Growing Up Online - How Life has Changed for Gen Z - Leslie's Lowedown on Life

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Leslie low Welcome to Leslie's Low Down on Life.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Hi everyone, and welcome to Leslie's Low Down on Life.
I'm kind of excited today because my two guests are
usually the ones behind the camera and they're working everything
to make this podcast come to life. But today they're
in front of the camera or behind the mic, so
to speak, and we're talking to all things Jen See
that's right, Jen. Hey, So we have Quinn, we have Olivia.

(00:41):
We're talking about social because we have this conversation. We've
had several conversations about social media and dating apps and
life the way it is now compared to you know,
say a few years back in my day.

Speaker 3 (00:53):
Yeah, well, you know, we obviously getting to be behind
the camera working this with you has been super fun
for us. With that, we've got to kind of see
the YouTube side of things. I've learned a lot more
about social media and all of that stuff through working
with you on this project. So it's just been a
lot of fun getting to talk to you about all
of our Obviously.

Speaker 2 (01:10):
We're in that gen z. I saw recently a term calledzillennial.

Speaker 3 (01:14):
Which is what I think a millennial they claim, at
least according to the Google search I did is that
year in between gen Z and millennials, which is right
where I fall in nineteen ninety seven. So I think
I have that slight perspective of both millennials and gen Z.

Speaker 4 (01:28):
You definitely do.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
Yeah, but we have the best conversations because we're so
I mean, they're so opposite. It's fascinating. I think it's
fascinating on buffins. And I gotta say I appreciate youtub
so much more than words could actually say, because you're
incredible behind the camera, but you're just incredible what you do,
and you're incredible people. So I'm excited about this. Let's talk,

(01:50):
let's we love working for you, but we love you. Yeah,
I'll be back.

Speaker 3 (01:56):
I think, honestly, first place to start is Olivia and
I were pretty much raised most of our lives with
social media involved or some sort of technology, video games
and that type of stuff from an early age, and
we kind of just want to know, for our gen zers,
what the heck was life like before you could get
on there and see what all your friends were doing,

(02:18):
and like, how much has changed since social media has emerged?
And you saw life before social media, and you saw
life after social.

Speaker 2 (02:25):
Media, it was amazing. There was a lot more peaceful.
I mean, because I'll laugh and I'll bring up the
days of like the payphone, Like if you wanted to
talk to somebody had to stop on the side of
the road where you saw really taking myself way back there. Yeah,
that's crazy, but it's just kind of a cool thing, right,
And so I remember, gosh when AOL started, kind of

(02:50):
really am sounding sold right now, but you know, the
whole dial up and internet and then having access to that.
But I remember I was in the business pretty newly
in the business when social media started, and that was
a crazy transition, right because it was like, all of
a sudden, you were connected to all these people. They

(03:12):
came out of the woodwork people you went to school with,
and people you went to college with, and people you'd
work with and other jobs. And it was kind of
cool at first because you had those great connections and
you could see what people were doing, families could see
each other's pictures, and it was just a great thing.
And then all of a sudden, like everything does, Yeah,

(03:33):
the bad kind of crept in and all the I
call them, I call them creepers, you know, for lack
of better ways of putting. The people who just set
behind a keyboard and just kind of like write the
mean stuff. They don't think about it. The haters. The haters, Yeah,
haters gonna hate, right, but they do find their way
of creeping in. So I'm curious too from my end

(03:57):
of it, because you guys have grown up with this,
what has been like for me? It was so fantastic
at first, right, it really was. It was great connecting.

Speaker 4 (04:05):
And because people want to is yeah, connection, that's what
we thrive off of, right, And that's all that obviously
you guys knew at first, and so to have that
amplified through a platform like that's like this is really
cool because we can all see what everyone's doing. But
then it's like, yeah, what you said, there's always gonna
be some sort of like I guess, like dark side,

(04:25):
negative side to it thing back, Yeah, something goes wrong,
yeah yeah.

Speaker 3 (04:29):
And I think I really saw that change because I
was probably ten to twelve years old, like when Instagram
became a thing and all of that, and I remember
loving social media and like when my parents let me
get on Facebook and get an Instagram account and all
that stuff.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
It was so much fun.

Speaker 3 (04:44):
Like you the pictures that you posted were just stupid,
like and granted I was twelve, but even so it
was kind of the general thing for people, like I'm
just gonna post here's my sandwich that ate for lunch
or whatever stupid stuff you did.

Speaker 2 (04:56):
And then you saw over time, like as with.

Speaker 3 (04:58):
Anything where there's money to be made, and in these
types of platforms, businesses get in there, algorithms change, they
develop it and all that, and now it's much different.

Speaker 2 (05:06):
Like you go on and you post your most curated things,
not just.

Speaker 3 (05:08):
Your crappy little photo of some random thing that you're
doing that day.

Speaker 4 (05:12):
Yeah, now it's got to be picture.

Speaker 3 (05:14):
Perfect, yeah, picture perfect, and you feel kind of that
like if you post stuff that doesn't feel like it's
picture perfect and kind of worthy of being posted, it's
like you can kind of feel that hate.

Speaker 2 (05:23):
Are you this post does?

Speaker 3 (05:25):
I got twenty likes on this one, And if I
post something that's more serene and picturesque, I get one
hundred likes or something like that.

Speaker 2 (05:32):
And there's a lot of those things that creep in. Yeah.
I hadn't thought about that. You guys, I think, yeah,
that's a thing because you're right. At first, we all
just posted what we had for dinner, you know, pictures
of you know, our dog or our kids in my
case or things like that. But over time, you know,
we've introduced things like face app and light room. I'm

(05:53):
just trying to filter it, filters, all the filters.

Speaker 1 (05:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (05:57):
If it's not yeah, if it's If it's not a
quality post, people are less likely to they're just less
likely to like it or say anything or like, you know,
if it is a because I remember people used to
just yeah, like what you said, we'd post our like
our drinks or like our sandwiches, or like our dog,
and it's like a blurry photo of the dog run

(06:18):
like you know, no one cared it for. And then
you get to this point where, yeah, people, it's almost
like a production. It's like you have to really think
about what you're putting out there because people judge. They
do they judge, they judge, like, oh, what did you
take that with like an android? It's like that's the
things that people would say. Nowadays it's like that looks

(06:39):
really bad, you know, it's so it's weird.

Speaker 2 (06:43):
It's weird. So I know for like for like my
generation and when all of this started out the Facebook
and then the Instagram and now TikTok, and I'm sure
there's many more I'm missing here, but it was like
that adrenaline rush when you got like the like buttons
or people commented, and it was a sort of that

(07:05):
and it kind of fed into our lady validation and
being connected to like our viewers in my case. What's
it been like though for you guys? Like going through school,
like you said, posting the pictures where you did you
base like some of your value on the number of
likes or comments or how did that work for you guys?

Speaker 3 (07:24):
Yeah, I know I can go in if you want,
but where I think, thankfully with some age. For me,
I'm now twenty eight, so I'm not not super old,
but I'm now I'm ten years out of high school
and things like that. I know, for high school it
was way worse like it was. You were, so you
put so much stock into that stuff even before social
media was kind of the beast that it was it

(07:45):
is now. Just I played high school basketball and so
it was like a big deal for me to get
like that cool action shot to be able to post
so all my friends and people back home or the
girls at the high school or whatever it's like, so
they knew that, Oh I'm a mister pop do.

Speaker 2 (08:00):
Whatever like they want to show.

Speaker 3 (08:02):
Yeah, And there was a lot of it, because then
you get like, well, this post didn't do as well,
or like this person didn't like this one, but they
liked that one. And there's so many random little mental
games like that that you find yourself even subconsciously, I think,
thinking about because I don't think a lot of us
are actively thinking about that stuff as we're posting and
moving and taking photos and things like that. But I
think it's just something that has kind of crept into

(08:24):
a lot of our subconscious in this generation, where that's
just in the back of your head, like, oh, I'm
not going to post this even though I love this photo,
but it's not quite as nice as this other one
that's going to look a little bit more glamorous and
a little bit more.

Speaker 2 (08:36):
Worried about the judgment. Yes, yeah, back on it. Did
you feel the same way, because how old are you?

Speaker 4 (08:41):
Now?

Speaker 2 (08:41):
Do you mind my ask?

Speaker 4 (08:42):
Now? I'm twenty two, okay, I yeah, I all throughout
high school it was like you wanted the first of
all people thetablish they almost established like on some of
their pages, like an esthetic, so like they have like
the theme that they follow and so everything like it's
very it's very like curated down to like the yeah,

(09:03):
the filter, the way that it looks, the quality, and
so in high school it was kind of a big thing,
but even especially now, like I find myself like, I
don't know, I see other people's posts and I'm like, wow,
that was really well edited or really well done, and man,
I wish that my like I was as good at
I guess like putting a post together as someone else was.

