Speaker 1: Flex and Frooms, Flex and Fromes. This is the Flex
Speaker 1: and Frooms catch up podcast. Hey guys, it's Flex and
Speaker 1: Frooms for another podcast. Hope you enjoy it. See you
Speaker 1: on the other side.
Speaker 2: KT, Flex and froomes.
Speaker 3: You're listening to Flex and Frooms.
Speaker 1: What the frick, Lexie? We must keep the TikTok how
Speaker 1: do you call it? Analysis? Continuing? Because what's more annoying
Speaker 1: than tiktoks? Analyzing tiktoks? I feel like we don't have
Speaker 1: the language yet.
Speaker 4: Do you know what's more annoying than analyzing tiktoks is
Speaker 4: explaining a TikTok?
Speaker 1: Oh, I hate it, I hate it, don't make me
Speaker 1: do it. Well. One thing that I'm sure we both
Speaker 1: have seen is the gen Z shake. I think after
Speaker 1: the millennial pause, the millennials hit back and said, we
Speaker 1: can also pathologicize what you're doing, and so the gen
Speaker 1: Z shake was coineda oh, the camera shake. Yees, So
Speaker 1: when they're putting the phone down, I thought they were
Speaker 1: talking about this one where they put their hands in
Speaker 1: front of them.
Speaker 4: It's the camera shake. So what gen Z have been
Speaker 4: known to do when they're posting content is to hit
Speaker 4: the record button and then stabilize their phone on a
Speaker 4: surface and shake it around, give the illusion of this
Speaker 4: is happening haphazardly in a moment, I'm not even thinking
Speaker 4: about posting just an extension of what I do. Whereas
Speaker 4: millennials generally set themselves up, prepare themselves, click record, and
Speaker 4: then double check its recording so they can just then
Speaker 4: they can speak with certainty that it's their facts.
Speaker 1: Well, this is an explainer straight from the belly the based.
Speaker 5: With gen Z, a lot of their institutions crumbled around them.
Speaker 5: They no longer have the school institution that everyone else did,
Speaker 5: the job institution, the college institution, and as a result,
Speaker 5: it was even more amplified that they had to be
Speaker 5: perceived online as a way to kind of pay to
Speaker 5: play seriously, And I think because of that generational resentment,
Speaker 5: a way of rebelling against this is by approaching everything
Speaker 5: they do online in a kind of ironic way. Someone
Speaker 5: who's gen Z could go on to get a PhD
Speaker 5: and become an open heart surgeon. If they were to
Speaker 5: post about it online, they would have to do it
Speaker 5: in a way that's like it was just a bit
Speaker 5: the joke was pulled off, and so the camera shake
Speaker 5: has really become an act of rebellion for gen Z.
Speaker 5: They could script out an entire video and put a
Speaker 5: lot of thought into it, but the camera shake is
Speaker 5: their last act of rebellion. I didn't plan to be
Speaker 5: perceived online. It's kind of an accident that I'm being
Speaker 5: perceived online. Whereas I think the millennial pause has more
Speaker 5: to do with just the fact that millennials had snap
Speaker 5: stories and Instagram Stories when they first started filming themselves onlined.
Speaker 5: If anyone used any of those apps back then, there
Speaker 5: was a delay and when the video would start and
Speaker 5: when it would start recording audio, so you had to
Speaker 5: wait a few seconds to talk or else it wouldn't
Speaker 5: get your first few words.
Speaker 1: An act of rebellion, she says.
Speaker 4: When we did go on, we scowled, we scoffed.
Speaker 1: Act of rebellion. We've got a woman shutting shutting off
Speaker 1: lines on the harp breach mean American.
Speaker 4: People gluing themselves to tennis poles are scrumpted to surruct
Speaker 4: national events. But gen Z as a population after rebellion,
Speaker 4: is to shake the camera as they participate in everything
Speaker 4: that we participate in. Look, I get it. I love
Speaker 4: analysis generally, but it's very unhelpful for an everyday conversation.
Speaker 4: I do think it is this dissonance with not wanting
Speaker 4: to be perceived as millennial, but also not wanting to
Speaker 4: be perceived generally, and how at one point in time
Speaker 4: people used to make fun of people who spoke to
Speaker 4: the camera in selfimode. It was maybe two three four
Speaker 4: years on the Internet where I was like, oh my goodness,
Speaker 4: you can think you're an influencer, you think you're cool,
Speaker 4: and now it's the norm to do so. So it
Speaker 4: almost was I like, oh, no, I just happened to
Speaker 4: be here, and I guess I'm gonna post something, but
Speaker 4: like I wouldn't actually sit here, you know, you.
Speaker 2: Get what I mean.
Speaker 1: It's casual.
