Co-Star

0:00 [SPEAKER_00]: I've been engaging in art recently, I saw play on Monday, I saw play yesterday, she believes in a week, I'm feeling pretty good about myself. [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, reducing my reign for creativity. [SPEAKER_01]: Timothy Shalom may be damned, she's going to the theater. [SPEAKER_00]: We're going to the theater.

0:17 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I saw a play called Bayther's, and it was a play that I'm assuming was written quite recently because they were referencing like Bieber, Chella, in it. [SPEAKER_00]: And there was a lot of, it was just like a lot of like hot topic discussions like data centers and anyways, and it was about like a group of friends chilling at someone's lake house.

0:34 [SPEAKER_00]: And the whole thing happens on the dock and they're kind of struggling over how to console this one guy who's like a strange mom died. [SPEAKER_00]: but it was really funny and I had so much fun and I'm really glad I went and it kind of just like reignited my like yearning to be on stage I guess oh yeah you got bit by the bug I got bit by the bug I mean I used to love acting on stage that was like my bread of butter for my entire use basically and then it's like I just feel so disconnected from that part of myself I don't even know if I could do it now like I don't know if I'd be good [SPEAKER_00]: But there's really just like, is nothing like being honest.

1:09 [SPEAKER_00]: I just think there's there's such a difference between theater and film acting and to me at least theater acting feels so much more rewarding because it's like you're kind of like following the momentum and like the temporality I guess of being in this one moment with this audience like it's just the stakes are high and it feels like there's like an energy in the air I guess that is really exciting and you're like carrying with the emotions like the emotions are being carried through to the end whereas in film acting it's like a lot more chopped up obviously.

1:35 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's an adrenaline rush, really. [SPEAKER_01]: Mm-hmm. [SPEAKER_01]: You're in a play. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm in a play, yes. [SPEAKER_01]: So I can attest to this. [SPEAKER_01]: I am doing amateur theater, which honestly is one of the things that like excites me about being in London is that in Toronto, there's not...

1:51 [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, maybe I'm wrong, but I've just never been aware of like a particularly strong amateur theater community and I don't know. [SPEAKER_00]: I was thinking about that the other day because I feel like we were pretty chopped into Toronto's theater scene when we were teenagers, but I don't really know.

2:04 [SPEAKER_00]: I think, yeah, I think it's all pretty professional. [SPEAKER_01]: Or I guess there's like, you know, independent and like people making their own shows, but this is just genuinely like a theater company, it puts on like 16 or 18 shows a year to really old company and people just come in and direct shows.

2:21 [SPEAKER_01]: They have all these like resources, but it's still like it's pretty small scale, and so it feels like being in camp. [SPEAKER_01]: Because like you pay to be a member of your audition and then you're just in the company. [SPEAKER_01]: So it's like going extra curricular and I can attest to like this feeling of, you know, thinking how it's pretty go when I was younger and then actually returning to it and remembering that it's hard and it's intimidating and I tried to audition for like a serious play.

2:49 [SPEAKER_01]: It was an Oscar wild play. [SPEAKER_01]: So it was a comedy but like, yeah, it was like, [SPEAKER_01]: but it's a drama like it's you know and I was so bad like did such a bad job. [SPEAKER_01]: in it was shaking and I've never felt that way ever performing. [SPEAKER_01]: I've never had stage fright that actually like took over me.

3:11 [SPEAKER_00]: I think we've been kind of taken over by all the like neuroses of adulthood honestly. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I look back at that time and I was like, wow, I was so fearless. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I did so much improv back in the day. [SPEAKER_00]: I like loved doing improv and now I go to like an actual improv show to watch.

3:25 [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm like, oh, how do these people do it? [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, no, truly I was just I could barely read the page in front of me. [SPEAKER_01]: I was so nervous. [SPEAKER_01]: And this play that I'm in, I didn't end up auditioning for, I just kind of, they needed somebody in this ensemble, and it's a really silly play.

3:43 [SPEAKER_01]: It's basically like a pantomime, but for Halloween, and I'm playing like four different roles. [SPEAKER_01]: I have one monologue and then like no lines, like a lot of background work really, but she's playing an old man. [SPEAKER_01]: That is my main role is an old man three. [SPEAKER_01]: It's very serious work.

4:03 [SPEAKER_01]: It's a long model, actually, that I have to do. [SPEAKER_00]: That's more than like most bit parts can say, you know? [SPEAKER_01]: You know what, right? [SPEAKER_01]: It's um, the place kind of silly. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know if it's the best written play in the world, but it's a lot of fun.

4:17 [SPEAKER_01]: And it has been, [SPEAKER_01]: I think a good, like, re-entry point into, like, the stage, I suppose, because it is rather than doing something very serious and like, coming in and like, taking yourself seriously, it's like forcing you to just be silly and like, be, I think, more vulnerable.

4:35 [SPEAKER_01]: I think it's more vulnerable, it'd be silly if an emotional, unsage personally. [SPEAKER_00]: For me, it depends. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, yeah, comedy's like really vulnerable. [SPEAKER_00]: Lines that need a laugh. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, that can be very vulnerable. [SPEAKER_00]: I got that. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

4:48 [SPEAKER_01]: But not just comedy, just like being over the top, like being hammy. [SPEAKER_01]: Totally totally. [SPEAKER_01]: I think more preserved prison. [SPEAKER_00]: I find it very... And like, body acting isn't adult. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I feel like I was so willing to throw my body around at that age, call it versus fucking nerds.

5:03 [SPEAKER_01]: But then, you know, it's just interesting to edit, buddy. [SPEAKER_01]: Whatever. [SPEAKER_00]: Now, I completely agree. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I really come to be terrified of public speaking. [SPEAKER_00]: I really don't like it. [SPEAKER_00]: I do it pretty frequently for my job randomly.

5:16 [SPEAKER_00]: And I'll get nervous about it like months in advance, honestly. [SPEAKER_00]: And it'll be like the smallest thing. [SPEAKER_00]: And then I'll have to write everything down that I'm saying. [SPEAKER_00]: I really can't wing it anymore in front of an audience. [SPEAKER_00]: I find it really difficult.

5:27 [SPEAKER_00]: I've usually gotten through. [SPEAKER_00]: And I wonder, I've started to wonder, [SPEAKER_00]: kind of adult stage fry. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, one is, yeah, from my, just like, it's just from the troubles of adulthood, I guess, but also, I think that one of the last plays I did at our high school, it was like, it was a one woman show that got broken up in a three, like, it was me and my two friends and then each one of us.

5:49 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, we basically, the whole show was just monologue, like we weren't on stage with each other really ever. [SPEAKER_00]: And I remember, [SPEAKER_00]: Midway three one of my monologues for the first time in my life forgetting a line like on stage and it was like a split second Like it was a really short amount of time that I forgot it, but it felt like a year like I was sitting there and I remember just my I could hear my heart beating [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, oh fuck what's the line and I was blanking and I just have never had a worse feeling, truly.

6:16 [SPEAKER_00]: And I managed to pick it up like it. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think anyone even noticed, but since that I've had the fear of that, like, coming back on stage, I guess. [SPEAKER_01]: And so now I write everything that out of course, that would be terrifying. [SPEAKER_01]: How's that around you?

6:29 [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know. [SPEAKER_01]: I think I've... [SPEAKER_01]: If it did, like, I think I was pretty good at improv, not to brag, back in the day. [SPEAKER_01]: But I don't really remember, I do remember, making people cry in my grade 12 show and being like, this. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think this is the greatest feeling in the world.

6:53 [SPEAKER_01]: I did have that moment in grade nine. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I did a monologue and people in my class. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I cried. [SPEAKER_00]: I cried. [SPEAKER_00]: I think I just got like swept up and did something. [SPEAKER_00]: I got like really overwhelmed and I just started kind of sobbing in my like, remember the slice of life monologues?

