Full Transcript
Sh uh shall I keep going with that? Grades. Um or have we done enough? And I’ll leave that for the next time. We’re gonna do the thanks. That was kind of like the summing up. Let’s go to Thanksgiving then. Okay. And I’ll bring grades um to later because it feels like you re you wrapped up rants and um I’m not funny and should be fired anyway.
David:
And this is Gatriarch. Yeah, that is gatriarchs. Okay, so you and I have talked endlessly about like these new eras of parenting and how when they come, it’s not this huge big ceremony, it’s these little moments that you look back and you’re like, holy shit, that was the moment. So I had three this week.
Gavin:
That’s like that’s like a third of Taylor Swift eras, I might add. That you are, I mean, when you think of eras, I mean it’s dog years, right? Like toddlering eras are go maybe six months, but um you know Taylor Swift is uh an album every two years. And um, anyway, eras. Eras are all it’s it’s an era of eras.
David:
Um but my because my kids are so young, I do feel really good. Shut up, Gavin. That way you jumped. I know. Do you not have a thing on the side of your computer? I have a thing on the side of my computer that says, don’t say like so much and slow down. Yours should say, is it and stop talking? Um, but anyway, so I have young kids, so my eras happen so fast. Yes. And so here’s some era things that happened this week. So, you know, the little plastic, it’s it’s a whale for us. Yeah, it’s like the birthday. Yeah, I already know. Yes, the bathtub baby. Yeah. We were cleaning the bathtub and we were like, we don’t have babies anymore. Do we need this? And we said no, and I took it off, and it was weird to throw away, even though the underside was covered in mold. Mold.
unknown:
Covered in mold.
David:
We have never cleaned it.
Gavin:
Do you know how many times I open my kids’ water bottle? Not infrequently, I might add. And I look at the like the you know, the screw top and I’m like, oh, there’s definitely mold in that. But we’re just I mean, I’m I’m boosting their immunity system, right? Yeah, absolutely. Their immune system. Um, I have those errors are so um indelible. I’ll never forget the pictures that I took the time that I, in the middle of the night, went mission impossible dun dun dun with a bunch of uh stuffed animals, threw them in the trash and took a picture. And it was sad for four seconds and then I got over it. And it does seem like on another topic. I mean, throwing away stuffed animals seems so awful. There’s got to be a way to recycle them or upcycle them or something. No, ultimately, nobody wants your cast off um stuffed animals. So throw them in the trash and enter a new era.
David:
Anyway, I saw a TikTok of somebody pulling uh drywall down, and somebody had stuffed the wall cavity with um uh stuffed animals as insulation. Anyway, that’s um yep, and so the thing that’s yeah, the other thing that’s happening this week for me is my two-year-old daughter, who I’m so used to being able to do whatever I want in front of her because she never remembers anything and she can’t really say anything, um, fucking called me out in front of my husband. And they were we were talking about her hair and you know, girls’ hair gets naughty and whatever. And yeah, and Hannah says to my husband, she goes, Um, you give me conditioner. Daddy doesn’t condition my hair. And my stomach dropped, and I was like, I don’t, because it’s a step I can skip and go to bed earlier. And bitch just called me out. Bitch, just call you out. Um, so that was number two. And uh number three, um, uh, I my son went to go poop and he closed the door and usually asked me to sit in there with him, but this time he didn’t. And for a while I was like, what is going on? He’s in there forever. So then I open the door, unannounced, I don’t knock, I just open the door, and there’s my son with his little play um digital camera taking a photo of his junk. The second I walk in, I hear ch and I’m like, and he looks at me, I’m like, Emma, what are you doing? He’s like, I wanted to take a picture of it. And I was like, we can’t do that. And so then I grab the the camera and I start going through it. And it’s just shot after shot of a five-year-old’s dick dick pics. Just dick pics. And I was like, I said to my husband, I was like, we have to burn this. People are gonna think we’re taking dick pics of our children. Absolutely. So um, and then a last little bonus thing is that I have officially, you know, my kids have their little tablets, and there’s some games that I don’t even bother to learn or watch because they’re just stupid princess games or whatever. And now, when my daughter wants to play one, she’ll go, I don’t know how to do this. I don’t. I now just say, go just ask your brother. And I have officially passed the torch of knowing things to him, and he now knows how things go. So these are the changes happening in our household, and they’re they’re small, but they are mighty.
Gavin:
Small but mighty. And yeah, those eras, man, they are they are a real thing. I definitely do the ask my son to do the technology right now. I got a phone, new phone recently. I haven’t I have the brand new iPhone, but that’s because I came from a 12 mini. That was people people. That’s what this is. 12 mini. You still have a 12 mini? And I’m like, yeah, and it should last another three years. But I’ve dropped it so many times. It’s it it was time.
David:
Anyway, but I literally, I literally handed my 12 mini yesterday uh for the Halloween parade. I know we’re recording a little uh out of order, but uh for the Halloween parade, and she she looked at it and she wasn’t sure what to do. I said, It’s a 12 mini, relax. She was like, it’s just it’s just so small, I didn’t know what to do with it. I was like, shut the fuck up.
Gavin:
Well, anyway, I’m definitely in serious teen era right now, too. And it just feels, of course, everything everything feels endless and more epic and this, that, and the other. But we um, I think last time I mentioned how I was holding a grudge about something that my daughter had so easily moved on from. And um, and I I definitely like I didn’t come from an Italian family or I mean, we are so waspy growing up in the Midwest where we don’t tend to talk things through very much. We just, I don’t know, uh, scream and repress, right? But but now um there’s definitely a cultural shift between my partner and I, who he is very Connecticut, and I’m apparently I talk things through more, and he definitely holds on to grudges, and I’m able to kind of like explode about things and move on and forget about it. Well, my daughter’s even better at that. Luckily, she really is able to move on from stuff, and that it’s always a it’s kind of a shock to me that she is able to, because we seem to have some kind of crisis coming together, and I’m still hurt by it, and she’s not. Well, I happen to see on Instagram recently a psychologist talking about how teens are kind of live in dog hours, let’s say. Like an hour for me is seven hours for my teen, and she um is able to get over things much easier than I am. And I’m like, who is the child here? But it has given me a little bit of perspective that we are in an era of my daughter living in um uh dog hours, and um that I, of course, once again, as always, am the child in this relationship. Also, I’m the child in this um podcast, not actually thinking of anything funny to say, but it was a learning experience that we are here to inform also. Don’t hold a grudge and your kid has gotten over it before you have, don’t be the child.
