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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.

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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff Mom Never told you?

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Speaker 1: From House top Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to

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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Kristen, I'm Molly Welly. Would you agree

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Speaker 1: that the contents of someone's handbag or messenger bag or

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Speaker 1: backpack what have you says a lot about that person? Oh?

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Speaker 1: I agree. It's so fascinating to think, like what people

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Speaker 1: have in their handbag. And I remember as a kid

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Speaker 1: growing up, for instance, like my mom's handbag was totally

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Speaker 1: off limits. It was this kind of sacred object that

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Speaker 1: you could only go into if previously allowed, if you

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Speaker 1: had permission, and if you wanted to have some money

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Speaker 1: from your mom, you'd take the entire purse to her,

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Speaker 1: as opposed to just taking the five dollars on top, right. So,

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Speaker 1: I mean, I do remember being a kid and thinking

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Speaker 1: what is in there that is a secret of this

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Speaker 1: adult world? And I know some guys who are weird

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Speaker 1: about going into girls purses too. They don't they don't

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Speaker 1: want to like reach in and then find something horrifying,

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Speaker 1: like we have tampon traps or something like an old

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Speaker 1: damp on um and uh, since uh, since we're doing

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Speaker 1: this in Atlanta, we're from Atlanta, wanted to give a

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Speaker 1: shout out to this one cool photography project that this

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Speaker 1: area photographer j trav has done. He's gone around and

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Speaker 1: he's taken hundreds of pictures of people and he has

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Speaker 1: their head shot and then with that photo, he's got

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Speaker 1: a picture of their bag, whether it's a handbag or

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Speaker 1: messenger bag, whatever, their bag and then all of its

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Speaker 1: contents laid out really nicely, and it's so fascinating to

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Speaker 1: see how these people match up with what's inside their bag,

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Speaker 1: and you feel like you know them despite the fact

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Speaker 1: that all you can see is their head shot, right.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you definitely start to form these back stories

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Speaker 1: about you know, the tattered paperback that's in the pack

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Speaker 1: versus you know, yeah, we found normal cell phone. There

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Speaker 1: was there was one guy we found yeah with like

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Speaker 1: a he had a tattered a tattered paperback and an

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Speaker 1: extra bike wheel tube and rolling tobacco, you know what

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Speaker 1: I mean, Like all of these, all these types of

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Speaker 1: things and his bagging and the girls with this is

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Speaker 1: fascinating array of cosmetics and magazines and all sorts of things.

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Speaker 1: What do you think the most unique thing in your

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Speaker 1: handbag at any given time, It's Kristen my most unique thing.

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Speaker 1: Oh man, I don't know. I try to keep it

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Speaker 1: simple my handbag because otherwise I'll just fill it up

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Speaker 1: with all sorts. It becomes my trash receptacle. It becomes

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Speaker 1: my like overnight bag, It becomes it really like my

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Speaker 1: gym bag everything. And I don't even go to the gym,

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Speaker 1: so just just in case bags. Yeah, well, the top

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Speaker 1: of the day is handbags, purses, it bags, what what

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Speaker 1: women carry and what what it means. Yeah, because before

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Speaker 1: were we started researching this and Molly found so many

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Speaker 1: great resources for this article. I had no idea that

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Speaker 1: purses have such an extensive history. For instance, they have

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Speaker 1: paintings dated from four eighty b c. That show people

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Speaker 1: carrying bags. I mean they're not necessarily like Louis Vuitton person,

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Speaker 1: but still the the predecessors exactly. I guess who was

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Speaker 1: carrying all the bags in those really paintings. The guys

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Speaker 1: kind of like how men were. The first were high

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Speaker 1: heels and again these books, you know, it was not

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Speaker 1: like it we're confusing like suitcase versus person, like the

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Speaker 1: men were carrying this little person like pouches. And these

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Speaker 1: little pouches were always very useful, like, for example, one

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Speaker 1: of these ancient painting shows, you know, a farmer carrying

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Speaker 1: seeds from one side of the country to the other.