(09:27):
And it's like it's it's weird though to think about
it that way, because we use social media to share moments.

Speaker 2 (09:35):
Like that's your life. Yeah, so you're editing your life
right for what people are seeing. You're editing who you
are and what your life is. Oh my gosh. That's
such an interesting concept, isn't it.

Speaker 4 (09:46):
Yeah. Yeah, I've got like a if I've got like
a pimple or something, I like, go in. It's crazy
how you can go in now and like erase it
or like it's but we do it because we feel
the pressure to make perfecture perfect. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (10:01):
Yeah, And it's a yeah, it's not.

Speaker 3 (10:04):
And again, I think it's something that I find to
be in the subconscious of us because I don't actively
go around thinking these things often, but exactly that, like
touching up photos, adding filters, all this stuff. It's just
part of like what we do now, and I don't
think we necessarily realize some of maybe the mental repercussions
that has on our self image, self worth, how we
view others, how we view places, events, things like that.

Speaker 4 (10:27):
Well, then you get comments from people, and sometimes like
or likes, or you don't get alike from like people
specific too, it's like, well, that person didn't like my post,
and that was the whole point of this post. Like
that's a it's a thing, and comments are always nice
because I haven't really ever had Also, we should talk
about that here too, is like what you go through

(10:48):
online because you're somebody who is in the spotlight. I've
never had like a negative comment, but I know that
it feels really good when people, you know, hype you
up in your Instagram post and stuff. So when you're
not getting that attention, it's like, oh, this post didn't
do as well. It does kind of like you're like, oh,

(11:09):
maybe this wasn't such a goo and then you want
to take it down and then you put and it's like,
why there's so much energy that we waste so much?

Speaker 2 (11:18):
I call it a mind game in the bank. That's
my go to fella in the blank. But it is
it really messes with your head. It messes with your
head because you're like, Okay, I don't look good enough
in this picture, so I've got to alter it, you know,
to live up to this because we're I don't know
about you, I'm sure it's the same for all of us,

(11:40):
right we're comparing. We're constantly comparing ourselves to what somebody
else is. Well you just said it, how they've edited it,
or what the picture looks like, or what they're doing.

Speaker 4 (11:50):
You know.

Speaker 2 (11:50):
It's like it seems as though it's social media. Maybe
it's a little different. And you guys tell me that
everybody's putting the best of the beast out there or
sometimes the worst of the worst. You're like, we didn't
need to know all that.

Speaker 3 (12:06):
It seems to be either you were super curated going
for that like that esthetic that your Instagram page as
or whatever that is, or you tend to be the
oversharer that just everything that I do is going to
be on social media, which I think is another case
that we have, which I don't think either one of
us really fall into. But I see that a lot
where it's I have some friends of mine and I
remember like graduating from college and we're all looking for

(12:28):
jobs and just random friends would like post stuff on
stories of them in not good states and out doing stuff.

Speaker 2 (12:34):
They shouldn't be doing.

Speaker 3 (12:35):
And it was kind of even for me, like kind
of eye opening, like, man, like we don't need to
put everything on social media like that. That's probably some
stuff can just stay private to yourself. You don't need
to have that recorded while you're doing your keckstand or something,
you know, whatever.

Speaker 2 (12:49):
It is you're doing. Don't overshare, Yes, yeah.

Speaker 4 (12:53):
Don't, especially when you're trying to get like a job.
Eventually you have to to eat. Your digital footprint is
so important in my opinion, Like I've got some silly
stuff out there, but it's never gonna be me like
out drinking a ton or like getting like oh, like
it's just not I don't know, I don't think that's

(13:13):
not a picture I want to paint. And also it's
like people can find anything about you nowadays? Why would you?
Why would you put that up?

Speaker 2 (13:22):
Yeah, and I do want to talk about that for
half a second, so I didn't I interrupt you. So
digital footprint that wasn't a thing for me. I mean
it is now obviously, but that for me growing up
in those formative years when we're in high school and
we're doing all the stupid stuff for college and we're
doing we're doing all the fun, stupid things as we
should be, and you know, you post those things on

(13:44):
and then that becomes part of your digital footprint, which
is hot. I mean, that's gonna be really difficult. Like
I can't tell you how many times I'll be sitting
with friends and we will go where glad Facebook wasn't gone.

Speaker 3 (13:57):
Then that's what I was going to ask say, was
it nice to not have to have everything taken a
picture of and everything recorded?

Speaker 2 (14:04):
You know what's fun is that if I'll get together
with friends or see friends is pulling out like the
scrap books or the photo albums or you know, they'll
send pictures that they've taken up the picture and that
was fun, right, And so we didn't have everything that
lived online, and I got I have to imagine that

(14:25):
going through school and growing up with everything online, like
everything's out there?

Speaker 3 (14:33):
Oh, is that it's a weird. It's something that at
least for me, I never paid much attention to until
recent years when these terms like digital footprint and stuff
kind of started becoming more mainstream and we started to
understand what being on the internet does, where there's always
a trail of everything you've ever google searched or posted,
and all this stuff, even if you deleted it, any

(14:55):
messages you sent, there is a trail of that. There
is a copy of that somewhere that someone confined.

Speaker 4 (15:00):
Yeah, he's got it somewhere. Yeah, even if it's the
app itself, like snap I know Snapchat has been under
some fire for like keeping everything even when it's like gone,
like wiped. Yeah, they still have everything.

Speaker 2 (15:14):
Yeah, I think so.

Speaker 3 (15:15):
That's what I've heard too, is you send a Snapchat
that supposed to vanish within ten seconds or whatever their
thing is. But we've learned and been told that that
lives somewhere, that picture goes somewhere, that.

Speaker 2 (15:26):
Is forever learned that. Like security, I didn't want to
believe that security was an issue because I wanted to
believe that that Snapchat whatever was going to disappear. I
only did Snapchat with my youngest son, so but you know,
we did stilly videos back and forth and you're thinking, Okay,

(15:47):
that video is gone and you can't get that back.
But you're right, stuff lives somewhere, and there's a bit
of a security issue if you're putting out where you're at,
or dropping a pin and as to where you're at,
or putting your information even just giving your phone number
to and I'll just use Facebook as an example. You know,

(16:10):
you're giving your information, they're taking that information, and they're
using it for something. Does that make you, guys nervous?
Because it didn't me at first, Now it does. Now
I'm like so hyper aware of that.

Speaker 4 (16:22):
It is scary, especially like in being like a young
woman that lives alone Snapchat. I saw recently the Instagram
might be doing something with our location or might like
be sharing our location kind of like Snapchat.

Speaker 2 (16:35):
Yeah, it's wait and surprise me.

Speaker 4 (16:37):
I yeah, And I'm like, I don't want that out there.
I don't even want my Snapchat location on. I can't
remember if it's even on or not. But like they
kind of snapchat went ahead and just was like, Okay,
you're on a map now and people can see where
you are unless you turn it off, of course. But
it's like, right, that's weird.

Speaker 2 (16:55):
You shouldn't have to go in and turn it off
if you want it on. You should be able to
go I suppose and turn it on, but you shouldn't
have to go, oh, I have to turn this off
because a lot of people might not know that. So
that's also another interesting conversation though, yea.

Speaker 3 (17:10):
And it's such an interesting thing too with that how
that's kind of changed because, like you said, in the
early days of social media, when people weren't using it
quite as much, and we didn't we weren't sophisticated with it.
I remember being in high school and getting a cell
phone my junior year of high school for the first time,
and I remember going in my Instagram bio and putting
my cell phone more and they're saying like text me,

(17:32):
like whatever I put in there, And now I look
at that and saying like, oh my god, like what
a way for somebody to find your information and just
get access to you so easily. But at the time,
early in the early days, you didn't worry about some
of these things and the kind of creeps and some
stuff that can be out there nowadays. And now I
feel like I am very protective about what I post,
and I try not to post too much. I try

(17:54):
not to post a time like I've seen friends of
mine that have little kids and little babies and they
will not post that baby on social media because they
don't want anyone getting a visual of it, have.

Speaker 2 (18:03):
Any idea just what their day to day is.

Speaker 3 (18:05):
Yeah, and things like that that you now have to
be aware of because there's just unfortunately people out there
that are doing creepy, yeah, terrible things.

Speaker 2 (18:13):
Yeah, it's an interesting world. I don't know if you
guys noticed this, but I didn't say your last names.
There's a reason for that thing, right, because I'm super
now protective of things that whereas before I wasn't. I
feel like just some behind the scenes for me, I
felt like my life was so out there for everybody
to see, all the good, the bad, and the ugly,

(18:34):
and yes I have put I have put a lot
of that out there, and now I just won't, like
I won't post a picture of somebody without having like
their permission, or my kids and their last names or
grandkids and their last names. And because there are so
many creepy people there are being on a vacation, you

(18:56):
don't want to post that at the time that you're
on it, because then you're telling people you're not in town, right,
and there are people there's you know, there's bad people
out there. Yes, And I hate even believing that there's
just so many bad people out there. You guys know that, right, unfortunately. Yes, yeah, yeah,
ask me some questions. What do you want to ask me?