David:
Just put it on the side of your computer, Gaben. Just say, end the story now. And is it funny? But also, you called your daughter a dog, basically. So I just want to put that out there. Thank you for making it funny. Yes. Um, so uh we have been, I am so backed up on saying this, and I apologize to our listener, but we’ve gotten so many very sweet DMs and emails and messages from you all throughout the months that I just haven’t gotten to. And I I fully apologize, but it reminded me that you, our listener, does reach out. You guys do reach out and send us stuff. You guys very much appreciate it. You guys do reach out, thank you. And I very much appreciate it. So I wanted to kind of open the floor to everyone out there. I know we have only one listener, but I would love to do a mailbag episode. And by mail, we mean your ballzack. No, but I I I, you know, I listen to a lot of other podcasts that often will do a mailbag episode of questions you have or things you want us to talk about or whatever. So I’m kind of putting that out to there to you, listener. If you have any questions or you want us to talk about something specific, or you want us just to us to say something stupid or to gave in to tell a long story that has no point, just tell us. Send us an email at Gatriarchspodcast at gmail.com or DM us. Um, two messages I want to bring up. Ben, I’m just gonna use your first names. Ben having a new baby, new listener. Congrats, Ben! And very excited for Ben. And also, Liam sent us a really funny story. Um, we he was particularly moved by my sister-in-law telling people, oh no, I’m pregnant with my brother’s child and making it awkward. Right. Um, and he was telling uh a similar story about uh his husband buying a car and asking the salesman um if he could store dead bodies in the trunk and the guy being really weird because he guess transports dead animals sometimes, but he wanted to make it awkward and very much appreciated that. We love a good awkward uh situation like that for sure. Please send us more awkward stories, but really send us questions so we can do a uh a ball bag episode. So, with that, it is also November 20th, and it is about to be Thanksgiving next week. Oh, Lee Moli, favorite time of the year. Everybody does Thanksgiving differently. Uh, but you know, we have children, unfortunately. Yeah. And so we all do Thanksgiving in many different ways.
Gavin:
So many more expectations placed upon us for sure. And trying to create magic and keep it all balanced, especially if you’re hosting. Oh my God. Oh my god. Yes.
David:
But Gavin, you said you found some internet article you wanted to bring in.
Gavin:
I mean, you know, we could easily go down a gratitude path because you know I’m all about it. No, no. But I was kind of like, how do I force feed gratitude to my teen and my preteen now? And um, I was Googling like just teens and gratitude. Do you know how much religious shit comes up there constantly? I mean, just like praise God every day, and then there’s gratitude. And I’m like, okay, right, well, praise something every day. But and then I came across something called the Washington Parent, which I have not done the background check on whether Washington Parent is something that we would that would be a gay triarch or not. Oh God, I hope they’re MAGA. I hope they’re something crazy. Well, so far this is pretty boring. But the it was Googling like seven reasons to be thankful for teenagers this Thanksgiving. So this is not about force-feeding gratitude to your kid. It’s more like us staying in the moment of being like, hey, we wanted to be parents, right? Especially David, you and me, this was not a situation in a bathroom in, you know, um, with some Michelobe lights. It was a very intentional thing. Um, so you know, here’s seven reasons why we can be grateful to have teens. So this is something that you can salivate over and um be miserable about for the next 10 years, David. You’re welcome. One, teens sleep in. True. Two, they care about the menu and like the food. So they actually like won’t theoretically throw down a you know a hissy fit over what you’ve um served and if the mashed potatoes are touching the green beans or not. Three, teens can help and clean up for the conversation is more meaningful. No, it won’t be. No, my kids, no, absolutely not. They will eat as fast as they can, they will leave. I’ll try to ask questions about art, life, religion, and politics, and they’ll be like, oh god, dad. And they’ll just grunt monosyllabic things at me. So who is this Washington parent who has children actually talking about life, religion, art, and politics? But anyway.
David:
I feel like your kids and me need to have like a mute mic button, like at a political debate where we’re just like Gavin’s like, well, you know, gratitude, but they just they part of it off. Thanks. Thanks.
Gavin:
You really helped me the process. How about they co-host sometime? That’s an idea. You co-host with my daughter. Oh my god, she will tell so much shit about me. If I think anyway, one, if number five, you can nap again because you can just like leave the teenagers, and all they want it to be is on their damned front phones anyway. Uh, sixteens can sleep up, uh sleep in and put themselves to bed. And seven, it’s much more low-key, stress-free holiday. I cannot imagine Thanksgiving ever be completely being low-key and stress-free because I’m just enough of a control freak that I want it to be amazing. And I don’t know, you’re a control freak too, though. So I am a control freak too.
David:
Relaxing. Yeah, and no, especially because I almost always host Thanksgiving and cook everything. Oh, everything. You don’t allow anybody knowing. No, no, that’s the control freak. So I am I am happiest when people leave me alone to just serve them. Yeah. Like they’re like, well, when are you gonna sit down? Sit down, sweet. I’m like, stop it.
Gavin:
I have things to you guys eat. The angry host at that, or are you genuinely happy?
David:
No, it makes me happy to think that they are just they are eating and they’re happy and they’re not worrying about if I’m gonna be there because that stresses me out that they’re like, well, we’re not gonna start without you. Um, okay, that is really great reasons to look forward to having a teenager. I won’t even get into having a five and two-year-old for a meal.
Gavin:
How are you grateful for them this Thanksgiving?
David:
I’m not, I’m not even gonna go into it. But I do have one final question to wrap up this Thanksgiving bit. Please. And it’s just, and it’s a it’s Gavin, you have to answer just succinctly. Uh-huh. Does Christmas begin on November 1st, the day after Thanksgiving, or December 1st? Day after Thanksgiving. That’s incorrect. Um, thank you for playing with us. No, that is also what my husband believes. I am a the day those Halloween decorations come down, Christmas goes up. No. We had to meet in the middle. We’re gonna meet in the middle, and now we have agreed to the day after Thanksgiving.
Gavin:
That is when See, this is why you are such a cold-hearted snake, because you don’t indulge in any of the gratitude. This is why you’re making fun of me all the time. It’s because you skip gratitude and you go from stuffing your face with Reese’s peanut butter cups to give me presents.
David:
To getting stuff, to getting stuff. Um, yeah. Uh, speaking of getting stuff, before we move into our dad hack of the week, um I posted this silly little video um on TikTok, and one of the hashtags I added was gay dads. Um, just because I like to keep gay dads in the um and it got removed. It got flagged for inappropriate content. No, not the video. The hashtag is not allowed on TikTok. Gay dads isn’t? Gay dads is not allowed on TikTok.
