Please Send Gossip
Or, I really don't want to be perceived rn, thx.
For a refresher on what JFT is, tap your sweet lil’ thumb here. Thanks for reading, it makes me happy to be doing this again on a regular basis. Also happy one month! Look at us go!
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If I’m being honest, all I want to talk about are other people’s problems.
The last five weeks for me have been filled to the brim with self-reflection, inner work, and overall attempts at self-improvement. And to be frank, I am feeling pretty over it. Not in a way where I think said work was or is pointless and I just don’t want to do it anymore, but I’m feeling more than a little drained by myself. I think anyone who is actively working on themselves gets to this point, probably more than once or even semi-regularly. I’m really over talking about myself, my problems, the things I can stand to improve upon. I would rather talk about literally anyone else, please and thank you.
Two terms I called myself on TikTok that got a lot of love were that I am A) a professional opinion haver and B) a person with chronic just my two-cents syndrome. While yes, I am patting myself on the back for the wit of it all, it’s also deeply honest. I have an opinion about everything. I will chime in about anything. If you ask and I think you can handle it, I will jump at the opportunity to tell you what I think.
Which combined with my current self-exhaustion means that nothing sounds more appealing to me than solely focusing on other people’s issues, someone else’s shit, anyone else’s anything. Marital problems in the suburb where my best-friend lives? Let’s pop down on the sectional and dive in. Friendship tension between someone in my circle and someone else who I’ve literally never met? Can’t wait to discuss whether or not they should get hit with the unfollow. Workplace drama at a company I am unaffiliated with? I am armed and ready to insert myself as much as you’ll let me.
I’m self-aware enough to understand that a huge part of this self-improvement fatigue is just growing pains. Taking care of yourself is hard, often un-glamorous, and frankly tedious. It’s also, at times, super fucking lonely. And I know it will pass. I know there’ll be a time when I’m on the other side of it. Everything passes.
But at the moment I’m just done with it. Over it. Stick a fork in me I’m cooked. I don’t want to examine why my parents hurt my feelings on an ongoing basis, I don’t want to talk about the root of my fear of abandonment. I don’t care to look internally at why or how or what has led me here as the person I am today. No more, no more, no more.
For now just give me all the gossip. All the tea. All of the adult drama. Let me escape from being the focal point and instead fixate on issues that have nothing to do with me. The sweet, sweet relief of focusing on someone else, for a change.
I’ll get back to my own problems soon.Something I think we’re on the precipice of is seeing a huge pushback in putting children onto social media.
The Ruby Franke case had my undivided attention all of last week.
If you’re not familiar here’s a quick summary:
Ruby Franke is a mother and content creator from Springville, Utah who was arrested last week along with her business partner, Jodi Hildebrandt, on several felony counts of child abuse, neglect, and torture. Franke came into the public eye via her YouTube channel “8 Passengers” where she documented life with her husband and their 6 children. She’s been under scrutiny for quite some time for not only her insanely strict and allegedly abusive parenting methods (she regularly would say the children had to earn “food privileges” and even at one point took away her son’s bed for months as a punishment) but also what many said was exploitation of her children. Franke’s entire online persona was about her family and she filmed and uploaded very personal moments like her daughter’s first time shaving her legs or trying on a training bra.
Earlier this month Franke was arrested after her 12-year-old escaped through a window and went to a neighbor’s home for help. The police report documented both he and his younger sister (who was found in the Franke home) were extremely malnourished to the point of being emaciated, and had open wounds on their bodies, and injuries from duct tape around their wrists and ankles. Franke’s four minor children are now in the care of Utah’s DCFS while she and her business partner are in prison with no option for bail. Franke’s husband, Kevin, had apparently not lived in the home for over a year. Her sisters and oldest daughter have expressed relief over the arrests stating that “it needed to happen.”
The Ruby Franke case is one of the worst case scenarios when it comes to children as content. Unfortunately though, hers is not even an outlier.
In 2019 YouTuber Machelle Hobson of Arizona was arrested on 30 counts relating to child abuse. At her channel’s peak she had over 800,000 subscribers. The adopted children in her videos described absolutely terrible physical and sexual abuse that would occur if they refused to be in the videos or didn’t “perform” enough. Taylor Frankie Paul, a TikTok mom with over 4 million followers, was arrested in February for domestic violence while a child was present. She only reached a plea deal as of a few days ago. And we all know about Dee Dee Blanchard.
