Being Damaged Is Not A Personality Trait - Freya India

Chris Williamson 0:00 Why do you think so many girls are drawn to therapy culture?

Freya India 0:04 Oh, I think it's a lot of things. Um, I do think this is kind of a cliché thing to say now, but I do think therapy culture has replaced religion. Um, and that's not a new thing to say. People have been saying that for a long time, so... Christopher Lash was writing about that in the '70s. Uh, Frank Furedi writes about it really well now. But in recent years, since social media, I would say therapy culture has just escalated, um, to the point where... I think young women don't see it as a worldview. They just see that as kind of life, so they interpret everything through this therapeutic lens. So their lives, their relationships, their emotions. Um, and I think it has elevated to the level of religion. Um, so you think of- you think of all the kind of characteristics of religion. We just mimic them with therapy culture. So instead of praying, we just repeat our, like, positive affirmations. Um, instead of, like, seeking salvation, you'll go on, like, a healing journey. Um, instead of, like, you know, resisting temptation from the devil, you'll reframe your intrusive thoughts. Um, and so I think the young women in particular who are becoming less religious, this kind of therapeutic worldview has completely replaced that void.

Chris Williamson 1:24 What does a therapeutic worldview consist of? What- what- what does that mean?

Freya India 1:29 Um, like, seeing problems in your life, kind of pathologizing problems and experiences as something medical rather than, "I'm just experiencing this emotion or kind of age-old anxiety." Now it's become a medical issue. Um, so things like talking in the language of attachment styles, uh, and- and trauma, and losing the language of just ordinary hurt and disappointment, and things like that.

Chris Williamson 1:59 And for some reason this is giving some kind of solace or comfort?

Freya India 2:06 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 2:06 S- s- uh, order being brought out of chaos?

Freya India 2:10 I think it gives the comfort religion gives, and the consolation of like... Y- like, you see p- young women on TikTok saying things like, um, like they won't pray to God but they'll give a request to the universe-

Chris Williamson 2:22 Mm.

Freya India 2:22 ... and, like, have faith in that.

Chris Williamson 2:24 Yeah.

Freya India 2:25 And so I think it gives all the comfort of religion, but it takes away the inconvenient parts, so the- any actual demands on you or kind of restrictions on your freedom or anything like that.

Chris Williamson 2:36 Mm-hmm. Being held to standards of behavior, et cetera.

Freya India 2:39 Yeah. So it has what women are craving in modern life, I think, which is belonging and security in something and faith in something, but it's- it's a much easier version of religion.

Chris Williamson 2:51 Slippery religion.

Freya India 2:52 Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 2:53 How many of these girls are in therapy, do you think?

Freya India 2:57 A lot. Um, th- there was a study recently showing 32% of all 12 to 17-year-olds in America have either had therapy, been on medication, or had some kind of treatment in 2023. Um-

Chris Williamson 3:10 In a s- over a single year? One-third?

Freya India 3:12 Yeah, which is insane. And I was talking to someone about that statistic, and they were like, "Oh, that's great. That's amazing," and I was thinking, "That's a bleak statistic." Um, so yeah, I think there's- there's the girls that are in therapy, which is a lot, but then there's also the girls who are just, like, living in therapy culture. So it's just they scroll through Instagram and it's all about attachment styles, trauma. They go on TikTok and it's, like, a trauma-informed therapist telling them, like, red flags they should watch out for and stuff.

Chris Williamson 3:43 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Freya India 3:43 It's just like... There's the actual therapy, which I'm sure there is- there's useful therapists, but there's also just this culture, which is just the world that they're swimming in.

Chris Williamson 3:54 Yeah, so you're never able to switch it off.

Freya India 3:56 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 3:56 I think, um... Alain de Botton was sat in that same seat as you.

Freya India 4:00 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 4:01 Big proponent of psychotherapy.

Freya India 4:03 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 4:03 I think trained as a psychotherapist himself too, owns A School of Life, which isn't just a YouTube channel but a psychotherapy, uh, facility here in London.

Freya India 4:10 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 4:11 And even he, like, the biggest proponent of it, I think would very much say that there is a time for therapizing.

Freya India 4:20 Yes.

Chris Williamson 4:20 And then there is a time to not, in the same way as going to the gym. There is a time to train and then there is a time to recover. And I wonder whether... (laughs) One of the criticisms that's common that I put to him was, uh, lots of people online, more old school people, more sort of typical stiff-upper-lip type people-

Freya India 4:38 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 4:39 ... would say, uh, "You're not fixing your past's problems. You're dwelling on them."

Freya India 4:44 Yes.

Chris Williamson 4:44 "And by dwelling on them, you are, uh, ruminating too much." There is some evidence, I mean a g- good bit of evidence, rumination's not particularly fantastic for you. I'm finding this line between, yeah, mate, we don't wanna deny that bad things happened and never alchemize them or transcend and include them into our life.

Freya India 5:00 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 5:01 And then on the other side, we don't wanna wallow in them. Uh, but I suppose if you have the online environment that you exist within, permanently using this language-

Freya India 5:10 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 5:10 ... you're permanently having these structures and these thinking patterns reinforced-

Freya India 5:14 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 5:14 ... and then it's how you begin to talk to yourself about what happens offline.

Freya India 5:19 Yes.

Chris Williamson 5:19 And then you also have, you know, facilitation or medication or conversations with your friends. Further embracing all of that, it's-

Freya India 5:28 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 5:28 You're just entrenched in this all the time.

Freya India 5:30 Yeah, well I used to think, and I think a lot of people think therapy culture's particularly bad for men because it- it kind of has a female approach to problems, and it's about, you know, ruminating and often it's like if you don't have a female response there's something wrong with you. Uh, it's kind of a red flag if you don't go to therapy. But I actually changed my mind on that and I actually think therapy culture is worse for women, because women ruminate more. They co-ruminate more.

Chris Williamson 5:55 So it's playing into the weakness that they already have?

Freya India 5:57 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 5:57 Or the- the disposition?

Freya India 5:58 Yeah, if you think of an anxious young 14-year-old girl, the worst thing you can tell her is to go further into her own head to get relief, and to think...... more about her problems and to kind of search her life for symptoms. You know, that... If you told me that at 14, i- it's the worst thing I could've heard. Um, so I actually think maybe f- some men do need to do that a little bit more, but the average young girl, uh, needs to kind of cut it out.

Chris Williamson 6:23 I wonder whether therapy language and therapy culture for girls is what gym language, gym culture-

Freya India 6:32 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 6:32 ... psalms, testosterone, steroids at 17, uh-

Freya India 6:37 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 6:37 ... is for guys.

Freya India 6:38 Yeah, I think it's a form of control, so it's like, it's our version of control. You know, if we feel uncomfortable or feel an uneasy emotion, we're just like, "I'm gonna categorize that and diagnose it." You know, "That's my attachment disorder," or, "That's, uh, my depression." Um, and I think men do that kind... They have their own kind of self-optimization trends in the gym stuff, where that can become, like, a form of control, um, to deal with kind of uneasy emotions.

Chris Williamson 7:08 Mm.

Freya India 7:08 And I think, yeah, this is the women's version of that. It's like we can't sit with it or just accept, like, a painful situation, so I often think about... So, if you look at these kind of attachment style forums or girls talking about their attachment styles, very often, they'll describe just a bad relationship and then they'll say, "Oh, it's my attachment disorder." So they'll be like, "He cheated on me and I can't get over it because of my anxious attachment," and it's like... Uh, it's so sad because they're actually losing the language to talk about the actual problem-

Chris Williamson 7:41 Mm.

Freya India 7:41 ... that they're facing 'cause they're trying to get control. 'Cause it's a lot easier to be like, "Oh, you know, I'm anxious," or, "He's avoidant" than, "We have a terrible relationship and I've just wasted four years with someone." It... You get the control-

Chris Williamson 7:54 Mm.

Freya India 7:54 ... through the therapy culture, um, so that's why I see it becoming a danger to girls and young women.

Chris Williamson 8:01 What's that stat that you mentioned there about girls from religious families seeming to do differently well and-

Freya India 8:07 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 8:08 ... now 18 to 25-year-old girls are religious at different levels and stuff?

Freya India 8:11 Yeah, so I think for the first time in history, young women are less religious than young men now.

Chris Williamson 8:17 Typically, women would have been more-

Freya India 8:19 Yeah. But among Gen Z, it's men that are going to church way more than women now. Um, and Jonathan Haidt did some research on this showing that... He, like, presented... He looked at a survey of statements, and they were things like, "I have no hope in myself. I don't beli-" Like, really self-disparaging statements, um, and he found that teenagers without religion agreed with them way stronger than teenagers who were religious, and especially who were Conservative. Um, and I think there's a couple of reasons for that. I think one is kind of the external locus of control, so Conservatives tend to have more, um, of an internal locus of control, so they feel more control over things happening in their lives. Also, if you're Conservative teenager, you're more likely to be living with both parents, which I think protects your mental health. Um, and also your parents are more likely to have clearer boundaries with you, um, which I think is actually very useful for anxiety, um, and depression. So there's different explanations for it, but yeah, it's a worry because young women are becoming less religious and their mental health is also tanking, um, so there has to be some link there.

Chris Williamson 9:41 And maybe therapy culture, therapy language is stepping into the void.

Freya India 9:45 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 9:45 And also stopping them from perhaps going back to finding religion.

Freya India 9:50 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 9:50 I'm hesitant to say e- therapy culture is getting in the way of religi- isn't, like, religion is necessarily the answer to this, but that it's whatever better alternatives could be, including-

Freya India 10:04 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 10:04 ... religion-

Freya India 10:05 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 10:05 ... are being precluded by this much sexier, uh-

Freya India 10:09 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 10:09 ... newer, more comforting answer to everything that makes no demands on you-

Freya India 10:14 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 10:14 ... as a person, that doesn't require you to follow any edicts or, or-

Freya India 10:18 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 10:18 ... refrain from any types of behaviors.

