimate details of his life,

his mental health struggles,

and that diagnosis through documentaries.

So like the Netflix documentary How I'm Feeling Now.

My anxiety is out of control.

I feel like I'm in a race against the clock

to get my mental health in order.

Has he always had Tourette's?

He's always had it, but he was only diagnosed recently.

And apparently anxiety can make it worse.

Yeah, right.

So being on stage, I can't even imagine.

Yeah, and I mean, I think seeing hundreds of thousands

of people singing together to begin with

is very emotionally effective,

but then this added layer of coming in and supporting

an artist who is struggling with their disability

on stage is really beautiful.

Claire, what does this moment mean to you?

And what does it tell us about how we're treating

mental illness and disability in 2023?

I get goosebumps every time I watch this video.

And I think there's a few things here

that I want to break down.

So first, the idea of disability

and this being a really powerful representation of it

and the fact that disability can exist alongside

success and joy.

Like this is a man standing on stage in front of

100,000 people singing a song he wrote for an album

that sold more than any other in the UK that year.

He has achieved so much alongside his disability

and it's not that his disability is some magical thing

where it's like, I am this way because of my Tourette's.

It's like, no, I have achieved all this.

I'm a really talented musician, songwriter,

and I've done that alongside my Tourette's

and it's okay to put that on the global stage.

So do you think in another time,

10 years ago, 5 years ago, 20 years ago, 50 years ago,

he would just not have ever been signed to a label.

He would never have got to this level

because it would have been seen as a disqualifier

in an impossible obstacle.

He speaks in his documentary about how when he got these tics,

he thought he was dying.

He was convinced he was dying.

So I think it's also a really interesting example

of how psychoeducation, so the idea that you go to a doctor

and they say, it's okay, you have Tourette's

and he was like, oh, thank God.

Like I was convinced that I had a condition

that was going to end my life

because I didn't know why this was happening.

So the fact he's got a name for it,

a label for it, he knows to some extent

what he needs to do in his personal life,

that he needs to look after his health

and try to ameliorate his anxiety

in order to kind of relieve these symptoms.

I think that that's huge.

But the other part I thought is that we love

to look at young people right now

and say that they're snowflakes and say they're oversensitive

and say that everybody's obsessed with their trauma

and their diagnoses and all of that.

I think this moment showed the best of humanity

and showed that there's something beautiful

about this new generation of young people,

which is they no longer want artists to be performing puppets.

They don't want artists to be these two-dimensional things

on stage that we're just like whipping to keep performing.

They're seeing them as fully-formed humans

and they're seeing their vulnerability

and responding to that vulnerability.

I actually don't think that's a coincidence

with Lewis Capaldi in particular

because he's incredibly likable

and he's been incredibly open in sharing.

He seems to have like an edgier and kind of a vibe.

Yes, really self-deprecating.

So it's quite hilarious that he sings these love songs

and you think he's going to be some hunk

and then he gets in front of the camera

and just takes the piss out of himself

and is really honest about Impostor Syndrome,

the fact that he wrote that first album

that went really, really well

and completely broke down before the second album,

thinking there's absolutely no way I can top that.

He's been really, really honest about his anxiety

and the fact that success, money, fame, adoration

does not necessarily make you happy.

But I think that that moment tells us something

really important about young people

and I think it's something to remember

when we're mocking the oversensitivity

and how everybody likes to label themselves or whatever

to remember that what we ultimately get

is somebody on stage and a crowd that wants to hold them.

Do you think that the story kind of represents

learnings from the past, like we're finally breaking through?

In particular, I'm reminded of the Amy documentary

and how that kind of walked through

all of the media coverage of Amy Winehouse's eating disorders

as well as her problems with addiction.

And I guess I'm wondering, like, do you think that this is evidence

that we've come past that, that we've actually learned the lessons now?

Yes, we keep looking at performers, people like

Britney Spears, Amy Winehouse, even Paris Hilton,

there was a whole story there

and regretting the way we treated them.

And I love that this is an example

of how we are seeing a person struggling

and holding them up rather than tearing them down.

In real time.

Yeah, in real time.

When I first saw it, I thought it was just,

everyone was just singing the words,

because, you know, artists will often do that at a concert.