7:06 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and then people cried. [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, oh, I'm a genius. [SPEAKER_01]: It's a, and this is like why people like actors are the most annoying, like, inseparable whereas people in the world is that like, [SPEAKER_01]: It is so gratifying to force emotions out of unsuspecting people.

7:26 [SPEAKER_00]: Me, yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Or, like, what's worse is what you think you're doing, and you're not, but you're like, you really are like, wow, I'm cooking right now. [SPEAKER_00]: My recent extracurriculars that I've been doing driving lessons, which I have at driver's license, I have half a license from Toronto in Canada, Americans, we have to do two tests, which I actually think is pretty valid, like one test is a road test, where you drive around the road, and then the second test to get your like official license is a test on the highway, where you do drive on the highway.

7:55 [SPEAKER_00]: For some fucking reason in America, which is the land of highways, they don't test you on that, which I think says a lot because when I'm on a highway here, I'm like, what the fuck? [SPEAKER_00]: People are driving like psychos. [SPEAKER_00]: Anyways, I scammed my way into a full license in New York.

8:09 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I just traded in my Canadian license for a full license because it is the equivalent of a full license here. [SPEAKER_00]: And so I was like, okay, well now that the pressure is off to do a test, I don't have any tests to do. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm just going to take lessons as I go. [SPEAKER_00]: And the first lesson I did at like last month, I was killing it.

8:25 [SPEAKER_00]: Like I was like, oh my God, I'm amazing. [SPEAKER_00]: My instructor was like, you're a really good driver. [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, I know. [SPEAKER_00]: I can't believe it. [SPEAKER_00]: This time, I showed up in kind of a weird mood. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I don't know why. [SPEAKER_00]: I was just in a bit of like a distracted mood.

8:38 [SPEAKER_00]: Horrible, horrible. [SPEAKER_00]: I have not driven worse. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think ever. [SPEAKER_00]: It was like truly astonishing. [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, I don't know if I could be trusted behind the wheel. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I'm a distracted driver. [SPEAKER_00]: I have a lot of trouble taking in, I'm saying this like people are listening to this probably who've been driving for like 10 years and they're like, what?

8:55 [SPEAKER_00]: But like a lot of trouble taking in the entire panorama of the front of the car. [SPEAKER_00]: Like it's really hard to just take in all of the things in front of you in the car. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: I was also driving like my neighborhood was really busy at the time, like all these cars or double parts, pedestrian, it's New York.

9:11 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, you know, so I'll give myself some credit there. [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, it did really acknowledge my confidence. [SPEAKER_00]: It knocked me down to beg. [SPEAKER_01]: Is this like a compelling case against funding arts education? [SPEAKER_01]: Is that really like, isn't there nothing like making people cry on stage and then we're like guys?

9:28 [SPEAKER_00]: I can't believe it. [SPEAKER_00]: It's really overwhelming when you look at the window. [SPEAKER_00]: No, but I think maybe maybe Hannah, if I was feeling more confident and like, you know, maybe if I had that muscle of being confident in front of people, I could also be confident behind the wheel.

9:40 [SPEAKER_01]: You know, so you should do an improv course. [SPEAKER_01]: Is there a peptide for confidence? [SPEAKER_00]: Probably, where you could just like take and fed a means or something. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know. [SPEAKER_00]: Everyone I know here does a lot of outerol. [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe all searching outerol.

9:53 [SPEAKER_00]: Everyone does it, but me. [SPEAKER_00]: I feel kind of left out. [SPEAKER_01]: I think if you don't want to drink coffee, then you should maybe not do outerol. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, we'll copy actually because that's my stomach. [SPEAKER_00]: We can't even get into this. [SPEAKER_00]: I started drinking coffee for the first time in 10 years.

10:09 [SPEAKER_00]: I was ripping it every day. [SPEAKER_00]: And then my colon was like, girl, no. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, my intern, my bowels were like, no, something like, like, you would be just all doing that. [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe in fact, it means actually it's like a smart alternative for you. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, maybe I should just start doing that.

10:23 [SPEAKER_00]: Look, you know what? [SPEAKER_00]: We'll talk. [SPEAKER_00]: My speed freak. [SPEAKER_00]: All right. [SPEAKER_01]: And on that note, I'm Hannah, and I'm Maya. [SPEAKER_01]: And this is Rehash, a podcast about the social media phenomena that strike a nerve in our culture, only to be quickly forgotten, but we think are due for a revisiting.

10:42 [SPEAKER_01]: We've decided to switch things up, so we're going to be posting on a bi-weekly schedule now and you can catch us wherever you listen to podcasts every other Monday. [SPEAKER_01]: Starting your week out, great. [SPEAKER_01]: If you like our show and you want to hear more from us, you can support us on Patreon at patreon.com-rehashedpodcast where we have monthly bonus episodes, weekly mini episodes, and early access to a regular programming.

11:07 [SPEAKER_01]: If you don't want to join the Patreon, feel free to rate and review us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts because that helps us out a lot. [SPEAKER_01]: Maya, Henny, what's your sign? [SPEAKER_01]: Virgo. [SPEAKER_01]: And how many times in your life have you found yourself in like a social function with bunch of strangers and had that question brought up?

12:00 [SPEAKER_01]: True, accountless, I would say. [SPEAKER_01]: And when the group gets talking about astrology, like, how are they engaging with it? [SPEAKER_01]: Are they talking about it seriously? [SPEAKER_01]: Or is there like a bit of seetuousness in their tone? [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, it really depends.

12:14 [SPEAKER_00]: I have some friends who take that shit so seriously. [SPEAKER_00]: Who talk about it in like pretty matter of fact turns? [SPEAKER_00]: Like, they're like, this is just standard. [SPEAKER_00]: This is the bar. [SPEAKER_00]: But then, I know people... [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, who are a little more joking about it, but the only kind of be ironic about it, but it's like, you know, they care, you know, yeah, I'll have these conversations, but it's just very surface level, like my knowledge of the signs is very like, oh, Gemini's are too fast, or vergo's are anal, or tenta, which is so true, or like, let's just, or like, everyone likes them.

12:47 [SPEAKER_01]: Is that the thing about Libras? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and then there's like, I have this thing about Sagittarius women. [SPEAKER_00]: I have a lot of close, all the women in my life have been close to me, but have been kind of like domineering or Sagittarius women. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's like actually crazy, like all of them.

13:00 [SPEAKER_00]: And many of them, who were not my family members, I fall in out with. [SPEAKER_00]: And so I have a thing about Sagittarius women that I find fascinating, regardless. [SPEAKER_00]: I was saying it's like usually, it's never like two facetions. [SPEAKER_00]: I feel like it's always either sweet and service level or like someone really fucking cares and they're tatted.

13:18 [SPEAKER_00]: They're tatted. [SPEAKER_01]: They've got the baby bang to be a septum ring. [SPEAKER_01]: They got that biojell set, you know. [SPEAKER_01]: It's like not even just a normal biojell set. [SPEAKER_01]: Like there's something for you going on with it. [SPEAKER_01]: There's like a [SPEAKER_01]: No, that is my point exactly.

13:44 [SPEAKER_01]: I think talking about astrology brings a surface a lot of the complicated nuances about belief as a contract, because people who say they don't believe in it, still probably have a few, either horoscopes they've read, or they're like, that's crazily accurate, or like you're saying they've noticed patterns in people in their lives and those science.

14:07 [SPEAKER_01]: all of my best friends for the most part of earth signs. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm especially drawn to vergos. [SPEAKER_01]: I tend to go crazy over Aquarius men. [SPEAKER_01]: Like air sign men in general, but like Aquarius men kryptonite for me. [SPEAKER_01]: I have really strong distinct bonds with Scorpios who are across the chart from Taurus's, because that's Taurus.