Gavin:
Wait a minute, I put that shit up all the time, I thought.
David:
Yeah, for whatever reason, it got it got flagged. Well, you’re just you have a dirtier account than we do, as teachers. I think the video was like, you know the video? The video was that cat on the broomstick, like flying away. Um, and it was like, you know, you know, the daycare saying, like, oh, you could pick your kids up early after the Halloween Halloween parade if you want. And it says me going. See you. Um, and I said hashtag gay dads. Wow.
Gavin:
Wow. No. Okay, well, that’s that’s some bullshit right there. Um, I did discover a dad hack of the week. So we’re a family of mostly boys in our house, right? I have a son. And um, I am so sick of telling him to lift the seat when he pees. And I mean, you know that guys are disgusting, right? I mean, we are we are we are we everything points to our disgustingness. If you ever like clean up around the base of a uh of a toilet where it touches the floor, you know, or the little, I swear to god, it’s just a urine trap on the back where the bolts are.
David:
And it’s like right there. It’s a pool of urine, a dried urine, a layer of dried urine underneath a layer of just like like drying urine.
Gavin:
It’s just like syrup of urine back there that’s just golden. It’s so disgusting.
David:
Essence.
Gavin:
Essence overreduced. So um, I this is so simple and so stupid, but I thought, wait a minute, if I make the effort to put the entire lid down, then that means my kid can’t just walk up and start peeing without lifting the seat. He has to lift the lid, so he might as well lift the whole thing, also. I know that is so simple, but hey, it’s the simple I it might be so simple it doesn’t even count as a hack. And maybe everybody in the world knows this, but put the lid down too, so that your son, and frankly, yourself and your partner, your husband, also has to just like if you’re gonna lift something the lid up, you might as well lift the seat up too. So there you go, ladies and clean men. I’m trying to make it a cleaner world. But why is there that urine on the back of the toilets?
David:
It’s so gross. I don’t know. It’s so gross. But you know what else is really gross? Do tell our top three list.
Gavin:
Gate three marks, top three list, three, two, one.
David:
Uh, so this week is my week. Yeah. I love my week. So the best weeks. Um, this week it is the top three covers of songs that are better than the original.
Gavin:
I’m prepared. And it this is hard. I don’t know how to narrow it down, frankly. And so my thinking is going to be narrowing it down in the moment, I might add. But go ahead.
David:
Okay, that’s fine. Yeah, and we might have some overlap. I’m sure our number one is the same. But um, and I have two that I’m I’m gonna leave out, but I was like, if it speaks to me, but there’s so many great uh covers of songs. But here’s my top three. Uh, and number three, nothing compares to you. Sinead O’Connor. Is a cover? Of Prince. That’s Prince song. Wow. I mean, I’m gonna expose so much of my idiocy and my age in the song. No, I had to Google a lot of this stuff. Wow. I had to Google a lot of this stuff. Um, number two, this is gonna sound silly, but I am such a fan of the Sing movie. I’ve talked about it on the show before. And it is basically karaoke of these famous songs or whatever. Um, I’m still standing, Taryn Edgerton. It’s excellent. It is when I hear that song, that is to me now the version of the song. And when I hear the Elton John version, I’m like, uh, it’s not as good. And that’s not a dig at Elton, but Taryn Edgerton, yeah, he’s such a good singer. It’s such a great thing. Yeah, it’s excellent. I’m still standing. Yeah. And number one, I I cannot imagine this is not on your list, or at least not your number one. I will always love it, yes, Whitney and Dolly.
Gavin:
I mean I mean Dolly, the Dolly version is so fantastic.
David:
Beautiful, but nothing compares to uh nothing compares to Whitney and Daniel. I think Dolly even agrees with us there.
Gavin:
Oh, yeah. So that was gonna be an honorable mention for me. I’m gonna have so many. I I’m gonna have to do a bunch of honorable mentions, okay? But number three for me, Istanbul by They Might Be Giants. Istanbul. Yes! And if you go back and Google the original, it’s like 1950s doo-wop Istanbul was Constantinople. And um, which it’s you just kind of have to, but the They Might Be Giants version is so fantastic. So good. Um I love number two for me is Can’t Help Falling in Love by the Pet Shop Boys from full 90s. But then I forgot that UB40 also covered it, showing my age. And of course, it’s an originally an Elvis song based upon some French song from the 1930s. So who cares about the French, obviously? But I really love every single um generation era, if I may, of Can’t Help Falling in Love With You, it just gets better and better, I think. And Willie Nelson’s great too. Um, I guess I’m gonna go with the first thing that came to mind for me for number one late 80s cover of Total Eclipse of the Heart, danced version by someone named Nikki French, who I don’t know if she’s had a career or not, but of course, it’s the cover of the Bonnie Tyler um song. And it is it smacks, man. It is so good. Total eclipse of the heart. I think that you I didn’t know there was a I think you’re gonna have to do some editing of basically all of these songs for the play out here, okay? Oh, that would be really fun.
David:
I’m gonna do quickly too, my two honorable mentions Kill Killing Me Softly by the Fuji. Yes, excellent. Right, excellent. And then also respect Aretha Franklin is not the original bonus running. So that was a really great one.
Gavin:
Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Oh, okay. Then my honorable mentions also, even though I love the original, the remake from Carr’s movie is even better. Life is a Highway. Oh, that’s Rascal Food. But originally it was Tom Cochran, and that was a really good one. And here’s another one that she shows me is um Madonna’s cover of Fever, originally by Peggy Lee, is just a great throwback from my high school. Are there any?
David:
Covers of like Gregorian chants you want to mention.
Gavin:
So, what’s next week? Next week, I want to know the three ways that you owe your parents a huge apology now that you’re a father.
David:
Okay, so our guests this week are wildly overqualified to be here. So, Gavin, please button up and make yourself look classy. Because one of them is a psychoanalyst and a faculty member at NYU’s postdoctoral program in psychotherapy and psychoanalysis. And the other is a professor of performance studies and social and cultural analysis at NYU and a psychoanalyst. But wait, there’s more. They are both authors and recently wrote the new book, Gender Without Identity. So these are two people who are going to be horrified at what comes out of Gabin’s mouth. Please welcome to the show, Avi Sakatopulu and Ann Pellegrini.
Gavin:
A pleasure to be here. Thank you for joining us, Anne and Avgi, very, very much. This is um, yeah, I’m blown away for sure. So um let’s uh continue to be blown away.
SPEAKER_00:
Thanks for having us.
