WEBVTT - An Unhinged List Of Rules No One Asked For 0:00:00.360 --> 0:00:03.320 Hello, and welcome to Mom and Mia out loud. It's 0:00:03.320 --> 0:00:05.640 all I'm actually talking about. On Friday, the twentieth of 0:00:05.680 --> 0:00:08.639 March out louders, I just want to offer you all 0:00:08.680 --> 0:00:11.960 an enormous congratulations. You are still listening to the number 0:00:12.000 --> 0:00:17.400 one show in Australia. We might have told you about 0:00:17.400 --> 0:00:18.919 that on Wednesday, but we're going to tell you about 0:00:18.920 --> 0:00:22.000 it again and again and again and again. Congratulations on 0:00:22.040 --> 0:00:26.040 your excellent taste. Congratulations and congratulations class. 0:00:26.040 --> 0:00:28.080 You can say, and I'll take a little bit of 0:00:28.080 --> 0:00:30.000 credit because last time I was sort of like trying 0:00:30.000 --> 0:00:32.800 to head but my way into the celebration. Everyone's like, 0:00:32.960 --> 0:00:34.960 no offense, beat you won't there, you were there. 0:00:35.040 --> 0:00:37.720 I can't take any credit because I wasn't here all affair. 0:00:37.920 --> 0:00:42.080 Yeah, your vibes was always here, Yeah, always here. You 0:00:42.120 --> 0:00:44.280 were on holiday, but your vibes were still here. 0:00:44.320 --> 0:00:45.800 Thank you, Thank you anyway, alauders, I. 0:00:45.800 --> 0:00:48.240 Have one request from the number one show in the nation. 0:00:48.479 --> 0:00:50.959 If you love it, if you love us, wherever you're 0:00:50.960 --> 0:00:52.920 listening to this, there'll be a little way for you 0:00:52.960 --> 0:00:54.360 to show it. There will be a place where you 0:00:54.400 --> 0:00:57.960 can hit five stars or leave a little review. Yeah, 0:00:58.200 --> 0:01:00.000 saying we love our girls. 0:01:00.080 --> 0:01:02.120 And also they're very attractive, thank you so much. 0:01:03.160 --> 0:01:11.000 We're not really girls very attractive like the bridesmaid aging 0:01:11.200 --> 0:01:14.880 really well, lady. Anyway, if you would like to leave 0:01:14.959 --> 0:01:17.560 us over your five stars, we would love it. Anyway. 0:01:17.600 --> 0:01:18.399 Who else is with me? 0:01:18.560 --> 0:01:19.959 Well, you haven't said who you are? 0:01:20.720 --> 0:01:23.440 Who are so sorry? I've been talking to us a 0:01:23.440 --> 0:01:26.759 bit over excited. I'm Holly Wayne Wright. 0:01:26.920 --> 0:01:30.520 You're also like, I need no introduction. The number one 0:01:30.520 --> 0:01:31.440 podcast in the country. 0:01:31.520 --> 0:01:36.160 I'm Clare and I'm M N M and on Today's Agenda. 0:01:36.200 --> 0:01:39.600 The best selling memoir that has us asking how much 0:01:39.760 --> 0:01:41.160 truth actually matters. 0:01:41.240 --> 0:01:43.920 We have recommendations that include a TV show that made 0:01:43.920 --> 0:01:46.600 Claire cry, a movie that m can't stop raving about, 0:01:46.640 --> 0:01:49.240 and a literally eye opening beauty product from me. 0:01:50.160 --> 0:01:53.360 And there is a substack titled the Unofficial List of 0:01:53.440 --> 0:01:57.240 Things that men should Never do. I'm immediately obsessed, and yes, 0:01:57.280 --> 0:01:57.960 I've created my. 0:01:57.920 --> 0:01:59.680 Own list to add on. We're going to have a 0:01:59.720 --> 0:02:03.080 little barney about that, I think. But first, in case 0:02:03.080 --> 0:02:06.440 you missed it, your difficult friends are shortening your life. 0:02:06.560 --> 0:02:09.040 I'm just leaving this here in case you need a 0:02:09.040 --> 0:02:13.520 little nudge this weekend to cancel some plants a very 0:02:13.560 --> 0:02:21.840 fancy scientific journal called PNAS. I do not read that 0:02:21.880 --> 0:02:22.400 out loud. 0:02:24.280 --> 0:02:26.240 I'm sorry that. 0:02:27.040 --> 0:02:33.440 I didn't even realize that Proceedings of the National Academy 0:02:33.480 --> 0:02:39.880 of Sciences PNAS, it's real, have published a study blah 0:02:39.919 --> 0:02:44.799 blah study blah blah, but experts