(00:00:04):
When choosing a partner in the past, I would fall in love first and try to make them fit.

(00:00:09):
This did not end well, as you can imagine.

(00:00:12):
After an unequal marriage,

(00:00:13):
when I drowned in domestic responsibility and a five-year stint with someone who

(00:00:17):
repeatedly cheated,

(00:00:18):
I wanted to choose better as we women are told to do.

(00:00:22):
I found my current partner on the internet.

(00:00:25):
I was determined to fully understand what I wanted and needed first.

(00:00:29):
What were the deal breakers?

(00:00:30):
I vetted all potential suitors by message and looked at their profiles.

(00:00:34):
Red flaggers were immediately deleted and blocked.

(00:00:37):
I believe this is known as the haystack method.

(00:00:41):
When I came to meet my partner for our first date, I already knew we worked on paper.

(00:00:45):
We had the same values, beliefs, diet, philosophy, and dreams for the future.

(00:00:49):
Luckily, we hit it off in person, and it is the most wonderful relationship I've ever been in.

(00:00:53):
I wish this for everyone.

(00:00:57):
Hi, I'm Zonva Lines, and this is the Liberating Motherhood podcast.

(00:01:01):
Today, we are talking about dating wisely and a patriarchy with Jenny Young.

(00:01:06):
Jenny Young is a professor of writing and rhetoric at the University of

(00:01:09):
Wisconsin-Green Bay,

(00:01:10):
specializing in applied rhetoric,

(00:01:12):
humor,

(00:01:12):
and feminism.

(00:01:14):
She holds a PhD in rhetoric and discourse studies from Case Western Reserve

(00:01:18):
University and a satire writing certificate from Second City Chicago.

(00:01:23):
Her work has been published in McSweeney's, Ms.

(00:01:25):
Magazine,

(00:01:26):
HuffPost,

(00:01:27):
and others,

(00:01:27):
and covered by major media outlets such as the New York Times,

(00:01:30):
Rolling Stone,

(00:01:32):
Washington Post,

(00:01:33):
Newsweek,

(00:01:33):
and Wall Street Journal.

(00:01:35):
Jenny Young is also a friend of the podcast, and this is her second time here.

(00:01:39):
This time,

(00:01:40):
she's here to talk about her amazing book,

(00:01:42):
Burn the Haystack,

(00:01:43):
which will be out April 7th.

(00:01:45):
Jenny, thank you so much for coming back.

(00:01:46):
I'm so excited to have you here.

(00:01:48):
Oh, thank you for having me back.

(00:01:50):
I've been looking forward to this.

(00:01:51):
Yeah, this is going to be awesome.

(00:01:54):
Before we get started, I have my usual administrative reminders.

(00:01:58):
This podcast,

(00:01:59):
as everyone knows,

(00:02:00):
depends on reader support,

(00:02:02):
which means that your support really does matter.

(00:02:04):
You can offer that support in the form of heart reacts,

(00:02:07):
positive reviews,

(00:02:08):
shares on social media,

(00:02:09):
telling a friend,

(00:02:10):
telling an enemy.

(00:02:12):
All of this kind of stuff.

(00:02:13):
Comments and other engagement really help boost the podcast visibility because of

(00:02:17):
the way social media and other algorithms work.

(00:02:21):
And if you're a super fan,

(00:02:22):
you can become a paid subscriber on Substack or on Patreon.

(00:02:26):
Paid subscribers get at least eight extra essays a month, plus a bonus podcast episode.

(00:02:31):
They also get access to the private Liberating Motherhood support community.

(00:02:36):
To sign up, visit zon.substack.com or patreon.com slash liberating motherhood.

(00:02:41):
And that part is all one word.

(00:02:43):
So Jenny, let's just jump into it.

(00:02:45):
Tell me about your amazing new book.

(00:02:47):
I'm so excited about it.

(00:02:49):
Oh, thank you.

(00:02:50):
Yeah, I'm excited about it too.

(00:02:52):
So the book is the comprehensive guide on Burnt Haystack Dating Method.

(00:03:01):
My platforms developed organically because I was working with women to sort of

(00:03:10):
articulate and refine the method and tweak the rules and create

(00:03:15):
the heuristics and identify the rhetorical patterns.

(00:03:18):
And all of this was happening in real time.

(00:03:21):
Like, as you know, I had no idea it was going to turn into this.

(00:03:27):
I had embarked on a non-monetized academic project in which I was trying to

(00:03:34):
accomplish something specific and I wanted some input from other women and I wanted

(00:03:38):
us to arrive at,

(00:03:40):
you know,

(00:03:40):
like kind of a set of principles that could...

(00:03:44):
that could be helpful and protective of women, but I did not foresee any of this.

(00:03:48):
So which,

(00:03:50):
so it's,

(00:03:50):
it's like beautiful in,

(00:03:52):
in that the community is a hundred percent like legitimate and authentic where it

(00:03:58):
gets a little hairy is that we've now amassed so much content and knowledge and

(00:04:05):
findings and applications.

(00:04:07):
And it's sort of all over the place that it needed a book.

(00:04:11):
Like it needed one place to be,

(00:04:15):
well-organized in a way that walks people through the philosophy behind the method,

(00:04:21):
the how-to,

(00:04:23):
the if-then scenarios,

(00:04:25):
like if he says this,

(00:04:26):
then you should do this,

(00:04:28):
the FAQs.

(00:04:30):
All of this needed to be in one place in an accessible,

(00:04:34):
easy to digest format that women could turn to as a handbook,

(00:04:39):
a handbook of how to date successfully and safely and efficiently.

(00:04:43):
But also I wanted it to be a source of emotional support and community building and humor.

(00:04:49):
There's tons of humor in the book.

(00:04:52):
And I'll leave it at that for next.

(00:04:53):
I know we're going to talk more about it, but like the book is it.

(00:04:56):
And as more and more fake Facebook groups spring up and more people are,

(00:05:01):
you know,

(00:05:01):
stealing intellectual property,

(00:05:03):
which I just realized is like unavoidable in 2026.

(00:05:06):
This is it.

(00:05:07):
Like, this is the real thing.

(00:05:08):
And it's what works.

(00:05:12):
Yeah,

(00:05:12):
so I'm glad that you mentioned the intellectual property piece thing,

(00:05:16):
because I think that this is something that people who aren't professional writers

(00:05:21):
don't really know a lot about.

(00:05:22):
There is this whole world of people stealing your work.

(00:05:27):
And when you're the originator of the work,

(00:05:30):
You can look sort of like protective and defensive and even a bit narcissistic when

(00:05:35):
you are defending that work.

(00:05:38):
But what happens is like people steal your work and they water it down or they use

(00:05:43):
it harmfully or they use it to make money for themselves.

(00:05:47):
So I think it's just I think it's really important to point out to listeners that

(00:05:51):
like if you like Jenny.

(00:05:53):
if you like me,

(00:05:54):
if our work has helped you in any way,

(00:05:57):
when you see these people stealing this work,

(00:06:00):
you really do need to report them because they really are doing harm.

(00:06:03):
And they're not just harming,

(00:06:04):
you know,

(00:06:05):
the originators,

(00:06:06):
they're harming anybody who wants to learn how to use this work and how to make the

(00:06:10):
world a better place.

(00:06:11):
And like,

(00:06:11):
We just, you know, shouldn't steal women's labor.

(00:06:14):
Like, I think I think that's right.

(00:06:16):
It is.

(00:06:16):
And and the other thing people can do, you don't even have to rise to the level of reporting.

(00:06:23):
Just just ignore it.