While all of these cases are extreme and absolutely horrific, I think they’re part of a larger conversation that we’re only in the beginning stages of having societally.
Which are:
What are the ethics about putting your children online? And what are the aftereffects and ramifications of doing so?
One of the problems with influencing as an industry as a whole is that it cannot evolve at the rate the internet can. So while it is trying to catch up as a business, things are continuing to develop and change and evolve online at a rate that is next to impossible to predict. This leaves influencers and creators unprotected and continuously navigating new waters in way more “traditional” media does not.
In traditional TV and film, child performers have the Coogan Act to ideally protect them from exploitation and abuse. The state of California has several laws and regulations enacted to attempt to protect kids in Hollywood ie: obtaining a legally required work permit, education laws, and required supervision. The laws around putting your kids into your digital content do not exist. It’s left up to the parent’s/caregiver’s discernment. The state of Illinois is currently the only state with any legislation pertaining to kids online, and it’s only about their potential earnings, not anything to do with protecting them from an ethical standpoint.
In the age of the attention economy I think the two most valuable things we have as people are 1) the ability to decide where we give our attention and 2) the ability to decide whether or not we ourselves want attention. The right to privacy and to controlling your own digital footprint is something I think about regarding children of Very Online People™ a lot. Not only because the idea of having Google search results tied to your name before you can vote or drive seems deeply overwhelming and immoral, but because they’ve never had agency. Imagine having something as important as your personal digital history be completely out of your control. That would send any of us into a tailspin—we’d probably try to sue anyone who did that to us for slander—and yet there are hundreds if not thousands of momfluencers literally making their money doing exactly that.
I am fully convinced we are maybe a year out from an adult child of a mommy blogger suing their parents for exploitation. I’m honestly shocked we haven’t had more who have tried to get legally emancipated. And I think we’re only going to see more and more studies about the detriments that come along with being put online at a young age. I think all of the above are an inevitability.
A natural product of working in digital strategy, specifically in social media, is I spend a lot of my time thinking about social media. But another natural product of being in any industry is when you see how the proverbial sausage gets made it starts to become unappetizing. I can tell you story after story after story about why social media has the potential to be horrible. Of how it’s ruining our ability to consume media critically and with any semblance of literacy. Of how businesses will purposefully exploit your children and use them without your knowledge or consent in their ads without a second thought. Of how if you’re going to be on it, you should really try and learn how it works so you can be an informed user and consumer.
And if you’re too young to be an informed user and consumer, it’s my opinion that it really is no place for you.
What are the ethics about putting your children online? I don’t think we have a definitive answer. But I do think if you’re doing something that takes away your child’s future right to privacy and agency you kind of have at least PART of your answer.
And what are the aftereffects and ramifications of doing so? I think we can point to the Ruby Frankes of the world and the kids beginning to speak out as evidence that being in your content is really nowhere for a child to be.Yesterday, Alison Roman hard launched her marriage.
I could not respect this more. A relationship kept completely private until you’re married? Icon behavior. 10/10. No notes.
I was going to ramble about the idea of being perceived and how I think there’s so much value in having things for yourself and no one else but I said no notes so I’m leaving it with no notes. I’m obsessed with this—and the fact that she had buckets of caviar, potato chips, and crème fraîche all over the place at her dinner/reception. Iconic moves all round.The following section contains spoilers for potential upcoming seasons of HBO’s ‘The Last of Us.’ You’ve been warned.
I’m replaying The Last of Us: Part II for the first time since the game came out in 2020.
To say that TLOU2 ripped me open and shredded me would be an understatement. I played through the 32 hours of gameplay in 3 and a half days and it was all I could talk about for a solid month. After putting the controller down while the credits rolled I had to go for a half hour walk to process what I had just experienced. I talked about that game in therapy. It shattered me.
I’m taking my time this time around. I’m not bingeing. I’m trying to find every playing card, every coin, every piece of lore. It’s been about a week and I only just reached what was probably the most shocking part of the first play through. After the golf club, of course. (Sorry, I had to.)
