Geoff and Georgie react and discuss an arguably sensationalist article, dumping on everything from outrage tactics, to unfair criticisms of internet interactions, and yes even Kim & Kanye feature in this episode.
Geoff and Georgie react and discuss an arguably sensationalist article, dumping on everything from outrage tactics, to unfair criticisms of internet interactions, and yes even Kim & Kanye feature in this episode.
✍🏻 View the transcript for this episode
Hot topic article: https://thewalrus.ca/more-is-more-the-end-of-minimalism/
Social media
Toast & Roast:
Georgie:
Geoff:
Geoff 0:00
Hi, and welcome back to another episode of Toast & Roast. I’m your co host Geoff, and I’m here with my co host Georgie, as usual.
Georgie 0:09
Hello.
Geoff 0:10
How’s it going, Georgie?
Georgie 0:12
It’s going alright, a bit tired today, but I’m sure we’ll we’ll have something to roast today, right?
Geoff 0:17
Yeah, I think we’re gonna dive, I guess into this article that you shared with me. So you’ve read this article, and I haven’t read this article. So this is going to be a live kind of reaction from me.
Georgie 0:34
To be fair, I don’t think I, I may have skimmed it to some extent, because I may have had some opinions about it as I was reading, but I also formed a stronger opinion by the end I think so.
Geoff 0:51
Okay.
Georgie 0:51
Yeah, let’s well, we’ll go into it a deep dive,
Geoff 0:55
I guess. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so the article is called “More is more: the end of minimalism”. And this triggered Georgie so we’re gonna have to talk about it. “Marie Kondo’s decluttering dominance is over, make way for maximalism, where the more stuff the merrier”. That’s a very, what do you say? Yeah, it’s a triggering statement—
Georgie 1:23
A big claim.
Geoff 1:24
A big claim. “So last January, shortly before the WHO declared COVID 19, a pandemic Sotheby’s in New York put together what was supposed to be the modest auction of a dead interior decorator’s things”. That’s kind of weird.
Georgie 1:44
Yeah.
Geoff 1:44
Okay. Mario Boyata rose up in the 1980s as the prince of chintz, whatever that means, blah, blah, blah, blah in a manically floral over stuffed, country house, blah, blah, blah, okay, this guy has some furniture that people want to sell.
Georgie 2:01
Pretty much.
Geoff 2:02
Next up, they had an auction for it. Excellent. And interesting. “An imperfect porcelain tureen shaped like a bunch of asparagus, estimated at between 2000 to $3,000 went for $25,000”. You know, this kind of stuff, it kind of like—
Georgie 2:25
Goes over your head?
Geoff 2:26
On a different tangent. About you know, the art world and how people perceive art as this thing to simply collect because they can brag about how much they spent on it. And my friend’s wife, she does a lot of art pieces. And, and yeah, deals with this kind of stuff where you know posers come into the gallery. And they just want to, they just want to wank off by pay, by purchasing art for ridiculous amounts of money.
Georgie 3:02
Right?
Geoff 3:02
This is what it reminds me of, this is ridiculous.
Georgie 3:05
So what that reminds me of is actually like, it’s saying it’s estimated between 2000 to $3,000. And but it went from a lot more than that. Which reminds me of, I think we might have mentioned this in a previous episode, about the, the cost of something is very different to the value that someone gives it. So obviously, whoever purchased this thing, imperfect porcelain tureen, I don’t even know what terrain is, by the way.
Geoff 3:33
Yeah, let’s have a look at what a tureen is.
Georgie 3:35
So this person was willing to spend $25,000—oh is that a teapot? Okay.
Geoff 3:42
It’s like a teapot. Yeah.
Georgie 3:44
Okay. So they wanted, they were fine with spending $25,000, on, on this teapot, and for whatever reason, that was, like, I’m not gonna judge them right. They were obviously fine to spend that much money. They thought it was worth a lot of money. What they were gonna do with it, I have no idea. But I mean, you can say the same thing about many other just normal item, normal knickknacks, or everyday items, right? Someone might think that something is worth a lot of money, but someone else might not think so. And I mean, I would not buy a tea—okay, so I like tea, but just assume it’s a teapot. So I like tea—
Geoff 4:25
It looks kinda like a teapot, but also not, like it’s like a little—
Georgie 4:31
Receptacle?
Geoff 4:32
It’s just a container with a lid on it. Maybe some have spouts. Look at this. This ceramic.
Georgie 4:39
Maybe that’s what it actually...
Geoff 4:42
Okay, yeah, I get what you mean. We shouldn’t judge people for what they value.
Georgie 4:46
Yeah.
Geoff 4:47
For like something that’s valued at $3000.
Georgie 4:48
But let’s just say yeah, let’s just say it’s like a teapot because like, to me it looks like a teapot, like I like tea. But the most I’ve spent on a teapot is probably like 50 to $70. And like, yeah, I was into I think I bought it from Muji even. It was like a nice glass teapot with like, the strainer was just made of plastic, but because it was made of plastic, tea leaves didn’t so much get stuck in it as compared to, like stainless steel ones. But yeah, I mean, like, I think this depends on who is purchasing the item. The value is clearly going to depend on the person.
Geoff 5:30
Yeah. So yeah, people have, people can spend what they want. Well, I think it’s kind of like, you know, goes back to the whole minimalist finance, financial aspect where it’s fun to fun to cost ratio. I’m sure you can have just as much fun with porcelain tureen shaped like a bunch of asparagus that cost $3,000 versus $25,000.