Speaker 3 (19:18):
Yeah, well, I know one that's just been on top
of my mind since we mentioned it. Olivia and I
are not in the public eye, like you mentioned earlier,
we worked behind the camera here, so we are doing your.

Speaker 2 (19:28):
Filming and doing the editing and all that stuff, so
we don't have to.

Speaker 3 (19:30):
Deal with I can go out to eat, or I
can go to Riverfront Park.

Speaker 2 (19:35):
And nobody knows who I am unless I've actually met
the person.

Speaker 4 (19:37):
Yeah, unless it's like a mutual friend. It's like, no
one's going to stop us everywhere we're going. It almost
seems like you're living that reality of you are like
a local celebrity. Yeah, And so I couldn't imagine. I
couldn't imagine dealing with that on social media and especially
like going out in public. It's like that's got to

(19:57):
be a lot.

Speaker 3 (19:58):
Yeah, And so I wonder like from your perspective, particularly
given that you because you've been in TV for a
long time and so kind of before the big social
media wave, what has that change been like for you
with the accessibility that people feel to you and the
hateful comments that you get and things like that.

Speaker 2 (20:14):
That's a heavy sigh, right, I mean, no, no, no, it's
a really great conversation to have. It really is, because
I will say ninety five percent of people are just amazing.
There really are. There are some incredible people, and I'm
so grateful every single day for the online community that
I've had support from in the community itself had support from.

(20:38):
It is a very weird thing, and I would say
that my personality has probably changed a lot over the
years because of that. I should explain that there is
like introvert extrovert, right. I think I was more extroverted,
say when I was younger, and then you become more
introverted and you become more protective your self. And like

(21:01):
I said, I had put a lot of stuff out
there that people could see, whether it be relationships or
children or whatever. So in one way that helps people
to know you better. In another way gives them too
much information about you. And so I'm very private now.
The weird thing to answer your question is that when
I go out in public, this is hard. Actually, I

(21:24):
have panic attacks, like I have anxiety, have the worst anxiety,
and it's just progressively gotten worse. And I think it's
because there are several different reasons. But I don't want
to disappoint people. First of all, I don't want to
let anybody down. I don't want anybody to feel like

(21:46):
I dismissed them or didn't see them, or I didn't appropriately,
you know, yeah, address them or address their comment or
question or whatever it is. In my daily life, maybe
I'm out running an error into a grocery store. For
an example, I'll give you a couple that'll help, kind

(22:07):
of like maybe pull it together. I had gone out
one day to fred Meyer and I was just looking
for a particular birthday cake for my granddaughter when she
was little. And this was just after COVID and so,
and I'll go back to COVID here in a minute.
But I had just run in the store. I was

(22:27):
in a hurry. I was just trying to do things
very quickly, and I'd run in the store and I
had I went straight to the bakery. I asked it
for a particular thing. They didn't have it. I feel like,
I'm always really nice to people because I just like people,
so I'm not going to be rude. And then I
just left. You know. It was it was in straight

(22:48):
back and ale. They didn't have what I wanted. Well,
evidently somebody had called at the station and said she
dismissed me. She told me she didn't care about my question,
and I was like, I didn't talk to anybody except
for the lady behind the counter at the bakery. I
was so confused by what that was about, and it

(23:09):
hurt me. I was like, oh my god, I didn't
hear anybody ask me a question. I would never tell
them I don't care about what they have to say usually.
And one of the reasons I kind of stopped going
to the stores was you run in for something and
we all have limited time, right, and then I would
always know that I would have to build in maybe
thirty or forty extra minutes. Because you want to talk

(23:30):
to people, you want if somebody stops to talk to
you want to acknowledge them and thank them for like,
first of all, knowing who you are, second one for
watching and wanting to say hi. But that can become overwhelming.
So I thought I would never dismiss somebody, especially that
a valid question. So that bothered me so much. And

(23:52):
then I'll walk backwards to COVID and mask no mask,
mask no mask, and then going to the grocery store,
and uh, you know, everybody was scared, right everybody and
had an opinion rightfully, so great and we were very
divided during that.

Speaker 3 (24:09):
So whether you had the mask on or had it off,
somebody had something to say.

Speaker 2 (24:13):
Something to say, And so that became overwhelming to be
stopped and why do you think this way? Why do
you think that way? Or you know, you guys, are
you know, doing it wrong? And the media sucks and
all of that, And so I found myself driving to
the stores and then you know, not going in. I

(24:34):
would just I stopped going and started ordering online. And
then I think one of the creepiest things for me,
hardest things for me was I had gone to the
mall after being out at the lake one day and
I had an event to go to that night, so
I just went into Victoria's Secrets because I needed to
get something to go with this dress, and so I
was just stating there. It was quick. I was wearing

(24:56):
a sun dress, and all of a sudden, I felt
somebody's hand go all the way down my back to
my back end, and I was like, I turned around.
I didn't know who this person was. It was a guy,
and I was like startled, and he's like, we're friends,
We're friends on Facebook. And I didn't know who this

(25:17):
person was and he's got his hand on my backside,
and I'm like, I was so freaked out by that,
and I thought, oh, I like that people feel like
we're friends. I want them to, but there's also a boundary.

Speaker 4 (25:31):
There's boundaries that's like insane.

Speaker 2 (25:34):
And I felt like I couldn't get mad at him
because then I would somehow get in trouble or be
looked on badly for being upset about it. But I
went go to the mall for like a year after that.

Speaker 3 (25:48):
Yeah, And I feel like that, I'm sure is a
thing when you are any sort of celebrity of any
kind of that local celebrity to a big national celebrity.
I feel like because of social media is that there
was boundaries do get blurred sometimes and where it's oh,
Facebook friends or I follow you on Instagram, so I
get to see everything that you're doing.

Speaker 2 (26:06):
So I know so much about you, even though you
don't know who I am or any idea.

Speaker 3 (26:10):
But I feel this yeah relation, right, Yeah, that parasocial.

Speaker 2 (26:14):
It's an interesting thing, isn't it. Yeah, it's really weird.
So you guys feel like that's just such an interesting dynamic.

Speaker 4 (26:21):
Yeah, because yeah, in you know, honestly, I couldn't imagine
somebody you're just coming up to me and like touching me.
I could, I wouldn't and I wouldn't allow it. Like
I'm I'm props to you for being like so nice
because I just couldn't allow it and be like, yeah
you can, you can step away now I don't.

Speaker 3 (26:40):
Well, and then that puts you in a hard situation too,
because then you are, I'm sure, despite this could be
the nicest guy in the world, which maybe it doesn't
sound like it was, but nonetheless it could if it was.
You don't want to come off as like, oh, get
away from me and all this stuff because you have
an image and a reputation to uphold, but at the
same time, when they start crossing those bound it puts

(27:00):
you in that uncomfortable situation of how do I react
to this without being off putting and causing a scene
essentially because I am in the.

Speaker 2 (27:08):
Public eye and people are looking at me.

Speaker 3 (27:10):
But also how do I go to the mall without
essentially getting that's felt up by some random.

Speaker 2 (27:15):
By Yeah, yeah, exactly. That's been the blurry line. That's
been the hard thing for me is I was never
good with boundaries anyway. And then when all of this
started to kind of like domino into a fact and
it kind of did over time, like you guys saw
how you know, then all of a sudden, creepy people
go in and then you have to start worrying about
security and all of that. Yeah, you're you're always hyper

(27:39):
aware of like what you're being seen as. And that
was hard for me because I am a nice person
and I do want to be good to people, but
I'm like, whoa, there are some there are some boundaries.
One of the other ones was I was driving down
the road and I, you know, in the cars right
next to you, and you're like, oh, maybe I just

(28:02):
I'll speed up a little bit because it gets weird
when somebody's like right next to you. I don't know
why that is, but it is. And I looked over
and it was a guy who is just videotaping me
and waving, and I'm like, I don't know what to do,
and I wait, oh wow, and then I tinted my windows. Smart. Yeah.
So those are some of the things, you know.

Speaker 3 (28:20):
Yeah, and that we grow up with it, obviously, but
that's the side that I don't think even our generation
fully understands. And I think our generation might even violate
some of that stuff with famous celebrities that we love
and things like that, because it you go to a
concert or you buy like a VIP ticket to meet
these people. And I think a lot of the times
with people our age, that boundary does get blurred to
where it's like, oh, this is my friend, and how

(28:42):
they treat me in this situation means so much to
me even though I've never actually met this person. I'm
not actually friends with this person, but I feel like
I'm so close with them.