They won't sing and they'll put the microphone out to the crowd

and the crowd will sing.

I was also impressed that they knew every lyric.

Yeah, I was going to say that, but then I listened to the song

and I was like, I know this song back.

Yeah, I know every word to get.

This week on No Filter,

I interviewed a woman who coined a term

that is setting the world on fire.

That's not true.

But it's actually causing a lot of conversation

among women who are saying, oh, thank God,

you've put a name around something that I experienced.

It's called camel mode.

Is going camel mode inevitable for parents?

Is the subject line of a newsletter that I read recently

by a woman called Catherine Jazza Morton.

And I interviewed her on No Filter.

Here's a little bit of how she explained what camel mode is.

I define it as a period of life, you know,

when your kids are young, but it can last for years and years.

Like I think for me, it lasted until my kids were like 10 and 7.

So like that's a long time.

Where your sense of yourself recedes into the background

and you're dealing with other people's needs

to the point where you lose sight of your own desires

in terms of just the adventure of being a person.

So maybe that's, you know, sexual desire is part of it.

But it's also just like, what do you want in a given moment?

And I think of the experience of being asked,

like, you know, what would you like to do this summer?

Or like, you know, what do you want to do for your birthday?

And, you know, you're a mother of however many children

and you're like, I don't know.

And like, don't ask me.

I don't know if there's somehow like the pressure

or the task of even coming up with desire feels like kind of dreadful

because you've been away from that for so long.

Now, I'm nodding my head off while I'm listening to that.

You two are looking a little bit blankly at me

because she talks about it in terms of

camomile being something that happens

when you've got young children, your needs recede

and other needs and needs of others

or other people or other things take precedence

to a point where you kind of lose yourself.

And I was like, oh my God, that is exactly what it feels like.

And she's very clear about the fact

that it's not necessarily depression

and it's not necessarily that you're unhappy.

It's just you get lost for a while.

And the reason that you two are looking blankly at me

is obviously because you don't have children.

But I asked her to expand on this idea of camel mode

and she was saying that it can happen to you

for other reasons as well.

It might be that you're going through a chronic illness

or you've had a traumatic injury

and you're recovering from it.

It's something that basically disrupts your life

for a long period of time

and sort of impinges upon your identity.

Claire, you look skeptical.

Yeah, so I think the thing that defines camel mode

is the selflessness of it

and you're putting other people's needs

above your own.

The stakes are high and there's a sense of urgency to that,

like when you've got kids.

It's not necessarily other people's needs

because you might have been diagnosed with breast cancer

and you might be going through chemo.

It's a sense of you've just got to sort of power down

and focus on one particular area

and just do whatever it takes to get through that period.

Almost like survival mode.

Can we clarify why it's a camel?

A camel, to my understanding of my great experience with camels,

they're very low maintenance

when they're getting across the desert

so they can have a big drink

and then not drink for a really long time.

Put their needs to decide to achieve the goal.

They can kind of power down

to just help you get across the desert

and ferry you on their back with their lumps

and then when they get to the end of the desert

then they'll have an eat and a drink.

It's not because camels don't have a particularly strong sense of identity.

It's true.

They just need to know who they are.

But thinking about camel mode,

at first I was like, I've never been in a definable life stage like that.

I don't have kids.

I haven't looked after an elderly parent.

I've never had a chronic illness.

I could only think of really acute situations

like cramming for an exam

where you're no longer thinking about what you're eating

or seeing sunlight or exercising or anything like that.

No, that's not camel mode.

And then I thought about depression

and I think maybe that's maybe a little bit different.

I don't know why.

And initially I got frustrated

because I was like, why do we need a term for everything,

especially when I feel like we've already got a term,

which is survival mode.

I feel like we already know how to talk about this

and can't we just have a life stage

without trying to overanalyze it and pathologize it.

However, then...

Oh, you're going to argue with yourself.

Saved me the trouble.

Then I had an epiphany because

what Jeze Morton talks about

is that there's an opposite of camel mode

and the opposite of camel mode apparently is callard mode

and that's named after a philosopher called Angela Callard

and the idea of callard is that she's demanding

and uncompromising and she has decisive strong feelings

and she has no problem putting them first.

I think maybe I'm permanently in camel mode.

Camel or callard?

Camel.