Georgie 5:55
Yeah.
Geoff 5:56
So. But I mean, their claim here is like “so much for minimalism. Donald Trump’s ex sister in law”—why they asking? Why are they asking Blaine Trump.
Georgie 6:10
I didn’t even know who Blaine Trump—
Geoff 6:12
Just she was there.
Georgie 6:14
But I read that and I was like, I read Blaine Trump. And I just immediately assumed this person, before continuing reading, that this person must be related to Donald Trump. And then I read Donald Trump’s ex sister in law, and I’m like, that’s all cool and stuff. And then like my mind, like tangentially was like, why did they? Like why does it matter? That she’s Donald Trump’s sister in law? Why can’t we just say that? Some person.
Geoff 6:42
Does being Donald Trump’s ex sister in law give her any more credibility to the statement?
Georgie 6:49
Well—
Geoff 6:49
So much for minimalism.
Georgie 6:50
What this reminds me of is how like, sometimes women in, when they are mentioned in news articles, they get mentioned as like, the, their husband’s wife, you know what I mean? So someone might say, for example, “Geoffrey Chong’s wife”, blah, blah, blah, instead of just saying her bloody name, by the way, Geoff’s not married. That was just an example.
Geoff 7:12
Yes, not married. The yeah, that’s really interesting as well. I saw an article today that was posted to me about how the husband of a well known Sydney pole dancer, like influencer, was done in by the Australian Federal Police or whatever for drug trafficking. And I was just like, what relevance is the fact that his wife is a well renowned pole dancer to me, to the fact that he is the one being called away for drug trafficking, right.
Georgie 7:54
Yeah.
Geoff 7:55
It’s all about I think, I think for that respected perspective, it’s more about click baiting like, ooh, pole dancing? That’s exciting.
Georgie 8:03
Or maybe someone who knows the woman—
Geoff 8:03
But wait, it’s not about the pole dancer. It’s about her husband.
Georgie 8:07
Yeah, precisely. But maybe it’s also just an excuse to be able to talk about ordinary, non famous people by referring to their famous like, friends, family, etc.
Geoff 8:21
Yeah.
Georgie 8:22
I better not make any friends with any famous people because it’ll be like blah blahs, friend, if you get famous.
Geoff 8:28
Yeah.
Georgie 8:28
It’ll be like Geoffrey Chong co host, podcast co host.
Geoff 8:33
Yeah. All the controversies that come up, Georgie. She’s been at her job for over 10 years. How scandalous of Geoffrey Chong’s less famous co host friend Georgie? Is she riding on the coattails of his fame on this podcast? (laughs)
Georgie 8:55
(laughs) You know what’s sad is that that’s precisely the kind of shit that they write about.
Geoff 9:01
Yeah. She’s never changed jobs? She’s just happy earning the same wage?
Georgie 9:07
How dare she.
Geoff 9:08
She must just be benefiting from Geoffrey Chong’s podcast. Is there gonna be a fallout? Will it just be toast? No more Roast? (laughs)
Georgie 9:18
(laughs) And there’s gonna be a thing at the end of the article that says we can’t wait for like this news article to be roasted on the podcast.
Geoff 9:31
Yeah, it’s sort of like we’ll have to avoid talking about those articles purely because I don’t want to bring attention to them in the podcast. God the dishwasher in the back is really loud.
Georgie 9:42
I actually can’t hear it.
Geoff 9:43
My microphone is picking it up.
Georgie 9:44
Oh, yeah. By the way last week, you had, I think I could actually hear birds from your side in the microphone so I don’t know if the—
Geoff 9:51
Really.
Georgie 9:51
Yeah, I don’t know if it got recorded. Yeah, actually, I don’t know.
Geoff 9:55
Anyways.
Georgie 9:56
The birds are pretty loud here and the door is shut. So I don’t know if you can hear them here. Anyway.
Geoff 10:00
Oh, my door is open. Hopefully there’s no birds around.
Georgie 10:06
It’ll be organic, it’ll be like going for a walk kind of shit.
Geoff 10:09
It’s true. We’re real people living at home with birds.
Georgie 10:14
Oh actually. It reminds me of you know, the Apple Fitness that I have. They have a Time to Walk thing. And it’s actually like famous people going for a walk. And they’re just telling you like inspirational stories from their life and stuff. And the thing I actually like about it, because you’re supposed to listen to them while you walk. So it feels really organic. And then sometimes they even pass people they know. And they’re like, oh, hey, you can hear them having a conversation with the person. So it kind of feels like they’re walking with you. So I wouldn’t worry too much about fucking bird noises. Maybe we should just record one outside for fun? I don’t know. We’ll figure it out.
Geoff 10:47
Maybe. Maybe like we’re in the park.
Georgie 10:50
Yeah, having a chat.
Geoff 10:52
Having a chat.
Georgie 10:53
Not a bad idea actually.
Geoff 10:54
Where were we? Right? We’re like—yeah.
Georgie 10:57
Blaine Trump.
Geoff 10:58
Yeah, for the record. I’d never want to become famous. I don’t understand the appeal. For me, I guess, the appeal of becoming famous. Get the too much attention. I think I was talking about this with friends. I think? I can’t remember who I was talking about this with. But in any case. Oh, that’s right. My coworkers, anyways, not important.
Georgie 11:26
But you might have been talking to me about it—
Geoff 11:27
You want to be—
Georgie 11:28
Because you, you might have talked to me about it. Because I think when we started this podcast, you were hoping that we wouldn’t become famous?