Freya India 10:21 Well, therapy culture, I think it probably is getting aw- in the way in a sense because it's, it's kind of the opposite of religion. So if you think of Christianity, it's about dying to yourself, like, giving up some of yourself, um, to be part of something bigger. Therapy culture is all about going more and more into yourself, discovering yourself and, like, finding your authentic self. It's the complete opposite. So something like Christianity, I think most young women just view it as really restrictive and limiting, and something like therapy culture, or just liberal culture in general, tells them that any limit or constraint is a problem.

Chris Williamson 10:57 What like?

Freya India 10:59 Well, just this sense in culture now that any obligation is like an obstacle to your life or your mental health. I think, I think that's just endemic from everywhere we look, um, and it's, yeah, very much the opposite of what religion tells us, which is that through sacrifice you find kind of actual fulfillment.

Chris Williamson 11:21 Mm.

Freya India 11:22 And you kind of break free from yourself. Now we're kind of told, whether it's through feminism or therapy culture, whatever girls are scrolling through on TikTok or Instagram, it's like, you know, think... Like, if you think of therapy culture on TikTok, it will say something like, "Don't be a people pleaser. Don't be needy." Um, but these things are kind of the opposite of what Christianity is telling you, which is like, "You should be someone who puts your needs second. It's good to be someone who gives for other people, who depends on people and they-

Chris Williamson 11:53 Mm.

Freya India 11:53 ... depend on you." Um, that's not the message girls are growing up with.

Chris Williamson 11:58 Is therapy culture less prosocial?

Freya India 12:01 Yes, I think so. Well, again, you're just going inwards, um, and yeah, also I often think of... Again, it's a similarity between-... therapy culture for women and kind of self-optimization stuff for men-

Chris Williamson 12:15 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 12:15 ... because it's like, for men, if you go too far that way, other people become obstacles to your, like, ambition and your-

Chris Williamson 12:23 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 12:23 ... self-development.

Chris Williamson 12:24 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 12:25 Um, so people become, like, distractions and annoyances. It's the same with therapy culture because then, for a young woman who's really into therapy culture, a man is just like an obstacle to her healing and her mental health. Um, so I think if you go too far in it, you can just interpret anyone or anything as a threat to your peace.

Chris Williamson 12:44 Yes. Yeah, that's very interesting, which is, you know, the best kind of relationships are the ones that make both people in them better-

Freya India 12:53 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 12:53 ... that they enter the relationship and stay in the relationship, hopefully, or if they leave, they leave in an improved situation, individually.

Freya India 13:03 Yeah. Yes. But I don't think, um, that's really getting across to young women. I think, yeah, the... I think the- what the problem is, is you go on something like TikTok, and you have, like, a trauma-informed therapist who might be interesting and informative, but she's now competing in a attention economy. So, she has to create a video which is engaging and extreme, so she has to say, "Five red flags you should avoid in men." And they're, they're things that are just so vague and, um-

Chris Williamson 13:36 What like?

Freya India 13:37 Things like... Well, I literally saw one that said, "Gifts and trips is a red flag" because it's love bombing.

Chris Williamson 13:44 Okay.

Freya India 13:45 Um, but other things, like, they'll say, you know, "You're in a bad relationship if he makes you feel insecure," for example, "by making a comment about your looks." But it's, it's so vague that it's like, well, anyone's boyfriend could be included in that somehow.

Chris Williamson 14:02 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 14:02 Um, but if you add them all together, if you're scrolling through this all day every day, which a lot of girls are, the message is basically like anyone can be toxic and anyone can be a red flag. And-

Chris Williamson 14:14 Unsafe.

Freya India 14:15 Yeah. And you'll... Unfortunately, girls do co-ruminate together, and it's really bad for their mental health, so.

Chris Williamson 14:23 Co-ruminate?

Freya India 14:24 Yeah. So, dwelling on their problems with friends. Um, which, if you think of something like Re- a Reddit forum, that is just a rumination machine. It's just like, it's there for everybody to analyze together.

Chris Williamson 14:38 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 14:38 TikTok is literally somewhere you can ruminate, and then it will start recommending you new disorders and problems.

Chris Williamson 14:44 (laughs)

Freya India 14:46 (laughs) So, it's like it's, it's kind of like the inner world of these young girls, but now getting fed more and more to them.

Chris Williamson 14:52 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 14:53 Um-

Chris Williamson 14:53 Other people's inner worlds, which can become-

Freya India 14:55 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 14:55 ... a sort of, "Ooh, that's a nice thought pattern. Maybe I'll try that one on."

Freya India 14:59 Yeah. And the most risk-averse, neurotic, anxious women on there will get the most traction because they'll be saying-

Chris Williamson 15:06 And everybody else is following along from them.

Freya India 15:08 Yeah. So, if you spend too much time on there, you will think that, like, a well-adjusted woman doesn't need anyone, doesn't have any distraction in her life, and feels good all the time, that no one ever threatens her or makes her feel anxious. And, and that's just, like, a lonely life.

Chris Williamson 15:26 And any perturbance from feeling the opposite of that-

Freya India 15:30 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 15:30 ... is not because of her. It's because of-

Freya India 15:33 Yes.

Chris Williamson 15:33 ... some insult that occurred in one form or another from the world or from structures or from a partner or from a friend-

Freya India 15:40 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 15:40 ... or from...

Freya India 15:41 But the problem with that is you shut down any constructive criticism of you. Like, if your boyfriend has a constructive comment about you, if you are being selfish or something, um, therapy culture does provide endless excuses to kind of twist that into-

Chris Williamson 15:57 "You don't need to hear this."

Freya India 15:58 "Yeah, he's a toxic person. You're only like that because of your childhood trauma. He's just, like, an asshole, but you have, like, all of these reasons why you behave that way."

Chris Williamson 16:09 Have you contrasted this, I don't know whether you've been able to look at it, with what young guys see? Is there an equivalent for young guys?

Freya India 16:15 I, I think the only equivalent I could think of is the productivity stuff. So, I don't know if you saw that tweet recently of the guy, he's like, uh, "This morning routine saved me." And so, he does his morning routine, which is, like, super productive. It's like everything. It's the red light therapy and the journaling and everything. Um, but it's kind of eerie when you watch it, because it's like, this is not a lifestyle you could have with anyone else around. It's so to the absolute, like, minute.

Chris Williamson 16:43 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 16:44 Um, and you think, like, this is kind of a similar thing with therapy culture. It's like we're trying to have this perfect control over our lives and, like, get perfect control before you commit to anybody.

Chris Williamson 16:58 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 16:59 Um, and then you think of things like young people not wanting to get married and have children, and it's like, well, yeah, because there'll be a huge obstacle if we think that we have to have this perfect control over our mental health or our productivity routine.

Chris Williamson 17:11 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 17:12 Um, anyone else is gonna seem like chaos coming into that. And so, I think young men and women can bo- can both go to an extreme of those. But it's kind of the same thing. It's like an avoidance strategy. It's like, "I have full control in this situation, and I'm not vulnerable."

Chris Williamson 17:29 Have you read any Oliver Burkeman?

Freya India 17:31 Yes, I love Oliver Burkeman. He's great.

Chris Williamson 17:33 He's phenomenal.

Freya India 17:34 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 17:34 Uh, did you get his new one, Meditations for Mortals?

Freya India 17:36 No.

Chris Williamson 17:36 Okay. It came out a couple of months ago. One of the best things that I got exposed to this year. Just talks about a lot of this. You know, it's v- very, uh, self-deprecating, very British, some might say.

Freya India 17:45 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 17:46 Uh...

Freya India 17:46 No, I relate to him painfully because... (laughs)

Chris Williamson 17:51 (laughs) Yeah, me too. Uh, he really sees a particular cohort of human nature-

Freya India 17:57 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 17:58 ... very transparently, I think.

Freya India 17:59 Yeah, and I think I have that tendency to see people as distractions, 'cause I'm trying to work. So, I'm often like, you know, "I need to write in perfect silence. I need to have my perfect routine." Um, and yeah. I, I read a quote f- I think it was C.S. Lewis saying something like-Eventually, you realize that all of these distractions from your life were just your life. (laughs) Um, like, they weren't distractions at all. And I think it's really sad to kind of teach young people, or just like drill into their heads that they should avoid anyone getting in the way of their self-development and their ambition or their healing, because that's life getting in the way. Um, and yeah, i- it's sad to see people kind of half-heartedly do relationships or kind of, um, put them off in pursuit of that ultimate control. I think that's a really... That will backfire

Freya India 18:53 eventually.

Chris Williamson 18:54 What are the problems of excessive self-focus?

Freya India 18:58 Um, well, I think that... I think it's Jordan Peterson says there's no difference between, like, self-obsession and mental illness, in the sense that it's all focusing too much on yourself. Not to say that it's in your control all the time necessarily, but that is what it is. It's focusing too much on your own problems. Um, and I think, yeah, as I said, girls are particularly vulnerable to it. And I think it... What it does is it blocks real self-development because you can't see where you're going wrong because you have these endless excuses of, for why you're behaving the way you are. Um, so I think a lot of girls think they're doing self-development and self-reflection, but it's actually accidentally like self-obsession-

Chris Williamson 19:47 Hmm.

Freya India 19:47 ... because they're, they're thinking, "Oh, you know, I'm analyzing my attachment style, and I'm thinking about my trauma, and I'm, like, doing the work," but there's not much actual self-development going on.

Chris Williamson 19:58 Work being done.

Freya India 19:59 Yeah, and I think it, it can kind of be a trap where you think, "I'm working on myself as a person." Um, and the same with the self-optimization stuff. Like, I think you can get so obsessed with stuff like maybe the ice baths and the breath work, that you're not thinking about trying to be a better person.