David:
So you all wrote this book. And tell us a little bit about kind of where the idea came from and what the book is about.
SPEAKER_00:
Well, the idea came from uh trying to basically push back against people who were trying to get us to not publish this piece. Um, in short, like we wrote a paper, we submitted it for an award. Uh, the paper is what eventually became the book. Uh, we got the award, yay! And then um the paper was going to get published by a very prestigious journal. The journal was all up for what we were saying until we added a footnote expressing acknowledgments and appreciation for our queer and trans colleagues, um, especially welcoming them not just as patients, but also as peers and our teachers, um, and uh naming the harm that psychoanalysis has done to queer and trans patients. And then all of a sudden, our paper became a little bit less wanted. Um, I mean, we were told that unless we remove that piece, it could not get published. And um, I think the pressure was really to take it out. I don’t think they really expected that we would say, we’re good, we’re gonna go elsewhere, we’re gonna do something else with it. I think that they thought, who’s gonna give up this offer? And the answer is um queer people. Queer people are gonna give up this offer, of like being constricted into um saying things that uh or taking things out from what we need to say and having our academic freedom restricted.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:
So basically, we didn’t want to submit to the blackmail of basically pinkwashing the journal by publishing a piece that is apparently open to talking with more complexity about transness and queerness, but without acknowledging the blood that psychoanalysis has on its hands historically and in an ongoing way about precisely transness and queerness. But in in true homosexual fashion, we turned lemons into a cosmopolitan by actually getting to and for brunch, just for other purposes, and to expand. You know, but you know, in some sense, this was this was not what we would have wished for to sort of have this basically have to pull our article at the last minute because of their restrictions and what we could say. But um, the argument we’re making in the book, gender without identity, felt to it felt to us so important that in fact getting to expand it into a book, which is actually ended up reaching many more readers and readers outside psychoanalysis. So, in some ways, we would not have wished for it to have happened this way, but the outcome we think has had has actually been doing more work. And I don’t know if it would help to say a little bit about what the book is trying to do. I mean, I mean, we’re intervening in these really ugly contemporary debates inside psychoanalysis as well as outside it, that want basically a world with as few trans people in it as possible. That might be would like to have fewer gay people too. But especially right now, we’re seeing a war on trans children and trans adults as well, with more than 500 bills this legislative year alone in states across the United States, so many of them targeting trans kids and trans adults. So this book is really trying to intervene in those debates by trying to offer a different model for how anyone comes into their gender, not just trans people, not just gender non-binary people, but anyone. And by opening up more space to think about all gender as actually a complicated process of becoming and not something anyone is born with, we’re trying to sort of basically intervene in those debates in which, you know, we have to justify our existence as trans people and queer people. And instead, we’re saying, you know, like, you know, the reason not to discriminate against trans and queer people is not because we were born that way. It’s not because we can’t change, can’t help it, but because there’s nothing wrong with being trans or being queer. That’s why it’s wrong to discriminate against queer and trans people.
Gavin:
There is an underlying apology made in there or just like justification of saying um we can’t help it, and therefore, and um I appreciate this, just saying uh the fact is uh more diversity is going to make us all better, and there is nothing wrong with being who you are, whatever that may be. When you’re explaining this, hey, we get the language, we get this lingo. I’m so curious though, here, even at the beginning, how do you bring about your philosophy and your efforts and your research and everything to the people who, okay, maybe they’re just choosing not to get it, but let’s assume they aren’t for a second. And the people who are like, I just don’t get it. I just like, how do you explain it to my grandparents, for instance, God rest their souls? Or how do you explain it to people who aren’t at the center of this debate, who don’t think they know, I’m putting it in quotes, that don’t think they know any trans people, for instance. How do you just like try to simplify it and relate to them human to human?
SPEAKER_00:
I think that’s I think that’s the million-dollar question, right? Everybody’s asking that question right now, so here we are. Um I mean, look, there’s a couple of different ways in which people ask that question. There is the I don’t get it, which is cover for I don’t want to get it, there’s nothing new here, uh, I’m being forced into something, um, which is kind of like it it presents itself as if it’s a question, but it’s not really a question. It’s uh it’s really a way of saying, uh, kind of like, you all people don’t know what you’re talking about. And I’m the only one who has common sense. And we see like this being said explicitly, right? Like uh we all know what a woman is, like those kinds of statements that seem to imply that anybody who would think differently just doesn’t have basic rationality, right? And then there’s people who are actually curious. And the way that you explain it to people who are actually curious is actually quite different than those who have the pretense of curiosity, uh, but are kind of like just doing something else. Uh and that is that um gender has always been the idea that gender is binary or that there’s only two genders, has always been a fantasy, a very powerful fantasy, a very influential fantasy. But it’s always been a fantasy, just like the idea that everybody’s straight has always been a fantasy. Like trans kids have existed for a very long time. Trance is not always the word that might have been applicable, but gender complexity exists, has existed throughout time in different cultures. It’s been disciplined basically through kind of like um colonialism. So the same people who will say, I don’t get it and don’t want to get it, are also the people who will kind of like usually um are also the people who will say, everybody has a race except me, who being white. I mean, we hear this a lot, kind of like that’s the kind of thing you hear a lot from white people. So there’s a lot of connections between these um these um matters that have to do with power and what it means to hold on to power and not want to let it go.
David:
Yeah. I feel like I feel like everybody knows blank before your argument is such a great, if I’m being honest, tactic on the right because they set up this like truth that isn’t true, but they’re they’re not making that the their point. So people just kind of skip over it. Well, everybody knows that you know Trump won more votes and blah, blah, blah, blah, but blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And you just you just kind of let that seep in. I mean, a lot of family, a lot of friends who just quote unquote don’t get it. And like you said, there’s kind of the lane of I don’t get it is cover for I don’t want to get it. And there’s the people who I partially why I start this podcast is like are afraid to ask weird or uncomfortable or insensitive questions out of they want to learn, but they don’t want to offend anyone. So they say, I don’t get it. And I want to make sure that people, because I I will tell you, I’ll be done with my monologue in a second. I grew up.
Gavin:
I was absolutely about to text you and be like, you’re monologuing. You are monologuing.
David:
Well, because so I grew up in the South saying and doing the worst things imaginable, as a as a as a gay woke man now would never do. And it was all out of, I just was kind of following in line and I didn’t really ask any of the questions. And me becoming a gay man and realizing that kind of forced me out of that in a weird way. And so I have a lot of uh straight white Christian friends who just don’t have to ask any of those questions. They don’t have to get it. It doesn’t actually matter to them. So the same ones who say, like, ah, politics is so annoying, just ignore all that stuff. Well, because it’s not gonna affect you in the way it’s gonna affect me. I’m done monologuing, I’m apologize.