labor labeling your difficult 0:02:44.800 --> 0:02:48.600 friends and family members as Hassler's is the official scientific 0:02:48.760 --> 0:02:52.400 term for it, Hassler's and saying they're literally aging you. 0:02:52.720 --> 0:02:55.360 A couple of lines from this study. We investigate the 0:02:55.440 --> 0:02:58.880 role of Hassler's, say p NAS people in one's close 0:02:59.000 --> 0:03:02.119 social networks who create problems or make life more difficult, 0:03:02.360 --> 0:03:06.240 finding that these negative ties are not rare, disproportionately experienced 0:03:06.240 --> 0:03:11.840 by individuals facing greater social and health vulnerabilities and consequential 0:03:11.880 --> 0:03:14.720 for aging. So basically, they're saying they're bad for you 0:03:15.200 --> 0:03:19.799 each additional Hassler, So every extra awkward, annoying person you 0:03:19.880 --> 0:03:24.800 have in your life is associated with faster biological aging 0:03:25.440 --> 0:03:29.480 with especially pronounced effects when that Hassler is a family member. 0:03:30.840 --> 0:03:34.480 So look, you don't need to have brunch tomorrow with Betty, 0:03:34.520 --> 0:03:36.840 who drives you crazy. She is ushering you to an 0:03:36.880 --> 0:03:39.200 early grave and you just need to say, so's Betty, 0:03:39.240 --> 0:03:40.920 I have to cut you off for my health. What 0:03:40.960 --> 0:03:41.400 do we think? 0:03:41.880 --> 0:03:45.240 I mean, there's a lot of debate, isn't there about 0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:49.160 how we need a little bit of social friction and 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:52.800 social tension in order to have community. 0:03:52.320 --> 0:03:53.680 But not if it's aging myself. 0:03:53.760 --> 0:03:56.320 And then we're told that it's aging us. And obviously, 0:03:56.360 --> 0:03:59.800 as the resident scientist, I went and read the entire 0:03:59.840 --> 0:04:03.960 study and it's legit like and it is as you say, Holly, 0:04:03.960 --> 0:04:06.240 it's not just friends, it's family members. And I thought 0:04:06.320 --> 0:04:08.800 what was interesting They make the point in the study 0:04:09.280 --> 0:04:14.000 that often the hasslers are the people who are closest 0:04:14.040 --> 0:04:16.480 to you, because they're the ones that you give the 0:04:16.520 --> 0:04:19.919 bandwidth to be annoying, Like if you had if you 0:04:19.920 --> 0:04:22.280 had an acquaintance who was like that, you just kind 0:04:22.279 --> 0:04:24.400 of ignore them. But it's hard when it's your mum. 0:04:25.080 --> 0:04:28.400 So it's often these people who are really close to you. 0:04:28.600 --> 0:04:30.760 I do like that it gives you permission. 0:04:31.279 --> 0:04:34.599 And we've got a name. Hassler's Ye, you're a hassler. 0:04:34.760 --> 0:04:36.720 You're not a hassler. M thank you so much. Are 0:04:36.760 --> 0:04:38.120 you going to cut off some hasslers? 0:04:38.240 --> 0:04:43.120 I mean, it's very rare where I hear something new 0:04:43.160 --> 0:04:45.560 that's come up that has a lot of scientific backing 0:04:45.640 --> 0:04:47.080 on it, and I go wrong. 0:04:48.760 --> 0:04:55.040 She lives universe, take side and shove it. 0:04:55.279 --> 0:04:58.840 This is wrong because this whole thing is Also because 0:04:58.880 --> 0:05:00.880 I did read a lot of the science words in 0:05:00.960 --> 0:05:04.720 this piece, and I saw I saw the word chronic 0:05:04.800 --> 0:05:08.120 stress come up a lot. So they're comparing that some 0:05:08.200 --> 0:05:10.839 people who are hasslers in your life are adding to 0:05:10.880 --> 0:05:13.560 your chronic stress. And we know stress is a slow killer, 0:05:13.560 --> 0:05:15.440 but it is a killer. That's not the only thing 0:05:15.480 --> 0:05:18.279 that's stressful. So what I'm worried about is that we 0:05:18.360 --> 0:05:21.320 could get someone who has all of these friends around 0:05:21.320 --> 0:05:23.880 them and then them just going you stress