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Speaker 1: So you know, it's always had the purse in the

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Speaker 1: handbag has always had this idea of being of use,

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Speaker 1: of helping you out when you are, you know, getting

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Speaker 1: from one place to another. But at the same time,

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Speaker 1: like you said, it's got this long history, but now

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Speaker 1: it's got all this loaded metaphor simbolism in it. As

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Speaker 1: these handbags have taken off and now they cost as

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Speaker 1: much as a year of college. So we're gonna unravel

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Speaker 1: all that. And um, one thing that I didn't think

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Speaker 1: about was one of the main reasons why purs is

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Speaker 1: this idea of bags, these utilitarian bags have such a

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Speaker 1: long history too, is because they preceded pockets. It took

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Speaker 1: a long time for us to figure out that pockets

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Speaker 1: would be a really great idea and clothes. But it

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Speaker 1: seems like even now that we figured out pockets, men

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Speaker 1: have been like, Okay, we'll use the tocket. We'll put

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Speaker 1: the BlackBerry in one pocket, We'll put the wallet in

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Speaker 1: the other pocket. And women, despite buying these you know,

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Speaker 1: jeans with all these pockets, it can buy the really

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Speaker 1: cute sun dresses with pockets. Now we're still lugging around

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Speaker 1: the back. Why is that? Well, I don't know. Maybe

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Speaker 1: it goes back to, say, the fifteenth century. The fifteenth

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Speaker 1: century does have one of the sweetest tidbits of handbag history. Yes,

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Speaker 1: men and used to give their new brides these elaborately

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Speaker 1: decorated purses, and they were usually embroidered with an illustration

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Speaker 1: of a love story. Isn't that sweet? It's kind of sweet.

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Speaker 1: I kind of like that that tradition to come back.

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Speaker 1: But I don't know if I would trust a guy

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Speaker 1: to pick out a back. And that's what's so interesting

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Speaker 1: is because these have become such gendered objects, despite the

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Speaker 1: fact that earliest, the earliest bags were unisex. These have

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Speaker 1: moved into definitive gender territory, to the point where Christy

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Speaker 1: and I were wondering, are these bags signs of female

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Speaker 1: power or do they hold us back because they're so

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Speaker 1: heavy and filled with junk and we can never find

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Speaker 1: what we need? What is what is inner handbags? And why? Well,

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Speaker 1: if we go through handbag history, and there is actually

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Speaker 1: a lot of handbag history out there. Handbags really came

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Speaker 1: into the mainstream in terms of being this wardrobe staple

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Speaker 1: that women had to have when they started leaving the

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Speaker 1: home for work in the nineteen forties, whence World War

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Speaker 1: two is out and the guys were out and then uh,

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Speaker 1: then the women had to take their places in the workforce,

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Speaker 1: so they started leaving the home more so they needed handbags.

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Speaker 1: So in that way you could see it as a

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Speaker 1: symbol of women's progress, because that was one of the

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Speaker 1: first time that women were leaving the home. You know,

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Speaker 1: before that time, their their place was in the home

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Speaker 1: with the children, or before they got married. They'd be

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Speaker 1: going out on these dates where you would just carry

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Speaker 1: essentially just like the smallest little bag you could. It

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Speaker 1: might hold like a lipstick and a cigarette, but you

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Speaker 1: would not carry money because at that time, your your

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Speaker 1: male escort would pay for your dinner and your drinks.

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Speaker 1: And there was this one quote um in two but

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Speaker 1: called Bags and Purses, where um a woman who complained

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Speaker 1: that tiny evening bags would not hold both cosmetics and

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Speaker 1: a cigarette case was told, any woman is smart enough

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Speaker 1: to carry this tiny handbag is sure of an escort

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Speaker 1: who will provide the cigarettes, so you know, you you

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Speaker 1: just didn't need a big bag because the man was

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Speaker 1: handling everything for you. So it really is this gender

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Speaker 1: shift in that the bigger the handbag, the more independent

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Speaker 1: you are, probably because if it's big, you've got some

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Speaker 1: files in it from work, You've got, you know, all

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Speaker 1: your money, and you go on to work your bags

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Speaker 1: full of money. And so I think that that does

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Speaker 1: show sort of the big gender shift in that big

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Speaker 1: pocketbook equals big power. But at the same time, though,

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Speaker 1: we have Germaine Greer arguing that shouldering luggage is an

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Speaker 1: ancient female habit born of servitude. But I would like

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Speaker 1: to say, Greer, you might want to look a look

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Speaker 1: at the handbag history because really it wasn't born of servitude,

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Speaker 1: but more born of fashion, because those kind of bags

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Speaker 1: became more necessary just style wise, when um, the big

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Speaker 1: kind of voluminous fashion of the Elizabethan era, the big

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Speaker 1: dresses where they could hide different pockets under skirts and things,

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Speaker 1: gave way to post French Revolution very um, slender, neo

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Speaker 1: classical silhouettes that didn't have any space for these additional pockets.