Gavin:
Well, what’s the most outrageous thing that gets said to you all on your paths that you think, oh, no, all right, I’ve heard this before.
SPEAKER_02:
Well, you know, I actually one of the things we’re saying in the book, which is really counterintuitive, actually connects to the what is this what is the most outrageous, or maybe what is the most common question we’re getting. Um so one of the things we’re arguing in the book is that gender may have a relationship to trauma. Like all gender may have some relationship to it. And the reason that’s such a surprising and even counterintuitive argument is that currently in conversations certainly about transness, but also actually about queerness, forms, you know, forms of gayness and lesbianism, the argument has been that if there’s any possible relationship between being queer or being trans and trauma, then that invalidates your queerness and your transness. So it’s it’s that their homosexuality or being trans would be a symptom of the trauma. So if you address the trauma, you’d straighten out that person. They would actually be straight. They should have been straight, but this sexual abuse they experienced turned them gay. Or this bad teacher or the wrong internet site, or again, sexual abuse made them think they were trans, but it actually, of course, they’re vino, they should be cisgender, right? So we’re actually making a really different claim that indeed trauma may have a relationship to becoming trans or becoming queer, but it has a relationship to becoming any gender at all. So I say that because that one of the things that we get asked is, well, what about trauma? Can’t something, you know, basically the question is what causes transness? Doesn’t trauma cause it? We don’t like the length of causality, but we’re saying we don’t, you know, like we don’t know what causes any gender, like how anyone becomes who they become, right? Right. Um, and we want to like even sort of talk about again the the everydayness of some of these things. So maybe a concrete example, and I’m gonna hand the baton off to Avi, has to do with thinking about how trauma is embedded in normative femininity. Okay, right. That it’s and it’s actually once you start thinking about that, it’s like so amazing. And this it’s a way to talk to everyday people about how, you know, like anyone who’s raised to be a woman has to think about the the fear, yeah, or maybe the actual experience of sexual violence. How is that not trauma embedded in the meaning of being a woman?
Gavin:
I think we understand, I think David and I would understand what you’re saying, but could you expand upon that just a little bit, or even just rephrase what you just said? That the normative experience of being a woman is an exercise in trauma almost all the time? Is that uh is that an could you expand that a little bit?
SPEAKER_02:
I want to actually hand this off to Avier because the argument we’re developing with respect to the relationship between trauma and gender is one that builds on something she argued in her first book, Sexuality Beyond Consent. And we couldn’t have done the thinking in our book without the sort of the kind of the ground she already sort of laid down for us. And it it’s and so I’m gonna just gonna hand it off to her.
SPEAKER_00:
Okay, well, here’s what I would say. Like, if you think about what it means to become a woman, if you take like the old dictum, like one is not born but becomes a woman, right? From Peter Beauvoir. Like this idea that yes, you may be born with a certain kind of body, with a certain kind of assignment, but you still have to learn how to become a woman. You still have to become who you are ostensibly are from the beginning. Um think about like how sexual violence, sexual harassment, the threat of rape is something that little girls are taught to think about from very early on. Whether you start with like, don’t talk to strangers, don’t take candy from strangers, don’t Little Red Riding Hood. Yeah, exactly.
Gavin:
It’s in our Don’t go out in the woods, wolves are everywhere.
SPEAKER_00:
Absolutely. Like it’s in our fairy tales, it’s in our cultural stories, it’s in how parents raise their children. And it’s not like these things are not also said to boys, but they’re said with a different valence, or children who are assigned male at birth are also getting these messages. But if kind of like if somebody who’s assigned female at birth grows up with these kinds of stories and ends up identifying as a girl, part of her femininity, part of her womanhood actually runs through the the constant knowledge that she will have to negotiate a sexism and male aggression and the possibility of rape, how she dressed, it it infiltrates everything. How you dress, how you speak, whether you are kind of like, and I’ll put this in kind of like scare quotes, provoking male attention. Oh, yeah.
David:
That’s that’s the one you hear all the time that’s just so horrific. Like, why was she wearing that out there? Yes. And never why was he raping her? Yeah, exactly. Exactly.
SPEAKER_00:
But that that’s kind of like that becomes woven into how then somebody who might identify as a woman learns to discipline herself, learns to kind of like whether she ends up wearing the short skirt or not. This crosses her mind. So she may not wear it out of fear or wear it out of like a like, screw this, I’m gonna do whatever I need to do for myself. But it’s always in some relation to the knowledge that in this culture, at this moment in time and for many centuries, women have been getting harassed and raped, kind of like, you know, I we don’t need to go into the stats, they’re terrible. So even kind of like what somebody who says, I don’t understand what this whole thing is about, even that person would have to concede that womanhood also runs through the cultural pressure and the cult and the trauma of constantly being rapable. So here you have an expression of like what we might call normative gender running through trauma. And yet nobody would say to a woman, but are you sure you’re a woman? Because if you resolve this trauma around fearing kind of like that you will be raped, maybe your gender would be different. Like nobody in their right mind would say that. Why? For two reasons. The first is because kind of like we kind of like normative gender is never questioned. This is also the pressure that trans puts on normative gender. All of a sudden everybody’s gender is under inquiry. Sure. Uh, and the second is because like we just see that as part of what it means to be in this world. Um, but this is not an affordance that is extended to trans people. Like for trans people, if you’re dealing with something social, then it’s not real, it’s just the social effect of something. Um Yeah, the fantasy is you cure the trauma, you cure the transness.
SPEAKER_02:
Pshew took care of that, took care of that problem.
David:
I’ve I’ve I listen, I’ve been looking for uh a way to cure Gavin of all of this. And I just maybe you guys can uh uh give me some analysis on that. But I I am curious of okay, so so this is all uh this is all big, you know, thoughtful stuff. And I’m wondering for the dads out there, for the parents out there, for the moms out there who are raising kids and they want to be raising their kids thoughtfully, yeah. Um, whether or not their kids are, you know, pre I don’t know how you would say it, but like seem to be going down a pretty cisgendered path, or maybe there’s something else there. What what advice would you give them? Like how how do you do you because we have to deal practically with like boys, you know, boys’ room, girls’ room, boys on this side of the room in kindergarten, girls do this, and it comes up all the time with my kids.