(00:06:24):
Like this is the foundation of burned haystack,

(00:06:27):
you know,

(00:06:27):
which is like that block to burn rule is we're not feeding these men in any way.

(00:06:34):
Not with our time, not with our attention, not with our bodies, not with our paychecks.

(00:06:39):
And I would encourage women to apply that same philosophy when they encounter bad

(00:06:45):
actors on the internet,

(00:06:47):
which they're out there.

(00:06:48):
And I knew that was the trade-off.

(00:06:50):
I knew that if I wanted this to be freely accessible,

(00:06:53):
that people were going to steal and profit from my work in ways that I'm not.

(00:06:57):
And it's happening to a greater degree than I was prepared for, that's true.

(00:07:03):
But I'd still, I'd make that same trade again

(00:07:07):
just in the interest of being able to reach a larger community.

(00:07:11):
But yeah, it's, it's everything you just said, like resonates with me deeply.

(00:07:17):
So thank you for getting it and for articulating it.

(00:07:20):
Yeah, it's, it's so frustrating.

(00:07:22):
So

(00:07:24):
I think the thing, when I discovered your work, I was immediately a super fan.

(00:07:29):
Like three paragraphs in, I was like, I love this woman.

(00:07:32):
I had already discovered you long before that.

(00:07:35):
Did you know that?

(00:07:37):
You know, I don't even remember like where on my like human existence timeline I found you.

(00:07:42):
It feels like you've always been in my life.

(00:07:45):
Yeah.

(00:07:47):
Yeah, I would say the same thing.

(00:07:48):
And I had been following your work and thinking, oh my God, she's such a badass.

(00:07:52):
And she's saying the things that all women know and want to say, but won't dare to say it.

(00:07:58):
But I did not know that I was on your radar at all.

(00:08:01):
So the first time you reached out, I was just absolutely giddy and I emailed my agent.

(00:08:06):
I'm like, oh my God, look, Zod knows I exist.

(00:08:08):
Yeah.

(00:08:10):
So I think there's this really I mean,

(00:08:13):
obviously,

(00:08:13):
we're both talking about how relationships can be harmful and all of that.

(00:08:16):
But one of the really important intersections of our work that I think is also an

(00:08:22):
area that's really hard to get women to kind of change the way they are acting is,

(00:08:28):
you know,

(00:08:28):
I have this idea that,

(00:08:30):
you know,

(00:08:30):
patriarchy is the extraction of resources of women.

(00:08:33):
And like, that's not an original idea for me.

(00:08:35):
I mean, I think that's what patriarchy is.

(00:08:38):
Right.

(00:08:38):
And,

(00:08:38):
you know,

(00:08:39):
one of the things that men do is they steal our time so that they can benefit from

(00:08:43):
our time in a myriad of ways.

(00:08:44):
It makes them feel good about themselves.

(00:08:46):
They use our time to get their own leisure time.

(00:08:48):
They steal our time to have sex.

(00:08:50):
Sometimes they just steal our time to make us feel bad.

(00:08:53):
And I think that's something you've really hit on with your work where you

(00:08:58):
You don't advocate like arguing with these men or telling them they're stupid or,

(00:09:03):
you know,

(00:09:03):
recording them to their bosses or whatever.

(00:09:06):
You're just like, get rid of them, silence them.

(00:09:08):
And I think that's so important because the thing that I see a lot and I feel this

(00:09:13):
impulse in myself sometimes is we want to feed the beast and we want to fight with

(00:09:19):
the beast and it doesn't work.

(00:09:21):
And all it does is dysregulate us and upset us.

(00:09:24):
Yeah.

(00:09:25):
And I think so,

(00:09:27):
like a lot of the women in the burned haystack community who are also participating

(00:09:33):
in these fake groups and communities,

(00:09:35):
I think they genuinely see it as like we're there to defend

(00:09:40):
the real mission but that's that's not the outcome of their involvement in those

(00:09:47):
groups because as you just said they're now handing over their time and energy to

(00:09:53):
the patriarchy even if they're doing it like out of the goodness of their hearts it

(00:09:58):
doesn't matter because there's an economic

(00:10:01):
distribution of energy and time and labor and bodies.

(00:10:05):
And they're feeding that patriarchal system by participating in it at all.

(00:10:11):
Yeah, absolutely.

(00:10:12):
I mean,

(00:10:13):
we just we have to claw back as much of our time as we possibly can in like every

(00:10:19):
area that we can.

(00:10:20):
So one thing that I'm I'm interested in is,

(00:10:23):
you know,

(00:10:24):
I know this started as an academic project for you and that you're an academic at

(00:10:28):
heart.

(00:10:29):
And that definitely comes through in your work.

(00:10:32):
How did you develop this method?

(00:10:35):
Like, where did this come from?

(00:10:36):
I mean,

(00:10:38):
initially,

(00:10:39):
it just came from my own frustration and demoralization as a woman on the dating

(00:10:47):
apps.

(00:10:48):
And I remember I had one night where I just thought, we're not going to do this anymore.

(00:10:54):
Yeah.

(00:10:55):
And I didn't necessarily know who we was at that moment,

(00:10:59):
but it was like I was starting to realize that the experience I was having was not

(00:11:04):
isolated.

(00:11:05):
It was the experience all women were having on dating apps.

(00:11:12):
And and I just I became very determined.

(00:11:15):
I didn't know how or like what my approach was going to be,

(00:11:20):
but that I had to find a way to push against it.

(00:11:25):
And and then shortly after that, thinking I literally have a doctorate.

(00:11:31):
in discourse analysis.

(00:11:33):
Like I have a lot of tools at my disposal to address this productively.

(00:11:38):
I just had to figure out like what vehicles to use to do that,

(00:11:43):
how to talk about it in a way that was accessible and how to build a community that

(00:11:49):
was interested in working with me.

(00:11:53):
So, okay.

(00:11:54):
So there's this dynamic in dating and, and I think that your work

(00:11:59):
Kind of addresses this.

(00:12:01):
And I'm going to try to describe it.

(00:12:03):
And I have to try to describe it by telling you about this conversation my husband

(00:12:06):
and I had last night when I was getting ready for this interview.

(00:12:08):
Okay.

(00:12:09):
Which there's this video going around of this woman who's on a first date with a man.

(00:12:15):
And they're coming back from the date.

(00:12:17):
And she's like a Disney princess.

(00:12:19):
Like that's her job is she goes to like kids' birthday parties.

(00:12:23):
Okay.

(00:12:23):
So she works with kids.

(00:12:24):
She's very cute.

(00:12:25):
She's very charming.

(00:12:26):
You know, she's just like the kind of person that like most of us would really like.

(00:12:29):
Okay.

(00:12:30):
So there's on their date,

(00:12:31):
there is a six year old birthday party and they're singing happy birthday to the

(00:12:35):
six year old.

(00:12:36):
And this woman joins in.

(00:12:39):
It's delightful.

(00:12:40):
Like that's charming and nurturing.

(00:12:41):
And like, I would just love a person like that.

(00:12:44):
Right.

(00:12:45):
He, their whole drive back is lecturing her about how she has shamed him and embarrassed him.

(00:12:51):
Right.

(00:12:51):
And, you know, for their future together, that's not what he wants.

(00:12:54):
And it's insane.

(00:12:55):
It's so insane.

(00:12:56):
I'm going to post a link to it, like, in the show notes just so people can see it.

(00:13:01):
Did she capture, like, this actual conversation in real time?

(00:13:05):
Oh, God.

(00:13:05):
The whole thing is on video.

(00:13:06):
And it's pure...

(00:13:08):
And then she tries to get out of the car and he starts trying to stop her.