Chris Williamson 20:17 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 20:17 Like, it just becomes-

Chris Williamson 20:19 There's a couple of traps, uh, for that. Alex Hormozi taught me a really, really good lesson as I started to do, like, little bits of investing and stuff like that. So sometimes a company will say, "Hey, we... We're this interesting company in a world that you maybe know or like. Would you like to p- put some money in and maybe come on as an advisor," or whatever it might be. And I was talking to him, and he said, "How many of these calls are you taking?" I said, "I don't know. You know, maybe had two last week or something." He says, "They're the most dangerous calls that you have because they all feel like work, they all feel like business, and almost none of them result in anything." And it's kind of like that upfront, it feels like you're doing a thing-

Freya India 20:59 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 20:59 ... which is more dangerous than not doing anything at all because it acts as a placeholder. It takes up the parking space-

Freya India 21:04 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 21:05 ... of what could be work.

Freya India 21:08 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 21:08 If you're doing nothing, you would have this big vacancy and you'd go, "Oh, god, I really, I really need to step my game up," or do whatever.

Freya India 21:13 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 21:14 Uh, you know, it's one of the problems I think that people have with, uh, scam supplements, uh, with training styles that don't actually do anything-

Freya India 21:21 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 21:22 ... that it w- the subtext that they understand is this thing is taking the place of something that would work, and this thing doesn't work-

Freya India 21:32 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 21:32 ... which means that you're, you're getting neither of the benefits.

Freya India 21:34 It's kind of like the highlighter girls who-

Chris Williamson 21:37 What's that?

Freya India 21:37 Like, girls who have, like, the perfect highlighters and gel pens for their exam, but they get like a D 'cause they were obsessing over having the perfect setup.

Chris Williamson 21:45 The system, not the outcome.

Freya India 21:46 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 21:46 Yes. Yeah, that is interesting. Um, I suppose this self-pity thing gets wrapped up as empowerment in a way.

Freya India 22:00 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 22:00 And that causes girls to suffer.

Freya India 22:03 Yeah, and it's funny because there's a lot of emphasis on like, um, like, women walking away from disrespect and not tolerating any bad behavior. Um, but there's also kind of this self-pitying stuff going on. So it's like, real empowerment would be very often, "I'm, yeah, I'm not tolerating this. I'm walking away." But you kind of... You look online now, and there's a lot of young women who just ruminate over a problem. So like I was saying before, they might be in a bad relationship and they'll be analyzing both of their attachment styles and thinking about how it's toxic and talking to other girls about it rather than just leaving. And so I think sometimes young women, like me as well, get caught up in the analyzing and not the actual action.

Chris Williamson 22:51 Hmm.

Freya India 22:52 And they think all the mental health stuff is actually empowering them, but I often see it, like, taking, again, taking the language away from actual problems. And rather than everybody opening up, it's actually like closing down their ability to see what's going on-

Chris Williamson 23:06 Hmm.

Freya India 23:08 ... and act upon it.

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Chris Williamson 24:10 Well, all of this stuff is instrumental, right?

Freya India 24:12 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 24:12 There are things that you do in order to be able to do a thing.

Freya India 24:15 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 24:15 The, the, the mode is not the end itself.

Freya India 24:17 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 24:18 And it's the same with the morning routine thing. You know, I...... hold my hands up. I would- I, eh, if not for a slightly different life and a different algorithm, that could've been me, the guy that went- that trended on-

Freya India 24:28 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 24:28 ... Twitter. I've said this a couple of times, but I had an absurdly long, very elaborate routine for about probably four years, three or four years. Uh, and my retrospective justification for it is that I had done so little in the way of self-reflection-

Freya India 24:46 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 24:46 ... that I had, you know, from 18 to 30 or whatever, I had a- over a decade of catching up to do.

Freya India 24:51 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 24:52 And it could've- I could've spaced it out like a normal sane human, and it might have taken some time, or I could've done Navy SEAL Hell Week version, uh, uh-

Freya India 25:00 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 25:00 ... very intensely, and, uh, get up on a morning and go for a walk and get back and journal and do breath work and meditate and do yin yoga and then prep my food and- and read-

Freya India 25:11 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 25:12 ... and then start my day. And I'm like-

Freya India 25:13 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 25:13 ... "How fucking opulent and luxurious and ridiculous and inaccessible," all of these things, I understand. Uh, but I had a lot of low-hanging fruit that I needed to get and then-

Freya India 25:26 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 25:26 ... higher-hanging fruit too. Uh, but one thing that I am happy about is that I never confused the mode of improvement for the reason for the improvement.

Freya India 25:39 Yes.

Chris Williamson 25:40 And (coughs) very quickly looked at ways to apply that. "All right, okay, I, um, seem to be able to deal with emotional perturbance a bit better now after a few thousand sessions of meditation. Huh. Maybe I should use that-"

Freya India 25:55 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 25:55 "... and start pushing myself into different places emotionally."

Freya India 25:58 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 25:58 "Uh, wow, I've learned some stuff about how human nature works, or resilience or whatever. Let's see if I can find some situations that I can stress test that and see if it actually works for me." Or, "I've got new mobility because I've been doing yin yoga for fucking forever. Uh, m- maybe I can start doing CrossFit," which I did.

Freya India 26:16 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 26:16 Or a different training modality, something else. Um, not confusing instrumental goods for the ends themselves-

Freya India 26:23 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 26:23 ... uh, I think is very important, and it takes the placeholder. The therapy culture takes the placeholder of something that could be functional work and very viciously encourages you to not actually go out and even try.

Freya India 26:37 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 26:37 Th- there is no such thing as a stress test of this. Anytime it gets str- it's unfalsifiable. Anytime it gets stressed, it's a- an admission that the very philosophy itself was correct-

Freya India 26:48 Yes.

Chris Williamson 26:48 ... and that you should have never encountered this thing in the first place.

Freya India 26:50 Yeah. Well, I think you view it, as you've said about, like, The Lonely Chapter, you view it as, like, a set time-

Chris Williamson 26:56 I think so.

Freya India 26:57 ... that has to come to an end.

Chris Williamson 26:58 Yes.

Freya India 26:58 Which is what therapy should be as well, is, like, a set period. Um, but the problem is now, therapy culture stuff is so tied up with identity stuff, so you get kind of young girls who start reading about social anxiety and they relate to it because they're 14 and shy.

Chris Williamson 27:16 And everybody is.

Freya India 27:17 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 27:17 Yeah.

Freya India 27:18 And they go on, again, these forums and these communities where everyone's saying, um, "I have social anxiety disorder, and because of that, I can't get public transport," or, "Because of that, I can't do this." And then they start thinking, "Well, I feel it. It's really painful for me, so why would I put myself in those situations? I'm just not built for those situations." Um, and so that's the problem with it, is there's no end to it, because you can just go on there and then it becomes part of who you are. And again, as you said, the second you go out and you feel intense anxiety, as you do as a 14-year-old in, like, any situation, then you'll think, "Oh, yeah, this is confirmation that I have social anxiety disorder and shouldn't be here." Um, so yeah, I always just think of these things as, like, me at 13, and the worst things you could say to me, and social anxiety disorder is one of them. It's like, I kind of needed people to kind of laugh it off and just say, "Well, you have to go anyway." Th- that's what I needed.

Chris Williamson 28:16 Hmm.

Freya India 28:16 Like, if someone came to me and said, "Well, some people call it a disorder and they take medication for it, and some people need th-" I'd be like, "Well, I need that."

Chris Williamson 28:25 It's kind of like the mental health, psychological health equivalent of the misdiagnosis of gender dysphoria among young kids.

Freya India 28:34 Yeah. Yeah, that, i- it's- it's like, um, seeing the symptoms as- seeing your personality traits as symptoms, which happens with the gender dysphoria stuff as well.

Chris Williamson 28:49 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 28:49 Which is like, now just, like, quirky, edgy things about people become...

Chris Williamson 28:55 Their personality.

Freya India 28:56 Yeah. That becomes a diagnosis. So, like, before, we'd be like, talk about some guy and be like, "He's always late. It's just something about him. You know, it's kind of lovable and annoying, but it's his personality." And now it's like, "Oh, because of his ADHD he's always late."

Chris Williamson 29:11 (laughs)

Freya India 29:11 (laughs) Yeah.

Chris Williamson 29:13 Yeah, that's so funny. That's really interesting to hear, to hear the language. I mean, even- even we do it. We do it around here. You know, there'll be, for instance... Does this can have it on? Yes, it does. Can you punch in on this, dude? Can you punch in? All right, so I'm not sure how tight that lens can get. Uh, if you look very, very, very carefully here, there's a "Follow us," this, um, for the people listening, I'm pointing to the back of a can of Newtonic. We've produced maybe a million of these, this particular version of the can in America. "Follow us," there's the three social icons and then there's newtonic.com at the bottom. If you look really, really carefully just here, you'll see that the Instagram icon is probably one mil to one and a half mil to the left of the "Follow us" and the left of the newtonic.com thing. And this little world is maybe two mil in from the "us," u- um, on, after the "Follow." Uh, I noticed that, because I notice things, and sent a photo in. And immediately, immediately after sending that photo in, said, "The autism strikes again." Never been diagnosed with autism, don't think I've got it, hold eye contact with most people perfectly well.

Freya India 30:25 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 30:26 Even within that, there's something, and i- it's-... self-deprecating, it's mockery-

Freya India 30:32 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 30:32 ... it's whatever. But even in that, it belies this, like, somebody made the joke about, uh, Elon Musk's Department of Governmental Efficiency was less Avengers Assemble and more Asperger's Assemble. Um ... (laughs)

Freya India 30:45 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 30:46 So, (laughs) like even on the guy side-

Freya India 30:49 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 30:49 ... of things. You know, OCD. "Oh, I'm, I'm obsessive-

Freya India 30:52 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 30:53 ... about this sort of stuff." Uh, it's, it's my au- like, you know.