SPEAKER_00:
All the time. Yeah. It goes back actually back to something that you were saying, like when you were asking earlier, like what’s what’s the most outrageous thing you’ve heard? And there’s like many outrageous things, including many transphobic things. But the thing that is most interesting is how anxious, especially gay parents, can get around their child’s gender non-conformity.
Gavin:
Oh my God, yes. Absolutely. Yes. That fear that, oh great, somebody’s gonna judge us out on the playground because you give two fags a kid and they’re gonna dress it up in a dress. And you’re like, oh my God, we want our kids to be the most heteronormative possible, so you’re not looking at the city.
David:
And we’re first carrying our our trauma onto those kids and being like, no, no, no, we can look just like the straight people. Watch us raise these straight all-American men. Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_02:
And that’s we can raise some miserable children too.
David:
We could we could be terrible parents too, full equality. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:
I mean, that’s that’s exactly right. Because it’s interesting, like you were speaking earlier, um, David, about like falling in line, kind of like. And I think that there’s all kinds of pressures, especially on queer parents, to fall in line with what straight culture demands of us. Just like the journal did to us, like, fall in line, like say this but don’t say that, think this, but don’t think that. Fall in line in order to kind of like so much of anti-trans activism right now is happening by people who are either gay or protecting gay people, protecting against, I put this in scarecodes, protecting them, like there’s all of these panics around, like, what about gay children? Are they being trans? Because people are afraid of their homosexuality. You know, like there’s so this can play out in a variety of different ways. So, two two pieces of practical advice that I would give to parents as somebody who has been working with trans kids and their families for over 20 years, is that first, like, children, if you have a child who comes to you and says, My gender is not what you think it is, like you should be, you should be congratulating yourself. You should be jumping up and down. Because it means for a child to go to a parent and say, You got something wrong about me, when they know that this is going to make the parent anxious, and kids know this about us, they sense this about us, when they know that it’s going to bring up so much in them, requires a lot of trust from the child. It requires also a child that has been sturdy enough psychically and feels enough trust and enough confidence in themselves to come to you with what might to a parent feel like a revelation, but to the child might have been very, very hard, a very hard process of articulating that. So that’s the one thing that I would say that kind of like that’s not a moment to panic, even though you may panic. And there’s nothing wrong with panicking internally, or talking to a professional, talking to a friend, talking to communities of other parents who have had their children address them this way. The other thing is that kids make identity claims, and they also say, for example, I’m this or I’m that, and that needs to be taken seriously, though I would say not. At face value. And what I mean by that is, kids need the room to be able to change. So sometimes I have parents who come to me and say, This is parental anxiety, right? Parents who come to me and say, Well, my boy started kind of like playing with girl with toys that girls play with. He wants to wear dresses. Do you think, is he proto-gay or proto-trans? Like, and these are well-meaning questions. Like they’re questions that have to do with how do I support my child. But they are kind of like putting the cart again, the horse again before the cart, I think is the expression.
Gavin:
Sure, whichever. Well, we we we don’t want to you know box you into any lane.
David:
That horse can be before the cart, or maybe or maybe it’s a pony, or maybe it’s a unicorn, or maybe it’s an alicorn. My son is very into my little pony right now, so I know the entire world and history and all the claims. Anyway, I want I want to I want to give a quick compliment to what something you said earlier, which I so love about just the queer community in general, about your paper and it turning into a book. If you tell us don’t, y’all, we’re gonna do it 10x. I don’t know what to tell you. If you try to like limit us, we’re just if you’re like, can you not be so gay? I’m showing up in a giant ball gown tomorrow. I don’t know what to tell you.
SPEAKER_00:
That’s what fear survival is about, right? If you make it out, you it’s very hard to be put back in because there’s also a lot of people who would not do that. And those are the people who are still in the closet, gender or sexuality-wise, or self-hating, people who try to kill themselves. Um, so kind of like what you’re saying, David, is like so important because that is survival, that’s a survival strategy. Yeah, totally.
David:
And we’ve mentioned on the uh sorry, David. I uh I always say we’ve witnessed this on the show before, but it’s so silly, but it’s so true. And it’s talking back to what you were saying, uh how kind of the defense of gayness was always like, um, I was born with it, so therefore you can’t um that can’t be a negative thing about me. Like, uh, how could I help it? And it hasn’t really worked. It hasn’t. Um, as uh, and so that’s very interesting. But you know, the bros of the movie, they jokingly say, like, you know, hey, we gay people, our relationships look just like yours. And then he goes, No, we just said that to trick you into giving us rights. Well, our relationships are totally different. So I think there’s a natural way that we try to like gain some sort of equality in life is to try to assimilate in a weird way, just to kind of get our foot in the door. And then once we’re kind of in, we’re like, JK, we’re actually very different. And thank you for it.
SPEAKER_00:
But you know what? Like what you’re saying is so interesting because this idea of like assimilation, like this is kind of kind of like queer and trans people are screwed either way. Yeah. Because if you try to trick to assimilate, then you’ve tricked people, and now they have to be constantly watching for not being tricked. Because that’s what queer and trans people, I mean, that’s kind of like the the specter of like trans women are deceptive because they deceive straight men into thinking they’re women. Of course, I’m saying this kind of like in a critical way, right? Like this idea that you have to constantly be suspicious of the queer and trans person, right? Um but they’re also putting us in the position where you can’t get in as yourself. You have to pass in a variety of different ways. And if you pass, kind of like you’ve you’ve been deceptive, and if you don’t pass, you’re out. So here we go.
SPEAKER_02:
Or, you know, the the model of assimilation where if you’re a good enough gay, right, a gay who does all the things that a good heterosexual is supposed to do, not only do you get married, but you’re you’re monogamous, you’re gonna have children, you’re gonna do all the things that the good heterosexual is supposed to be do. And not only that, you’re supposed to then think badly of any queer who doesn’t line up and do it that way. So they’re like the good gays who maybe get full civil rights. Maybe, because it’s always provisional.
unknown:
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:
And then they’re the bad gays, oh, we’re not like that. And then, oh my goodness, get rid of those trans people because they confuse everything even more. I mean, it ends upsetting, you know, sort of queer people against other queer people.
David:
Luckily, Gavin and I are the bad gays, flat out. Excellent.
Gavin:
Which is that’s which is why we’re talking to you.
SPEAKER_02:
Yes, we’re demonstrating this is an urban all the bad behaviors.
Gavin:
Yeah, this is an urban. We want the rest of the world to be better than we are. So, um, in the process of uh talking with kids, obviously uh we are a kid-focused um podcast and uh on the parents as well, but I bet you hear some crazy shit from kids once in a while. And I would love to know, in the process of some of your work, what’s been the most eye-popping or entertaining or shocking stuff that you hear from kids, which I would imagine is often just truth-telling, but share so share some beautiful stories from kids, would you?