Speaker 4: It all is as contrived as the next unfortunately, and
Speaker 4: the one thing I appreciate about the millennial Internet is
Speaker 4: that everything was contrived and hypercurated with intention. You knew
Speaker 4: what it was. People sat there in front of their
Speaker 4: cameras with sixteen lights, a little agenda of what they
Speaker 4: were going to say and why they were gonna say it,
Speaker 4: and the content ate it was consistent. The thing about
Speaker 4: the way that gen Z's or even this new style
Speaker 4: of curating. It's relying on you and the observer to
Speaker 4: think that everything is natural, that everything came by coincidence haphazardly,
Speaker 4: and that's not the case. You can't keep that up.
Speaker 4: And that's also why there's this big dissonance of why
Speaker 4: TikTok creators don't translate in real life, because you can't
Speaker 4: fake this like, oh, I'm on the contrary, I know
Speaker 4: you're in the room with me currently, and you can't
Speaker 4: rely on a trending sound or a quip to get
Speaker 4: the conversation across. You actually have to align yourself with
Speaker 4: social norms and the way that things aren't like naturally done,
Speaker 4: not in this like alternate land where you can speak
Speaker 4: in half sentences and memes.
Speaker 1: I feel like a millennial Internet is a classical painting.
Speaker 1: Yeap gen Z is abstract, Yes, abstract, and they're just
Speaker 1: they're just in this rebellious period where you know, going
Speaker 1: up and doing a well thought out video is an art.
Speaker 1: As you say, let's not forget that, let's not forget it.
Speaker 1: Nissance beautiful. This is flex and frooms on kit.
Speaker 4: If you're a land of flex and frooms, you would
Speaker 4: know that at one point we referenced TikTok every waking
Speaker 4: minute I landed this, I saw there's am and it's
Speaker 4: dropped off. Not for lack of trying. My TikTok screen
Speaker 4: time is higher than ever. But what I'm finding is
Speaker 4: that I have to keep scrolling much longer to get
Speaker 4: anything that tickles the spot. It used to tickle frequently.
Speaker 4: I just look at my phone in Giggle, save posts,
Speaker 4: last share, and now it feels like I don't know
Speaker 4: if it's because everybody knows, no, that's not true. I
Speaker 4: don't know if it's because the majority of content creators
Speaker 4: on TikTok are trying to be famous or viral or
Speaker 4: well white, and so popular content gets replicated so quickly
Speaker 4: that everything starts looking and feeling same, samey, And then
Speaker 4: with every derivative post, it's less good than the last
Speaker 4: one I saw because it happened later. And also, you
Speaker 4: can't fake the feeling of experiencing something for the first time.
Speaker 4: So maybe it's just like fatigue from app use. But
Speaker 4: as I was scrolling, I came across this theory that
Speaker 4: might be the answer as to why TikTok and most
Speaker 4: social media apps are getting shit.
Speaker 3: Yes, you're not crazy. My fyp has also been totally jacked.
Speaker 3: I'm like seeing dancing teens on it, like it doesn't
Speaker 3: even know me anymore for whopage. But this creator really
Speaker 3: got to the bottom of it. They're putting the squeeze
Speaker 3: on us. I just like them, have seen my screen
Speaker 3: time go up as I'm chasing that good old FYP.
Speaker 3: I think that they did realize that they could get
Speaker 3: us to be on the app longer. It's harder to
Speaker 3: get the fix. Perhaps you've heard about the in shitification
Speaker 3: of social media. This is the theory that these tech
Speaker 3: companies have this venture capital cycle where they're in this
Speaker 3: big growth phase and they don't suck at first. They
Speaker 3: get you hooked, but then slowly but surely, they get
Speaker 3: worse and worse. We knew TikTok would eventually take a turn.
Speaker 3: I don't know if it's right now or if they're
Speaker 3: just tweaking some stuff with the algorithm, but change is inevitable,
Speaker 3: and at least for me, I think I need to
Speaker 3: make the decision to divest my screen time a little bit.
Speaker 3: I think we have to turn around and put the
Speaker 3: squeeze back on them, let them know that if they
Speaker 3: won't give up that FYP that we know they can deliver.
Speaker 3: We're not going to stick around. I mean, that's obviously
Speaker 3: the solution, but it's easier said than done, especially if
Speaker 3: you're going through something really hard and you really need
Speaker 3: that dissociation. I'm not sure what plans they really have
Speaker 3: coming down the pike, but this is one small way
Speaker 3: that I think we can help stave off the in shiitification.
Speaker 4: When they said we're going to divest, I said, Nana,
Speaker 4: I'm going to say thank you. They're going through tough time,
Speaker 4: but I'm going to stick by them. Okay, divest. What
Speaker 4: do I just think what's happening? And what I've noticed
Speaker 4: is that because TikTok isn't ticking every box because it's flawed,
Speaker 4: I'm able to use Instagram with a lot more joy.