Geoff 11:35
Oh, yeah. I mean—
Georgie 11:37
We talked about it.
Geoff 11:37
The other factor is like when you you want to stay kind of like the million to the 10 millionaire. Because once you get to 100 million. That’s when shit gets really weird. Like, when you become 100 millionaire?
Georgie 11:50
Yeah.
Geoff 11:51
We were talking about talking about how no, we should never get to 100 millionaire or a billion, because you just become a psycho. A psychopath like Elon Musk.
Georgie 12:01
Oh dear. But I think that like, yeah, as you get more famous and have more visibility in the media, and in public, there’s a bit of responsibility these days in woke-ass 2021 for you to use your platform or your voice to create change, and not just be like, hey, I’m—
Geoff 12:22
To do good.
Georgie 12:22
Yeah. And I’m not saying that’s a bad thing. But, but there’s a lot of pressure and expectation from many people in the world who know you for you to be doing that. So.
Geoff 12:36
Yeah, and it’s kind of like cor—like goes back to corporate responsibility as well. Right. Like people are cancelling whole brands, like just because they they didn’t do something that like woke culture agreed with. And—
Georgie 12:49
Yeah.
Geoff 12:49
If you want to stay famous, that’s just it. You have to kind of not placate but placate, to do the, to the masses all the time. And it’s a it’s a little suffocating, can’t just eat whatever you want to eat. You can’t just walk around with the water bottle that you want to walk around with.
Georgie 13:10
People judge what like, what you buy and what you purchase.
Geoff 13:13
Yeah. Absolutely. But yeah, we were talking about how like, you know, when you become a million or 10 millionaire, and then you like, you start going, you know, maybe you start flying first class, right? Like, really small things. So—
Georgie 13:27
You call that small!
Geoff 13:28
Yeah, it’s really small. Like, that’s what I would do to be honest, like, became a millionaire. Then I would just start start doing stuff like going first class, but then you like, meet other first class people, right?
Georgie 13:39
Yeah.
Geoff 13:39
And you meet other people in the lounges. And then, and then you start, you know, getting more famous friends. You start hanging out with more famous people. And then just I think that’s just like, all downhill from there.
Georgie 13:51
Do you think famous and rich people have like a, like, almost like, some competition like, you know, because of their, of the amount of money they have and the amount of fame they have. They’re like, oh, look at me. I’ve got like, I don’t know, a million likes on Instagram. And it’s like, you only got 900,000.
Geoff 14:06
I wonder if that’s the kind of conversation—they probably don’t bother with that stuff. Unless you’re like in a house full of influencers. You’re like, worried about how many likes they have. But like, let’s say I’m in a, in a, probably wouldn’t be in first class with Elon Musk or anything. But that’s that’s like that’s to the ceiling, right, when you’re one to 10 millionaire. When you get the hundreds and billions, start getting your own jets, start going to space. You start fighting over who’s gonna go to space? That shit’s hust crazy. Anyways, back to this article.
Georgie 14:41
Yeah.
Geoff 14:42
This is, I don’t know if Blaine Trump as an attendee is is credible enough to talk about minimalism. But already like without reading further on, just because someone chose to spend $25,000 on this tureen, feverish bidding wars, Venetian grottos, like. That doesn’t mean it’s a death of minimalism so far. People are just buying expensive stuff all the time. But the thing about the Buata Stampede was nobody really knew where all these mystery bidders were coming from. Some were minor style bloggers, many were surprisingly under 50. Still, everyone at the auction seem to feel the same thing, like a lid had been lifted. This is very sens, sensationalist. Clearly, there’s a lot of people fed up with the monochromatic interiors, okay. And are excited about Mario’s maximalist style? All right, I think I got it. I think I got it. This is, we’re two paragraphs in but I can’t call it. They have mixed up minimalism, as a style, with maximalism as a style. And they’re talking about it. In a way that is yeah, more about style, but they only just say minimalism, which is the triggering part. And they also say Marie Kondo is decluttering dominance is over. So yeah, they’ve totally mixed minimalism as a style and as a lifestyle.
Georgie 16:22
Totally. You are on point. And that is pretty much, that was pretty much my actual stance on the entire article. As I kept reading through and this is why I said I kind of skimmed it, was because yeah, they were mixing the two and you know, as as we’ve talked about before, minimalism as a lifestyle doesn’t mean to like strip yourself of all personality and the things that you love and enjoy even if they are bloody a asparagus styled tureen thing, right? And—
Geoff 16:57
Yeah, this is, like, yeah, man. I also saw a picture posted by the BBC. I think it’s on Twitter somewhere. But they posted a picture of a rock climber, BBC rock climber, and in the background, they had like a big robot. Yeah. They said, Oh, look at the Transformers in the background. But actually, it was a Gundam. And they yeah, here you go. This is this this picture. Just when you thought it was frightening enough, you now need to impress a transformer too, but actually in the background is a Gundam. This distinction is quite niche, to be fair, not many people would know the difference. But—
Georgie 17:47
So for people who don’t know what—
Geoff 17:48
Right yeah, for people who don’t know what a Gundam is, actually, I think, around the same time as Transformers, but a Gundam is basically a big robot suit that a person goes inside of and controls and fights. It’s like Iron Man on 100 times scale. But a Transformer is a sentient, mechanical, like alien that can transform between two different different forms. So yeah, they got, like there’s a bit of outrage over the fact that BBC called it a Transformer and not a Gundam. But that just goes to show, like this is just how the internet works these days. Yeah, the news and media. There’s, they were so concerned about making this really really quippy twit, tweet that they didn’t research it. So I’m not surprised that a entire article about minimalism is not actually about minimalism. But, yeah. It gives it obviously a bad rap. August 4, yes. Three days ago.