Speaker 2 (28:51):
That's so interesting. Yeah, I think if it's a.

Speaker 3 (28:53):
False sense of reality at times with relationships and people
in different settings.

Speaker 2 (28:58):
Well that is that what's the word I would dichotomy
like that? I mean, just that weird kind of connection
that we all feel like. I'll look at things too,
and I'll feel like, oh, I know that person. You
do feel like you know people, but it's a different way.
It's a different way. And then that also brings me
to like when people you don't know, or if they

(29:21):
don't really know you then are commenting on you and
saying things about you, You're like, wait a minute, why
are saying such ugly things? And I don't know, do
you guys encounter any of that.

Speaker 4 (29:34):
Or is it pretty.

Speaker 2 (29:37):
Just your friends that you've got and so you feel
pretty safe with them.

Speaker 4 (29:41):
I mean I would say I definitely don't encounter like it.
Just again, I reiterate this. I couldn't imagine like being
in the spotlight and receiving like hate comments like that,
because yeah, you I mean, it's a rarity though for
to say it like this, but ordinary people like us

(30:02):
to get people who are like, you know, just I
don't know. I've seen I manage your social media, you.

Speaker 2 (30:09):
Deal social media. That's not the only one that sees
those things.

Speaker 4 (30:18):
And obviously I'm not like going through your message it,
but there's things that pop up because I get your
notifications and I'm like, gosh, that was nasty. I could
not imagine it. So I mean from an ordinary standpoint, like, no,
I don't, I don't really experience that. I mean, I've
experienced like weirdos sometimes like sliding into my like they

(30:40):
say call it like slide in your DMS and weirdos
that it's like uninvited stuff. But I'm not. I don't,
I don't have I'm not in the spotlight like you are.
So it's it's easier for me, at least to just
ignore that stuff.

Speaker 3 (30:56):
Yeah, And you know, I think for me, like early
stages when social media was still kind of new, like
I don't even know if you remember, there was a
social media app called like yik yak and stuff where
you could just post anonymous anonymously about people in your
town or in your school or your area, and that
would get super nasty. So I dealt with some of
the kind of like the social media bowlie not necessarily
to me.

Speaker 2 (31:16):
Directly, but I saw it within my schools and stuff
like that.

Speaker 3 (31:19):
And then I think over time, as we became a
little bit more literate with social.

Speaker 2 (31:23):
Media, teachers and parents started monitoring some of that stuff.

Speaker 3 (31:26):
So I feel like we don't see it necessarily as
much like hate directly to us again as kind of
the quote unquote ordinary people. But I see it so
much like I'm a big sports fan, and like right
now is the WNBA season, and I love women's basketball,
so I watch a lot of that and then I
but what I see on social media fifty percent of
the time is just these nasty, hateful comments in that demographic, unfortunately,

(31:48):
mostly from men, saying objectifying, nasty things that they just
feel that everyone can see, but they feel like it's
okay for them to say and just put out there.
And so I feel like, you see that, and it
kind of makes maybe like it's exactly what you said,
those kind of keyboard warriors behind the screen, Like these
successful athletes are these successful musicians whoever people are hating on.

Speaker 2 (32:09):
It's like when you're in the cheap seats or you're.

Speaker 3 (32:12):
Not the man in the arena, it's so easy to
pick God and we do, yea, we sure do.

Speaker 2 (32:18):
It's insane.

Speaker 4 (32:19):
It's like why and also it's it's a public comment too.
It's not like other other, especially with a celebrity, and
like in or like a an athlete, a famous athlete,
the public is more likely to see that comment than
like the athlete themselves. You're like, yeah, like if you're
just scrolling through the car, it's like that's public. It's

(32:40):
like I can't I can't imagine writing a nasty comment
like that on anybody's profile, no matter who they are,
no matter even if I really don't like them. It's like,
I can't imagine doing that because you know, it's.

Speaker 3 (32:55):
Well, like we said, you can see that, Yeah, everyone
can see it. Jobs, parent, yes, future, girlfriend, boyfriend, all
of that.

Speaker 2 (33:04):
It's all out there.

Speaker 3 (33:05):
And then, like we said earlier too, it doesn't go away,
so there's always a record of that.

Speaker 2 (33:09):
And so it's it really is.

Speaker 3 (33:10):
It's like early on, like you're told they don't believe
everything you see on the internet, which is very very true.
And then there was kind of like that like you
have to conduct yourself as if you were just in
person when you're doing these things. And I feel like
we've lost that a little bit where it's we feel
so empowered to be those keyboard warriors and I'm going
to text you this big game, or I'm going to
comment this nasty thing, but if I ever saw you

(33:32):
in person, I'd be too scared to ever actually do
any of this myself. But I have that freedom to
do it behind a keyboard. And I feel like we
fall too easily into that.

Speaker 2 (33:40):
It's crazy, and I think we really have fallen into that.
And I'm like, oh, there's if that's what's coming out
of you, and you're putting out there for the public
to see what's inside of you, right, And my general
rule of them with social media is okay, would you
say that to their face? And if you wouldn't say
that to their face, what are you doing? Right? What

(34:02):
are you doing? Yeah? Here, I don't know.

Speaker 4 (34:05):
Well, And when you see stuff like that, like the
nasty comments, I feel like it's I especially a person
like you, because you're so kind and like such a
great like person to work with. It's like, it's hard
to see any weird, nasty hate comments. And I know
that that probably gets to you sometimes it's like.

Speaker 2 (34:23):
More than I'm I'd like to yeah, and yeah.

Speaker 4 (34:28):
Appreciate if and you work really hard and you're good
at what you do. It's like, but keeping in mind that,
like somebody like that who kind of like you said,
they have something wrong with them. Obviously there's something underneath
that's not there's an underlying something maybeah yeah, or they're
just maybe even just a horrible like just there's evil

(34:49):
people out there. It's like it would almost be a
disservice to your character for them to like you anyways.
So it's like, I try to think that's a nice way,
but I like about it like that it would almost
be a disservice to your character if somebody nasty like
that did like you, because it's like, I don't know,

(35:09):
I really think about that because you are wonderful. It's
like I don't. It's it's a rarity to see like
super hateful stuff on your at least the social pages. Yeah,
I'm managing a lot of people really like you, even
even too much, Like I don't. I don't know if
I could put we probably couldn't put this in here,

(35:31):
but I remember sending Quinn a screenshot of a couple
Facebook comments that were just grown or like some guy
being like I'm married and I have a wife and kids,
but I just want to sit down with you sometime
and go to Lune it's like, what, Yeah, it's at
least you're honest, but that's weird, like or even the
hateful stuff I've seen. I'm like, but I just I

(35:55):
get out of that.

Speaker 2 (35:55):
But I'm always like, when I see it now, it's
different than when I saw it, say even a few
two years ago. I'll say that I've grown a lot
in two years, and I've had to get thicker skin,
so to speak, because I am overly sensitive, and so yes,
it does get to me. Yes it does hurt. No,
I don't like it at all, But I think that

(36:17):
I've gotten older and my skin's got a little thicker,
and I think, Okay, these people don't know me. They
won't know me, you know, because I won't. I wouldn't
let them close to me anyway, exactly. So boundaries and
then learning the art of block. Yes, because if you
don't like me, I didn't ask you to be here,

(36:37):
right Like, if people come to my professional page, then
they've chosen to be there, And I'm like, well, you
don't have to be here. It's okay. If you don't
like me, maybe I remind you of somebody that you
didn't like before. You know, not everybody's gonna like you.
I think I've come to that, and of course it's always.

Speaker 4 (36:52):
Easy to also, even not on the spotlight.

Speaker 2 (36:54):
Yeah it's scary, Yeah it is. You just want to
be like you do want to be liked. That's human
nature though, I think so right it is, Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 (37:03):
I heard it said once in that on that exact
note is like, if you wouldn't take advice from somebody
but they comment on yourself, you shouldn't pay attention to
what they comment on your social media. So if that's
not somebody in your life that you value, that opinion,
that you would seek out to ask advice on whatever
you're dealing, right, then their opinion shouldn't influence you.

Speaker 2 (37:22):
It matter to you.

Speaker 3 (37:23):
But it's a lot easier said than done than actually
having to see the comment and take it and then
deal with it.

