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"slug": "the-h-1b-visa-process-but-make-it-a-video-game",
"title": "The H-1B Visa Process But Make It a Video Game",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Life on an H-1B visa — a visa that lets U.S. companies hire foreign-born workers for specialized jobs — is difficult, unpredictable, and has gotten even harder under the Trump administration. A new gaming studio, Reality Reload, is trying to capture that experience in a mobile game. It’s called H1B.Life, and it simulates the difficult choices, competing priorities, and personal sacrifices visa holders face — complete with chaotic design elements, like all-powerful “gods” who control your fate.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">KQED reporter Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman joins Morgan to break down the game’s surprising design choices, the mission behind it, and the stories he heard from people navigating the H1-B process. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC2401184331\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Guest:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/author/adahlstromeckman\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, reporter at \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">KQED\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Further Reading/Listening:\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12076756/what-does-it-take-to-get-a-h-1b-visa-this-video-game-shows-just-how-complicated-it-is\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What Does It Take to Get a H-1B Visa? This Video Game Shows Just How Complicated It Is \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">KQED\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.businessinsider.com/meta-google-amazon-microsoft-h-1b-visa-applications-decline-2026-4\">Meta, Google, and Amazon slash H-1B petitions after Trump’s visa crackdown\u003c/a> — Geoff Weiss, Melia Russell, Andy Kiersz, and Alex Nicoll, \u003ci>Business Insider \u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/state-policy/2026/01/29/faculty-warn-against-state-bans-h-1b-visas\">Faculty Warn Against State Bans on H-1B Visas\u003c/a> — Jessica Blake, \u003ci>\u003ci>Inside Higher Ed \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.the-scientist.com/h-1b-visa-restrictions-will-hurt-america-s-research-potential-experts-say-74267\">H-1B Visa Restrictions Will Hurt America’s Research Potential, Experts Say\u003c/a> — Shelby Bradford, PhD, \u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>The Scientist \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wired.com/story/trump-immigration-visa-secrutiny-tech/\">US Tech Visa Applications Are Being Put Through the Wringer \u003c/a>— Lauren Goode, \u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>Wired \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wired.com/story/made-in-china-a-new-game-turns-the-h-1b-visa-system-into-a-surreal-simulation/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A New Game Turns the H-1B Visa System Into a Surreal Simulation \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Zeyi Yang, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wired \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Want to give us feedback on the show? Shoot us an email at \u003ca href=\"mailto:CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\">CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Follow us on\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/closealltabspod/\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Instagram\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> and\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@closealltabs\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">TikTok\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hi, it’s Morgan. Be honest with me, how many tabs do you have open? Feeling a little overwhelmed by closing them? Well, we have an episode for you. If you like our deep dives and wanna hear more, please rate and review us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to the show and tell your friends about us too. Okay, let’s get to the episode. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Quick note: in this episode we use the term “immigrant” in a broad sense to refer to people living and working in the U.S. on H-1B visas. In legal terms the H1-B is a nonimmigrant temporary visa, though many visa holders hope to stay in the U.S. long term. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Every March, a corner of the Chinese social media app Red Note gets flooded with posts about Chick-fil-A. The users go all out, buying Chick-fil-A keychains, changing their profile pictures to the red and white chicken logo, and of course, treating themselves to a hearty meal of a chicken sandwich and waffle fries. You’ll often see the same emojis in each post: prayer hands, a chicken, and an American flag. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All of these users are applying for the H-1B visa, a visa for highly skilled immigrants sponsored by an employer. Many come to Silicon Valley to work in tech. Hundreds of thousands of hopefuls apply every year, but only 85,000 applicants are selected. So, what does this have to do with fried chicken? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It turns out that there’s a tradition amongst Chinese H-1B applicants here in the United States that they believe that eating a lot of Chick-fil-A and just generally associating with Chick-fil-A brings you luck and will increase your chances of getting selected in the H-1B lottery. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman is a reporter at KQED. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And apparently, if you go to a Chick-fil-A here in the Bay Area around March, you’re likely to see a lot of Chinese immigrants who potentially could be H-1B applicants eating there. And it’s not really clear where this started, but it’s definitely a thing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Azul said that this trend, the annual Chick-fil-A frenzy on social media, is part of a much bigger story. To even apply for an H-1B visa, you need an employer to sponsor you, which means that you need to have a job offer. It doesn’t guarantee a visa, just that you can enter the lottery. The process for getting an H-1B Visa has been changing, and a system that was already difficult has become even harder for applicants. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It is true that with the Trump administration, there has been a lot of changes specifically to this year’s H-1B visa process. The first is that there’s now a $100,000 fee if a company wants to sponsor somebody who isn’t currently living in the country. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In wake of the changes and very steep application fee, some universities and companies implemented a hiring freeze for H-1B applicants. And the ones that are still hiring are sponsoring far fewer visas than in previous cycles. The updated application system isn’t totally random anymore. Higher paid applicants have a better chance of being picked now. But for the most part, the application process feels like a game of luck. At the end of the day, it’s still a lottery. Which is why good luck traditions, like getting Chick-fil-A during the registration window, have become baked into the modern mythology of the American immigrant experience. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It can all feel like a game, one in which the rules seem arbitrary and unpredictable. So when Azul heard about a studio turning that experience into a playable app, it made perfect sense. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">H1B.Life is a game that tries to simulate the experience of an immigrant who’s trying to get H1-B visa status. And it’s a pretty early prototype now. Basically, it’s sort of like a text-based decision tree on your smartphone. And I played a demo of it, and it was actually kind of interesting. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So one of the opening scenes of the game says, during high school, you spent hours and hours on your laptop binging Gilmore Girls on shady, unauthorized streaming websites. Everything in your drowsy new town reminds you of the show. If it wasn’t for Lorelai and Rory, you might have never decided to… and then there’s like two decisions, and one is study journalism or come to New England. And I was like, wow, that’s really oddly specific. And it turns out that H1B.Life is based on real-life interviews from H1-B applicants, specifically Chinese immigrants living in Silicon Valley. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’re diving into H1B.Life today, the arduous application process, how capricious policy changes impact the trajectory of an immigrant’s entire life, and the cost of chasing a dream, all wrapped up in a mobile game. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>This is Close All Tabs. I’m Morgan Sung, tech journalist and your chronically online friend, here to open as many browser tabs as it takes to help you understand how the digital world affects our real lives. Let’s get into it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Before we talk about the game itself, let’s get into the reality that inspired it. And as always, we’re starting by opening a new tab: Life on an H-1B Visa. Last month, the annual Game Developers Conference took over San Francisco. The Asian Art Museum was hosting a showcase for a game that involved chance, timing, and bureaucracy to, “determine who stays and who is deported.” The game was H1B.Life. Azul had heard about the game and decided to check it out. At the event, he talked to a few people about their own experiences with the immigration system. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The first person I talked to, his name was Donduk Dovdon, and he’s an ethnically Mongolian, Chinese national who now is a U.S. Citizen. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So I came to States 12 years ago for my master’s degree in Washington, D.C. And eventually I got H-1B, and then later I got green card. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donduk said the process demands a lot of sacrifice and that it can be hard to ever feel secure about the future. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He told me it is a very hard and arduous process to get H-1B status. And then even once you have H-1B status, you’re still not secure. You have to work towards getting a green card and then citizenship. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I didn’t see my parents for 10 years. I didn’t see any of my relatives for 10 years. So I think that’s still very emotional for me to say. Like, I eventually went back, I think, two years ago when I became citizen. It was so emotional. And I feel… I miss them, they miss me, a huge chapter of our lives…ten years, like many Americans, it’s just unimaginable. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donduk’s 10-year gap without seeing his family may be on the extreme end. H-1B visa holders are technically allowed to travel internationally and re-enter the country, as long as their visa stamp is still valid. But he’s not alone. The decision to stay in the U.S. is often driven by fear of not being allowed back in. Over the last year, given the heightened scrutiny of visa holders and the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, some legal experts, universities, and even tech companies who employ visa holders have cautioned against international travel. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Concerns about travel aside, taking time off to visit family abroad often depends on your employer’s time off policy. H-1B visas hinge on employment. Changing jobs involves a new sponsor and another mountain of paperwork. Some H- 1B visa holders have spoken out about feeling trapped abusive work environments because of their visa status. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When I was on H-1B, I met various shady employers who technically did not pay me, which was illegal. And it was like, if you dare to report me, you will get your H-1B revoked. So eventually, I was lucky enough and I left that organization, but I heard other people, in order just to get one H-1B, worked for three years free. And after work, they work at a restaurant or bubble tea store illegally for three years. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Getting picked in the visa lottery doesn’t guarantee long-term stability either. H-1B visas have a 6-year cap and visa holders have to spend a full year outside of the U.S. before they can reapply. Donduk mentioned one of his friends, who’s also Chinese Mongolian. He recently had to say goodbye to her. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She self-deported herself three or four days ago. We were at the airport. She was on H-1B for five years, but no companies was willing to sponsor her green card. She spent 14 years in the States. She even bought a house. And then she sold the house, sold the car, and moved back. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Visa status can be all consuming. At the showcase, Azul spoke with another attendee who’s currently on a different work-based visa. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He said that whenever he meets up with other visa holders, the number one thing that they ask each other is ‘what visa are you on? ‘ because it has such a powerful determining factor over what you do, who you date, where you live, where you work. You have to keep your employer happy and they have to continue to sponsor you. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>You might need to take a job that takes you traveling out of the country, but with the Trump administration, you know, maybe it’s hard for you to get back into the country based on your country of origin. So I think people are constantly taking risks and living under uncertainty, you know, from one presidential administration to the next. They’re not sure how these rules surrounding H-1B status are going to change. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In his reporting, Azul talked to an immigration lawyer based in Silicon Valley, Sophie Alcorn. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The game metaphor made sense to her that the H-1B process is sort of like a game. She said that her two young sons invite her to play video games when she’s home and she says… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sophie Alcorn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You guys, I’m already playing one of the hardest video games. I don’t need to play another game because the immigration system is so complicated as it is. There’s randomness, there’s luck, there’s skill, there is strategy. There’s trying to go around and collect like, badges and items to upskill to be able to get to the next level just like in a game. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In games, players are the most affected by the rules, but they also have the least control over them. Right? Players are beholden to the rules but the people that make the rules are not playing the same game. I mean, you could say that we’re now playing on difficulty level hard with the Trump administration. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, let’s talk about the game itself, H1B life. Donduk, the guy who just got his American citizenship, actually thought the prototype he played was too realistic. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He said that the gameplay was a little triggering for him, it was too real. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’re going to get into that after this break. But first, we wanted to remind you that Close All Tabs depends on listeners like you to keep us going. You can support us by becoming a member at donate.kqed.org/podcasts. Okay, more about the game after the break. Stick with us. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Welcome back. We’re getting into this game, H1B.Life. Who is it for? How does it work? And can it really help make sense of the immigration process? Let’s open a new tab: How to play the H1-B Visa game. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>The immigration system, at times, can seem like a black box to applicants, lawyers, and maybe most of all, to natural born American citizens who’ve never needed to think about this. The seemingly arbitrary rules that can change at the whims of an unseen entity, the gravity of every single decision, the pressure to succeed as the perfect model immigrant, that is the experience that developers are trying to capture in H1B.Life. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from H1B.Life Trailer] America the big and beautiful country, but you need a visa. Be talented, big brain, build chips, then you might get an H-1B visa .\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s a trailer for H1B.Life, which is still a very long way from being playable. The Kickstarter hasn’t even launched yet, but Azul got to try a demo. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s basically like this text-based decision tree. The top half of the screen is like a text prompt and the bottom half is like, a series of choices. And then as you play through the game, you select different choices. There are these like four core attributes that you need to maintain. It’s intelligence, wealth, social support, and burnout rate, right? So this kind of like simulating. The things that it takes to be a person going through the H-1B visa process. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from H1B.Life Trailer] You make smart choices to get that visa and stay. What separates winning from losing is how you react when fate happens. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As you play, you’re presented with these different choices, like you’re done with your study abroad program and you go back home to Shanghai and you want to pursue journalism. But maybe you can get a job in this field and get an H-1B visa, so you decide to put off your dream and pursue something else. And as you do that, your core attributes sort of change. And so you’re having to sort of weigh those choices. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You can spend social capital, instead of going to, you know, your friend’s birthday party, you stay late at work because, you know, you’re trying to get sponsored, right? So your social support goes down, but you know your intelligence goes up, right? Like, that’s kind of the balancing act. Then what’s promised in subsequent versions of the game is that if those core attributes run out, it triggers a sort of like slot machine feature where different gods decide players fates, and that’s sort of supposed to describe this random nature of the H-1B visa process. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from H1B.Life Trailer] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And don’t forget the immigration gods: code god, free god, fried chicken god, even orange god.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Can you tell us more about these different gods in the game? I know there’s one called the orange god. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So the orange god is the one that caught my eye. The orange god bears a very strong resemblance to Donald Trump. And the orange god claims to control everything and has already changed the policy 500 times before you finish reading the sentence. That’s what the description of the orange is. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Allison Yang: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He’s the newest God in this universe. He’s very powerful. He can destroy your life any minute he wants, and he usually do. So you have to be very careful of him. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s Alison Yang, the founder of the game studio, Reality Reload. She told Azul about the other gods in the game. So there’s the code god, who looks like a cyborg and is obsessed with tech and optimization. The free god resembles the Statue of Liberty and is supposed to represent the American dream of a free society. And the fried chicken god? A nod to the annual Chick-fil-A tradition. And that god…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">…According to the game description, keeps you surviving through the power of fast food grease. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Laughter] Reality Reload is a game studio made up of immigrants, developers, designers, and journalists. The founder, Allison, has a background in journalism. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Allison Yang: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I love journalism, but over the years, as an editor and a reporter, I realized less and less people are reading long form, but there’s so much stories and information we want to pass on. I had the luck to step into the game industry for 7-8 years now, and I realized it’s the opposite. Like, people spend a massive amount of time in a the game. They complained one of my games to be too short, play is two hours. At the same time, they would complain that one of my articles is too long. So I thought, what if I turn it around, like a trojan horse. Like we wrap the news or information into a game and people doesn’t have to know that. They’re just playing something fun and they’re exposed to information anyway. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So, as Allison told Azul, the point of H1B.Life is to educate people about the complexities of the immigration system. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think they started with the H-1B visa because it’s like this caricature of the visa system. It’s highly sought after. It’s very competitive, but they realized that it’s not just H-1B visas, it’s the whole United States Immigration System. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The Reality Reload team initially designed the game based on their own experiences as Chinese immigrants in Silicon Valley. They conducted dozens of interviews with other Chinese immigrants for storylines in the game. But the team quickly realized that this experience is more universal than they first believed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Allison Yang: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s kind of funny because there is internal tensions between people of different origin who are competing for the same visa. But when we were talking to them, we realized it’s the same rat race, and you’re competing with each other not because the other party is evil or better, it’s because you have to. And then everyone’s, or every context, country of origin have their own dilemma. Like when we talk to Latino people from Bolivia…here it’s already very hard to find a job, but people at home find it very difficult to believe they couldn’t find money in the States. They have to mitigate through that. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I talked to my physician who is Indian, and she said their problem is even if they get a visa, there are too many Indian visa holders, they have to wait, I’m sure this number is not right, but she said 100 years to get a green card. So it’s like different versions of a game. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">H1B.Life revolves around choices and rules, which the player may or may not know about until they break one. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Allison Yang: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And the rules are changing every day. The player usually the one who has the least power or say, but they are the one we have to play through. So that tension is something we want to focus on. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Allison did admit that early versions of the game were maybe too realistic. She told Azul that when they ran play tests, some people, like Donduk, found it a bit traumatic because they’ve dealt with this in real life. Donduk thought the game was triggering and not playful enough for a typical video game. Here’s Azul again. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But he did think that it could have an application in like corporate diversity trainings. You could imagine like being at Google and a lot of your coworkers are H1B sponsors, being like, wow, I didn’t know that you had to go through that to get here, you know? And then that’s so different from how a United States citizen would get here. So that’s like, one potential application. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">H1B.Life is still a prototype. The Reality Reload team is still interviewing other immigrants to weave their experiences into the story. And they plan to add more fantasy and play to the game before it launches. Azul mentioned one mini game in the works, which involves juggling. Your hands are full with a social life, maintaining grades, and looking for a job that’ll sponsor you, all while checking emails from your immigration lawyer. This is core to the game, managing the tension between competing priorities. It prompts players to consider what they want more: to pursue their dreams, or to fit the mold of an ideal immigrant in order to stay in the country. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Allison Yang: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">At the beginning we thought we were going to do a simple visa simulation game and now we realize it’s more about how people figure out what kind of life they want, where they want it to be. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Which is also a sentiment that almost all employment-based visa holders have to consider. Except, unlike in the game, there’s no decision tree guiding their path. They have to make these choices for themselves. What does life look like when it’s not dictated by a precarious visa status? Let’s open another new tab: the post-visa midlife crisis. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For Donduk Dovdon, he came here as a student and he was pursuing a master’s degree. And now he needs to decide where he’s going to work, not based on what he wants to do, but based on who will sponsor him for an H-1B visa. After you get an H1B Visa, then you’re on a six-year timeline where you have to hit certain benchmarks in order to get a green card. After 10 years of uncertain visa status…once he got his U.S. citizenship, he basically had like a midlife crisis. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because before, when I was on H1B, the only thing I had, my goal was to survive and be in this country. So I do whatever it takes to get a job that sponsors me for H-1B. And I do whatever it takes make my boss happy. But when I eventually got a green card, I finally had the privilege to think like an American, like, oh, what do I actually want to do with my life? I think now I’m still figuring out like what do I actually want to do? Now I’m like a 21 years old American, just graduated from college. I have all the opportunities finally opened up for me and I remember when I became citizen and I decided to quit PhD that was the hardest time in my life because like I’m like now finally I can move to anywhere in the States. I can be a bartender in Miami, but do I really want to be? \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>I don’t know. Like I spent two months wondering where should I go next. And I know some other also H-1B workers, they were like of the best coders as a company or program manager or whatever. And then when they got a green card, some guys, I know one guy, he quit and he moved to Midwest and he opened a bakery because that’s what he actually is passionate about. And I think it’s just, it’s like, finally as immigrants, like when we got our green card of citizenship, we finally have the privilege to ponder what Americans did probably around 18 years old, or early 20s, like what do you actually want to achieve? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What do I really want to do with my life? It’s a conundrum that American citizens can ponder at any age, but most consider it when they’re teenagers or fresh out of college. Maybe a couple years into your career, you realize that it’s not for you and you can pivot. But if your legal status in this country hinges on being able to do one highly specialized job, you don’t get to pivot. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Your whole reason for being in the country is holding these special degrees, this special job and at the end of the day, that’s not all anyone is. Nobody is just an H-1B visa holder. Like, they’re complex people with multitudes of desires and I think feeling the weight of that lift can be unsettling for people. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donduk, for one, questioned whether this pressure is worth it for everyone. He told Azul that he was glad to stay in the United States, which, despite everything, is a safer and more free place for him as an openly gay, ethnically Mongolian person. But, if he knew that he could live in China without fear of persecution… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think the U.S. is getting harder and harder to stay here for immigrants. Like, you have to evaluate, what do you value more. If you can live a comfortable life in your back home country and you value your family connections, do you really want to spend 10, 15 years here just working like a dog to get a green card here? And also we heard many other stories like some immigrants, eventually they moved to Singapore or Canada and they found happiness there. Or even some move to Africa. It’s not like U.S. is the only place you can be happy. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fewer international students are interested in studying in the U.S. Last year, international enrollment in American universities dropped 17%. Both Texas and Florida have banned H-1B hiring at public universities. Many scientists have raised concerns that the U.S. will lose its competitive edge in research between DOGE enforced funding cuts and H- 1B hiring freezes. But, as for working in the U.S., outside of academia? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services said that they did hit their cap this year. So obviously there is still a demand for H-1B visas, but the Trump administration has made it a lot harder to get an H-1B visa. A lot of the Reality Reload team are Chinese immigrants and coming here, they’ve had the same experiences as the people they interviewed for these stories. I think it is very personal and part of why they wanted to give a voice to this experience because it is so pervasive in, you know, especially in like, the Bay area or other places where there’s a high need for specialized immigrant labor. This is really a huge thing and I think it’s not something that a lot of American citizens are aware of. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What do you think the game says about the intersection of technology and very bureaucratic systems like the immigration process? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Immigrants feel the whiplash of American government policies from like, Democrat to Republican, maybe more than most groups here in the country, and how it can upend their lives. And so I think this is a way for immigrants to tell their experiences and for them to feel seen and maybe to inject a little bit of critique into real life. Sometimes, like the experience can feel so arbitrary or so gamified. So maybe a game is the best way to understand and work towards making these processes better, or at least like, explain them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have the privilege of being a natural-born U.S. Citizen. Both of my parents immigrated here when they were young, and I’ve never had to navigate the complexities of the immigration system myself. Many of my close family members have dealt with that, but I admit that even as a journalist, I struggle to differentiate between types of visas and what you can do with them: H-1B, OPT, EB-3, O-1, L-1B, K-1? It’s a dialect that’s unintelligible to a lot of natural born citizens. There’s a whole other world of paperwork and red tape that most Americans never have to think about. But that doesn’t mean it’s unimportant. So how do you get through the doom scrolling and get American citizens to understand the real life impact of these shifting immigration policies?\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Like Allison pointed out, people who aren’t inclined to spend 20 minutes reading about visa changes, may be more convinced to spend 20 minutes in a game, trying to avoid the wrath of the orange god. Through surreal slot machines, fickle deities, and some skill juggling, games like H1B.Life can open players up to an unseen reality that exists right in front of them, one that might affect their friends, their coworkers, and their neighbors every day. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Special thanks to Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman for sharing this story along with the interview recordings you heard today. You can find a link to Azul’s story and more about H-1B.Life and the immigrant experience in our show notes. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, let’s close all these tabs. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Close All Tabs is a production of KQED Studios and is reported and hosted by me, Morgan Sung. This episode was produced by Maya Cueva and edited by Chris egusa, who also composed our theme song and credits music. The Close All Tabs team also includes editor Chris Hambrick and audio engineer, Brendan Willard. Additional music by APM. Audience engagement support from Maha Sanad, Jen Chien is our director of podcasts and Ethan Toven-Lindsey is our editor in chief. Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco Northern California Local. This episode’s keyboard sounds were submitted by Alex Tran, and recorded on his white Epomaker Hi75 keyboard with Fogruaden red samurai keycaps and gateron milky yellow pro v2 switches. Thanks for listening. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"title": "The H-1B Visa Process But Make It a Video Game | KQED",
"description": "Life on an H-1B visa — a visa that lets U.S. companies hire foreign-born workers for specialized jobs — is difficult, unpredictable, and has gotten even harder under the Trump administration. A new gaming studio, Reality Reload, is trying to capture that experience in a mobile game. It’s called H1B.Life, and it simulates the difficult choices, competing priorities, and personal sacrifices visa holders face — complete with chaotic design elements, like all-powerful “gods” who control your fate. KQED reporter Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman joins Morgan to break down the game’s surprising design choices, the mission behind it, and the stories he heard from people navigating the H1-B process.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Life on an H-1B visa — a visa that lets U.S. companies hire foreign-born workers for specialized jobs — is difficult, unpredictable, and has gotten even harder under the Trump administration. A new gaming studio, Reality Reload, is trying to capture that experience in a mobile game. It’s called H1B.Life, and it simulates the difficult choices, competing priorities, and personal sacrifices visa holders face — complete with chaotic design elements, like all-powerful “gods” who control your fate.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">KQED reporter Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman joins Morgan to break down the game’s surprising design choices, the mission behind it, and the stories he heard from people navigating the H1-B process. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC2401184331\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Guest:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/author/adahlstromeckman\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, reporter at \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">KQED\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Further Reading/Listening:\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12076756/what-does-it-take-to-get-a-h-1b-visa-this-video-game-shows-just-how-complicated-it-is\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What Does It Take to Get a H-1B Visa? This Video Game Shows Just How Complicated It Is \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">KQED\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.businessinsider.com/meta-google-amazon-microsoft-h-1b-visa-applications-decline-2026-4\">Meta, Google, and Amazon slash H-1B petitions after Trump’s visa crackdown\u003c/a> — Geoff Weiss, Melia Russell, Andy Kiersz, and Alex Nicoll, \u003ci>Business Insider \u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/state-policy/2026/01/29/faculty-warn-against-state-bans-h-1b-visas\">Faculty Warn Against State Bans on H-1B Visas\u003c/a> — Jessica Blake, \u003ci>\u003ci>Inside Higher Ed \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.the-scientist.com/h-1b-visa-restrictions-will-hurt-america-s-research-potential-experts-say-74267\">H-1B Visa Restrictions Will Hurt America’s Research Potential, Experts Say\u003c/a> — Shelby Bradford, PhD, \u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>The Scientist \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wired.com/story/trump-immigration-visa-secrutiny-tech/\">US Tech Visa Applications Are Being Put Through the Wringer \u003c/a>— Lauren Goode, \u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>Wired \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wired.com/story/made-in-china-a-new-game-turns-the-h-1b-visa-system-into-a-surreal-simulation/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A New Game Turns the H-1B Visa System Into a Surreal Simulation \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Zeyi Yang, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wired \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Want to give us feedback on the show? Shoot us an email at \u003ca href=\"mailto:CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\">CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Follow us on\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/closealltabspod/\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Instagram\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> and\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@closealltabs\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">TikTok\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hi, it’s Morgan. Be honest with me, how many tabs do you have open? Feeling a little overwhelmed by closing them? Well, we have an episode for you. If you like our deep dives and wanna hear more, please rate and review us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to the show and tell your friends about us too. Okay, let’s get to the episode. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Quick note: in this episode we use the term “immigrant” in a broad sense to refer to people living and working in the U.S. on H-1B visas. In legal terms the H1-B is a nonimmigrant temporary visa, though many visa holders hope to stay in the U.S. long term. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Every March, a corner of the Chinese social media app Red Note gets flooded with posts about Chick-fil-A. The users go all out, buying Chick-fil-A keychains, changing their profile pictures to the red and white chicken logo, and of course, treating themselves to a hearty meal of a chicken sandwich and waffle fries. You’ll often see the same emojis in each post: prayer hands, a chicken, and an American flag. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All of these users are applying for the H-1B visa, a visa for highly skilled immigrants sponsored by an employer. Many come to Silicon Valley to work in tech. Hundreds of thousands of hopefuls apply every year, but only 85,000 applicants are selected. So, what does this have to do with fried chicken? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It turns out that there’s a tradition amongst Chinese H-1B applicants here in the United States that they believe that eating a lot of Chick-fil-A and just generally associating with Chick-fil-A brings you luck and will increase your chances of getting selected in the H-1B lottery. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman is a reporter at KQED. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And apparently, if you go to a Chick-fil-A here in the Bay Area around March, you’re likely to see a lot of Chinese immigrants who potentially could be H-1B applicants eating there. And it’s not really clear where this started, but it’s definitely a thing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Azul said that this trend, the annual Chick-fil-A frenzy on social media, is part of a much bigger story. To even apply for an H-1B visa, you need an employer to sponsor you, which means that you need to have a job offer. It doesn’t guarantee a visa, just that you can enter the lottery. The process for getting an H-1B Visa has been changing, and a system that was already difficult has become even harder for applicants. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It is true that with the Trump administration, there has been a lot of changes specifically to this year’s H-1B visa process. The first is that there’s now a $100,000 fee if a company wants to sponsor somebody who isn’t currently living in the country. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In wake of the changes and very steep application fee, some universities and companies implemented a hiring freeze for H-1B applicants. And the ones that are still hiring are sponsoring far fewer visas than in previous cycles. The updated application system isn’t totally random anymore. Higher paid applicants have a better chance of being picked now. But for the most part, the application process feels like a game of luck. At the end of the day, it’s still a lottery. Which is why good luck traditions, like getting Chick-fil-A during the registration window, have become baked into the modern mythology of the American immigrant experience. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It can all feel like a game, one in which the rules seem arbitrary and unpredictable. So when Azul heard about a studio turning that experience into a playable app, it made perfect sense. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">H1B.Life is a game that tries to simulate the experience of an immigrant who’s trying to get H1-B visa status. And it’s a pretty early prototype now. Basically, it’s sort of like a text-based decision tree on your smartphone. And I played a demo of it, and it was actually kind of interesting. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So one of the opening scenes of the game says, during high school, you spent hours and hours on your laptop binging Gilmore Girls on shady, unauthorized streaming websites. Everything in your drowsy new town reminds you of the show. If it wasn’t for Lorelai and Rory, you might have never decided to… and then there’s like two decisions, and one is study journalism or come to New England. And I was like, wow, that’s really oddly specific. And it turns out that H1B.Life is based on real-life interviews from H1-B applicants, specifically Chinese immigrants living in Silicon Valley. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’re diving into H1B.Life today, the arduous application process, how capricious policy changes impact the trajectory of an immigrant’s entire life, and the cost of chasing a dream, all wrapped up in a mobile game. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>This is Close All Tabs. I’m Morgan Sung, tech journalist and your chronically online friend, here to open as many browser tabs as it takes to help you understand how the digital world affects our real lives. Let’s get into it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Before we talk about the game itself, let’s get into the reality that inspired it. And as always, we’re starting by opening a new tab: Life on an H-1B Visa. Last month, the annual Game Developers Conference took over San Francisco. The Asian Art Museum was hosting a showcase for a game that involved chance, timing, and bureaucracy to, “determine who stays and who is deported.” The game was H1B.Life. Azul had heard about the game and decided to check it out. At the event, he talked to a few people about their own experiences with the immigration system. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The first person I talked to, his name was Donduk Dovdon, and he’s an ethnically Mongolian, Chinese national who now is a U.S. Citizen. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So I came to States 12 years ago for my master’s degree in Washington, D.C. And eventually I got H-1B, and then later I got green card. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donduk said the process demands a lot of sacrifice and that it can be hard to ever feel secure about the future. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He told me it is a very hard and arduous process to get H-1B status. And then even once you have H-1B status, you’re still not secure. You have to work towards getting a green card and then citizenship. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I didn’t see my parents for 10 years. I didn’t see any of my relatives for 10 years. So I think that’s still very emotional for me to say. Like, I eventually went back, I think, two years ago when I became citizen. It was so emotional. And I feel… I miss them, they miss me, a huge chapter of our lives…ten years, like many Americans, it’s just unimaginable. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donduk’s 10-year gap without seeing his family may be on the extreme end. H-1B visa holders are technically allowed to travel internationally and re-enter the country, as long as their visa stamp is still valid. But he’s not alone. The decision to stay in the U.S. is often driven by fear of not being allowed back in. Over the last year, given the heightened scrutiny of visa holders and the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, some legal experts, universities, and even tech companies who employ visa holders have cautioned against international travel. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Concerns about travel aside, taking time off to visit family abroad often depends on your employer’s time off policy. H-1B visas hinge on employment. Changing jobs involves a new sponsor and another mountain of paperwork. Some H- 1B visa holders have spoken out about feeling trapped abusive work environments because of their visa status. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When I was on H-1B, I met various shady employers who technically did not pay me, which was illegal. And it was like, if you dare to report me, you will get your H-1B revoked. So eventually, I was lucky enough and I left that organization, but I heard other people, in order just to get one H-1B, worked for three years free. And after work, they work at a restaurant or bubble tea store illegally for three years. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Getting picked in the visa lottery doesn’t guarantee long-term stability either. H-1B visas have a 6-year cap and visa holders have to spend a full year outside of the U.S. before they can reapply. Donduk mentioned one of his friends, who’s also Chinese Mongolian. He recently had to say goodbye to her. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She self-deported herself three or four days ago. We were at the airport. She was on H-1B for five years, but no companies was willing to sponsor her green card. She spent 14 years in the States. She even bought a house. And then she sold the house, sold the car, and moved back. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Visa status can be all consuming. At the showcase, Azul spoke with another attendee who’s currently on a different work-based visa. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He said that whenever he meets up with other visa holders, the number one thing that they ask each other is ‘what visa are you on? ‘ because it has such a powerful determining factor over what you do, who you date, where you live, where you work. You have to keep your employer happy and they have to continue to sponsor you. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>You might need to take a job that takes you traveling out of the country, but with the Trump administration, you know, maybe it’s hard for you to get back into the country based on your country of origin. So I think people are constantly taking risks and living under uncertainty, you know, from one presidential administration to the next. They’re not sure how these rules surrounding H-1B status are going to change. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In his reporting, Azul talked to an immigration lawyer based in Silicon Valley, Sophie Alcorn. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The game metaphor made sense to her that the H-1B process is sort of like a game. She said that her two young sons invite her to play video games when she’s home and she says… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sophie Alcorn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You guys, I’m already playing one of the hardest video games. I don’t need to play another game because the immigration system is so complicated as it is. There’s randomness, there’s luck, there’s skill, there is strategy. There’s trying to go around and collect like, badges and items to upskill to be able to get to the next level just like in a game. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In games, players are the most affected by the rules, but they also have the least control over them. Right? Players are beholden to the rules but the people that make the rules are not playing the same game. I mean, you could say that we’re now playing on difficulty level hard with the Trump administration. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, let’s talk about the game itself, H1B life. Donduk, the guy who just got his American citizenship, actually thought the prototype he played was too realistic. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He said that the gameplay was a little triggering for him, it was too real. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’re going to get into that after this break. But first, we wanted to remind you that Close All Tabs depends on listeners like you to keep us going. You can support us by becoming a member at donate.kqed.org/podcasts. Okay, more about the game after the break. Stick with us. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Welcome back. We’re getting into this game, H1B.Life. Who is it for? How does it work? And can it really help make sense of the immigration process? Let’s open a new tab: How to play the H1-B Visa game. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>The immigration system, at times, can seem like a black box to applicants, lawyers, and maybe most of all, to natural born American citizens who’ve never needed to think about this. The seemingly arbitrary rules that can change at the whims of an unseen entity, the gravity of every single decision, the pressure to succeed as the perfect model immigrant, that is the experience that developers are trying to capture in H1B.Life. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from H1B.Life Trailer] America the big and beautiful country, but you need a visa. Be talented, big brain, build chips, then you might get an H-1B visa .\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s a trailer for H1B.Life, which is still a very long way from being playable. The Kickstarter hasn’t even launched yet, but Azul got to try a demo. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s basically like this text-based decision tree. The top half of the screen is like a text prompt and the bottom half is like, a series of choices. And then as you play through the game, you select different choices. There are these like four core attributes that you need to maintain. It’s intelligence, wealth, social support, and burnout rate, right? So this kind of like simulating. The things that it takes to be a person going through the H-1B visa process. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from H1B.Life Trailer] You make smart choices to get that visa and stay. What separates winning from losing is how you react when fate happens. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As you play, you’re presented with these different choices, like you’re done with your study abroad program and you go back home to Shanghai and you want to pursue journalism. But maybe you can get a job in this field and get an H-1B visa, so you decide to put off your dream and pursue something else. And as you do that, your core attributes sort of change. And so you’re having to sort of weigh those choices. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You can spend social capital, instead of going to, you know, your friend’s birthday party, you stay late at work because, you know, you’re trying to get sponsored, right? So your social support goes down, but you know your intelligence goes up, right? Like, that’s kind of the balancing act. Then what’s promised in subsequent versions of the game is that if those core attributes run out, it triggers a sort of like slot machine feature where different gods decide players fates, and that’s sort of supposed to describe this random nature of the H-1B visa process. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from H1B.Life Trailer] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And don’t forget the immigration gods: code god, free god, fried chicken god, even orange god.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Can you tell us more about these different gods in the game? I know there’s one called the orange god. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So the orange god is the one that caught my eye. The orange god bears a very strong resemblance to Donald Trump. And the orange god claims to control everything and has already changed the policy 500 times before you finish reading the sentence. That’s what the description of the orange is. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Allison Yang: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He’s the newest God in this universe. He’s very powerful. He can destroy your life any minute he wants, and he usually do. So you have to be very careful of him. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s Alison Yang, the founder of the game studio, Reality Reload. She told Azul about the other gods in the game. So there’s the code god, who looks like a cyborg and is obsessed with tech and optimization. The free god resembles the Statue of Liberty and is supposed to represent the American dream of a free society. And the fried chicken god? A nod to the annual Chick-fil-A tradition. And that god…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">…According to the game description, keeps you surviving through the power of fast food grease. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Laughter] Reality Reload is a game studio made up of immigrants, developers, designers, and journalists. The founder, Allison, has a background in journalism. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Allison Yang: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I love journalism, but over the years, as an editor and a reporter, I realized less and less people are reading long form, but there’s so much stories and information we want to pass on. I had the luck to step into the game industry for 7-8 years now, and I realized it’s the opposite. Like, people spend a massive amount of time in a the game. They complained one of my games to be too short, play is two hours. At the same time, they would complain that one of my articles is too long. So I thought, what if I turn it around, like a trojan horse. Like we wrap the news or information into a game and people doesn’t have to know that. They’re just playing something fun and they’re exposed to information anyway. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So, as Allison told Azul, the point of H1B.Life is to educate people about the complexities of the immigration system. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think they started with the H-1B visa because it’s like this caricature of the visa system. It’s highly sought after. It’s very competitive, but they realized that it’s not just H-1B visas, it’s the whole United States Immigration System. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The Reality Reload team initially designed the game based on their own experiences as Chinese immigrants in Silicon Valley. They conducted dozens of interviews with other Chinese immigrants for storylines in the game. But the team quickly realized that this experience is more universal than they first believed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Allison Yang: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s kind of funny because there is internal tensions between people of different origin who are competing for the same visa. But when we were talking to them, we realized it’s the same rat race, and you’re competing with each other not because the other party is evil or better, it’s because you have to. And then everyone’s, or every context, country of origin have their own dilemma. Like when we talk to Latino people from Bolivia…here it’s already very hard to find a job, but people at home find it very difficult to believe they couldn’t find money in the States. They have to mitigate through that. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I talked to my physician who is Indian, and she said their problem is even if they get a visa, there are too many Indian visa holders, they have to wait, I’m sure this number is not right, but she said 100 years to get a green card. So it’s like different versions of a game. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">H1B.Life revolves around choices and rules, which the player may or may not know about until they break one. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Allison Yang: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And the rules are changing every day. The player usually the one who has the least power or say, but they are the one we have to play through. So that tension is something we want to focus on. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Allison did admit that early versions of the game were maybe too realistic. She told Azul that when they ran play tests, some people, like Donduk, found it a bit traumatic because they’ve dealt with this in real life. Donduk thought the game was triggering and not playful enough for a typical video game. Here’s Azul again. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But he did think that it could have an application in like corporate diversity trainings. You could imagine like being at Google and a lot of your coworkers are H1B sponsors, being like, wow, I didn’t know that you had to go through that to get here, you know? And then that’s so different from how a United States citizen would get here. So that’s like, one potential application. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">H1B.Life is still a prototype. The Reality Reload team is still interviewing other immigrants to weave their experiences into the story. And they plan to add more fantasy and play to the game before it launches. Azul mentioned one mini game in the works, which involves juggling. Your hands are full with a social life, maintaining grades, and looking for a job that’ll sponsor you, all while checking emails from your immigration lawyer. This is core to the game, managing the tension between competing priorities. It prompts players to consider what they want more: to pursue their dreams, or to fit the mold of an ideal immigrant in order to stay in the country. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Allison Yang: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">At the beginning we thought we were going to do a simple visa simulation game and now we realize it’s more about how people figure out what kind of life they want, where they want it to be. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Which is also a sentiment that almost all employment-based visa holders have to consider. Except, unlike in the game, there’s no decision tree guiding their path. They have to make these choices for themselves. What does life look like when it’s not dictated by a precarious visa status? Let’s open another new tab: the post-visa midlife crisis. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For Donduk Dovdon, he came here as a student and he was pursuing a master’s degree. And now he needs to decide where he’s going to work, not based on what he wants to do, but based on who will sponsor him for an H-1B visa. After you get an H1B Visa, then you’re on a six-year timeline where you have to hit certain benchmarks in order to get a green card. After 10 years of uncertain visa status…once he got his U.S. citizenship, he basically had like a midlife crisis. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because before, when I was on H1B, the only thing I had, my goal was to survive and be in this country. So I do whatever it takes to get a job that sponsors me for H-1B. And I do whatever it takes make my boss happy. But when I eventually got a green card, I finally had the privilege to think like an American, like, oh, what do I actually want to do with my life? I think now I’m still figuring out like what do I actually want to do? Now I’m like a 21 years old American, just graduated from college. I have all the opportunities finally opened up for me and I remember when I became citizen and I decided to quit PhD that was the hardest time in my life because like I’m like now finally I can move to anywhere in the States. I can be a bartender in Miami, but do I really want to be? \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>I don’t know. Like I spent two months wondering where should I go next. And I know some other also H-1B workers, they were like of the best coders as a company or program manager or whatever. And then when they got a green card, some guys, I know one guy, he quit and he moved to Midwest and he opened a bakery because that’s what he actually is passionate about. And I think it’s just, it’s like, finally as immigrants, like when we got our green card of citizenship, we finally have the privilege to ponder what Americans did probably around 18 years old, or early 20s, like what do you actually want to achieve? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What do I really want to do with my life? It’s a conundrum that American citizens can ponder at any age, but most consider it when they’re teenagers or fresh out of college. Maybe a couple years into your career, you realize that it’s not for you and you can pivot. But if your legal status in this country hinges on being able to do one highly specialized job, you don’t get to pivot. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Your whole reason for being in the country is holding these special degrees, this special job and at the end of the day, that’s not all anyone is. Nobody is just an H-1B visa holder. Like, they’re complex people with multitudes of desires and I think feeling the weight of that lift can be unsettling for people. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donduk, for one, questioned whether this pressure is worth it for everyone. He told Azul that he was glad to stay in the United States, which, despite everything, is a safer and more free place for him as an openly gay, ethnically Mongolian person. But, if he knew that he could live in China without fear of persecution… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Donduk Dovdon: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think the U.S. is getting harder and harder to stay here for immigrants. Like, you have to evaluate, what do you value more. If you can live a comfortable life in your back home country and you value your family connections, do you really want to spend 10, 15 years here just working like a dog to get a green card here? And also we heard many other stories like some immigrants, eventually they moved to Singapore or Canada and they found happiness there. Or even some move to Africa. It’s not like U.S. is the only place you can be happy. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fewer international students are interested in studying in the U.S. Last year, international enrollment in American universities dropped 17%. Both Texas and Florida have banned H-1B hiring at public universities. Many scientists have raised concerns that the U.S. will lose its competitive edge in research between DOGE enforced funding cuts and H- 1B hiring freezes. But, as for working in the U.S., outside of academia? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services said that they did hit their cap this year. So obviously there is still a demand for H-1B visas, but the Trump administration has made it a lot harder to get an H-1B visa. A lot of the Reality Reload team are Chinese immigrants and coming here, they’ve had the same experiences as the people they interviewed for these stories. I think it is very personal and part of why they wanted to give a voice to this experience because it is so pervasive in, you know, especially in like, the Bay area or other places where there’s a high need for specialized immigrant labor. This is really a huge thing and I think it’s not something that a lot of American citizens are aware of. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What do you think the game says about the intersection of technology and very bureaucratic systems like the immigration process? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Immigrants feel the whiplash of American government policies from like, Democrat to Republican, maybe more than most groups here in the country, and how it can upend their lives. And so I think this is a way for immigrants to tell their experiences and for them to feel seen and maybe to inject a little bit of critique into real life. Sometimes, like the experience can feel so arbitrary or so gamified. So maybe a game is the best way to understand and work towards making these processes better, or at least like, explain them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have the privilege of being a natural-born U.S. Citizen. Both of my parents immigrated here when they were young, and I’ve never had to navigate the complexities of the immigration system myself. Many of my close family members have dealt with that, but I admit that even as a journalist, I struggle to differentiate between types of visas and what you can do with them: H-1B, OPT, EB-3, O-1, L-1B, K-1? It’s a dialect that’s unintelligible to a lot of natural born citizens. There’s a whole other world of paperwork and red tape that most Americans never have to think about. But that doesn’t mean it’s unimportant. So how do you get through the doom scrolling and get American citizens to understand the real life impact of these shifting immigration policies?\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Like Allison pointed out, people who aren’t inclined to spend 20 minutes reading about visa changes, may be more convinced to spend 20 minutes in a game, trying to avoid the wrath of the orange god. Through surreal slot machines, fickle deities, and some skill juggling, games like H1B.Life can open players up to an unseen reality that exists right in front of them, one that might affect their friends, their coworkers, and their neighbors every day. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Special thanks to Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman for sharing this story along with the interview recordings you heard today. You can find a link to Azul’s story and more about H-1B.Life and the immigrant experience in our show notes. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, let’s close all these tabs. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>Close All Tabs is a production of KQED Studios and is reported and hosted by me, Morgan Sung. This episode was produced by Maya Cueva and edited by Chris egusa, who also composed our theme song and credits music. The Close All Tabs team also includes editor Chris Hambrick and audio engineer, Brendan Willard. Additional music by APM. Audience engagement support from Maha Sanad, Jen Chien is our director of podcasts and Ethan Toven-Lindsey is our editor in chief. Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco Northern California Local. This episode’s keyboard sounds were submitted by Alex Tran, and recorded on his white Epomaker Hi75 keyboard with Fogruaden red samurai keycaps and gateron milky yellow pro v2 switches. Thanks for listening. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>"
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"title": "Save or Scroll: Looksmaxxing, AI Fruit Love Island, BTS Arirang, and Meta Lawsuits",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In a spring installment of \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Save or Scroll\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, Morgan teams up with culture journalist Steffi Cao to dig into the stories they can’t stop thinking about. From \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">looksmaxxing to \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">AI Fruit Love Island, BTS’ new album, and Meta losing a landmark series of lawsuits, they’ve got a lot to discuss. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Save or Scroll is our series where we team up with guests for a rapid-fire roundup of internet trends that are filling our feeds right now. At the end of each segment, they’ll decide: is the post just for the group chat, or should we save it for a future episode?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC4630070510\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Guest:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://stefficao.substack.com/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Steffi Cao\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, culture journalist \u003c/span>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Further Reading/Listening:\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://stefficao.substack.com/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">More from Steffi Cao\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Substack\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.gq.com/story/inside-claviculars-thirsty-tour-of-new-york-city\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Inside Clavicular’s Thirsty Tour of New York City \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Kieran Press-Reynolds, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">GQ\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.thedailybeast.com/in-gen-z-gym-culture-steroids-are-often-a-gateway-drug-to-the-alt-right/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Why Steroids Are Now Turning Young Men into Dangerous Incels\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Steffi Cao, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The Daily Beast\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.fastcompany.com/91519147/fruit-love-island-tiktok-most-popular-ai-generated-series-now-facing-trouble-in-paradise\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">‘Fruit Love Island’ is TikTok’s most popular AI-generated series. It’s now facing trouble in paradise \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Jude Cramer, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fast Company \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wired.com/story/theres-something-very-dark-about-a-lot-of-those-viral-ai-fruit-videos/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s Something Very Dark About a Lot of Those Viral AI Fruit Videos \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Kat Tenbarge, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wired \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.teenvogue.com/story/who-decides-if-bts-album-arirang-is-korean-enough-op-ed\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Who Decides If BTS’s Album ‘Arirang’ is ‘Korean Enough’? \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Jiye Kim, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Teen Vogue \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://slate.com/culture/2026/03/bts-arirang-album-netflix-swim-comeback-concert-2026.html\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">BTS’s Arirang comeback was supposed to be a triumph. What happened?\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Nadira Goffe, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Slate \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://19thnews.org/2026/03/social-media-addiction-trial-meta-youtube/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Meta and YouTube ordered to pay $3 million to young woman in social media addiction trial\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Jasmine Mithani, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The 19th\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-lede/what-the-verdict-against-meta-and-google-says-about-the-way-we-live-now\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What the Verdict Against Meta and Google Says About the Way We Live Now\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Jeannie Suk Gersen, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The New Yorker \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ype6c6DdHQY\">The Truth About the Social Media Addiction Trial\u003c/a> — Taylor Lorenz, \u003ci>Free Speech Friday \u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Want to give us feedback on the show? Shoot us an email at \u003ca href=\"mailto:CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\">CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Follow us on\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/closealltabspod/\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Instagram\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> and\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@closealltabs\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">TikTok\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey, it’s Morgan. We just celebrated the show’s first birthday. That’s right, Close All Tabs is a Pisces. Want to celebrate with us? It would be so, so helpful if you could rate and review us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to the show. And tell your friends about us too. Okay, let’s get to the episode.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey guys, welcome to Close All Tabs. I’m Morgan Sung, tech journalist and your chronically online friend, here to open as many browser tabs as it takes to help you understand how the digital world affects our real lives. Except today, we aren’t opening any tabs. Instead, we’re doing another Save or Scroll. We’ve done a few of these now. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Occasionally, while scrolling, I come across a truly wild post, but it might not make sense to spend an entire episode on it. Maybe I do a little digging and it turns out that the lore behind it just isn’t compelling enough to justify a deep dive, but I’m still dying to talk about it. And this is the beauty of Save or Scroll, the game where a guest comes to the show and we trade stories from the internet that we’re dying to talk about. Today, we have the one and only Steffi Cao. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you so much for having me, Morgan. I’m so excited. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, Steffi, tell us about yourself. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hi everyone, I’m Steffi, I am a culture journalist and Slate’s newest dating advice columnist for Unhinged. You can find my writing everywhere from The Atlantic, to Rolling Stone, to The Guardian, to Slate now, so I’m very excited to share all my tabs and work in today. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, so let’s talk about the rules of Save or Scroll. Save, as in when you see a post on TikTok or Instagram or X and you bookmark it, add it to your save folders or if you’re me, drop it in notes app and hope that you’ll remember it’s there. Basically, you’re holding onto the story because you know you’ll want to dig into it more. And scroll, as you think about it and then move on. It disappears into the digital ether.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So Steffi and I have each brought some stories that we can’t stop thinking about, and we’re gonna go back and forth to decide if they’re worth a deep dive on the show. So if we decide to scroll, it means we’ve talked about it, we’re moving on. And if we save, it means that we might hold onto the idea for a future episode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, Steffi, please tell us about looksmaxxing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Over the past few years, looksmaxxing is the subculture of young men primarily who are seeking guidance from other men in terms of how to gamify their looks to become super, super hot. The essence of looksmaxxing is basically ‘the hotter I can be, the better my life will be around other men.’ And the pinnacle of these content creators currently is a man named Clavicular of collarbone fame.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’s a 20-year-old white man who has a very soft elfin face and a Dorito-shaped body and has really been associated with a lot of, like, Nazi ideology, has been recently arrested for inciting a fight between two women, allegedly and also allegedly shooting an alligator in Florida. He was kicked out of Las Vegas, I believe, and has become this sort of lightning rod for this entire culture of all these men wanting to get hotter and be hotter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah and Clavicular first went viral for not only his extensive skin care and workout routine, but for also saying that he microdoses meth and would hit his face with a hammer to get a more, I guess, angular jawline. What a man. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What a guy. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What a character. Clavicular is so fascinating to me because his political stances are indecipherable. He has gone on some more right-leaning podcasts, and when they try to get him to be kind of transphobic, he said… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Clavicular in audio clip]\u003cbr>\nI did a podcast with Michael Knowles the other day and he’s sitting here saying like and getting all mad about transgenders and I’m like bro that’s one more person a mog you know what I mean so like I don’t get too I don’t get too upset when people go trans and all that shit. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s just another person to mog. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How would you describe mogging? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mogging, I think, is the essence of being hotter than somebody else. So if you’ve mogged them, it’s like you’ve shown them up in some way. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio clip of Clavicular on the Adam Friedland Show] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Clavicular: That’s the goal of the game, right, is to mog other people, right? \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Adam: Tell the boomer cells about what that is. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Clavicular: So, mogging is essentially just, you know, outperforming them, looking better than them, yeah and just sort of dominating, right. It came from something called AMOG, which was alpha male of the group, then it was shortened to just mog, so that’s kind of like the term we use. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So the language has become like a bigger than itself sort of phenomenon where, you know, maxxing and mogging have started from this internal community and then now becomes sort of like general ironic gobbledygook for everybody. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s so interesting too, because the whole looksmaxxing thing has become like the peak Manosphere content. All the allegedly straight boys are really into doing all this to impress other men. It doesn’t seem like they actually do this in any way to appeal to women. And like, I’ve seen a lot of like gay men point out, this is literally gay male culture, what they’re doing, the peacocking, trying to show each other up and like only seek validation from other men, which is from a gender perspective, I’m like, what’s going on here? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It feels like horseshoe theory a little bit. They are doing all of these performative things that come right back to a drag of what a straight man is. It’s like it’s heterosexual drag. Like you’re trying to, you know, build up your face a certain way, you’re trying to mog other straight men, like that’s drag, honey. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like that’s gender performance. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">100% Yeah, I mean, self-improvement leans so well into fascist ideology because a lot of it is predicated on this idea that you can earn your way into something better, which is exactly what looksmaxxing is, right? You can gamify your looks. Like, If you’re not hot now, all you need to do is do all these steps and gain more points, more aura points, until you have achieved this thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Which is exactly why in Nazi Germany you see a lot of propaganda being espoused about the strongman. That was a huge beauty standard at that point in Hitler’s Germany, was specifically this idea of a man who is super jacked and is super like, is mogged, really, and I have no other word for it really. It’s just like they really..\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A mogged man has always been this cultural fascination and in many ways a mogged woman, obviously. Um, has been a huge part of, uh, fascist ideology for a long time. You know, think about all these essays about why Republican women all look the same and they have this specific look about them. And it has a lot to do with this culture of self-improvement and making all these alterations to yourself to try and earn your way or like bootstrap your way into beauty and therefore access and power and all of these things. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Okay, well, looksmaxxing, the big thing of the year right now, do we save or do we scroll? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, I’m saving it because I think there’s going to be developments. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No, yeah, there are going to be new words that have never been said before. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s going be crazy. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But looks maxed as a trend, I think we’re saving. After the break, a new bombshell enters the villa. Unfortunately, she’s AI generated and also made of fruit. Steffi and I are going to explain all of the drama around AI Fruit Love Island. Stick around. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have a story for you now. Are you familiar with AI Fruit Love Island? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, am I! Oh my god, I feel like it came out of nowhere and then it’s sudden, it’s like omnipresent now. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So, for the uninitiated, AI Fruit Love Island was this interactive AI-slop parody of \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Love Island\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> with sexy anthropomorphized fruit. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Clip of Audio from AI Fruit Love Island] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Host: Welcome Back to Fruit Love Island. Today we’ve got a steamy challenge and after over 370,000 viewer votes, our bombshells have officially hit the villa. All right ladies let’s get this started. You’ll be kissed one by each guy and after each kiss you rate it. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, so that is one of the episodes of Fruit Love Island. What was happening in that clip? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Um, it’s basically just a real \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Love Island\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> challenge, but done with fruit. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, they have human bodies, um, but their heads are fruit. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">These are all like, obviously done by AI. The colors are highly saturated. It’s super bright, super like in your face. And then a grape man wearing a Hawaiian shirt and, uh, board shorts, like comes up and kisses the fruit ladies blindfolded. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Clip of Audio from AI Fruit Love Island] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Host: Grapenzo, you’re up first. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Contestant: That was hot, an 8.5. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You see all these badly done reactions in the background of these AI fruit women laughing and sort of being like, ha ha ha, this is crazy. So it just is like a \u003cem>Love Island\u003c/em> episode, but with fruit. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So for context, this TikTok account kind of came out of nowhere, AICinema021, and they gained about 3.1 million followers in like a week and a half. And now there are so many copycat accounts. The characters include Limeyra, the lime, Bananito, the banana who has abs and is always shirtless, Strawberrina, the strawberry, Coconick, the sexy coconut. And yeah, it’s not good. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The animation and voices are all stilted. There’s zero consistency. It’s pure slop. So viewers gave storyline feedback via Google Form and voted for their faves in the comments. And this account was getting crazy numbers, like 20 million views per episode at its peak and just churning out new episodes every day. I feel like it used to be kind of embarrassing to enjoy this kind of content, but then you had Zara Larsson and Joe Jonas being like, ‘Oh my God, I can’t wait for the next episode.’ Like major celebrities. But yeah, what’s your like initial gut reaction here? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think it makes sense why this thing is taken off, because even though young people online want to act like only boomers love watching AI slop, the fact is our brains are primed to watch AI slop. We have all these deep fried memes and internet humor is so self-referential, but it removes a lot of these barriers in our heads of consuming something like this that really feels as though, like, okay, maybe, um, what could be embarrassing previously could be ironically fun now. I love it because it’s fascinating to see how excited people get about it. But like, is the content good? No, it’s trash, but I don’t think it’s trying to be good. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Well, have you been following the great AI Fruit Love Island crash out… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have not. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">…that happened over the weekend? Okay. So this account literally gained millions and millions of followers, three million followers in like a week and a half, which is insane. Like there are human creators who grind for years to get a third of that. But, you know, this account was able to just churn out content so fast and people were invested. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So basically, people were criticizing the account for being AI slop and criticizing viewers for being slop consumers. And the creator did not respond well. In TikTok comments, they complained about how hard it was to make this content and basically implied that like viewers were ungrateful. A real hilarious irony where they were like, it’s really hard because I have to prompt so many times and the AI sometimes messes up and I have to redo it and then I have edit it together. And it sometimes takes me like three hours to make one of these videos. And it’s like, yeah, well… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Imagine how long it must take to film a real TV episode? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s so funny that they’re like, this is so hard, even like having to prompt a generator to be like, and now make Strawberrina kiss the kiwi man is like too much effort. So then their video started getting removed. The creator claimed that it was part of a mass reporting campaign and started crashing onto their story. So this was the first one…they were, I guess, sick of it, right? \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They were like, “This is it. I’m sick of all of you.” They were getting criticized for like wasting water basically and people were pointing out like, hey, this is like really sh*tty that you’re kind of encouraging this consumption. So they were posting like, “Was a good run, didn’t expect any of this, but here we are from being a nobody to being cancelled. I guess I’ll take it. People hate to see people win,”. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s awesome! \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">…with screenshots from like their episodes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’t the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“I’m so glad y’all got what you wanted. Saving the planet three gallons of water at a time, truly inspirational. It’s like, f*ck all y’all, you jealous motherf*ckers, save the planet, OMG, water, OMG. I love water, clean water, please clean water. What y’ all sound like.”. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s hilarious. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“Thanks for 3 million followers though. Wow, I guess some might like it.” Then they posted one final one, basically saying like, this series is over, this is it, with Bananito, a fan favorite, unfortunately, the sexy banana that is never wearing a shirt. Um, and basically they said, “All right, f*ck all you b*tches, no more Fruit Love Island. Since people are so obsessed with it, all my videos banned, I make no money. I guess I am being targeted because no other AI account is getting f*cked. Y’all heard it from Bananito himself. Bye.”. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Bye. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s just really funny because they also got mad that other like copycat AI accounts were like copying their theme, which is a real like, so many layers between like, being mad about the copycats and then being like suddenly like creative integrity matters basically. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And then being mad at like the effort it took to make these videos. The layers of complete unawareness just go so deep. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Laughter] It’s one of those things where I’m like, oh, of course, this is where we are. People are so fixated on this idea of it’s fine until it’s me because passive consumption is just so self-centric, you’re only thinking about yourself. So of course this person’s mad that other people are stealing their AI fruit slop content without contributing to the AI slop database that can then pull out more content. Okay. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s like a content self-eating snake, you know? But I will say, there is one glimmer of hope, despite how many people were obsessed with this slop. I would say there’s an equal faction of people who are really into human-made content. And so this inspired several Fruit Love Island non-AI copycats,. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">With real fruit? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">…which I will show you now, which is really beautiful. I love that people are doing this. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Clip of Audio from Fruit Love Island] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Host: Welcome to episode one of Fruit Love Island, that’s not AI. I’ve made sure to gather the juiciest of drama in the villa in the past day. Now let’s see what’s happened. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Contestant: I’m here to break hearts, not to fall in love. Hopefully these guys don’t get too attached. Or I don’t. I won’t though. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So it’s basically a similar idea, but it’s not really animated so much as like, there are these photoshopped pictures of like people, human bodies with fruits for heads. It’s a human being that made this and it’s not as refined, but they did get voice actors on Discord to like volunteer their voices and voice all of this. And so I’m just like really encouraged by the fact that this has kind of blown up this non-AI Fruit Love Island. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think that’s beautiful. I think we need to reject modernity and embrace tradition in a lot of ways, because we already had Annoying Orange. We need to bring back the original recipes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I know. And like Annoying Orange,I hated that content. I didn’t dread it. But you know what? A human being made it.\u003cbr>\n\u003cb>\u003cbr>\nSteffi Cao: \u003c/b>A human-being made it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>So AI Fruit Love Island, do we save or do we scroll?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m gonna scroll on it, but I defer to you. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m going to scroll on it too. I think it had a good run. I don’t think we need more of it. I think the crash out was beautiful and hilarious and a real internet moment. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Perfect irony. It’s truly, like, perfect. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tell us about this next story you brought. What’s going on with BTS’ new album? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio clip of BTS music] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Swim swim, \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is how it all begins\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Swim, swim\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I just wanna dive…\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">BTS was away in the military for four years, and the K-pop group, who was arguably one of the biggest acts in the industry and has been for many years, returned with an album called Arirang, and it was predominantly sung in English, and because of that, as well as the fact that it was a different sound from what they’ve previously put out in the past, it was, I think, personally sonically more mixed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio clip of BTS music] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Watch this, watch this, \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Beat going hooligan. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We pop out, we actin’ a fool again \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It became very controversial. It didn’t also help that when they did their first live performance in Seoul after the fact, there were a lot of statistics reported about how many people actually attended. They shut down a very busy intersection in Seoul saying that 300,000 people were expected to show up. Korean officials, some of them said that as low as 42,000 showed up and there were adverse impacts from store owners who expected a lot of influx but didn’t get that. And so now there’s this huge debate happening about this album, what it means for K-pop in the industry and like how things have shifted, et cetera. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Do you think the fandom has aged out of, like, acting like fans? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cem>[Laughter] \u003c/em>I think that the industry has shifted a lot, and what a fan should act like has changed with it. Because I think in the past, the eternal struggle of a BTS ARMY was trying to convince people that K-pop was a serious art form, that it wasn’t just some silly thing that teen girls listened to, that it was corporate slop pop music, that there were a lot of uphill battles, I think, for a K-Pop fan.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And I think now, over the past four years, you’ve seen a lot more Western embrace of K-pop as a serious art form, as a legitimate cultural export, and not like a niche subculture. So I think that with “K-Pop Demon Hunters”, you have Blackpink headlining Coachella, you had KATSEYE at Lollapalooza, you had all these bigger acts coming out of a Korean system that I think is legitimized in a different way. And so I think that BTS ARMY doesn’t have to convince anyone anymore that BTS is legit. It has shifted this fan identity of like, okay, well, now what? And now what happens?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right, you mentioned that like the entire album is sang in English or like all the lyrics are mostly in English, which is interesting because Arirang is a really culturally important folk song in Korea with a lot of history behind it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Clip of Arirang sung in Korean from Youtube user @Miss_Taex] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think people expected a little bit more of that cultural representation with this album. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, I think BTS has also throughout their career really emphasized their Korean-ness, especially because they tend to sample a lot of traditional Korean music, a lot of Korean culture comes into play into their performances. And so I think that it was disappointing for a lot fans to open up this album and hear Teddy Swims in the song. Right? They end on a country song, which is like, possibly the most American form of music that we associate in mainstream culture. We don’t associate country music with Korea. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, right. And it’s a hard thing to follow “K-Pop Demon Hunters.” Just like the way that that movie was such a cultural moment and how it introduced so many people to Korean folklore and Korean culture and Korean language. That was a movie that was in English, but a lot of the songs were in Korean. And a lot people who have never spoken Korean learned those songs. And so it’s interesting that BTS wouldn’t see that and like kind of seize the moment. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yes, 100%. I think that it’s frustrating as a fan to feel like the whole reason that you fell so deeply in love with this group has suddenly shifted under your feet and that the intention of the group’s project didn’t align with where you thought they were going to go. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Okay, well, BTS’s new album, do we save or do we scroll? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think. I’m going to personally scroll on it, but I think that there’s a lot to talk about in terms of like Asian artistry. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s a lot to keep an eye on, but personally, don’t come for me, ARMY. I didn’t like the album. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Me either. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So I’m gonna scroll on it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh! \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I was just bored. I was bored. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m in ARMY. I’m in ARMY-da. And I got the tickets. Any ARMY that wants to come for me and I will see you at MetLife. I’ve got the tickets. And what now? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But you can be disappointed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m disappointed in the album. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You’re allowed to be disappointed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m disappointed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And you’re allowed to scroll. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I am allowed to scroll on it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, last story for today. The Meta lawsuits. Okay, so Meta faced two separate lawsuits: one in California over social media addiction and one in New Mexico for child safety. The one in California took place in LA and it centered around this 20 year-old woman who said that she became addicted to YouTube and Instagram as a child. And that that greatly affected her mental health.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So Snapchat and TikTok were also both defendants, but they settled before it went to court. And a jury in LA found Google and Meta both negligent because the design of their apps encourages infinite scrolling. And the companies didn’t warn users about the dangers of that. So the plaintiff’s lawyer said that both Meta and Google intentionally target kids and prioritize profit over safety. \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\nThe jury concluded that Meta is liable for $4.2 million in damages, and Google is liable for $1.8 million. And then for the case in New Mexico, the state sued Meta over child safety issues. Former employees testified that underage users were shown sexualized content on Instagram and were exposed to predators. And during the court proceedings, they said that Meta’s decision to encrypt Facebook Messenger blocked access to evidence of predators grooming minors. And basically, this is the first time that New Mexico, as a state, was able to successfully sue Meta. So now Meta was ordered to pay $375 million.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So these lawsuits are being celebrated as huge wins for child safety and kind of taking down these evil tech companies. But I’m kind of skeptical of big companies like Meta and Google actually changing their practices. And whenever I hear like child safety social media lawsuit or like child safety and social media in the same sentence, I’m like, everyone wants kids to be safe. Everyone wants to protect the kids. No one wants to expose kids to predators or inappropriate content. But alarm bells are going off in my head where I’m, like, will they be using this to justify more surveillance and more censorship and more practices like age verification, which we’ve covered a lot on this show. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, it makes sense that there’s a lot of cynicism around these child safety lawsuits because what we’ve seen over our careers is that every time there has been one of these landmark lawsuits, it’s like, what is it actually put into practice? People have been concerned about this topic for many, many years, but it feels like the people who are in Congress still miss the mark on the concept of social media as itself. We’ve seen endless clips of Congress people essentially asking Mark Zuckerberg for tech help during Senate hearings. Yeah. So it makes sense that this verdict, even though it’s being lauded as a huge case, I’m not convinced on it either. We’ve seen Meta pay up a lot in the past, and it hasn’t seemed to really shift the needle at all. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s like, if anything, the practices don’t change. Kids aren’t necessarily safer. And everyone else is a little bit more surveilled and censored, like, with the current wave of age verification requirements, like, sweeping any internet platform whatsoever, where you have to put in your ID to continue using Spotify in some countries and I really distrust that. And, I do kind of worry that like any kind of trying to like ensure child safety on social media will just be used to justify more age verification laws. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, 100%. I think that the solution being trusting big tech to manage more of our data and requests that we give up more of privacy is like, it makes a lot of sense as people who’ve grown up online and we’ve seen this play before. It does, I think, breed more of a culture of surveillance.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think also the problem with this lawsuit is that like, it’s not a silver bullet. Like this is a multi-pronged problem where it’s like a part of it is having adults be smarter about their tech use and teaching their kids to critically analyze the content they’re consuming day in and day out. It’s a lot on the education system.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s on providing structural support for young kids to have more time offline to build all these social skills that when you are isolated and just on your feed even though it can be very fun and exciting to be on Tumblr as a 16-year-old, freewheeling it online, you still need an infrastructure behind you to teach you all these skills that you don’t really get when you are online.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So it’s like a multi-pronged problem. It really is on every adult, regardless of where you stand, if you have kids or not, to try and train yourself to be better about your own skillset, because they’re kids, they’re just imitating whatever resource is there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right, and it’s like, Taylor Lorenz on her Free Speech Friday series pointed out that a lot of kids do still, you still need to let them have agency online in some capacity and just like, you know, a lot kids do rely on these online resources to access information about sex ed or find queer community when they don’t have that in real life and to potentially silo them further and take that away could actually endanger kids. Okay, the child safety lawsuits with Meta and Google, do we save or do we scroll? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I feel like we’re going to have to save it because this is going to continue. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, It’s an evergreen save. This is just collecting more and more tabs every day. Thank you so much for joining us, Steffi. Where can people follow your work? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you so much for having me, Morgan. You can check me out on Instagram at Steffi Cao, S-T-E-F-F-I-C-A-O, and my sub-stack, It’s Steffi. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Perfect, thanks so much. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Close All Tabs is a production of KQED Studios, and it’s reported and hosted by me, Morgan Sung. This episode was produced by Chris Egusa, who also composed our theme song and credits music. It was edited by Chris Hambrick. Our team includes producer, Maya Cueva. Additional music by APM. Brendan Willard is our audio engineer. Audience engagement support from Maha Sanad. Jen Chien is our director of podcasts. Ethan Toven Lindsey is our editor in chief. Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California Local. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Do you like these deep dives? Are you closing your tabs? Then don’t forget to rate and review us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to the show. Maybe drop a comment too. Thanks for listening. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In a spring installment of \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Save or Scroll\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, Morgan teams up with culture journalist Steffi Cao to dig into the stories they can’t stop thinking about. From \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">looksmaxxing to \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">AI Fruit Love Island, BTS’ new album, and Meta losing a landmark series of lawsuits, they’ve got a lot to discuss. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Save or Scroll is our series where we team up with guests for a rapid-fire roundup of internet trends that are filling our feeds right now. At the end of each segment, they’ll decide: is the post just for the group chat, or should we save it for a future episode?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC4630070510\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Guest:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://stefficao.substack.com/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Steffi Cao\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, culture journalist \u003c/span>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Further Reading/Listening:\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://stefficao.substack.com/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">More from Steffi Cao\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Substack\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.gq.com/story/inside-claviculars-thirsty-tour-of-new-york-city\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Inside Clavicular’s Thirsty Tour of New York City \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Kieran Press-Reynolds, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">GQ\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.thedailybeast.com/in-gen-z-gym-culture-steroids-are-often-a-gateway-drug-to-the-alt-right/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Why Steroids Are Now Turning Young Men into Dangerous Incels\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Steffi Cao, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The Daily Beast\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.fastcompany.com/91519147/fruit-love-island-tiktok-most-popular-ai-generated-series-now-facing-trouble-in-paradise\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">‘Fruit Love Island’ is TikTok’s most popular AI-generated series. It’s now facing trouble in paradise \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Jude Cramer, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fast Company \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wired.com/story/theres-something-very-dark-about-a-lot-of-those-viral-ai-fruit-videos/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s Something Very Dark About a Lot of Those Viral AI Fruit Videos \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Kat Tenbarge, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wired \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.teenvogue.com/story/who-decides-if-bts-album-arirang-is-korean-enough-op-ed\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Who Decides If BTS’s Album ‘Arirang’ is ‘Korean Enough’? \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">— Jiye Kim, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Teen Vogue \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://slate.com/culture/2026/03/bts-arirang-album-netflix-swim-comeback-concert-2026.html\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">BTS’s Arirang comeback was supposed to be a triumph. What happened?\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Nadira Goffe, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Slate \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://19thnews.org/2026/03/social-media-addiction-trial-meta-youtube/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Meta and YouTube ordered to pay $3 million to young woman in social media addiction trial\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Jasmine Mithani, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The 19th\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-lede/what-the-verdict-against-meta-and-google-says-about-the-way-we-live-now\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What the Verdict Against Meta and Google Says About the Way We Live Now\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Jeannie Suk Gersen, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The New Yorker \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ype6c6DdHQY\">The Truth About the Social Media Addiction Trial\u003c/a> — Taylor Lorenz, \u003ci>Free Speech Friday \u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Want to give us feedback on the show? Shoot us an email at \u003ca href=\"mailto:CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\">CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Follow us on\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/closealltabspod/\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Instagram\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> and\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@closealltabs\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">TikTok\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey, it’s Morgan. We just celebrated the show’s first birthday. That’s right, Close All Tabs is a Pisces. Want to celebrate with us? It would be so, so helpful if you could rate and review us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to the show. And tell your friends about us too. Okay, let’s get to the episode.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey guys, welcome to Close All Tabs. I’m Morgan Sung, tech journalist and your chronically online friend, here to open as many browser tabs as it takes to help you understand how the digital world affects our real lives. Except today, we aren’t opening any tabs. Instead, we’re doing another Save or Scroll. We’ve done a few of these now. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Occasionally, while scrolling, I come across a truly wild post, but it might not make sense to spend an entire episode on it. Maybe I do a little digging and it turns out that the lore behind it just isn’t compelling enough to justify a deep dive, but I’m still dying to talk about it. And this is the beauty of Save or Scroll, the game where a guest comes to the show and we trade stories from the internet that we’re dying to talk about. Today, we have the one and only Steffi Cao. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you so much for having me, Morgan. I’m so excited. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, Steffi, tell us about yourself. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hi everyone, I’m Steffi, I am a culture journalist and Slate’s newest dating advice columnist for Unhinged. You can find my writing everywhere from The Atlantic, to Rolling Stone, to The Guardian, to Slate now, so I’m very excited to share all my tabs and work in today. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, so let’s talk about the rules of Save or Scroll. Save, as in when you see a post on TikTok or Instagram or X and you bookmark it, add it to your save folders or if you’re me, drop it in notes app and hope that you’ll remember it’s there. Basically, you’re holding onto the story because you know you’ll want to dig into it more. And scroll, as you think about it and then move on. It disappears into the digital ether.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So Steffi and I have each brought some stories that we can’t stop thinking about, and we’re gonna go back and forth to decide if they’re worth a deep dive on the show. So if we decide to scroll, it means we’ve talked about it, we’re moving on. And if we save, it means that we might hold onto the idea for a future episode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, Steffi, please tell us about looksmaxxing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Over the past few years, looksmaxxing is the subculture of young men primarily who are seeking guidance from other men in terms of how to gamify their looks to become super, super hot. The essence of looksmaxxing is basically ‘the hotter I can be, the better my life will be around other men.’ And the pinnacle of these content creators currently is a man named Clavicular of collarbone fame.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’s a 20-year-old white man who has a very soft elfin face and a Dorito-shaped body and has really been associated with a lot of, like, Nazi ideology, has been recently arrested for inciting a fight between two women, allegedly and also allegedly shooting an alligator in Florida. He was kicked out of Las Vegas, I believe, and has become this sort of lightning rod for this entire culture of all these men wanting to get hotter and be hotter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah and Clavicular first went viral for not only his extensive skin care and workout routine, but for also saying that he microdoses meth and would hit his face with a hammer to get a more, I guess, angular jawline. What a man. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What a guy. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What a character. Clavicular is so fascinating to me because his political stances are indecipherable. He has gone on some more right-leaning podcasts, and when they try to get him to be kind of transphobic, he said… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Clavicular in audio clip]\u003cbr>\nI did a podcast with Michael Knowles the other day and he’s sitting here saying like and getting all mad about transgenders and I’m like bro that’s one more person a mog you know what I mean so like I don’t get too I don’t get too upset when people go trans and all that shit. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s just another person to mog. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How would you describe mogging? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mogging, I think, is the essence of being hotter than somebody else. So if you’ve mogged them, it’s like you’ve shown them up in some way. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio clip of Clavicular on the Adam Friedland Show] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Clavicular: That’s the goal of the game, right, is to mog other people, right? \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Adam: Tell the boomer cells about what that is. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Clavicular: So, mogging is essentially just, you know, outperforming them, looking better than them, yeah and just sort of dominating, right. It came from something called AMOG, which was alpha male of the group, then it was shortened to just mog, so that’s kind of like the term we use. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So the language has become like a bigger than itself sort of phenomenon where, you know, maxxing and mogging have started from this internal community and then now becomes sort of like general ironic gobbledygook for everybody. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s so interesting too, because the whole looksmaxxing thing has become like the peak Manosphere content. All the allegedly straight boys are really into doing all this to impress other men. It doesn’t seem like they actually do this in any way to appeal to women. And like, I’ve seen a lot of like gay men point out, this is literally gay male culture, what they’re doing, the peacocking, trying to show each other up and like only seek validation from other men, which is from a gender perspective, I’m like, what’s going on here? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It feels like horseshoe theory a little bit. They are doing all of these performative things that come right back to a drag of what a straight man is. It’s like it’s heterosexual drag. Like you’re trying to, you know, build up your face a certain way, you’re trying to mog other straight men, like that’s drag, honey. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like that’s gender performance. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">100% Yeah, I mean, self-improvement leans so well into fascist ideology because a lot of it is predicated on this idea that you can earn your way into something better, which is exactly what looksmaxxing is, right? You can gamify your looks. Like, If you’re not hot now, all you need to do is do all these steps and gain more points, more aura points, until you have achieved this thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Which is exactly why in Nazi Germany you see a lot of propaganda being espoused about the strongman. That was a huge beauty standard at that point in Hitler’s Germany, was specifically this idea of a man who is super jacked and is super like, is mogged, really, and I have no other word for it really. It’s just like they really..\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A mogged man has always been this cultural fascination and in many ways a mogged woman, obviously. Um, has been a huge part of, uh, fascist ideology for a long time. You know, think about all these essays about why Republican women all look the same and they have this specific look about them. And it has a lot to do with this culture of self-improvement and making all these alterations to yourself to try and earn your way or like bootstrap your way into beauty and therefore access and power and all of these things. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Okay, well, looksmaxxing, the big thing of the year right now, do we save or do we scroll? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, I’m saving it because I think there’s going to be developments. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No, yeah, there are going to be new words that have never been said before. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s going be crazy. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But looks maxed as a trend, I think we’re saving. After the break, a new bombshell enters the villa. Unfortunately, she’s AI generated and also made of fruit. Steffi and I are going to explain all of the drama around AI Fruit Love Island. Stick around. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have a story for you now. Are you familiar with AI Fruit Love Island? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, am I! Oh my god, I feel like it came out of nowhere and then it’s sudden, it’s like omnipresent now. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So, for the uninitiated, AI Fruit Love Island was this interactive AI-slop parody of \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Love Island\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> with sexy anthropomorphized fruit. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Clip of Audio from AI Fruit Love Island] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Host: Welcome Back to Fruit Love Island. Today we’ve got a steamy challenge and after over 370,000 viewer votes, our bombshells have officially hit the villa. All right ladies let’s get this started. You’ll be kissed one by each guy and after each kiss you rate it. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, so that is one of the episodes of Fruit Love Island. What was happening in that clip? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Um, it’s basically just a real \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Love Island\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> challenge, but done with fruit. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, they have human bodies, um, but their heads are fruit. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">These are all like, obviously done by AI. The colors are highly saturated. It’s super bright, super like in your face. And then a grape man wearing a Hawaiian shirt and, uh, board shorts, like comes up and kisses the fruit ladies blindfolded. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Clip of Audio from AI Fruit Love Island] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Host: Grapenzo, you’re up first. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Contestant: That was hot, an 8.5. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You see all these badly done reactions in the background of these AI fruit women laughing and sort of being like, ha ha ha, this is crazy. So it just is like a \u003cem>Love Island\u003c/em> episode, but with fruit. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So for context, this TikTok account kind of came out of nowhere, AICinema021, and they gained about 3.1 million followers in like a week and a half. And now there are so many copycat accounts. The characters include Limeyra, the lime, Bananito, the banana who has abs and is always shirtless, Strawberrina, the strawberry, Coconick, the sexy coconut. And yeah, it’s not good. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The animation and voices are all stilted. There’s zero consistency. It’s pure slop. So viewers gave storyline feedback via Google Form and voted for their faves in the comments. And this account was getting crazy numbers, like 20 million views per episode at its peak and just churning out new episodes every day. I feel like it used to be kind of embarrassing to enjoy this kind of content, but then you had Zara Larsson and Joe Jonas being like, ‘Oh my God, I can’t wait for the next episode.’ Like major celebrities. But yeah, what’s your like initial gut reaction here? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think it makes sense why this thing is taken off, because even though young people online want to act like only boomers love watching AI slop, the fact is our brains are primed to watch AI slop. We have all these deep fried memes and internet humor is so self-referential, but it removes a lot of these barriers in our heads of consuming something like this that really feels as though, like, okay, maybe, um, what could be embarrassing previously could be ironically fun now. I love it because it’s fascinating to see how excited people get about it. But like, is the content good? No, it’s trash, but I don’t think it’s trying to be good. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Well, have you been following the great AI Fruit Love Island crash out… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have not. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">…that happened over the weekend? Okay. So this account literally gained millions and millions of followers, three million followers in like a week and a half, which is insane. Like there are human creators who grind for years to get a third of that. But, you know, this account was able to just churn out content so fast and people were invested. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So basically, people were criticizing the account for being AI slop and criticizing viewers for being slop consumers. And the creator did not respond well. In TikTok comments, they complained about how hard it was to make this content and basically implied that like viewers were ungrateful. A real hilarious irony where they were like, it’s really hard because I have to prompt so many times and the AI sometimes messes up and I have to redo it and then I have edit it together. And it sometimes takes me like three hours to make one of these videos. And it’s like, yeah, well… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Imagine how long it must take to film a real TV episode? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s so funny that they’re like, this is so hard, even like having to prompt a generator to be like, and now make Strawberrina kiss the kiwi man is like too much effort. So then their video started getting removed. The creator claimed that it was part of a mass reporting campaign and started crashing onto their story. So this was the first one…they were, I guess, sick of it, right? \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They were like, “This is it. I’m sick of all of you.” They were getting criticized for like wasting water basically and people were pointing out like, hey, this is like really sh*tty that you’re kind of encouraging this consumption. So they were posting like, “Was a good run, didn’t expect any of this, but here we are from being a nobody to being cancelled. I guess I’ll take it. People hate to see people win,”. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s awesome! \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">…with screenshots from like their episodes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’t the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“I’m so glad y’all got what you wanted. Saving the planet three gallons of water at a time, truly inspirational. It’s like, f*ck all y’all, you jealous motherf*ckers, save the planet, OMG, water, OMG. I love water, clean water, please clean water. What y’ all sound like.”. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s hilarious. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“Thanks for 3 million followers though. Wow, I guess some might like it.” Then they posted one final one, basically saying like, this series is over, this is it, with Bananito, a fan favorite, unfortunately, the sexy banana that is never wearing a shirt. Um, and basically they said, “All right, f*ck all you b*tches, no more Fruit Love Island. Since people are so obsessed with it, all my videos banned, I make no money. I guess I am being targeted because no other AI account is getting f*cked. Y’all heard it from Bananito himself. Bye.”. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Bye. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s just really funny because they also got mad that other like copycat AI accounts were like copying their theme, which is a real like, so many layers between like, being mad about the copycats and then being like suddenly like creative integrity matters basically. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And then being mad at like the effort it took to make these videos. The layers of complete unawareness just go so deep. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Laughter] It’s one of those things where I’m like, oh, of course, this is where we are. People are so fixated on this idea of it’s fine until it’s me because passive consumption is just so self-centric, you’re only thinking about yourself. So of course this person’s mad that other people are stealing their AI fruit slop content without contributing to the AI slop database that can then pull out more content. Okay. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s like a content self-eating snake, you know? But I will say, there is one glimmer of hope, despite how many people were obsessed with this slop. I would say there’s an equal faction of people who are really into human-made content. And so this inspired several Fruit Love Island non-AI copycats,. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">With real fruit? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">…which I will show you now, which is really beautiful. I love that people are doing this. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Clip of Audio from Fruit Love Island] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Host: Welcome to episode one of Fruit Love Island, that’s not AI. I’ve made sure to gather the juiciest of drama in the villa in the past day. Now let’s see what’s happened. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Contestant: I’m here to break hearts, not to fall in love. Hopefully these guys don’t get too attached. Or I don’t. I won’t though. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So it’s basically a similar idea, but it’s not really animated so much as like, there are these photoshopped pictures of like people, human bodies with fruits for heads. It’s a human being that made this and it’s not as refined, but they did get voice actors on Discord to like volunteer their voices and voice all of this. And so I’m just like really encouraged by the fact that this has kind of blown up this non-AI Fruit Love Island. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think that’s beautiful. I think we need to reject modernity and embrace tradition in a lot of ways, because we already had Annoying Orange. We need to bring back the original recipes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I know. And like Annoying Orange,I hated that content. I didn’t dread it. But you know what? A human being made it.\u003cbr>\n\u003cb>\u003cbr>\nSteffi Cao: \u003c/b>A human-being made it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>So AI Fruit Love Island, do we save or do we scroll?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m gonna scroll on it, but I defer to you. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m going to scroll on it too. I think it had a good run. I don’t think we need more of it. I think the crash out was beautiful and hilarious and a real internet moment. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Perfect irony. It’s truly, like, perfect. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tell us about this next story you brought. What’s going on with BTS’ new album? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio clip of BTS music] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Swim swim, \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is how it all begins\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Swim, swim\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I just wanna dive…\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">BTS was away in the military for four years, and the K-pop group, who was arguably one of the biggest acts in the industry and has been for many years, returned with an album called Arirang, and it was predominantly sung in English, and because of that, as well as the fact that it was a different sound from what they’ve previously put out in the past, it was, I think, personally sonically more mixed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio clip of BTS music] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Watch this, watch this, \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Beat going hooligan. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We pop out, we actin’ a fool again \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It became very controversial. It didn’t also help that when they did their first live performance in Seoul after the fact, there were a lot of statistics reported about how many people actually attended. They shut down a very busy intersection in Seoul saying that 300,000 people were expected to show up. Korean officials, some of them said that as low as 42,000 showed up and there were adverse impacts from store owners who expected a lot of influx but didn’t get that. And so now there’s this huge debate happening about this album, what it means for K-pop in the industry and like how things have shifted, et cetera. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Do you think the fandom has aged out of, like, acting like fans? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cem>[Laughter] \u003c/em>I think that the industry has shifted a lot, and what a fan should act like has changed with it. Because I think in the past, the eternal struggle of a BTS ARMY was trying to convince people that K-pop was a serious art form, that it wasn’t just some silly thing that teen girls listened to, that it was corporate slop pop music, that there were a lot of uphill battles, I think, for a K-Pop fan.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And I think now, over the past four years, you’ve seen a lot more Western embrace of K-pop as a serious art form, as a legitimate cultural export, and not like a niche subculture. So I think that with “K-Pop Demon Hunters”, you have Blackpink headlining Coachella, you had KATSEYE at Lollapalooza, you had all these bigger acts coming out of a Korean system that I think is legitimized in a different way. And so I think that BTS ARMY doesn’t have to convince anyone anymore that BTS is legit. It has shifted this fan identity of like, okay, well, now what? And now what happens?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right, you mentioned that like the entire album is sang in English or like all the lyrics are mostly in English, which is interesting because Arirang is a really culturally important folk song in Korea with a lot of history behind it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Clip of Arirang sung in Korean from Youtube user @Miss_Taex] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think people expected a little bit more of that cultural representation with this album. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, I think BTS has also throughout their career really emphasized their Korean-ness, especially because they tend to sample a lot of traditional Korean music, a lot of Korean culture comes into play into their performances. And so I think that it was disappointing for a lot fans to open up this album and hear Teddy Swims in the song. Right? They end on a country song, which is like, possibly the most American form of music that we associate in mainstream culture. We don’t associate country music with Korea. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, right. And it’s a hard thing to follow “K-Pop Demon Hunters.” Just like the way that that movie was such a cultural moment and how it introduced so many people to Korean folklore and Korean culture and Korean language. That was a movie that was in English, but a lot of the songs were in Korean. And a lot people who have never spoken Korean learned those songs. And so it’s interesting that BTS wouldn’t see that and like kind of seize the moment. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yes, 100%. I think that it’s frustrating as a fan to feel like the whole reason that you fell so deeply in love with this group has suddenly shifted under your feet and that the intention of the group’s project didn’t align with where you thought they were going to go. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Okay, well, BTS’s new album, do we save or do we scroll? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think. I’m going to personally scroll on it, but I think that there’s a lot to talk about in terms of like Asian artistry. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s a lot to keep an eye on, but personally, don’t come for me, ARMY. I didn’t like the album. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Me either. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So I’m gonna scroll on it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh! \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I was just bored. I was bored. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m in ARMY. I’m in ARMY-da. And I got the tickets. Any ARMY that wants to come for me and I will see you at MetLife. I’ve got the tickets. And what now? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But you can be disappointed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m disappointed in the album. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You’re allowed to be disappointed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m disappointed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And you’re allowed to scroll. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I am allowed to scroll on it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, last story for today. The Meta lawsuits. Okay, so Meta faced two separate lawsuits: one in California over social media addiction and one in New Mexico for child safety. The one in California took place in LA and it centered around this 20 year-old woman who said that she became addicted to YouTube and Instagram as a child. And that that greatly affected her mental health.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So Snapchat and TikTok were also both defendants, but they settled before it went to court. And a jury in LA found Google and Meta both negligent because the design of their apps encourages infinite scrolling. And the companies didn’t warn users about the dangers of that. So the plaintiff’s lawyer said that both Meta and Google intentionally target kids and prioritize profit over safety. \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\nThe jury concluded that Meta is liable for $4.2 million in damages, and Google is liable for $1.8 million. And then for the case in New Mexico, the state sued Meta over child safety issues. Former employees testified that underage users were shown sexualized content on Instagram and were exposed to predators. And during the court proceedings, they said that Meta’s decision to encrypt Facebook Messenger blocked access to evidence of predators grooming minors. And basically, this is the first time that New Mexico, as a state, was able to successfully sue Meta. So now Meta was ordered to pay $375 million.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So these lawsuits are being celebrated as huge wins for child safety and kind of taking down these evil tech companies. But I’m kind of skeptical of big companies like Meta and Google actually changing their practices. And whenever I hear like child safety social media lawsuit or like child safety and social media in the same sentence, I’m like, everyone wants kids to be safe. Everyone wants to protect the kids. No one wants to expose kids to predators or inappropriate content. But alarm bells are going off in my head where I’m, like, will they be using this to justify more surveillance and more censorship and more practices like age verification, which we’ve covered a lot on this show. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, it makes sense that there’s a lot of cynicism around these child safety lawsuits because what we’ve seen over our careers is that every time there has been one of these landmark lawsuits, it’s like, what is it actually put into practice? People have been concerned about this topic for many, many years, but it feels like the people who are in Congress still miss the mark on the concept of social media as itself. We’ve seen endless clips of Congress people essentially asking Mark Zuckerberg for tech help during Senate hearings. Yeah. So it makes sense that this verdict, even though it’s being lauded as a huge case, I’m not convinced on it either. We’ve seen Meta pay up a lot in the past, and it hasn’t seemed to really shift the needle at all. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s like, if anything, the practices don’t change. Kids aren’t necessarily safer. And everyone else is a little bit more surveilled and censored, like, with the current wave of age verification requirements, like, sweeping any internet platform whatsoever, where you have to put in your ID to continue using Spotify in some countries and I really distrust that. And, I do kind of worry that like any kind of trying to like ensure child safety on social media will just be used to justify more age verification laws. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, 100%. I think that the solution being trusting big tech to manage more of our data and requests that we give up more of privacy is like, it makes a lot of sense as people who’ve grown up online and we’ve seen this play before. It does, I think, breed more of a culture of surveillance.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think also the problem with this lawsuit is that like, it’s not a silver bullet. Like this is a multi-pronged problem where it’s like a part of it is having adults be smarter about their tech use and teaching their kids to critically analyze the content they’re consuming day in and day out. It’s a lot on the education system.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s on providing structural support for young kids to have more time offline to build all these social skills that when you are isolated and just on your feed even though it can be very fun and exciting to be on Tumblr as a 16-year-old, freewheeling it online, you still need an infrastructure behind you to teach you all these skills that you don’t really get when you are online.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So it’s like a multi-pronged problem. It really is on every adult, regardless of where you stand, if you have kids or not, to try and train yourself to be better about your own skillset, because they’re kids, they’re just imitating whatever resource is there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right, and it’s like, Taylor Lorenz on her Free Speech Friday series pointed out that a lot of kids do still, you still need to let them have agency online in some capacity and just like, you know, a lot kids do rely on these online resources to access information about sex ed or find queer community when they don’t have that in real life and to potentially silo them further and take that away could actually endanger kids. Okay, the child safety lawsuits with Meta and Google, do we save or do we scroll? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I feel like we’re going to have to save it because this is going to continue. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, It’s an evergreen save. This is just collecting more and more tabs every day. Thank you so much for joining us, Steffi. Where can people follow your work? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steffi Cao: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you so much for having me, Morgan. You can check me out on Instagram at Steffi Cao, S-T-E-F-F-I-C-A-O, and my sub-stack, It’s Steffi. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Perfect, thanks so much. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Close All Tabs is a production of KQED Studios, and it’s reported and hosted by me, Morgan Sung. This episode was produced by Chris Egusa, who also composed our theme song and credits music. It was edited by Chris Hambrick. Our team includes producer, Maya Cueva. Additional music by APM. Brendan Willard is our audio engineer. Audience engagement support from Maha Sanad. Jen Chien is our director of podcasts. Ethan Toven Lindsey is our editor in chief. Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California Local. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Do you like these deep dives? Are you closing your tabs? Then don’t forget to rate and review us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to the show. Maybe drop a comment too. Thanks for listening. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>"