14:31 [SPEAKER_01]: And like that's hot, that's hot. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I told my mom that a guy I'm seeing, he's born in November, and my mom was like, Oh, so he's like fiery, so like he has spice, and I was like, no, no, it's late November, so, you know, calm down. [SPEAKER_01]: Like November would make a misogytares that is fiery.

14:50 [SPEAKER_01]: And I know, oh, is that a terrorist fire, slime? [SPEAKER_01]: Sogytares is a fire sign, yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I don't know anything, then. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, you know enough, you know enough that you know that a Sagittarius is a thing and that people, you know, have the side and that's most people's relationship to astrology.

15:08 [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I only know about the signs that are impacting my life and like, I don't know about Libras. [SPEAKER_01]: People like them, that's all I know. [SPEAKER_00]: And I really like the Libras of my life, they're so nice. [SPEAKER_01]: What's the one? [SPEAKER_01]: It's not, oh, cancer is Pisces, like I don't, who are you?

15:24 [SPEAKER_01]: Cancer is a very emotional. [SPEAKER_01]: Pisces is my dad. [SPEAKER_00]: It's not, so I don't think. [SPEAKER_01]: Sorry, so you line up with Scorpios. [SPEAKER_01]: No, it's like we have, it's like an intense bond. [SPEAKER_01]: I think sometimes have an intense bond with the person who's signed as I cross the trifle from you.

15:43 [SPEAKER_01]: This is also like, while I'm saying all of these things out loud, I feel embarrassed, even though it like some you believe them. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, no, no, no, there is enough anecdotal evidence in my life to prove it, but I'm also, [SPEAKER_01]: And like, oh god, people are going to listen to me talk this artistly about astrology.

16:00 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, it's cute. [SPEAKER_00]: Hannah's coming out as someone who loves astrology. [SPEAKER_00]: Everyone please be respectful. [SPEAKER_00]: She's been really closeting it for years. [SPEAKER_00]: I have to say, you know, it's been a whole year of her like really repressing. [SPEAKER_00]: I think she just needs to be yourself.

16:13 [SPEAKER_01]: That's so kind of your support means the world to me. [SPEAKER_01]: I would say, I almost everything about my vibe gives a girl who's into astrology. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't really think that that's a secret. [SPEAKER_00]: That's so not true to me. [SPEAKER_00]: I just know you're too multifaceted for me to like I know every facet of you that it's like I don't I can't see it with an archetype.

16:34 [SPEAKER_01]: So you're saying I can't be summed up a simply a tourist. [SPEAKER_01]: Definitely not. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like barely true, but, you know. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, so, oh my god, okay, once I get into this episode and I'm talking about the flaws with believing in astrology, this is all gonna sound like really hypocritical, but I'm in a funny position here and just to say, tourists is ruled by Venus, which is the planet of beauty and love.

17:04 [SPEAKER_01]: And so maybe I'm not materialistic in a traditional sense, [SPEAKER_00]: It's okay. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know if you had like a fur covered image of David Hasselhoff on your wall for years. [SPEAKER_00]: It's hard for me to be like, Hannah loves beautiful things, capital B. [SPEAKER_00]: I feel like you like actually distinctly love kitchie things.

17:27 [SPEAKER_01]: I love kitchie things, but I think kitch can be beautiful. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, but you look a love for the things that are kind of like unbeutiful on purpose. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I feel like you love that. [SPEAKER_01]: But I hate aesthetics that are intentionally like ugly or gross. [SPEAKER_01]: That's true.

17:44 [SPEAKER_00]: Hannah and I also have been to a lot of our museums together. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, thank you. [SPEAKER_00]: So, but I mean, I mean, not that that qualifies is like you just like beauty. [SPEAKER_00]: It's interesting. [SPEAKER_00]: You don't like the Renaissance period. [SPEAKER_01]: I do, I just find it repetitive.

17:58 [SPEAKER_00]: That's valid, yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, no, I'm not trying to say that you don't like beauty. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm just like, yeah, again, these traits are too, like, they're too flattening. [SPEAKER_00]: Anyways, tell me more. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, no, I mean, that would make sense because this sort of idea of archetypes that are represented by each sign.

18:15 [SPEAKER_01]: I think because astrology itself is such an ancient practice, I mean, [SPEAKER_01]: literally has history rooted in ancient times across the globe in different societies, being used for different things. [SPEAKER_01]: We take for granted the idea that these archetypes that are assigned to each of these signs are as old as the practice itself.

18:37 [SPEAKER_01]: But sunsign astrology, which is what we in the West, like mostly practice today, like this modern sunsign astrology, [SPEAKER_01]: a newer form of the practice, and specifically Horoscopes, like the monthly or weekly Horoscopes that you would read in a newspaper, which is most people's first introduction to astrology in general, that started in 1930 when Princess Margaret was born.

19:09 [SPEAKER_01]: Basically a British newspaper hired an [SPEAKER_01]: where he predicted that she would live in a vengeful life, which, yeah, likely she's a princess. [SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes those pictures were bored. [SPEAKER_01]: That's true, but you know, I think he took a pretty safe swing in the dark there.

19:33 [SPEAKER_01]: That was the first time someone had like published like a newspaper horoscope and the popularity of the column. [SPEAKER_01]: led him to get a regular column where at first he was like predicting things for people born within that week, and then he turned it into like a weekly horoscope for readers based off of their son's sign, which the son's sign is the sign most people would be familiar with.

19:59 [SPEAKER_01]: It's the one based off of like the month he were born in, basically. [SPEAKER_01]: And from there, newspaper horoscopes took off and other newspaper started replicating it until it became sort of a common place as classified ads or When was last time I read a newspaper? [SPEAKER_01]: What else is in a newspaper?

20:19 [SPEAKER_01]: Of the Sunday Funnies? [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: The sports section. [SPEAKER_01]: The sports section. [SPEAKER_01]: And new ones. [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, that. [SPEAKER_01]: But by the mid to late 20th century, astrology got absorbed more into the world of new age, thinking, men's spirituality, which you're familiar with, obviously.

20:41 [SPEAKER_00]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: Sorry, I don't know why it's so hard. [SPEAKER_01]: You are. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I'm woo, it was bug. [SPEAKER_01]: You're not that woo. [SPEAKER_01]: I love Eastern medicine. [SPEAKER_01]: Which is honestly on the scale of things like that's that's fine. [SPEAKER_01]: That's fine.

20:58 [SPEAKER_01]: The new age movement for people who aren't my year was basically like a hotspot of esoteric, alternative and eastern practices that then like white people in the west sort of started taking bits and pieces from for like enlightenment and personal growth and over the course of like the 70s and 80s got really absorbed into this sort of self-help obsession that everybody had.

21:24 [SPEAKER_01]: So, people would be doing meditation and then like gestalt therapy and breaky healing and like it didn't matter that these were all from different places and cultures and whatever. [SPEAKER_00]: Bob and Ted and Carol and Alice are Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice I think it's the name the movie was like Natalie wood and oh my god our queen fuck.

21:48 [SPEAKER_00]: Diane Cannon she's just a wonderful death drop. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, Queen of the Pot. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna say I love her. [SPEAKER_00]: Anyways, that movie is so I feel like it's definitely satirizing Early like new age culture. [SPEAKER_00]: They like start the movie at this this like a Retreat where everyone's like holding each other and crying and like talking about their feelings Like in a way that just feels so new because it's in the sixties Fules so um, prototypical of what was to come and then they try and do that polycule shit You know, it's like it's they really were protecting something [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, truly.