This is recent, right? Yeah.
How did you come across the article though?
Georgie 19:01
That’s a really good question. I don’t even remember. I’m trying, I must have been on like, on Twitter or something. Like I don’t think it would have been on Instagram. And it might have actually been a sponsored tweet, not something that, not something that like someone I follow tweeted.
Geoff 19:16
The algorithm.
Georgie 19:18
But yeah. But yeah, it didn’t give me the best impressions because you know, as we talked about, like, just because a style is really minimalistic in color and form, like when it comes to home decor and shit, because the article, even, I sense that we’re probably not gonna go through the whole thing, because now we’ve got the gist of it. Or at least I have.
Geoff 19:40
Clearly you got the gist of it.
Georgie 19:43
Yeah, at least I’ve definitely actually quote unquote, read it. Yeah, I forgot my point. (laughs) But yeah, to conflate the lifestyle. Like just because yeah, as like you were saying, lifestyle with the minimalist style, which is like completely wrong because like, if you just, I mean if they did their research, like you implied, and just took, I don’t know, five minutes to read up on what minimalism actually is in terms of lifestyle, then then understand that it’s not about like stripping yourself of all personality and only wearing black even though that’s what you choose to do Geoff. That’s I mean, because that’s your style as well. But then they’ve gone out and read this article and written about Marie Kondo, which as we’ve also established, she’s not really like about minimalism. She’s about keeping tidy, being clean, like, yeah. Oh, yeah. Let’s talk about maximalism.
Geoff 20:48
Yeah, the maximalism stuff? Um, but I mean, Marie Kondo. Also big headliner, I think to catch a lot of readers because people know.
Georgie 21:01
Yeah.
Geoff 21:03
Know them. So actually, this whole article, it has a bunch of I even see like, “now divorced from Kanye, Kim who kept the property is said to be redecorating the home using the extra space as a warehouse for all her stuff”. Like, they’re just pulling in all of these celebrity names, famous people to, to like, I don’t know. Not solidify, but legitimise their their point. And—
Georgie 21:36
Yeah.
Geoff 21:37
As we all know, just because they’re rich and famous, doesn’t mean they’re doing the right thing. Like, I don’t know, what was that really big scandal in Australia, when Johnny Depp and Amber Heard brought their dog into Australia illegally. And they made the weird ass apology video like, I mean, celebrities are not the greatest role models sometimes.
Georgie 22:09
Nope.
Geoff 22:11
And like we said, the richer you get, the weirder you get. So.
Georgie 22:17
So yeah, I wanted to touch on maximalism as a style right because I’m into like fashion and style. And like I that’s the way I kind of see it. Like if you look up maximalist like clothing, right? You see people who wear pretty avant garde stuff, mixing prints, mixing colours, they’re wearing a lot of accessories, and that is like, effectively, their statement, right?
Geoff 22:47
Yeah.
Georgie 22:47
And like, I don’t, I don’t know anybody who’s super like this, who has this kind of style. I know someone her name’s Carly Findlay and she likes to wear a lot of colour in all of her outfits and you know she she feels awesome in that, and that’s her personal style, it’s like characterised by lots and lots of different colours, like every colour of the rainbow. But you know, I wouldn’t go as far to say as just because that’s what her style is like in terms of what clothes she chooses to wear that her house is the same. So this article kind of talks about interior you know, interior decor, it talks about, it mentions IKEA, being all minimalist and everything like that. But you know, just because your house is I mean, just because your style is like a certain way does not mean it’s exactly the same in you know, the way you choose to live at home. And similarly, like just because I’m a minimalist, doesn’t mean that my wardrobe is is like that? And like I like to express myself with lots of colour, lots of like, decoration in my outfits, but generally at home I like to keep things pretty clean, like pretty neutral in colour.
Geoff 24:02
Yeah, I think it’s definitely a bit of a travesty. Like crossing the two things because like you said, your house, even if you max if you’re, even if you do maximalism style in your house, you could have very few things, like just because it’s colourful doesn’t mean that it’s it’s technically—
Georgie 24:26
You got all this this stuff.
Geoff 24:28
You’ve technically got lots of stuff. Yeah, looking through some photos of maximalism, furniture and maximalist as clothing. Yeah. I’m sure you know, the only reference I have to maximalist clothing it’s like Harajuku style in Japan, right? They’re like, pretty out of the ordinary. I don’t think Harajuku is actually that crazy, out of the ordinary. But in Japan it’s it’s kind of seen as very extreme. Yeah, because the most of the people are wearing Uniqlo and MUJI clothing where it’s all like neutral colours.
Georgie 25:16
(laughs)
Geoff 25:16
So anyone—
Georgie 25:16
Yeah.
Geoff 25:17
Anyone with a red sweater? Is kinda like a maximalist to them. AKA you.
Georgie 25:23
Hey, I have a lot of red in my wardrobe.
Geoff 25:26
You belong in, you belong in Harajuku. But yeah—
Georgie 25:31
But that’s, that’s the thing as well, right? So it differs from like, wherever, wherever you are, like so in somewhere, like a red sweater would be like, “holy shit, she’s not a minimalist”.