me out 0:05:23.920 --> 0:05:25.680 this way. I didn't like when you did that. That 0:05:25.760 --> 0:05:27.400 was a bit stressful. I didn't like when you did that. 0:05:27.400 --> 0:05:29.479 That was a bit stressful. But also the same person 0:05:29.480 --> 0:05:32.360 could just have like a job that's literally aging them 0:05:32.480 --> 0:05:34.479 and that's the biggest stress in their life, and they 0:05:34.560 --> 0:05:37.960 end up dumping all their friends keeping this crappy job, 0:05:38.200 --> 0:05:41.599 and now they're still stressed out, going through chronic stress, 0:05:41.960 --> 0:05:43.840 and they've got no friends because I got. 0:05:43.800 --> 0:05:48.160 Rid of them. Also, social support really really important for 0:05:48.520 --> 0:05:51.720 fighting stress. So I do think, m there are lots 0:05:51.720 --> 0:05:52.960 of confounding factors. 0:05:53.120 --> 0:05:53.960 Get me a lab coat. 0:05:54.000 --> 0:05:54.440 I've got this. 0:05:55.160 --> 0:05:58.320 I'm just gonna get little badges made like Hassler. Just 0:05:58.360 --> 0:06:00.359 hand them out to my friends and be like, this 0:06:00.480 --> 0:06:04.440 is a present. It's a great compliment. Everybody around them 0:06:04.440 --> 0:06:07.000 will be like, stay away. 0:06:08.680 --> 0:06:12.720 There's a book cover I have been seeing everywhere. Amelia's 0:06:12.760 --> 0:06:14.800 reading it, Me is reading it, and it's next on 0:06:14.839 --> 0:06:18.760 my list. It's called Strangers by Bell Burden. But before 0:06:18.839 --> 0:06:21.120 I've even had the chance to pick it up, I've 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:25.880 seen some criticism circling for context Burden, who happens to 0:06:25.920 --> 0:06:29.680 be an heiress. She has descended. 0:06:30.880 --> 0:06:34.599 So I just displayed so much about myself by giving 0:06:34.640 --> 0:06:37.040 a little snort through my nose and rolling my eyes. 0:06:37.040 --> 0:06:40.080 I'm very sorry, Bell Burden. I'm sure you're a lovely person. 0:06:40.160 --> 0:06:40.680 Not her fault. 0:06:41.560 --> 0:06:42.920 Heiresses can write books. 0:06:43.000 --> 0:06:48.840 Yes, she descended from the Vanderbilts. She wrote a viral. 0:06:51.200 --> 0:06:52.760 People are allowed. 0:06:52.360 --> 0:07:01.760 To be heiress, discriminated Charlie inside voice. Sorry, we're not gLing, Claire. 0:07:01.839 --> 0:07:03.520 I was just trying to get through this one. 0:07:04.560 --> 0:07:07.720 Sorry, Clara, please continue telling us about it, just because 0:07:07.720 --> 0:07:10.720 we're not heiresses. You know, one day we might be 0:07:11.480 --> 0:07:13.920 She wrote a viral essay for the New York Times 0:07:13.920 --> 0:07:17.239 Modern Love section, and that is the basis for this memoir. 0:07:17.560 --> 0:07:20.000 So it opens in the early days of the pandemic 0:07:20.080 --> 0:07:23.160 in twenty twenty, and she receives a phone call from 0:07:23.160 --> 0:07:27.520 a stranger who says, FYI, your husband is having an 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:31.480 affair with my wife. And that's her husband of twenty years, 0:07:31.520 --> 0:07:35.680 scary of her three children. He is a hassler. But 0:07:35.800 --> 0:07:38.239 the twist is she didn't know he was a hassler, 0:07:38.880 --> 0:07:42.920 because the other kind of remarkable thing about this story 0:07:43.520 --> 0:07:47.520 is that she says in this book that there were 0:07:48.000 --> 0:07:52.040 no signs, and so at first he says he's really sorry, 0:07:52.280 --> 0:07:54.960 and he is embarrassed, and the relationship is over. Then 0:07:55.040 --> 0:07:57.480 he sort of switches and says he doesn't want to 0:07:57.480 --> 0:08:00.239 be married, and then he becomes a stranger to her. 0:08:01.000 --> 0:08:04.320 So that's the concept of strangers. It's been hailed as 0:08:04.360 --> 0:08:08.080 a memoir about betrayal and self discovery, but there are 0:08:08.120 --> 0:08:12.400 also people who say it's not entirely true or not 0:08:12.680 --> 0:08:13.920 entirely consistent. 