Speaker 4: It is a welcomed break because something about TikTok and
Speaker 4: scrolling up constantly is it fatigues me. I'm like, gosh,
Speaker 4: I gotta work so hard to see something interesting. Whereas
Speaker 4: an Instagram story, because I'm not following anyone who's trying
Speaker 4: to make engage in content on the story, the amount
Speaker 4: of effort that's required for me to engage feels equal
Speaker 4: to the amount of effort or the quality of content
Speaker 4: I get in return. Little tap tap tap, I'm seeing
Speaker 4: a little outfit. I'm seeing a little barada, seeing a
Speaker 4: dog that's chill. But on TikTok, because I'm used to
Speaker 4: chasing such a high, it feels like I'm laboring to
Speaker 4: get even a squeeze of what came so freely before.
Speaker 1: How they get you.
Speaker 4: It is how they get you.
Speaker 1: And you've got nick watched, you know. I just go
Speaker 1: on TikTok to try and find the best little nuggets,
Speaker 1: and it takes hours.
Speaker 4: It does.
Speaker 1: I do it once a week and just let me
Speaker 1: let me tell you, I'm popp on my bussy.
Speaker 2: It's a week.
Speaker 1: You're good.
Speaker 4: I know.
Speaker 1: Flex and flex and firms FLEXI. We seem to often
Speaker 1: talk about pretty privilege and other matters of being hot,
Speaker 1: pretty and beautiful.
Speaker 4: I mean from a lived experience, we have three interests ourselves,
Speaker 4: the things we like and the things we don't like.
Speaker 1: Honestly, it's true. He is a TikTok by a cheek
Speaker 1: called Kira.
Speaker 2: I think something is missing when we talk about pretty privileged,
Speaker 2: and I have a theory about what it is. I
Speaker 2: will be using Kimberly Finkel as an example. I think
Speaker 2: we think of pretty privilege as like a linear thing,
Speaker 2: but I actually think it's like multiple different categories, multi axis,
Speaker 2: and one of those axises is respectability or perceived respectability,
Speaker 2: and another access, probably has something to do with environment
Speaker 2: and intention. What I'm saying is there's types of women
Speaker 2: that specifically men find respectable and don't find respectable, and
Speaker 2: that establishments and businesses find respectable and don't find respectable.
Speaker 2: A lot of these notions are racist. I hear blonde
Speaker 2: girls on this app say when they were blonde, they
Speaker 2: got way more attention, but the wrong kind of attention,
Speaker 2: And I think we know that comes from like the
Speaker 2: stereotype of blondes being dumb, YadA YadA. Think about the
Speaker 2: girl in your life who is always in a long
Speaker 2: term relationship. Do you know what I'm saying. It's like
Speaker 2: it's like the mousey brunette, short brown hair, big eyes,
Speaker 2: small nose, unassuming. They people feel like they are the
Speaker 2: pinnacle of that intersection for whatever reason, do you know
Speaker 2: what I mean?
Speaker 3: And shade no shade to.
Speaker 2: These people like they're just I think it comes very
Speaker 2: natural to them, But do you kind of see what
Speaker 2: I'm saying. When people talk about I see a lot
Speaker 2: of videos of people saying pretty privileges actually working against
Speaker 2: me and like they feel that it's done more harm
Speaker 2: than good.
Speaker 4: So from what I gather from that video, and I too,
Speaker 4: is someone who says a lot of words when I
Speaker 4: could say less words, I understand that that needed to
Speaker 4: be thirty seconds.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: In summary, pretty privilege is not just hot person. Pretty
Speaker 4: privilege is someone who can be seen as quite average,
Speaker 4: but benefits from being seen as quite average because sometimes
Speaker 4: being too pretty is to the detriment of the pretty person.
Speaker 4: We got that same thing, yep, Okay, cool, we reckon,
Speaker 4: as Brookie was pointing during that video when they started
Speaker 4: rattling off some of the qualities.
Speaker 1: Now see Brunette, etc. Yeah, do I think it's intellectualizing
Speaker 1: something that I guess it is that deep in a way.
Speaker 4: It is that deep, do you know what?
Speaker 2: So?
Speaker 4: I think when I have been in my really insecure phases,
Speaker 4: especially we're pretty privilege has to be concerned. I always
Speaker 4: have not I always, but in those situations had this
Speaker 4: fear that the thing that I want is going to
Speaker 4: be lost to somebody. Plain interesting because it happens in
Speaker 4: some capacity. I'm like, oh, you know, you spend all
Speaker 4: this time trying to be pretty, be unique, be memorable,
Speaker 4: be whatever, And then you're like, oh, that was the
Speaker 4: person that got what I wanted. And it's never you
Speaker 4: think to yourself, it doesn't really matter what you look like.
