Ep 311: Trad Wives and Ballerina Farm
[00:00:00]
SARAH: Hey, what's up? Hello…
KAYLA: What? Mm
SARAH: Hey. Mm. Hey, what's up? Hello. Welcome to Sound Fake But Okay, a podcast where an aro-ace girl, I'm Sarah, that's me… We're keeping it… and keep going.
KAYLA: Oh boy, and a bi demisexual girl, that's Kayla.
SARAH: Talk about all things to do with love, relationships, sexuality, and pretty much anything else… Everything else? What did we decide? I can't remember. We just don't understand.
KAYLA: Uh, now you throw me off. Okay…
SARAH: On today's episode
KAYLA: On today’s episode, Trad Wives.
BOTH: Sounds Fake But Okay.
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SARAH: We're a little rusty. I also had a hard day, so brain not all there.
KAYLA: Brain bad. What are you going to do?
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KAYLA: You can comment now, like the one person who asked…
SARAH: Like SoundCloud?
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SARAH: Like so it's like time stamped?
KAYLA: Yes. The person who…
SARAH: Is that where that came from? I was confused about where that came from.
KAYLA: I don't think it's time stamped to where it is in the episode. But it’s like…
SARAH: So, it's not like SoundCloud?
KAYLA: No, I was thinking you meant something else. No, but that was not a feature before. So yes, the comment that someone left asking if you were autistic was a comment on an old episode.
SARAH: Read for filth.
KAYLA: Read for filth.
SARAH: I don't need a doctor to tell me when I've got that. I can just print it out.
KAYLA: Yeah, there you go. There's your diagnosis.
SARAH: I don’t need a doctor to say, hey…
KAYLA: Hey, this person said I'm autistic. Anyway, that's all I have.
SARAH: Okay, shall we begin our podcast, Kayla? That was a rhetorical question. What are we talking about this week?
KAYLA: This week we are talking about trad wives by way of Ballerina Farm.
SARAH: Yes. Was this more timely last week when we considered talking about it?
KAYLA: First, yes. However, there has been some recent news about…
SARAH: Okay. Have there been developments?
KAYLA: A little bit.
SARAH: Okay
KAYLA: Not like that exciting, but it's still in the news-ish
SARAH: Okay.
KAYLA: So, you know.
SARAH: Yeah, we're talking about trad wives.
KAYLA: Yes
SARAH: Kayla, what's a trad wife?
KAYLA: Okay. A trad wife is short for traditional wife. It is a subset of women, more of like an online identity or like online word, I would say. But it describes…
SARAH: Which is ironic.
KAYLA: Yeah, it is ironic. But it describes a type of wife and also mother, usually, who is a very traditional wife. So, stays home, cooks and cleans, takes care of the kids.
SARAH: Doting, loving.
KAYLA: Yes.
SARAH: Like does everything for her husband.
KAYLA: Yes. Yeah, like subservient to the husband also seems to kind of like coincide with a very like granola…
SARAH: Oh, yeah.
KAYLA: Like natural medicine.
SARAH: Homesteading.
KAYLA: Homesteading, yes.
SARAH: Yeah, my sister sometimes likes watching homesteading content and it's very hard to find homesteaders that aren't super right wing and trad wifey.
KAYLA: Yeah. It also, yeah, I would say does often coincide with people who are very religious and or more right wing.
SARAH: Conservative.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: Yes.
KAYLA: So that is what a trad wife is. This came up in the culture of America, at least. I guess I don't know how well. And the UK is where the one article came from. But there's this woman named Hannah. She goes by like Ballerina Farms online. She has now 10 million followers on Instagram. She had like maybe seven or eight before this like article came up and went viral.
SARAH: Oh, yeah
KAYLA: But she has been an online presence for a long time. She… in 2023 was Mrs. America.
SARAH: Uh, I didn’t know that
KAYLA: Not Miss America.
SARAH: Mrs. America?
KAYLA: Mrs. America. Yeah. Because in Miss America, you're not allowed to be married.
SARAH: Yeah. If you think you haven't seen her content, there's a chance you may have. I'm not going to be confident about it because I don't know what your algorithm shows you.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: But like, I'm not like a homesteader girly. But I have organically come across a couple videos from her.
KAYLA: Yeah, she just… Yeah, she has a lot of followers. And it's all… so, that's her. She has a husband. They have eight children
SARAH: Eight kids
KAYLA: And they live on a farm.
SARAH: How old is the oldest?
KAYLA: 12
SARAH: Like what's the age gap?
KAYLA: It goes to six months to 12 years old.
SARAH: Okay.
KAYLA: And there's eight of them. I can give you all of their ages if you'd like.
SARAH: I just got it mixed up. I was thinking… because my dad is one of eight kids.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And I was mixing it up because my aunt, the youngest of the eight became an aunt when she was 12. But I'm trying to… in my head, I was like the age gap was 12. But it's not 12. There is a set of Irish twins in my dad's family.
KAYLA: These are mostly like a lot. So, the age range is… oldest is 12, then 9, 7, no 12, 10, 9, 7, 5, 3, 2, 6 months.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: And the parents are 35 and 34.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: They're very young. So that they have their eight kids. There's them two, their eight children. They live on a big farm. They have like a huge ranching business…
SARAH: In Utah?
KAYLA: In Utah, they are Mormon.
SARAH: Utah
KAYLA: Notably, the dad, his father is one of the owners of JetBlue and other companies as well. So very rich.
SARAH: Yes
KAYLA: So, they make a lot of content online about like homesteading and her all of her like organic food she makes, it is just like life on the farm.
SARAH: Yeah. She makes shit from scratch. And…
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: I mean, they live in a very like picturesque, beautiful home.
KAYLA: Yeah, it’s very beautiful
SARAH: But is that attainable for normal people? No
KAYLA: No, it's… Yeah
SARAH: It's romanticizing farm life and romanticizing old timiness and traditional values in a way that is very much for the camera and not actually realistic.
KAYLA: No, it's not realistic because these people came from money and like they…
SARAH: And she homeschools all the kids, but they also have a nanny.
KAYLA: They don't. They don't have a nanny.
SARAH: I thought they did have a nanny.
KAYLA: No, so they… that is like…
SARAH: That's… I know… I knew that was part of the… that I knew it was a point of contention.