Speaker 2 (37:28):
That's one of that's I mean, that's a great point
because and that's a piece of advice I would give
to kids these days. If you're not going to if
this person doesn't mean anything to you and you wouldn't
take their advice in the first place, don't look at that.
And I'm specifically like inkling towards online bullying and I
get so angry, Like it's one thing to online bully me,
Like I'm an adult. I don't like it. It hurts,

(37:51):
it sucks. It's going to bother me for probably more
days than I care to admit to. But a kid,
like a kid who's bullying another kid, or a parent
who is bullying another person's child, Yeah, that makes me
so angry. I'm like, what are you doing and what
are we teaching are kids? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (38:14):
Yeah, yeah, it's when it comes back to again, like
not all of your feelings and opinions need to be
on social media, in my opinion, And even if there's
some kid that really rubbed you the wrong way or
he said something about your kid or something like that,
things used to be handled like you should go talk
to their parents or talk to that kid or confront it.
I feel like now there's a you don't have to

(38:35):
do the hard things when it comes to confrontation and
even relationships and stuff.

Speaker 2 (38:39):
I think that again talking about people in their hateful comments,
and you wonder, Okay, what's going on with him that
they that they would say that. There's just so like
obviously they don't feel good about themselves, so they're projecting
like you just said, you know, they're projecting something out there,
and I just don't want I said a second ago, it's.

Speaker 4 (39:02):
Hard for me.

Speaker 2 (39:02):
And I'm a grown up. I'm an adult, so as
a kid, I'm like, I want kids to know, you know,
don't listen to that stuff. You wouldn't listen to them
in person. That's not the person you value their opinion.

Speaker 4 (39:16):
That comes with age two. Yeah, like true to a
point in your life where you're like, you know what,
Like you almost stop caring about what people think. It's like,
I know who I am and that's that's bs. And
like whether it's in you know, you're in the spotlight,
or if it's just your personal life, it's like I
know who I am and that's what's important, and that's
what's important. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (39:37):
I remember vividly actually when I was in college. I
remember going through high school and I played very low
level college basketball when I played. But in high school,
I was deciding on where I was going to go
to college, and it was a big deal to me
to have it be like some big name school that
everybody at school could be so impressed by.

Speaker 2 (39:55):
And I remember years later, I'm.

Speaker 3 (39:57):
In college and I'm playing at not a big name
school that everybody knew of. But I remember telling my
dad on some road trip or something and saying, man,
I wish I gave more consideration to what was important
for me at what I was looking in for for
a college as opposed to what was going to be
the most make me look the best or make me
impressive to the people that I went to high school with.
Because I haven't other than my really close friends, I

(40:20):
haven't talked to anybody.

Speaker 2 (40:21):
I don't care about any of the people that what's
going on.

Speaker 3 (40:23):
They're not And that sounds a little rude, but you
know what I mean, whereas it's it is, yeah, and
they don't care about what I'm doing vice versa as
they should.

Speaker 2 (40:30):
They have their own life.

Speaker 3 (40:31):
Yeah, And so you immediately you get out of some
of those early ages and those formidable ages in particular,
and you realize nobody gave a crap anyway. So why
was I letting that influence and dictate how I viewed
myself and decisions that I made and things like that.

Speaker 2 (40:45):
And I will say, that's like even I had that
growing up, and I didn't have this social media piece
of it. So I can only imagine how much more
pressure than.

Speaker 4 (40:55):
You're posting a photo in front of like say Harvard
or something, right, huge, Yeah, and like you that was
a really great that's a really great point. Like I
do remember a time in my life where I almost
was applying to colleges based off of like prestige almost, yeah,
and like how that would look on my I guess resume,

(41:18):
which is like it is helpful sometimes, but it's like
I was. So that's a really great point. Worry about
what's gonna be best for you, Like sometimes I don't
know how to. I don't even know.

Speaker 3 (41:32):
Yeah, well you'll you'll look back and you and what
you did for yourself and the people that you care
about and you love, that's what's gonna matter, and that's
all you're gonna have eventually, as opposed to oh great,
my Yeah. Joe Schmoe was the popular kid at our
high school. He thought I was really cool for twenty
minutes when we saw my post. Yeah that gets you nowhere.
But I think we, unfortunately, I think social media has

(41:54):
in our brains like that instant dopamine hits and everything
that we talked about earlier, that's become ingrained. So it's
like that it feels so important I need to have that,
and I'm going to be a loser if I don't,
or whatever it is.

Speaker 2 (42:05):
And then you realize that.

Speaker 3 (42:06):
Oh, that that was just for an instant gratification, that
actually didn't mean anything for my actual life.

Speaker 4 (42:12):
Yeah, and you you also, it's like that's another thing
about you. You enter adulthood and it's like, wow, everyone
has their own lives and a lot of the stupid
stuff that people care about, like when you're when you're young,
it's like no one, no one's paying attention to what
you're doing anymore. And that's a harsh reality for like,

(42:33):
I mean for a lot of people is like, you know,
they they act a certain way in high school and
college or post things or they're like you know, they do.
But then eventually you enter adulthood and it's like this
isn't it's not a production. It's not like your life
doesn't revolve around social media and what looks good. It's
like you got to just start living for.

Speaker 2 (42:54):
But you do grow uppy, and I'm talking specifically about
you two and the younger genera. You do grow up
with your life being a production. And then I mean
you're both at Facebook, so social media in general, and
then Instagram came along, right, So then the faster scroll
because then you were really starting to scroll through things
and then TikTok and that's even a faster scroll. So

(43:18):
do you guys feel like like that has like affected
And I'm trying to think of the best way to
put that. Like for me, I call it a death scroll, right,
So your doom scroll death.

Speaker 4 (43:35):
Victim to that. I know you probably do time just
it's yeah, it's tough to get out of.

Speaker 2 (43:40):
That my meter. Yeah, but I mean that's that's part
of your life. I mean, it's all of ours. Right.
You can get into the doom scroll and then all
of a sudden you're like, oh crap, where'd the time go? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (43:53):
And I think I mentioned this to you. Actually, I
might have mentioned to both of you guys the other
day when we were talking. But I was doing just
a little research on some social media stuff leading up
to this, and I saw the quote in one of
the articles I was reading that said social media used
to be an escape from reality. Now reality is an
escape from social media. Yes, and that is what it
feels like because it is so real. Yeah, but you

(44:14):
go home and I try to have downtime from the
phone and things like that. But even with that, like
you get in bed and you find yourself. I'm going
to bed at nine pm tonight. Next thing you know,
it's eleven thirty and I've just I've done nothing. I've
just been sitting here, just scrolling yes and adding no
value to my life, making my sleeping habits worse, making waking.

Speaker 2 (44:31):
Up tomorrow way harder, and all for nothing.

Speaker 3 (44:34):
I've I've just doom scrolled, and I have nothing added
to my life other than I have seen a couple
of TikTok dances are like some trends, and.

Speaker 2 (44:40):
That's all that it adds. Oh that one does hit hard,
doesn't it? It does, It's hard.

Speaker 4 (44:44):
It does. Sometimes you just need a break. And there
are some people out there who they and I don't
want to try and segue into something else if we're
not ready to do that yet. But there are some
people who love that they're constantly in front of a screen,
or like they they want to constantly have a screen
in front of them. They don't. They almost don't want

(45:06):
to break. And I don't know if that's like an
escape for them or what but I've seen it out
there and I know probably you have too.

Speaker 3 (45:14):
Yeah, Well, I think it's changed, and we talked about
this a little bit as well. It's changed our communication
styles and things because it is very much it is
much more normal now for our generation to be all
majority of my contact and people that I talk to
and stuff is on my phone, as opposed to majority
of people I interact with and am in contact with
is in person at worker, at school, or just day

(45:36):
to day out and about. I feel like so much
of that happens inside our phones, and so I really
do think it's rewired some of our brains in certain ways.
And I think it's it's made our communication styles harder,
and like I know, it's difficult to like, eye contact
is a big thing that it's hard to get younger
kids to like make just eye contact when talking and
things like that.

Speaker 4 (45:55):
In your eyes, and it's weird. They don't want to
or they're just they're just here.

Speaker 2 (46:00):
Don't know how. Yeah, And I do think that that's
such a fair point rewired brains, right, because that's how
they've grown up. They've grown up here and so they
and that's kind of one of my biggest and I
don't want to say complaint, because every generation has their thing, right,
it's just how that that, you know, a whole couple

(46:21):
of generations now grown up, and it's hard when you're
trying to have a conversation with somebody like you guys
are great. And I don't know if it's because you
work in the the you know, broadcasting media field, or
if you just had a good balance, but it's hard
when you're trying to have a conversation with somebody and
they can't actually look at you in the eye, or

(46:42):
they can't seem to follow through with the entire conversation,
or they feel like they need that right now, like
they don't want to work for it, they just deserve
to have it right now, just because that's that instant
gratification that I think that doom Scroll provides, right, and
they're seeing these people who are on some of the

(47:02):
social media platforms, we're making money doing this, and some
of it's like great, like we had a chance to
meet goals and a fantastic kid who's doing great things
with what he's doing. But then I think that that
also leads to kids thinking they need to have that
everything right now. Yeah, how do you guys feel about that,

(47:23):
that whole rewiring his brain? And yeah, yeah, you know
it's hard.