SPEAKER_00:
I have a beautiful story, but I’m I’m I’m afraid it’s not like a fun story, even though it’s a very poignant story.
David:
I I host a show with Gavin. There’s plenty of not fun in here. Don’t worry. You should go right in his line.
SPEAKER_00:
And you did invite two psychoanalysts, so there’s also like the stone.
David:
Well, to be fair, I felt a little bamboozled because it says anal in the middle of psychoanalysts. So I that’s what I that’s the only thing I saw. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:
Um okay. So I’m stumped.
David:
She’s like, what am I doing?
SPEAKER_02:
No, I actually have a I have a t-shirt that highlights the word anal in psychoanalysts. So I am just so.
SPEAKER_00:
I feel very close to you right now. I was actually just thinking that and trying to decide if I was gonna say that or not.
SPEAKER_02:
We might ask you later to cut this part of the interview off.
SPEAKER_00:
What the heck? Let’s just go down that round. So here’s here’s a story. I um a few several more than 10 years ago at this point, um, two parents brought their child to me. Um, she was five at the time, she had been assigned male at birth, was um um was living as a girl, she was socially transitioned. And when she started, she and I started working together, she I knew from her parents that she had been assigned male at birth, but she never said that to me. So for two years, we worked in ways that kind of like she built up the courage to tell me. And and the way that she told me is like really poignant and so characteristic of the experience that so many kids have. She said to me, when we started talking about it, she said to me, My dad thinks I’m a boy. And sometimes I wear boy clothes so that I don’t break his heart. Oh, oh wow. Which is kind of like so, this is what I meant earlier about like the sturdiness of trans kids. And this is also this also goes to what we were talking about just a second earlier of like how do you trick people to get in. Like you could say, like the father could say, like, she’s she’s ambivalent, she’s wearing boy clothes, like maybe she’s not clear, but she’s wearing both clothes because she’s she can’t bear his heartbreak, yeah, which she can see, even though the father, who I I worked with a family for many years, for over 10 years, the father never said that to her. In fact, if anything, he was very careful. But kids sense those things, like you know, they pick up on them.
SPEAKER_02:
So I was just gonna say something that go back to something Avi said earlier. That if your child comes to you and said and basically says to you some version of you got something wrong, like I’m actually a boy, or you know, I’m I’m not the girl you think I am. Um you this is an achievement. Yet your child trusted you enough to say that. Because children sense they worry about disappointing their parents. They they they’re aware of things that were said overly, they also pick up on things that have been said implicitly. All these implicit cues they’re getting not just from the parents, but the familial culture, the larger culture. So a plus grade to you, parent, if your child says this to you. But this brings up something else that I think is really important. And children worry about disinteresting the parents in so many different registers. Like they want to major in something in college that the parent didn’t want. They are interested in school activities different from the ones the parents imagined for them. So maybe we could even de-dramatize the question of gender and trans childhood or gender non-normative kids, that there are so many ways in which the child the parent has imagined when they’re trying to get pregnant or when they’re adopting or when they’re fostering, that child is the adult’s fantasy, the parent’s fantasy. The little person that child will become. Yeah, the parent has something to do with, but the parent can’t control. So because of the because of the the kind of the bright lights on gender as a social category, um, I think that there’s so much more drama and disappointment, say, around, you know, a child, you know, sort of saying to the parent, you know, I actually I I’m, you know, I’m trans or I’m a girl when the parent was thinking the child was a boy. But if we put it into the context of all sorts of other ways in which children will become beings different from ones the parents imagined, that might help. Because I think this is a much more common experience.
SPEAKER_00:
And parents have to get over that too. I mean, parents have to negotiate all the time the gap between the child they imagined and the child they got, all the time.
Gavin:
Yeah. And and we’re all dealing with our own daddy issues and our mommy issues of our own and dealing with our own trauma. And unfortunately, putting that trauma on our children, it’s so true.
David:
And what we talked about with being a gay parent specifically, I have personally experienced this in a way that, like, you know, you you you go into parenting, I feel like, being like, I’m gonna be fucking amazing. Not only am I gonna be amazing, but I’m gay. So I’m woke and I get it all, and nothing can shake me. And man, if my kid wants to tap dance or play baseball, I’m ready to go. But the truth is, is that my, you know, my my son started kind of like liking, you know, my little pony, or he’d want to like wear a skirt every once in a while. And it and it shook us. It shook us in a way that I was embarrassed to to kind of really look at like what I was feeling. Because what I was really feeling was like, can’t you just be like a straight boy and the gay dad raising the straight boy and look at this equality? And it was, it was this like like you know, uh terrible, flat candy coating of equality that was in my brain. But it was forcing me to kind of be like, no, but are you actually letting him be who he wants and not it had always pinged in me a little bit? And so it was something that I was like, oh, I am nowhere near as far along in my quote unquote wokeness or my thoughtfulness as I thought it was. And it all is tied to both the parenting delusion of like, my kid’s gonna be president of the United States, and every time that’s not that, you’re just like, what the fuck? But as a gay parent specifically, and that weird chip on our shoulder of that we’re gonna create more gay kids, it yeah, it really, it really shook me. And so any other gay parents out there who maybe have gay or trans children, it it is an interesting experience that we are having that I’ve heard from a lot of other gay parents that I did not expect.
SPEAKER_00:
I actually have a quick story that comes to mind from a mother, a lesbian mother that I had worked with whose child wanted to wear pants and she was all for that. A female assigned at birth child. And she was all for that, kind of like as long as she could see that through feminism, right? Like girls don’t have to wear dresses, but the moment that it started tilting into kind of like a gender complexity, she kind of like she started, she didn’t want to force her child. It’s a very interesting story. She didn’t want to force her child to wear a dress. So what she did was she would not wash the pants, hoping that you know they’ll run out of clothes, they’ll eventually wear a dress. And um, and one day her daughter came to her. They were going to go somewhere, and she said, Well, I have like I can’t find any pants. She said, Well, why don’t you wear the dress? The dress is clean, which was a plan all along. And her daughter said to her, I don’t want to come. She said, I don’t think you want me, I think you want the dress to come with you.
David:
Oh, ooh, she got red for Phil by that little girl.
SPEAKER_00:
Right, right. I mean, what is a slap in the face, but a slap in the face that the mother was able to allow to rattle her, as opposed to kind of like come down on her daughter about it, it really changed so much. And how much must a parent be doing right for a child to be able to call you out this way?