KAYLA: They might have someone that comes in to help them teach but so the article I keep referencing is an article from the Times, which is the Sunday Times in the UK. And this journalist Megan Agnew went to their house and interviewed them and just like spent time at the farm. And like had some pretty like scathing things to say, like specifically about the husband like the portrayal she gives is that the husband is kind of very overbearing, that she wasn't really able to talk to Hannah on her own, that the husband kind of like answered for her a lot.
SARAH: Yeah, she said that she was never really able to talk to Hannah on one on one.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: Not really. And like the one opportunity that they kind of got was when she was like… was the only time Hannah ever said anything that was like, “Oh, well when my husband wasn't in town, I got an epidural.”
KAYLA: Yes. So, yeah. All of her children but two were completely natural births like no pain meds.
SARAH: Nothing.
KAYLA: But in one case, yes, her husband was gone because it was meatpacking day. So, he had to do the business. And the baby was like two weeks overdue, very large. And so yeah, she got an epidural and she was like, “Oh, it was amazing.”
SARAH: But it was like… it was like… it was like a secret thing, she did behind her husband's back like, “Oh, I got an epidural.”
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: Like, the implication also being that like, he wouldn't let her.
KAYLA: Yes, the implication I think also was that like the… her followers wouldn't really like that either because she is like known for being a very like natural person.
SARAH: Yeah, but…
KAYLA: Because all of the babies but two were also home births, not like in hospital.
SARAH: If that was that big of a concern…
KAYLA: Right. She wouldn’t have said it
SARAH: Would she have told the Times? You know, like
KAYLA: No, yeah, you're right. So yeah, the journalist kind of talks about Hannah's, like younger life. So also of note, Hannah was a very amazing Ballerina. She went to Juilliard.
SARAH: She was at Juilliard. They let 12 Ballerinas in per year.
KAYLA: Yeah.
[00:10:00]
SARAH: She was one of them.
KAYLA: Yeah. So, she's… she goes to Juilliard for college. In the middle of college, she meets Daniel, her husband, the dad. And this part is like really kind of freaky to me. But, so, they meet. And he's immediately like, I'm obsessed with her. Like, that's going to be my wife. She doesn't… like she's not interested. She doesn't go out with him for six months.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: Then they are both going on a flight back to the same place. And he's like, “Oh my god, I'm going too,” makes a call to his dad, because it's a JetBlue flight and gets them seated to each other… next to each other.
SARAH: I don't even think he was going where she…
KAYLA: No. I think he just decided he was going
SARAH: I think he decided he was going there.
KAYLA: Yes
SARAH: And then he intentionally, he pulled some strings to get the seat next to hers.
KAYLA: Yeah. And then that was like their first date. Then she says, like, I didn't want to get married for a couple years, because she's still in school. And he is two years older than her. And he's like, “No, that's not going to work for me. We need to get married now.”
SARAH: It’s because Mormons…
KAYLA: So, they get engaged after a month and a half…
SARAH: Mormons do it fast
KAYLA: Because… Yeah, because they have to. So then after a month and a half, they get engaged, and then they get married. And then she gets pregnant while she's still in school, the only Ballerina at Juilliard to get pregnant during school in modern history.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: And she like accepts her diploma while carrying her baby, which is just like, in school having a baby is like…
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: So much stress on the one hand, but also, she's a dancer.
SARAH: I mean, crazy that she graduated still.
KAYLA: True
SARAH: Especially… because it's not just like, “oh, you're graduating with a degree.” It's like, it is dance school. It is very much about your body and what your body can do.
KAYLA: Yeah, very physically intensive. Yeah.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: She also, while at Juilliard did a lot of pageants, like scholarship pageants to help her pay for school. And that's how the kind of like Mrs. America thing also came to be of no… the article kind of opens up talking about how her most recent baby who is six months old, two weeks after she had that baby, she was in a pageant. And, like had only just stopped, like bleeding, like the day before or two days before the pageant was like, you know, not well. They also talk about there are sometimes weeks at a time where she is so sick, she can't get out of bed because she is the sole childcare person. So, they like, they don't have a nanny.
SARAH: Eight kids.
KAYLA: Eight kids, they don't have a nanny. They do have date nights where they'll get a babysitter. But…
SARAH: And here's the thing, here's the thing about this. A lot of this discussion around trad wives is like, “oh, women shouldn't work.” And of course, there's, you know, the discussion of “well, what constitutes work?” But all of these internet trad wives are working. They are full time creating content. That is her job.
KAYLA: Well, that's the interesting thing about this case, too, is that they are… so they're like a farm, social media aside, their farm is how they make a lot of their money.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: They… you know, they have all their livestock, they also sell, like, I don't know, organic candles and like, rock salt, whatever that kind of shit. And they are co CEOs of that business.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: And the way they talk about it, at least is that they are like, very equal in that business. And like, it also seems like the dad is like, as hands on as he can be with the kids. It's not like he's not around. So that's also what's interesting to me. And it's not that she… she does not identify as a trad wife.
SARAH: No
KAYLA: She's like, people have put that upon her, but she's not being like, “I'm a trad wife.”
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: But that is what's interesting about this case is that like, you know, say what you will about their farm. She does have a job. They are running a business. And so yeah, it is a very interesting twist on like their situation.
SARAH: Yeah. And so like, whenever you see these, like trad wives, who are like, romanticizing the life they lead, while also doing a full-time job of being a content creator, and in her case, also running a company that's not technically trad wife. Is it?
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: Karen?
KAYLA: No. Karen?
SARAH: Susan. Um, continue. I think you were in the middle of something.
KAYLA: I probably was. I don't know. This like… the Ballerina farms thing, I think is like, an exceptional example of like trad wives. We don't need to get into like the whole specifics of their story to like, really get into trad wives. But you could this is a very… it's a very good article.
SARAH: I did see interesting comments specifically about them how the fact that it is called a Ballerina Farms, not Ballerina’s Farm, like, she is… she doesn't have ownership over it. She's like a product of it.
KAYLA: Well, yes. And speaking of the Ballerina part, the… one of the saddest parts of this article is that when they like moved… so they lived in… or they lived in New York until she could finish school, then they moved to Brazil because his dad gave him a job at one of his companies in Brazil. So immediately she… she does dance for a couple years still, but very quickly has four children under the age of four, and then gives up dancing. And then they moved to Utah to like start their ranch, which is ‘their dream.’ It's his dream, your Honor, but so the one thing she was supposed to have to herself was the barn which she was going to turn into a ballet studio, which is now the children's schoolhouse. Like she doesn't even get that. She doesn't have her own closets anymore because there's like too many kids, all their shit.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: The other thing that went viral that's very sad is all she wanted for her birthday, her most recent birthday was like a trip to Rome…
SARAH: It was Greece
KAYLA: Greece? She was very excited about it. And then her husband was like, “Oh, I have your birthday gift. Like it's so exciting.” And it was an egg apron, like an apron with all the pockets in it to hold the eggs she gets from their chicken.
