Cultural Catalysts: Why Some Ideas Go Viral While Others Disappear?

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;03;05 Stephanie Who decides what's important and why. 00;00;03;05 - 00;00;11;07 Stephanie This episode unpacks how trends become movements, why some ideals gain traction while others fade. 00;00;11;09 - 00;00;18;18 Shaniqua And how collective values shape industries, policies and daily life. 00;00;18;18 - 00;00;22;06 00;00;22;06 - 00;00;49;19 Shaniqua Welcome back to another episode of From Illumination to Innovation. It's Shaniqua and Stephanie here, and we're talking about in this first part of the show, we're talking about past and current trends. Stephanie, what a trend. A pop culture trend that, like, resonates with you, that you think of first? 00;00;49;22 - 00;01;20;22 Stephanie When I think of art, and I guess maybe just to give a little bit more context around the conversation, like these cultural trends that have really had an impact on my life or that really shaped like even the culture around us and changed the way that we looked at things or that we engaged with things. And so when I think about it from that perspective, I think about when MTV came about and I this is like a very Gen-X moment for me. 00;01;20;22 - 00;01;27;12 Stephanie But it's not I don't think it's like a hyperbole to say it literally changed my life. 00;01;27;14 - 00;01;36;13 Shaniqua When MTV came about, was it during the time when the TV still cut off out of like, what, 7 p.m. was that during that time, or was this a little bit after? 00;01;36;16 - 00;01;44;19 Stephanie Okay. And I don't actually remember the TV cutting off at 7 p.m. when I was a kid. The TV would cut off at midnight and midnight. 00;01;44;20 - 00;01;44;28 Shaniqua Okay. 00;01;45;00 - 00;01;59;07 Stephanie It was every night and it would play the national anthem at the end of the night. I'm pretty sure all stations that there were only 3 or 4 and it were played then, and then it would go to just like on Poltergeist. If you ever saw the movie Poltergeist, that's exactly how it happened. And it was always at midnight. 00;01;59;10 - 00;02;02;16 Shaniqua Midnight. So there was no such thing as bingeing throughout the night. 00;02;02;18 - 00;02;26;01 Stephanie There were there was not. No people slept at night or as far as I know, that was what I was told. And so MTV came about and the really early days of cable television and so cable television was pretty new and were and this was like one of the things for me, this was just like a sad cultural moment of my life where I lived in a neighborhood. 00;02;26;01 - 00;02;43;25 Stephanie And this is the honest to God truth. Cable was like brand new to my neighborhood, and they took it all the way to my next door neighbor Beth's house, and it didn't go to my house. So if I wanted to go watch like MTV or HBO or any of the really cool, I had to go to Beth South. 00;02;43;27 - 00;02;45;29 Unknown I don't. This is. 00;02;45;29 - 00;02;50;20 Stephanie Devastating. Okay, Beth, if you're out there, I know that you know the church. I know you know the truth of it. 00;02;50;23 - 00;02;52;18 Shaniqua That's awful that it didn't make it here. 00;02;52;18 - 00;02;54;05 Unknown Felt also forever. 00;02;54;05 - 00;03;24;10 Stephanie Like this was the truth. I just simply stopped in my house and the MTV, like I remember probably at the onset of MTV, the the we were when the channel literally came on, like waiting, like watching a blink channel and having it come on and go right into the first video that killed the radio star. And just from that moment on, being just, like, mesmerized, like just captivated. 00;03;24;13 - 00;03;37;10 Shaniqua So did you find that, like, when the premiere of MTV, did it unite you with your peers? And like other members of that, did it create its own subculture in a sense? 00;03;37;12 - 00;03;38;22 Unknown I think it. 00;03;38;25 - 00;04;10;21 Stephanie Both created one. It was so new and it was so fresh. Keep in mind, in 81, when it came out, I was 11 or 12 years old, like I was tween. So it really did in terms of that core piece of my life. Have a real impact. Like, I can remember all of the different genre type shows of MTV that over time it kept adding, I think what MTV did was it created a subculture, but it also did a pretty good job of trying to tap into subcultures. 00;04;10;22 - 00;04;38;29 Stephanie And I think for for our perspective, it's like I grew up in small town Texas, where we were a tiny little subculture of our own, really cloistered, not highly exposed to a lot of broad culture. And so for me, MTV exposed me, like to the first music genres of a different type, like that was a country and western or southern rock, or which we're all fine music I grew up with and love. 00;04;38;29 - 00;05;03;06 Stephanie But, you know, all of a sudden I would see like new wave music or I would see just different music from Europe or music, just music that I myself wasn't exposed. Service. Yeah. I'm maybe, you know, like people in bigger cities and bigger places somewhere. But for me it was like in. Yeah, I think in our town we were very like, we cared about it. 00;05;03;08 - 00;05;12;25 Stephanie It was there were shows that we watched. There were like genre shows, definitely. There were. I watched Metal Hour, like definitely when they started playing metal music, I was like, yeah. 00;05;12;27 - 00;05;40;20 Shaniqua But oh my gosh, was this like was MTV pre Satanic Panic? Because I feel it was like, this is bringing different genres across the nation. And I remember like in the I was born in 89. So I was going to say the late 80s but maybe late 80s early 90s Satanic panic. Like really being a thing, like hearing about like a rapid being sacrificed was like, I. 00;05;40;20 - 00;05;41;20 Unknown Mean, I definitely the. 00;05;41;20 - 00;06;05;12 Stephanie PMRC and the tipper Gore fighting for the parental rights thing and all of that stuff was happening in the mid 80s. And that was also there was a lot of satanic panic that was tied into that. Like Ozzy Osborne was sued because somebody died by suicide, supposedly while listening to one of his album, he had a song called Suicide Solution. 