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Speaker 1: So so you pooh, pooh, germ angry. I don't want

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Speaker 1: to see I don't really want to open up that

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Speaker 1: Candra finding words in your mouth. But I think that, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I don't. I think that it's um. I don't know.

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Speaker 1: Maybe it's a stretch, you know, maybe here's another stretch

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Speaker 1: I want to throw out it. Yeah, all right, here's

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Speaker 1: what old Sigmund Freud said about handbags, that they are

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Speaker 1: a symbol of a vagina. Of course he did, because,

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Speaker 1: especially as you said in the forties, fifties, sixties, is

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Speaker 1: moremen are going to work. That putting this huge thing

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Speaker 1: on the outside of you is just saying, screaming, vagina.

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Speaker 1: It can be open and closed. Yeah, you put when

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Speaker 1: you put something into it. He said that was a

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Speaker 1: metaphor for sex. And uh so it's it's just another

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Speaker 1: blow to the to the idea that that bags are

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Speaker 1: unit sex. They become this very um, big symbol of

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Speaker 1: I guess, the ultimate symbol of being a female, the vagina.

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Speaker 1: And uh you know, we were talking about, we've talked

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Speaker 1: about in the past, how when you go into the

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Speaker 1: workplace sometimes you feel like it can't be too feminine,

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Speaker 1: that you've got to keep up with the guys, and

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Speaker 1: you may be wearing, you know, a very conservative button

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Speaker 1: up suit, and you may be feeling like I can't

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Speaker 1: express the fact that I'm a woman at all. But

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Speaker 1: this allowed women who still wanted to be feminine to

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Speaker 1: march in with their vagina bag and say, hey, I'm here,

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Speaker 1: I'm a woman, hear me, roar, and here is my

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Speaker 1: three thousand dollar Loui veton of vagina. Okay, but that

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Speaker 1: that should we talk about pricing because these bags are extensive.

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Speaker 1: Well depends on you know, the old thrifty niels like

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Speaker 1: us might not be shelling out for these kind of bags.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, bag prices, as most people know, can just

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Speaker 1: get out of control. And uh, we were doing some

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Speaker 1: research about some of the most iconic brands like the

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Speaker 1: Chanel two point five five, the Birken bag, the Fendi

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Speaker 1: bag get and how when you we shell out these

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Speaker 1: tens of thousands of dollars, you're really buying a lifestyle.

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Speaker 1: You know, you're buying the bag that you saw jackieo

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Speaker 1: ware or you're buying the bag that you saw Lady

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Speaker 1: Die wear, and how that that becomes this external marker

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Speaker 1: for the values you believe in. And there was this

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Speaker 1: one article that said, no matter what else you're wearing,

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Speaker 1: if you're just wearing the the crappiest sweatsuit you can find,

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Speaker 1: you're still saying something to the greater world by the

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Speaker 1: label on your back. And even if you're dressed on,

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Speaker 1: you'll assume if you're carrying around, you know, a ten

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Speaker 1: dollar Birken bag, all right, you must be rich. So

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Speaker 1: we've got so now we've come up with a few

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Speaker 1: signifiers of what this bag means is you're walking down

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Speaker 1: the street. One, it's saying, hey, I'm feminim because it's

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Speaker 1: a vagina and because men don't don't carry them according

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Speaker 1: to Freuding to Freud. Two, we're saying that it shows

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Speaker 1: affluence and social class well depending on the bag, Depending

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Speaker 1: on the bag, what else will people think of when

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Speaker 1: they see that bag? So now we've got a few things,

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Speaker 1: a few signifiers you're sending out when you walk down

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Speaker 1: the street, caring about your your proclaiming financial independence. Because

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Speaker 1: it's got this history associated with women going into the workplace.