SARAH: If you watch this video, even though I had no context for it, like I could clearly understand what was happening, which was that like she had been saying for a long time, like, “I really want to go to Greece. Like I just want to go to Greece.” And it's not like they don't have the money for it.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: Like they… like it's… they're fine.
KAYLA: They also have employees.
SARAH: Yes.
KAYLA: It's not like they're doing this entire farm themselves. They have employees.
SARAH: They have quite a few employees, but they all work for the business. And none of them help her with…
KAYLA: Yes, the children
SARAH: With the children and teach… homeschooling the children also.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: But I… what was I saying? They…
KAYLA: Um
SARAH: They…
KAYLA: Greece? The egg apron?
SARAH: Greece, right, you watch this video, and he like hands her… it's like a pack. It's like it's not wrapped. It's like a… it's like a package that came in the mail.
KAYLA: Mm-hmm
SARAH: And he hands it to her. And she's like, “what is this? like tickets to Greece? like a swimsuit for Greece?” Like…
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: You know, and he's like, “open it, open it, you're going to like it.” And she opens it. And it's an egg apron to wear while she's collecting eggs. And she was like, “Oh like, it's cute.” And then he was like… like, he prompted her to say thank you.
KAYLA: Yeah. Yeah.
SARAH: What is happening here?
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: And there was also a lot of, this is a slight sidebar, but there was a lot of discussion online of like, whether we should even feel bad for her, because, you know, she put herself into this situation. But it's like, I think both things can be true, that you can feel bad for her and also know that at least a chunk of the blame is on her for getting herself into it for the… in the first place.
KAYLA: Yes
SARAH: But she's also not… she's also not in a place now where she can just get out of it.
KAYLA: Right. Like she's… Yeah, I don't truly know what she could do at this point to like get out of it. She has eight children, like you can't get rid of your eight children.
SARAH: Mm-hmm
KAYLA: Um, I will say like, so both of them grew up Mormon in like nine-kid families.
SARAH: Mm-hmm
KAYLA: So, I will say that, like the culture she grew up in, gives her a little bit less of a choice. Like…
SARAH: Yeah. But the fact that she like went to Juilliard and like, was pursuing her own personal dreams, like shows that there was at least enough, I guess, progressiveness in…
KAYLA: Yes
SARAH: Her circle to allow her to do that and to not be like, “Oh, you can only be a wife and a mother.”
KAYLA: Yes. But also, like, from what I understand, a big belief in the Mormon Church is that like, your talents come from God. And so, to not use your talents is like, kind of sinful, because like…
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: He gave us you which is like, I don't want to like stereotype, but like, often why you see like very successful Mormons, because at least this is like the understanding I got when I was dating a Mormon, is that like…
SARAH: Or what… What they want you to believe? Maybe
KAYLA: Yeah, that's their propaganda, I guess, of like, you know, you have these talents because you have to use them. And so, part of me thinks like, is that part of why like Juilliard and like her being such a good Ballerina was like, she had that push to do it. But I mean, yes, she did choose to get married when she did and everything. But also, like, that was just the culture and like, was she going to say no, you know? Like, it's, it's tough. It's tough.
SARAH: Yeah, like, both things can be true at the same time.
KAYLA: Yes
SARAH: And they can be weighted differently, depending on context and situation and blah, blah, blah, blah.
KAYLA: So, an interesting part of the article that was just talking more about trad wives in general, that will… that I will read to you, because it's kind of an interesting thing to think of, like, how did we get here? Like, how did we get to like the trad wife movement and why all these people are like, have so many followers, and it's just like this big online community.
[00:20:00]
KAYLA: So, this article says, “in order to explain trad wives and their popularity, we need to look back 15 years or so when the fourth wave of feminism was breaking. This was the Girlboss era when women were told to be bolder in the workplace, to lean in further, to break glass ceilings. The poster woman for the movement at the time was the Facebook boss, Sheryl Sandberg. But as years went on, women realize they've been sold a lie. This individualistic feminism didn't resolve anything unless you were a millionaire. For normal working mothers, the Girlboss era achieved virtually nothing.” And it goes on to talk about, you know, you know, this kind of like, wanting it all, mentality of like, you can be a mother and a wife and you can work and, but, you know, there's… it's very isolating to be in that situation. There's not like support for women.
SARAH: And you still have to bear the brunt of parenting your kids, because of course, that's not going to just suddenly become equal.
KAYLA: Right.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: Yes, exactly. And like, you know, maternity leave isn't long enough. There aren't… There is an infrastructure for helping you take care of your kid, you know, all that kind of thing.
SARAH: In the US, at least.
KAYLA: In the US, yeah. And so, it says, “as a reaction to both the Girlbosses and the frazzled mothers, along came a group of women who didn't seem to care about any of that. They advocated for a life that rejected the drive for money, public power and success, and elevated gentle domesticity and hands on motherhood to almost divine state, enter the trad wives.” So, like, on one hand, it makes sense. And it's like trying to talk about how it's also this like escapism, especially of like homesteading, where it is, I think it can be very enjoyable to, like, watch people live that life and kind of dream of like, oh, unplugging and not, you know, doing whatever
SARAH: Making your own sourdough bread and then making a sandwich out of your own sourdough bread and meat from your ranch and, you know?
KAYLA: Exactly, but also like doesn't… that romanticism doesn't get out… get at how much work that is like if, if becoming a trad wife is your escape from like, a very fast-paced, like work culture where you're like, working and being a mother, becoming this is not going to fix that.
SARAH: No
KAYLA: You don't, you're not going to have less work.
SARAH: And when you see these trad wives, or even… what's her face, the fucking ASMR girl that pisses me off?
KAYLA: I don't know who that is.
SARAH: No, you do know who she is. She… it's not intentional ASMR, but she talks like this. And she talks about how they ran out of toothpaste. So, she made toothpaste from scratch. And this is how they… they're really, really rich.
KAYLA: I don't like that.
SARAH: Do you not know who I'm talking about?
KAYLA: The toothpaste thing sounds vaguely familiar.