00;06;05;12 - 00;06;38;02 Stephanie So these were things that were happening at the time that were all getting amplified and elevated. And I think that some of the imagery and visuals that were shown, certainly everything amplifies everything. So when MTV, a lot of what part of what made it cool was seeing these, like these little mini movies of music, Inc., getting to tap deeper into what, as a viewer at the time, especially now, we can look back and be like, how much did the artists influence the video? 00;06;38;02 - 00;07;00;09 Stephanie How much was that influenced by a director or a studio or what have you? There's a lot of stuff to look at there, but at the time it felt like we were getting to tap like deeper into the artist vision or deeper into what the song might be about. And so certainly just as much as there was a lot of like, really interesting fun, there was dark and very provocative things. 00;07;00;09 - 00;07;03;23 Stephanie Also on MTV. 00;07;03;26 - 00;07;16;08 Shaniqua How do you feel that the MTV culture influenced your daily life or the daily life of others around you? 00;07;16;11 - 00;07;17;08 Unknown I think it it. 00;07;17;08 - 00;07;45;25 Stephanie Was so much not that it was even influencing our daily life. It was just starting to shift the way we could express ourselves. I think it was giving us like more views and it just different. Again, it tapped into a lot of genres and so if you identified and saw yourself and, you would be, I think, more open to expressing. 00;07;45;25 - 00;08;12;02 Stephanie So, you know, in the 80s, there were a lot of different really musical subgenres that popped up that all had this visual expression of who they were based on the genre that was really defined, whether it was punk rock or hip hop or the heavy metal hair band, or it's like you could see somebody and based on five items and their hair determine who they were in the 80s. 00;08;12;02 - 00;08;13;29 Unknown Okay. It was like, and that's. 00;08;13;29 - 00;08;43;11 Stephanie Not stereotyping. It was really like just a very this is who I identify with. And I'm going and I think MTV really helped to define that a lot because again, it tapped into these subgenres and elevated them in a very kind of succinct way. There were like shows that were very genre dedicated. And so in that sense, it did, I think, amplify that. 00;08;43;13 - 00;09;02;28 Shaniqua Here are you speak about your like how MTV impacted you and the culture it created. It reminds me of the meme culture. I know you've heard of the biologist Richard Dawkins. He coined memetics or means how he used to. 00;09;02;28 - 00;09;05;12 Stephanie Say that together it sounds like a movement. 00;09;05;14 - 00;09;05;27 Unknown That was. 00;09;05;27 - 00;09;09;18 Stephanie Like a great word. 00;09;09;21 - 00;09;44;10 Shaniqua And Richard, he believes that means spread. Like how Gene spread in our biology and essentially like the genes that are helpful to our species are the ones that stick around the memes that resonate or can convey an idea that others like understand tend to spread and stay for a very long time. And there is this other I think she's a I think there's a such thing as a mimetic theorist. 00;09;44;13 - 00;09;45;24 Unknown I was to say I'm. 00;09;45;27 - 00;09;46;15 Stephanie Us small. 00;09;46;15 - 00;09;47;09 Shaniqua With just. I like. 00;09;47;09 - 00;09;48;19 Unknown That way. 00;09;48;21 - 00;09;54;10 Shaniqua She believes that humans evolved as meme machines and that we. 00;09;54;12 - 00;10;01;15 Stephanie Okay, I thought really quick, let's just stop really quick and acknowledge two t shirts. Yeah. Wait, what did you say about the memes and the jeans. 00;10;01;15 - 00;10;03;25 Unknown Is there's a little there's. 00;10;03;25 - 00;10;08;07 Shaniqua What is it like jeans meme spread like jeans in biology or. 00;10;08;07 - 00;10;09;25 Unknown Something like that? Like jeans needs to be. 00;10;09;25 - 00;10;14;03 Stephanie A t shirt. And then now you're also most recent when they just spoke. 00;10;14;05 - 00;10;17;15 Shaniqua Humans are meme machines. 00;10;17;17 - 00;10;18;20 Unknown Are meme machine. 00;10;18;22 - 00;10;26;22 Stephanie These are t shirts. So we will be we will eventually be getting these on our new to come website. Okay. 00;10;26;24 - 00;11;06;25 Shaniqua There's essentially we're great at imitating and spreading ideas, right? Some folks would counter with culture. Is it just like copy and paste, like copying blindly like genes? But I think that there's something to it. For instance, you mentioned that there were like genres of like music that you're introduced to. There's operas, for me, right. There's the overly happy means, there's like the animal means there's even a sub genre within that subgenre of cat specific means. 00;11;07;02 - 00;11;07;10 Unknown Yeah, I'd. 00;11;07;10 - 00;11;10;18 Stephanie Make that like a macro genre. 00;11;10;21 - 00;11;11;26 Unknown There's cat memes. 00;11;11;26 - 00;11;14;10 Stephanie And then within that there's a subgenre of animal. 00;11;14;10 - 00;11;16;07 Unknown I mean, I believe. 00;11;16;08 - 00;11;22;00 Shaniqua That's fair. Cats doing things, cat slapping things. 00;11;22;02 - 00;11;22;17 Unknown Oh, yeah. 00;11;22;17 - 00;11;24;02 Stephanie And there's other animals too. 00;11;24;02 - 00;11;57;01 Shaniqua There's so there's different genre means that I find it for me as a people pleaser. I think millennials, we may identify as me, like people pleasers. We're forced to be happy and grateful for what we have our boomer parents giving us our participation trophy. So you gotta be happy. Yeah. So we tend to aim to please. And I think that is quite interesting, seeing the means that passed back and forth from our friends all over social, whether it's like in your DMs. 00;11;57;06 - 00;12;08;09 Stephanie Why do you think you all adopted them so quickly? I like to me, I associate memes with millennials to the degree that it took me a really long time to remember what to call them. It's like. 00;12;08;12 - 00;12;08;27 Unknown I was what I. 00;12;08;27 - 00;12;10;28 Stephanie Was all. I was a meme girl. 00;12;11;01 - 00;12;12;07 Unknown That was a meme girl. 00;12;12;09 - 00;12;16;22 Shaniqua Oh, technically you would be correct because it's memetic, so you'd be correct. 