0:08:14.080 --> 0:08:15.560 Let me guess is one of them. 0:08:15.800 --> 0:08:21.760 The husband, Well, weirdly, he read it and gave his. 0:08:21.680 --> 0:08:24.000 Approved Okay, so he was like, you've got me. This 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:27.920 is my penance, Please publicly humiliate me for lessons. 0:08:28.480 --> 0:08:31.320 But he I think it was very much like the 0:08:31.440 --> 0:08:34.600 royal response to Prince Harry's memoir, which was like, recollections 0:08:34.600 --> 0:08:37.959 may vary my favorite Yeah, because it's just I mean, 0:08:38.320 --> 0:08:41.200 a truer sentence has never been spoken about life. But 0:08:42.160 --> 0:08:46.240 there are apparently discrepancies between what Burden wrote in the 0:08:46.280 --> 0:08:50.240 New York Times essay, what she said in interviews about 0:08:50.240 --> 0:08:53.400 the book, and then what's actually in the memoir. One 0:08:53.440 --> 0:08:56.319 of those is the idea of there being no signs 0:08:56.320 --> 0:08:59.120 of the problems in her marriage, because sometimes she phrases 0:08:59.160 --> 0:09:03.400 it that you willfully ignored them. Sometimes she kind of 0:09:03.400 --> 0:09:05.600 brings up things that people are like that was a sign. 0:09:06.360 --> 0:09:11.319 But to me, I'm life, Yeah, we're all inconsistent humans exactly. 0:09:11.360 --> 0:09:13.679 I'm like, yeah, if I told any story about my 0:09:13.720 --> 0:09:17.360 life any number of times, it would change because that's 0:09:17.600 --> 0:09:20.000 the nature of language and perspective. 0:09:20.120 --> 0:09:21.640 Yeah, but you're not making profit on it. 0:09:21.840 --> 0:09:27.120 Yeah, true, I like, but I think even still, we 0:09:27.200 --> 0:09:30.840 don't want people to be totally rehearsed in exactly what 0:09:30.880 --> 0:09:33.040 they tell us. And your understanding of your own life 0:09:33.240 --> 0:09:37.760 evolves over time. But there's also this sub stacker came across, 0:09:37.760 --> 0:09:41.160 which is so detailed to the point of it was 0:09:41.280 --> 0:09:43.800 a little bit funny, where it goes through all of 0:09:43.840 --> 0:09:49.360 Burton's claims dissects them. And what's interesting is that this 0:09:49.720 --> 0:09:56.280 critic seems to be annoyed at Bellburden for not considering 0:09:56.320 --> 0:09:58.120 the perspective of her husband in. 0:09:58.080 --> 0:10:00.560 All this, and even though he has and just like, 0:10:00.760 --> 0:10:01.240 go for it. 0:10:01.720 --> 0:10:04.240 Yeah, And I'd just like to say that no one 0:10:04.320 --> 0:10:06.760 who's been dumped out of the blue is at pains 0:10:07.240 --> 0:10:10.360 to walk in their partner's shoes, like you have your 0:10:10.440 --> 0:10:14.640 experience of what happened, and that's the bloody experience. So 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:18.360 there's also criticism about the dialogue in the memoir about 0:10:18.360 --> 0:10:21.520 how could you possibly have remembered those conversations, which makes 0:10:21.559 --> 0:10:22.520 me think that's just me. 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:27.200 People are so annoying. I'm sorry, but people are annoying. 0:10:27.280 --> 0:10:29.800 Let the woman write a book, exactly, Let the air 0:10:29.960 --> 0:10:30.840 s write a book. 0:10:31.120 --> 0:10:33.480 Let her write her book and make a lot of money. 