SARAH: I hate the way she talks so much. Like it... I have a visceral reaction to it. Um, and that's like… and she's like a stay at home, whatever. It's a little bit less of like, it's not like a homesteady vibe. But it's another situation where like she's cosplaying this traditional role. But the only reason that's possible, first of all, she is working full time and creating this content and doing that stupid voiceover. And the other thing is, she and her husband are incredibly wealthy.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: Money coming out their asses.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: And that's why they can afford to put on this little charade and cosplay as trad whatever, and have it look nice, rather than look fucking difficult, which it is.
KAYLA: Yeah, yes, being a stay-at-home parent is extremely difficult. It is not not having a job. It is your job being managing a household and taking care of children.
SARAH: There was a child at my work today… It was funny, my coworker’s kid, who I've met before, she's great. What a gem. But she was in my office, doing her thing. She drew me a drawing. And then she was teaching me how to play her Sasquatch game. And my coworker like texted me, and she was like, hey, like, if she's bothering you too much, just like, let me know. And I was like, no, first of all, she's my assistant now. But you know how much work I got done when she was in the room with me?
KAYLA: None
SARAH: Almost none. Because…
KAYLA: You were playing Sasquatch
SARAH: I was playing Sasquatch with her. So, like that... Yeah
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: Yeah. Here's something I want to get your thoughts on. So, I was looking at the Ballerina Farm Instagram earlier just to like get a vibe of what they were up to. Oh, first of all, the most recent news is that…
SARAH: It is Nara Smith.
KAYLA: Okay, I don't know...
SARAH: I looked up ASMR voice trad wife toothpaste.
KAYLA: I don't think I know who that is.
SARAH: You might recognize her.
KAYLA: Okay.
SARAH: I'm going to send you a TikTok.
KAYLA: Anyway…
SARAH: It's the toothpaste TikTok
KAYLA: The most… the most recent Ballerina Farm drama is that Hannah, the woman, made a video being like, I can't believe this article. It's like attacking my family and making my husband seem like oppressive. That's not true, blah, blah, blah. So, I'm like… they were like, it seems like this journalist came in with an agenda to make us look bad, which…
SARAH: Maybe, but…
KAYLA: Probably
SARAH: But if it's that easy.
KAYLA: Yeah. So that's the thing is, like, it does very much so feel like this journalist came in wanting to be like trad wives are bad. Like that definitely feels like the angle. But also, like, it's not like everything in this is untrue. Like there are direct quotes, you know
SARAH: And the author was very honest about like, I couldn't talk to Hannah alone.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: I would ask questions to Hannah.
KAYLA: And he would answer
SARAH: And he would answer.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And it's like, well, if you don't want to be portrayed this way, then don't act that way.
KAYLA: Yeah. So that's the most recent drama. But anyway, I was looking at her Instagram, and I was looking at some of the comments. And a lot of the comments were talking about, you know, true feminism is giving people the choice to do what they want. And if they want to be a stay-at-home mom, and to be, you know, a ‘trad wife,’ then they can do that. And feminism is allowing them to do that.
SARAH: Mm-hmm.
KAYLA: Thoughts?
SARAH: I’m going to be honest, I wasn't listening super closely, because my mom sent an article about how Alyssa Slotkin's house was swatted.
KAYLA: Okay, well, that's not what we're discussing.
SARAH: But it happened.
KAYLA: Okay.
SARAH: Say it again
KAYLA: But it's not the topic of this podcast.
SARAH: Say it again. Say…
KAYLA: Are you listening this time? Or are you reading an article?
SARAH: I wasn't even reading the article. I was just looking.
KAYLA: Okay
SARAH: I'm listening. I'm looking right at you.
KAYLA: Okay, thank you. A lot of the comments… Stop looking at me like that, you look like a meerkat. A lot of the comments… Exactly.
SARAH: This isn’t…
KAYLA: A lot of the comments were saying that true feminism is giving women the choice to do what they want with their lives. And if that is being a stay-at-home mom and managing a household, then we should let them and support them. And that's what feminism is. What are your thoughts?
SARAH: I think, on paper, on its face, in theory, that is absolutely true. I think that does not necessarily apply here. Because she's selling a lie. They're selling a lie. And they know they're selling a lie. And they know it's appealing because it's a lie.
KAYLA: Mm
SARAH: You could say like, oh, it's the internet, like everyone shows the best parts, whatever. But I think… look, she has the right to live her life like this. I don't… based off of that article, I don't know that she's happy.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And so, you know, I think if you're going to use that argument, like, oh, feminism allows women to do whatever they want. And if this is what they want, then great. But is this what she wants?
KAYLA: Yeah, that's fair.
SARAH: Or is this what he wants?
KAYLA: Fair. And I will also say, I think there's a difference between allowing women to do whatever they want, right? Like, I'm not stopping her.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: She can… whatever. I think there's a difference between allowing people to live whatever the life they want, and promoting that life
SARAH: And selling that life to other people.
KAYLA: Right. Because I think a lot of the concern I've seen coming from this is like, okay, this person has millions of followers, there are a lot of other women like her making content in this vein. What does that tell young girls about their place? What they should dream to achieve?
SARAH: Mm-hmm
KAYLA: I've also seen a lot of trad wives will say, like, part of this is being subservient to your husband.
SARAH: Yeah, that’s not it
KAYLA: And like, they… and they like… but they're like, and that's part of it.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: And they're like, we like that, like we… that's how it is on purpose. Which…
SARAH: If that's, it's, it's hard to say, like, if that's the dynamic you prefer, then okay, because it's so socially, like, you're not… you're not coming into it unbiased
KAYLA: Right
SARAH: As an onlooker, or as a participant.
KAYLA: Right. Because relationship dynamics like that where you have like a dom and a sub, whatever, like that is very much so a part of kink culture. And when it is in that culture, it makes a lot more sense to me, because that is a culture of consent, where they are breaking norms down first, and then rebuilding them.
SARAH: And there is also a time and a place.
KAYLA: Yes
SARAH: In kink culture. I feel like… I feel like with this, like, being subservient to your husband, like that's 100% of the time.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: Whereas in kink culture, like, there is a time and a place. And if it is not going well, or if someone is suddenly like, actually, no, you… it stops.
KAYLA: Yes. But this is yes, because it is so baked in. And it's also the social norm of what should happen. It makes it… so yes, again, it's like, okay, you say you're choosing this, but what are the cultural things surrounding this?