00;12;16;24 - 00;12;21;09 Stephanie I feel like it's right. We are not going to get into a duff conversation, but. 00;12;21;15 - 00;12;23;26 Shaniqua I say gif, you. 00;12;23;28 - 00;12;32;15 Unknown Know, it's GIF actually gif. Okay okay okay. Yeah. Okay. Back to memes. That's a bit. 00;12;32;20 - 00;12;43;01 Stephanie I mean, for you, like, when like, why do you think that your generation really adopted memes in the way that they did as really tools of communication? 00;12;43;04 - 00;13;08;02 Shaniqua You can say the darkest thing through a meme without it being your voice, but the other person gets to know about you how deep and dark and like and layered your humor could be. Because even if they are rather dark, like the house on fire with the mischievous girl in front with her lips curl like the Grinch. 00;13;08;29 - 00;13;30;06 Shaniqua It's still funny, so you get a sense of but in. But if that was your house it wouldn't be funny. But it's like in conversation you can, it allows you to be quite whimsical in how you communicate. Like I could ask if I'm texting with a friend, you know, what happened at brunch. They can send that meme. And I'm like. 00;13;30;06 - 00;13;30;18 Unknown Oh. 00;13;30;24 - 00;13;49;07 Shaniqua Where is that tea? And in an Instagram right now, there's this whole trend of, I believe there's a need for this. Like, I don't talk to my friend at all, but we send means back and forth to one another. And it's that's a form of staying in contact. 00;13;49;10 - 00;13;51;20 Stephanie Actually, I actually have a couple of meme friends. 00;13;51;27 - 00;13;53;09 Unknown Yeah, maybe we should. 00;13;53;09 - 00;13;58;23 Stephanie Come up with them. Maybe it's their name in Urban Dictionary already. For a meme friend. 00;13;58;25 - 00;14;09;24 Shaniqua I don't know, but it's like the modern day pen pal. You're just sending them back and forth. I have like, I had to deactivate my Instagram because there are so many. It's like another. The DMs and Instagram is like a. 00;14;10;01 - 00;14;10;15 Unknown Whole. 00;14;10;15 - 00;14;20;14 Shaniqua Other world of like text exchange. So I think meme culture is like the digital, like MTV for millennials. 00;14;20;16 - 00;14;31;03 Stephanie There's it definitely seems like it's like a natural progression of because honestly, like MTV does, I don't even think they show videos anymore. They don't even they're oh. 00;14;31;05 - 00;14;34;22 Shaniqua My MTV days were TRL. We had the. 00;14;34;24 - 00;14;35;18 Unknown Oh. 00;14;35;20 - 00;14;52;08 Shaniqua It was like the video live like recount up ten videos of the person daily. Oh my gosh. I could not wait to see which artist debuted their new album or new video, so that was quite important. I don't know if we have meme debuts one a new ones. 00;14;52;10 - 00;15;15;16 Stephanie I will tell you that like my for just to circle back quickly on MTV as as they did evolve and start moving away from videos and like trying out different types of shows. There was a little brief period for MTV where they had a show called Liquid Television, and all Gen Xers who loved MTV right now are like having a moment. 00;15;15;18 - 00;15;52;06 Stephanie And Liquid Television produced things like Influx and Beavis and Butthead and like, these are just really iconic things that, like, grew out of it. But at the time it was so raw and so real and just incredibly creative, and that was beautiful. But I feel like that also lends itself to that memes like aspect of how MTV related and to future generations, because they did become more visually creative and more kind of a little like the way you describe memes, like there's a little sarcasm built into them, there's a little cynicism build. 00;15;52;09 - 00;16;10;04 Stephanie You can use them as call outs. You could like they serve some purposes to release, maybe some aggression, not just the darkness, but like some actual frustration. Or here's a way to elevate this pent up emotion and and then also see the humor and what's happening with the. 00;16;10;06 - 00;16;20;07 Shaniqua Critiques that you normally wouldn't be able to say allowed or grievances that you wouldn't necessarily feel comfortable sharing. You can. They can be conveyed through me. 00;16;20;09 - 00;16;31;03 Stephanie Okay, this is not meant to be a quiz. So if you don't know the answer, we'll we'll find it. Do you know what the first meme is? I don't know the answer. So that's why I'm asking. Do you know what's considered the first meme? 00;16;31;06 - 00;16;49;05 Shaniqua I don't know, but I'm going to guess the day quand meme. I just remember De Quan being everywhere. And for those that may not know, it's this guy maybe in the classroom, but he's looking quizzical. There's a. 00;16;49;05 - 00;16;50;10 Unknown Bunch of question. 00;16;50;10 - 00;16;52;06 Shaniqua Marks over and. 00;16;52;08 - 00;17;01;09 Stephanie We're going to do the research, y'all. We're going to find the first one, but we're also going to make sure we put up the daikon one so that you can see if if it's not the first. It may be though, because. 00;17;01;09 - 00;17;01;24 Shaniqua I don't know, I'm. 00;17;01;24 - 00;17;09;11 Stephanie Going to it's been around for yeah I know I'm like I'm super curious what's considered to be I don't even there's got to be an archive on everything in the world now. Right. 00;17;09;13 - 00;17;10;08 Shaniqua There should be. 00;17;10;15 - 00;17;13;13 Stephanie Certainly Wikipedia now. 00;17;13;15 - 00;17;22;03 Shaniqua I just Google Wikipedia mentioned maybe it was the emoticon, the smiley face. 00;17;22;05 - 00;17;24;10 Stephanie Being the very first meme. 00;17;24;13 - 00;17;26;08 Shaniqua Yeah, I don't know. 00;17;26;12 - 00;17;26;17 Unknown But. 00;17;26;18 - 00;17;28;13 Stephanie Seems like a low bar. 00;17;28;15 - 00;17;31;14 Shaniqua Yeah, maybe we need to do the first meeting to go viral. Maybe like. 00;17;31;16 - 00;17;33;13 Stephanie The first meme to go viral, that might. 00;17;33;13 - 00;17;34;10 Unknown People find it in. 00;17;34;16 - 00;17;36;14 Stephanie The first meme that anybody cared or knew. 00;17;36;14 - 00;17;37;26 Unknown About. 00;17;37;28 - 00;17;41;18 Shaniqua But okay, my guess is the day climbing would be your. 00;17;41;18 - 00;17;42;19 Unknown Guess. 00;17;42;21 - 00;17;46;08 Stephanie Since it took me like a really long time to learn how to say meme I. 00;17;46;08 - 00;17;47;22 Unknown But I can't tell. 00;17;47;23 - 00;17;51;13 Stephanie You like the first one. I remember. Or maybe. 