Geoff 25:41
Like in a—
Georgie 25:42
Like somewhere else—
Geoff 25:43
Iceland, whatever.
Georgie 25:43
Like amongst these. Whereas amongst like, I don’t know on the catwalk, you know, even amongst people who like dress in this Harajuku style, I’d be the fucking minimalist in a red fucking sweater.
Geoff 25:56
And just, yeah, and then just because like you said, they’re walking around inand crazy outfits, their houses are probably super minimal, because just by nature of Japanese style homes, it’s not like they have a lot of space for anything, really. So.
Georgie 26:12
Yeah.
Geoff 26:12
Yeah, it’s a bit contrived to cross the two concepts together, and then just slap a few famous people who redecorate their houses, and do like this concoction of an article that is yeah, needless to say, very wide swathing statements. I’m going to take a paragraph out of context here. “If minimalism was about controlling the static and crashing of a world spinning too fast”. What kind of sentence is that?
Georgie 26:54
“Minimalism was about controlling the static and crashing”—static and crash, what?
Geoff 26:59
Yeah.
Georgie 27:00
Of a world...
Geoff 27:01
Spinning too fast?
Georgie 27:03
Control as in controlling the static of a word spinning too fast and—
Geoff 27:08
Maxim, maximalism, may be more about filling in a void of loneliness and isolation. This—
Georgie 27:15
Yeah, so that’s a big jump, right?
Geoff 27:17
Yeah.
Georgie 27:17
Something that’s pretty stylistic, to, “oh, man, deep feelings”.
Geoff 27:21
That’s, that’s cra—like, yeah, that’s no way you—
Georgie 27:24
Which is again, about the attachment to your things, your sentimental attachment to things which I don’t think you can assume. I feel like as a journalist, that’s, that’s very irresponsible thing to assume.
Geoff 27:35
Hugely.
Georgie 27:35
That someone has that much attachment to their things and the things represent your personality. Because then we go back to minimalism, right. Which minimalism precisely says that, like, you are not your things.
Geoff 27:49
Yeah.
Georgie 27:49
Right. We are about the people around us like the the conversations that we have with people. And so even if you did fucking like strip me of all my belongings, like me as a person, I don’t know. It’s—
Geoff 28:02
Although—
Georgie 28:02
Like—
Geoff 28:02
You were about to put minimalism as your census religion.
Georgie 28:09
I was not, that was a tweet from like, five years ago. It was a joke. It was a joke, because like, I mean, it’s a joke because some people have said that minimalism is like a religion or a cult. And so that’s, yeah.
Geoff 28:27
Yeah, no, got it.
Georgie 28:31
(laughs)
Geoff 28:31
So the next sentence is actually even more weird. It says the number of people living alone in Canada has more than doubled over the last 35 years.
Georgie 28:41
What does that have to do with anything?
Geoff 28:42
Exactly. “In both Canada and US young people are having less sex than ever”. Oh my god, where are they going with this? We had like, what is going on? “Most millennials and Gen Z-ers do their dating through the internet and a good part of that social socialising through their phones. All this before COVID-19 made everyone’s life less tactile”. How, what? This whole paragraph makes absolutely no sense.
Georgie 29:16
So I’ve been, I grew up on the internet like you, you were probably—
Geoff 29:19
Yeah. Grew up on the internet.
Georgie 29:20
....on the internet. Yeah. So I just feel like the fact that when we might be dating through the internet and socialising, god forbid, using technology on our phones, it’s like it’s flabbergasting. I mean, like, is flabbergasting a word?
Geoff 29:41
Flabbergastered?
Georgie 29:41
It’s—
Geoff 29:42
It’s a word.
Georgie 29:43
You can be—you can flabbergast, it’s a verb.
Geoff 29:47
Don’t forget to flabbergast.
Georgie 29:51
Can that be like our outro.
Geoff 29:55
Yeah, stay chilly. Don’t forget to flabbergast.
Georgie 30:00
So yeah, and then it’s so, now it’s trying to make a point about how the pandemic has affected the way we see ourselves.
Geoff 30:07
So yeah, I think they’re trying to draw the line with like, we’re staying home so much. And then even the next paragraph’s, like, we all know that feeling off the two hours of online shopping, scrolling social media or streaming, a work webinar, human experiences shorn of humans. Now, that’s also a crazy statement, but I think they’re trying to draw the line though, is that we’re home. And therefore we hoard. Because we have nothing else better to do.
Georgie 30:36
But we try and connect with people, like you and I are like connecting right now, because we’re talking online. It’s almost saying that like, you know, the fact that we’ve moved a lot of these processes to online, like shopping like Zoom calls, like, you know, you’d normally meet up with your family. It’s like they’re saying that, that in doing that, it’s it’s like not, it’s not no longer human?
Geoff 30:57
Yeah.
Georgie 30:58
I mean, but I always feel like I have connected more with people during this time, or had better opportunities, because it’s like, thanks to technology. Yeah, I don’t know what the problem is.
Geoff 31:13
The idea that you have to be in the same physical space as someone just to have human experiences is, I guess, a very generalistic way of putting it. I don’t think a lot of people are like us where we’ve grown up on the internet, and we can, you know, create the human experiences efficiently over the internet. So, yeah, everyone, I know, everyone’s you know, a bit tentative about the fact that we’re all sitting in our homes rather than seeing people. But yeah.
Georgie 31:52
Don’t get me wrong. It’s like, I like to see people in—
Geoff 31:55
Same yeah.