The section where (you) the player switch POVs and take control of Abby after playing through approximately 15 hours as Ellie has long divided the gaming world. Let me preface this with a couple of things.
THIS IS WHERE THERE WOULD BE SOME MAJOR SPOILERS YOU ARE WELCOME FOR WARNING YOU TWICE.
Anyone who did not see Joel’s fate coming has not only A) never seen a single movie or read a single book but B) fundamentally misunderstands the world of TLOU. The world of TLOU does not allow for avoiding the consequences of your actions. When you make a choice, you will deal with what comes after. It is a huge plot point and play through point and…just point of the story Naughty Dog is trying to tell you. This is a man who was a ruthless, brutal, and often unapologetic murderer. And furthermore, I don’t know that either Part I or Part II are meant to have happy endings. To have Joel living out a peaceful life in Jackson with nothing from his past coming back to haunt him or hunt him would be the antithesis of the world they exist in.
Plainly put, Joel got from Abby exactly what he would have done to her if the roles had been reversed. And it surprises me that so many people were…surprised by that story choice.
While it’s not without flaws I think the POV switch to Abby is one of the more genius and bold choices I’ve seen in gaming. I remember standing up and having to take a pause when I realized who she was, who her family was, when I saw the obvious callback with her and her father and the zebras to Joel and Ellie with the giraffes. I would not call myself an Abby apologist, I would call myself an Abby enthusiast. I think her whole narrative and story is brilliant. Brilliant brilliant brilliant.
And bigger than that, if you really think about it, Abby accomplished what Joel and Ellie arguably could not.
She got redemption. She forgave. She moved on.
A lot of people believe that the point of the first game and the first story is to tell the story of Joel’s redemption arc. And I don’t think you can really make that case when the man literally opted to remove the possibility of a cure from humanity. But that lil’ moment aside, I never saw the story that way.
Joel never cared about redemption or forgiveness or righting his wrongs—he was always clearly going to do what felt best for him, for Joel. The story of Joel is a story about what we are willing to do for the people we love. Even if, in the end, it costs us the happy ending. Even if it costs us them. Even if it costs us ourselves.
A few hundred words or so ago I said I don’t think happy endings exist or are meant to exist in the TLOU stories thus far. But in saying that I was forgetting about this moment:
If you finish The Last of Us: Part II and let the credits play, the title screen previously featuring Ellie’s lonesome little boat in Santa Barbara will change to this boat, which has reached the Catalina Island Firefly post.
In moving on, in letting go of the hatred of the rage, the only happy ending I’ve seen so far is (potentially) Abby’s.
It’s a moment that reduced me to absolute tears the first time I saw it.
I can’t wait to see it again.Happy Soup Season, To Us All.
To know me, is to know that I am to my core, a soup girl.
The bowl is the superior vessel for consuming things. The spoon is the superior utensil. A warm bowl of soup that someone made you is, to me, a love letter.
I love soup. In all forms. I love a pureed soup, a chunky soup, a soup that needs a cracker. The second the temperature drops below 80, I’m ready to break out the dutch oven and make a large batch of some type soup. Pozole, butternut squash, chicken and dumplings, chili, clam chowder, lasagna soup, roasted tomato, Alison Roman’s (Mazel, again!) bean stew. I love them all.
I think I’m at a point on the aforementioned “healing journey” (gag) where I just want things to feel comfortable. To feel like a hug. To feel empathetic and warm and safe. Putting on jeans feels abrasive. Overhead lighting or even too much sunshine stresses me out. I just want things to feel soft. To feel gentle. To feel comforted.
So even though it was still warm AF out today, I’ve decided it’s officially soup season. It’s only bowls (in more ways than one) season. It’s every blanket on the couch season. It’s sweatsuit season. It’s showering with the lights dimmed at night season. It’s find a good movie and stay in season. It’s read nothing but fiction that helps your brain feel calm season. It’s cider season. It’s light all of the candles and make something that needs to simmer for several hours season.
After a summer filled with retrogrades, it’s what we deserve.
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One last thing. Not to be that person who pushes things out that I think you should buy because I really hate capitalism but I cannot live without these bra tops from Target. I have some titties and can wear them as an actual top and they’re so comfy and cute and wash well and they’re like $10. K bye I love you.