So I think I live in camel mode

and I actually think a lot of people live in camel mode

and I think people pleases live in camel mode.

We're so used to just going through the desert,

being like, oh, don't worry about me.

I don't need anything.

I've got water in my humps.

I don't have water in my humps.

You're so...

You're so used to just not demanding anything,

not being decisive because when,

in that conversation with her,

when she's talking about knowing what she wants,

like, what do you want to do during the holidays?

And she's like, I don't know.

I don't know.

Do you think that's because you're a twin?

I think I've grown up having no decisive sense of self

because I'm so used to compromise.

Is this something that your partner or, like,

Jesse recognises in you?

My partner is like, we have a bit of a joke

that he has to help me be assertive in really small ways.

Like, if we're at a restaurant and nobody served us,

I'm like, I will wait indefinitely.

I will not bother anyone.

They are just doing their job.

I've worked in hospitality.

And he'll be like, as a challenge,

try and wave that wader down.

And when I heard Callad Mode described,

I've never been that.

So Callad Mode is like super assertive.

You know who you are.

You know what you want.

And you know what you want to do

and you're not afraid to do it.

You can see things like crystal clearly.

So this was the woman, I believe her name's Angela Callad.

A profile was written about her in the New Yorker

that a lot of people were talking about a few years ago.

She's this professor.

She's got two little kids.

She fell in love with this guy,

but she still wanted to be married to her husband.

So she just was.

She just said to her husband,

she's basically like, I want both of you.

So there was no sense of molding herself

around the needs of her children, her husband, her anything.

It was just about what she wanted,

which is interesting.

It's kind of the other extreme.

But my experience of you, Claire,

is that you've only got two modes.

You're not assertive, not assertive, not assertive,

and then like crazy assertive.

Yeah.

I'm Camel Mode.

I'm this little camel.

And then every now and then I'm a camel.

I was a tantrum.

You're like Callad Rising.

I just start like, I don't know,

puffing my water out through a blowhole.

But it's like, I think that happens

because I'm always in Camel Mode.

I think I need to get out of Camel Mode.

Do you find it frustrating then?

Are you frustrated with yourself?

Yes, always.

Oh, darling.

I think I need to go to a psychologist

and say I am a camel.

I think you just need to play this segment of the podcast.

Have you ever had to be a camel Elfie?

Do you relate to this?

I don't think Elfie is a camel.

No, I don't think I'm a camel.

And I also think like, oh, I just came out of my 20s.

And I think that's a generation that's very much defined

by not being a camel.

When you're extremely selfish and self-assertive

and annoying, there is something in Camel Mode

that could probably apply to grief.

And it's something that I've witnessed in Friends

and it's something that I've heard a lot about.

So there was this brilliant podcast episode of Ai Wei,

which is that Jamila Jamil podcast.

And she had this guest on Megan Devine,

who is a therapist and a grief counselor

because she experienced awful tragic loss early on in her life.

She lost her partner in this sudden accident.

And she said that she was going through this really isolated period

and then a friend came over and they said the most useful thing to her,

which was you just have to feed the organism.

And you basically think about yourself as like an animal or a plant.

Camel.

A camel.

Exactly.

Because all of your emotional needs, your well-being,

that cannot be repaired for the moment.

And so it can't take first precedence.

But everything else, like drinking, eating,

like all of those basic things are the priorities.

Yes.

I think grief is such a good point

because it's like you do just become consumed by something.

And this resonated with me so much,

even though my children are older,

I'm sort of coming out of that period

because my youngest child is now 14.

I'm coming out of that identity of a mum, you know,

with like little kids.

I mean, I haven't had little kids for a long time.

But then I'm going into being a grandmother in a minute,

in a hot minute, even by the end of this podcast.

Who could say I could be a grandmother?

And I had experienced something that I think

a lot of Generation X women feel,

which is just like, I feel like human grout.

It was this sentence that sort of just surfaced in me

towards the end of last year when I was like,

who am I?

For 26 years, I've been someone's mother and someone's partner.

I've been running a business.

I'm about to become someone's grandmother.

But who am I?

Like, I don't know.

I don't know what I want.

So interesting.

It surprises me because from the outside,

compared to a lot of people,

you do have something that's your own.