22:19 [SPEAKER_01]: It's fascinating reading and watching things from around that time, because like I just finished Harper and Nora Afron's book which is set in the 70s and everyone's gotten analyst watching Woody Allen films. [SPEAKER_01]: It's the same like everyone's gotten analyst. [SPEAKER_01]: Sorry cancel me [SPEAKER_00]: Lots of things about like people being in group group therapy and deeply New York also Super New York everyone else here in a way that like know where else truly.

22:47 [SPEAKER_01]: I Have a grandfather who studied Gustal with the Esalon Institute and a grandmother who had a white Buddhist wedding so like So Rachel getting married and Rachel getting married. [SPEAKER_00]: It's a white woman in a black man and they got married and like sorry [SPEAKER_00]: They're just not just because they like it.

23:05 [SPEAKER_00]: I remember looking it up into like wait I might think something here and it's like nope. [SPEAKER_00]: They just wanted to do that. [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm like cool Go on. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm fine. [SPEAKER_00]: Really because oh, I don't care where you're sorry I'm that's fine [SPEAKER_01]: Okay.

23:23 [SPEAKER_00]: Perfect. [SPEAKER_00]: Now that I have your permission, I've had friends who ask me if it's okay to wear a sorry to an Indian wedding. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm like, this is gone too far. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, of course you guys. [SPEAKER_00]: I also just, I love that you're the spokes. [SPEAKER_01]: That's how white our friend group is, that you're the spokes person.

23:37 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, I've been the token, any of all of my photographs, yeah, it's pretty funny. [SPEAKER_01]: If you people will think of this, they're like, Yeah, so astrology is one of these, you know, practices that have long histories and like wider uses that just get absorbed into this sort of self-help world, this sort of attempt that people were having at this time in history, too.

24:05 [SPEAKER_01]: find something beyond themselves, find some kind of greater meaning to things. [SPEAKER_01]: And honestly, like, our understanding of it in the West hasn't really changed from that. [SPEAKER_01]: It really doesn't have a lot of the same like divination or pre-scientific like purposes. [SPEAKER_01]: It really is about the self at this point.

24:26 [SPEAKER_01]: My year calls it the religion of the self. [SPEAKER_00]: She's quoting me with a quote, I don't even fully remember saying. [SPEAKER_01]: Really? [SPEAKER_01]: We talked about it on here on like a mini-sode. [SPEAKER_01]: I was like, yeah, I think I'm getting into astrology and you're like, I think astrology's just the religion of the South.

24:41 [SPEAKER_00]: Damn, I'm fucking, it's like, this is when I would write exams. [SPEAKER_00]: I would write like a three hour exam. [SPEAKER_00]: You write like three as long, more or less. [SPEAKER_00]: I'd like questions. [SPEAKER_00]: And then I would not remember writing. [SPEAKER_00]: It truly, I just like black the fuck out.

24:51 [SPEAKER_00]: And then I go, I get my exam back. [SPEAKER_00]: And I look at it and be like, man, I'm good. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like every episode I kind of forget completely black out and then like like completely forgot all the information Uh, I'll be like fires. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, if anyone tries to like ask me what I said five episodes, it'd go I'd be like No clue people try and like bring up old episodes to me like what we said on it and like uh-huh [SPEAKER_01]: Uh-huh.

25:15 [SPEAKER_01]: It's just really the same and like I that that's been replaced by something else in my head and not like I really don't It's really like bad. [SPEAKER_00]: It's bad the way my brain works. [SPEAKER_00]: It retains information long enough to like spouse it to the masses and then completely blacken it so anytime I'm like asked about it It feels like I'm being quizzed.

25:30 [SPEAKER_01]: It's a lot of information and a lot of it is kind of useless [SPEAKER_01]: totally, but no, no. [SPEAKER_00]: I do think it is a religion of the self for sure. [SPEAKER_00]: As like the West has done with everything like the West's definitely mutilates most things into being about selfhood and individuality.

25:46 [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, because if it wasn't, there would be nothing to buy, you know what I mean? [SPEAKER_01]: Well, also like, the fact that this was, you know, happening a lot like during peak, yuppiedum of like the 70s and 80s, it's also just like the [SPEAKER_00]: Well, yeah, and if you don't have like a good surface level construction of your selfhood companies, won't know who they're selling to.

26:09 [SPEAKER_00]: It's like a consumer data thing, you know? [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: OK, I'm getting kind of like tinfoil hot. [SPEAKER_00]: Go on. [SPEAKER_01]: No, I love it. [SPEAKER_01]: Keep it up. [SPEAKER_01]: OK, in recent years, astrology, I think you could say, has undergone a bit of a makeover.

26:23 [SPEAKER_01]: My Yute, you've used co-star, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I actually deleted it really recently and I thought about you, Hannah. [SPEAKER_00]: deleting it right as Hannah's about to do this astrology apps up. [SPEAKER_00]: Feel symbolic. [SPEAKER_01]: There are some really good reasons to delete co-star.

26:38 [SPEAKER_01]: I am anti-co-star, but totally. [SPEAKER_01]: As a former user, can you describe it a little bit? [SPEAKER_01]: Oh my god, it has a gorgeous interface. [SPEAKER_00]: I'll just say that. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, you hit me with this Sarah font on anything honestly, and I'm like, oh, a nice, like, somewhat textured background.

26:54 [SPEAKER_00]: It's just beautiful. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, it's like, [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, they have the serif text, which we can talk about the accessibility of that another time, but like kind of grayish serif text, they have these like beautiful graphics, kind of like they look like their hand drawn. [SPEAKER_00]: And basically to start the app you put in, you know, your birthday, you put in the time of your birth, which luckily I know because I was born at night on a Friday, which I think is really cool.

27:16 [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it's why she's such a party girl. [SPEAKER_00]: No totally unlike I'm so cool. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you put it in and then it then kind of like can assess what your birth chart is and so it'll tell you your son It'll tell you your moon horse go, and then I'll tell you your rising horse go so for example I'm a Virgo son a Capricorn moon and a tourist rising.

27:43 [SPEAKER_00]: I've no idea what that means [SPEAKER_00]: But I know that they're all listening to, I don't know, I don't know, she's playing dumb. [SPEAKER_01]: She's playing dumb, she's playing dumb. [SPEAKER_01]: I know. [SPEAKER_01]: I know. [SPEAKER_01]: Did you about it before? [SPEAKER_01]: No.

27:54 [SPEAKER_01]: The fact that my years big three are all earth science makes so much sense to me completely. [SPEAKER_01]: She's the vergar, she's incredibly anal. [SPEAKER_01]: Wait, is it tourists moon or rising? [SPEAKER_01]: It's a rising. [SPEAKER_01]: That's interesting, sort of rising is like the mask you kind of wear to the world, and so I think that does sort of make sense because You can be quite stubborn and all over listeners think I'm a bitch, which I'm not.

28:21 [SPEAKER_01]: No, you can be stubborn, but you're not actually a stubborn as I am to be honest. [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, I'm really stubborn. [SPEAKER_00]: If I have an opinion that everyone's like you're wrong or they disagree with it, I'll just dig my heels. [SPEAKER_00]: Like even if I like, there's some kernel in my head that knows that they're wrong, I'll still, you know.

28:37 [SPEAKER_01]: But I think like in a general sense, I'm stubborn and like, I will for years just like decide something and like not, like I can stuck in my ways. [SPEAKER_00]: You're a little immovable about certain ideas, I think maybe. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, which I think that you're actually deep down way more open to like trying to figure out the best idea.

28:55 [SPEAKER_01]: You know what I mean? [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, I think, so maybe you're like surface level stubborn, but I think that that capricorn deep inside of you is actually very practical and is like trying to find solutions to things. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, I love Hannah, I miss her. [SPEAKER_00]: Anyways.