(00:13:12):
And so what you see is you see how this really,

(00:13:17):
you know,

(00:13:17):
abnormal behavior can quickly spiral into violence.

(00:13:21):
So Jeff, my husband, and I were watching this.

(00:13:24):
And he said something like, you know, I'm so glad you never had any experiences like this.

(00:13:29):
And I was like, oh, yeah, you know, I was really lucky.

(00:13:31):
And then I started thinking and I realized that I had had a number of experiences like this.

(00:13:36):
It's just that it was so normalized that it didn't even register to me as like that

(00:13:42):
was a dangerous date.

(00:13:44):
I had a guy that I went on a first date with who was

(00:13:48):
You know, seemed nice, you know, nice guy in caps.

(00:13:53):
And then the second date, he started screaming about how he was going to shoot everybody.

(00:13:57):
I had a guy I went on a date with, again, like with friends.

(00:14:02):
We were bowling.

(00:14:02):
He was nice.

(00:14:03):
You know, he wasn't punching people or doing anything super crazy.

(00:14:07):
And then he started messaging me, calling me a whore.

(00:14:11):
You know, so there's that dynamic of the switch flipping by like the second or third date.

(00:14:18):
Right.

(00:14:19):
There's the other dynamic where they maintain the nice guy facade for a while and

(00:14:23):
then they become progressively more abusive.

(00:14:25):
Mm-hmm.

(00:14:26):
And then there's the one where they,

(00:14:27):
like,

(00:14:28):
flip the switch back and forth where they're very into you and then they ghost you.

(00:14:32):
And I don't think that people who don't date men understand that this is so normal

(00:14:40):
that we often don't even notice it.

(00:14:42):
And we, like, question ourselves.

(00:14:45):
What did I do to make him do that?

(00:14:47):
Yeah.

(00:14:48):
But your method really captures the fact that there are early warning signs if we

(00:14:54):
learn to look for them.

(00:14:56):
Yes.

(00:14:57):
Like, I can't tell you how many...

(00:15:00):
inquiries or posts or messages I get that include a screenshot of a guy's bio.

(00:15:06):
And the woman will say, honestly, I did not see any problems here.

(00:15:10):
He was great on the first date.

(00:15:13):
And then, you know, over time, it always becomes something nightmarish, right?

(00:15:17):
On a kind of a spectrum of what that nightmare becomes.

(00:15:21):
But

(00:15:22):
I would say 99% of the time we see it in his bio.

(00:15:26):
We find disciplinary directive.

(00:15:29):
We find I'm the prize pattern.

(00:15:31):
We find conditional decency.

(00:15:33):
We find, were you at the Capitol on January 6th?

(00:15:35):
We find, are you my mother?

(00:15:37):
Like these patterns, I'm not saying that that's true 100% of the time.

(00:15:43):
I would feel comfortable saying it's true 95% of the time.

(00:15:49):
Can you talk a little bit more about these patterns and about sort of if there are

(00:15:55):
certain types of people who have been certain patterns like what I don't just

(00:16:00):
explain a little bit to me more about like what people are looking for and what it

(00:16:04):
reveals.

(00:16:06):
So, okay, so we use rhetorical patterning to identify red flags.

(00:16:13):
And as you know, there are a variety of red flags, right?

(00:16:17):
Like some red flags just suggest that someone's going to be annoying or a lot of

(00:16:22):
emotional labor.

(00:16:23):
That might be the bored toddler pattern guys or the, are you my mother?

(00:16:28):
Yeah.

(00:16:29):
Others keep turning into abuse over and over and over again.

(00:16:34):
So any man giving women directives in his profile of any kind,

(00:16:42):
and I mean as low key as saying something like,

(00:16:46):
you should be fit and ready for adventure.

(00:16:50):
That might not sound like a problem, but it is a problem.

(00:16:53):
And it'll almost always turn into much more of a problem over time.

(00:16:58):
So any kind of directive,

(00:17:00):
even if it's implied,

(00:17:01):
like one of the things the book includes is the common dating app prompts.

(00:17:08):
So these aren't things written by men.

(00:17:10):
These are things written by Bumble, written by Hinge.

(00:17:14):
But if a man even selects them, I would rule him out on that...

(00:17:20):
On that metric alone.

(00:17:21):
Like if he picks the you should not go out with me if.

(00:17:25):
Like we're done.

(00:17:26):
We're done with that guy no matter how he answers it.

(00:17:30):
And so there's a whole list of those prompts that you don't even have to get to

(00:17:34):
word one with the man.

(00:17:35):
The fact that he chose it is a problem because he's using this vehicle,

(00:17:41):
the dating app,

(00:17:43):
to exercise control over women that he hasn't even met yet.

(00:17:47):
That he hasn't even conceived of yet.

(00:17:50):
Yeah, the pre-control thing is really...

(00:17:54):
I feel like that flows directly from like red pill manosphere.

(00:17:58):
Oh yeah, for sure.

(00:17:59):
We see this framing of women as like children and possessions who must be controlled.

(00:18:06):
And that just like bubbles out on these apps.

(00:18:09):
And they feel very comfortable laying down that law.

(00:18:14):
Like you can tell,

(00:18:15):
I mean,

(00:18:15):
some of them are overtly like aggressive and violent,

(00:18:19):
but many of them,

(00:18:20):
you can tell as the guy's sitting there typing it,

(00:18:24):
He he doesn't actually intend anything nefarious.

(00:18:29):
Now, he'll end up nefarious.

(00:18:31):
But like in his mind, he just thinks this is how things work.

(00:18:37):
That women are still submissive to men and that that is like right and good and how

(00:18:43):
things should work.

(00:18:45):
And there's no way that doesn't become abusive.

(00:18:47):
Well, and I like that you added that, you know, he might not think of himself as nefarious.

(00:18:53):
Right.

(00:18:53):
No, he doesn't.

(00:18:54):
I think so often we as women are made to feel like we have to give men a chance and

(00:19:00):
we have to give them the benefit of the doubt.

(00:19:02):
And so if he doesn't mean it, we have to educate him.

(00:19:05):
Yes.

(00:19:06):
And that's the beauty of critical discourse analysis,

(00:19:10):
which is my primary methodology upon which Burn Haystack is founded.

(00:19:15):
So CDA is the acronym.

(00:19:18):
What CDA does really well is reveal to you what people are really like that they

(00:19:26):
have no idea they're revealing.

(00:19:28):
Right.

(00:19:29):
Yeah.

(00:19:30):
Like the intention doesn't matter at all.

(00:19:32):
I get that all the time where women say he didn't mean anything by it.

(00:19:35):
I'm like, yeah, I know.

(00:19:35):
It doesn't that doesn't matter at all.

(00:19:37):
That's actually great.

(00:19:38):
Like we don't we're not interested in his intentions.

(00:19:41):
We're trying to get at the rhetorical linguistic clues that reveal who he actually

(00:19:49):
is,

(00:19:49):
because that's who you're going to end up with.

(00:19:52):
I went,

(00:19:53):
so when I was dating,

(00:19:54):
and this has been like 20 years now,

(00:19:55):
I went on out to date with this guy who was,

(00:20:00):
so I was,

(00:20:01):
you know,

(00:20:01):
this young,

(00:20:02):
like conventionally attractive,

(00:20:04):
like blonde girl and,

(00:20:06):
you know,

(00:20:07):
tended to attract men who were like drawn to that.

(00:20:10):
And I had sort of learned that they tended not to be safe.

(00:20:13):
So I started trying to pursue like nerdy,

(00:20:17):
like not conventionally attractive men thinking that that would be safer because we

(00:20:21):
always just,

(00:20:22):
I don't know, make dumb decisions when we're dating.