[00:30:00]
SARAH: Mm-hmm
KAYLA: Like, it's the… that decision is not made in a vacuum.
SARAH: Well, and in the article, like it notes how Hannah talks about like, how much she misses dance, and how much she… not regrets the life that she has, but wishes that she could still dance, wishes that her barn was her studio, and not her fucking school for her homeschooled kids.
KAYLA: Yeah, well, she also talks in the article about, you know, like, oh, our first couple years of marriage were really hard. We both made a lot of sacrifices. And, you know, we made a lot of sacrifices to have this life now. And the journalist, I don't think she said this in person, but makes the point of like, what is the husband…
SARAH: What has he sacrificed?
KAYLA: What has the husband sacrificed? Like, it was his dream? Like, actually, I want to read this part, because it was like, oh, damn. So, yeah, they talk about Hannah says, “our first few years of marriage were really hard. We sacrificed a lot. But we have this vision, this dream.” And Daniel interrupts, “we still do.” The journalist asks her what kind of sacrifices she says, “Well, I gave up dance, which was hard. You give up a piece of yourself. And Daniel gave up his career ambitions.”
SARAH: But I thought this was what he wanted.
KAYLA: Right. Well, and then the journalist says, “I look out at the vastness and don't totally agree. Daniel wanted to live in the great western wilds. So, they did. He wanted a farm. So, they do. He likes date nights once a week. So, they go. They have a baby babysitter on those evenings. He didn't want nannies in the house. So, there aren't any. The only space earmarked to be Neelan zone… “
SARAH: Hannah zone
KAYLA: “A small barn where she wanted to convert into a ballet studio ended up being the kids schoolroom.”
SARAH: Ugh
KAYLA: Heart wrenching. Heart wrenching.
SARAH: Yeah. Also, I don't know why I thought that there were nannies. But I think the fact that like, he doesn't want nannies in the house. Well, why doesn't he want nannies in the house? Because he has all these employees helping him with his work.
KAYLA: Yeah, they have a lot. Yeah.
SARAH: Why is she not entitled to that?
KAYLA: Yeah. And it would be one thing if she didn't want them. And it's like, okay, that's your business. But…
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: But that's the thing is, like, I don't understand what he gave up.
SARAH: Yeah, I don't either.
KAYLA: Like, what were these career ambitions that he had? Like… because the job he had before that, his dad gave him?
SARAH: Right.
KAYLA: He got a job as the director of his father's security company. Was that his career ambition?
SARAH: Right.
KAYLA: Really?
SARAH: And if you watch the… like their TikTok videos, when she's like doing… like making aesthetic foods or whatever. A lot of times the audio is just whatever the audio was in the background. And you can hear kids like screaming and yelling and being kids.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And she's there making content for them. And then like having to like, stop and like, deal with the kids. And who fucking knows what they're actually learning?
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: If they're being homeschooled, and she's trying to homeschool by herself, eight kids of different ages.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And like, that's not… that's not even a dis on her. Like…
KAYLA: No, that's just…
SARAH: That's just not… You can't do that. Like it doesn't work
KAYLA: That’s really hard.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: I do wonder what… I think their... I don't know. It's also interesting to think about what the children of trad wives will grow up to be like, will they grow up kind of…
SARAH: Well, the older kids are going to fucking babysit all the younger kids.
KAYLA: Well, that's the thing in this article... Yes. In the article, she talks about, you know, it seems like they kind of have like a system going where the older kids do help take care of the younger kids. And it's like, that's just not fair. Like we talked about that with these large families a lot. Like it's just not fair to the older kids.
SARAH: Like you don't have kids for them to be free labor. That's not why you have kids, which is a little ironic, because like when you think about like families who lived on farms back in the day, like a lot of times they would have a lot of kids to…
KAYLA: Right
SARAH: Like take care of the farm
KAYLA: But these kids like… I'm sure these kids are helping but like they have employees.
SARAH: Right.
KAYLA: They don't need the kids to help.
SARAH: And like, it's the Lord's year 2024 and you are extremely wealthy and you live in the United States. You're fucking white. Like…
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: That's not why you're having kids.
KAYLA: No
SARAH: Your choice to have kids is all you. It's not like, oh, I need to have a child to milk this cow.
KAYLA: Well, actually, Sarah, I'll tell you why they have kids.
SARAH: Because God told them to make big Mormon families.
KAYLA: So, the journalist did ask about birth control.
SARAH: Mm
KAYLA: Well, she asked, does she plan pregnancies? And Daniel says, Daniel, no one was asking you, Daniel says, “no.” And then Hannah says, “when he says no, it's very much a matter of prayer for me. I'm like, ‘God, is it time to bring another one to earth?’ And I've never been told no.” And then Daniel says, “but for whatever reason, it's exactly nine months after a baby that she's ready for the next one.” And then she says, “it's definitely a matter of prayer.” And Daniel says, “it's a matter of prayer, but somehow it's exactly nine months.”
SARAH: Have you considered the way that your body has to fucking recover after having a child? Maybe that's why she needs nine months. Oh, you're complaining about nine months?
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: Also, so have they ever had a miscarriage? I'm guessing based on this. No.
KAYLA: Uh, I mean, I… if they have, I don't know that it's public knowledge.
SARAH: And it can't have been too far along in the pregnancy just based off of the…
KAYLA: I mean, yeah, with the time
SARAH: With the age gaps.
KAYLA: Yeah. With the timeline, my guess would be no, but I don't know. And they also, they talk a little bit in the article about their stance on abortion. It's the same stance as the Mormon church has. I don't know how much they talk about politics or that kind of thing on their platform, but it seems like a pretty right leaning vibe.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: I just don't quite know what to do with trad wives. Like it's a very… I think it's like a very interesting cultural moment. And like, I understand the argument of like where they came from, of like, you know, the pendulum really swung one way in the ‘80s, especially of like, we're all working hard and doing a bunch of coke and we're all Girlbosses.
SARAH: Mm-hmm
KAYLA: And I understand that then people, you know, you realize how hard that life is and then the pendulum kind of swings back.
SARAH: Well, you realize how hard that life is. And also, that you're not reaping the rewards that you hoped to.
KAYLA: Yeah, that…
SARAH: And the combination of those two things.
KAYLA: Right. And you know, I think there are a lot of women that do just want to be stay at home moms or like, not just, it's very hard.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: But I do think there's just a huge difference between wanting to be a stay at home parent and becoming a trad wife.