29:12 [SPEAKER_01]: Whereas I'm I'm a leotaurus sandwich so my rising is a leot Leoturizing is like I think I dressed like a leot like I like funky things and then I'm a bit more actually like reserved a bit more I think of a homebody in the middle like in the torus and then in my deep heart I'm like a leot again, or so I'm actually very dramatic and intense [SPEAKER_00]: We're both pretty dramatic.

29:38 [SPEAKER_00]: We actually have a lot more in common than we think we do. [SPEAKER_00]: I think just surface level hand is like more shy than me, but otherwise I think we're pretty similar a lot of ways. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, there's a reason we're friends. [SPEAKER_01]: I would pause it. [SPEAKER_00]: And once again, I'm wondering if anyone wants this interesting.

29:53 [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe just only the most Paris social of people. [SPEAKER_00]: Well, I just love that the astrology apps Ep has also turned into us dissecting ourselves. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, this is the thing is that like again, I gave a warning, it's gonna sound really hypocritical because I'm guilty of all of this, but I still think it's worth interrogating and to interrogate myself, which I guess, again, is self interrogation.

30:14 [SPEAKER_01]: But what can I say? [SPEAKER_01]: I'm a product of this culture that I grew up into. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that is true. [SPEAKER_01]: You log on. [SPEAKER_01]: It does give you your main three on because our but it actually gives you more than that. [SPEAKER_01]: It's like an in depth birth chart they use AI and NASA data to like generate these birth charts and then new or has it all been like that.

30:40 [SPEAKER_01]: No, so that Kostar has used AI from the beginning. [SPEAKER_01]: I think obviously our idea of like what AI is has changed. [SPEAKER_01]: Now that AI has become a thing, whereas it's using like machine learning to like generate something, I think that was being used in various capacities on different apps, but Kostar has always like made that part of its brand.

31:04 [SPEAKER_01]: Like, [SPEAKER_01]: I think it was trying to be at the forefront of the fact that it was using AI when that felt really futuristic. [SPEAKER_01]: Is it like AGI? [SPEAKER_00]: It's AI, like, because it's like open AI, like it predates. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's not. [SPEAKER_00]: It's not.

31:18 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: So Kostar does have a chat bot, which we'll talk about later, that came out more recently, but it was using AI and what it called AI before that. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay. [SPEAKER_01]: I think also the use of the term AI combined with the fact that it's like producing NASA data.

31:39 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: And it's a whole sleek modern design to me, at least, feels like a way of trying to take this concept of astrology from this sort of new age, woo, woo. [SPEAKER_01]: cookie and with, you know, beaded curtains kind of vibe into something that, you know, you're millennial who worships Steve Jobs and works three unpaid internships can like get behind.

32:07 [SPEAKER_01]: The founder's a woman, right? [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, she has no background in astrology like her background is in fashion. [SPEAKER_01]: She's working at V files. [SPEAKER_01]: I just think there's like a type of woman who's like kind of adjacent to Silicon Valley who has that vibe. [SPEAKER_00]: Who's like kind of?

32:24 [SPEAKER_00]: Well, that's not the way to spiritual. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, yeah, which we kind of talked about in the rationalist episode, but like, this is the type. [SPEAKER_00]: The new age and Silicon Valley, we talked with this also with Deadhead. [SPEAKER_01]: Like that is those are two very overlapping histories.

32:39 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you see the men in their G-Lays, you wouldn't think so, but it has roots in, I guess, quote-unquote Bohemia. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, before tech was taken over by the G-Lay where it was a bunch of, want to be, like, hippie, beaten egg types. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: It wasn't stupid to scow.

32:54 [SPEAKER_01]: Because you've got to do a lot of acid before you can come up with some of that shit. [SPEAKER_01]: Steve Jobs dated Joan Bias. [SPEAKER_01]: Steve Jobs was a deadhead. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: I think even though there is that overlap in order to take something that is mostly in the domain of like slumber parties in middle school or people who are living in vans off the beach and make it something that's, I'm more quote unquote like rational thinking every day person is going to actually like believe in or be [SPEAKER_01]: Ben Uglare, who is the creator of Kostar, did something really smart by trying to brand it here as more scientific and as a bit more like chic.

33:43 [SPEAKER_01]: It made astrology feel more factual, I suppose. [SPEAKER_00]: I wonder it also how much that has to do with millennials just being this cohort that's pushed into corporate life because Bohemian life is unsustainable now like I wonder if it's because it's also like a young people thing and because so many more young people are working these professional managerial jobs.

34:02 [SPEAKER_00]: We need to find out how to market this thing to people who are looking to be a little more straight-laced because they like can't really have even a forward to be. [SPEAKER_01]: that, or I think it's people who are more corporately minded because they were raised into that and because, yeah, that's in necessity.

34:19 [SPEAKER_01]: But then when you are so focused around the corporate, like you're still a human being and you still have these needs that you need to fulfill, [SPEAKER_01]: And if you're not attached to like traditional theology and you don't have any kind of other outlet to find quote unquote meaning and you're not doing something that feels meaningful to you outside of making money, then I think and we'll talk about this a bit more later, but like I think that's the appeal to it.

34:46 [SPEAKER_01]: But [SPEAKER_01]: At the same time, we're a generation that feels very self-aware or how things are presented to us. [SPEAKER_01]: So in order to get us to get behind something that has typically been seen as silly and fake, it was necessary that somebody with this background in fashion, in design, and tech was coming in and repackaging it.

35:10 [SPEAKER_00]: Lord knows it worked on me. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, it worked on all of us. [SPEAKER_01]: I remember people being like, yes, I have an astrology app, but it's so different from reading the newspaper or astrology, whatever, because it's really based off of science and it's in depth and it's not just like, oh, maybe you don't relate to your son's sign, but that's because you haven't unlocked all the other ones, and you need to really understand it.

35:33 [SPEAKER_01]: And it had a social feature, so you could compare your entire chart to your friends. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, that was like a huge selling point. [SPEAKER_01]: And it's smart and like she got this idea because she birthed her she birthed. [SPEAKER_01]: She gave her friend a birth chart for her newborn baby.

35:50 [SPEAKER_01]: And was like, hey, wait a minute, we could do that. [SPEAKER_01]: So she and a team of people from V files got together and made it. [SPEAKER_01]: So the app launches in 2017 and by 2019 apparently has like five million global users and millions in funding from Silicon Valley. [SPEAKER_01]: And then let's say I'm year in 2019 a plethora of similar horoscope apps like the pattern and sanctuary.

36:15 [SPEAKER_01]: also launched, which caught the attention of like tecturnalists who were trying to figure out if like astrology in the new age was going to be the next big thing. [SPEAKER_01]: Khosar leads the charge and the app becomes viral because of its bizarre daily push notifications are you familiar with these?

36:34 [SPEAKER_01]: No, because I never have pushed notifications on for anything. [SPEAKER_01]: So it would be like your daily vibe and then it would say something like don't use big words [SPEAKER_01]: start a cult or bake cookies today. [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, yeah, yeah, I've truly nonsense. [SPEAKER_01]: So it's like people were meaning it on Twitter and stuff like completely ridiculous.

36:53 [SPEAKER_01]: It's based off of whatever's happening in the planets and your birth chart. [SPEAKER_01]: They're like, AI is just like generating out. [SPEAKER_01]: Like, they've prewritten this copy. [SPEAKER_01]: but then the AI is selecting it and sending it out to you and they'll send you repeats it's just like their use of AI is interesting because it seems like it's a lot of like human writing that is then put into this machine like their own copy because they have a really small team it's like eight or ten people and then the AI is like generated it.

37:25 [SPEAKER_01]: the copy itself is like supposed to sound more relatable and human than maybe traditional astrology has been like as if you're chatting with your friends about it like what we were just doing but often it is also just non-sensical and does read like AI word salad like [SPEAKER_01]: I checked mine today and it was telling me I was experiencing luck in sex and love and underneath it wrote diplomacy is less importantly than truth.