00;17;51;13 - 00;17;52;19 Unknown I don't know if it's. 00;17;52;19 - 00;17;55;12 Stephanie The first one I remember, but. 00;17;55;14 - 00;17;55;19 Unknown I. 00;17;55;19 - 00;17;56;06 Stephanie Mean, there's. 00;17;56;12 - 00;17;59;01 Unknown One like little girl. 00;17;59;01 - 00;18;00;29 Stephanie In the car with the word. 00;18;01;01 - 00;18;04;19 Unknown But she's like this like little two year old, oh my gosh. 00;18;04;19 - 00;18;06;04 Shaniqua She I. 00;18;06;04 - 00;18;07;06 Unknown Think it's. 00;18;07;07 - 00;18;09;20 Shaniqua You. It's giving. What are you looking. 00;18;09;20 - 00;18;13;23 Unknown At the face or she is she's left I well she's. 00;18;13;23 - 00;18;15;06 Stephanie Been around for a while. I don't. 00;18;15;06 - 00;18;16;01 Unknown Know. 00;18;16;03 - 00;18;19;05 Stephanie I feel like if we found her now, she'd be like older. 00;18;19;10 - 00;18;22;01 Shaniqua I believe she may be an adult. An adult. 00;18;22;01 - 00;18;22;16 Stephanie And I'm pretty. 00;18;22;16 - 00;18;25;04 Unknown Sure. I'm pretty sure I get. 00;18;25;04 - 00;18;36;27 Shaniqua Ready, which so memes that brings. Let's talk about, like, fashion. And not just like fashion. That's like a current trend, but like fashion. As we. 00;18;37;03 - 00;18;40;26 Stephanie Before we dive into that, you want to take a quick break. 00;18;41;03 - 00;18;44;22 Shaniqua Come back. We can take a closer look at that. 00;18;44;24 - 00;18;47;06 Unknown I think it would be cool if. 00;18;47;09 - 00;18;50;00 Stephanie All right, y'all go find some cool meme. So we're on break. We'll be right back 00;18;50;03 - 00;18;53;23 00;18;53;23 - 00;19;07;07 Stephanie and we're back. And, Sonequa, you were just about to bring up, honestly, like one of my favorite topics, you were going to talk about fashion and change. Where are we going to say I'm curious? 00;19;07;09 - 00;19;37;03 Shaniqua I was going to discuss, like, how fashion has evolved over the last 125 years, and not just like from hoop skirts to pants, but like how did we get here? And I think a lot of that could be explained through, like the social change that we've experienced as women, as people of color. The Met Gala is around the corner, the gates like me, Steph, I believe in there. 00;19;37;10 - 00;19;39;20 Shaniqua The theme is Dandyism that. 00;19;39;20 - 00;19;41;10 Stephanie I did not know the theme yet. 00;19;41;13 - 00;19;43;04 Unknown Oh what you that I cannot. 00;19;43;07 - 00;19;46;12 Shaniqua Yeah, I'm getting dressed up with my girlfriends and watching so. 00;19;46;19 - 00;19;46;27 Unknown That's. 00;19;47;04 - 00;19;59;14 Shaniqua Really looking forward to it. But like how did Dandyism come about. But I believe fashion linked with social justice is something very delicious we can sink our teeth into. 00;19;59;20 - 00;20;30;19 Stephanie I yeah, fashion, I think, is in some ways has always been a driver of maybe social justice, but definitely like cultural shifts. And I think that it has such a important role that it can play and has played in social justice. Even if we start with something as basic as women, being able to have pockets. So you know that they can carry things. 00;20;30;22 - 00;20;35;25 Shaniqua And how we've evolved from the tiny pocket to actual full sized pockets. 00;20;35;25 - 00;20;54;21 Stephanie Now it's it's interesting, like the level of freedom that something as simple as a pocket actually provides. And then it really makes you contemplate why that wouldn't have been just the norm to begin with. Right? 00;20;54;22 - 00;21;17;20 Shaniqua Like I'm sorry. Oh, no, go ahead. Think about their, when women when they would be robbed of their purses, imagine if she could put everything in her pocket, be a little bit more difficult to rob someone. And now you're seeing, like, how freeing it is. I could imagine it being like, you won't have to. There's not a need to feel like a damsel in distress, like meeting someone to save you with. 00;21;17;23 - 00;21;20;12 Shaniqua It's something as simple as a pocket. 00;21;20;14 - 00;21;51;12 Stephanie Something as simple as a pocket. We've seen fashion driving social justice throughout periods of our history. Even my lifetime. Your lifetime. We've seen these different things get elevated and social ways, whether it's whether we're talking about like the civil rights movement or sort of the counterculture movement in society. Women start wearing pants, they stop wearing bras, men start growing out their hair. 00;21;51;12 - 00;22;20;05 Stephanie They start like these shifts start happening that drive a lot of other shifts, because it allows other things to occur in different ways. Women, when they're allowed to wear pants, now they get pants. They've got pockets and pants. They have immense freedom. They can do a lot more things without being restricted by the clothing on their body. 00;22;20;07 - 00;23;01;04 Shaniqua At the time when you were talking about the going through the timeline, the timeline there, it reminded me how cyclical trends are in fashion and also how cyclical social evolution or evolutions are as well. In the first, I guess like the early 1900s, who still were coming off the end of the Victorian era where women's clothing were more restricted, you're wearing more layers, your collar starts at your neck and your hemline goes past your heels, so you're covered from head to toe. 00;23;01;07 - 00;23;29;15 Shaniqua You're also wearing a hat. Gloves like you are close to the suffragette movement. Then women having granted rights, entering the workplace, removing the bra. That's like you mentioned this in our planning session. Women going from constructed fashion into more, I would say like a fashion release in a way. Like there shedding the layers. 00;23;29;17 - 00;23;32;21 Stephanie But now no more pantyhose. 00;23;32;23 - 00;23;43;01 Shaniqua I remember hearing that every time I would walk. Oh my gosh, I remember wearing a slip growing up. Slip in pantyhose. Oh, why I am 12. 00;23;43;03 - 00;23;55;12 Stephanie Am I the last time that I remember wearing pantyhose with with? Because I felt an obligation to. And this is important to note, every now and then I wear colorful tights because I think that's cool fashion. 00;23;55;15 - 00;23;56;08 Unknown Yeah, exactly. 