SARAH: Yeah. I mean, I… my dad's cousin who lives out here is a stay at home mom. Although she does now teach some like sewing classes, which is fun. But it's not in a trad wife way.
KAYLA: Yeah. I mean, my mom was a stay-at-home mom.
SARAH: Like she wants, she wanted, that's what she wanted to do. And then also when she had this opportunity to maybe teach some sewing classes and that was something she also wanted to do. So, they found a way to make that work. Like, you know, it's not as the lines and the rules are not as hard and fast as internet trad wives will make you believe.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And I think the more online, the more visible and front-facing these trad wives are, regardless of whether or not they call themselves trad wives, like it's a very clear definition that you can kind of apply to other people and no one is really going to contest it except maybe them just because they don't like the term for whatever reason. But these people who may not identify as such, but are trad wives, the more forward facing, the more public they are about it, the less I trust that any of it is real at all.
KAYLA: Yeah, I definitely agree, because if you look at like the definition of a trad wife, it's like, it doesn't really match with being very an online influencer.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: You know? One interesting point as well. I don't remember if it was in this article or a different one, I read they talk about how this rise kind of coincides with the rise in concern over like birth rates. And…
SARAH: I was going to pivot to JD Vance.
KAYLA: Oh, great. I love that.
SARAH: JG Wentworth, 877 cash now. Did you see that? Apparently, Trump accidentally called him JD Wentworth.
KAYLA: I love that, very well
SARAH: Anyway. Yeah. I was actually going to go here, because I think it's quite related, which is the right-wing panic about women not having children, which is really exemplified by fuck ass JD Vance, who is Trump's VP pick, talking out of his ass about so much shit that even Trump was like kind of walking some of it back.
KAYLA: Oi.
SARAH: But as… so JD Vance is an interesting fella. He doesn't make… he… I mean, he does make sense. All he wants is power and he doesn't… whatever. He is married to an Indian-American woman.
KAYLA: I did not know that.
SARAH: Yes. He has mixed race children, which is even crazier than that he and Trump are going after Kamala for being like, “are you Indian or are you black?” Like, are you going to ask your kids that? “Are you Indian or are you white?” Like what?
KAYLA: Brother.
SARAH: But he has basically just come out very hard against women who don't have kids. And he has had to specify like, “oh, I don't mean women who want kids, but can't have kids. I just mean women who don't,” like he had to, because people were like, “well, what about…” and he was like, “well, well, well”
KAYLA: Yeah
[00:40:00]
SARAH: But AOC said that it was giving incel like the way he talks and she's right. I believe this is a direct quote that I wrote down. “Childless people hate normal Americans for wanting a family.”
KAYLA: Oh, okay.
SARAH: He attacked several people for not having kids, including Kamala Harris, who is the stepmother of Doug's kids and both Doug's kids and their biological mother acknowledge her as a mother figure to them. AOC, who is not that old, she's like in her early thirties.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: She could very much still have children if she wanted to.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: And Pete Buttigieg, who is a man, is gay, and has children.
KAYLA: Oh no, he has them?
SARAH: Yes, they have twins.
KAYLA: Oh no.
SARAH: But basically, I'm not going to like go into and like look up a bunch of quotes because it'll just make me angry. And he's basically just saying that like the problem with America is that women don't want to have kids and like, whatever
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: And he's just going to like such extreme lengths and extreme rhetorical points that are just absurd and all about controlling women and all that fun stuff. But it's all related to this trad wife thing because basically what he is saying is the perfect woman, the American woman, the patriotic thing to do is to bust out kids.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: And there's all of these think pieces and people talking about this on the right. And it doesn't matter how hypocritical they are. Like not necessarily specifically on this, but JD Vance is just a very hypocritical person to begin with because he's like coming after Kamala for being like, you're from San Francisco. Home dog lived in San Francisco for five years working in the tech industry.
KAYLA: Cringe.
SARAH: Also, he wrote a book that a lot of people considered to be actually quite good. They made a movie out of it.
KAYLA: I didn't know that.
SARAH: It's like a critique of Southern conservative culture, to be honest. And…
KAYLA: Well, he also… and there's emails of him being like, “I hate Trump” and now look where he is.
SARAH: Yeah. Because he just wants power. He'll do anything for power. And now he's just sucking Trump's dick. So obviously he's a hypocrite in every possible way. But it seems that on this, he has been kind of consistent, which is cool, but it's related to this discussion about trad wives because the discussion is coming from the bottom up and also the top down. It's a two-pronged… it's a sandwich. And I think that's part of the reason why it's such a moment right now is because it's coming from both directions.
KAYLA: Yeah. That's a very good point, which I think like, I don’t know, part of me is trying to figure out why… like are they connected somehow or why this is happening at the same time.
SARAH: Everything is just a reaction. Everything is just so reactionary and the more polarized the world is getting, the more polarized the United States is getting, the more extreme everything gets and the more extreme of a stance people take, which means they back themselves into these corners where they're dying on the hill of these absolute batshit things that 10 years ago they wouldn't have agreed with.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: And it's just, it's the polarization of everything and it's just…
KAYLA: It's bad.
SARAH: It's bad. In conclusion, trad wives, I think my conclusion really is in theory, sure. In practice, almost never.
KAYLA: I would agree. In theory, I don't give a fuck what you do. In practice, I don't trust your motives.
SARAH: Yeah. I don't trust your motives. I don’t…
KAYLA: The problem for me is when trad wives are a collective.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: If I were to meet a singular trad wife and I could get to know her, understand how we got here, really trust that this is something that you want and are happy with, I'd be like, “great.” The problem I have is with the movement and what that means for where we're going for the people taking in that content and how it is affecting people who did not consent to be part of that culture.
SARAH: Right. And part of me wants to say, I don't trust that this is what you want, but that's also getting into the territory of like, “What? You just don't believe these women because they have different values and different wants than you? “
KAYLA: Sure
SARAH: And like that's getting into dangerous territory
KAYLA: Absolutely
SARAH: But because of the social and just morally ingrained ideas of womanhood and what it is to be a wife and a mother, those things can't be separated. So, I take everything with a grain of salt because maybe it really is exactly what you want, but neither of us is ever going to know for sure because you didn't grow up in a vacuum, you grew up on planet earth.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: So, it's a fine line. A lot of fine lines here, as Harry Styles said.
KAYLA: I was just going to say that. Wow. We're so back.
SARAH: Anything else?
KAYLA: No.