0:10:33.920 --> 0:10:37.880 I'm money fascinated by this conversation because I've just finished 0:10:38.520 --> 0:10:41.520 listening to the Walkers the Real Salt Path which Holly 0:10:41.559 --> 0:10:45.320 recommended a few weeks ago, seven part series about the 0:10:45.320 --> 0:10:49.240 best selling memoir by rainer Win, and you flagged when 0:10:49.240 --> 0:10:51.959 you recommended it. Holly that on the one hand, there 0:10:52.000 --> 0:10:56.600 are some very legitimate claims about the story not being true, 0:10:57.000 --> 0:11:01.920 or rainer Win misrepresenting her life for example, that's not 0:11:02.040 --> 0:11:07.319 her name, just little things at all. But there are 0:11:07.520 --> 0:11:10.199 also things that seem really petty, and I'm not sure 0:11:10.240 --> 0:11:14.880 that they actually take away from the emotional truth of 0:11:14.920 --> 0:11:17.760 what she was trying to say. Holly, where do you 0:11:17.760 --> 0:11:18.560 think the line is? 0:11:18.679 --> 0:11:21.560 I think we live in and it's all true crime 0:11:21.600 --> 0:11:22.439 podcast fault. 0:11:22.559 --> 0:11:22.760 Right. 0:11:22.840 --> 0:11:24.800 We live in an era where everybody wants to be 0:11:24.840 --> 0:11:28.240 a detective, and everybody likes to excavate on the internet, 0:11:28.280 --> 0:11:32.120 and everybody likes to prove people wrong and expose the truth. 0:11:32.280 --> 0:11:35.600 And we don't believe anybody about anything, so we're always digging, right. 0:11:36.080 --> 0:11:40.000 That's become a very just mainstream cultural thing now that 0:11:40.040 --> 0:11:42.319 we someone tells you something and you go, sure, I'm 0:11:42.360 --> 0:11:44.760 going to go check. I'm going to go check receipts 0:11:45.040 --> 0:11:47.440 like that's a thing. A lack of trust in general, 0:11:47.800 --> 0:11:51.400 the thing that makes that really tricky atmosphere to drop 0:11:51.400 --> 0:11:55.400 a memoir in is a memoir isn't an autobiography. We 0:11:55.440 --> 0:11:57.560 need to remember that, right. A memoir is different. So 0:11:57.600 --> 0:12:00.520 it's not supposed to be a straightforward out of every 0:12:00.520 --> 0:12:02.960 single thing that's ever happened to you. The whole point 0:12:03.000 --> 0:12:05.160 of a memoir is it's a story from your life 0:12:05.160 --> 0:12:08.440 that you're telling. It might focus on one particular period 0:12:08.440 --> 0:12:11.600 of your life or one particular relationship, or it might 0:12:11.640 --> 0:12:13.960 pick out different stories, but the whole point of a 0:12:14.000 --> 0:12:18.800 memoir is it's a like, it's written in an engaging 0:12:19.520 --> 0:12:23.520 literary way, telling a story from your life. Now, as 0:12:23.520 --> 0:12:26.400 we've already said, if I'm going to tell a story 0:12:26.440 --> 0:12:29.360 about something that happened to me yesterday, it will be 0:12:29.440 --> 0:12:31.520 my version of it, and then if I ask you 0:12:32.160 --> 0:12:34.240 and you were there, you'll probably tell a different version. 0:12:34.360 --> 0:12:36.160 And that's life. It doesn't mean mine was wrong or 0:12:36.200 --> 0:12:38.319 yours was wrong. It means I came from my perspective, 0:12:38.360 --> 0:12:41.520 you came from yours. And you've got to give memoir 0:12:41.760 --> 0:12:44.680 and that level of recollection the benefit of the doubt 0:12:44.800 --> 0:12:47.400 in that someone's telling you their story, you know it 0:12:49.160 --> 0:12:51.920 with your eyes open going in. This isn't supposed to 0:12:51.920 --> 0:12:55.760 be an entirely fair documentation of events. This is Bell 0:12:55.840 --> 0:12:59.439 Burden's story. Or another example of this would be last 0:12:59.520 --> 0:13:03.719 year I read and interviewed Liz Gilbert about All the 0:13:03.720 --> 0:13:05.600 Way to the River, which was her memoir about the 0:13:05.640 --> 0:13:11.120 death of her partner, Raya Ellis Elias Raya Elias, and 0:13:11.480 --> 0:13:13.760 that was a very controversial book that got a lot 0:13:13.800 --> 0:13:16.800 of crap because people said it was ungenerous to Raya 0:13:16.840 --> 0:13:18.520 because at the end of Raya's life she turned back 0:13:18.520 --> 0:13:21.400 towards her drug addiction. That is not a disputed fact, 0:13:21.920 --> 0:13:23.560 Like everyone who knows her and who is in her 0:13:23.559 --> 0:13:26.679 circle knows that happened. But they didn't like Lizzie's telling 0:13:26.679 --> 0:13:29.200 of what life was like. But the thing is is 0:13:29.280 --> 0:13:31.760 only Liz knows what it was like to be the 0:13:31.840 --> 0:13:35.440 partner of that person in that moment, and she's telling 0:13:35.480 --> 0:13:38.199 her version of events. It's got her name on the cover, 0:13:39.040 --> 0:13:42.960 like it's to me, that's fair enough, right. The problem 0:13:43.120 --> 0:13:45.440 is when you shit on other people in your memoirs. 