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Speaker 1: You're so associating yourself with femaleness in general. Because old

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Speaker 1: Freud and his vagina theories and just um, the fact

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Speaker 1: that men don't carry them. You're showing off social class.

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Speaker 1: If you have a really nice bag, or if you

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Speaker 1: have a really crappy bag, and those those finer eyes

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Speaker 1: among us can say to not pay that much for

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Speaker 1: that bag, that's a knockoff. But you're you're showing, basically,

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Speaker 1: I guess, the best life that you want to live.

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Speaker 1: If you do have a bag that was inspired by

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Speaker 1: a celebrity icon or that's the newest thing on the market,

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Speaker 1: you're showing that you're a person that pays attention to that.

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Speaker 1: And it's it's just, you know, it's an outward symbol

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Speaker 1: of who you are, despite the fact what we talked

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Speaker 1: about the beginning that the inside of it so private

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Speaker 1: and intimate. Yeah, but do you really want the outside

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Speaker 1: symbol of who you are to be? You know, a

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Speaker 1: piece of crocodile leather that you bought for like dollars, No,

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Speaker 1: because crocodile will scare me. And that's why we'll never

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Speaker 1: have a crocodile bag, because I think, even in my

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Speaker 1: warped little mind, I would think it was going to

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Speaker 1: come back alive and kill me. Okay, so let's let's

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Speaker 1: call it calf skin. How about how about a calf

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Speaker 1: skin burkin for thirty seven thousand dollars. Well, here's where

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Speaker 1: where here where, Here's where things get tricky because before

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Speaker 1: we came in here, Kristen, I were trying to decide

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Speaker 1: if these bags are you know, a way to symbolize

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Speaker 1: equality and that women are out in the world more

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Speaker 1: or if they just hold us back because all they

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Speaker 1: do is invite judgment and and they invite back pain

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Speaker 1: and shoulder problems. They do invite back pain and shoulder problems.

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Speaker 1: This is true. There has been, uh, there's been a

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Speaker 1: rising tide of women who carry these gigantic bags and

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Speaker 1: have to go to chiropractors and physical therapists. And if

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Speaker 1: you do carry a big bag, a few tips, you're

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Speaker 1: gonna want to obviously switch shoulders, yeah, because it'll make

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Speaker 1: you walk with one shoulder lower than the other and

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Speaker 1: totally throw your back out of a line. Meant you

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Speaker 1: also need to have good posture and keep those shoulders

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Speaker 1: up and down instead of just letting yourself get all hoppled.

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Speaker 1: And so if you're curious about, well, how how have

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Speaker 1: you have a bag? Can I bring in? Come on? Women?

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Speaker 1: We know when the bags getting too heavy, but we

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Speaker 1: suffer through it anyway. But the American Chiropractic Association recommends

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Speaker 1: that a handbag way no more than ten percent of

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Speaker 1: your body weight. Good luck. Yeah, And you know they

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Speaker 1: have these tips and I don't know if they're practical

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Speaker 1: or not, like things like clean out your bag every week,

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Speaker 1: but that's just like cleaning out the most intimate powert

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Speaker 1: of yourself? Can you really do that on a weekly basis? Now?

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Speaker 1: Not only is there a chance that wearing a too

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Speaker 1: big of a bag could lead to back problems things

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Speaker 1: like that, but according to a study that Molly and

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Speaker 1: I have found, wearing the wrong kind of bag could

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Speaker 1: also do damage to your morals, to your soul, to

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Speaker 1: your core values. Because if you were trying to avoid

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Speaker 1: those costly bags, what do you do? You you plan

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Speaker 1: a trip, team or street and you get a cheap

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Speaker 1: knockoff bag. Well, Professor Dan Arielli from Duke and Who's

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Speaker 1: at Duke and m I t he was given this

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Speaker 1: PRODA bag after he spoke at some conference and he

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Speaker 1: noticed how that bag made him feel different, and so

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Speaker 1: he wanted to see what's going on here? Is is

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Speaker 1: a designer item so much more different than a knockoff