37:53 [SPEAKER_01]: What comes flying out of your mouth surprises even you, which I don't know what that has to do with either of those things or anything. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you haven't said anything particularly a landage to me today. [SPEAKER_00]: In our designated 20-minute catch-up call. [SPEAKER_00]: No, or when we were having sex, um, yeah, exactly.

38:16 [SPEAKER_01]: So the advice or predictions you'll find on Cossar, like vague and meaningless enough that if you look hard enough, you'll be able to find what you're looking for, basically, in any of it. [SPEAKER_01]: which we were sort of hinting at is kind of the point of astrology in most people's lives.

38:33 [SPEAKER_01]: I know you're very smart and logical because you are a triple Earthside Maya, but have you ever found yourself turning to astrology for some kind of like guidance or answers or wisdom at all? [SPEAKER_00]: Not particularly, I mean, when I start dating someone new, sometimes I'll go on the Google.

38:51 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'll go on the Google and I'll put in, yeah, it's on some random generator. [SPEAKER_00]: I'll just put in like, or to, you know, vague sunscience and see what happens. [SPEAKER_00]: But honestly, no, I think like the clothes that's come for me is when I was really going through it with like my PMDD.

39:07 [SPEAKER_00]: There was like a really long time where my period was lined up with the moon, like the full moon, and that I've actually found like, [SPEAKER_00]: really comforting. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not aligned with it anymore, which, you know, bums me out. [SPEAKER_00]: But I felt like it could kind of explain for me.

39:21 [SPEAKER_00]: When you're PMS, saying a lot of the time out, especially if you have bad PMS, there's like a certain buzzing within your body. [SPEAKER_00]: Like a really intense restlessness that makes it really hard to sleep. [SPEAKER_00]: you feel like kind of shaky all the time and on edge, just really, really, like, unstable.

39:35 [SPEAKER_00]: And that kind of helped me because it was like, oh, full moons in gender, this, like, this atmosphere of restlessness and so everything's a little off and the energy is buzzing. [SPEAKER_00]: And so I think that helped me, but that's like, not really that relevant, I guess. [SPEAKER_00]: But that's the closest I've come to kind of using some sort of, like, astrological things to feel, like, I'm healing some part of myself, I guess.

39:57 [SPEAKER_01]: Again, I don't understand, I'm not a woman in STEM. [SPEAKER_01]: Don't know the science enough to fully explain it. [SPEAKER_01]: But I often do think, well, the moon controls the tides where 90% water, like women's menstrual cycles are impacted by the moon or the tides or something, right?

40:15 [SPEAKER_01]: One of them, both. [SPEAKER_01]: I think the moon impacts the tides, which is right. [SPEAKER_01]: And the tides impact menstruation. [SPEAKER_00]: I think the moon impacts tides and menstruation. [SPEAKER_01]: That sounds so stupid. [SPEAKER_01]: But to me makes sense, I mean, like, I get really sensitive also to the full moon.

40:35 [SPEAKER_01]: It makes me a crazy, it gives me like this jolt of like energy, or intensity. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think it's because, and again, I guess it's not quite the same as the straw jelly. [SPEAKER_01]: It's kind of related to it. [SPEAKER_01]: But I do think that like when I've had moments where I am, [SPEAKER_01]: perhaps more inclined to indulge in my curiosity with astrology.

40:56 [SPEAKER_01]: It's at moments where I'm feeling otherwise crazy. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like an anchor, you know. [SPEAKER_00]: It's a it's a important storm. [SPEAKER_01]: That and I think it's it is something maybe if I have moments perspective it is this sort of general feeling of like what when I'm feeling crazy is what I also feel the most connected to like the universe.

41:16 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, totally totally. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, okay, like we could look at it as port in the store and we could look at it as like mirage in the desert depending on what you think I'm No, I agree. [SPEAKER_00]: I think it's I don't know. [SPEAKER_00]: I like the boo-boo sign of me does really believe that there is something happening in the air There's something going on and I think I think Yeah, as a woman I feel very yeah, I feel pretty tied to the earth in a way that makes me [SPEAKER_00]: feel good about myself, you know, as well as the cosmos.

41:43 [SPEAKER_00]: I think it just gives us also like, okay, if we're gonna be fucking bleeding once a month and like losing our minds and going into borderline psychosis, like the least we can have is this idea that there's like some higher purpose to it, I guess. [SPEAKER_00]: That there's a reason that this is happening to me and not just like, okay, this is like the condition of being a woman is that like shit sucks.

42:01 [SPEAKER_00]: all the time. [SPEAKER_01]: It's interesting you say that because so back in 2019, co-stars website used to say that it allows irrationality to invade our techno-rationalist ways of living because like, yeah, most of us like, we download it and we're like, I just need to have some kind of like other thing to believe in or maybe like that when you're like checking it to sign in to check it.

42:30 [SPEAKER_01]: Secondary superstition. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, she's pulling a door no out on our houses. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, babe because he wrote a 70-page article about horoscopes Let's get frank for it with it True So he writes about how like the average person who is engaging with astrology isn't someone who like actually believes in the occult But they do just accept its existence and they use it as needed so you know He compares it to something like [SPEAKER_01]: psychiatry or political parties or symphony orchestras.

43:03 [SPEAKER_01]: He's like, this is just like a part of our lives now. [SPEAKER_01]: And like, you can just kind of go in and out. [SPEAKER_01]: But like most people aren't full-fledged believers. [SPEAKER_01]: So it's not like you're like somebody who sees ghosts or something. [SPEAKER_01]: And on the surface, that feels fun and harmless.

43:20 [SPEAKER_01]: He characterizes astrology in like particularly horoscopes as this authoritarian cloak layered over traditional mental health and advice columns, which he says rather than promote human like agency within the reader the way maybe one of those things would horoscopes allow us to take up this passive position and like maybe fulfill this subconscious desire to be passive.

43:47 [SPEAKER_01]: by leaving our fate up to the stars. [SPEAKER_01]: So what you're saying, it's when you're like I feel [SPEAKER_01]: inexplicably horrible or crazy. [SPEAKER_01]: Even though like perhaps you could actually trace the reasons behind like, oh well live a PMS disorder and it's being triggered by this and whatever and the medical system isn't like investing enough time or research into like helping women's lives who face this, you could go or maybe Mercury's in retrograde and the moon is in [SPEAKER_01]: That's what I do all the time.

44:25 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think like, I mean, I almost find this similar to the types of therapy that really spend a lot of time digging into people's past and using those things as explanations for why we are the way we are in kind of like an innate way. [SPEAKER_00]: Obviously not all forms of therapy do that, but there is like a pretty large contingent of people who like go to therapy and kind of like, well, cherry pick events from their lives to like explain their own behavior, which to me feels similar in the way that it's like, you're relying on something that you have no control over to explain why you are the way you are.

44:55 [SPEAKER_00]: And in those forms of therapy, I feel like that's a way to kind of like really entrench yourself in your own behavior. [SPEAKER_00]: And it feels like sometimes with astrology, that's also the case. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I do think some people use it as a reason to like justify aspects of themselves that they probably actually do have the ability to change.

45:12 [SPEAKER_00]: There's also people who use it in dating too. [SPEAKER_00]: Like the way that they talk about astrology is like completely immutable. [SPEAKER_01]: Me. [SPEAKER_00]: Like facts. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, but it's not like there are people who are like who will be like, [SPEAKER_00]: I won't date this type of person because this is their sign.