(00:20:25):
So I, you know, I found this guy who was like very dweeby and like very smart.

(00:20:31):
And,

(00:20:32):
you know,

(00:20:32):
he presented himself as a nice guy,

(00:20:34):
by which I mean,

(00:20:35):
he kept telling me how nice he was.

(00:20:37):
And, you know, back then I was young and I'm just like, well, he says he's nice.

(00:20:41):
Right, right.

(00:20:42):
He wants to be nice.

(00:20:44):
Yeah.

(00:20:44):
Yeah.

(00:20:45):
And he was he was some sort of test instructor like GRE,

(00:20:49):
that sort of thing,

(00:20:50):
because he had gotten a very high score on like his GRE and his his SAT and his

(00:20:55):
LSAT.

(00:20:55):
And he was very proud of this.

(00:20:58):
And like I happen to be someone who tests well.

(00:21:00):
So we sort of like joked about that and seemed fine.

(00:21:04):
But there were like a number of comments he made early on that made it clear that

(00:21:11):
he really looked down on people who didn't test well.

(00:21:14):
And he really saw himself as like a superior sort of person because he saw himself

(00:21:21):
as intelligent.

(00:21:22):
And because I was not being judged by him in that moment, like I missed that flag.

(00:21:28):
And, you know, then we went on a date and he turned out to be a complete psycho.

(00:21:31):
I mean, just awful.

(00:21:34):
It was, it was an awful date.

(00:21:36):
I was like trapped in his car with him,

(00:21:38):
you know,

(00:21:39):
yammering on about his ex and how women should shave and what they should shave and

(00:21:44):
just a nightmare.

(00:21:46):
And so,

(00:21:47):
you know,

(00:21:47):
I didn't call him back and I reposted my ad on whatever dating app I was using at

(00:21:53):
the time was probably like Craigslist or match or something.

(00:21:56):
And he emailed me a couple of days later with a link to my ad.

(00:22:00):
And he was like, why are you still advertising for a partner?

(00:22:04):
Oh, my God.

(00:22:05):
He decided we were married, I guess.

(00:22:07):
Yeah.

(00:22:08):
And I was like, well, I don't think it's going to work out.

(00:22:10):
And he sent me like a 10,000 to 15,000 word essay.

(00:22:12):
Oh, my God.

(00:22:15):
On why I was dumber than him because my SAT score was 10 points lower than his.

(00:22:23):
He like went through my blog and found examples of my stupidity.

(00:22:27):
It was insane.

(00:22:28):
And at the time I felt like, oh, I, I never could have seen this coming, but in hindsight, um,

(00:22:35):
It was there.

(00:22:36):
It was there immediately in our first interaction.

(00:22:39):
And I think it usually is.

(00:22:43):
And I've been in the same boat.

(00:22:47):
I have ended up with similar type of people for far more than one date, I'm ashamed to admit.

(00:22:54):
So yeah, it has nothing to do with...

(00:22:58):
you know, like intelligence or education level or anything like that.

(00:23:03):
Like these are social scripts that we are all subject to and conditioned to entertain.

(00:23:12):
And it's in the intentional like unwiring and then rewiring of how we approach love

(00:23:20):
and dating that lies the power to change these dynamics for women.

(00:23:25):
And that's what I'm trying to do with Bernd Haystack.

(00:23:28):
Well, and the thing that I really love about it is dating can be so miserable.

(00:23:33):
It's miserable because you have to deal with so many shitty people.

(00:23:36):
And then it's also miserable because it's emotionally intense in a really unpleasant way.

(00:23:42):
You know, women are socialized to seek men's approval and they don't get it.

(00:23:46):
And you just feel this like chronic rejection.

(00:23:49):
Also, you know, the fear.

(00:23:50):
I mean, we, we,

(00:23:52):
pretty much all have terrible dating experiences where we're nearly murdered or

(00:23:56):
raped or any number of things.

(00:23:58):
So it's awful.

(00:24:00):
But what you have done is you've taken this thing that is miserable and you've

(00:24:04):
taken kind of the unpleasantness of confronting the misery of it and you've almost

(00:24:09):
sort of gamified it.

(00:24:11):
So you've taken something that feels awful and made it into like a fun little

(00:24:16):
project and puzzle.

(00:24:17):
And I think that really does something.

(00:24:22):
Do you think that this maybe helps women feel less emotionally invested in dating

(00:24:28):
and in a way that like makes them more discerning?

(00:24:31):
For sure.

(00:24:31):
And there's a whole section in the book where I take women through a process to

(00:24:40):
intentionally create that mindset because I

(00:24:44):
There's this sort of like,

(00:24:47):
you know,

(00:24:47):
we all feel compelled since the search is for love and intimacy.

(00:24:52):
We feel compelled to address that through the channel of emotion, which will...

(00:24:59):
I mean, number one, it doesn't work.

(00:25:02):
Number two, it might get you raped and killed.

(00:25:05):
And so we want to intentionally adopt this business-like,

(00:25:11):
intellectual,

(00:25:12):
gamified,

(00:25:13):
as you just said,

(00:25:14):
mindset to the early stages.

(00:25:15):
And I don't mean just the early stages of swiping.

(00:25:19):
I mean for the first several weeks.

(00:25:22):
And some people push against that.

(00:25:23):
But

(00:25:24):
it takes several weeks to get to actually know someone.

(00:25:28):
Like you just can't,

(00:25:29):
you can't tell after a date or two or three,

(00:25:32):
you can definitely rule them out after a date or two or three,

(00:25:35):
but you could have three great dates and he could still turn into a psycho.

(00:25:39):
I was looking through screenshots.

(00:25:41):
So I, do you remember when we recorded our first podcast, you and I?

(00:25:47):
I think it was in maybe April or March of last year.

(00:25:54):
Okay.

(00:25:54):
So that was before I met my needle.

(00:26:00):
In fact,

(00:26:01):
I looked at the date of when we aired the first podcast,

(00:26:06):
and I think it said August 6th.

(00:26:08):
And I met my partner, Pat, on August 3rd in person for the first time.

(00:26:14):
We'd connected on the app in July.

(00:26:16):
And I mean, he was just...

(00:26:18):
a hundred percent green flags, like in every single way from the beginning.

(00:26:23):
But like,

(00:26:24):
just to like,

(00:26:24):
sort of like see where my own mindset was,

(00:26:27):
I was scrolling back through texts with my girlfriend.

(00:26:29):
So I have,

(00:26:30):
I have three friends from childhood that we've been friends since we were 10 years

(00:26:33):
old.

(00:26:33):
So, and we share everything.

(00:26:34):
So like our group,

(00:26:36):
chat on iMessage is basically like a collective biography of all of our lives.

(00:26:41):
And even like several weeks into this,

(00:26:44):
I found a text where I'd sent my girlfriends like all these great things Pat had

(00:26:49):
done and how kind he was and just glowing.

(00:26:53):
And then like three texts in,

(00:26:54):
I was like,

(00:26:55):
yeah,

(00:26:55):
but I mean,

(00:26:56):
you know,

(00:26:56):
I'm sure he's going to turn out to be a psycho,

(00:26:58):
which

(00:26:59):
That's kind of insane, but it's also sort of a healthy mindset.

(00:27:03):
You have to stay very realistic, very businesslike.

(00:27:07):
And I did do that,

(00:27:08):
not because I have more willpower or strength than anyone else,

(00:27:13):
but just because I know and because I have suffered from not doing that,

(00:27:17):
you know,

(00:27:17):
like in in some very.