00;23;56;10 - 00;24;18;13 Stephanie Fashion is it's like a choice and it's expression. But the obligation of pantyhose for sure. In the 90s, for me, I'm going to go with like maybe 98, but maybe as late as, maybe as late as 2002, I was still in that space of thinking that I needed to wear stockings or pantyhose of some sort, no matter what. 00;24;18;13 - 00;24;38;16 Stephanie Like even like under slacks, like in Texas in the summertime, like it was. There was such an expectation that you just did it. You just like is I think about that time and it's it's been so long in my life since that's been a requirement in my life. Like all the eastern factions, all the discomfort. 00;24;38;16 - 00;24;40;20 Unknown All the ripped holes, all of the. 00;24;40;23 - 00;24;43;22 Stephanie Tragic moments, there's so many things that I'm just like. 00;24;43;22 - 00;24;44;12 Shaniqua Where? 00;24;44;14 - 00;24;55;20 Stephanie Why was that even taller, hated. Like, how did women. And it's such a minor, but it's an inconvenience and it's unnecessary. And it was all based on social expectations. 00;24;55;22 - 00;25;15;10 Shaniqua Oh, yeah. Necessary. Yeah. And I think about so for us it's easy to identify as women like the unnecessary layers that you have to put on and how it impacts your body. And more ways than are. Yeah. And I think about men you mentioned, like in their 70s, a counterculture where men grew their hair out, the grew beards. 00;25;15;12 - 00;25;35;22 Shaniqua Men like, they went into restrictive 80s where they were clean shaven. I did not know that men could grow facial hair for the grown up. Every woman I knew who only had a mustache. If they had a mustache like the military, men would have a mustache because they felt like they were rebelling. That was the most rebellious it could be. 00;25;35;26 - 00;25;39;24 Shaniqua But men that were in corporate did not have even a mustache. 00;25;39;27 - 00;25;50;18 Stephanie Yeah, I feel like the porn stache in the 70s really killed facial hair for everybody. Only Tom Selleck in the 80s was really, truly allowed to have a mustache. 00;25;50;21 - 00;25;51;23 Unknown Tom Selleck and. 00;25;51;24 - 00;26;02;21 Stephanie Yeah, and Sam oh, version knows last name. I'm terrible with names. Y'all know I'm terrible at names, but I guarantee you, like women my age and older all know exactly who Sam is. And you're thinking about this mustache right now. 00;26;02;21 - 00;26;03;03 Unknown Okay. 00;26;03;03 - 00;26;05;11 Shaniqua What is it, Sam? Elliot the guy? 00;26;05;12 - 00;26;07;27 Unknown Yes. Thank you. 00;26;07;29 - 00;26;14;17 Shaniqua His mustache should have its own agent. It is a Nick mustache. 00;26;14;17 - 00;26;16;23 Unknown It's like. That's why I. 00;26;16;26 - 00;26;21;06 Stephanie It's like I'm clumsy. I can't even come up with this name. I'm just stuck on the stache, okay? 00;26;21;12 - 00;26;22;10 Unknown I'm like. 00;26;22;10 - 00;26;52;22 Shaniqua Maybe cut it all off. Right? The 80s, 90 2000s. And then there was like this resurgence of they called them like the Silver War hipster. So they started to grow out their hair, the beer they're wearing, flannel, the boots. They're cool, they drink, they eat tofu and drink matcha, like those guys. And so here in Austin, you see a lot of men with longer hair, but I think it may be changing a bit. 00;26;52;25 - 00;27;04;07 Shaniqua Maybe they're going back to the cleaner cut as women are wearing more like, there's like a trend I saw most recently online of. 00;27;04;09 - 00;27;05;22 Unknown A woman said she's. 00;27;05;22 - 00;27;32;24 Shaniqua Like going to a club, and she sees women there in prairie dresses and like, am I in the right place? So I think we're moving back into a more today additional state. And there is an economist mentioned, you can tell the health of an economy based on a hemline. The more traditional people dress, the more stressed the economy is and the shorter the hemline. 00;27;32;26 - 00;27;37;27 Shaniqua The economy is doing great, and I think we see that in both men and women's fashion. 00;27;38;00 - 00;28;20;16 Stephanie I think that's a really interesting thing to look at. And yeah, of the resurgence of the Prairie Trust, it's definitely a reflection and a response to a, I think, a few different things. I think it is a combination of responding to the late 90s, 2000, where women's power and sexuality was pretty prominently expressed and for good. And I say this truthfully, for good or for bad, because I think there was a lot of powerful expression happening. 00;28;20;16 - 00;29;02;10 Stephanie At the same time, I think there was a lot of incredible exploitation occurring, and it was a very mix of messages and sometimes really hard to filter through that in terms of what empowers me as a woman, what do I want to express about myself, right? And how do I want to express that? And and then leading into the MeToo movement, where women start asking for accountability around how they're being perceived, not just because of how they want to express themselves, but because of sort of the restrictions and the stigmatization that's put on all different types of expression. 00;29;02;13 - 00;29;13;05 Stephanie That's not really tied to fashion at all. It's really tied to control. And so I think that the combination of those things are what led into that space, if that makes sense. 00;29;13;06 - 00;29;18;02 Shaniqua That makes sense. And I with. 00;29;18;19 - 00;29;58;29 Shaniqua I suppose what has broken my heart every time it's been expressed has been what was she wearing? Or of course, that what happened to her? Look what she was wearing. She was wearing skimpy bikini. Oh, of course she would be hurt by a man because men are visual creatures. He couldn't help himself. But to attack her. If she's wearing a mini skirt and a tube top, then of course, if she was wearing a turtleneck, if she was wearing a Victorian style dress, someone would have said, oh, the color red was lusting like it was lusty color. 00;29;59;06 - 00;30;17;15 Shaniqua And that's why he did that versus addressing the issue. And I believe that's what the MeToo movement was calling for, is to stop controlling women. And actually, let's figure out a way that we could, could, could remove the predator. 