45:26 [SPEAKER_00]: Me? [SPEAKER_00]: You don't actually employ that, though. [SPEAKER_00]: You don't employ that. [SPEAKER_00]: If you met someone who you were getting along with and it was like, uh, I don't know who's the opposite of you. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, in Aquarius, if I'm getting along with someone and then if I'm not there in Aquarius, I am not going to stop it.

45:39 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm just going to go, that's not going to end well. [SPEAKER_00]: And the other has, you have other people who won't even like start it, you know what I mean? [SPEAKER_00]: I feel like a lot of men really don't like women who are into astrology. [SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes I'm like, okay, that's what just massage me.

45:51 [SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes I'm like, it's about it, because some of these girlies are like, yeah, I feel like it's almost like a misreading of the point of it to a degree. [SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes. [SPEAKER_00]: Sorry, I'm just thinking about like the agency and the world having no, like we just don't understand why we're here.

46:04 [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know. [SPEAKER_00]: It's hard for me to like, obviously play in people either, because it's like we don't know why we're here. [SPEAKER_00]: We don't really have religion that much anymore. [SPEAKER_01]: He calls it disoriented agnosticism, which I am like bars. [SPEAKER_01]: He's like the intellectual attitude, it is expressive of, is of disoriented agnosticism.

46:22 [SPEAKER_01]: He's like honey, I think you're confused. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, he was like the cult of God has been replaced by the cult of facts and because astrology is also like supposed to be based off of the stars and these ancient like versions of sciences for the like rational quote unquote thinking person who has become removed from religion is no longer believing in God.

46:44 [SPEAKER_01]: But still needing to be fulfilled like we were talking about earlier. [SPEAKER_01]: This is sort of something that they can at least like half-heartedly Get behind but again all kind of new age thinking. [SPEAKER_01]: He's like this is making you look inward and it's making you look for solutions in The wrong direction because we don't want to do the work of interrogating the systems that are making us feel like we have no agency [SPEAKER_01]: Like he's like, yeah, you don't have a ton of agency but that's because of like structural and institutional issues and not because of like the cosmos.

47:19 [SPEAKER_00]: Well, yeah, I think it's just like the culture of looking inward is a really helpful distraction. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like a politicization of the self that completely erases the politics of belonging to the group. [SPEAKER_00]: And kind of kind of can cause divisions within the group because it's like, oh, I don't get along with those people because they're this, you know, totally putting ours in boxes Like what's gonna happen during like a revolution if we're like, he can't be the leader of the revolution.

47:42 [SPEAKER_01]: He's a fucking Aquarius Yeah, well, when I would not trust an Aquarius to be the leader of a revolution Wait, what was a door now? [SPEAKER_01]: Should we look it up? [SPEAKER_01]: That's so funny, yes A door no birth day Hmm [SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god. [SPEAKER_00]: Whoa. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay.

47:58 [SPEAKER_00]: What? [SPEAKER_00]: Aquarius? [SPEAKER_00]: He was born in 1970. [SPEAKER_00]: He was born around on on on on on on on on on on on on on on on on on on on on. [SPEAKER_01]: Wow, it's all making sense, you know. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, he's so per go. [SPEAKER_00]: He's so, he's a bit of me. [SPEAKER_00]: That's why I agree with him.

48:13 [SPEAKER_00]: Well, this is making sense. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, totally classic, irrational, anal Virgo. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like this episode is two girls being indoctrinated into astrology. [SPEAKER_01]: Um, fuck, that got me. [SPEAKER_01]: They're just so funny because your reason you see similarities is because you both agree and your takes against astrology.

48:35 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: But what you were saying with the revolution is worth noting because basically the whole thesis of what Adorno was getting at in this paper is that the quote unquote rational persons willingness to open themselves up to an irrational system such as astrology because it's fulfilling like our desire for passivity is priming us to fall victim to other kinds of irrational systems [SPEAKER_01]: which is basically what he was worried everything was going to lead to, but basically he was like, this is like a one of the ways our culture is making as more susceptible to authoritarian powers because we're kind of accepting things to be handled for us instead of just dealing with them.

49:22 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and like you could say that the people who are the messengers of horoscopes are like astrology, like that's a lot of power in their hands too, like you are kind of listening to a figure of authority in a way. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and he was criticizing like he was basing this off of the Los Angeles Times horoscope column, and he's really critical of the way it's written because it is being cloaked.

49:42 [SPEAKER_01]: in this language that makes it seem like it's coming from somewhere beyond the human. [SPEAKER_01]: Like, the person writing it is just a messenger. [SPEAKER_01]: That's how it's presented, but ultimately, like, this is human interpretation. [SPEAKER_01]: And it is, yeah, like you're saying a lot of pressure, I suppose.

49:56 [SPEAKER_00]: And I do think a lot of fascism is kind of like a top-down authority telling you who you are. [SPEAKER_00]: Obviously, that plays more into, like, telling the group who they are. [SPEAKER_01]: based on like a national identity, but yeah, and just, you know, the idea that things are like pre-ordained, and like your Liberty is just basically whether or not you choose to accept it or, you know, fight against it.

50:20 [SPEAKER_01]: Jumping ahead to this century when astrology apps had their big boom in 2019 and all these like tech journalists were trying to figure out why do you have any theories about like why 2019 would sort of re-spark an interest in something like astrology considering everything we've just said Trump.

50:42 [SPEAKER_01]: Unfortunately, that was one of the more common answers given yes. [SPEAKER_00]: One point out, but yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Like, co-star is publicly launched in 2017. [SPEAKER_01]: Guller says that she was inspired by the Trump election to leave fashion and do something more meaningful by launching co-star.

51:09 [SPEAKER_01]: This is around the time where people are kind of turning into more holistic and like new age forms of wellness. [SPEAKER_01]: And tech was kind of starting to catch up. [SPEAKER_01]: But I think even before that, like, this was a big moment for like meditation apps, like those had a boom right before astrology apps, like new age kind of recoming, not recoming, coming back, but like through tech.

51:34 [SPEAKER_01]: Also, there's this idea of [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, God, what's it called? [SPEAKER_01]: Fatalism, kind of a bit as well, where again, it's like people like turn to fatalism in moments where they're not really trusting the systems. [SPEAKER_01]: And there was all this assurance that Hillary Clinton was going to beat Trump in the election.

51:54 [SPEAKER_01]: And the electoral bodies would do what they should, but then obviously, [SPEAKER_01]: He won, not by popular vote, and everyone was taken aback by the fact that he had this victory and so you're not necessarily trusting all of these bodies and these sources that you maybe would have before and I think perhaps the ideas that that might also turn people towards other ways of seeing the world or have them look for answers.

52:26 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, in a time where you feel like you lack control. [SPEAKER_01]: you could probably like link any trend back to the Toronto Trump selection if you really wanted to like that and to make up that relying about the trend of this podcast and yeah basically but what do you think like about this astrology's growing popularity correlating with like what is a general global rise in fascism like [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, like, obviously, I don't think it's co-star specifically to me on this.

53:02 [SPEAKER_00]: I think it's like app culture in general. [SPEAKER_00]: I think that the ways that we're like, tacitly signing off our own personhood to these like tech companies. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, we can sit here and be critical all we want of these organizations, but ultimately it's like, we are all willingly signing off our data at all times.

53:22 [SPEAKER_00]: to these companies who are surveilling us and like we really were barely trying to fight that. [SPEAKER_00]: Like we're really not. [SPEAKER_00]: I do think because we have such individual relationships with our phones. [SPEAKER_01]: They're like extensions of ourselves. [SPEAKER_00]: They're extensions of ourselves.