(00:27:20):
bad ways that I'll never get over.

(00:27:22):
And I know that.

(00:27:23):
And I'm just determined to not let myself end up that way again.

(00:27:26):
And I really don't want other women to end up in those kinds of relationships either.

(00:27:31):
So the mindset shift is vital.

(00:27:33):
And I do spend a lot of time in the book talking about how to affect the mindset

(00:27:38):
that I think is going to lead to the most success.

(00:27:42):
Well, I think that part is so critical.

(00:27:44):
It's so when I finally started

(00:27:47):
I had so many bad dates.

(00:27:48):
I made so many bad decisions with men and just like awful, awful.

(00:27:53):
And then I finally did,

(00:27:55):
I like,

(00:27:56):
I went through a period where it was like,

(00:27:57):
I'm not ready to date because I just am not being discerning.

(00:28:00):
And then I finally returned to dating and I created an application to be my boyfriend.

(00:28:05):
And like, I made a whole podcast episode about it.

(00:28:08):
And I formed a committee of like three of my closest friends and we worked on the

(00:28:13):
application together.

(00:28:14):
We put it in a binder and our deal was we were going to meet every Saturday night

(00:28:19):
and like record the data on like the men I was dating and

(00:28:23):
Because the group consensus was that I just could not be trusted to make good

(00:28:27):
decisions without,

(00:28:28):
like,

(00:28:28):
oversight.

(00:28:29):
I love that.

(00:28:31):
And, you know, I had other friends who weren't so close who were like, this is batshit insane.

(00:28:37):
You are a crazy person.

(00:28:39):
Yeah.

(00:28:40):
Who's going to fill out an application to date you?

(00:28:43):
And what is this?

(00:28:45):
But the more I see,

(00:28:47):
the more I see how that was the right way to do it because it forced me to slow

(00:28:52):
down and really reflect on what is this person bringing objectively?

(00:28:57):
And we would do things like my best guy friend,

(00:29:01):
we had a policy that he would always crash the second date.

(00:29:04):
He would always just show up to make sure I wasn't being murdered, but to also...

(00:29:09):
like screen the guy and see if he got weird about like me having a male friend.

(00:29:14):
And it was, it was great.

(00:29:16):
And so,

(00:29:18):
you know,

(00:29:18):
I love it that you have like a more formal system,

(00:29:21):
but I also,

(00:29:22):
I just reflect on how many people thought I was being unreasonable or that my

(00:29:27):
standards were too high.

(00:29:29):
And the end result of that process is I've been with my husband for almost 20 years

(00:29:33):
and we're like ecstatically happy.

(00:29:36):
And everybody I know who thought I had standards that were too high has cycled

(00:29:40):
through bad relationship after bad relationship.

(00:29:43):
And so I say all that to highlight, this isn't like a trivial thing.

(00:29:48):
This is life and death.

(00:29:50):
It is.

(00:29:50):
Yeah.

(00:29:51):
The biggest risk to women is the men they date and marry and choosing both.

(00:29:57):
I don't want to say choosing wrong because that's not really what happens,

(00:30:00):
but getting wrapped in too early with the wrong man can have devastating lifelong

(00:30:07):
consequences.

(00:30:07):
And it's just like impossible to overstate how horrific it can be.

(00:30:11):
Well,

(00:30:12):
and even on a societal level,

(00:30:14):
like as catastrophic as those kind of relationships become for the women in them,

(00:30:20):
we're now talking about children being raised in those structures,

(00:30:24):
right?

(00:30:24):
It becomes generational.

(00:30:26):
So

(00:30:28):
I think too often women's issues,

(00:30:32):
women's relationship issues are viewed as like,

(00:30:35):
oh,

(00:30:35):
this is like fluffy stuff.

(00:30:37):
It's inconsequential.

(00:30:39):
It's like women's morning news slash magazine slash Instagram feed sort of stuff.

(00:30:45):
But it's actually what society is built upon.

(00:30:48):
And so until we collectively start taking these issues seriously,

(00:30:54):
and that's one of the things I'm trying to do,

(00:30:56):
With Bernd Haystack, we've got academic credibility.

(00:30:58):
We've got like, you know, this.

(00:31:02):
All the all the,

(00:31:03):
you know,

(00:31:03):
just the size of the platform,

(00:31:04):
the success stories that are building up and,

(00:31:07):
you know,

(00:31:08):
the work that you're doing,

(00:31:09):
the work that other feminist philosophers are doing,

(00:31:11):
it is.

(00:31:13):
We're getting to like a critical mass of people who are going to affect a sea change.

(00:31:18):
And that's why men are so angry.

(00:31:20):
Because for the first time,

(00:31:22):
I mean,

(00:31:22):
really in very recent history,

(00:31:24):
like I would say the last five to 10 years,

(00:31:27):
men are collectively starting to feel the consequences of their actions.

(00:31:31):
Not nearly enough,

(00:31:33):
but it is starting to happen because they're not getting dates and women aren't

(00:31:37):
willing to marry them.

(00:31:38):
Or have children with them.

(00:31:39):
And they say that.

(00:31:40):
I mean, you know, every day.

(00:31:43):
Well, you're going to end up alone with your cats and you need to lower your standards.

(00:31:47):
And it's clear that they're feeling such insecurity about not being able to live up

(00:31:52):
to like really basic human standards of decency.

(00:31:56):
Right.

(00:31:57):
Right.

(00:31:57):
Yeah.

(00:31:59):
And, you know, you mentioned the children part.

(00:32:01):
I want to talk about that a little bit more because almost everyone I work with is

(00:32:05):
a mother because it's liberating motherhood.

(00:32:08):
And the thing that I see that is just so devastating is that it's almost always the

(00:32:16):
children keeping these women in bad relationships because they're concerned about

(00:32:20):
child custody.

(00:32:22):
They're concerned about even if they win majority custody,

(00:32:24):
their children spending weekends with these bad men.

(00:32:29):
And so they stay so that they can protect their kids.

(00:32:33):
which is a laudable sacrifice,

(00:32:36):
but also they can never fully protect their kids because their kids are being

(00:32:40):
raised in these toxic environments.

(00:32:42):
And it is,

(00:32:43):
you know,

(00:32:44):
it's such a toxic stew and it has generational consequences because those kids are

(00:32:49):
going to grow up and what happens to them and their relationship choices and their

(00:32:53):
children.

(00:32:53):
Yeah.

(00:32:54):
Well, and yeah, and that manifests in a variety of ways, right?

(00:32:57):
Like you risk young women growing up and choosing male partners who repeat their father's sins.

(00:33:04):
You risk raising young men who've learned the lesson that you can actually do

(00:33:09):
whatever you want to women and they'll stay.

(00:33:12):
And we see the effects of that.

(00:33:15):
So yeah, it's, I mean, there's an infinite set of

(00:33:21):
like ramifications webbing out across all of human existence that has its roots in

(00:33:30):
romantic relationships.

(00:33:32):
Yeah, absolutely.

(00:33:34):
So going back to the angry men for a minute thing, I think the thing that I am seeing

(00:33:41):
Constantly.

(00:33:42):
And I feel like I'm seeing it more.

(00:33:44):
I feel like this idea is catching on more and more.

(00:33:47):
This idea that women have to like lower their standards.

(00:33:49):
And it has this foundational belief that like men have like...

(00:33:56):
A vested interest in women's time and that once you have spent any time with a man,

(00:34:02):
you like owe him more of it.

(00:34:04):
Yes.

(00:34:05):
I see this constantly in women's spaces,

(00:34:07):
whether it's her first date with some dude or like her 15th year with an asshole

(00:34:12):
who obviously doesn't love her.