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Speaker 1: and he found the people who buy the counterfeit goods,

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Speaker 1: the people who do go to Canal Street or just

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Speaker 1: you know, by the by the cheap oh, they are

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Speaker 1: more likely to cheat on tests. And what he did

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Speaker 1: to do this was he he told some people they're

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Speaker 1: wearing fake designer sunglasses, and he told other people they

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Speaker 1: were wearing the real ones, and the real the people

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Speaker 1: wearing the real sunglasses were more likely to be moral,

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Speaker 1: upstanding citizens and not cheating on the test. And so

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Speaker 1: he finds that just the first knockoff that you buy

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Speaker 1: is when this when this drop an authenticity overall in

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Speaker 1: your life begins to happen. Right, all it takes is

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Speaker 1: one one fake coach and you are on the slippery slope.

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Speaker 1: And he he was talking just in general about how

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Speaker 1: brands define us and not it doesn't be the brand

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Speaker 1: in terms of product or coach. But he put also

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Speaker 1: people in T shirts that said generous or stingy. And

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Speaker 1: so in the first part of the experiment he put

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Speaker 1: the generous or stingy on the outside and found that

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Speaker 1: people really did live up to those those labels, that

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Speaker 1: if they were wearing generous, they gave more money to

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Speaker 1: people on the street than the stingy ones. Whereas when

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Speaker 1: you put the label on the inside, and so only

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Speaker 1: the people wearing the shirt knew if they were generous

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Speaker 1: or stingy, Um, the difference wasn't as marked that the

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Speaker 1: generous people only gave more than the stingy people. So

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Speaker 1: there is something about knowing what you're wearing and knowing

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Speaker 1: that your bag cost thirty dollars that may makes people

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Speaker 1: act different. And you know, that's not some sort of

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Speaker 1: endorsement of buying at bag, nor is an endorsement of

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Speaker 1: buying a fifty dollar bag. It's just something to think about. Well, yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's amazing to know how what a psychological effect that

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Speaker 1: that brands do have on us and as a consumer culture,

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Speaker 1: and how how strongly we identify with him. Because at

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Speaker 1: the same time, Um, with all of these studies, he

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Speaker 1: also found that let's say, Molly, I find just such

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Speaker 1: a great fake Fendi baggett all right, and I buy

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Speaker 1: it for you, And I'm like, Molly, I wanted to

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Speaker 1: give you this extravagant gift of a Fendi Fendi bag.

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Speaker 1: Here you go knowing full well that it's a knockoff.

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Speaker 1: If you don't know that it's a knockoff. I'll be fine.

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Speaker 1: You'll be fine. You will get all the psychological benefit

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Speaker 1: of you know, ignorance is bliss of thinking that you

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Speaker 1: are toting around just the hottest bag. And I'll be thinking, man,

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Speaker 1: Christen is so nice, I know, and I'm gonna be

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Speaker 1: thinking Molly's totally buying me lunch sometime. But you know,

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Speaker 1: one fun fact about Fendi bags and baguetts is the

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Speaker 1: reason you saw them on Sex in the City so

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Speaker 1: much is because the Fendi people gave the Sex and

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Speaker 1: Seed customers and props people just free reign of the store.

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Speaker 1: And that was a smart choice because how many times

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Speaker 1: was that name dropped on that show? And how many

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Speaker 1: times did women see the show then go out and

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Speaker 1: drop their cash on a Fendi bag, which, again I

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Speaker 1: think brings us back to this way in which these

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Speaker 1: these bags and these designer bags and be together have

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Speaker 1: become um so associated with women. And you know, this

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Speaker 1: is the question of the day and why we want

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Speaker 1: to hear from you guys. Is this a good thing?

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Speaker 1: Where is it a bad thing? Is it a sign

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Speaker 1: of female power because you take yourself out into the world,

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Speaker 1: to the workplace with your glamorous bag and you live

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Speaker 1: a glamorous lifestyle. Or are we just holding ourselves back

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Speaker 1: by alligning ourselves with something so kind of silly or

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Speaker 1: is it just a you know, is it just a bag?