0:13:46.920 --> 0:13:49.880 And I don't classify the Raya Ellis example as that 0:13:49.920 --> 0:13:52.400 because Liz Gilbert did not do that in my opinion, 0:13:52.480 --> 0:13:55.280 in that book, and she was also very she didn't 0:13:55.280 --> 0:13:57.400 give herself an easy writing that she talked heaps about 0:13:57.400 --> 0:13:59.200 all the things she'd done wrong and all her different, 0:13:59.360 --> 0:14:03.400 you know, sort of issues. But if you are straight 0:14:03.520 --> 0:14:07.959 up just calling other people out and criticizing them and 0:14:08.000 --> 0:14:13.360 giving ungenerous descriptions of their role, that is difficult because 0:14:13.360 --> 0:14:16.199 you're putting the other person in a very tricky situation. 0:14:16.440 --> 0:14:19.200 I think like some celebrity examples of this would be 0:14:19.720 --> 0:14:25.520 Prince Harry's memoir Spare Yeah. He famously writes in there 0:14:25.520 --> 0:14:27.240 about a time that him and William got into a 0:14:27.240 --> 0:14:29.320 physical fight, do you remember, And there was about a 0:14:29.360 --> 0:14:31.840 dog bowl and he fell over, and the fight wasn't 0:14:31.880 --> 0:14:34.080 about a dog bowl, but they're like wrestling in the 0:14:34.160 --> 0:14:36.200 kitchen and then a dog boll goes over and someone's 0:14:36.200 --> 0:14:38.760 pulling someone's hair and it's all really embarrassing for everybody. 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:43.120 And Harry tells that story, and Prince William, who isn't 0:14:43.160 --> 0:14:45.680 allowed to comment on such matters but through his people, 0:14:45.720 --> 0:14:47.840 has been like that never happened, Harry, Like it did 0:14:47.880 --> 0:14:52.200 not happen. Like that. That's tricky, you know, because you're like, 0:14:52.840 --> 0:14:55.280 in order to negate someone else's account, you've got to 0:14:55.280 --> 0:14:58.040 come out. You've got to say what really happened or 0:14:58.080 --> 0:15:01.080 to you buy it from your perspective, Then you have 0:15:01.120 --> 0:15:04.200 to go deep on it. You have to accept questions 0:15:04.280 --> 0:15:05.920 on the matter, and like, who wants to do that? 0:15:06.280 --> 0:15:06.480 You know? 0:15:06.920 --> 0:15:11.160 I also want to talk about the reader of this situation, 0:15:11.400 --> 0:15:16.720 because for non readers or people who very rarely read memoirs, 0:15:16.760 --> 0:15:20.920 reading someone's memoir is a big deal. I rarely read memoirs. 0:15:20.920 --> 0:15:22.960 I find them quite boring and self indulgent. 0:15:23.040 --> 0:15:24.880 Well, some of them are brilliantly written, some of the 0:15:24.880 --> 0:15:26.840 most famous books in the world and memoirs, but then 0:15:26.880 --> 0:15:29.640 some of them are not, like Britney Spears, The Woman 0:15:29.680 --> 0:15:30.600 and Me not. 0:15:31.320 --> 0:15:33.280 But like even like Britney Spears, like I think, like 0:15:33.360 --> 0:15:36.080 I've the reason. Ones I've read have been Britney Spears 0:15:36.120 --> 0:15:39.560 and Jeanette McCurdy's. And there's some like social clouds in 0:15:39.640 --> 0:15:42.360 telling people you've read a memoir, and you can be like, well, 0:15:42.400 --> 0:15:45.040 in Britney Spears's memoir you hear all about the stuff 0:15:45.040 --> 0:15:47.440 of Justin Tim Blake, and people are like, WHOA, she's 0:15:47.520 --> 0:15:49.800 a great example though she's very well read. 0:15:49.960 --> 0:15:50.920 He wouldn't have liked that. 0:15:50.960 --> 0:15:53.520 He wouldn't have liked that. But with the strangers a 0:15:53.560 --> 0:15:55.360 lot of the stuff that she said. So in the 