(00:34:14):
There's this idea that women owe men relationships and that there's just like an

(00:34:18):
entitlement to her time that she has to basically earn her way out of,

(00:34:22):
which is so weird because it's basically framing relationships as a prison that

(00:34:26):
women have to like,

(00:34:27):
you know,

(00:34:28):
find a way to escape.

(00:34:29):
Yeah.

(00:34:30):
the time and and and our time in our bodies yes yes yeah and i love how your system

(00:34:38):
just completely looks past all of these weird fucked up philosophical ideas and

(00:34:42):
just asks you know is this person good for the woman is he likely to make her happy

(00:34:47):
is he likely to be a safe person but what do we do about this idea that like women

(00:34:53):
owe men chances like

(00:34:56):
It is so deeply ingrained.

(00:34:59):
I mean,

(00:34:59):
I've removed five people from my Facebook group just this morning for that kind of

(00:35:04):
rhetoric.

(00:35:05):
Just give him another chance.

(00:35:07):
He didn't mean it.

(00:35:08):
You're all overreacting.

(00:35:09):
I'm not like the other women in this group.

(00:35:11):
Oh, my God.

(00:35:12):
Those are direct quotes just from this morning,

(00:35:14):
like 10 minutes before you and I got on this call.

(00:35:18):
Yeah, I don't.

(00:35:20):
I mean,

(00:35:20):
I think our only hope is for women to unite with other women,

(00:35:25):
which is why I don't let men into my group on Facebook.

(00:35:29):
Yeah.

(00:35:33):
And it's, you know, it's just going to it's going to take a while, I guess.

(00:35:37):
I mean, it is way better.

(00:35:38):
It's hard to like we have to remind ourselves sometimes because in especially in

(00:35:44):
America right now,

(00:35:44):
we have definitely done some backsliding in certain segments of society.

(00:35:49):
But overall, you know, that there's that line from.

(00:35:53):
I can't remember what play it is.

(00:35:57):
the world only spins forward or something like that.

(00:36:00):
Like we are experiencing an extinction burst right now.

(00:36:03):
Like that's why the men are so loud and so angry and they're having temper tantrums

(00:36:08):
and they're making a lot of noise,

(00:36:09):
but it's because change is happening that they can't reverse and they know it.

(00:36:15):
And we're just gonna have to kind of like ride through this with,

(00:36:18):
not just with men,

(00:36:19):
but with women who are serving as a mouthpiece for the patriarchy,

(00:36:22):
like these women that I took out of my group this morning.

(00:36:25):
um i think they know that i think in their bones they they know that something's

(00:36:30):
not right about what they're saying but i don't know i can't like i can't access

(00:36:35):
the psychological constructs that allows women to behave like toxic men it

(00:36:40):
definitely it's a thing it's a problem we're seeing a lot of it i personally don't

(00:36:44):
understand how it works

(00:36:47):
I think it's like a safety-seeking behavior.

(00:36:50):
Yeah, it must be, right?

(00:36:51):
Yeah,

(00:36:52):
like a desire to believe in a just world and then,

(00:36:55):
you know,

(00:36:57):
well,

(00:36:57):
I'm not like the other women,

(00:36:58):
so I'll make better choices,

(00:36:59):
so I'll be okay.

(00:37:00):
But the weird dynamic there is like,

(00:37:03):
There's this idea that,

(00:37:04):
like,

(00:37:04):
I make better choices than other women,

(00:37:06):
but then also,

(00:37:06):
like,

(00:37:07):
actively undermining women who are trying to make better choices.

(00:37:10):
It's kind of like the men who say,

(00:37:13):
like,

(00:37:13):
choose better men and then get mad when we try to do that.

(00:37:16):
Right.

(00:37:17):
Yeah.

(00:37:18):
It's almost like a collective Stockholm syndrome, right?

(00:37:21):
These women who are reading all this red pill rhetoric stuff.

(00:37:25):
And not only buying into it, but then replicating it.

(00:37:30):
And we're seeing that international government right now, too.

(00:37:34):
So, yeah, I don't know.

(00:37:37):
So,

(00:37:37):
OK,

(00:37:37):
speaking of this red pill rhetoric thing,

(00:37:39):
I didn't have this on my list to ask you,

(00:37:41):
but I feel like you might be someone who can.

(00:37:43):
talk through this with me because it's just driving me bonkers this widespread

(00:37:49):
thing on social media where we're telling women to be in their feminine and so that

(00:37:54):
they can attract masculine men yeah and so that they can submit we know they never

(00:38:00):
define what submission means i assume it just means having bad sex with someone who

(00:38:05):
smells bad forever right right um

(00:38:08):
But there's so many women I see who are feminist or feminist adjacent who are like

(00:38:15):
buying into this.

(00:38:16):
And it's just like gender essentialist bullshit.

(00:38:19):
Are you seeing this?

(00:38:20):
Do you have any thoughts on this?

(00:38:21):
Yeah.

(00:38:22):
I mean, yeah, I'm seeing it too.

(00:38:25):
I mean, I think a lot of it is rooted in conservative Christianity, which is not...

(00:38:34):
like what I would consider real Christianity.

(00:38:36):
I have a lot of people will say, is it, is it impossible to be feminist and Christian?

(00:38:43):
And my, my answer to that would be no.

(00:38:45):
Like,

(00:38:45):
I think you can be Christian and feminist,

(00:38:47):
but they're,

(00:38:48):
you know,

(00:38:49):
like the word Christian is,

(00:38:52):
um,

(00:38:52):
an umbrella term at this point that's being co-opted by a whole lot of,

(00:38:58):
um,

(00:38:59):
nonsense.

(00:39:00):
Um,

(00:39:01):
So I don't know.

(00:39:02):
I don't know if it's like pick-me-girl effect kind of stuff.

(00:39:07):
I don't know if some of it is genuine, you know, like thinking that that really is real.

(00:39:16):
the whole like feminist or feminine masculine dichotomy.

(00:39:21):
I mean,

(00:39:22):
it's been disproved in so many different ways through social science,

(00:39:27):
through,

(00:39:27):
you know,

(00:39:28):
through biological science,

(00:39:30):
through anthropology.

(00:39:31):
I, I don't know.

(00:39:32):
I,

(00:39:33):
I don't know if it's just a, I don't think it's a, people want to say it's a lack of education.

(00:39:38):
That's not right.

(00:39:39):
People,

(00:39:40):
everyone who has a smartphone,

(00:39:42):
which is pretty much definitely everyone on a dating app,

(00:39:45):
has access to all of the knowledge of human history in their hand.

(00:39:51):
So it's not that.

(00:39:52):
It's not a lack of access.

(00:39:54):
It's a lack of willingness to confront information with which you might not be comfortable with.

(00:40:02):
So, I mean, I think it's, it's cowardice more than anything.

(00:40:07):
Well,

(00:40:07):
it also,

(00:40:08):
like,

(00:40:08):
it seems like maybe it's an attempt to put,

(00:40:11):
like,

(00:40:11):
a kinder,

(00:40:12):
gentler veneer on,

(00:40:13):
like,

(00:40:13):
the violence of women's relationships.

(00:40:16):
A way to, like, romanticize it, I guess.

(00:40:19):
Kind of like how we dismiss, like, domestic violence as just passions.

(00:40:23):
Yeah.

(00:40:23):
Right.

(00:40:24):
Yeah.

(00:40:25):
Yeah.

(00:40:25):
I mean that maybe, I don't know.

(00:40:27):
It's so bad.

(00:40:28):
Okay.

(00:40:28):
So you and I talked a little bit about this before we recorded.