Georgie 31:56
Real life as well. It’s, I mean, clearly, you can’t replace face to face communication entirely with digital. But I don’t know, I don’t think that we should be focusing on the fact that two hours of online shopping scrolling social media is human experiences shorn off humans, it’s like that’s but that’s literally all we have to do to get through this time and to remain safe, while still showing that we care about each other. So I don’t really get what the point is.
Geoff 32:24
Yeah, they’re just being dramatic. They’re being overly dramatic about everything.
Georgie 32:29
And trying to make it, trying to make it timely, I guess, with what’s happening right now.
Geoff 32:34
It’s true, they’re trying to make it relevant. Ugh. Relevant.
Georgie 32:37
But also, you could argue that it’s probably even manipulative and making you feel sad by reading this article by going oh, yeah, I haven’t seen a human and like, so and so.
Geoff 32:48
Yeah, I was just also thinking about how it like inadvertently glorifies the face to face like sitting in front of humans that, in a way that, you know, you now think that, oh, if I don’t see the human, then oh, my god. It’s super bad. All I’ve got all I’ve been doing is two hours of online shopping, scrolling through social media and streaming Wi Fi work webinars. None of that is you know, human interaction, like—
Georgie 33:24
Yeah, also, we do like a multitude of things using the internet. Like, we don’t just do like essential things like work and shop and stuff. Like we go on, like FaceTime, or Zoom with our families, like I’ve been doing zoom exercise classes. Like, it’s not all just like this shallow thing that, you know, replaces what we do in person. Like, I don’t know.
Geoff 33:51
Yeah, it’s weird. It’s just all a weird, like idea. And it points, it may inadvertently point out to people that yeah, like you said, “Oh, I haven’t seen a human. Oh no, I’m sad now”. This article is saying that it’s a sad thing to to, to do all of these things.
Georgie 34:14
Okay, so one thing that is—
Geoff 34:15
You can online shop with your friends, like we can share screens—you can online shop.
Georgie 34:21
I can try on my clothes, right? And I’d be like, “hey, Geoff, check out my haul!”
Geoff 34:24
Yeah exactly. Can do live haul.
Georgie 34:28
Exactly. I mean, yeah, the one thing I don’t like about this article is that it’s mentioned like something about having less sex as if that’s like a fucking bad thing, like, I don’t even wanna go down that path but it’s just like, ugh.
Geoff 34:41
This entire paragraph is zero relevance. Everything from minimalism, controlling the static and crashing of a world spinning too fast to this next sentence, that talks about maximalism being about filling a void of loneliness and isolation, you’re making peop—you’re shaming people for buying things, is what I’m reading here.
Georgie 35:05
Yeah. Or not buying things.
Geoff 35:06
Or not buying things.
Georgie 35:07
I feel like it could even be shaming people for either side. Yeah, I mean, I don’t know what I’m supposed to gather from this.
Geoff 35:12
Yeah, it’s all confusing. Like you either either say that I shouldn’t buy things because maximalism is is like a little bad, but also I should buy things because I have a void of loneliness and isolation I need to fill.
Georgie 35:30
So, read the last paragraph.
Geoff 35:33
Yeah, here we go. I am excited about this last paragraph. But even the next sentence is, “it’s something like a cold, empty bowl in your gut where the generative stuff would normally take seed”.
Georgie 35:49
What does that even mean?
Geoff 35:54
They’re trying to go for like writing award of some sort? “So perhaps it’s no surprise that if one feels like a sexless husk, living a disconnected, digitised life, getting a pink velvet”—satay?
Georgie 36:11
Settee.
Geoff 36:12
Settee?
Georgie 36:14
Settee.
Geoff 36:15
Can be just what the decor doctor ordered. All, everything we talked about in this entire podcast was summarised in that one sentence going from so many extremes in less than 140 characters like—
Georgie 36:32
Well, you still have one more paragraph.
Geoff 36:34
Madness. All right. “And if in this extravaganza of muchness, you bash your shin on a slipper chair, or a shell form purdonium on wheels”—what the fuck is a purdonium?
Georgie 36:52
I’m gonna guess it’s like a cart with like—
Geoff 36:55
They’re honestly putting—
Georgie 36:56
Cart on wheels.
Geoff 36:56
In like $100, $100 words. $1,000 words.
Georgie 37:01
These aren’t $100. These are like little antique fucking things.
Geoff 37:03
No, I mean, like the word itself, purdonium. Who, how many people know what a purdonium is?
Georgie 37:09
Yeah, I mean, it’s one of those things like I’ve been saying, this is a slight humble brag, because like, I’m a bit of a, like an English aficionado. But I find that a lot of journalists replace what you could say with pretty common words and have the same effect with unnecessarily, quote unquote, big words. Like to make it seem, you know, really elaborate, eloquent. And I have to admit, like, because I used to, I mean, I still do like writing on my blog, but when I was young, I would do the same thing I’d get, get a word and I’d be like, I need to make this word sound better. And then I’d go look in the thesaurus and find some other weird shit. But then, you know, I had a very good English teacher in school, in high school in year 10. And he actually called me out on it, he was like, I can tell you’re using words that you didn’t originally mean, like and then you just gone looked them up to sound a bit better. And he said, don’t do that. Because it actually detracts from your actual point. It makes almost makes the argument weaker. And I just you know, from then I just found it so much easier to just focus on like, what the point I was trying to make, because I think that’s how you get good writing, not by writing fucking purdonium, and what was the other thing, the, the what, I don’t even remember.