Freya India 30:57 I, I mean, I am writing this book at the moment, and one of the chapters is about, uh, these kind of TikToks that girls are looking at about autism. And I literally went down a rabbit hole, like, "I'm autistic. I'm fully autistic."

Chris Williamson 31:09 (laughs)

Freya India 31:09 (laughs) Well, like, all of the symptoms, they're all about shy, nerdy girls. And I'm like, "Oh, okay, this has been me my whole life-"

Chris Williamson 31:18 (laughs)

Freya India 31:18 "... just kind of awkward and didn't fit in and reads a lot and everything." And it, and I'm like, "Oh God, reading this, if you're just like slightly different from the mainstream, popular, extroverted girl, you're going to be autistic." (laughs) And, and it, but it's such a, it's like, it's funny, but it's also like, oh my God, there's like... I can't say a serious point 'cause you're laughing now.

Chris Williamson 31:42 Why is autism s- it's like, it's, it just always makes me laugh. I think it's-

Freya India 31:46 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 31:46 ... kind of charming. It's definitely, autism holds like a very unique, in the mental pathology library that we can all take, it's the one that I think is sort of easiest to throw. I see f- maybe it's because the autistic people, like, aren't registering it, but I, it's the, (laughs) the lowest amount of offense seems to be taken by people-

Freya India 32:06 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 32:06 ... misdiagnosing that in some way. And maybe that's because autism, in many ways, is a disadvantage for people, but also bestows, uh, some of what some people would consider as advantages too.

Freya India 32:16 Yeah, and I-

Chris Williamson 32:17 I don't know.

Freya India 32:17 ... I, autistic people I've met do kind of openly joke about it, I feel.

Chris Williamson 32:22 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 32:22 Um, whereas I feel like OCD is more offensive to say, "Oh, that was me being OCD."

Chris Williamson 32:26 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 32:26 I feel like that's become a bit more-

Chris Williamson 32:28 Yeah, "It's my suicidal ideation."

Freya India 32:29 ... really, yeah. (laughs) Um, but yeah, no, it's funny, but it's also like, you think of like a 13-year-old girl who really convinces herself she has autism, and actually, she's just quite unique and quirky. Um, that can be like a lifelong sentence of thinking you're different from other people-

Chris Williamson 32:47 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 32:47 ... because you're unwell. Um ...

Chris Williamson 32:50 A much more pernicious one maybe would be something which is less serious of a diagnosis and that everybody believes that they have, which would be an attachment style thing.

Freya India 32:58 Yes.

Chris Williamson 32:58 Because it's such a, it's such a defining characteristic of how you relate to other people, the most important things that you do.

Freya India 33:08 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 33:08 And to be able to write off every time that it comes in, "Ah, it's my avoidant attachment again."

Freya India 33:16 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 33:16 "Ah, that's triggered-"

Freya India 33:17 And c- t- to kind of ignore your gut instinct. Like, I feel like you can be in a bad relationship and you have a feeling about someone, um, and now you interpret that as, "That's my anxiety coming up. That's like my attachment disorder triggering," rather than, "Oh, they've just said something or revealed something about themselves that I should be, I'm actually tuning into."

Chris Williamson 33:37 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 33:38 The worry is like young girls convince themselves they have a disorder and then shut down that instinct.

Chris Williamson 33:43 I suppose also it denies you the opportunity to... It, it stops you from having the opportunity to deny yourself from being at the mercy of that thing.

Freya India 33:57 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 33:57 That you say, "That's, uh, a pattern that keeps coming up in me. I don't like it and I want to get rid of it."

Freya India 34:06 Yes.

Chris Williamson 34:06 "Well, it's a part of me. It is me."

Freya India 34:08 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 34:08 "It defines me as a person."

Freya India 34:11 Yeah. I d- I hate this phrase, like, "I'm anxiously attached," rather than, like, "I'm feeling anxiety at the moment." Um, and, and also you see on like, on the internet, like anxious attachment quizzes and like T-shirts and like, it's become a-

Chris Williamson 34:26 Jesus Christ.

Freya India 34:27 ... a thing to identify with.

Chris Williamson 34:29 It's a brand.

Freya India 34:29 Yeah, and it's also a community, like an online community of people who all, again, co-ruminate over it. Um, but I think it's actually more dangerous than we think if you take it too far, because you, again, you just become blind to what's actually happening in your life.

Chris Williamson 34:44 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 34:44 And you're kind of living by a theory.

Chris Williamson 34:47 And also blind to how you can be complicit in causing-

Freya India 34:51 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 34:51 ... these things to happen.

Freya India 34:53 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 34:53 Uh, how you could have self-authorship over stopping these things from happening.

Freya India 34:57 Yes. Yeah. Well, if someone's behaving badly and all you're doing is like repeating your positive affirmations in the mirror-

Chris Williamson 35:06 (laughs)

Freya India 35:07 ... um, (laughs) it's not gonna help you. Like, at some point you need to have the kind of confidence to stand up to people. And you're not gonna have that if y- if your like core belief is that you're an anxious, damaged person.

Chris Williamson 35:18 Mm-hmm. 73% of boomer males said, "No matter what psychological challenges I face, I will not let them define me." 72% of Gen Z females say, "Mental illness is an important part of my identity."

Freya India 35:31 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 35:31 Bit of an arc.

Freya India 35:33 I mean, that's just tragic. Um, but I think I, again, I can't really blame young girls for that. I just think it's everywhere now. And as Konstantin says, like, if the incentives are there, it's just gonna happen. And there are incentives now to do that. Um, it's almost like now, you know when we were saying before, like, if you're English and you talk about something good happening in your life, um, people kind of judge you and think you're weird? It's kind of become, like if you go around saying, "I actually have really good mental health and I deal with things really well and I don't get anxious," people look at you like, um, that's kind of a wrong thing to say. Like, you, I think if you were a girl saying that in school, people would not relate to you as much.

Chris Williamson 36:20 Oh, you're just in denial.

Freya India 36:21 Yeah. Or like-It's kind of a- a braggy way to be now, to say, "Oh, I handled it fine."

Chris Williamson 36:26 Good for you. Good for you.

Freya India 36:27 Yeah. For some of us-

Chris Williamson 36:28 As opposed to, "Well done."

Freya India 36:29 Yeah. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 36:29 Yeah, yeah, those of us that have, you know ... Grew up with parents that caused us to have anxious attachment-

Freya India 36:34 Yeah. Try be autistic or something. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 36:36 (laughs) That's actually a solution. I think that more people should be autistic and that would fix a lot of problems that we're facing. Uh,

Chris Williamson 36:43 yeah, I'd- I'd mentioned to you before Lewis Capaldi.

Freya India 36:46 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 36:46 Um, there's a great documentary on Netflix called How I'm Feeling Now.

Freya India 36:49 Hmm.

Chris Williamson 36:49 Highly recommend you watch it. I think it's-

Freya India 36:51 Okay.

Chris Williamson 36:51 ... super pertinent to what you're doing. It'd be great if the book too.

Freya India 36:55 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 36:55 Uh, so you have this guy who ... Lots and lots of success, and the success causes him to, uh, develop a ... He must have had a genetic predisposition for Tourette's. I don't know what ... Tourette's, you can't catch it, I don't think.

Freya India 37:09 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 37:10 So he must have had this predisposition and the pressure that he puts on himself-

Freya India 37:13 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 37:13 ... and it's coming from outside too. And the story he tells himself and the rumination, uh, causes his mental health to decline to the point where he's got this sort of tic.

Freya India 37:21 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 37:21 And his shoulder's sort of ... He's always doing this. His like, whole body is contorting. And, uh, I think maybe it's two years in a row now, at least one year at Glastonbury, he was ... He stopped singing. He came out on stage, began singing, and then partway through the song, was unable to continue. Had to get the audience to help. And that happened at a show at The O2, I think, uh, which is in the documentary, and then they tried to bring this documentary into land at the end of '22 or '23 or whatever. It's like, "And he took six weeks off and started doing yoga and stopped eating McDonald's, and look at him now." It's like-

Freya India 38:01 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 38:01 And then the updates since then are sad. That, uh, guy under an awful lot of pressure, with a beautiful voice, with really, really wonderful stories to tell, uh, that make people feel things, feeling so much and being unable to handle it to the point where the very art form that he was built to do, he's unable to do onstage in front of people.

Freya India 38:22 So has he, like, backed away from singing as a result?

Chris Williamson 38:26 I haven't checked in.

Freya India 38:28 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 38:30 But the last that I saw was this summer, there was some festival thing, I think, that he was at that he had some trouble on stage again.

Freya India 38:36 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 38:37 I mean, maybe he had a bug or whatever, but it seems unlikely. It seems like it was probably the same challenge that he's been dealing with since the documentary. And, um ... Yeah, that kind of got me thinking about the mental health thing affecting everybody all the way up.

Freya India 38:53 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 38:54 Uh, you know, there's not really any hiding from it. And the way that he goes about it, you know, he's very self-deprecating.

Freya India 39:00 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 39:00 But he does not ... He's- he's relieved when he gets a diagnosis in-

Freya India 39:04 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 39:04 ... the documentary. You know, he finally ... They say, "Turns out I've got Tourette's." Uh-

Freya India 39:09 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 39:09 "That kind of makes sense. Uh, and that thing I was having, um, where my heart rate went really high and I kept on breathing," he's like, "That ... Apparently, that's called a panic attack." It's like, huh, that's a person finding a diagnosis, not identifying-

Freya India 39:21 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 39:21 ... with a diagnosis.