00;30;17;18 - 00;30;19;09 Unknown Well, it's up to us. 00;30;19;12 - 00;30;46;11 Stephanie To expect men to be accountable for their own behavior, because even from just I work as a coach and I work with people all the time on behavior patterns, just really basic things like, I can't have time management or this person pisses me off or whatever it is, and one of the core foundation of sort of behavior re patterning or kind of is the idea that you can't control somebody else, you can only control yourself. 00;30;46;14 - 00;31;12;06 Stephanie And so when we are asking all the women of the world to somehow adapt their behavior in order to control the behavior of all the men in the world, that's literally impossible. It's literally in a you take it down like to the root of just like individual behaviors. And I want to change my own habit and I can't I want to stop drinking. 00;31;12;09 - 00;31;42;16 Stephanie I'm the one that's going to have to figure out how to whether I need to get therapy or support. I can't expect all the people around me to stop drinking, because that's unrealistic and I'll never stop drinking. If that's my expectation. I have to take the accountability that I'm not going to drink. That's that simple. And we don't have that expectation for men when it comes to misogyny or just functionally respecting women. 00;31;42;19 - 00;31;42;25 Unknown At. 00;31;42;25 - 00;32;03;22 Stephanie A humanity level. I just don't even get honestly like gender. It's like I look at humans and I'm like, I wouldn't hurt a human. I wouldn't murder human naked or clothed, I wouldn't hurt, I wouldn't like. This desire for me is even difficult to understand. It is very much a power or control aspect of things, that. 00;32;03;25 - 00;32;04;08 Shaniqua The way. 00;32;04;08 - 00;32;06;10 Unknown That we. 00;32;06;12 - 00;32;21;27 Shaniqua The way that we as women police other women, it just primes it because we're not, like you said, holding them accountable. So then we're and I do believe the policing is out of love, right. The women like it. 00;32;21;29 - 00;32;24;00 Unknown I do think it's like it's. 00;32;24;02 - 00;32;25;00 Shaniqua And. 00;32;25;28 - 00;32;26;19 Shaniqua Okay. It could be. 00;32;26;19 - 00;32;34;09 Stephanie Sometimes fear sometimes there are definitely women who are supporting that mindset. I'm definitely how that experience. 00;32;34;14 - 00;32;41;11 Shaniqua I correct myself out of fear, out of fear that you would be harm. And they believe that they're protecting you. And that is. 00;32;41;11 - 00;32;43;04 Unknown Not I mean. 00;32;43;06 - 00;33;04;18 Stephanie That's not my experience. I've had women who and I guess this is maybe it's a genetics thing. We were raised to be very competitive and we were not raised to really be friends with each other. I didn't learn to become friends with women until I was a full blown adult, because we were raised to be very cutthroat and very. 00;33;04;18 - 00;33;28;23 Stephanie And I had like my core group of friends. But my experiences with women up until I was probably in my early 30s was very difficult. And when I talk to my peers, people my age, a lot of them echoed that sentiment because there was a very it's like there were only there was only so much room for women in the boys clubs. 00;33;28;26 - 00;33;51;04 Stephanie And there were different ways to get into those spaces. But in a lot of cases, the level of competitiveness that you see among men is what women were working with was that was the conditioning. And if you want to show up in these spaces, you're going to have to fight to be there. So I definitely had women who were not supportive of me. 00;33;51;06 - 00;33;51;13 Stephanie I think. 00;33;51;15 - 00;33;55;14 Shaniqua That's like culturally like white women of your culture is that I. 00;33;55;14 - 00;34;16;27 Stephanie Can only speak to my experiences in the context of I worked in technology, I worked in primarily male dominated environments where there were not very many women to begin with, and there were not very many people of color. So in both cases, it's hard for me to really, like, speak to it beyond what my actual experience was. But I definitely know that up until a period. 00;34;16;27 - 00;34;31;03 Stephanie And then it started to shift, like what I and I don't think it was just an Asia. I credit millennials, I credit younger generations because I feel like y'all had more empathy. You somehow I all the time I'm taught. 00;34;31;03 - 00;34;32;07 Unknown That all the. 00;34;32;07 - 00;34;55;00 Stephanie Time. There's more. There's a element which in acts where it's I say sometimes anything's a running joke. It's usually not funny, it's a problem. And so that kind of fuck you ism. A Gen X is also an edge that can push us away from each other. And so I think that's something that we've had to evolve through. And it's hurt us even when we see like where we are socially today. 00;34;55;00 - 00;35;17;15 Stephanie There's a lot of division and stuff like that. And I'm just speaking to my own generation specifically. But yeah, I think that's a part of that. But with women, especially back in the 90s and the 2000, I think we were just positioned and conditioned to be a lot less supportive and a lot more competitive nowadays. I don't think that at all nowadays. 00;35;17;16 - 00;35;49;01 Stephanie I don't think it's a whole list entirely, but I a much better transition. I love my women friends. I love being around women I love. For me personally, that's a feeling. But I also see that in community. Like I feel that energy and it feels great because we're powerful and we should be. We should join and be aligned with and find ways to support each other and be present for each other and not make money, and not call each other out on of the ways that we express ourselves. 00;35;49;04 - 00;35;59;24 Shaniqua How do you think that fashion played a role like in policy through social change? 