Geoff 38:36
I’m going to give him a pass because we looked, I looked it up right and the purdonium, they’re basically talking about some antiques.
Georgie 38:42
It’s a very specific thing.
Geoff 38:43
From the very beginning. I think from the very beginning is the antiques they sold. Things we skipped over. So the sentence here is like, if you bash your shin on a slipper chair or shell form purdonium on wheels, at least you will feel something at least you will feel something. And in a few years the wallpaper and throw cushions come become suffocating, rest assured that your interiors will change again, because your insides have. Wow, what a powerfully nonsensical statement.
Georgie 39:25
So I think it’s trying to probably make us look deep inside us and be, like, I yeah, I am an empty nothingness because of the things I own or don’t own. And potentially I could buy some things to fill the fucking void. But like, isn’t that just like perpetuating the idea that you need to buy more stuff to feel whole, which is like the whole reason why minimalism as a lifestyle exists in the first place, because we shouldn’t be attaching like our personal values to like stuff.
Geoff 39:58
Yeah, which I guess does tie into their whole point where more is more, the end of minimalism because they’re making you feel fucking bad for not like, they’re making you feel fucking bad for something, right? It’s either, yeah, you have like they just basically stating everyone has this huge void in their life because they can’t see anybody. And now they’re filling it with things like these really expensive antiques so that they can feel something when they stub their toe. Like, wow.
Georgie 40:31
That’s a bit outrageous.
Geoff 40:34
This is really sensational writing.
Georgie 40:37
Not in a good way.
Geoff 40:38
Yeah. My, my, my thing is like every now and then I’ll, I’ll pull out some really big word from from my head somewhere from my vocab, right, and then the next minute, I’ll be like, we should action better. And like, you can see people pause, they’re like, wow, Geoff, that was a real big $100 word you had, and all the way to “action better”? Where is the English gone. Yeah. So that was an exciting article, the overarching idea seems to be an expressive, communicative humanity and—
Georgie 40:38
Connective.
Geoff 40:41
Intentional—oh sorry, I really didn’t read that. Connective. Let me start again, “the overarching idea seems to be an expressive connected humanity. An intentional hot mess”.
Georgie 41:36
Wait, hang on. Wait, wait, the word intentional though. Isn’t that something that you could tie into minimalism? If I, what if I was a minimalist, and I was like, I am making an intentional hot mess of my fucking life right now.
Geoff 41:47
Exactly.
Georgie 41:47
Fucking let me. That’s my intention.
Geoff 41:51
Yeah, I sat down for like, a couple hours in my existential crisis, and I’ve decided that I should be a hot mess. And I will be a hot mess.
Georgie 42:00
Yeah, go for it.
Geoff 42:02
I mean, if we go back to the Kim and Kanye statement, Kim Kardashian, you could say is a very intentional hot mess.
Georgie 42:11
(laughs)
Geoff 42:13
For just the sake of the fame right, to hold on some people’s fame. Sometimes they need to be intentional hot messes.
Georgie 42:22
Oh, wait, wait, let’s go about it. What does hot mess technically mean? In the, are you going to Urban Dictionary this?
Geoff 42:29
Let’s go with some examples of hot messes.
Georgie 42:32
No, you actually—oh my goodness.
Geoff 42:35
Something or someone that is emphatically a mess, such as something in a state of extreme disorder or disarray. I’m sorry for calling Kim Kardashian a hot mess. She is not an extreme disorder or disarray.
Georgie 42:49
In a state of extreme disorder—yeah, actually, she’s not. She’s quite well composed.
Geoff 42:53
She’s composed.
Georgie 42:54
She’s famous, right?
Geoff 42:55
Yeah.
Georgie 42:56
But like, wouldn’t you argue that a lot of people going through this whole pandemic thing right now, feel like their life is a hot mess.
Geoff 43:04
Probably?
Georgie 43:04
We can all relate. We can all sympathise.
Geoff 43:06
We’re all relatable.
Georgie 43:08
And but you know, maybe maybe in this case, it’s not an intentional hot mess, maybe that’s not actually—wait maybe that’s not actually possible. Maybe like—
Geoff 43:17
Yeah, I don’t think you can’t be intentionally a hot mess.
Georgie 43:20
By that definition like something—
Geoff 43:22
Yeah.
Georgie 43:23
Disorder, disarray, like to be intentional about that would probably indicate that you have a like a mental issue that needs to be checked out.
Geoff 43:32
Yeah, you wouldn’t be intent—
Georgie 43:33
Wait hang on, is this article ableist now?
Geoff 43:36
Yeah, maybe. I mean, or is Merriam Webster words Merriam Webster wrong? That self destructive person. Whoa.
Georgie 43:47
Woah.
Geoff 43:47
This is getting deep. Yes. Also such a person who is at the same time attractive or sexy!
Georgie 43:54
Oh, okay. So maybe some people might agree that Kim Kardashian—
Geoff 43:58
Yeah.
Georgie 43:58
Is indeed a hot mess.
Geoff 44:00
By, by some weird definition in this array of things that she could be a hot mess.
Georgie 44:07
Actually Geoff, with that said with that said, hot mess being person was at the same time attractive or sexy. I think that I am definitely an intentional hot mess because I am intentionally attractive and intentionally sexy.