Freya India 39:22 Well, that's kind of another problem with the therapy stuff, is it's ... Well, one, it's kind of offensive to people like that, because the ... I mean, there are literally young women, um, mimicking tics, tics from Tourette's, TikTok. (laughs) Um, and whether that's-

Chris Williamson 39:37 Tic-TikTok.

Freya India 39:39 Yeah, I think it, there is actually a TicTok, hashtag. Um, but yeah, they're- they're picking up Tourette's, and, you know, whether that's conscious or not, um, some of them at least are kind of jumping on that identity.

Chris Williamson 39:51 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 39:52 Um, and then you hear someone like Lewis Capaldi's story and it's like the pain of that is actually stopping him doing what he loves. Um, but that conversation is kind of being swallowed up by the conversation of, like, young girls identifying with Tourette's. Like, it-

Chris Williamson 40:10 And people are fucking LARPing with this on-

Freya India 40:11 Yeah. S-

Chris Williamson 40:12 ... face, to camera videos.

Freya India 40:13 Yeah. Again, it actually takes away the language to talk about people who are actually suffering. Um, because it's just become so big now that everyone's autistic, everyone's got Tourette's and ... (laughs)

Chris Williamson 40:24 I can't not. (laughs)

Freya India 40:24 Yeah. (laughs) Every time I-

Chris Williamson 40:25 I just can't not laugh at it.

Chris Williamson 40:27 Uh, is there a new story about why people are so addicted to social media? Is there any more that-

Freya India 40:33 Um-

Chris Williamson 40:33 ... you've come to think about?

Freya India 40:36 Yeah, well, I ... When I started writing, I was writing about addiction to social media and trends and stuff and kind of, um, wondering why that was happening. And then I've been trying to kind of trace it back to think, um, what is the actual need that's not being met here? So, one of them, um ... I was looking at all this at- attachment style stuff and, like, the dating gurus, how popular, like, relationship advice is on TikTok and stuff. Um, and I was thinking, is this because young people don't have adults giving them guidance about relationships? So now they go and watch an influencer who's an attachment expert, um, because parents and families aren't getting as involved in giving advice about relationships. Um, so things like that. There's a lot of trends where I think you can trace it back to adults have stepped away from giving some form of guidance. Um, so you see it with, like, relationship stuff on TikTok and also the desperate search for, obviously, community and belonging to something is coming from a real pain of not having any community in real life. Like, I had loads of people ... When I started writing about social media, loads of people would say to me, "Oh, but, you know, young people need social media because it's like a lifeline. Like, they have their online communities and stuff." And I'm like, "That is not a benefit of social media." Like, that's just an absolute indictment of where we are in modern li- like, why is their community a Reddit forum? Um, so we can talk about social media addiction, but I think you have to kind of strip it back to what ... Why young people are so obsessed with it and what is missing in their actual life.

Chris Williamson 42:16 What is everyone searching for-

Freya India 42:18 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 42:18 ... or missing?

Freya India 42:19 Yeah, because when you meet people who aren't on social media or don't have, like, ridiculously high screen times, um, they usually have a lot of their needs met in the real world, which just sounds like an obvious thing to say, but ...It's true, and I think the more you find yourself in a fulfilling relationship or you're happy with your job, you don't feel as much as a, of a pull to scroll endlessly through TikTok all day. Um, so the fact that young people are spending like six hours a day on their phones is, is not just because social media is addictive. It's because there's nothing more addictive in their life or like a reason to stop scrolling through it.

Chris Williamson 42:58 Mm.

Freya India 42:58 Um, and so I think sometimes I can get caught in the trap of like complaining about social media, whereas social media is just filling the gap of whatever was stripped away before.

Chris Williamson 43:10 Hmm. Yeah, it's not necessarily that there's even nothing more addicting. There's nothing more compelling.

Freya India 43:16 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 43:16 The... Wh- what else, what else is there that's as fun to do-

Freya India 43:21 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 43:21 ... that's, that, uh, offers everybody the same, uh... Yeah, I mean, you know, I left my old life of nightlife, uh, three years ago-ish, and, um, that kind of felt a little bit like exiting Bitcoin at 100K or something and being like, "Well, that was kind of selling at the top," because there's some crazy stat about how by 2036 there'll be no nightclubs left in the UK.

Freya India 43:50 Really?

Chris Williamson 43:50 None. Yeah, so there, I think it's one a, one a day or one a week or something is closing at the moment-

Freya India 43:56 Wow.

Chris Williamson 43:56 ... across the UK, just that night clubs are not only competing with brunch and with restaurants and with lane seven and with top flight darts-

Freya India 44:08 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 44:08 ... and with those ball pit fucking places where people get to take selfies. It's not just competing with other in-person events-

Freya India 44:16 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 44:16 ... and other, uh, community based events, pickleball or whatever. It's competing with Netflix, Amazon Prime.

Freya India 44:21 Is it 'cause everyone's autistic and no one's going clubbing? (laughs)

Chris Williamson 44:24 The answer-

Freya India 44:25 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 44:25 ... to every question is either, it's only one of two things, too much or too little autism, and I vote that it's too little and we need more. But yes.

Freya India 44:34 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 44:34 I think, um, you s- you must have seen this trend the other day, this like, uh, like slug life thing where people just want, they, "I'm not going out, I don't want to-"

Freya India 44:44 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 44:44 "... do anything." Uh, it was a huge Substack article that-

Freya India 44:48 Oh, there was one about, yeah, like rotting in bed.

Chris Williamson 44:50 Yes, that was it.

Freya India 44:51 Yeah. Yeah. Um, yeah, like I think it was about being a loser and how it's like an English thing again, being a loser has become the way that you introduce yourself and talk about yourself.

Chris Williamson 45:04 Oh, I don't have a life.

Freya India 45:05 Like hard to... Yeah. I don't go anywhere, I don't have friends.

Chris Williamson 45:06 I don't have any interests.

Freya India 45:07 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 45:08 No, no, no. I like Netflix.

Freya India 45:09 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 45:09 I don't... Boyfriend? No, no, no, no. Not for me.

Freya India 45:12 No. Yeah, I want, I, I-

Chris Williamson 45:14 Would ruin my 7:00 PM bedtime.

Freya India 45:16 I don't know where that's come from, but I think, I think it's probably social anxiety and then people come up with all of these kind of romantic ways to talk about it. So they're like-

Chris Williamson 45:28 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 45:28 ... "Oh, I'm just an introvert who enjoys my own time," or, "I'm, like, working on this big thing so I can't go out clubbing and stuff."

Chris Williamson 45:36 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 45:36 And they build their identity around something which would justify-

Chris Williamson 45:40 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 45:41 ... not going out.

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Chris Williamson 46:47 I guess even relationships have been infected by social media. The boyfriends of Instagram trend has been around for a while.

Freya India 46:54 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 46:55 But, uh, has maybe escalated a little bit.

Freya India 46:58 Well, have you seen like... I read an article the other day that made me wanna kill myself. It was about, it was about like soft launching your boyfriend on Instagram.

Chris Williamson 47:07 Please tell me more.

Freya India 47:08 So it was about telling a... So this young woman wondering how should you announce to your followers, like not influencers, like I'm talking ordinary young women.

Chris Williamson 47:16 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 47:17 How should you announce your boyfriend? Should you do a soft launch where it's just like his arm?

Chris Williamson 47:21 (laughs)

Freya India 47:21 Or should you do like a full reveal?

Chris Williamson 47:23 (laughs)

Freya India 47:25 But it's like, but it's kind of messed up because it's like this is like introducing a brand deal or something. (laughs) Um, like we're literally viewing our partners like products.

Chris Williamson 47:37 Hmm.

Freya India 47:38 Like...

Chris Williamson 47:39 Yeah. How do we, how does this play in the optics of public life?

Freya India 47:43 Yeah. Someone said to me the other day, or they commented on my Substack article, like a relationship is now just a brand collaboration, like two personal brands coming together-

Chris Williamson 47:51 Wow. That's good.

Freya India 47:52 ... and then posting it online.

Chris Williamson 47:53 That's really good.

Freya India 47:54 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 47:56 Soft launching. Well, I've de- I've seen people talk about the hard launch, which is just a couple photo that happens-

Freya India 48:02 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 48:02 ... out of nowhere.

Freya India 48:03 Yeah. Well so you have all of that. You have like how do you manage the relationship on social media, but then you also have how social media affects the relationship. So like the boyfriends of Instagram thing. Like it's kind of funny that boyfriends, you know, when you see like a guy literally on the floor trying to get a good angle of the girl. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 48:22 There was a, a, I went to Gili T in, uh, Bali.

Freya India 48:27 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 48:27 It's one of these little islands. About five years ago.And there's a famous beach club that's got a swing sort of out in the water and it's gorgeous. The sun sets, because it's so close to the equator, the sun sets in the summer at 6:30 PM, and in the winter at 6:00 PM.

Freya India 48:43 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 48:43 So, 12 hours of daylight and it just sh- wobbles a little bit like that.

Freya India 48:46 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 48:47 And this, (laughs) this girl wanted to get a photo of her on the swing, but she wanted to catch the sort of sun bouncing off the top of the water.

Freya India 48:56 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 48:56 And I remember thinking, like watching this guy and she was saying, "No, no, no. You need to get lower. You need to, like, get sort of lower down, closer to the water." And this dude sort of chest to shoulder to neck to fe- and by this time it's sea, it's the sea, so it's not being gentle with him. So he's like, f-f-f-f, trying to take this photo, the phone's out of the water, he's getting splashed and... I remember thinking, like, that really better be wifey because that's a big-

Freya India 49:20 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:20 ... ask.

Freya India 49:21 But also, I- I just always think who is it for if your boyfriend is right there? Like, it d- it does get to the point where you're, like, posing in a bikini and your boyfriend's taking the pictures of you. It's like, "I-i-is this for Instagram?" Because I don't, I don't know. It just, it's, it's such a strange thing that's become so normalized.