SARAH: I also think this obsession with trad wives is a nostalgia for a past which never existed.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: And I think because of the polarization of things and things getting more progressive, and that scares people. And so, they want to go back to “how things were.”
KAYLA: Yes
SARAH: And so, they put their rose-colored glasses on and they say, “oh, this is how things were.” When in reality, this was never how things were.
KAYLA: But it's also…
SARAH: They want to pretend it is.
KAYLA: It's wanting to go back to simpler times when they were not simple.
SARAH: They were not simple.
KAYLA: Or they were simple for a very select group of people.
SARAH: Or they were simple, but they weren't fucking easy.
KAYLA: Yes. Yeah.
SARAH: Yeah. And people rose-colored glasses. Hey, I've got a suggestion for you, take off your rose-colored glasses.
KAYLA: Mm-hmm
SARAH: Okay. You can even keep the frames if you want, but take the lenses out.
KAYLA: Mm-hmm
SARAH: And I want you to trade them in for purple-colored glasses.
KAYLA: Oh, she's cooking.
SARAH: Sounds Fake But Okay, an aromantic…What is it? Subtitle, subtitle, subtitle.
KAYLA: An asexual and aromantic perspective.
SARAH: On…
KAYLA: On love, relationship, sex.
SARAH: On love, relationship, sex. And pretty much everything else?
KAYLA: Anything else.
SARAH: Fuck.
KAYLA: Next time for sure we'll have it.
SARAH: Fuck me.
KAYLA: Anyway, read that.
SARAH: Anything. A like aro-ace.
KAYLA: Exactly.
SARAH: Anything. Okay. What?
KAYLA: Read it, bitches.
SARAH: Oh, right. I turned it into an advertisement.
KAYLA: You did turn it into an advertisement. Yeah.
SARAH: Kayla, what's our poll for this week?
KAYLA: I'm just very interested to hear people's thoughts on trad wives and the trad wife movement. Because I do think it is a deeply complex issue.
SARAH: Mm-hmm
KAYLA: Like there is a lot of, I don't know, there's a lot of, I don't think it's an easy thing to just be like, it sucks. Like, I think it's a nuanced situation.
SARAH: Yeah. And it's also interesting because if you look back on the past, you can try and impose the title of trad wife onto things. Like, okay, in theory, I guess you could call my grandma a trad wife because…
KAYLA: But she was the… they were the OG though. Like trad wives are emulating.
SARAH: I'm talking about my other grandma, not the one with big kids.
KAYLA: I don't care what grandma you're talking about. I'm just saying, like it's a modern term because it's about tradition.
SARAH: I know, but I'm saying people look to the past and they can assign this identity onto these people and say like, “oh, this was, this is what trad wives are trying to emulate.” But then you look at those people and they're actually not what you think they are. Like my grandma, who was a teacher and when my mom was born, stopped teaching and “stopped working” and didn't work ever again. And she was a stay-at-home mom, actually was the secretary for my grandpa's company and did a lot of work for him that was technically unpaid because it was his company. So, he didn't… and she was his wife, so he didn't have to pay her. But like that is still work in addition to being a mother and taking care of the kids and the house. Like she was doing like actual genuine, like 9 to 5 work.
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: So, like you could be like, oh, that's like a trad wife because the relationship she had with my grandpa was kind of like, I don't want to… I don't want to call it subservient because it wasn't
KAYLA: Yeah
SARAH: I wouldn't say it was to that extent, but she was very… she, I mean, my grandma is still alive, like she, she was very much of the mindset that, you know, her job is to make my grandpa's life easier. Like my, my grandfather could not boil water. Like, so… so you could look back on that and say like, oh, that's like a classic OG trad wife, but then you dig into it and you're like, no, she, she worked a full-time job.
KAYLA: Yeah.
[00:50:00]
SARAH: So, you know, anyway, yeah. What thoughts on trad wives? Do you know anyone, does… does anyone identify as a trad wife? Or is it just a term that we place on it?
KAYLA: I saw some quotes from some different articles that were like attributed to trad wife influencers that made it like seem like that those people were identifying that way. But I guess I don't know for sure.
SARAH: Do you know any trad wives? Do you know any people who either identify as trad wives or you would describe as kind of trad wives? Are any of them offline?
KAYLA: Are you or a loved one a trad wife?
SARAH: Tell us more.
KAYLA: Tell us more about that.
SARAH: All right, cool. Uh, Kayla?
KAYLA: Yes?
SARAH: I was waiting for a response.
KAYLA: Oh, okay. Usually, you don't…
SARAH: Yeah, but I wanted one this time.
KAYLA: Oh, okay. Well, yes.
SARAH: What is your beef and your joos for this week?
KAYLA: My beef this week is I injured my finger at work this week.
SARAH: Oh, not the finger.
KAYLA: I was… we have a large collection of like foam board signs.
SARAH: Mm-hmm
KAYLA: The collection is so large that like… to like shuffle, like shuffle through them to get to one is like very heavy because there's so many.
SARAH: Yeah
KAYLA: So, I was trying to get to one and I kept like losing my grip on the signs I was holding. So, I like gouged my finger, but it's right in the like, it's not this finger. It's this one with the… it's right in the crack. It's in the knuckle.
SARAH: It’s in the crinkle. Yeah
KAYLA: The inside knuckle.
SARAH: Yeah.
KAYLA: The pit. The knuckle pit?
SARAH: The crinkle.
KAYLA: The crinkle?
SARAH: That's called a crinkle.
KAYLA: I know you and your sister call it a crinkle. I'm aware of what the Costellos call the…
SARAH: Well
KAYLA: It's the crinkle.
SARAH: Yeah, it's a crinkle.
KAYLA: It's a crinkle. Anyway, it really hurts. And like, I don't know if it's ever going to heal because like, I keep putting a Band-Aid on it, because it like, it keeps touching things and hurting,
SARAH: Mm-hmm
KAYLA: But the Band-Aid being on it so much is not allowing it to like air out and scab.
SARAH: Put… have you put Vaseline on it?
KAYLA: I put Neosporin… Oh, like Vaseline and no Band-Aid? I have not tried that, I might go try that
SARAH: As someone who has experience with...
KAYLA: Oh yeah. We… yeah. Tell me what to do. You're the expert. Give me everything. Why didn't I think of this before? What are we doing here?
SARAH: I… because I also… I also recently got a cut on one of my fingers in like, in… in like a knuckle-ish spot.
KAYLA: A crinkle?