Speaker 4: But I'm like, no, that it definitely is an archetype
Speaker 4: of neutral, not in a bad way or a good way,
Speaker 4: but neutral that is more generically appealing than rare. But
Speaker 4: that's cointuitive to what you're taught to be like as
Speaker 4: a person. Be memorable, be different, be unique, be whatever.
Speaker 4: Turns out that's polarizing, fully, and if you were just
Speaker 4: the most mousiest version of yourself, maybe you wouldn't feel
Speaker 4: really exciting. Maybe you wouldn't get people complimented you every
Speaker 4: day and stopping you on the street to say you're
Speaker 4: so beautiful. Happens all the time. It does to me,
Speaker 4: it does, but I'm still being picked in the same
Speaker 4: way the neutral person is being picked interesting.
Speaker 1: So really having colored hair, for example, your pinks and
Speaker 1: your purples are losing out.
Speaker 4: But that's if you want to be picked as well.
Speaker 4: Because you know, we had this conversation a little while ago,
Speaker 4: when we're talking about dating apps, and when I was
Speaker 4: on Hintre in particular, I was like, I don't want
Speaker 4: to be liked by everyone. It's flattering to be seen
Speaker 4: as appealing to everyone, but realistically I want someone to
Speaker 4: know why I'm appealing, to be like, oh no, I
Speaker 4: really like her for insert these reasons here. I like
Speaker 4: her mind, I like the way she looks, I like
Speaker 4: what she thinks. Like this is really exciting to me.
Speaker 4: As opposed to being like I can project what I
Speaker 4: want onto this person, I'm viewing as neutral.
Speaker 1: Totally, do you know what I mean? I feel like
Speaker 1: was a very dominant kind of like growing up that
Speaker 1: would get the most attention in high school and stuff
Speaker 1: were kind of like blank canvases, like the ones that
Speaker 1: really captured a lot of guys that I knew attention
Speaker 1: didn't really talk much.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, which is odd because then you could
Speaker 4: know that maybe even consciously or subconsciously and still feel
Speaker 4: in your heart of hearts and your loins that to
Speaker 4: be more appealing is to add more.
Speaker 1: Yeah you know.
Speaker 4: And it's like, isn't it ironic that when we're younger,
Speaker 4: I remember when I was like, maybe eighteen, I was
Speaker 4: obsessed with like wearing so much foundation, eyelashes, like like
Speaker 4: a spank or whatever, things that would give people the
Speaker 4: illusion that I looked different. And then you get older
Speaker 4: and you're like, I don't really care to deviate too
Speaker 4: far from what I actually look like because it doesn't
Speaker 4: actually matter. It's similar to that. It's not like you
Speaker 4: grow up to want to be a blank canvas, but
Speaker 4: you recognize that the additions aren't really adding or getting
Speaker 4: you the result that you think it's going to get you.
Speaker 1: Oh, speak, do you know?
Speaker 4: And it happens. I know right now, there's we're having
Speaker 4: a bit of like a lip what's the opposite of
Speaker 4: lip filler, a lip dissolver moment, moment where people were like, oh,
Speaker 4: at one point, I looked at this and I thought
Speaker 4: I felt really beautiful. It felt like a good job.
Speaker 4: And now I look back on the same pair of
Speaker 4: lips I have and they look bul bulky or they're migrating,
Speaker 4: and I didn't see it like I used to see it,
Speaker 4: And now I want to get it resolved, dissolved, and
Speaker 4: I want my natural lips back, or people who did
Speaker 4: hectic things with their eyebrows at one point thought. You know,
Speaker 4: at one point I felt really beautiful, and then I
Speaker 4: had some distance from myself and were like, actually no,
Speaker 4: and so maybe the concept of being a neutually appealing
Speaker 4: person is not I mean, if you want the best
Speaker 4: go at benefiting from pretty privilege, it's not the trend
Speaker 4: cycle pretty, it's the neutral pretty, the one where people
Speaker 4: can almost what's the thing I'm looking for, Like the
Speaker 4: when people can kind of look at you as like
Speaker 4: a blank canvas and supurien, you know, as opposed to
Speaker 4: you creating such a specific vision that people are put
Speaker 4: off by vision that you've created.
Speaker 1: Oh, this is really interesting.
Speaker 4: I love learning.
Speaker 1: Yeah, take it, Yeah, just do whatever, do whatever. But
Speaker 1: the idea that additions will change what you are is
Speaker 1: tricky territory because some people are just going to see
Speaker 1: you for this thing that you are elementally.
Speaker 4: Yeah, thanks to that, babe. I like this chat.
Speaker 1: You've been listening to The Flex and Froom's daily podcast.
Speaker 5: For more, tune Indicator on DAB or stream it on iHeartRadio.