0:15:55.400 --> 0:15:58.160 book she was like, there were no signs, But then 0:15:58.160 --> 0:15:59.760 she does interviews and she was like, there were some, 0:15:59.760 --> 0:16:02.240 so this could have been sign. So it's like her 0:16:02.280 --> 0:16:04.840 going against her own word. And as a reader, if 0:16:04.840 --> 0:16:06.920 I were to read that memoir and I would have 0:16:07.000 --> 0:16:08.520 told all my friends about it and been like, there 0:16:08.560 --> 0:16:10.720 was no signs, no science, and then she's out doing 0:16:10.800 --> 0:16:13.200 interviews going here's a sign here, this could have been 0:16:13.200 --> 0:16:15.280 a sign, I would have felt betrayed, and I've been like, 0:16:15.320 --> 0:16:18.600 you are wasting my time for making me reader's book. 0:16:18.680 --> 0:16:21.600 But don't you think that Sometimes, Like so, in an 0:16:21.600 --> 0:16:24.320 account of a marriage or a relationship, everybody wants a 0:16:24.360 --> 0:16:27.640 neat narrative, right, you know, the first question whenever anyone 0:16:27.680 --> 0:16:30.680 breaks up is what happened? And what we want is 0:16:30.920 --> 0:16:34.680 something really simple? She cheated, he was bored, you know, 0:16:34.760 --> 0:16:38.120 like we want something like that, don't we? And very 0:16:38.240 --> 0:16:42.720 rarely is it like that. It's really often the story 0:16:42.720 --> 0:16:45.240 of a relationship, particularly a long relationship, will be a 0:16:45.280 --> 0:16:47.600 million little messes that then tip over to be the 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:51.360 thing that upends it. So when you ask someone were 0:16:51.360 --> 0:16:53.640 their signs, and you're like, no, I thought we were happy. 0:16:54.160 --> 0:16:57.000 That doesn't necessarily mean that every day you were skipping 0:16:57.040 --> 0:16:59.720 down the street holding hands. You might just mean there 0:16:59.760 --> 0:17:02.200 was the usual amount of shit going on, because in 0:17:02.240 --> 0:17:05.560 every relationship there is, and maybe when you're being questioned 0:17:05.560 --> 0:17:07.919 about that, you're going to reflect on it differently than 0:17:07.920 --> 0:17:09.120 when you're writing it out. 0:17:09.280 --> 0:17:11.720 But a book allow you to reflect on that like 0:17:11.760 --> 0:17:13.959 a book. I feel like, because you're sitting down writing 0:17:14.000 --> 0:17:16.480 this book, you are reflecting. You should have all of 0:17:16.480 --> 0:17:18.320 that in there. It's not a social post. It was 0:17:18.359 --> 0:17:20.600 a social post of her going he cheated. I'm like, 0:17:20.640 --> 0:17:22.879 that's fine. I don't care about the science, but the 0:17:22.880 --> 0:17:24.119 scigence should have been in the book. 0:17:24.280 --> 0:17:26.760 Well, yeah, I haven't read it, so it's very hard 0:17:26.800 --> 0:17:29.280 to be really specific about that example when you haven't 0:17:29.280 --> 0:17:32.280 read it. But like I think, I just think that 0:17:32.359 --> 0:17:36.080 we want really neat narratives and that's not what memoir is. 0:17:36.359 --> 0:17:40.040 And I think what makes it really tricky in an 0:17:40.359 --> 0:17:45.400 age of the Internet and hot takes and you know, 0:17:45.480 --> 0:17:48.040 everybody wants to wants to post about it or have 0:17:48.040 --> 0:17:52.040 an opinion, is that stuff gets taken out of context. 