Speaker 3 (47:31):
Well, you know, I within my sports world, I also
coach a freshman basketball team, and so I've had awesome,
really really great kids that I've coached.

Speaker 2 (47:38):
Over the four years that I've been there.

Speaker 3 (47:40):
But there are a handful that you see that just
don't know how to take responsibility. I don't know how
to have hard conversations and things like that, where like,
we have a rule you can't miss practice and if
you do, you better let the coach know well in
advance and your reason and all of that. And you
just have kids missing practice and then showing up and
just avoiding eye contact and not and then you have
to go up and you have to where were you?

(48:01):
And it's just a lack of communication. They don't want
to talk about hard things when it's not easy. And
they the ones that will text you, they'll sit behind
the keyboard and text you, but then when you ask
about any of those tough things in person, they don't
want to talk about it and it's hard for them
to have that human interaction. And so I can't imagine
what it's like for parents, right now having to raise kids,

(48:22):
I think I'm very grateful for mine. I think one
thing I would encourage, not having kids of my own,
is to let them kind of hate me now, love
me later, and be really hard on the social media
stuff now, and put a lot of boundaries in place now,
because that's some of the stuff that my parents did
before I even really knew what they were doing. Social
media was still kind of new, and I now look

(48:42):
back ten fifteen years later and say, my god, I'm
so happy that my parents didn't let me have my
phone in my bedroom when I went to sleep, and
just like little.

Speaker 2 (48:50):
Things like that.

Speaker 4 (48:51):
Yah, yeah, it's extremely important. I hear about like the
way that Quinn was raised and like, I hate to
tell your story for you.

Speaker 2 (48:59):
No, it's okay.

Speaker 4 (49:00):
It sounds like they were you know, it's frustrating in
the moment when you're dealing with parents that are a
little bit more strict with that stuff. But like it
made you, I mean, at least in my opinion, like
it made you a well rounded like like seriously, it's
and it's kind of a I hate to say it,
it's kind of a rarity. And like people our age
they're you know, they they've almost had so much access

(49:23):
to it that they don't know any different. It's really
it's it's hard to watch.

Speaker 2 (49:29):
I think from my point of view, it's as a parent,
you know, you have to be a parent first and
a friend later, and you do. You have to set
the hard boundaries and you have to let them hate you.
And I was one of those parents. Actually, I you know,
my kids were the age of the video games coming out,
and I wouldn't let them have video games or when
the cell phone stick if they had to be at

(49:50):
certain age and know they couldn't have them at the
dinner table. I know, they couldn't have them passed a
certain time there was you know. And yeah, I just
I think you have to do the hard work right
off so that your kids understand the boundaries. And I
think is so often now we just see what we
call iPad bags where they're you know, they've got their

(50:11):
ipow which is I understand, because I mean I would
put my kids in front of a movie, in front
of the TV. Sure, but when I can hand a
three year old phone and say here, do this, and
they can do it faster than.

Speaker 4 (50:24):
Yeah, which it's weird.

Speaker 2 (50:26):
That's weird.

Speaker 4 (50:27):
But yeah, it's it's such a I do really think.
I really like that perspective of like, yeah, parents really
should tighten up during these times because that you don't
know what your kids looking at.

Speaker 2 (50:43):
And I can tell you right now from experience, everything's scary.

Speaker 3 (50:47):
Like my parents I look at they didn't know, they
didn't know what the heck was on the internet at
the time, And I think we're smarter to that now
than ten fifteen years ago. But kids are more social media,
more digitally literate and understand how to work technology. Oh gosh,
if you don't do some of the stuff, they're looking
at stuff they shouldn't be. They're doing stuff that they
shouldn't be because they know how to access it.

Speaker 2 (51:09):
They know how to manipulate it.

Speaker 3 (51:11):
So where you maybe don't see it now if you're
like monitoring there. So I would just say be very
strict on that stuff, because I think when you're a kid,
you know how to get access to that stuff in
a world where your parents don't not have navigate the internet.

Speaker 2 (51:23):
As well, so where parents are thinking, okay, we put
these specific parental controls in place, so now kids are
finding you know, a backdoor I.

Speaker 3 (51:35):
Did, so you know it was I dam when I
was thirteen to sixteen, seventeen.

Speaker 2 (51:40):
You when you're at those ages, you're a little mischievous.

Speaker 3 (51:43):
And maybe particularly as a boy at those ages, with
testosterone and things running, you know you are you are,
you find a way to go against your parents, and
particularly when you understand how social media platform are, the
internet searching works and all this stuff, you can find
that way to kind of manipulate it and not let
them see what you're doing, which is a really scary thing.

Speaker 2 (52:02):
It is, And I'm not proud of some of the
bad things that I've done, but but I mean I
think in my day we did our own bad things
like staking out you know, the windows. So there's got
to learn.

Speaker 4 (52:14):
Yeah, there's also like there's an extent because it can
get it can get really really it can get really unhealthy. Yeah,
if you're not learning and you're just and I.

Speaker 2 (52:25):
Worry about mental health. I worry about mental health because
when your brain isn't formed and you're just discovering all
these things and you're just trying to figure out who
you are, then there are so many things that can
just fill in the blank with your head really and
and gosh, really mess up.

Speaker 4 (52:46):
Yeah, it's it's it's kind of an addictive for a
lot of people. I can I don't want to say
I'm not addicted to my phone, but I really don't
think that I am, because I'm I have this ability
to unplug and I don't.

Speaker 2 (53:03):
That's good.

Speaker 4 (53:04):
Yeah, it is good. And if someone's talking to me,
you know, I've I've met people where you could be
talking to them and they could be watching a TV
or they could be on their phone. None of it's registering.
Yeah they hed a word. I don't even know that
you're speaking to them. But for me, it's like if
I am on my phone and someone is talking to me,
I can kind of be like, oh gosh, I'm sorry,

(53:26):
Hey I miss that. I want to let me put
my phone down. You know. It's like being able to
unplug is so it's so important.

Speaker 3 (53:34):
Yeah, and I think that's something that for us is that, yeah,
it can ruin connection by not putting the phone down.
And I think we don't realize that as often as
we should, because it is that they're like relationships, opportunities,
and careers are just in life in general. They don't
just happen by just sitting there being scrolling on the phone,

(53:55):
and so you don't know what you're missing by being
absorbed by that. No, whether that be with a person
with an opportunity, with a place, a new place to
go visit.

Speaker 2 (54:04):
I think we are missing a lot of that. I
always say that we weren't before. Look up. Yes, if
you look up and put this down, put it down.
It's so important. It means a world. It makes a
world of a difference. And you know, I was recently
on a vacation. I was like, I don't want to
look at my phone. I rarely even want to pull

(54:25):
it out to take a picture, but I want to
get a picture sometimes, so I'll pull it out and
I'll see I had eighty seven text on one day,
and we'll get that later. We'll get that later, because
I didn't want to miss what was around me. And
I feel like I've lost years because I was busy,
you know, paying too much attention to this that really

(54:46):
did matter with maybe people who didn't really know me
or care about me. When I and I was missing
so much of what was out here. And I just
want to say to people, look up. Put that way serious.
Look up.

Speaker 4 (54:58):
It ruins, Yeah, it ruins like your perception of like
it ruins your perception of everything. It's affected like even
relationships that I've been in, Like I remember, well maybe
and I'm like, you know, I don't really mind talking
about it, honestly, but I do remember like having a
boyfriend at the time, and it felt like they were

(55:24):
always just looking at a screen, like and it's like
they were never not looking at a screen. It wasn't ever,
And I found myself like begging like whether it was
It could have been Instagram, it could have been like TikTok,
it could have been a video games especially, it could
have been I'm trying to think even like the crazy
like the the even the hyper sexualized sides of the

(55:48):
Internet like stuff like that. It's like it's all we
have access to all of that and everything that they
think that everything you need is on a screen. So
I yeah, I found myself constantly being like, you know, hello,
kind of like you feel invisible. I felt like I was,
yeah with a screen.

Speaker 3 (56:07):
Yeah, yeah, like you're fighting for attention over essentially ananimate
objects that you're trying to like have this human connection.

Speaker 2 (56:13):
But yeah, that's all yeah robot in between essentially. Yeah. Yeah,
and that doesn't feel good. No, it's that doesn't feel
good at all.

Speaker 4 (56:22):
You feel like you're competing with It's like, well, what's
so interesting on your right on your phone then? And
what's so you know it? Yeah, it's it's hard, it's
isolating a little bit.