53:35 [SPEAKER_00]: They're hyper-customized. [SPEAKER_00]: Like it's like you don't think of your phone as your enemy. [SPEAKER_00]: You think of it as like yeah, your limb almost a proxy for your own mind. [SPEAKER_00]: So I wouldn't necessarily blame co-star for all of that. [SPEAKER_00]: I think that's [SPEAKER_00]: but he I do think he's predicting something totally like I I think he's right it's just that I think it's happening in like a more broad sense yeah it's interesting too because it's like these apps are using like our individual data but it's like eventually what this is going to be used for is is to control the masses [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I don't know when the Frankfurt School were extremely concerned about people operating as a mass, because of the way that you can be controlled.

54:12 [SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's exactly what's happening here. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like, we are all doing the same thing. [SPEAKER_00]: We're all giving our data away. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's being used to kind of predict these major trends. [SPEAKER_00]: And I don't know where I'm getting at this with.

54:23 [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, no, no. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I agree. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, my friends were giving me a hard time because they were like, I refuse to get a period tracker app because I was like, I don't want my phone to know such personal information. [SPEAKER_01]: They're like, you gave your astrology app like your time, place, and like, [SPEAKER_01]: whatever of birth like you are you're you're you're not exactly like keeping things low key online totally like where we draw the line is pretty arbitrary it's deeply arbitrary I mean it's like when I when I accept cookies and when I don't you know it's like depending on like what we would have been.

54:58 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's like in my feeling lazy as fuck, or in my being, you know, briefly diligent. [SPEAKER_01]: I agree with you. [SPEAKER_01]: I kind of, for me, I think it's also, if we're thinking about like, aside of just fascism, but the system of like AI, like an AI takeover, we're like the growing prevalence of that.

55:17 [SPEAKER_01]: I think [SPEAKER_01]: we were talking about this in our episode on rationalists. [SPEAKER_01]: And I do kind of feel like this is a spiritual sequel to that episode. [SPEAKER_01]: I brought it up in that episode, but the sort of irrationality of AI, which is presented to us as this very rational voice, is something that in even considering the links between Silicon Valley and the new age, [SPEAKER_01]: perhaps it's priming us to indulge in one kind of thinking maybe priming us to that indulge in the other, because it is irrational things being sold to us as rational, and also not for nothing, but the prevalence of AI within these apps is not to be ignored.

56:03 [SPEAKER_01]: not just to kind of generate a birth chart but now they're all adding their own chatbot features which basically lets you like consult a robot astrologist which for all of the things we want to talk about with the fears of what you know listening to horoscopes might do to us. [SPEAKER_01]: At the very least, like you were saying, it's human interpretation.

56:25 [SPEAKER_01]: Like there's a human element to it, whereas this is a robot's interpretation on something that is like pseudo-scientific and pseudo-speritual. [SPEAKER_01]: And to me, especially when we think about right now, like the weird relationships people are building with their chat bots, people who are having psychotic religious breaks.

56:45 [SPEAKER_01]: because their chat bots have convinced them that their God or the bot is God. [SPEAKER_01]: To me, it feels a bit like dangerous, like to be messing around with this, to be having like AI have like the capacity to like, [SPEAKER_01]: give people this kind of advice or analysis. [SPEAKER_01]: And I tried out two different chatbots from astrology apps, first I did co-star as I mean.

57:10 [SPEAKER_01]: And co-sars is like you ask, it's called the void. [SPEAKER_01]: So co-sar is like usually all white background, but the void is like a black background. [SPEAKER_01]: So it feels like you're not a space. [SPEAKER_01]: Whoa. [SPEAKER_01]: and it gives you like you can ask it questions and it'll give you like a few like example questions but you can ask it whatever you want so I was like okay who's my soul mate and then the void wrote your soul mate doesn't exist because you won't let one exist you chase brilliance then suffocate it with demands for consistency [SPEAKER_01]: People aren't puzzles to solve, your attention turns critical when the spark fades.

57:46 [SPEAKER_01]: Stop looking for someone to fill your gaps. [SPEAKER_01]: The person who stays isn't the one who completes you, the one who tolerates your restlessness while grounding it. [SPEAKER_01]: You don't need a perfect match. [SPEAKER_01]: You need someone who's weirdness you're willing to endure and vice versa.

57:59 [SPEAKER_01]: Except the mess. [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm like, that the way it's talking to you, based off of, I guess, your chart and the data from that, is like, as if like your closest friend, like that's how your closest friend would analyze you, like the specificity of this sort of characterization, versus, you know, reading a newspaper horoscope feels really innocuous.

58:22 [SPEAKER_01]: They're like, hey, Taurus, you're stubborn. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I miss those. [SPEAKER_01]: This one is... [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you got an hyper-customized thing of your phone being a limb. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: It's just an extension of that, basically. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, that was like one thing, but then I spoke to the pattern, which is another one of these apps.

58:41 [SPEAKER_01]: Sounds like a Netflix dating show. [SPEAKER_01]: The pattern? [SPEAKER_01]: Well, that's so funny because the woman who created the pattern is also not an astrologist. [SPEAKER_01]: She had a production company. [SPEAKER_01]: She was a YouTuber who then made a production company and then sold it to Disney for millions of dollars.

58:57 [SPEAKER_01]: All right. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: So, their top-ought [SPEAKER_01]: is like more of just a regular chatbot and you can also ask a question. [SPEAKER_01]: So I was also asked it who is my soulmate and then it gave me like multiple paragraphs long answer. [SPEAKER_01]: They didn't even mention like my chart.

59:14 [SPEAKER_01]: It had nothing to do with astrology. [SPEAKER_01]: It was just like basically felt like robot therapy. [SPEAKER_01]: It'll ask you a question after and then you give a follow up and again it's like talking to me like it knows me. [SPEAKER_01]: So while I know that like for people who've actually used chatbot [SPEAKER_01]: like the design to work that way, but there's just something about it in this like space that was, I don't know, I think spirituality and like belief are really complicated and could spark like a million like philosophical debates, but I do think that even if maybe people don't necessarily view astrology as a sacred belief the way like normal theology would and a door note like criticise people who choose something like that over regular theology,

59:57 [SPEAKER_01]: I still think there's something really perverse to me about using this type of technology within this space, but maybe that's wrong, I don't know. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, also people who are like, yeah, that's what ChaP wants to do. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like, okay, yeah, maybe you're a little too used to this.

1:00:12 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, maybe you're a little too comfortable with this idea. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I think people who don't use it are like, yeah, it's weird when you do use it because it is weird. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, just because that's how it's designed, doesn't mean it's not fucking weird. [SPEAKER_00]: Not that old.

1:00:27 [SPEAKER_00]: We can't be like this used to it, you know, we're adapting like too easily. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I agree. [SPEAKER_01]: I think Adorno's point about like disoriented agnosticism really stuck with me. [SPEAKER_01]: Thought that was a great line, but also because he's already with us in 1957, but like that's only gotten more and more true as times progressed.

1:00:48 [SPEAKER_01]: And I think especially now [SPEAKER_01]: You know, replace the cult of God with the cult of facts, but it's like the cult of like tech, and like the cult of something that is so, like the voids actually a great name for that AI, because that's what it kind of feels like out there. [SPEAKER_01]: It's like cold.

1:01:07 [SPEAKER_01]: It's unfeeling, and so now we're trying to humanize it, and like we've decided to move our entire lives online, and now we need to find meaning in that as well, and so we're like, I don't know, trying to find God in like a chatbot. [SPEAKER_01]: I think at the point, I think the chatbot is supposed to be [SPEAKER_00]: call them God, you know, like I think that's what the whole idea of it is.

1:01:26 [SPEAKER_00]: It's like this omniscient thing that gives us, I don't watch it purpose or tells us what to do when we feel like lost and confused. [SPEAKER_00]: I have the reason we feel lost and confused is because I took our drops, but you know, that's the greatest trick the devil ever pulled. [SPEAKER_00]: Something something.

1:01:56 [UNKNOWN]: Thank you.