David:
Totally. And also, let’s talk about like the audacity of any parent thinking that when a child has a toddler, especially, has decided on a pair of shoes or a shirt or a fork that they’re gonna use, that anything you do can change their mind. Because I have a two-year-old girl at home, and if she wants the green fork, she’ll burn this fucking house down until she gets that green fork. Absolutely.
Gavin:
Yeah, and as the parent of a 13-year-old girl, uh, you choose your bottles or battles. Anyway, you do not choose the bottle, they choose the bottle, and you just go along with it. And in the meantime, parents don’t choose your unnecessary battles for sure.
SPEAKER_02:
I want to go back to something that you said earlier, David, about the you know, the accusation, right? The this is something that gay parents twirl under the fear that if their child is queer, whether gender queer, queer in terms of gay, lesbian, that they will be accused of having done that. But they made their kid trans or they made their kid queer. Like, good luck with that. If parents could make their children in terms of like binary gender or heterosexuality, there A, there’d be no queer people, there’d be no trans people. We just we know that it doesn’t work that way. Um, and but you know, I think what would it mean to imagine that parents make room for, which is not making their kid gay, making their kid trans, but what would it mean if parents make room for their children to have the space to become in the ways that that could happen? That there’s a this not forcing the question, are you gay or are you trans? Are you straight or are you gay? Like actually just providing space because childhood, in some sense, is just queer. Children try things out, they’re learning things, lots of stuff.
David:
And then give them the space. Parties, yeah, brunch. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s very gay.
Gavin:
So as we wrap it up here, again, we are so thrilled to have had you. And you, I I know that neither of you are parents, but you deal with children all the time. I’m wondering, can you just leave us with a bit of parenting advice that you’ve observed to help make wonderful children go on and save the world?
SPEAKER_00:
Yeah. I what I would say is to take us back to the example for the mother with the mother and the dress, is that there’s there’s something really powerful about allowing your child to say something to you that really shocks you and causes you to rethink things. I mean, that is an incredible gift to give to a child, as opposed to trying to ask your child, but why do you think this? And asking them, in essence, to prove something to you. Because you need that to in order to be able to stabilize yourself into like, but is this something reasonable to support or not? As if your child can present like uh a research paper to you that confirms like who they are.
Gavin:
Um the PTSD I’m having from a battle I had with my daughter just yesterday, where I kept saying, why, why, why? Thank you. I needed to hear this yesterday, admittedly, but still I can take it.
SPEAKER_02:
Better late than never. Yeah. Yeah. I think that what I would suggest, maybe in some sense links to what Avi just said, which is that, you know, it may well be that a parent is disappointed, even profoundly so, in something that the child discloses to the parent about the child’s gender, or maybe a child who’s, you know, uh is cisgender and heterosexual, but who says, look, I’m never gonna have a children, right? That’s not something I want. And the parents crush because they’re so invested in having grandchildren, right? It is actually okay for a parent to be sad and disappointed about that. But it is not your child’s job. And no matter what age that child is, full adult or you know, like a five-year-old, it is not the child’s job to help you mourn that. That’s your job. That’s work you have to do on your own. Um, get yourself a therapist, talk to your peers. Do not make the child hold it for you. That’s an unfair burden to place on them, and it gets in the way of them actually becoming themselves and flourishing and the relationship you could have with the young, with this little being who actually is going to become who they are.
David:
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:
I I actually was going to jump in and say just one last thing about that. The best protection that your kid can have against being, let’s say they are trans, being a trans person in a transphobic world is feeling that there is, there are at least some places of safety. And start that starts with a family.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:
It may not be physical safety in the world because of kind of like how the world kind of like all the attacks and violence against trans people, but having like a psychic space where they feel like there’s there’s a possibility to be loved for who they are, to be held for who they are without being asked to change, yeah, is psychically, it can make uh it can be incredibly important.
David:
Yeah. Right. That’s really great. I mean, like I I love a practical advice, and and just hearing you say, like, allow your kid to sh surprise you is it’s so so easily digestible. Most of our listener are just very simple-minded people like Gavin. So we appreciate you taking this very thoughtful conversation and helping us. Thank you so much for demeaning yourself by being on our stupid little podcast. Afi and Ann, their book is called Gender Without Identity. Thank you so much for coming.
SPEAKER_00:
A blast to be with you today. Yes, thank you.
David:
So, my something great this week. You guessed it. It’s a TikTok. Uh but it’s a it’s a TikTok trend. I don’t know if you saw this. It’s people talking about living room kids.
Gavin:
Okay.
David:
Oh man, it is it is so sweet. It is basically talking about how kids these days just are always in the living room. Why don’t they ever leave? Why don’t they go to their room? When I was a kid, I would read all day or I’d hide away in my bedroom and play video games, or I’d go whatever. Like kids are in the living room all the time. And they were saying the reason kids are in the living room all the time is because they feel safe around you and they don’t feel like they have to retreat into books or media in their own room locked away because they feel safe and comfortable in the living room. And I was like, that is really fucking sweet. And who knows if that’s actually true, but we are a living room family. Uh neither of my kids really spend much time in their rooms without us, and so it kind of made me feel happy. And so that’s my something great this week.
Gavin:
Well, that is uh gratitude adjacent. Then again, the something great. You set me up for the game. Thanksgiving week. It’s Thanksgiving week. 87 episodes ago, you set me up for sheer gratitude and you just being able to talk about TikTok with our something great closer. But I but listen, for me, I’m gonna I’m gonna be true to me and say it is Thanksgiving, and I am grateful to be here doing a podcast with you, even though you want to fire me. And even though this is a lot of work, but it’s worth it because it is fun. So um, that is my something great is gatriarchs. And and before before you pull the plug on me, that’s our show. If you have any comments, suggestions, or general compliments, you can email us at gatriarchspodcast at gmail.com.
David:
Or you can DM us on Instagram. We are at Gatriarchspodcast on the internet. David is at David FM Vaughn everywhere, and Gavin is at GavinLodge on Turkey Time.
Gavin:
Please leave us a glowing five-star review and also send us all of your questions and comments that we can refer to in a mailbag episode wherever you get your podcasts.
David:
Thanks, and we’ll tell a concise story that’s funny with you next time on another episode of Gagey Arcs. This was Gavin is I can already see in his eyes, he’s spinning. He’s so in love with Gavin.
SPEAKER_02:
I feel more homosexual as a result of this conversation. And I was like pretty plus plus plus before we started today.
David:
We we do make gay people gayer.