Like you've had a really clear identity

independent of, say, being a mother,

like independent of what your children think of you,

because you happen to have a business

and a podcast and write books.

I seem like I've got main character energy, right?

Yeah, you're a personality.

I know.

But I think I can objectively have main character energy,

and I probably fall closer on the spectrum of Calard to Camel.

When you've got a business, you work for the business.

I've been in Camel mode just Jason and I running this business

and building this business for 15 years.

I've been in Camel mode because of that too.

You seem to be able to switch between the two quite seamlessly.

Like Camel mode when you need to be a Camel

and then being able to very easily switch

because you're very good at knowing what your passion is

and what it is that you want to do at any moment in time

and you don't hesitate to follow that instinct.

And that's what Jason Morton talks about,

that once you're in Camel mode, you don't actually know what you want.

Whereas you always seem to have a really clear idea of that.

I think it's so interesting.

Out loud as we've had such a big response to this podcast,

if you haven't listened to it, we'll put a link in the show notes.

We want to know if you've experienced Camel mode.

Also in the episode, we bring in friend of the pod,

Amelia Lester, who is just starting to emerge from Camel mode.

She's got little kids.

So it's that same kind of Camel mode.

And she was really, really so insightful about what she gained

and what she lost in Camel mode.

And we talked about what you do within a friendship

when one of you is in Camel mode and the other one isn't.

It's such a good episode.

If I do say so myself, let us know what you think.

Mamma Mia, out loud!

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

we release segments on Tuesdays and Thursdays

just for Mamma Mia subscribers.

To get full access, follow the link in the show notes,

and a big thank you to all our current subscribers.

I self-proclaimed nice guys, looking for a real relationship.

I don't know anyone who wouldn't want to be in love.

Yabba, a self-proclaimed F-boyz year to win money.

Over the last few weeks, there's been a lot of discussion

in the Mamma Mia office about F-Boy Island,

a reality series that just finished on binge.

And I feel 100 because I have not been watching.

I've been seeing updates on host Abby Chatfield's Instagram

and analysis all over the place

about it being a very different kind of reality show.

I have some thoughts to share about the idea of...

About the show you haven't watched.

Well, about the concept of an F-Boy.

But before we get to that, Elfie, you've watched the show.

Please explain it for those who haven't watched.

This is my favorite television show.

I don't care about anything else.

And I do not like reality TV.

I'm obsessed with F-Boy Island.

So to give you the kind of elevator picture of it,

F-Boy Island originated in the U.S.

as a series hosted by comedian Nikki Glaser.

But the Australian iteration, as you mentioned,

is hosted by Abby Chatfield.

Basically, there are three women looking for love

among a pool of 24 men.

The catch is that half of the guys have signed up as F-Boyz.

And the other half are self-declared nice guys

who say that they have the same aims as the women,

which is to meet the one.

And the show follows the elimination decisions

made by the women,

knowing that if they end up choosing a nice guy,

that pair will split $50,000.

But if they choose an F-Boy,

he can walk away with all of the money.

And I think that the format of this show is literally perfect.

It doesn't get better television than this.

This is the peak of entertainment, so I would get into it.

And the reason...

Why do you like it so much?

Well, the reason that I say that is because, like,

the split of guys looking for love

and guys looking for money

creates this perfect pool of, like, contained chaos

where people get to explore their Machiavellianism

to its, like, logical end.

But then also the nice guys are exposed when they, like, flail,

do stupid things that make the women question them.

So I think it's, like, the perfect encapsulation

of all single guys' kind of ridiculous failures and evils.

But what I really became interested in

while I was watching the finale on Monday

is the idea that we have focused so much

on the male contestants in this show so far.

We focused on all of their behavior.

But then I started to reflect on, like,

the women who are involved in this show

who each say that they have dated fuckboys in the past

and they kind of have a tendency

to be drawn towards those people.

Can you describe a fuckboy for our audience

who might not be familiar with the term?

Okay, a guy who likes to sleep around,

who doesn't necessarily treat women as an equal,

might be a little bit misogynist.

Are there any other characteristics I'm missing here, Claire?

You're nodding your head.

You're usually very charismatic

and win you over quite quickly.

Totally, manipulative.

Yes, they'll tell you what you want to hear.