0:17:52.160 --> 0:17:55.800 So it's like, this might be an eighty thousand word manuscript, 0:17:55.840 --> 0:17:59.600 and I remember thinking this a lot about Lena Dunham's 0:17:59.600 --> 0:18:03.800 memoir all those years ago, very very controversial, and there 0:18:03.840 --> 0:18:07.280 would be a passage that just got taken out and 0:18:07.400 --> 0:18:11.600 totally ripped apart, and I thought, but that's completely devoid 0:18:11.760 --> 0:18:15.280 of all the context and all the context about who 0:18:15.359 --> 0:18:18.040 she is and why she was telling that story. I 0:18:18.080 --> 0:18:21.480 do think there's a big difference between those sort of 0:18:21.600 --> 0:18:28.399 gray area inconsistencies that we probably all have and the 0:18:28.720 --> 0:18:34.720 serious fabrication of a story completely. So there is a 0:18:34.760 --> 0:18:36.960 big controversy going on at the moment with a book 0:18:37.000 --> 0:18:40.040 called The Tell by Amy Griffin. It was all the 0:18:40.080 --> 0:18:42.800 book Club Picks in twenty twenty five, so it came 0:18:42.840 --> 0:18:46.520 out in March last year. Then this month it came 0:18:46.560 --> 0:18:49.600 out that she's being sued by a former classmate who 0:18:49.600 --> 0:18:53.439 says that Griffin's story of being sexually abused was based 0:18:53.480 --> 0:18:57.000 on assaults that this classmate had actually suffered at their 0:18:57.000 --> 0:18:57.639 middle school. 0:18:57.680 --> 0:19:01.600 Well, that's an excusable ye to me. There's fraud. There's 0:19:01.600 --> 0:19:03.640 out and out fraud, and there are some very famous 0:19:03.640 --> 0:19:07.480 cases of that in memoir where people have fabricated everything 0:19:07.520 --> 0:19:11.119 from racial identity to you know to their background and 0:19:11.160 --> 0:19:13.400 all those things. That to me is a much clearer 0:19:13.400 --> 0:19:15.760 cut and dried case, like if you're pretending a thing 0:19:15.840 --> 0:19:18.040 happened to you and it absolutely didn't, or you're pretending 0:19:18.080 --> 0:19:20.439 to be someone else, Which is one of the arguments 0:19:20.480 --> 0:19:24.840 about the Saltpath discussion, is that so I'm on the 0:19:24.880 --> 0:19:26.560 record of saying I read that book, I love that book. 0:19:26.600 --> 0:19:29.160 I still love that book. It's beautifully written, like it's 0:19:29.200 --> 0:19:31.439 a really well written, gorgeous book, which is why it 0:19:31.480 --> 0:19:35.919 got so much attention. The argument there is whether the 0:19:36.040 --> 0:19:40.639 whole premise is now discredited, which is that she and 0:19:40.680 --> 0:19:43.320 her husband were in a very difficult spot financially and 0:19:43.400 --> 0:19:45.480 health wise, and they went off on the walk, which 0:19:45.520 --> 0:19:48.080 is a crazy decision to make, but they did do that. 0:19:48.080 --> 0:19:52.280 That's all true, and then it sort of follows them 0:19:52.320 --> 0:19:56.240 through and the accusations about them are like, the whole 0:19:56.280 --> 0:19:59.480 thing is fake, and it's not fake, but it's just 0:19:59.520 --> 0:20:02.560 that a lot one of the motivations that she spelled 0:20:02.560 --> 0:20:05.399 out she either left out massive details, like the reason 0:20:05.440 --> 0:20:09.040 that they were in debt was allegedly because she's stolen 0:20:09.080 --> 0:20:12.600 money and got involved in this very complicated scheme, And 0:20:12.640 --> 0:20:15.400 whether or not her husband's illness is as serious as 0:20:15.440 --> 0:20:19.560 she has portrayed it, but the story still holds. That's 0:20:19.600 --> 0:20:23.080 different to like I say, I grew up in a 0:20:23.160 --> 0:20:25.960 palace in London, and really I grew up in Manchester, 0:20:26.040 --> 0:20:26.600 you know what I mean. 0:20:26.640 --> 0:20:31.480 I think the claim there that has that I feel 0:20:31.520 --> 0:20:35.600 the most uncomfortable about is Rayna Winn writes about her 0:20:35.680 --> 0:20:41.560 husband having a certain neurodegenerative and physically degenerative condition, and 0:20:42.600 --> 0:20:45.320 it really sounds like that might have either been exaggerated 0:20:45.600 --> 0:20:47.080 or he but. 0:20:47.080 --> 0:20:50.280 We don't know that. Yes, but in a microsoft. 0:20:50.040 --> 0:20:52.640 If that is the case, then I do think. 0:20:52.520 --> 0:20:54.040 And that falls into the fraud cast. 0:20:54.119 --> 0:20:56.879 Yeah, that falls into because the people who read that 0:20:56.920 --> 0:21:00.959 book also think maybe I can walk my way into health, 0:21:01.040 --> 0:21:04.600