Chris Williamson 49:38 It's a little bit of an indica- I mean, unless this is your new album cover or whatever for your-

Freya India 49:45 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:45 ... po- slam poetry or some shit that you do.

Freya India 49:47 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 49:48 There is a little bit of, like, well surely the person that you're trying to impress the most is-

Freya India 49:53 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:53 ... the one that's taking the photos, so what does the photo need to be taken for? Unless it's for his private collection or some stuff.

Freya India 49:57 But it's beco- (laughs) it's become so normalized that, like, when I wrote about boyfriends of Instagram, people were replying like, "Oh, but it, you know, I'm trying to get memories and stuff." Uh, and like I had a picture-

Chris Williamson 50:07 He's not in it.

Freya India 50:08 Yeah, there was a picture of, like, three girls in bikinis and three guys all on the same beach, all taking pictures of their girlfriend, and people were defending it like, "Oh, they're allowed to have memories." I'm like, "What? A memory of you in a bikini?" Like, uh, but I actually, I don't think they're lying. I think that's just how normalized it's become. It's like, well obviously if you go to the beach you do a photo shoot.

Chris Williamson 50:30 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 50:31 Um, and I always try and express that to people, like, you think of an influencer and how her income depends on taking pictures and everywhere she goes she has to get content, um, ordinary women think like that now.

Chris Williamson 50:43 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 50:43 Most people have it in the back of their mind, "I should be getting a social media picture," or, "This is a good moment," or, "This landscape would get really good clicks." Like, that's how they think. Um, and I, I don't think some older people realize that young girls are behaving and thinking like their influencers-

Chris Williamson 51:01 Mm.

Freya India 51:01 ... all the time.

Chris Williamson 51:02 Is that an aspirational thing? Is that just that the power users of Instagram and TikTok behave like that because it's their job, which means that the people who are not th- they have none of the same obligations feel like they should behave in the same way?

Freya India 51:15 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 51:15 Or is there something more going on? Is this aspirational? Is this that people hope, "Maybe I'll get picked up by a modeling agency"?

Freya India 51:20 I think a part of it is that, but I think another part is i- they started doing this when their brains were forming as young girl, they started capturing their life as they went, and they, I don't think they can conceive of just living and existing. I really think it's that ingrained of, like, their entire childhood was having a childho- childhood, but also performing and marketing and managing it all at the same time. Um, and then, like, when you try and get out of it, like when I deleted Instagram years ago, uh, that lingering was still in my head of, like, "Maybe I should share this online."

Chris Williamson 51:55 Mm.

Freya India 51:55 "Or maybe this could be a good photo opportunity." And it's re- it's really hard to not, to kind of unwire that. And now if I go to an event and I don't take a picture, young women I'm friends with will be kind of confused, like I'll say I've been on holiday and I have no evidence of it.

Chris Williamson 52:12 (laughs)

Freya India 52:12 It's confusing to them because that is-

Chris Williamson 52:13 They're suspicious about whether or not you actually went on the holiday.

Freya India 52:16 Yeah. It's kind of weird. Um, and I think there are genuinely young people who go on holiday to get pictures.

Chris Williamson 52:23 For the photos.

Freya India 52:25 Who even get in relationships for the photos.

Chris Williamson 52:27 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 52:28 And who are quietly living their life for Instagram-

Chris Williamson 52:31 Mm.

Freya India 52:32 ... in ways that people don't realize has become that intense.

Chris Williamson 52:38 What do you make of the contribution of family breakdown to this? Of that, you mentioned before about that sort of lack of guidance, people looking for a little bit of guidance.

Freya India 52:48 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 52:48 Um, maybe filling the void with entertainment that typically would've been taken up by family. What-

Freya India 52:54 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 52:54 ... what role does family breakdown have here?

Freya India 52:56 I think it's linked to what I was saying about, yeah, looking for relationship guidance. It's like, um, well, you look at something like mental health TikTok, um, people are sharing, like, their really deep trauma and turmoil and problems, um, and you can't help but look at it and think, "Are you close to your family?" Like, th- this is the kind of thing that you talk about with your family, it's what your family is there for, and now you're telling strangers on TikToK. Um, and then you look at the statistics of the amount of Gen Z who aren't living with both their mother and father. I think it's, uh, I think in the UK it's over half of children by 14 don't live with their mum and dad. Um, and so they don't have the feeling of belonging at home, and then you stretch that out to they don't have any sense of community. A community as a Reddit forum or Instagram. Like, I, growing up, had no sense of what a local community is or, like, neighbors knowing each other. It's just, it's really foreign to me.

Chris Williamson 53:58 Mm.

Freya India 53:58 And I think a lot of Gen Z, they don't have a conception of it beyond, like, an online community or, like, the LGBT community or something. That is the limit of community they know. So their family falls apart, there's nothing really to catch them, there's no neighborhood of adults who are there. Um, then you add to that they're becoming less religious. They don't feel that they belong to anything bigger than that.

Chris Williamson 54:22 Mm.

Freya India 54:22 They have no faith in anything bigger. Um, and so the feeling of loneliness is just so intense. Um, and I was writing recently about how I think that actually one of the biggest drivers of behavior we see among Gen Z is this abandonment fear and feeling-Um, because their families fell apart, because they don't have community, because they don't belong to anything bigger, um, they feel constantly alone. And if you look at the kind of symptoms of abandonment, if you look at, like, attachment theory, like, real attachment theory, not the TikToks but the-

Chris Williamson 54:58 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 54:58 ... like, Mary Ainsworth studies and everything, um, it shows, like, people who are abandoned, they're really hypersensitive to criticism, they have very low body image and self-esteem. Um, all of the kind of caricature of Gen Z, all of the traits are, like, to do with this feeling of not belonging anywhere. Um, so not, not to say that it explains everything, but I think families breaking down and not having a sense of belonging really messes people up, and I think a lot of Gen Z are kind of carrying that around and then looking for it in places so they're, obviously they're gonna spend hours on TikTok where people are talking to them and talking about their problems, because they don't have anything resembling that in real life. Um, and so yeah, I think a lot of the things we kind of laugh at young people for as being kind of narcissistic and, um, I guess selfish and kind of we cringe at them having these crazy screen times.

Chris Williamson 55:54 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 55:55 It's like, what else is there?

Chris Williamson 55:58 Yeah. Is there a lack of moral direction or adult guidance or something?

Freya India 56:03 Yeah, I think, um, I think in the modern world, like, adults, they view everything as, like, imposing on their children, so we, we kind of became suspicious of anyone who's authoritative 'cause we think they're being controlling-

Chris Williamson 56:18 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 56:18 ... or, like, old-fashioned.

Chris Williamson 56:19 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 56:20 So adults kind of politely stepped back and kind of allowed children just to become themselves and act the way they want, and-

Chris Williamson 56:28 Sounds virtuous.

Freya India 56:29 Yeah. And, you know, there's obviously an element of that that's important in parenting, um, but I think what happened is parents stepped back, so they just became like our best friends. Um, then religion retreated away from public life, then communities broke down, um, neighbors stopped knowing each other, and then if you're an anxious young person, uh, there's no one there, and we got rid of anything that was, like, more substantial guidance. So I think if you think of therapy culture today, a lot of people think, oh, if you're an anxious young person, you have more advice than ever, like, you have all this guidance. But I actually think modern culture has very little to say to anxious young people-

Chris Williamson 57:15 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 57:16 ... because we got rid of anything more substantial because we thought it was judgmental, so you can't tell someone how to live their life or what to do. Uh, we got rid of anything to do with God or religion because that was superstitious. We stopped appealing to moral character and telling them they should improve themselves and be better because that's also judgmental, and, you know, claiming that there's a right and wrong. And all that we have left is, like, these endless empty, like, platitudes of be yourself, you do you, you know best, you know, adults telling that to young people who I think are craving some direction. Like, there's no clear milestones to adulthood anymore to follow, and so they look to the adults, and the adults are saying, "You know best." Um, and of course you feel anxious. The an- the anxiety gets worse.

Chris Williamson 58:09 That lack of guidance is, I don't know, I, I, I, the equivalent for the guys is pick your favorite podcaster or YouTuber or fitness body builder of choice-

Freya India 58:21 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 58:22 ... and looking up to that, okay, well, it's the missing patriarch that I-

Freya India 58:26 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 58:26 ... didn't have or didn't have along enough or didn't understand this world, and I'm going to surrogate the-

Freya India 58:33 Yes.

Chris Williamson 58:33 ... that to this parasocial online relationship.

Freya India 58:37 But then it becomes someone who doesn't know you, so let's say you have a relationship problem, like you're a young woman who has met someone, um, and you're not sure about him. The average young woman will now go on YouTube and turn to the dating experts-

Chris Williamson 58:52 Diagnose.

Freya India 58:52 ... and the attachment style, yeah, and get the guidance from experts because they don't have adults in their lives who know them intimately. You know, because people are different. Like, people need different advice in different situations, and I think it's a real shame that adults who kind of intimately know girls and young women and can give them advice in, like, a community setting have stepped back. And now of course they're all on TikTok asking each other, like, "Oh, you know, he cheated on me. Is this a problem 'cause we weren't exclusive? Is that a red flag?"

Chris Williamson 59:25 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 59:25 And it's like, we need some adults in our lives who clearly say, "I think this person's bad for you."

Chris Williamson 59:30 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 59:31 Um, and, and a confident-

Chris Williamson 59:32 I suppose your, your, your s- everything, i- it's great that we have instant frictionless access to all information from experts that maybe are even more expert than our parents would be ever and trained and all the rest of it, even if they're legitimate, and obviously there's a lot of room for illegitimate-

Freya India 59:48 Yes.

Chris Williamson 59:48 ... experts to sneak in, but it is still self-diagnosis.