SARAH: Yeah. It wasn't like quite on like the back of the crinkle, but it was like on the knuckle.
KAYLA: The front of the crinkle?
SARAH: It was on the knuckle where it was being impacted.
KAYLA: The knuckle? The front crinkle, you mean?
SARAH: It was like on the side.
KAYLA: You know my knee, my front crinkle?
SARAH: Fuck off. You know, the, the elbow crinkle? the elbinkle.
KAYLA: Hmm. I know her well.
SARAH: I would say what's really good is, uh, it's called Joshua Tree gymnast salve.
KAYLA: Okay. Well, I don't have that, so what’s next?
SARAH: I do.
KAYLA: Okay.
SARAH: And it's great.
KAYLA: You send that to me.
SARAH: It's good because it basically like, it toughens it up.
KAYLA: I see.
SARAH: Using Vaseline or like back when I did gymnastics, I would… I would put Vaseline on my ribs while I was doing bars under the Vaseline, then chalk, do your bars. And then after that, when they were all what I would put chapstick, like regular chapstick on them. And then that would make them heal more, but it would make them soften up. So, then you would use Joshua Tree to like keep them like tough. So, you would kind of like use both. Um, I would say do… do like Vaseline
KAYLA: Or like an Aquaphor?
SARAH: Yeah. And try to like, maybe like overnight.
KAYLA: I was thinking of keeping the Band-Aid off while I sleep.
SARAH: Yeah. I would suggest…
KAYLA: Fuzz is going to get in there though. I know it.
SARAH: Well, I don’t know what to tell you
KAYLA: Me either. Anyway, that's one of my beefs. My other beef is that my ears hurt. Why do my ears hurt? Because I went to festival and I stood close to speakers and didn't wear my earplugs because I'm silly.
SARAH: You dumb bitch, dumb bitch
KAYLA: But juice, I saw Chapel Rowan and I was so close to her. She was right there. She was right there
SARAH: Right there.
KAYLA: But beef, she did not sing ‘Subway,’ her unreleased song, but juice, I found someone put it on Spotify as a four-minute podcast and they like edit it really nice. So, like you can't hear the crowd from like whenever they… and it's stuck in my head so bad that I need it.
SARAH: I don't know it
KAYLA: Show it to me, Rachel. I'll send it to you. It's…
SARAH: Okay.
KAYLA: Those are a collection of my beefs and juices.
SARAH: Great. My beef is just like everything happening all at once at work.
KAYLA: Mm-hmm. I'm having that as well, too.
SARAH: Very suddenly. I don't like that.
KAYLA: Mm-mm
SARAH: My juice is I put up art on my walls.
KAYLA: It looks very good.
SARAH: And now my walls look nicer. He he
KAYLA: He he
SARAH: That's all, you can tell us about your beef, your juice, your thoughts on Ballerina Farm, your thoughts on trad wives on our social media @soundsfakepod. We never really check it, but you can tell us there anyway. Well, I never really check it.
KAYLA: Check what?
SARAH: Social media.
KAYLA: I do. And one day I'll get back into posting too. Just you fucking wait.
SARAH: Someday it'll happen.
KAYLA: Someday. Probably not soon though, because work is crazy.
SARAH: For real, for real. Anyway, social media @soundsfakepod. We also have a Patreon patreon.com/soundsfakepod, if for some reason you would like to support us monetarily. Our $5 patrons who we are promoting this week are AliceIsInSpace, Amanda Kyker, Ashley W, Boston Smith, and Bronwyn Herron. Thank you all of you.
KAYLA: Thank…
SARAH: Our $10 patrons who are promoting something this week are Alyson who would like to promote Arden Gray by Ray Stoeve, Ani who would like to promote the importance of being kind to yourself and others, Arcnes who would like to promote The Trevor Project, Benjamin Ybarra who would like to promote Tabletop Games, and Bones, who would like to promote Asked.
KAYLA: Uh?
SARAH: That's not what Bones would like to promote. I wrote that I asked Bones.
KAYLA: Oh, Bones
SARAH: I didn't check actually if Bones responded, because I forgot.
KAYLA: Bones.
SARAH: No. I asked three months ago and they haven't answered.
KAYLA: Weep
SARAH: Bones, what do you want to promote? Although, if you don't tell me, I'm just going to say you promote ‘Asked.’
KAYLA: What are you going to do?
SARAH: Our other $10 patrons are Celina Dobson, David Harris, David Harris, also, twice, Derick & Carissa, Elle Bitter, My Aunt Jeannie, Kayla’s dad, Maff, Martin Chiesl, Parker, Purple Hayes, Barefoot Backpacker, SongOStorm…
KAYLA: Brother? What is happening?
SARAH: That was their name on Discord for a while, Backfoot Backpacker
KAYLA: Oh, I do remember that one.
SARAH: Val and Alastor. Our $15 patrons are Ace, who would like to promote the writer Crystal Scherer, Andrew Hillum who would like to promote the Invisible Spectrum Podcast, Hector Murillo, who would like to promote friends that are supportive, constructive, and help you grow as a better person. And I encourage you to not become a trad wife if you don't want to.
KAYLA: Mm-hmm. Only if you want to
SARAH: And if you do want to, I hope you interrogate those thoughts and why you have them.
KAYLA: Mm-hmm
SARAH: And if the conclusion you come to is that that's really what you want, then great. It's good for you.
KAYLA: Then, excellent.
SARAH: Nathaniel White, who would like to promote NathanielJWhiteDesigns.com, Kayla's Aunt Nina, who would like to promote katemaggartart.com, and Schnell who would like to promote accepting that everyone is different and that's awesome. Our $20 patrons are Dragonfly, Dr. Jacki, who would like to promote Dr. Jacki, and my mom, and all of them together would like to promote paid maternity and paternity and genderless eternity leave.
KAYLA: So true.
SARAH: Don't have that here. I mean, not that I'm going to have child, but still, we should have, you know?
KAYLA: Sure.
SARAH: Thanks for listening. Tune in next Sunday for more of us in your ears
KAYLA: And until then, take good care of your cows, but only if you want to, if it's a farm that you actually want to be living on.
SARAH: Mm-hmm. And if you're not able to… wanting to take good care of them, I encourage you to maybe find someone else who can so that they're not like neglected.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: And they still live a good life, but you don't have to do it if you don't want.
KAYLA: Yeah.
SARAH: Thank you.
KAYLA: Bye.
[END OF TRANSCRIPT]