00;35;59;27 - 00;36;20;17 Stephanie And what's like I could look at if we look at women coming into the workforce. Right. And so we go from, you know, women only wearing skirts first in the workforce they could only wear. When I first started working and a lot of jobs I took, it was an expectation that women could only wear skirts. You couldn't even wear outs. 00;36;20;20 - 00;36;49;10 Stephanie And then in the 80s, women started like dressing, wearing slacks and more businesses. But it's still very much modeling how they dress after how men dressed in corporate spaces very boxy, structured, not very fashionable. And over time, I think women one those were not comfortable ways for women to dress that were very uncomfortable. There were corporate environments were very much designed for men and of men. 00;36;49;12 - 00;37;19;01 Stephanie And so I think that on that level at least, like if I just look at like that arch because there's like that question, so big question. So like there if I just look at that arch of how women became more expressive, naturally, they started dressing more comfortably for themselves and how that got perceived by other people. And I think this is part of what you were talking about earlier, about we're being called out like men being like, she dressed a certain way or she did a certain thing. 00;37;19;07 - 00;37;35;09 Stephanie And somehow that giving grace and it's really she's most women really are dressing for themselves most I believe most women really are making their clothing choices based on how they want to look and feel. They're not doing it to antagonize. 00;37;35;11 - 00;37;36;29 Unknown And to the degree that. 00;37;36;29 - 00;38;02;06 Stephanie They are, that's their choice to the degree that they are. But that's not my perception, and that's never been the way I approached. Sure, even if I am dressing in a way that is provocative, I'm doing that because that's how I want to feel for myself. Like, truthfully, like I'm not wanting to be provocative for the world. And so there's a weird, I think, energy there that we don't know really how to manage or work with. 00;38;02;08 - 00;38;15;28 Shaniqua Is still your choice, and consent is still required. So even if you were or someone else wanted to be wanted to dress provocative for themselves and for everyone else, you still have to ask for consent, right? Like it's you can't. You're not. 00;38;15;28 - 00;38;17;08 Unknown I would hope that's. 00;38;17;13 - 00;38;21;14 Shaniqua That's a baseline requirement in our society. And to think that. 00;38;21;21 - 00;38;21;26 Unknown I. 00;38;21;26 - 00;38;25;20 Stephanie Don't know if you maybe you don't. This is do you watch White Lotus. 00;38;25;22 - 00;38;27;07 Shaniqua I've seen the first two seasons. 00;38;27;09 - 00;38;46;07 Stephanie So in this third season, there's a really hysterical moment where Belinda, one of the characters, she's a beloved character and she was in the first season, and then she shows up in the third season, and there's a scene where she's going to get like a knight, right? For a pawn. She is going to stay the night, but they're having this like little awkward moment of politeness. 00;38;46;10 - 00;38;51;24 Stephanie Right? And so she's trying to like kind of say, okay, you can stay. And she literally says, and I. 00;38;51;24 - 00;38;52;12 Unknown Laughed. 00;38;52;12 - 00;39;00;16 Stephanie Out loud. She's so just to be clear, that was consent. Y'all do that here because we just started it recently in and. 00;39;00;18 - 00;39;01;02 Shaniqua We just. 00;39;01;02 - 00;39;06;12 Unknown Started in this country. Well, I laughed out loud because. 00;39;06;14 - 00;39;35;01 Stephanie Again, anytime something's a running joke, we know it's a problem. But that was like pure like brilliance in terms of hitting on that. And it's we think we have consent. But do we like the expectation should be that it shouldn't even be in question. But if we then just look at our rights, there's we don't have full consent over as women like we it's it starts, I think, in very foundational ways. 00;39;35;04 - 00;39;58;01 Stephanie And if the government doesn't give us consent over our bodies and what we do, then it's a lot easier for somebody else to dismiss that consent as well. So that's why I think that that's super problematic, and how fashion ties to that is just a way to rationalize something else, something more sinister. That's an opinion on that. 00;39;58;01 - 00;40;00;09 Shaniqua Now let's take a break. 00;40;00;12 - 00;40;04;19 Stephanie And on the sinister. 00;40;04;21 - 00;40;14;25 Shaniqua A roller coaster. Sinister. Sinister on the back end here. We're going to come back and discuss future cultural trends. So stay tuned. 00;40;14;28 - 00;40;18;16 00;40;18;16 - 00;40;37;24 Shaniqua All right. And we're back I let's quickly touch on the future, what the future holds for our culture trends and the changes that we see on the horizon. And Stephanie, do you want to go first? Kick us off with what you predict. 00;40;37;26 - 00;41;26;06 Stephanie Yeah. So one thing that I think we're going to see happening is a sort of a refresh on how we're approaching ageism. I think that we've gone through this, like really brutal cycle of generations, judging generations, whether it's millennials being attacked for killing avocado toast or boomers being dismissed because everybody's just angry at them or whatever the issue is with ageism, I think we're going to start seeing more individuals being taken based on the wisdom and value that they bring to the table, and that, especially as we see things like retirement ages are increasing, they're only getting longer, people are working longer. 00;41;26;08 - 00;42;01;28 Stephanie And I think that with new technology happening, there's going to be more dependency on the wisdom of youth who understand this technology in a more hyper connected way in some ways. And so there's going to be a need for age, collaboration. I've also seen a lot of really interesting things around, like memory care centers, where bringing in younger people or college students to spend time has like really had like a huge impact on the quality of these people's lives and their ability to actually stay healthy longer and things like that. 00;42;01;28 - 00;42;25;02 Stephanie And so I just think that we're going to come back to a time where we're not so age segmented and recognize the value of learning cross generationally from each other. And I think that there's a lot of things out there that sort of point to that trend, as in its early stages of development. What about you? What do you think is on the horizon? 00;42;25;04 - 00;42;55;01 Shaniqua It's actually in the same vein of what you were speaking about. I think, as I mentioned earlier, fashion, if we take a look and assess our fashion, we can see what's going on in other facets of our culture. And I believe that in the U.S, I can only speak about the U.S culture since I'm here, but I think that we're transitioning from an individual consumerist culture to more of a new age conscious community. 