Not looking for a relationship.

Not looking to be tied down.

It just made me think about times in my life

where I have specifically been drawn to the fuckboy

and why that is.

And I wonder, Claire,

because you have just been nodding along to this,

has there been a time when you think

that you have exclusively dated fuckboys

or you've been romantically attracted to that archetype?

Interestingly, no.

No?

And I can get a bit judgy.

And even when I read books where somebody is...

Judges men or women?

Women.

Oh, okay.

So even when I read books and it's like,

and then she slept with this guy who was horrible

and then she slept with this guy who was horrible.

Oh, you're like, dirty slut.

No, I'm like, I'm like, I don't understand

the motivation.

I don't understand why.

Have you exclusively dated nice guys,

like decent people?

Well, I've almost exclusively dated one person

because I've been with him for like 15 years.

And he is objectively nice.

And he is a lovely, lovely guy.

So you've never seen the appeal of the bad boy

or the fuck boy?

Probably theoretically in that I've looked at a guy

and been like, oh, he's hot,

but he'd be a terrible boyfriend.

But the way I have seen it is that Jesse

had horrible, horrible, horrible taste.

Actually, that's not fair.

She had a pattern.

She went, f-boy nice guy, f-boy nice guy,

years and years and years.

And I didn't get it.

And she would be going out with someone

and I would say, he's a horrible person.

I don't understand.

Really?

Oh, God, yes.

It was just so obvious.

What were the sides from the outside?

Sending messages to other girls

and going out and being untrustworthy

and flirting with other friends

when she's there and all of that stuff.

And I just didn't get it.

So what was she like when she was with a f-boy

versus what she was like with a nice guy?

There was something about the f-boy vibe

that she wanted to win over or change him,

which I think is a thing that a lot of women have.

And then when she was with a nice guy,

it was like he was almost too nice

and he was putting her on a pedestal

and she didn't want to be up there.

She kind of had this conflict for a long time.

However...

Do you think it's about self-esteem

that we're attracted to f-boys

because we don't value ourselves enough

or is that too simplistic?

I think there's definitely an element of that.

I would also say that like times in my life

where I have dated f-boys,

I've just been a chaotic person

and I think that I just wanted to like

create a chaos that was happening inside myself

by like having a chaotic relationship.

Were you a f-girl maybe?

Well, yeah, no, I think I was at different points as well,

which is kind of like what I think about the show in a way

and it kind of does acknowledge this,

but I think people move in and out of these phases

and it's not like that term can define you long-term.

The thing that I get a bit funny about with the show

is this binary idea of f-boys and nice guys,

which don't exist.

Oh, I think they do.

They really disagree.

And the thing about f-boys in inverted commas,

which is I feel like I'm a bit old to even use that term,

like it doesn't feel right coming out of my mouth anyway.

The thing about those men

is they lack complete self-awareness.

They can't put their hand up and be like,

this is who I am because that's part

of what makes them so toxic.

But I don't think any guy goes, yeah, I'm a f-boy.

Like I don't think it's a label

that anybody would wear proudly.

But that's what the show is asking them to do.

Yeah, some of them do.

Some of them do, do they?

And I think a lot of it has to do with sexism

on their part, to be honest.

I think some guys just do not see women

as equals as human beings, really.

Like some guys can go to the extremes,

and you definitely see that in the show.

Like Mr. Big in Sex in the City,

was he a f-boy?

Yeah, like he was never going to commit that kind of thing.

I'm sounding like the biggest male apologist,

but sometimes we have to look

at how men have been socialized.

This binary idea that men easily fit

into categories of good and bad and women don't

is strange.

It's like women are always the virtuous ones.

And also, I do struggle a little bit

with the idea that in dating,

women are always victims of men's behavior.

Do you know what I mean?

Like I want women to have agency.

Yes, and I will say that like

the most defining f-boy relationship of my life,

I was 25.

I was, as Arthur mentioned, extremely chaotic person.

And I think the person that I was dating

could probably fit into that definition.

But I kind of forgive them for that

because I know that they moved out of that phase

of their life as well.

And I totally understand why they were in it as well.

They were coming out from a long-term relationship.

So I don't know if I would necessarily call them a f-boy.

And I totally understand what you're saying.