(00:40:31):
I,

(00:40:33):
this is like a frustration that I continue to have with women I work with and I

(00:40:39):
like,

(00:40:39):
and I,

(00:40:40):
I mean a frustration in that,

(00:40:41):
like,

(00:40:41):
I really want to help them with this and I do not know how,

(00:40:44):
which is that

(00:40:46):
There's so much intense patriarchal socialization that you can give women the literal manual.

(00:40:53):
You can give them your book and you can have a man waving red flags in front of them.

(00:40:59):
And there is a significant number of women who feel like they're being unfair if they don't.

(00:41:05):
go out on a second date with him,

(00:41:06):
who feel like,

(00:41:07):
you know,

(00:41:08):
they owe everyone an opportunity to access their bodies.

(00:41:12):
And like, this is real.

(00:41:16):
It's really deeply ingrained in there.

(00:41:19):
How can we help women break out of this?

(00:41:22):
Do you think that more exposure to things like burned haystack can sort of undo the

(00:41:28):
conditioning?

(00:41:29):
Like, what do you see with women moving beyond this thought process?

(00:41:35):
I do think that more exposure to things like burned haystack to,

(00:41:40):
to the content that you're writing on your sub stack.

(00:41:43):
I definitely think that helps.

(00:41:45):
I've actually been thinking about this a lot lately because I've been asking myself

(00:41:49):
the same question.

(00:41:50):
Like there's, there's so many discourses out there right now that are intended to help women.

(00:41:55):
And yet in,

(00:41:56):
in many ways,

(00:41:57):
they're not there either because they're not getting through or they're just not

(00:42:01):
being effective.

(00:42:02):
And yeah,

(00:42:04):
This is going to sound like I'm going off on a tangent, but I'll bring it back.

(00:42:09):
There was an experiment in California several years ago.

(00:42:13):
definitely more than 10 years ago,

(00:42:14):
where they implemented self-esteem education in public elementary schools.

(00:42:20):
Are you familiar with this?

(00:42:21):
Yeah, I've heard a little bit about this.

(00:42:23):
Okay,

(00:42:24):
so the thought process was children are acting out or failing or getting into

(00:42:30):
danger or whatever because they have low self-esteem.

(00:42:33):
Okay.

(00:42:33):
Okay.

(00:42:34):
And there's a lot of research to support that idea that that's true.

(00:42:39):
So California public schools was like, then we will teach them self-esteem.

(00:42:44):
And they made, I don't remember what they called it.

(00:42:46):
They might've just called it self-esteem,

(00:42:48):
but they made it a period in the school day that was,

(00:42:51):
you know,

(00:42:52):
the same as like math or gym or art.

(00:42:54):
And during that self-esteem period, students like

(00:42:58):
celebrated themselves.

(00:43:00):
They made collages of their face or their favorite things.

(00:43:03):
And they wrote poems about everything that made them wonderful.

(00:43:07):
And then at the end of the study,

(00:43:10):
I can't remember how many years it went on,

(00:43:12):
not very long,

(00:43:13):
but at the end of the study,

(00:43:14):
they compared the children who'd gotten self-esteem education to three control

(00:43:20):
groups.

(00:43:21):
One was high achieving adults and

(00:43:24):
The second was average achieving adults.

(00:43:28):
And the third was sociopaths on death row.

(00:43:33):
So you're talking like serial rapists and murderers.

(00:43:36):
And the children in their responses to the survey questions aligned most closely

(00:43:43):
with these sociopaths.

(00:43:45):
And they realized that what they'd done unintentionally was given these children

(00:43:51):
the message that you're so wonderful just because you exist.

(00:43:56):
It doesn't matter what you do or what you think or how you treat people.

(00:44:00):
Like you're just wonderful because you're you.

(00:44:03):
And then the next takeaway from that study is that you can't actually teach self-esteem without

(00:44:11):
In that way,

(00:44:13):
the way children actually develop self-esteem is to gain skills and knowledge that

(00:44:20):
help other people or that accomplish something in the world.

(00:44:23):
So if you can teach a child to effectively care for her younger siblings.

(00:44:29):
she will get self-esteem from that.

(00:44:31):
If you can teach a child to help her dad repair a car,

(00:44:35):
she will get self-esteem from that,

(00:44:37):
but she won't get it from being taught self-esteem.

(00:44:39):
So I've been thinking about this study for years and I'm also constantly like in

(00:44:44):
touch with all these discourses in like what I'll call women's content in 2026,

(00:44:51):
whether that's social media,

(00:44:52):
podcasts,

(00:44:53):
magazines,

(00:44:53):
whatever it is.

(00:44:55):
And I think we're spending way too much time

(00:44:58):
teaching, trying to teach empowerment.

(00:45:02):
Like as a thing,

(00:45:04):
we're teaching women to be empowered,

(00:45:06):
but we're doing it in the stupidest of ways because it's not rooted in anything

(00:45:12):
other than this,

(00:45:13):
like,

(00:45:13):
I am woman,

(00:45:14):
hear me roar kind of messaging,

(00:45:17):
which is actually nothing.

(00:45:18):
That's like a vacuum of stupidity.

(00:45:21):
It's the same thing as teaching self-esteem.

(00:45:23):
So what I would say is, you know what, let's stop talking about empowerment and

(00:45:29):
or being in your defined feminine or any of these other things that are not rooted

(00:45:32):
in any kind of actual knowledge.

(00:45:35):
And let's instead teach women what's happened in history when women have been disempowered.

(00:45:42):
Let's teach them critical discourse analysis.

(00:45:45):
Let's teach them applied rhetoric.

(00:45:47):
Let's teach them feminist philosophy.

(00:45:49):
I think you're a big fan of Kate Mann, right?

(00:45:51):
Mm-hmm.

(00:45:52):
Okay, so let's bring in some actual voices, some actual content knowledge.

(00:45:57):
And through those channels, that's how women actually grow and become empowered.

(00:46:03):
It's not through teaching empowerment.

(00:46:05):
I think that's where we're going wrong.

(00:46:07):
You know, oh my God.

(00:46:08):
Okay.

(00:46:09):
So I have so many thoughts listening to you say this.

(00:46:12):
The first thing that came to mind for me is that this is what patriarchy does to

(00:46:17):
men with these self-esteem classes.

(00:46:19):
Yes, yes.

(00:46:19):
You're the prize.

(00:46:21):
And men are taught from birth that they're just like entitled to these relationships.

(00:46:25):
Yes.

(00:46:25):
And it makes it make sense why they behave the way they do in their relationships

(00:46:31):
because they don't think they really have to earn them.

(00:46:33):
Right.

(00:46:33):
Right.

(00:46:33):
Exactly.

(00:46:34):
But then the inverse is also true for women.

(00:46:37):
I mean, the thing I see constantly from men

(00:46:41):
is that men hate it when women are proud of things.

(00:46:44):
You know, if you have a career, then you're, you know, you're a career woman and you're bad.

(00:46:49):
And then you're like,

(00:46:50):
okay,

(00:46:50):
well,

(00:46:51):
I'm proud of giving birth to my children and that was hard and parenting them well.

(00:46:56):
And it's like, well, everybody does that.

(00:46:58):
Don't brag about that, you stupid bitch.

(00:47:00):
Like whatever women are proud of, men are mad at them for being proud of it.

(00:47:05):
And like, that's not an accident.

(00:47:07):
There's a reason for that.

(00:47:08):
Right.

(00:47:08):
I mean, they're literally demanding that left and right in their dating app profiles.

(00:47:12):
They want women who are humble, who have humility, who don't think too much of ourselves.