Speaker 2 (56:33):
So I think it's fair to say, right, if you're
with somebody, whether it be a friend or a parent
or in a relationship, you have to be able to
separate the two because otherwise you're losing. That you're losing,
you're making somebody else feel like they don't matter, that
they're invisible, that they're not important, and and that's so unhealthy. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (56:56):
Yeah, connections. Really, I think it's so I think it's
so we in and I don't think these these can help,
but like they in the grand scheme of things, I
like even I can even recall a time where, like
sitting at dinner, they like the person I was with,
They needed a screen to watch during dinner.

Speaker 2 (57:17):
Okay, you know what makes me most sad when uh,
my boyfriend and I go out for dinner is seeing
another couple at a table and they're not talking or
licking at each other, they're both on their phones and
I think how sad is that it's awful?

Speaker 4 (57:35):
Like you should be.

Speaker 2 (57:36):
There and like having a conversation and enjoying good food.
Do you even know what happened? Or did you just
go somewhere to eat and look at your phone and
get your picture that get your picture? Yeah, look who
I'm with, But then I'm just gonna put it. Yeah,
or look where I'm at like you said, and it's like,
but you really missed where you were at. Yes, you

(57:56):
missed where you were at.

Speaker 4 (57:58):
Look around you, look at what's right in front of you.
Because we kind of discussed this the other day. It's like,
you're not going to get to this is kind of dark,
but you're not going to get to the end of
your life and be like, Wow, I wish I played
more video games. Wow I wish I scrolled more, while
I wish I ignored my surroundings more. That's really it's
really about connection and being present because that's at the

(58:24):
end of that really is all that matters. It's like
you are not going to look back and wish that
you spent more time online. Did this?

Speaker 2 (58:31):
Yeah, just spent more time. Doom scroll. I have my
phone so I can doom scroll my last few minutes
of life right now, nobody can't. And let me compare
myself my life to where somebody else is that you
don't want to do that, no, okay?

Speaker 3 (58:49):
And time is our most valuable thing, and I think
that's one of the things that I view it. Like,
my parents are starting to They're not getting old, but
they're starting to, just as anybody would. And so I
think about like all the different times that man, you know,
I should put this phone down and I should.

Speaker 2 (59:02):
Call my parents right now who live on the East Coast.

Speaker 3 (59:04):
I should give them a call and check in and
have that conversation, or go and visit them, like if
they're local to you, like, go and spend time with
people that you're not going to have time with eventually,
and do the stuff that you want to do, because
eventually you run out of time. And I think now
more than ever, we don't want to look back and say,
I was on my phone and that's why I didn't
do X, Y and Z because I spent all that

(59:24):
time on.

Speaker 2 (59:25):
Social media, Like what is that going to be worth
down the road. That is one of the biggest things
that people forget is that time is not endlest it's not.
I mean, there's an expiration date for everything. And so
if you don't look up and if you don't appreciate
what's around you and really see the people or the

(59:46):
places that you are in, then you lose so much.
I mean, time is not just a gift that somebody
just keeps giving you. Yeah, it eventually ends.

Speaker 4 (01:00:00):
Yeah, that's the it's it's kind of the harsh truth,
but it's true. Like having that mindset, I mean, I
sometimes I would hope that that would change somebody's perspective
about the endless like screens in your face. It's like,
you're right, you're you're killing You're killing precious time here.

Speaker 2 (01:00:19):
And what you're putting online and the time you're spending
putting if you are being hateful, if you're taking your
anger out online, why are you wasting that precious time
with so much ugly Like, go find someplace to spend
that time that's productive and you know something you're passionate about,

(01:00:40):
something that you positive that you can leave behind as
opposed to all of that. Okay, I have to switch
gears though, and I want to talk about online dating
because you too, like good lord, yes, no that to me,
and I'm just going to say it, like, it's horrified
to me these online dating apps because back in my day,

(01:01:04):
either met at school or.

Speaker 4 (01:01:05):
Your work or at a bar.

Speaker 2 (01:01:08):
Right, and that's just kind of how it was. So
you met in person, like, Hey, I want to go out, sure,
And now there's all these dating apps and and your like,
I don't even understand them. I don't understand them, but
bear the crap out of me I do either. Yeah,
did they scare you guys or is it just like
normal to you? I'm super curious.

Speaker 3 (01:01:31):
Well, I can so. I recently, actually, just this past weekend,
I got engaged. Yes, very nice, quick, little shameless plug.

Speaker 4 (01:01:39):
I love that.

Speaker 2 (01:01:40):
We were so excited for you and Emily.

Speaker 3 (01:01:43):
Yeah, but you know, I think for me, this was
one of the positives of social media because I met
my girlfriend. I'm from the East Coast in Buffalo, she's
from here in Spokane. We met through a mutual friend,
and we just became friends when she would come to
visit him in Buffalo, and then she ended up sliding
into my DMS at one point, as we call it, at.

Speaker 2 (01:02:02):
One point when we already knew we.

Speaker 3 (01:02:03):
Had a little bit of a we'd known each other
for about a year and a half two years as
friends and didn't spend a ton of time together because
of the distance, but then slid into my DMS and
then we dated long distance before I moved here. So
having texting and being able to communicate kept our relationship
alive for that early stretch and allowed us to.

Speaker 2 (01:02:20):
Have the relationship that we have now. But with that,
that was a little over five years ago.

Speaker 3 (01:02:25):
I think the kind of the tenders and all of
your different dating apps and all of that stuff have
just gotten kind of scarier and scarier and more and
more unpleasant. And I thankfully wasn't really on them before
that anyway, so and I don't think Olivia has a
ton of experience on them either, but I'll let her
speak to that, But I know that it's not something
that I'm very grateful I got out of dating when.

Speaker 2 (01:02:46):
I did, right, And you guys, I mean your kind
of online story is one of a friendship where you
had met in person, yes, and then it just kind
of evolved by being able to connect and touch that way.
And we love those, right, But yeah, other stories that
you hear sometimes, Yeah, So what do you know about
and how do you feel about as a female.

Speaker 4 (01:03:07):
It's it's pretty awful. I mean, my in my first
relationship ever I met I met him at like just
just at work. So yeah, and so but I'm obviously
I'm single now in my twenties, and like I the
thing about kind of like you mentioned Tinder, I feel
like they only have the I hate to I know

(01:03:30):
there's probably good guys out there. I don't want to
paint a horrible picture of like got men my age
or boys, but I just feel like they have one
motive and it's it's not good, you know what I mean. Like,
I feel like I feel like there's no there's this
hookup culture kind of within my age group, and so

(01:03:51):
it's not nobody. It feels like nobody wants real connection anymore.
It's like, if you're on tender, you only want one thing.

Speaker 2 (01:03:57):
So would it be fair for me to say that
they're thinking with one brain and not the other?

Speaker 4 (01:04:02):
Yeah, okay, I think the brain, Yeah, thinking with a
different Yeah different.

Speaker 2 (01:04:08):
We're getting the male perspective here too.

Speaker 4 (01:04:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:04:11):
Yeah, it's true.

Speaker 4 (01:04:12):
And one's a great guy guys.

Speaker 2 (01:04:14):
Yeah, yeah, but you can offer that perspective.

Speaker 3 (01:04:17):
Yeah, well, and I think I told you guys yesterday
that while I know I personally did not spend much
time on them because they were kind of new as
I was getting towards the end of college, and then
I obviously met Maddie, so I had no need for them,
but I was around all my friends.

Speaker 2 (01:04:30):
That were on. I was on that I think I did.
I don't know. I didn't think I might have, Sorry Maddie.

Speaker 3 (01:04:39):
But you know, from the male perspective, particularly in kind
of those late teenage to early twenty years, when our
frontal lobes are still developing, typically a little bit slower
than women's, I think that is the motivation and a
lot of the times, because you can be behind the screen,
you can play it off as oh, I'm the swave,
Oh I really care, I really get to know you,

(01:04:59):
and then we get that hookup that.

Speaker 2 (01:05:02):
I'm looking for, and then I gostia and that's the
end of it.

Speaker 3 (01:05:04):
And everything I did was a nice facade and a
lie that I had to put on for a week,
and now I can move on and be my normal self.
And I think that is unfortunately the mindset of a
lot of guys on those apps, which is not across
the board, but it's a high percentage.

Speaker 2 (01:05:16):
I have two boys, right, So I have two boys.
I know how they think, and I know that age,
and that's just normal. It really is just normal. Whereas
females think differently, you know, we're looking for that connection,
you know, mental hard connection thing, and we want to
believe that that's the thing. But boys are thinking differently,
and it really is just the way we're made up.

(01:05:37):
It's the way we're made up. So I can imagine
that it would be really difficult, Like it just would
be really difficult.