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"slug": "the-secret-lives-of-mormon-momfluencers",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Only 2% of Americans identify as members of the Church of Latter-day Saints — and yet a striking number of American social media influencers are Mormon. Why? The answer lies in a mix of religious doctrine, early internet adoption, and some surprising financial incentives.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In this episode, author and journalist Fortesa Latifi returns to the show to unpack her research for her new book, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like, Follow, Subscribe: Influencer Kids and the Cost of a Childhood Online\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. She breaks down the hidden industry behind Mormon “momfluencers,” how these creators both uphold and push against a patriarchal system, and why the trad wife fantasy can be damaging far beyond their audience. Plus, she and Morgan tackle the question hanging over reality TV fans everywhere: “Will MomTok survive this?”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC4522289126\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Guest:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.fortesalatifi.com/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fortesa Latifi\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, journalist and author of \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like, Follow, Subscribe: Influencer Kids and the Cost of a Childhood Online.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Further Reading/Listening:\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Like-Follow-Subscribe/Fortesa-Latifi/9781668080504\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like, Follow, Subscribe: Influencer Kids and the Cost of a Childhood Online\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Fortesa Latifi, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Simon & Schuster \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://whatsthevibe.substack.com/p/the-mormon-church-pays-its-influencers\">the Mormon Church pays its influencers\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Fortesa Latifi, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>What’s The Vibe\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.thecut.com/article/mormon-momtok-swingers-drama-explained.html\">A Refresher on the Mormon MomTok Drama\u003c/a> — Danielle Cohen, Olivia Truffaut-Wong, and Julia Reinstein,\u003c/span> \u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>\u003ci>The Cut \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/taylor-frankie-paul-bachelorette-canceled-controversy\">‘The Bachelorette’ Cast Taylor Frankie Paul For The Mess. They Got It. So, Who’s To Blame?\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Katherine Singh, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>Refinery 29 \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.marieclaire.com/culture/tv-shows/the-secret-lives-of-mormon-wives-season-2-review/\">‘The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives’ Shows the Trad Wife Reality \u003c/a> — Quinci LeGardye\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>Marie Claire \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.sltrib.com/religion/2025/08/02/how-lds-church-works-with-pays/\">Does the LDS Church pay influencers? Well, actually, yes.\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Dylan Eubank, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>The Salt Lake Tribune\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.thetimes.com/magazines/the-sunday-times-magazine/article/meet-the-queen-of-the-trad-wives-and-her-eight-children-plfr50cgk\">Meet the queen of the ‘trad wives’ (and her eight children)\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Megan Agnew, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>The Times \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2024/12/17/nx-s1-5206673/tradwives-have-taken-over-tiktok-now-ex-tradwives-want-their-moment\">Tradwife life isn’t as good as it looks on TikTok — just ask former tradwives\u003c/a> — Isabella Gomez Sarmiento, \u003ci>NPR\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Want to give us feedback on the show? Shoot us an email at \u003ca href=\"mailto:CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\">CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Follow us on\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/closealltabspod/\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Instagram\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> and\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@closealltabs\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">TikTok\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey it’s Morgan. We just celebrated the show’s first birthday. That’s right Close All Tabs is a pisces. Wanna celebrate with us? It would be so, so helpful if you could rate and review us on Spotify, Apple or wherever you listen to the show. And tell your friends about us, too! Ok, let’s get to the episode. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Have you been keeping up with the Secret Lives of Mormon Wives? \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, have I, yes.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fortesa Latifi is a journalist who covers the thorny world of child influencers, family vlogs, and parenting content. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You’ve seen my bylines in Rolling Stone, The New York Times, Teen Vogue, and many more. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fortesa was on Close All Tabs last year in our episode, Children of the Vlog. She just published a book called Like, Follow, Subscribe: Influencer Kids, and the Cost of a Childhood Online. And like me, Fortesa also loves watching the Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Promo for Secret Lives of Mormon Wives]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Come ye saints and come ye sinners! Ahhh…\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">My mom is visiting right now and she’s just like, are you seriously watching this? And I’m like, mom, shh. It’s like what my sister calls TV Xanax, like it just is like, just quiets the mind. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I know, I’m like, this is my temporary lobotomy for the night. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">100 percent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I put it on and I don’t think for like 40 minutes. It’s beautiful. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s a blessed experience. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, so for the uninitiated, The Secret Lives Of Mormon Wives is a reality TV show on Hulu, which follows a group of Utah-based mom influencers known as “MomTok.” They’re infamous for the so-called Mormon swinging scandal. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from Youtube User Spill Sesh] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You guys buckle up because we are talking about “Mom Tok.”. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from TikTok] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Now in both her confessionals and conversations with the other wives, Miranda denied doing anything other than kissing at these swinging parties. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from Youtube User Spill Sesh] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The drama is insane. It played out all online and now they’ve landed themselves a reality show for just how dramatic they have been and of course there’s more drama now. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To be clear, when we say “momfluencers”, we’re talking about this category of creators whose content revolves around motherhood and family. Like the ones who post the elaborate meals that they pack their kids for lunch, or post about the baby supplies that you, a new mom, actually need, which may or may not be sponsored. The name “MomTok” refers to a group of momfluencers from the show, The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Think of it as a friend group, well really, frenemy group. Many of them had started out on TikTok, making videos about their lives as stay-at-home mothers. Since then, they’ve built massive followings online and leverage that to launch their own businesses. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] J\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">en: I’m currently the breadwinner in my relationship. I’m providing for my kids, my husband. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Jessi: Being known as a successful businesswoman means everything to me. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mayci: We’re just powerful women trying to change the stigma of gender roles in the Mormon culture. And I’m a bad b*tch. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m talking a prenatal supplement brand, a hair extension salon empire, a Broadway debut, brand deals worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, and one of them was supposed to be the next Bachelorette, and that’s been a whole thing. What I’m getting to is that these women are girl bosses, ambitious, entrepreneurial hustlers. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Jen: My goal was really just to be able to provide for my family. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mayci, I need you to twerk your ass off! \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">On the show, they joke about being tradwives, the archetype of a homemaker who embraces traditional gender roles and doesn’t bother herself with affairs outside of her domestic sphere. But they’re upfront about the fact that they aren’t really tradwives. However, there is a faction of influencers who portray themselves as ideal, conservative, religious homemakers, while also running massive businesses. This is the tradwife girlboss. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, it’s so fascinating because the entire idea of a tradwife is predicated upon a woman staying at home, taking care of her babies, taking care of our house and her husband, and not working outside the house. But it’s a complete contradiction because the tradwives that we know about are all girl bosses. Like you said, I mean, some of them have multimillion dollar empires. So if I think about like a true tradwife, we would never hear about because she’s doing her work quietly and on her own. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We are not getting that deep into the current drama with mom talk and the secret lives of Mormon wives. Honestly, we need like another 15 episodes just to cover all of that. Today we’re digging into the industry of momfluencers, the women whose content revolves around parenting and family and their children. Not all creators who make this kind of content are religious, and not all of them identify as tradwives. But here’s something interesting. A lot of mom flensers are Mormon. We’re going to get into why that is and unpack how the Mormon church played a role in carving out an entire genre of content. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Ready? This is Close All Tabs. I’m Morgan Sung, tech journalist, and your chronically online friend, here to open as many browser tabs as it takes to help you understand how the digital world affects our real lives. Let’s get into it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Let’s open our first tab. Why are so many momfluencers Mormon? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Only 2% of Americans identify as from the Church of Latter-day Saints, which is colloquially called Mormons, but they are so overrepresented in influencer culture. Like almost all of the top mom influencers and family vloggers are Mormon or Mormon adjacent. And it’s just like, how did this happen? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To answer that question, we need to go back to 2007. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There was the commencement speech given at Brigham Young University, Hawaii, in which an elder of the church told the Mormons who were listening, please use the internet to your advantage basically. Like, use it to blog, use it share your beautiful life, use it to share positive things about the church. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>[Elder Ballard in commencement speech] \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And as you graduate from this wonderful university, may I ask you to join the conversation by participating on the internet, particularly the new media, to share the gospel and explain in simple, clear terms the message of the restoration. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s Elder M. Russell Ballard speaking to graduates at Brigham Young University almost 20 years ago. Let’s lay out some historical context for this. So, back in the 1800s, this guy, Joseph Smith, had a revelation and said that an angel told him to dig up a set of golden plates. These plates, according to Joseph Smith were engraved with a kind of companion text to the existing Christian Bible and contained guidance for establishing a new church. In 1830, Joseph Smith published what he said was a translation of the Golden Plates and called it the Book of Mormon, basically establishing the Mormon religion. He gained a following and started converting people. Local communities were not thrilled. The Mormon theology was considered blasphemous and they also practiced polygamy, a big no-no. They were seen as un-American and chased west to what is now Utah. The Mormon Church eventually denounced polygamy, but still faced a generational PR crisis. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They were so maligned for so many years by Americans and they were considered not even to be Christian and barely to be American. And so perfection became a doctrine of the Mormon church because once they did away with polygamy, they basically swung kind of in the other direction where they were like, we have to have the most perfect families on earth so that people can’t malign us anymore as un-American and not Christian. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The church encouraged Mormons to become the perfect, all-American, heterosexual, monogamous nuclear family unit, and not just live it, but also be seen living it, and share their faith while they’re at it. A century and a half later, the internet turned out to be the perfect medium for broadcasting both family and faith. Fortesa, said the church quickly realized how effective the internet could be for proselytizing. I mean, Elder Ballard speaking to new grads? That was in 2007. YouTube was brand new. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Elder Ballard in commencement speech] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You can start a blog in minutes and begin sharing what you know to be true.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it seems like Mormons above any other religion in the U.S., or really any other subculture in the US, really took to heart the idea of the early internet as a connector. And so many early mom bloggers were Mormon. I mean, when you think about early mom bloggers, you think of about Natalie Jean Lovin and people like that, and they were Mormon, or you think about Amber Fillerup Clark, also Mormon. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Why were Mormon women so effective as like the early proto-influencer? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So there are several reasons. One is that in Mormon culture, you usually get married young and you have a lot of babies, both of which are really good for the algorithm. The algorithm loves young mothers and it loves tons of babies. Another thing is that Mormons from a very young age, especially Mormon women, are taught to keep a record. So it’s actually part of their scripture is to keep a record of their lives and to do this kind of intense journaling practice. Like scrapbooking came from Mormons, which is wild. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, I know. It’s crazy. When I looked into it, I was like, wait, this makes so much sense. But they’re taught to keep these intricate records and to do beautiful scrapbooks and like what is influencing if not a journal and a scrapbook. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Another reason is that beauty is highly prized in Mormon culture. So making yourself beautiful, being perceived as beautiful is considered to be godly. And so it’s really interesting because in other religions, vanity is a sin. Right? And I don’t think that the Mormons would say that they’re vain, but they do consider beauty to be godly. On top of beauty being considered godly, prosperity is considered godly, and so they have this thing called the prosperity doctrine, Which is basically the more godly and the more devoted you are to your faith, the more money you’re going to make. And so making money in that way is considered almost holy. And so when you take all these factors together, it’s like, duh. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, it’s like the formula for the perfect influencer. So, Mormon influencers have used content creation as a means of proselytizing. Like that elder told BYU grads, use the new media to share the gospel. Was it effective? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think so, I mean, I think it’s interesting because many Mormons in their proselytizing online, it’s not explicit, right? Like they’re not getting on and saying, go read the Book of Mormon or go join the church. But what they are doing is they’re showing their perfect, beautiful families, their perfect beautiful lives, and then you know they’re Mormon and so you’re like, oh, well, there’s a connection between the Mormonism and the perfection. Right? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fortessa interviewed one former child influencer who grew up in a Mormon vlogging family. And they told her that during their family’s run as popular YouTubers, at least 50 families joined the church and cited their family as the reason why. This strategy was clearly effective and the Mormon church was invested, literally. More on that after the break. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Welcome back. So as Mormon family influencers spread across the internet, what role did the church play in all of this? Time to open a new tab. The Mormon Influencer Industrial Complex. While working on her book, Fortesla went deep into researching the Church of Latter-day Saints and its outreach strategy. And she uncovered a major detail: The church was paying influencers. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I had for a long time wondered why so many Mormons are influencers. And it’s like the church, which is the richest church on earth (it’s worth hundreds of billions of dollars, the Mormon church) they actually, specifically, give resources and brand deals and help with sponsorships with their influencers. And there’s like this thing where if you’re a big enough Mormon influencer, you’re invited to this like special influencer dinner and they all kind of network and figure things out together. It’s hard to say exactly when it started, but I would say once they saw the power of those early mom bloggers, it was clear that they could have a hand in it, and it worked. I mean, look, like you think of Nara Smith. I don’t know if she still considers herself Mormon, but her husband was raised Mormon. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, it is so wild. Can you walk us through the process of getting sponsored by the church? Like how do they pick the influencers to sponsor? How much do they pay? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, so it’s really interesting because one of the influencers who confirmed this to me, her name is Shannon Bird and she was one of the original mom bloggers and now she’s on Instagram, but she really had her heyday in mom blogging. And she said that the church just reached out to her and they said, we love your work. We want to have a hand in it. And they said how much is your rate for a post? And in my book, she tells me, “You know, I felt weird like charging my church a rate,” you know? So her normal rate for a post was like eight to ten thousand dollars for like a static post. But she was like, this is my church, like, that feels really weird and so she, I think she charged them like a thousand dollars.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But then at one point, the church accidentally copied her on an email that listed what other influencers were being paid. I know, I know. And she saw that those influencers were charging their market rate. They were charging tens of thousands of dollars for a post. And it was really interesting because the posts weren’t like, come to church with us on Sunday, hashtag Mormon, hashtag LDS or whatever.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like, it was like a little bit more subtle than that, where one of the sponsored posts that Shannon told me about was she was given rotisserie chickens and she was giving them out to unhoused people. And her blonde, perfect, beautiful children were like around her and it was basically like a photo of her with the supplies going out. And it was like, you know, give back this season or whatever but there was no explicit mention of Mormonism or the LDS church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And so I asked Shannon, like, what do you think was in it for the church? And she’s like, okay, so this is what I think and then this is she said, so what I think is people saw her post and they’re like this beautiful blonde mother with all her beautiful blonde children going out and like, giving back and then they know she’s Mormon and so there’s that connection there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Shannon told me, well, “One influencer can do a lot more when it comes to proselytizing than, you know, one missionary.” She’s like, “at my height, I had a million viewers of my blog a month. And so what makes more sense putting out missionaries and people don’t even open their door, or getting the beautiful blonde mother to give rotisserie chickens to unhoused people and people make the connection that she’s Mormon.” \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That is so wild. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And Shannon made such a good point. Like, she has a million viewers a month. What missionary can talk to a million people a month? Like, nobody. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So legally, influencers do have to disclose when they’re posts are sponsored, according to the FTC. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Aren’t the Mormon influencers doing that? Do they have to? Does it still apply? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I would think it would still apply. I don’t think they’re doing it because otherwise it would have been much clearer to people beforehand that the Mormon church was paying its influencers because no one has written about this before I had. So I don’t think that they’re following it to the letter of the law. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Regardless of the legal implications of these undisclosed church sponsorships, there’s a broader social shift going on here. Many of these women were raised to be wives and mothers. Momfluencing has opened doors that didn’t even exist for many women. Like we talked about earlier, they’re girl bossing. That’s huge, right? But is this a conscious act of reclaiming power? Time to open a new tab. Is mom-fluencing actually feminist? You made a really good point in your book about how, for a lot of these women, influencing and content creation is very lucrative, but it’s also one of the only ways that they’re allowed to exercise any kind of ambition or agency without threatening the patriarchy they live in. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Within the Mormon culture, which is heavily patriarchal, women are not supposed to work outside the home. And I think that’s slowly changing, but generally they’re not really supposed to have ambitions beyond being a perfect wife and a perfect mother and having nine children, but looking like they haven’t even had one child. And so, I consider influencing to be like this genius kind of loophole because it’s a way for them to exercise their ambition within the confines of the patriarchy because their job is predicated upon being a perfect mother and a perfect wife. And so it’s like, well, I’m still doing everything perfectly. I’m just showing other people about it and making a ton of money. So it’s, like, who can really have a problem with that? And influencing is largely done within the home. And so it’s kind of the perfect career for women who are in this patriarchal society that says, ‘no, you don’t go out and make the money, I go out to make the the money.’ \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fortessa pointed out this one scene in one of the earlier seasons of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. They’re gathered in someone’s kitchen, complaining about their husbands. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I know you don’t want to make a TikTok, but we’ve got to pay the bills. I mean, who else is going to pay the bills, right? \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Who is currently like the breadwinner at home? I think all of us. Really? Yeah. We all are. Look at us. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s kind of genius, like I really, as a concept, I think it’s really fascinating and I think its really cool that they found a way to exercise their ambition and agency within the confines of a patriarchal society. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yes, I mean the new season is all about how Dad Tok, the like, husbands and boyfriends of Mormon wives are all like upset. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Boo, Dad Tok ! \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m such a dad talk hater, but they’re all like, upset and they’re trying to find themselves because they’re like, they only know us as our wives’ husbands and not as our own people. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Dad Tok’s a lot funnier than Mom Tok, and we have our own place on social media. I think this is gonna be a great opportunity for Dad Tok. I think it shows that our wives don’t have a monopoly on social media. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s fascinating to see that they are in the position that Mormon women have been in for generations. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But they’re not realizing that. Like, they’re not thinking like, oh, for the last five or seven years before Mom Tok, this is how my wife felt while I went out and made money and had a life outside of the home and she was home with our several young children. It’s fascinating to me, especially as a mom myself, to see men have a taste of what it’s like to be a mom and they’re like, ‘Oh, this sh*t sucks.’ Like, okay, let me be clear, being a mother is incredible. Being a mother and having the mental load and being in charge of everything is very difficult. And being the one who’s at home is very difficult. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So, Mom Tok and Dad Tok drama aside, forging careers through social media has been so empowering for many women who grew up in conservative, religious communities. The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives is so interesting to me, because over the course of a few seasons, the women start to understand their own agency. They joke that the group is split between the saints and the sinners. The sinners are the ones who are no longer religious. While the saints still adhere to Mormon values and, more or less, the lifestyle. No drinking, no caffeine, and no divorce.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But throughout the show, even for the saints, you’re watching them deconstruct their upbringings in real time and actually get to exercise their own ambition. These are women who married and got pregnant as teenagers. If they did get to go to college, they were married and get pregnant right after graduation. They didn’t get to experience much of adulthood before they became mothers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And now, through the armies of followers they’ve built online, they’ve girlbossed their way into very successful careers. So they are making so much money. They are like the breadwinners of their family, which is so counter to the values that they preach. Which brings me to my next question. Is mommy blogging actually feminist? \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I really grapple with this, because on one hand, taking the unseen and unpaid labor of motherhood and making it seen and paid, I do think is a feminist act. But then again, you’re making it paid on the backs of selling this false vision to other women, which I don’t think can be considered feminist. So it’s like that tweet that’s like, is MasterCard an ally? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Laughter\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">] yeah. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Is this pop singer your friend? Like, it’s like… I don’t know, I don’t think that selling this vision of perfect motherhood to other mothers can be considered feminist, I just don’t think it can. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For the last two decades, mom-fluencing has revolved around performing domestic labor. But let’s talk about what it means to portray the fantasy of motherhood. What’s going on behind the scenes? What don’t viewers see? Let’s open one last tab: the trad wife illusion. Time for a case study. We’re going to talk about Ballerina Farm. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh my gosh, Ballerina Farm. I could write a thesis on her. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You may have seen one of her videos on your feed before. She’s this beautiful blonde woman, usually wearing a linen apron over a gauzy, puff-sleeved dress. She posts these videos of her preparing a meal from scratch, usually no narration, just the sounds of her sprinkling salt on freshly churned butter while her kids run around off camera. Sometimes, a cow in the distance. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Hannah Neeleman Instagram Account]\u003c/span>\u003c/i> \u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When we started to farm, I was swept up in the beauty of learning to make food from scratch. It makes sense why I soon fell in love with the idea of a family milk cow. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So her name is Hannah Neeleman. She is the foremost mom influencer, trad wife, blogger in the world. She lives in Utah. She’s Mormon. She’s married to a Mormon man who actually is the heir to the JetBlue fortune…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wild. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">…which they don’t ever talk about, which is interesting because it’s very like, we pulled ourselves up by our bootstraps and started this farm. And it’s like, your father-in-law is a billionaire. So that’s really interesting.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What’s especially tragic about her story is that she was a Mormon woman who did have a really promising career as a ballet dancer. Like, she was in Juilliard… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">at Juilliard. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Which is wild. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There was a profile of her where they talk about how it’s called Ballerina Farm, but on the entire farm, there’s no dance studio. But I mean, that that Times profile was really wild because she’s like in her senior year at Julliard and her soon to be husband, like, meets her and decides like we’re going to get married. And then like, she’s flying back from New York to Utah and she’s flying JetBlue, which his dad owns. And so he pulls some strings, and gets the seat next to her on the flight. And basically, the way that I read it in the story was, like, she wanted to take her time and like, finish school, whatever, and then it turned out she was married and pregnant by graduation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But she just had her ninth child. She looks like she hasn’t had any children. She is very beautiful in like, a very toned down way. She looks she has that no makeup makeup look, and like, she’s always wearing, like, flowy dresses and like, making sourdough from scratch and making like, butter for sandwiches. She makes everything herself. But now it’s turned into this entire empire. Like there’s the Ballerina Farm store, there’s the Ballerina Farm brand. I mean, they make protein powder and hydration powder and sourdough starter and it’s a huge thing. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What is the appeal of this kind of this genre of content right now? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think it makes a lot of sense that as so much of the country is in such a fragile financial situation. I mean, the promise of a one income household broke decades ago, but we used to, you know, when we grew up, it was like, yeah, one person could have a job and support an entire family and like, that’s gone. The middle class is shrinking, like upward mobility is basically non-existent unless you like hit the viral lottery. And so it makes sense that people are like, we want to slow down and like go back to basics. And whether or not this is actually true, they’re looking at a trad wife life as going back to basics. But I also think it can’t be disentangled from the way that culture generally is just shifting rightward. Like the zeitgeist is just becoming so much more conservative. And it’s like, of course, tradwives are surging at this time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, this trad wife content just depicts this really beautiful, idyllic life. What was it like for you to watch this content as a journalist before you became a mother and then after you became mother? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Before I became a mother, I was like, oh, I can kind of see the appeal. It does seem like kind of beautiful to just be like in charge of the home and just having to make bread and take care of your babies and like look beautiful. And I could kind of understand it. And then after I became mother, I was, like, this is not real life at all.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I have one child, I’m pregnant with my second and like, I have never made sourdough in my life. I don’t make my kids baby food from scratch. Like, my hair is usually not done. I’m never in a dress. It’s just the actual blood and guts and effort of motherhood are so disparate from this tradwife life that is shown online.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And I think, you know, tradwives never talk about the loneliness of mother hood. And that’s something that really hit me when I became a mother myself, because I have lots of family around. My husband is great. We have a part-time nanny. Like I have help, but it’s still like so lonely, especially in those first few months. And, like, if you watch these women, you would never think that anything was difficult ever. Like, all you have to do, mama, is cuddle your baby and co-sleep with them and breastfeed them on demand and make all their food from scratch and, like it just, it really shattered the illusion for me once I became a mother myself. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, you aren’t out there hand-picking berries to, like feed your kids. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No, dude, no. Like, maybe I should once in a while, but no, there’s no time. It just doesn’t make sense. It’s a fantasy, and that’s what made me realize these women aren’t being paid for the labor of motherhood, they’re getting paid for the performance of the laborer of mother hood. Because the labor motherhood is by definition unpaid and it’s often unseen. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What’s going on behind the scenes of this trad wife content that viewers don’t see? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I found out that many of your favorite mom influencers and family vloggers have full-time nannies, they have around the clock help, they have housekeepers, they have house managers, they have videographers, they have editors. I mean, this is an empire. This is a business. And I’ve said this before, there’s nothing wrong with having help. We have a once-monthly house cleaner. We have a part-time nanny. And I would be less sane than I already am without those people helping us. But I think what is troubling to me is selling this idea of self-reliance and saying, ‘I do it all myself.’ And by the way, if you buy this commissioned protein powder, you can be strong enough to do it yourself too, when secretly they have so much help behind the scenes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Beyond the impact that momfluencers have on their audiences, the biggest consequences may fall on the people at the center of it all, their kids. The last time Fortesa was on Close All Tabs, we talked about how children are affected when they’re forced to be part of their parents’ content. Now, the internet is starting to reckon with a reality of sharenting, a portmanteau of share and parenting. Momfluencers have gotten some heat lately over exploiting their children and their content. There’s a vibe shift afoot. And while there will probably always be a demand for this type of parenting content, a growing faction of brands and creators are moving away from showing kids in videos. In an industry that has opened doors for so many women, is there still space for momfluencers who don’t engage in sharenting? A refreshing part of the secret lives of Mormon wives is that their children rarely appear in the show. There’s the occasional shot of someone holding a newborn baby. But the children who can walk and talk are barely in the show at all. In fact, some members of MomTalk have stopped showing their kids in their online content too. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think they’ve kind of shifted from showing their kids to showing their experience as mothers and especially as working mothers. Well, that’s the thing is I don’t think there is a right way to be a mother on the internet because if you show your kids, people are like, you’re exploiting them. And if you take them off, then it’s like, oh, you just showboating and trying to act like you’re, like, so above this. And also if you’re gonna take them off, why did you ever put them on in the first place? There’s no way to win. People will hate you no matter what you do. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In many cases, these women are walking a tightrope, balancing audience expectations, traditional gender norms, and the realities of raising children. Fortesa tries to avoid thinking about momfluencers in simple black and white terms. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For someone who’s reported on the horrors and exploitation involved in family vlogging, you did take a very compassionate approach to writing about the Mormon mommy vloggers and, like, this world of influencers. How do you balance what you know about the momfluencing industry with maintaining empathy for the women involved? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> I mean I really do genuinely feel a lot of empathy for these women and I think especially becoming a mother myself has shown me you know to what lengths I would go to give my daughter a great life. A lot of times these women started mommy blogging in a vulnerable situation. They didn’t go to college or they started having kids really young or they were in some kind of financial instability. And so when I look around at my life and the stability that I have, and then I look at other women and the limited choices they have, I think it’s just dishonest to say that I would never make that decision. Like, I wouldn’t make that decision as myself in my experience, but I could see how you could make it in a different situation. And I’m not one of those people who thinks family vlogging and mom influencing is evil and immoral and bad across the board. I just don’t think that. I think it’s much more nuanced than that. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mom Tok is on the verge of collapse, all the time. These women have some very fraught friendships. Will Mom Tok survive this? Has kind of become a mantra on the show. The cultural appetite for family vlogs may fade, especially as the debate over child influencers continues and more viewers become disillusioned with the fantasy of trad wives. But the recent seasons of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives have proven that people don’t necessarily watch these creators for the content about their kids and not really for the husbands either. Dad Tok is just not it. People watch because they’re interested in the lives of these women, even the messy uncurated versions. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The performance of the perfect mother who feeds her kids freshly baked sourdough topped off with hand-churned butter is not always as compelling as the working mother who’s open about the struggles of juggling a career and her kids. As much as there’s still an audience for the tradwife, there’s also growing demand for creators who are honest with their viewers, both about who’s sponsoring their content and about the reality of motherhood. So as mindful sharenting takes more of a hold on internet culture, will mom-fluencing survive this? Probably. But it may have to change. Let’s close all these tabs. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Close All Tabs is a production of KQED studios and is reported and hosted by me, Morgan Sung. This episode was produced by Maya Cueva and edited by Chris Egusa, who also composed our theme song and credits music. The Close All Tabs team also includes editor, Chris Hambrick, and audio engineer, Brendan Willard. Additional music from APM, audience engagement support from Maha Sanad. Jen Chien is our director of podcasts and Ethan Toven-Lindsey is our editor in chief. Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California, Local. This episode’s keyboard sounds were submitted by Alex Tran and recorded on his white Epomaker Hi75 keyboard with Fogruaden red samurai keycaps and Gateron milky yellow pro v2 switches. Thanks for listening. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"description": "Only 2% of Americans identify as members of the Church of Latter-day Saints — and yet a striking number of American social media influencers are Mormon. Why? The answer lies in a mix of religious doctrine, early internet adoption, and some surprising financial incentives. In this episode, author and journalist Fortesa Latifi returns to the show to unpack her research for her new book, Like, Follow, Subscribe: Influencer Kids and the Cost of a Childhood Online. She breaks down the hidden industry behind Mormon “momfluencers,” how these creators both uphold and push against a patriarchal system, and why the trad wife fantasy can be damaging far beyond their audience. Plus, she and Morgan tackle the question hanging over reality TV fans everywhere: “Will MomTok survive this?”",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Only 2% of Americans identify as members of the Church of Latter-day Saints — and yet a striking number of American social media influencers are Mormon. Why? The answer lies in a mix of religious doctrine, early internet adoption, and some surprising financial incentives.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In this episode, author and journalist Fortesa Latifi returns to the show to unpack her research for her new book, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like, Follow, Subscribe: Influencer Kids and the Cost of a Childhood Online\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. She breaks down the hidden industry behind Mormon “momfluencers,” how these creators both uphold and push against a patriarchal system, and why the trad wife fantasy can be damaging far beyond their audience. Plus, she and Morgan tackle the question hanging over reality TV fans everywhere: “Will MomTok survive this?”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC4522289126\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Guest:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.fortesalatifi.com/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fortesa Latifi\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, journalist and author of \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like, Follow, Subscribe: Influencer Kids and the Cost of a Childhood Online.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Further Reading/Listening:\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Like-Follow-Subscribe/Fortesa-Latifi/9781668080504\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like, Follow, Subscribe: Influencer Kids and the Cost of a Childhood Online\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Fortesa Latifi, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Simon & Schuster \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://whatsthevibe.substack.com/p/the-mormon-church-pays-its-influencers\">the Mormon Church pays its influencers\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Fortesa Latifi, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>What’s The Vibe\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.thecut.com/article/mormon-momtok-swingers-drama-explained.html\">A Refresher on the Mormon MomTok Drama\u003c/a> — Danielle Cohen, Olivia Truffaut-Wong, and Julia Reinstein,\u003c/span> \u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>\u003ci>The Cut \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/taylor-frankie-paul-bachelorette-canceled-controversy\">‘The Bachelorette’ Cast Taylor Frankie Paul For The Mess. They Got It. So, Who’s To Blame?\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Katherine Singh, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>Refinery 29 \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.marieclaire.com/culture/tv-shows/the-secret-lives-of-mormon-wives-season-2-review/\">‘The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives’ Shows the Trad Wife Reality \u003c/a> — Quinci LeGardye\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>Marie Claire \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.sltrib.com/religion/2025/08/02/how-lds-church-works-with-pays/\">Does the LDS Church pay influencers? Well, actually, yes.\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Dylan Eubank, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>The Salt Lake Tribune\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.thetimes.com/magazines/the-sunday-times-magazine/article/meet-the-queen-of-the-trad-wives-and-her-eight-children-plfr50cgk\">Meet the queen of the ‘trad wives’ (and her eight children)\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> — Megan Agnew, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>\u003ci>The Times \u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/i>\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2024/12/17/nx-s1-5206673/tradwives-have-taken-over-tiktok-now-ex-tradwives-want-their-moment\">Tradwife life isn’t as good as it looks on TikTok — just ask former tradwives\u003c/a> — Isabella Gomez Sarmiento, \u003ci>NPR\u003c/i>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Want to give us feedback on the show? Shoot us an email at \u003ca href=\"mailto:CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\">CloseAllTabs@KQED.org\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Follow us on\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/closealltabspod/\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Instagram\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> and\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@closealltabs\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">TikTok\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey it’s Morgan. We just celebrated the show’s first birthday. That’s right Close All Tabs is a pisces. Wanna celebrate with us? It would be so, so helpful if you could rate and review us on Spotify, Apple or wherever you listen to the show. And tell your friends about us, too! Ok, let’s get to the episode. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Have you been keeping up with the Secret Lives of Mormon Wives? \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, have I, yes.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fortesa Latifi is a journalist who covers the thorny world of child influencers, family vlogs, and parenting content. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You’ve seen my bylines in Rolling Stone, The New York Times, Teen Vogue, and many more. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fortesa was on Close All Tabs last year in our episode, Children of the Vlog. She just published a book called Like, Follow, Subscribe: Influencer Kids, and the Cost of a Childhood Online. And like me, Fortesa also loves watching the Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Promo for Secret Lives of Mormon Wives]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Come ye saints and come ye sinners! Ahhh…\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">My mom is visiting right now and she’s just like, are you seriously watching this? And I’m like, mom, shh. It’s like what my sister calls TV Xanax, like it just is like, just quiets the mind. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I know, I’m like, this is my temporary lobotomy for the night. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">100 percent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I put it on and I don’t think for like 40 minutes. It’s beautiful. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s a blessed experience. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay, so for the uninitiated, The Secret Lives Of Mormon Wives is a reality TV show on Hulu, which follows a group of Utah-based mom influencers known as “MomTok.” They’re infamous for the so-called Mormon swinging scandal. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from Youtube User Spill Sesh] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You guys buckle up because we are talking about “Mom Tok.”. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from TikTok] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Now in both her confessionals and conversations with the other wives, Miranda denied doing anything other than kissing at these swinging parties. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio from Youtube User Spill Sesh] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The drama is insane. It played out all online and now they’ve landed themselves a reality show for just how dramatic they have been and of course there’s more drama now. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To be clear, when we say “momfluencers”, we’re talking about this category of creators whose content revolves around motherhood and family. Like the ones who post the elaborate meals that they pack their kids for lunch, or post about the baby supplies that you, a new mom, actually need, which may or may not be sponsored. The name “MomTok” refers to a group of momfluencers from the show, The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Think of it as a friend group, well really, frenemy group. Many of them had started out on TikTok, making videos about their lives as stay-at-home mothers. Since then, they’ve built massive followings online and leverage that to launch their own businesses. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] J\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">en: I’m currently the breadwinner in my relationship. I’m providing for my kids, my husband. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Jessi: Being known as a successful businesswoman means everything to me. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mayci: We’re just powerful women trying to change the stigma of gender roles in the Mormon culture. And I’m a bad b*tch. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m talking a prenatal supplement brand, a hair extension salon empire, a Broadway debut, brand deals worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, and one of them was supposed to be the next Bachelorette, and that’s been a whole thing. What I’m getting to is that these women are girl bosses, ambitious, entrepreneurial hustlers. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Jen: My goal was really just to be able to provide for my family. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mayci, I need you to twerk your ass off! \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">On the show, they joke about being tradwives, the archetype of a homemaker who embraces traditional gender roles and doesn’t bother herself with affairs outside of her domestic sphere. But they’re upfront about the fact that they aren’t really tradwives. However, there is a faction of influencers who portray themselves as ideal, conservative, religious homemakers, while also running massive businesses. This is the tradwife girlboss. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, it’s so fascinating because the entire idea of a tradwife is predicated upon a woman staying at home, taking care of her babies, taking care of our house and her husband, and not working outside the house. But it’s a complete contradiction because the tradwives that we know about are all girl bosses. Like you said, I mean, some of them have multimillion dollar empires. So if I think about like a true tradwife, we would never hear about because she’s doing her work quietly and on her own. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We are not getting that deep into the current drama with mom talk and the secret lives of Mormon wives. Honestly, we need like another 15 episodes just to cover all of that. Today we’re digging into the industry of momfluencers, the women whose content revolves around parenting and family and their children. Not all creators who make this kind of content are religious, and not all of them identify as tradwives. But here’s something interesting. A lot of mom flensers are Mormon. We’re going to get into why that is and unpack how the Mormon church played a role in carving out an entire genre of content. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Ready? This is Close All Tabs. I’m Morgan Sung, tech journalist, and your chronically online friend, here to open as many browser tabs as it takes to help you understand how the digital world affects our real lives. Let’s get into it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Let’s open our first tab. Why are so many momfluencers Mormon? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Only 2% of Americans identify as from the Church of Latter-day Saints, which is colloquially called Mormons, but they are so overrepresented in influencer culture. Like almost all of the top mom influencers and family vloggers are Mormon or Mormon adjacent. And it’s just like, how did this happen? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To answer that question, we need to go back to 2007. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There was the commencement speech given at Brigham Young University, Hawaii, in which an elder of the church told the Mormons who were listening, please use the internet to your advantage basically. Like, use it to blog, use it share your beautiful life, use it to share positive things about the church. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>[Elder Ballard in commencement speech] \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And as you graduate from this wonderful university, may I ask you to join the conversation by participating on the internet, particularly the new media, to share the gospel and explain in simple, clear terms the message of the restoration. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s Elder M. Russell Ballard speaking to graduates at Brigham Young University almost 20 years ago. Let’s lay out some historical context for this. So, back in the 1800s, this guy, Joseph Smith, had a revelation and said that an angel told him to dig up a set of golden plates. These plates, according to Joseph Smith were engraved with a kind of companion text to the existing Christian Bible and contained guidance for establishing a new church. In 1830, Joseph Smith published what he said was a translation of the Golden Plates and called it the Book of Mormon, basically establishing the Mormon religion. He gained a following and started converting people. Local communities were not thrilled. The Mormon theology was considered blasphemous and they also practiced polygamy, a big no-no. They were seen as un-American and chased west to what is now Utah. The Mormon Church eventually denounced polygamy, but still faced a generational PR crisis. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They were so maligned for so many years by Americans and they were considered not even to be Christian and barely to be American. And so perfection became a doctrine of the Mormon church because once they did away with polygamy, they basically swung kind of in the other direction where they were like, we have to have the most perfect families on earth so that people can’t malign us anymore as un-American and not Christian. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The church encouraged Mormons to become the perfect, all-American, heterosexual, monogamous nuclear family unit, and not just live it, but also be seen living it, and share their faith while they’re at it. A century and a half later, the internet turned out to be the perfect medium for broadcasting both family and faith. Fortesa, said the church quickly realized how effective the internet could be for proselytizing. I mean, Elder Ballard speaking to new grads? That was in 2007. YouTube was brand new. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Elder Ballard in commencement speech] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You can start a blog in minutes and begin sharing what you know to be true.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it seems like Mormons above any other religion in the U.S., or really any other subculture in the US, really took to heart the idea of the early internet as a connector. And so many early mom bloggers were Mormon. I mean, when you think about early mom bloggers, you think of about Natalie Jean Lovin and people like that, and they were Mormon, or you think about Amber Fillerup Clark, also Mormon. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Why were Mormon women so effective as like the early proto-influencer? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So there are several reasons. One is that in Mormon culture, you usually get married young and you have a lot of babies, both of which are really good for the algorithm. The algorithm loves young mothers and it loves tons of babies. Another thing is that Mormons from a very young age, especially Mormon women, are taught to keep a record. So it’s actually part of their scripture is to keep a record of their lives and to do this kind of intense journaling practice. Like scrapbooking came from Mormons, which is wild. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, I know. It’s crazy. When I looked into it, I was like, wait, this makes so much sense. But they’re taught to keep these intricate records and to do beautiful scrapbooks and like what is influencing if not a journal and a scrapbook. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Another reason is that beauty is highly prized in Mormon culture. So making yourself beautiful, being perceived as beautiful is considered to be godly. And so it’s really interesting because in other religions, vanity is a sin. Right? And I don’t think that the Mormons would say that they’re vain, but they do consider beauty to be godly. On top of beauty being considered godly, prosperity is considered godly, and so they have this thing called the prosperity doctrine, Which is basically the more godly and the more devoted you are to your faith, the more money you’re going to make. And so making money in that way is considered almost holy. And so when you take all these factors together, it’s like, duh. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, it’s like the formula for the perfect influencer. So, Mormon influencers have used content creation as a means of proselytizing. Like that elder told BYU grads, use the new media to share the gospel. Was it effective? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think so, I mean, I think it’s interesting because many Mormons in their proselytizing online, it’s not explicit, right? Like they’re not getting on and saying, go read the Book of Mormon or go join the church. But what they are doing is they’re showing their perfect, beautiful families, their perfect beautiful lives, and then you know they’re Mormon and so you’re like, oh, well, there’s a connection between the Mormonism and the perfection. Right? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fortessa interviewed one former child influencer who grew up in a Mormon vlogging family. And they told her that during their family’s run as popular YouTubers, at least 50 families joined the church and cited their family as the reason why. This strategy was clearly effective and the Mormon church was invested, literally. More on that after the break. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Welcome back. So as Mormon family influencers spread across the internet, what role did the church play in all of this? Time to open a new tab. The Mormon Influencer Industrial Complex. While working on her book, Fortesla went deep into researching the Church of Latter-day Saints and its outreach strategy. And she uncovered a major detail: The church was paying influencers. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I had for a long time wondered why so many Mormons are influencers. And it’s like the church, which is the richest church on earth (it’s worth hundreds of billions of dollars, the Mormon church) they actually, specifically, give resources and brand deals and help with sponsorships with their influencers. And there’s like this thing where if you’re a big enough Mormon influencer, you’re invited to this like special influencer dinner and they all kind of network and figure things out together. It’s hard to say exactly when it started, but I would say once they saw the power of those early mom bloggers, it was clear that they could have a hand in it, and it worked. I mean, look, like you think of Nara Smith. I don’t know if she still considers herself Mormon, but her husband was raised Mormon. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, it is so wild. Can you walk us through the process of getting sponsored by the church? Like how do they pick the influencers to sponsor? How much do they pay? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, so it’s really interesting because one of the influencers who confirmed this to me, her name is Shannon Bird and she was one of the original mom bloggers and now she’s on Instagram, but she really had her heyday in mom blogging. And she said that the church just reached out to her and they said, we love your work. We want to have a hand in it. And they said how much is your rate for a post? And in my book, she tells me, “You know, I felt weird like charging my church a rate,” you know? So her normal rate for a post was like eight to ten thousand dollars for like a static post. But she was like, this is my church, like, that feels really weird and so she, I think she charged them like a thousand dollars.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But then at one point, the church accidentally copied her on an email that listed what other influencers were being paid. I know, I know. And she saw that those influencers were charging their market rate. They were charging tens of thousands of dollars for a post. And it was really interesting because the posts weren’t like, come to church with us on Sunday, hashtag Mormon, hashtag LDS or whatever.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like, it was like a little bit more subtle than that, where one of the sponsored posts that Shannon told me about was she was given rotisserie chickens and she was giving them out to unhoused people. And her blonde, perfect, beautiful children were like around her and it was basically like a photo of her with the supplies going out. And it was like, you know, give back this season or whatever but there was no explicit mention of Mormonism or the LDS church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And so I asked Shannon, like, what do you think was in it for the church? And she’s like, okay, so this is what I think and then this is she said, so what I think is people saw her post and they’re like this beautiful blonde mother with all her beautiful blonde children going out and like, giving back and then they know she’s Mormon and so there’s that connection there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Shannon told me, well, “One influencer can do a lot more when it comes to proselytizing than, you know, one missionary.” She’s like, “at my height, I had a million viewers of my blog a month. And so what makes more sense putting out missionaries and people don’t even open their door, or getting the beautiful blonde mother to give rotisserie chickens to unhoused people and people make the connection that she’s Mormon.” \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That is so wild. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And Shannon made such a good point. Like, she has a million viewers a month. What missionary can talk to a million people a month? Like, nobody. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So legally, influencers do have to disclose when they’re posts are sponsored, according to the FTC. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Aren’t the Mormon influencers doing that? Do they have to? Does it still apply? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I would think it would still apply. I don’t think they’re doing it because otherwise it would have been much clearer to people beforehand that the Mormon church was paying its influencers because no one has written about this before I had. So I don’t think that they’re following it to the letter of the law. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Regardless of the legal implications of these undisclosed church sponsorships, there’s a broader social shift going on here. Many of these women were raised to be wives and mothers. Momfluencing has opened doors that didn’t even exist for many women. Like we talked about earlier, they’re girl bossing. That’s huge, right? But is this a conscious act of reclaiming power? Time to open a new tab. Is mom-fluencing actually feminist? You made a really good point in your book about how, for a lot of these women, influencing and content creation is very lucrative, but it’s also one of the only ways that they’re allowed to exercise any kind of ambition or agency without threatening the patriarchy they live in. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Within the Mormon culture, which is heavily patriarchal, women are not supposed to work outside the home. And I think that’s slowly changing, but generally they’re not really supposed to have ambitions beyond being a perfect wife and a perfect mother and having nine children, but looking like they haven’t even had one child. And so, I consider influencing to be like this genius kind of loophole because it’s a way for them to exercise their ambition within the confines of the patriarchy because their job is predicated upon being a perfect mother and a perfect wife. And so it’s like, well, I’m still doing everything perfectly. I’m just showing other people about it and making a ton of money. So it’s, like, who can really have a problem with that? And influencing is largely done within the home. And so it’s kind of the perfect career for women who are in this patriarchal society that says, ‘no, you don’t go out and make the money, I go out to make the the money.’ \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Fortessa pointed out this one scene in one of the earlier seasons of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. They’re gathered in someone’s kitchen, complaining about their husbands. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I know you don’t want to make a TikTok, but we’ve got to pay the bills. I mean, who else is going to pay the bills, right? \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Who is currently like the breadwinner at home? I think all of us. Really? Yeah. We all are. Look at us. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s kind of genius, like I really, as a concept, I think it’s really fascinating and I think its really cool that they found a way to exercise their ambition and agency within the confines of a patriarchal society. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yes, I mean the new season is all about how Dad Tok, the like, husbands and boyfriends of Mormon wives are all like upset. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Boo, Dad Tok ! \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m such a dad talk hater, but they’re all like, upset and they’re trying to find themselves because they’re like, they only know us as our wives’ husbands and not as our own people. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Dad Tok’s a lot funnier than Mom Tok, and we have our own place on social media. I think this is gonna be a great opportunity for Dad Tok. I think it shows that our wives don’t have a monopoly on social media. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s fascinating to see that they are in the position that Mormon women have been in for generations. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But they’re not realizing that. Like, they’re not thinking like, oh, for the last five or seven years before Mom Tok, this is how my wife felt while I went out and made money and had a life outside of the home and she was home with our several young children. It’s fascinating to me, especially as a mom myself, to see men have a taste of what it’s like to be a mom and they’re like, ‘Oh, this sh*t sucks.’ Like, okay, let me be clear, being a mother is incredible. Being a mother and having the mental load and being in charge of everything is very difficult. And being the one who’s at home is very difficult. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So, Mom Tok and Dad Tok drama aside, forging careers through social media has been so empowering for many women who grew up in conservative, religious communities. The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives is so interesting to me, because over the course of a few seasons, the women start to understand their own agency. They joke that the group is split between the saints and the sinners. The sinners are the ones who are no longer religious. While the saints still adhere to Mormon values and, more or less, the lifestyle. No drinking, no caffeine, and no divorce.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But throughout the show, even for the saints, you’re watching them deconstruct their upbringings in real time and actually get to exercise their own ambition. These are women who married and got pregnant as teenagers. If they did get to go to college, they were married and get pregnant right after graduation. They didn’t get to experience much of adulthood before they became mothers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And now, through the armies of followers they’ve built online, they’ve girlbossed their way into very successful careers. So they are making so much money. They are like the breadwinners of their family, which is so counter to the values that they preach. Which brings me to my next question. Is mommy blogging actually feminist? \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I really grapple with this, because on one hand, taking the unseen and unpaid labor of motherhood and making it seen and paid, I do think is a feminist act. But then again, you’re making it paid on the backs of selling this false vision to other women, which I don’t think can be considered feminist. So it’s like that tweet that’s like, is MasterCard an ally? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Laughter\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">] yeah. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Is this pop singer your friend? Like, it’s like… I don’t know, I don’t think that selling this vision of perfect motherhood to other mothers can be considered feminist, I just don’t think it can. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For the last two decades, mom-fluencing has revolved around performing domestic labor. But let’s talk about what it means to portray the fantasy of motherhood. What’s going on behind the scenes? What don’t viewers see? Let’s open one last tab: the trad wife illusion. Time for a case study. We’re going to talk about Ballerina Farm. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh my gosh, Ballerina Farm. I could write a thesis on her. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You may have seen one of her videos on your feed before. She’s this beautiful blonde woman, usually wearing a linen apron over a gauzy, puff-sleeved dress. She posts these videos of her preparing a meal from scratch, usually no narration, just the sounds of her sprinkling salt on freshly churned butter while her kids run around off camera. Sometimes, a cow in the distance. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Audio Clip from Hannah Neeleman Instagram Account]\u003c/span>\u003c/i> \u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When we started to farm, I was swept up in the beauty of learning to make food from scratch. It makes sense why I soon fell in love with the idea of a family milk cow. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So her name is Hannah Neeleman. She is the foremost mom influencer, trad wife, blogger in the world. She lives in Utah. She’s Mormon. She’s married to a Mormon man who actually is the heir to the JetBlue fortune…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wild. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">…which they don’t ever talk about, which is interesting because it’s very like, we pulled ourselves up by our bootstraps and started this farm. And it’s like, your father-in-law is a billionaire. So that’s really interesting.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What’s especially tragic about her story is that she was a Mormon woman who did have a really promising career as a ballet dancer. Like, she was in Juilliard… \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">at Juilliard. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Which is wild. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There was a profile of her where they talk about how it’s called Ballerina Farm, but on the entire farm, there’s no dance studio. But I mean, that that Times profile was really wild because she’s like in her senior year at Julliard and her soon to be husband, like, meets her and decides like we’re going to get married. And then like, she’s flying back from New York to Utah and she’s flying JetBlue, which his dad owns. And so he pulls some strings, and gets the seat next to her on the flight. And basically, the way that I read it in the story was, like, she wanted to take her time and like, finish school, whatever, and then it turned out she was married and pregnant by graduation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But she just had her ninth child. She looks like she hasn’t had any children. She is very beautiful in like, a very toned down way. She looks she has that no makeup makeup look, and like, she’s always wearing, like, flowy dresses and like, making sourdough from scratch and making like, butter for sandwiches. She makes everything herself. But now it’s turned into this entire empire. Like there’s the Ballerina Farm store, there’s the Ballerina Farm brand. I mean, they make protein powder and hydration powder and sourdough starter and it’s a huge thing. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What is the appeal of this kind of this genre of content right now? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think it makes a lot of sense that as so much of the country is in such a fragile financial situation. I mean, the promise of a one income household broke decades ago, but we used to, you know, when we grew up, it was like, yeah, one person could have a job and support an entire family and like, that’s gone. The middle class is shrinking, like upward mobility is basically non-existent unless you like hit the viral lottery. And so it makes sense that people are like, we want to slow down and like go back to basics. And whether or not this is actually true, they’re looking at a trad wife life as going back to basics. But I also think it can’t be disentangled from the way that culture generally is just shifting rightward. Like the zeitgeist is just becoming so much more conservative. And it’s like, of course, tradwives are surging at this time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, this trad wife content just depicts this really beautiful, idyllic life. What was it like for you to watch this content as a journalist before you became a mother and then after you became mother? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Before I became a mother, I was like, oh, I can kind of see the appeal. It does seem like kind of beautiful to just be like in charge of the home and just having to make bread and take care of your babies and like look beautiful. And I could kind of understand it. And then after I became mother, I was, like, this is not real life at all.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I have one child, I’m pregnant with my second and like, I have never made sourdough in my life. I don’t make my kids baby food from scratch. Like, my hair is usually not done. I’m never in a dress. It’s just the actual blood and guts and effort of motherhood are so disparate from this tradwife life that is shown online.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And I think, you know, tradwives never talk about the loneliness of mother hood. And that’s something that really hit me when I became a mother myself, because I have lots of family around. My husband is great. We have a part-time nanny. Like I have help, but it’s still like so lonely, especially in those first few months. And, like, if you watch these women, you would never think that anything was difficult ever. Like, all you have to do, mama, is cuddle your baby and co-sleep with them and breastfeed them on demand and make all their food from scratch and, like it just, it really shattered the illusion for me once I became a mother myself. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, you aren’t out there hand-picking berries to, like feed your kids. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No, dude, no. Like, maybe I should once in a while, but no, there’s no time. It just doesn’t make sense. It’s a fantasy, and that’s what made me realize these women aren’t being paid for the labor of motherhood, they’re getting paid for the performance of the laborer of mother hood. Because the labor motherhood is by definition unpaid and it’s often unseen. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What’s going on behind the scenes of this trad wife content that viewers don’t see? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I found out that many of your favorite mom influencers and family vloggers have full-time nannies, they have around the clock help, they have housekeepers, they have house managers, they have videographers, they have editors. I mean, this is an empire. This is a business. And I’ve said this before, there’s nothing wrong with having help. We have a once-monthly house cleaner. We have a part-time nanny. And I would be less sane than I already am without those people helping us. But I think what is troubling to me is selling this idea of self-reliance and saying, ‘I do it all myself.’ And by the way, if you buy this commissioned protein powder, you can be strong enough to do it yourself too, when secretly they have so much help behind the scenes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Beyond the impact that momfluencers have on their audiences, the biggest consequences may fall on the people at the center of it all, their kids. The last time Fortesa was on Close All Tabs, we talked about how children are affected when they’re forced to be part of their parents’ content. Now, the internet is starting to reckon with a reality of sharenting, a portmanteau of share and parenting. Momfluencers have gotten some heat lately over exploiting their children and their content. There’s a vibe shift afoot. And while there will probably always be a demand for this type of parenting content, a growing faction of brands and creators are moving away from showing kids in videos. In an industry that has opened doors for so many women, is there still space for momfluencers who don’t engage in sharenting? A refreshing part of the secret lives of Mormon wives is that their children rarely appear in the show. There’s the occasional shot of someone holding a newborn baby. But the children who can walk and talk are barely in the show at all. In fact, some members of MomTalk have stopped showing their kids in their online content too. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think they’ve kind of shifted from showing their kids to showing their experience as mothers and especially as working mothers. Well, that’s the thing is I don’t think there is a right way to be a mother on the internet because if you show your kids, people are like, you’re exploiting them. And if you take them off, then it’s like, oh, you just showboating and trying to act like you’re, like, so above this. And also if you’re gonna take them off, why did you ever put them on in the first place? There’s no way to win. People will hate you no matter what you do. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In many cases, these women are walking a tightrope, balancing audience expectations, traditional gender norms, and the realities of raising children. Fortesa tries to avoid thinking about momfluencers in simple black and white terms. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For someone who’s reported on the horrors and exploitation involved in family vlogging, you did take a very compassionate approach to writing about the Mormon mommy vloggers and, like, this world of influencers. How do you balance what you know about the momfluencing industry with maintaining empathy for the women involved? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Fortesa Latifi : \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> I mean I really do genuinely feel a lot of empathy for these women and I think especially becoming a mother myself has shown me you know to what lengths I would go to give my daughter a great life. A lot of times these women started mommy blogging in a vulnerable situation. They didn’t go to college or they started having kids really young or they were in some kind of financial instability. And so when I look around at my life and the stability that I have, and then I look at other women and the limited choices they have, I think it’s just dishonest to say that I would never make that decision. Like, I wouldn’t make that decision as myself in my experience, but I could see how you could make it in a different situation. And I’m not one of those people who thinks family vlogging and mom influencing is evil and immoral and bad across the board. I just don’t think that. I think it’s much more nuanced than that. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Morgan Sung: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mom Tok is on the verge of collapse, all the time. These women have some very fraught friendships. Will Mom Tok survive this? Has kind of become a mantra on the show. The cultural appetite for family vlogs may fade, especially as the debate over child influencers continues and more viewers become disillusioned with the fantasy of trad wives. But the recent seasons of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives have proven that people don’t necessarily watch these creators for the content about their kids and not really for the husbands either. Dad Tok is just not it. People watch because they’re interested in the lives of these women, even the messy uncurated versions. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The performance of the perfect mother who feeds her kids freshly baked sourdough topped off with hand-churned butter is not always as compelling as the working mother who’s open about the struggles of juggling a career and her kids. As much as there’s still an audience for the tradwife, there’s also growing demand for creators who are honest with their viewers, both about who’s sponsoring their content and about the reality of motherhood. So as mindful sharenting takes more of a hold on internet culture, will mom-fluencing survive this? Probably. But it may have to change. Let’s close all these tabs. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Close All Tabs is a production of KQED studios and is reported and hosted by me, Morgan Sung. This episode was produced by Maya Cueva and edited by Chris Egusa, who also composed our theme song and credits music. The Close All Tabs team also includes editor, Chris Hambrick, and audio engineer, Brendan Willard. Additional music from APM, audience engagement support from Maha Sanad. Jen Chien is our director of podcasts and Ethan Toven-Lindsey is our editor in chief. Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California, Local. This episode’s keyboard sounds were submitted by Alex Tran and recorded on his white Epomaker Hi75 keyboard with Fogruaden red samurai keycaps and Gateron milky yellow pro v2 switches. Thanks for listening. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>"
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"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
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"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
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"mindshift": {
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"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
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"order": 12
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"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
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"info": "Our weekly podcast explores how the media 'sausage' is made, casts an incisive eye on fluctuations in the marketplace of ideas, and examines threats to the freedom of information and expression in America and abroad. For one hour a week, the show tries to lift the veil from the process of \"making media,\" especially news media, because it's through that lens that we see the world and the world sees us",
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},
"perspectives": {
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"order": 14
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/planet-money/id290783428?mt=2",
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},
"politicalbreakdown": {
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"title": "Political Breakdown",
"tagline": "Politics from a personal perspective",
"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
"airtime": "THU 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Political-Breakdown-2024-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"order": 5
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"possible": {
"id": "possible",
"title": "Possible",
"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
"airtime": "SUN 2pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Possible-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.possible.fm/",
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"source": "Possible"
},
"link": "/radio/program/possible",
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"spotify": "https://open.spotify.com/show/730YpdUSNlMyPQwNnyjp4k"
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},
"pri-the-world": {
"id": "pri-the-world",
"title": "PRI's The World: Latest Edition",
"info": "Each weekday, host Marco Werman and his team of producers bring you the world's most interesting stories in an hour of radio that reminds us just how small our planet really is.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 2pm-3pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-World-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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},
"radiolab": {
"id": "radiolab",
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"view": "LANDING_VIEW"
},
"error": null
},
"youthMediaReducer": {},
"checkPleaseReducer": {
"filterData": {
"region": {
"key": "Restaurant Region",
"filters": [
"Any Region"
]
},
"cuisine": {
"key": "Restaurant Cuisine",
"filters": [
"Any Cuisine"
]
}
},
"restaurantDataById": {},
"restaurantIdsSorted": [],
"error": null
},
"location": {
"pathname": "/podcasts/closealltabs",
"previousPathname": "/"
}
}