I think that we just should have like basic empathy

for each other.

But I do think that there are some people

who are just awful.

Like there is a certain subset of men

that are just terrible when they're dating women.

Yes, and there obviously are men who are manipulative

and they lie and they cheat.

And then there's further on that spectrum is abuse

and that sort of thing.

And I'm not implying that women have any ownership

or part to play in that.

All I mean is this idea that by simply entering the dating game,

women are always going to be manipulated?

I don't know.

Yeah, I think that's a good point.

I think also that f-boys are exciting.

Like they're exciting.

And I think particularly when you're young,

you can easily mistake, I know I did drama for passion.

Especially in like your early 20s.

Yeah, and I think that we're probably socially conditioned

to want the guy who's spreading his seed around in some ways

because that traditionally has been the alpha guy

and they're biologically programmed men to sow their seeds around.

Now I'm sounding like a male apologist.

I really understand the appeal of the f-boy.

And I just think that you have to get bored of it.

You have to get bored of it.

And until you're bored of it and you realize,

oh, this actually isn't passionate and exciting.

The guy who just, is he going to call?

Is he not going to call?

No matter how good the sex is, you start to value other things.

So would you say that Jason isn't a f-boy?

If anyone could see a photo of Jason today.

Oh boy.

Who's my f-boy and today?

Not quite a f-boy.

Claire, you have a recommendation for a book.

I do.

So it's called Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabriel Zeven.

And I have been recommended this book so many times

and I've avoided it because it's about the world of video game design

and that turned me off completely.

I was like, huh?

Can't say I'm leaning into that.

Yeah.

I was like, oh, it's by a woman, but video games, I just know.

Like I'm thinking Halo that my partner plays.

I'm not interested.

Then I had one more person who was like, just do it.

It's really, really bloody good.

And thank God I did because it's about two friends

who come together as creative partners to design video games

in the 90s and the book spans 30 years of their story.

And it explores the success of what is essentially a tech company

at the turn of the century, which is fascinating.

And it also brings...

I love how you say turn of the century

and it's actually the year 2000 when we had the Olympics.

One of the first lines of the book is like in the late 20th century.

And I was like, oh my God, it is.

So that's why I say it.

But it brings to life the idea of play in a way

that I've never seen in a book before.

And I didn't realize that video games are like movies

in terms of their development where there's a storyline

and a score and everything from the way a character moves

to what they wear to the world they live in

is all intricately planned and designed in this really profan...

It's like art.

And it's really, really thawed out.

And I feel almost bad that I always dismissed video games

as being quite silly.

But the book also has a character with a physical disability

and it explores how gaming allows him to be able-bodied

in like a virtual world

and to essentially dissociate from his body

when he feels like it's failing him.

But it's also about how success and wealth and fame

don't protect you from failure

or the pain of creative ambitions or conflict or betrayals.

And it's almost kind of like the Lewis Camaldi story

in that it's like sometimes when you have a huge success

it's sickening because you know you can't back it up.

So tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow?

Yes, it is absolutely brilliant.

Please read it and tell me what you think.

If you're looking for something else to listen to,

oh my goodness.

So we spoke on yesterday's subs episode

about family estrangement

because more and more young people are cutting off their parents

for emotional boundaries, for mental health reasons

and not just you know in extreme cases obviously

if you've been abused or something traumatic's happened to you

but because of sometimes small incidents

sometimes sort of just ongoing chronic toxicity

I know that's a word that's overused but oh my lord above

Out loud as you are very interested in this topic

I think everybody what we've realised is everybody has a story

of family estrangement

someone within their family who's estranged

or it might be in their parents family or it might be a friend

it's so interesting we talk about why those relationships break down

and what happens when you stop talking to your family

can familial ties withstand our rapidly changing world views

or is it okay to move on if someone pisses you off?

There's a link in the show notes get involved in the conversation as well

thank you for listening to Australia's number one news and pop culture show

this episode was produced by Emily and Gazillas

and Suzanne and Macon the executive producer is Eliza Ratliff

with audio production by Leah Porges

Bye

Shout out to any Mum Mia subscribers listening

if you love the show and want to support us

subscribing to Mum Mia is the best way to do so

there's a link in the episode description

Machine-generated transcript that may contain inaccuracies.