Speaker 4 (01:05:45):
Yeah, I don't. I don't personally, I don't touch it
because I don't. I don't. I'm not on dating up
so I'm kind of the wrong person to talk to.
And it's not really for any reason besides the fact that,
like I I don't, I don't appreciate like the hookup culture.
I can't get I can't get behind it. I just
don't like it. It's like if I I I would

(01:06:07):
like to almost I'm envious of like the life that
you kind of had before social media, because people were
meeting at I mean just out and about, Yeah, met
at work, they met at like I mean maybe a
bar even or like I don't I don't really like bars,
but because those can be kind of that's where people
pick up pick up dates too and stuff sometimes, and

(01:06:29):
it's kind of like I feel like, I feel like
just our generation is just it's just wired different.

Speaker 3 (01:06:36):
Well, I think, like we said that rewiring of the brains,
I do think, and we'll probably learn more over the
coming couple decades as more and more gets released on
this type of stuff. But I would imagine that with
the social media, with that lack of human interaction and
connection getting less and less to it feels like that
that probably is changing the perspective that people have on

(01:06:57):
relationships on what they're getting into them for what they're
expecting to get out of them and stuff like that,
which is a sad and in a lot of ways
a scary thing depending on which way that goes. Yeah,
so it's interesting how that.

Speaker 2 (01:07:10):
I think it will be interesting to see how that
kind of all sort of falls together in the years
to come, right, Yeah, for.

Speaker 4 (01:07:17):
Sure, especially with like I also feel like in the day,
the dating world is kind of a weird one too,
because social media, especially for women, I feel like there's
that like comparison there because there's like influencers and like
celebrities kind of and like obviously, like I feel like
a lot of guys nowadays, like they there's this unreal

(01:07:40):
they kind of set an unrealistic expectation for a lot
of like men kind of. I feel like it's so
it's kind of hard being just like an ordinary young
woman when there's all of this stuff on social media
and some of it's not even most of it's not
even real.

Speaker 2 (01:07:58):
There's so much AI out there to from what I'm
learning just in the last few days, I'm like, but
that's a AI.

Speaker 3 (01:08:04):
Oh it right, and it's just gonna get worse.

Speaker 4 (01:08:08):
It feels like that only is worse.

Speaker 2 (01:08:10):
I think that everybody's view is skewed at this point.
I really just and you're right, it's so hard just
to be an ordinary person. Everything is filtered and aied
and perfected to a point that we've lost the real
and I would love to see like the real come back. O.

Speaker 4 (01:08:30):
It makes me sad.

Speaker 2 (01:08:31):
Yeah, I actually like hearing you guys say that.

Speaker 3 (01:08:34):
Yeah, And it's actually I saw somewhat recently, I had
a friend. Maybe it was a friend or maybe it
was a just a post that I saw, but it
was just it was like one of those old twenty
eleven blurry picture of my dog or sandwiches, and it
was with the hashtag make Instagram casual again, and like
make it like this, like this is like kind of
casual place where yes, I'm just gonna come out here

(01:08:54):
and post my lunch and like, let's have fun with
social media again. Not make it this like world that
we have to curate everything that we're doing and look
picture perfect and be consumed by like post a picture
of your lunch and then put your phone down and
come back tonight after you go and do something today
and see what your buddy said about that nasty looking
sandwich or that to listen, you know, just like something

(01:09:15):
like that, and then and make it fun and don't
make it like the center of our lives.

Speaker 2 (01:09:18):
It's like, try.

Speaker 3 (01:09:19):
To disconnect and put the phones down, occasion them down,
and make this stuff, make it casual to us again.
Don't make it the center of our lives, and don't
make it the be all end on what our brains
think about.

Speaker 2 (01:09:31):
Realize too that there's no such thing as perfect. There
is no perfect person out there, there's no perfect scenario,
there's no perfect life. Everybody has stuff everybody has stuff.
We all have flaws. Of course, we see our own
flaws way more than anybody else does, but we're so
busy perfecting everything to the point that we don't even

(01:09:52):
recognize ourselves. I think sometimes, yeah, so, what advice would
you give to people your own age? Oof?

Speaker 4 (01:10:02):
I I feel like it's kind of a hard one,
but I think that the best advice would just be like,
don't because I cause I I find myself guilty of this.
It's like a huge thing is comparison. It's like, don't
don't get caught up and like comparing yourself to other
people or like influencers or whatever, because it's kind of

(01:10:23):
like what you said, it's it's morphed our reality, you know,
so we don't we don't know what's real, and we
don't know what they're dealing with or we don't know
what some of them actually look like on a day
to day basis, Like we get so caught up in this, like, yeah,
we think that their life is perfect, and it's like,
well it's it's really it's really not though, and it's not.
It's yeah, you can't. Basically, I wouldn't get lost in

(01:10:48):
comparing yourself to like people, and I would just stay
stay true to like yourself and make real connections like
don't because easier said than done, I feel like nowadays.
But it's like my advice is go touch, go touch
some grass.

Speaker 2 (01:11:06):
Yes, yeah, yeah, that would be exactly mine.

Speaker 3 (01:11:09):
And while I am not, and I'm sure we both
would say we are not the experts in this, Like
there are nights we're on doom scroll and and on
my phone wait too much and thinking about comments and
all this stuff. But I think whenever I do disconnect
from my phone, and like my family was from the
East Coast, was just here for a couple of days,
and I just put my phone in my pocket or
put it in a bag and didn't look at it.
Those texts that you can respond to, you can respond

(01:11:31):
to them a few days later, no one unless I've
of course, urgent things come up. But for the most part,
ninety nine percent of the times those texts can wait
checking social media can wait disconnect from it for a
little while.

Speaker 2 (01:11:42):
And like, because that's how it used to be.

Speaker 3 (01:11:44):
People didn't have your constant attention and your constant communication
whenever they wanted it and whenever every second, every weeking second,
and so I don't think we're wired to be that
way as humans. So it's okay, even though it doesn't
feel like it anymore because we're so used to being
attached to that phone. It's okay to put it away
and not know what's going on in the world outside of.

Speaker 2 (01:12:02):
Your level personal bubble.

Speaker 3 (01:12:04):
Occasionally, like obviously you want to check in, but I
would just say, disconnect, Go touch grass, Go touch grass,
Go work out, go do something, Go be productive for
your life, because I worry that we're going to have
a generation of people that look back and just regret
that we didn't do anything, and we didn't know. We
never achieved anything, We didn't grow our society, we didn't
help anything because we just sat here attached to these phones.

Speaker 2 (01:12:25):
We missed it so much. We missed so much. You
know what's super interesting you guys, is that the advice
that you just gave to people your age is the
exact same advice I would give as well. Is that
put your phone down. Yeah, put social media way. You know,
for me, it's a part of my job, right and

(01:12:47):
again it's part of our job. Olivia is the keeper
of my social media. So just know if you send
something Olivia is going to see that as well, going
to see that's well. So it is. It's a part
of my job. So I know that I need to
keep that connection. But but do take that time. And

(01:13:09):
I would say that to you guys, but you already
know it, which I love and which why we have
such great conversations. But you know, to all the other kids,
and to my kids and to the generations of kids,
to come put the phone down or whatever that next
best thing is, because there will be a next best
thing and look around because life is short. Time is

(01:13:30):
not promised, and you want to be able to see
what's out there. You want to be able to talk
to people and get to know people, and you want
to feel. And I feel like that's lacking. We don't
actually know how to feel anymore because it's such a
disconnect on a daily basis. So learn to feel and
have those emotions and then just be who you are.

(01:13:53):
You don't need to be the filtered person. You don't
need to AI generate yourself. You're great just the way
you are. And nobody's perfect. There's no such thing. Nobody's
life is perfect. Everybody has h I S H I
T in their lives. See how I spelled that out,

(01:14:14):
But they do and life isn't always pretty, and so
it doesn't have to look perfect online and it doesn't
have to be perfect for you to be loved. Yet
I guess that's the best thing that was perfect. What
was that line again? What was that quote? They said?

Speaker 3 (01:14:28):
Social media used to be an escape from reality. Now
reality is an escape from social media.

Speaker 2 (01:14:34):
That's such the perfect way to end this. And I
just want to say thank you guys so much. When
congratulations to you and Maddie, thank you so much, thank you.
We're super excited. Olivia, You're beautiful in every single way.
The right personect Angel, the right person is out there
for you. Yep, yes he will show up on those apps. Really, motherly,

(01:15:01):
damn phone, that's what.

Speaker 4 (01:15:02):
That's what the that's what the you kind of hear
your parents say, it's that damn phone. It really is
that day.

Speaker 2 (01:15:07):
It really is that damn phone. Thanks you guys so much,
and thank you for all you do here and for
just being that light for me every single day. I
appreciate you both so much. You I love what you
love best here heard everybody, go make the rest of
your days the best of your days, put down your

(01:15:28):
damn phone,

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Growing Up Online - How Life has Changed for Gen Z

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