Freya India 59:54 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 59:54 And it is still self-treatment from that. You know, if you're-

Freya India 59:57 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 59:57 ... learning from TikTok, there is no part of, "Hey, why don't we, why don't we sit down? Why don't we-"

Freya India 1:00:02 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:00:02 "I'll, I will give you something," as opposed to, "You will learn from this thing and then go and have to work out what that means and apply it and not be able to ask questions and not be able to regulate with anybody-"

Freya India 1:00:14 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:00:14 "... and not have it contextualized even remotely."

Freya India 1:00:16 Yeah, and your mum isn't trying to get views on TikTok. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 1:00:19 (laughs)

Freya India 1:00:19 So she doesn't need to-

Chris Williamson 1:00:20 Speak for your mum.

Freya India 1:00:21 (laughs) She doesn't need to exaggerate and kind of keep you looking at her channel. (laughs) Um, you know, I, I think that's the problem is there are genuine experts who can help, but they are also subject to the kind of pressures of the algorithm a lot of the time.

Chris Williamson 1:00:37 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 1:00:38 And so they're kind of, I guess, dumbing down what they're saying or make, or presenting symptoms of autism as, as vague as possible-

Chris Williamson 1:00:46 Mm-hmm.

Freya India 1:00:47 ... to try and, uh, so as many girls relate to it as possible.

Chris Williamson 1:00:51 You had this breakdown. Uh, "One of the main causes of unhappiness in the modern world is a culture that presents other people as obstacles. Heal faster alone, work better alone, find freedom alone. It's such a lie. Loneliness is not empowerment." Is loneliness, uh, pedestalized by Gen Z TikTok?

Freya India 1:01:10 Yeah. I think, again, from all different angles. So it's like, the mental health stuff obviously you will feel better alone in some ways because someone... You don't have someone challenging you.

Chris Williamson 1:01:23 Mm.

Freya India 1:01:24 You know, if you do actually have problems from your childhood, um, to do with, say, your parents... I don't want to say an attachment problem, but... W- uh, it is an attachment problem, just the wording has been completely ruined. But if you do have that, you kind of need to be with someone to work on it. Because if you're single, you're gonna feel great, 'cause there's no one kind of triggering you and making you feel anxious and abandoned. Um, so you do need someone in your life in, in that scenario. Um, so yeah, loneliness then does seem like it's extremely attractive because you feel better when you're alone. The same with the productivity stuff. I think it's just the message that's missing for both young women and young men is like, it's actually okay to depend on someone and to need other people. Like, humans have always needed other people, and defined themselves by their ties and obligations to other people. And now we're kind of like, "No, you can, you can be self-sufficient enough, and driven enough, and healed enough that you're okay alone." And I think that's really quite a strong message for young y- young women here, which is like, "The worst thing you can be is needy."

Chris Williamson 1:02:38 Mm.

Freya India 1:02:38 "Like, do not ever need someone. And, and the worst situation for you is to end up with a guy that you need." Like, that's just... You need to avoid that at all costs. And it's, it's a really sad message because it's like, is that not love, to need someone?

Chris Williamson 1:02:51 Mm.

Freya India 1:02:51 And they need you. And it's kind of a beautiful thing, um, to rely on someone and have someone who's dependent on you. And actually, a lot of the actual attachment research shows that... Have you heard of, like, the dependency paradox?

Chris Williamson 1:03:07 Tell me.

Freya India 1:03:08 Um, that couples who are more dependent on each other become more independent in their lives. So there was, like, studies showing that, um... I think they got couples to do, like, games or puzzles, and then they had to fill out a survey of, you know, "How much do you respond to your partner's needs?" Um, basically, "How dependent are you on each other?" And the ones that were more dependent didn't want to hear, like, I think it was the clues or the answers from their partner. They wanted to do it independently.

Chris Williamson 1:03:38 Mm.

Freya India 1:03:39 And then they followed up and they found that the w- the couples more dependent on each other had met their independent goals six months down the line.

Chris Williamson 1:03:47 Why do you think that is? What's the proposed mechanism?

Freya India 1:03:49 Because it's, it's like the original Mary Ainsworth experiments where the caregiver leaves and they kind of measure how the child responds. You need, like, a stable, secure relationship to feel confident to go and explore the world.

Chris Williamson 1:04:05 Mm. Mm.

Freya India 1:04:05 You need to have, like, something to hold onto to step off.

Chris Williamson 1:04:08 Mm.

Freya India 1:04:09 Um-

Chris Williamson 1:04:09 Chaos in both domains is scary.

Freya India 1:04:12 Yeah. Y- you need, like, something to fall back on. And I think that's a big reason why Gen Z are incredibly, uh, risk-averse and not resilient, is because we don't actually have a foundation to fall back on. So if your parents s- are divorced, um, and you don't feel that sense of belonging, you're not gonna step off into the chaos of the world. You're gonna hold back, and you're gonna find relationships threatening. You're gonna find words traumatic. You're gonna be scared by it because the ground is, like, crumbling beneath you, so you can't step off it. Um...

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Chris Williamson 1:05:59 What have you learned? It seems like you've done a good bit of work on the attachment stuff-

Freya India 1:06:04 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:06:04 ... at least in terms of research. What have you learned about what's, uh, real and what's bunk from that?

Freya India 1:06:11 Well, I think, I think it's real that obviously your childhood impacts your adult life. I think that's just plain to see. Um, and I think it's real that you can kind of play that out in relationships that aren't t- you know. So you, however your parents responded to you, you'll then take that into an adult relationship. That seems very obvious. But I think where people go wrong now is they forget that... Like, in the original, um, attachment, uh, experiments and, and the book Attached, it's quite clear that it's, it's not a bad thing to d- depend on someone. And it's, it's not a bad thing to be attached. Like, we are wired to be that way.... whereas I think now where it's going online is, like, um, you have a problem if you're attached. Like, if you, if you're a young woman who kind of dreams of having a romantic relationship and really wants to depend on someone, now we view you as, like, weak. That- that there's something wrong with you if that's your ultimate goal, because we've had it drilled in so much that dependence is a problem. Um, and so you see all these people online saying things like, "Oh, you know, I'm anxiously attached because when my partner feels sad, I also feel sad." And it's like, isn't that just like loving someone? You know, you are affected by their emotions. Or they'll say things again like, "Oh, um, I always put their needs first, so can you train me out of being, like, a people pleaser?" And it's like, we used to just call that love and, you know, that was a trait that we treasured in people, people who put their partner's needs first.

Chris Williamson 1:07:49 Mm.

Freya India 1:07:49 And obviously that can go too far, but I think the problem is now we only pathologize dependence, and we glamorize independence.

Chris Williamson 1:07:58 Mm.

Freya India 1:07:59 And we never say, yeah, that being dependent on someone, having a long-term relationship doesn't mean that you lose yourself. You can actually find yourself through that. Um, but I think girls in particular, young women in particular, have just been told, yeah, the worst thing in your life is to need someone.

Chris Williamson 1:08:19 Do Gen Z have a lot of abandonment issues in that way?

Freya India 1:08:21 Yeah. I think, I think that's where it comes from. And I, that's why it's especially tragic, because you have a lot of young women, for example, whose families fell apart, and then they grew up thinking, "Well, I just want to have that myself. I wanna have a loving relationship and a family." And then they kind of get told, whether it's through therapy culture or some of the feminist stuff online, you- you kind of implicitly get told, um, that's a problem. Like, if you... Again, if- if your dream is to depend on someone, you should work on yourself. "You need to work on your self-love. You need to believe in yourself more. You need to be healed alone." And, um, you think of, like, a normal thinking, feeling young girl, of course she wants to be in a romantic relationship and of course she wants to depend on someone in some way. It's completely natural. Um, but I think you have young women thinking, "Oh, I need to get to a position where I'm confident, completely confident alone, I'm healed alone, I don't have any anxiety. Um, then I can allow a partner in." But I don't see that as the way that people operate. Um-

Chris Williamson 1:09:29 Mm.

Freya India 1:09:30 ... and I think there's a lot of girls now punishing themselves for being emotional and sensitive and wanting a partner and, and wanting to depend on someone, because now the, the image of a strong, independent woman is, is someone who doesn't depend on anyone and who doesn't get emotional, doesn't get jealous, doesn't care. And so you, you also have two contradictory messages, because you have therapy culture saying to girls, "Open up more and more about your problems, you know, be more emotional, um, tell everyone how you feel," but then you also have, "Strong, independent women don't care. You know, they never get emotional. And if they do get emotional, it's trauma or an attachment issue." And it's like, that's a really cruel thing to teach-

Chris Williamson 1:10:11 Ah.

Freya India 1:10:12 ... emotional young girls, and confusing, because it's like, of course they feel that way because they're human. But now they're being told that that's, yeah, a medical issue or something that they should heal.

Chris Williamson 1:10:27 I saw you tweet, "Kids as young as nine are addicted to porn. Girls as young as 13 are using fake IDs to post explicit content on OnlyFans. A third of those selling nudes on Twitter are under the age of 18."

Freya India 1:10:41 Yep.

Chris Williamson 1:10:41 Can you unpack that, please?

Freya India 1:10:44 Well, I think that's, again, a lack of adults. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 1:10:48 (laughs)

Freya India 1:10:48 Um, stepping in. Um, I have this theory I've been thinking about of, like, everyone just accepts now that, that parents are overprotective, so there's, like, the helicopter parenting and the coddling-

Chris Williamson 1:11:00 Mm-hmm. Snowplow. Yep.

Freya India 1:11:01 ... of Gen Z. But I think, like, parents are weirdly... They're not protective enough, but they're also coddling. So they're like, coddle their children but not put up proper boundaries or guard r- There's, like, no rules.

Chris Williamson 1:11:14 Mm.

Freya India 1:11:15 Um, but they're s- over-involved at the same time.