00;42;55;07 - 00;43;19;18 Shaniqua There's so many of my peers, my siblings and I are actually talking about this like doing intergenerational living. My partner and I are doing that now, and there's more homes that are being built for that intergenerational living one. As a millennial, it's so expensive to own a home and like generations before you would own a home, you would send your parents to a home. 00;43;19;21 - 00;43;24;07 Shaniqua We don't have that financing. Like we all have to live together. 00;43;24;07 - 00;43;24;29 Unknown Yeah. 00;43;25;01 - 00;44;01;25 Shaniqua And I think that as we're moving into a more conscious community, like we're intentionally building community living intergenerational, I believe that the individual style is not going to be about status, but more about showcasing ourselves, like to the collective within the collective. And I think in the past, in the past, we had more mass production. Fast fashion has hit its peak and I think people are beginning to feel not only exhaust sort of keeping up with the trends, but a little bit of discuss it with how the trends impact. 00;44;01;25 - 00;44;07;28 Stephanie Are and it's going away and like forever 21 just clothes, right? Yeah, I agree with I think you're right on point. 00;44;08;02 - 00;44;40;17 Shaniqua And I believe that we're we're moving away from being walking. Advertisement. Also, China has with this tariff war, China is exposing the luxury brand how they actually used the Chinese. Many factors, up to 80 to 90% of the the construction of the product, the luxury. Good. Then they're shipping to Europe for the logo and now it's made him align or now is made in France. 00;44;40;17 - 00;45;06;16 Shaniqua So I believe with in addition to the like conscious shift, the recent material that we've all ingested is going to help us break free from that logo and doing more like DIY. Like I'm wearing this not because someone told me that I will look wealthy, or someone would view me in a particular way. Like I'm wearing this because this speaks to who I am. 00;45;06;16 - 00;45;29;24 Shaniqua Like I'm sharing myself with you and I believe we can do that more soon. About who we are, because now we have community versus when you're individualistic in culture, you are more communal and or uniformed in what you dress because you need to feel a part of something. So fashion is a choice versus now we're moving to community if how we live. 00;45;30;01 - 00;45;32;26 Shaniqua And therefore you can express yourself individualist subtly. 00;45;33;02 - 00;45;57;03 Stephanie That also speaks directly to a broader social trend around authenticity in general, because of just what the internet and truth and what can you trust and all these things matters so much the people want. So you're speaking directly into that very key aspect of people showing up authentically. And I'm not a brand. I'm not advertisment. I'm I am myself. 00;45;57;03 - 00;46;10;27 Stephanie I am showing you I am and I like the way you put that who I am in my community and who I am and the space, like all of that is. That's awesome. I think those are and can. I hope both of those trends are happening? 00;46;11;00 - 00;46;12;20 Shaniqua I hope so. 00;46;12;22 - 00;46;14;01 Unknown Hey, you. 00;46;14;03 - 00;46;19;24 Shaniqua I, I'm really looking forward to it. Stephanie, what was your takeaway for? 00;46;19;27 - 00;46;51;16 Stephanie Wow. I think we spent a lot of time and I think for good reason, talking about fashion, which also is really an aspect of identity and expression. And I think that we cannot take for granted how relevant and important it is to pay attention to what's happening in that space and to to just really own our own expression, like to really embrace that and really own that expression and, and feel empowered by it. 00;46;51;18 - 00;46;54;26 Stephanie That's my key takeaway. What about you? 00;46;55;00 - 00;47;27;18 Shaniqua My my key takeaway is culture is ever alive and it's our individual responsibility to keep the culture alive and culture. Should evolve. They should change. And you touched on this plenty of times, and I love every time you say that. It's like we should be learning up and down. So we should be learning from the generations before us. 00;47;27;20 - 00;48;00;19 Shaniqua We under we should understand our current generation. We should learn from the generations that have come after us. And I think that's important when we're talking about culture, because that helps us evolve and evolve with intention. Not just like changing because we want to whiplash over here, because we don't like how we've done it before. I think there should be a reverence, a respect for the past, but also we should be guided by like our hearts and like what we desire for the future, like enjoying the present, respecting the past, and like driving forward together. 00;48;00;19 - 00;48;21;07 Shaniqua And I think if we aren't one present and active in our culture, like we shouldn't speak about it. Like you have to be active and involved. So this is more of a wake up call for myself, get more active, involved in your culture. And then secondly, understanding that it's going to change. It's natural to change, change, bring change. 00;48;21;10 - 00;48;33;18 Shaniqua And again, I think that it's been this conversation just helped me see that things change is okay and it will get better when you're intentional. Yeah. Those are my takeaways. 00;48;33;20 - 00;48;37;24 Unknown Yeah okay. Yeah. It's we hope that. 00;48;37;24 - 00;49;02;28 Stephanie You have we have given you some food for thought around change in your life. And maybe if you have had a specific high culture impact change experience in your life, drop it in the comments for us. Tell us what cultural changes occur that has really impacted you and affected the way that you lived your life. 00;49;03;01 - 00;49;13;28 Shaniqua Be sure to like, comment, and subscribe as we continue. And season two, the Architecture of Change. Stay tuned to the next video episode. 00;49;14;01 - 00;49;14;26 Unknown Yay! 00;49;15;02 - 00;49;16;18 Stephanie Bye, everybody! 00;49;16;18 - 00;49;25;07