(00:47:17):
Like they're using those words.

(00:47:20):
And it's like, I mean, have you ever met a woman who's not humble?

(00:47:23):
Like that's what patriarchy socializes us to be.

(00:47:26):
Right, right.

(00:47:27):
We're all so humble.

(00:47:28):
Yeah, we're humble to our own detriment.

(00:47:31):
All the time.

(00:47:32):
Yeah.

(00:47:32):
Every time I have someone on my podcast and they send me their bio,

(00:47:36):
like I want to edit it and add like the 50 other like great things that,

(00:47:40):
you know,

(00:47:41):
I want to add.

(00:47:41):
And this is also the greatest person who has ever lived,

(00:47:44):
as we all know,

(00:47:46):
because women just like undersell themselves.

(00:47:48):
But then I get I don't bring men on the podcast,

(00:47:50):
but I get pitches from men to come on the podcast all the time.

(00:47:53):
I'm sure.

(00:47:54):
Yeah.

(00:47:54):
Their bios are bonkers.

(00:47:56):
Oh, I know.

(00:47:57):
I mean, their LinkedIn bios are bonkers.

(00:48:00):
Oh, my God.

(00:48:01):
Yeah.

(00:48:01):
They're just,

(00:48:02):
you know,

(00:48:03):
we can just never be as high achieving as,

(00:48:05):
you know,

(00:48:05):
the man who has a wife at home doing everything for him while she also works.

(00:48:10):
Right.

(00:48:10):
Right.

(00:48:11):
Yeah.

(00:48:12):
All right, Jenny.

(00:48:13):
Well, okay.

(00:48:14):
Is there anything you want people to know about the book?

(00:48:17):
Like... I guess just that...

(00:48:21):
There's a lot of stuff.

(00:48:24):
We're talking so much all the time in the Burnt Haystack platforms about so many

(00:48:30):
different ideas and concepts and applications.

(00:48:33):
There's actually a lot new in the book that I've never talked about on social media.

(00:48:37):
There's also, and I'm revealing this on your podcast.

(00:48:41):
Yeah.

(00:48:42):
There's an Easter egg.

(00:48:44):
Do you know that term in the book?

(00:48:45):
I do.

(00:48:46):
Okay.

(00:48:47):
So there's some hidden coded,

(00:48:49):
there's a hidden coded story in the book about a personal experience of mine that I

(00:48:56):
think only women in the Facebook group will catch on to.

(00:48:59):
But I want you to know it's in there if you want a little like rhetorical challenge.

(00:49:05):
And I'm saying that like purely for entertainment.

(00:49:07):
It doesn't make it like any more meaningful that it was my story.

(00:49:11):
It's kind of portrayed as someone else's, but it's in there just for fun, really.

(00:49:16):
You know, I ended up meeting my partner like after I had already handed over

(00:49:24):
the manuscript.

(00:49:26):
But, you know, there's an editing and revising process that goes on for quite a while.

(00:49:31):
So there's some hidden info in there.

(00:49:34):
I love the hidden info thing.

(00:49:35):
So I made this post on Substack a couple of weeks ago.

(00:49:37):
I love frogs.

(00:49:39):
And anybody who follows me knows I love frogs.

(00:49:41):
And I have pet frogs.

(00:49:43):
I have like all these terrarians in my office.

(00:49:45):
So I posted a picture of three of my frogs, like hiding under a leaf together.

(00:49:51):
And it was like, it was very cute.

(00:49:53):
And I put on the caption,

(00:49:55):
you know,

(00:49:56):
you can't see them because they're hiding,

(00:49:58):
even though you could like obviously see them.

(00:50:00):
And,

(00:50:01):
but like the,

(00:50:02):
I had an extra message there,

(00:50:05):
which is like,

(00:50:06):
look at these frogs trying to hide.

(00:50:07):
Like, this is like how men do it too.

(00:50:09):
And so we can't, we can't see their badness because they're hiding.

(00:50:12):
And, you know, I got lots of comments about, oh, those precious frogs.

(00:50:16):
I don't see them.

(00:50:16):
Where are they?

(00:50:17):
And then I finally had one person post this long, like five paragraph thing and,

(00:50:23):
explaining the frogs as like a metaphor for men and and you know her comment was

(00:50:28):
like a little overwrought and she went deep on it but in a really charming like

(00:50:33):
endearing way yeah yeah yeah so okay i'm glad there's similar things in your book i

(00:50:38):
like that yeah there there's also a lot of resources in the book that go beyond

(00:50:44):
my book so there's reading lists in there and um like for fun and for information

(00:50:50):
and it's there's just a it's a comprehensive text but it's also extremely readable

(00:50:59):
like we we put a lot of time and energy there there was one chapter that when i

(00:51:03):
submitted it

(00:51:04):
I knew Harper Collins was going to be like,

(00:51:06):
yeah,

(00:51:06):
we're going to have to scale back the academic talk on this one.

(00:51:08):
And I knew it was coming and it was the correct move and we did.

(00:51:12):
But I'm proud to say we also retained all the intellectual weight of it.

(00:51:16):
So I feel like it'll serve everyone well, regardless.

(00:51:21):
One of the things I really love about your work is that it's not rooted in nothing.

(00:51:27):
It's intellectually healthy.

(00:51:28):
Right.

(00:51:29):
It's so accessible.

(00:51:30):
So you're doing all kinds of cool stuff, but you're also making people a lot smarter.

(00:51:36):
Thank you.

(00:51:36):
Yeah, I hope so.

(00:51:38):
The other thing I want to assure everyone about with the book,

(00:51:40):
because this is one of my concerns,

(00:51:42):
we cut men no slack.

(00:51:47):
We already know there's going to be a lot of anger because of things I wrote in the book.

(00:51:52):
And to HarperCollins' credit, they were behind me 100%.

(00:51:58):
They are willing to lose readers in order to say,

(00:52:02):
what needs to be said by women for women.

(00:52:06):
We just decided that I guess 50% of the population will have to be enough of a

(00:52:12):
target audience for this book.

(00:52:14):
So we truly pulled no punches.

(00:52:16):
There's no watering down.

(00:52:18):
I'm sure the death threats will be coming and we're prepared for that.

(00:52:24):
I love that.

(00:52:25):
I'm so glad to hear that because

(00:52:28):
I think so often feminists are pressured to water down our message and make it to men.

(00:52:32):
And it's like, it's not for men.

(00:52:34):
It's just not.

(00:52:35):
Right.

(00:52:35):
Exactly.

(00:52:35):
If they want to read it and learn from it, fine.

(00:52:38):
But, you know, we don't care.

(00:52:40):
So I love it.

(00:52:42):
We don't care.

(00:52:43):
Yeah.

(00:52:44):
Well, I'm so glad you had your support of your publisher for that, too.

(00:52:46):
That's wonderful.

(00:52:47):
And Jenny, you're just wonderful.

(00:52:50):
So thank you so much for coming on and for writing this amazing book.

(00:52:55):
I hope everybody loves it.

(00:52:57):
It will be out April 7th.

(00:52:58):
I'm going to put all of Jenny's information in the podcast notes.

(00:53:03):
She also has a sub stack.

(00:53:05):
She has this amazing book.

(00:53:07):
Facebook group, make sure it's her group and not one of the theft groups.

(00:53:13):
And Jenny is just the best.

(00:53:14):
So thank you so much for coming on.

(00:53:15):
Oh, thank you for having me back.

(00:53:17):
It's been the hour has flown by again.

(00:53:19):
Yeah, it's been it's been great having you and listeners.

(00:53:22):
I will be back next week.

(00:53:24):
So thanks for listening.