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Speaker 1: Is it a convenient way to carry your wallet and

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Speaker 1: cell phone around? Exactly? I mean it is convenient, but

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Speaker 1: it cannot be too convenient, that's the question. But you

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Speaker 1: know what, no matter where you fall on that spectrum,

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Speaker 1: you probably have quite a few handbags. Yeah, this is true.

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Speaker 1: This is yeah, the perfect fun fact to uh, to

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Speaker 1: end on. The average woman will have a hundred and

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Speaker 1: eleven bags in her lifetime. Can you believe that a

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Speaker 1: hundred and eleven? I wonder when they start counting, because

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Speaker 1: I had a lot of handbags when I was five,

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Speaker 1: christ And I don't know about you, that was probably

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Speaker 1: the time in which I had the most handbags in

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Speaker 1: my life. You and I kind of feel the same way.

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Speaker 1: I think about the the old dress up box with

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Speaker 1: like five old discarded purses. But you know for other

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Speaker 1: women that number continues to be consistent throughout their lifetime. Well, Molly,

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Speaker 1: maybe one of the reasons why we have to buy

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Speaker 1: so many handbags throughout our life is that of the

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Speaker 1: women in that survey, And that British survey also admitted

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Speaker 1: that they had lost bags in the past. So you

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Speaker 1: think that when you're spending that much money on a bag,

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Speaker 1: you'd keep your eye on it. Yeah, so so maybe

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Speaker 1: maybe part of it, Maybe that number is partially so

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Speaker 1: high because we just can't keep up with time. But

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Speaker 1: there are most intimate secrets, Kristen, there are vaginants. Why

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Speaker 1: are we leaving them behind? And on that note, let's

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Speaker 1: read some list of the mail. Well, I've got an

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Speaker 1: email here from Layton and this is in response to

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Speaker 1: you an older podcast we did on whether or not

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Speaker 1: kids need a mother and a father, and Layton writes,

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Speaker 1: I'm thirteen years old and I love listening to your podcast.

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Speaker 1: Thank you, Layton. My mom is a single mom and

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Speaker 1: I spend of my time with her. I do go

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Speaker 1: visit my father every other weekend for two days, but

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Speaker 1: I go to private school and I get the best

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Speaker 1: education possible, all thanks to my mom. While my dad

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Speaker 1: helps out. I live a very good life just with

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Speaker 1: my mom. She does the work of two parents with

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Speaker 1: the energy of one, does a very good job all

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Speaker 1: by herself. To make a point, I believe that any

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Speaker 1: kid will be raised correctly, whether by gay, lesbian, one

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Speaker 1: two or sixteen parents. I love your podcast very much

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Speaker 1: and I hope that you can read this on your

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Speaker 1: next podcast. Thank you well, Thank you Layden So perspective

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Speaker 1: from thirteen year old and I have one here from

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Speaker 1: Emily about the difference on weight loss between men and

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Speaker 1: women that we did recently. She writes, I am a

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Speaker 1: nurse and as my understand that women's body fat can

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Speaker 1: be protective as we age because if and when we

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Speaker 1: become sick, our outcomes will be less severe. If we

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Speaker 1: have some extra reserves, the body does become as malnourished

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Speaker 1: and we'll heal faster. Doe our ability to survive longer

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Speaker 1: with adipose tissue. Also, if we are seeking calories to heal,

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Speaker 1: we won't metabolize our muscle tissue. As you said, we

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Speaker 1: don't tend to stop gaining weight until about seventy This

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Speaker 1: is all in the design. I just sid I would

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Speaker 1: share that with you because in some ways we ought

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Speaker 1: not to fear fat as we age. Very true. Indeed, Well,

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Speaker 1: if you have some thoughts to share with us, send

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Speaker 1: us an email. It's mom stuff at how Stuff works

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Speaker 1: dot com, or you can share it with us and

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00:20:49,280 --> 00:20:52,480
Speaker 1: other listeners on our Facebook and Twitter. Then, finally, you

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00:20:52,480 --> 00:20:55,400
Speaker 1: can head over to our blog. It's also called stuff

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Speaker 1: and I'll Never Told You, and you can find it

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Speaker 1: at how stuff works dot com. Brought to you by

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Speaker 1: the reinvented two thousand and twelve camera. It's ready, are

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Speaker 1: you