Geoff 44:23
Yeah, it could be, you could be definitely intentionally disorganised, disheveled, and at the same time doing that to become attractive or sexy. To some people—
Georgie 44:35
I like the next one. Have a look at the archaic—
Geoff 44:39
Especially of soft or pulpy food! (laughs)
Georgie 44:43
That’s you, Geoff, are an intentional—
Geoff 44:45
I’m an intentionally soft and pulpy dish of food. So you get to, like unintentional hot—
Georgie 45:04
(laughs)
Geoff 45:04
(laughs) We gotta bring this back. The, Kim actually did something pretty intentional that I think was a bit of a hot mess for, for I guess, what you call it, marketing purposes, she she made something and called it Kimono, I think.
Georgie 45:24
Hmm. I really see a little bit of a problem with this potentially.
Geoff 45:30
Yeah. So she made shapewear and she called it Kimono. And she got huge backlash, obviously because she tried to trademark the word Kimono.
Georgie 45:40
That’s ridiulous. But what about it, like that, to me, like these pictures that you’re looking at, that to me doesn’t look like like, I would assume kimono relates to you know, the kimono traditional style of Japanese dress, right? Which doesn’t look like it does it all? So why would she go with that?
Geoff 45:56
Exactly. Kimonos are actually like more like robes, and they have no way related to shaping your body. But she’s like, “I’m always listening, learning and growing. I so appreciate the passion, varying perspectives”—like, come on you obviously knew. You knew that this would cause some outrage. You just don’t name something Kimono.
Georgie 46:23
Yeah. Did she apologise for this? Because then I’d be like, okay, all right.
Geoff 46:26
Half and half. I mean, that is basically. “When I announced the name of my shapewear line I did so with the best intentions”. Geez. My brands and products I build with inclusivity and diversity. This was all a stunt, I think, so that she can say these words and apologise and become some kind of yeah, and got free marketing, because everybody was outraged by the name of, look the mayor of Kyoto penned an open letter asking her to drop the—
Georgie 46:56
Oh, wow. That’s some serious shit. Yeah.
Geoff 47:02
This is not even the first one.
Georgie 47:03
Well, you’d think that if she had inclusivity in mind that she would have you know, I don’t know, checked his name with, you know, a, a group of people to make sure that she was not, you know, saying coming up with something that could offend people.
Geoff 47:18
Yeah, exactly. So I did note that you you said we didn’t want to share, like the article to not give it attention. I think this is exactly—
Georgie 47:27
Now we probably do.
Geoff 47:29
They knew exactly what they wrote this for, is to give it, is to get people to share it for some free free publicity just like Kim Kardashian and her Kimono. Yeah, Kimono stunt. And you could probably—
Georgie 47:47
You could argue that we are also trying to get publicity for our podcast by fucking talking about it.
Geoff 47:51
Yeah, we just drop, named dropped Kim Kardashian. I couldn’t shut up about it this whole podcast, like. (laughs)
Georgie 47:55
(laughs)
Geoff 47:55
But the thing is, that’s the thing, right? I couldn’t I can’t think of another celebrity who’s done anything close to stuff like this. Like who’s, who’s made outrage, such a weapon in terms of selling their stuff. But I would say that she is probably one of the greatest salesperson of all, salesperson of all time. She went from a sex tape to billions of dollars. Like usually sex tapes, you know, stereotypically crushed someone’s career. But she was rich enough—
Georgie 48:37
That started her career.
Geoff 48:38
And connected enough to kickstart her entire billion dollar empire off the back of quote unquote, pain. She got from the sex tape.
Georgie 48:48
Yeah, you do need to stop talking about Kim Kardashian.
Geoff 48:51
Yeah, I know. I know way too much, she takes too much space in my mind clearly.
Georgie 48:57
You don’t declutter her?
Geoff 48:58
Yeah.
Georgie 48:59
Mentally declutter her.
Geoff 49:00
She does not spark joy. She is, gonna throw her out.
Georgie 49:07
Maybe replace it with like a pink futon or some shit or whatever this article suggests.
Geoff 49:12
Oh, a purdonium. Yeah, I need a purdonium, for my shoes. With a chair, or a shell formed purdonium on wheels.
Georgie 49:25
Yeah.
Geoff 49:26
Man but yeah, I think this article is, was worth was worth looking at even, even randomly but you got it recommended to you by an algorithm. See, that’s how well the algorithm knows. So yeah, and I think that’s kind of all we have time for. Thanks for listening everybody to another episode of Toast & Roast.
Georgie 49:56
Where we actually did some serious roasting.
Geoff 49:57
We did do some serious roasting. And you can obviously follow us on all the big ones, the Apple Podcasts, and the Google Podcasts and Spotify podcasts.
Georgie 50:11
And the big cherry.
Geoff 50:13
Ooh big cherry. Don’t forget to stay chilly. Oh my god they even mentioned Cara Delevigne. What the hell is going on in this? Anyways.
Georgie 50:22
You need to give up on the article!
Geoff 50:24
Giving up on the article.
Georgie 50:25
Declutter the the article from your mind.
Geoff 50:27
Yeah. Take what, take learnings from articles like this. Lock the learning learnings away and forget where you got the learning from that’s the, solid advice, right there. Yhat’s why I always say random stuff like “I heard about this somewhere. I’m pretty sure I learned this thing but I can’t tell you where I learned it from”. And yeah, stay chilly.
Georgie 50:51
Don’t forget to flabbergast. You can find us on Twitter and Instagram @toastroastpod, and see you next time.
Geoff 50:59
Thank you everybody. And we’ll see you next week.