Chris Williamson 1:11:17 Over-bearing in all the wrong areas and-

Freya India 1:11:19 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:11:19 ... totally absent in all of the wrong ones as well.

Freya India 1:11:22 Yeah. So now it's like the only danger is, like, physical danger. It's injury. So, parents protect from injury, but they don't protect from something like their daughters being online and posting, tr- trying to get on OnlyFans. I mean, Jonathan Haidt talks about it when he says kids are overprotective in the real world and under-protected online.

Chris Williamson 1:11:43 Mm.

Freya India 1:11:44 But I think it's slightly more than that, 'cause I don't think parents are totally protective in the real world. Because they, again, they've also, I think, um, kind of internalized this messaging of, "I shouldn't get involved, you know, it's not my place." You know, you think of dads now, I think dads are less protective than they've ever been because they, they can't care about what their daughter wears or where she goes or who she dates because that would be backward. You know, it's her right to do that. But then you look around and you see girls doing that. You see, um, girls, like, selling themselves online to strangers. And I think what has acc- accidentally happened is feminism pushed this idea of, like, girls and boys are just as strong as each other, and then that led to people thinking, "Oh, so they don't need, girls don't need extra protection," which killed chivalry but also killed fathers actually protecting girls.

Chris Williamson 1:12:43 Mm.

Freya India 1:12:44 Um, because the problem is not, like, women are weak. It's that girls are vulnerable. But now we think, "Oh, we should all step back, let girls do what they want."

Chris Williamson 1:12:53 Mm.

Freya India 1:12:53 Um, respect their right.

Chris Williamson 1:12:54 A lot of baby went out with bathwater.

Freya India 1:12:56 Yeah. And now you see-

Chris Williamson 1:12:57 A lot of chivalry went out with patriarchy.

Freya India 1:12:59 Yeah. Well, we, we killed-Good authority. We just killed all authority. And so now you have young women, like, demanding that their universities protect them and demanding that the government step in and, like, staring at someone becomes harassment on the tube because they don't have... We degraded the authority of men they trust-

Chris Williamson 1:13:20 Mm.

Freya India 1:13:21 Like, good men and hopefully, like, their fathers and brothers. Um, we just said, "Oh, all kind of protection is patronizing and we don't need it." But then you leave girls completely vulnerable and looking coddled and loved but actually completely unprotected.

Chris Williamson 1:13:39 There was a great tweet I saw about, um, telling men, telling all men to stop being so pushy doesn't work, because the men who don't need to hear it will take it to heart. And the ones who do need to hear it aren't going to listen.

Freya India 1:13:54 Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it... I- I can't remember where it was, but there was this, like, scheme, um, some young women ran on a train where they had these cards, I don't know if you saw it, where it said, like, it said, like, "I'm being harassed right now." Where you hand it to someone. And so you could go into, I think it was, like, the tube station, you could go in and ask for the cards. And yeah, it's like-

Chris Williamson 1:14:17 Cards-a.

Freya India 1:14:17 ... "Someone is harassing me." Yeah. There was-

Chris Williamson 1:14:19 Cards-a.

Freya India 1:14:19 ... all different ones. I can't remember what they were. But it's like, in that situa- what is that going to do? And it's... That is actually the patronizing thing. Um, and to expect that to protect girls, but we find it off- offensive if a man steps forward and tries to help a girl out. I think it's... We've... Yeah, we've just thrown it all out and forgotten that, that part of the feminist message is right, that girls are vulnerable. Um, but unfortunately it's just led to a situation where we're like, "Oh, vulnerability means weakness, so they don't need protecting."

Chris Williamson 1:14:57 Why are girls under th- as young as 13 using fake IDs to... Are they... Do people want money? Is there a status thing associated with this?

Freya India 1:15:07 Yeah, I think it's a status thing. I think girls are now growing up with influencers being their aspirational figures, as we said. Um, I think it's something like 70% of Gen Z girls aspire to be influencers, or just Gen Z in general.

Chris Williamson 1:15:23 I thought you were going to say OnlyFans.

Freya India 1:15:24 (laughs) No.

Chris Williamson 1:15:25 Okay.

Freya India 1:15:25 Um, but if you look at influencers over the years, they've evolved dramatically. So, like, when I was 13, I would be watching, like, Zoella or someone who's really wholesome and didn't really have the same incentives of the algorithms back in the day, didn't really have the same competition, certainly didn't have, like, monetization of her content. Um, so she wasn't kind of exposing herself or talking about these weird therapy trends or anything like that. But you can just gradually see over the years how it's escalated.

Chris Williamson 1:15:59 Who are some of the more extreme Zoella equivalents now? Or if you don't want to throw names-

Freya India 1:16:06 Well, there's-

Chris Williamson 1:16:06 ... out, you can come up with-

Freya India 1:16:07 I can throw a name.

Chris Williamson 1:16:07 Yeah, yeah. Throw them out.

Freya India 1:16:09 There's, uh, the woman, Tana Mongeau? Um, I can never say her name.

Chris Williamson 1:16:12 Tana Mongeau.

Freya India 1:16:13 Yeah. So she's, like, a really popular influencer who talks about OnlyFans like it's... Like, like there's nothing dangerous about it for young girls or nothing to be worried about. And she'll... She has an audience of very young teens, probably pre-teens. And she'll just post with all the things she's earned from OnlyFans, so all of, like, the designer bags and stuff. Um, on her podcast, she'll talk about being on OnlyFans and, um, I think talking about commodifying yourself like it's completely normal, that is what girls are growing up with. So they're seeing influencers commodify themselves in general-

Chris Williamson 1:16:57 Mm.

Freya India 1:16:57 ... but then commodifying their body.

Chris Williamson 1:16:59 Mm.

Freya India 1:17:00 Um, and also having the nerve to call that empowering. Um-

Chris Williamson 1:17:05 You don't think it's empowering?

Freya India 1:17:07 No. Well, how can it be empowering to, even on Instagram, offer your body for judgment and then put your self-worth into the ranks and reviews that strangers give you? You're turning yourself into a product, effectively. So this talk of objectifying young women, you know, that is turning yourself into an object on display, um, which I think is quite clear to anyone who's not grown up with it. But I, I don't judge the ordinary young woman for thinking that's attractive because that has been her role models throughout growing up. And it's escalated slowly. So it went from Zoella to now OnlyFans influencers.

Chris Williamson 1:17:51 (laughs) Bonnie Blue, Zoella to Bonnie Blue.

Freya India 1:17:53 Yeah.

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Chris Williamson 1:18:54 Why is it that pretty much all of the examples of toxic masculinity from the past-

Freya India 1:19:01 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 1:19:01 ... promiscuity, sexual entitlement, hyper-independence, are all traits that are now regarded as-... boss girl-

Freya India 1:19:13 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:19:13 ... feminist power?

Freya India 1:19:15 I don't know. I think it might be, like, a revenge thing. (laughs) Um, like, I think, I think young women react to the very worst traits of some men by thinking, "I'll just do it back, and that will give me the power." So, they're like-

Chris Williamson 1:19:32 Mm.

Freya India 1:19:33 Uh, maybe they've had a string of relationships where the guy has kind of slept with them and then left or something, and then they think, "Yeah, I'll just do that to the next guy," or, um, you know, they look at the men doing that and think, "Well, they seem very confident and happy, so that's, that's the way to go." Um, I think it's like a defense mechanism of some kind.

Chris Williamson 1:19:55 Mm.

Freya India 1:19:55 And also, I think they're probably also the traits that get you popularity online, so if you look at Tana Mongeau or some of these influencers, uh, they are promiscuous. They're quite masculine. They're quite aggressive in their speech, because people who talk assertively and in extreme ways will just suit the algorithm, you know? If you're like a reserved, timid young girl, you're not gonna be the top influencer on Instagram.

Chris Williamson 1:20:20 Mm.

Freya India 1:20:21 So, I think those traits get rewarded, and then they're what girls are scrolling through all day every day, and they're like, "Oh, my favorite influencer is really, like, vulgar and promiscuous, and she's super assertive and aggressive."

Chris Williamson 1:20:34 That's the path to success.

Freya India 1:20:35 Yeah, and that's... Again, that's the model of, like, the healed, confident woman who's not held back by negative emotion or worry or jealousy or any of these things.

Chris Williamson 1:20:47 Mm, assertiveness is confused for self-assuredness or wholeness-

Freya India 1:20:51 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:20:51 ... completeness, fixedness.

Freya India 1:20:53 Well, also, promiscuity is like... Well, I often think now, if you're like a reserved young woman who's modest, you're now shamed. Maybe not explicitly, but implicitly, people will think there's something wrong with you, because they'll be like, "Oh, no, you are beautiful. You shouldn't be so, like, shy about guys, you know? You shouldn't worry about sex, you know? It's fine." Like, people will reassure her now, as to, like... Like, look at her as if she has a problem that needs healing, rather than she just is modest. Um, and I think that's what tends to happen, is you look at promiscuity become so popular and normalized, and then we stigmatize the girls that aren't interested in that or aren't that way. Um, so yeah. I think if, I think if you are a young woman now who's, who holds back in that way, it's kind of like if you're introverted and people come up to you and say, "What's wrong? You should speak more," and it's just like, sometimes it's just who you are.

Chris Williamson 1:21:56 Mm.

Freya India 1:21:57 Um, so I think it's the incentives again. You're almost punished socially if you're modest and shy and, and not super assertive and masculine, because people think you've got your, like, healing work to do. You need to become more confident and, like-

Chris Williamson 1:22:15 Mm.

Freya India 1:22:15 ... sexual and, like, get rid of all your reservations and, like, repression. People think you're just, like, a repressed person rather than-

Chris Williamson 1:22:24 That everybody should be Tana Mongeau, whatever she's called.

Freya India 1:22:26 Yeah, like she's, she's like released herself of all