Why Smart Women Podcast
Welcome to the Why Smart Women Podcast, hosted by Annie McCubbin. We explore why women sometimes make the wrong choices and offer insightful guidance for better, informed decisions. Through engaging discussions, interviews, and real-life stories, we empower women to harness their intelligence, question their instincts, and navigate life's complexities with confidence. Join us each week to uncover the secrets of smarter decision-making and celebrate the brilliance of women everywhere.
Why Smart Women Podcast
Gaslit at gunpoint. The real story behind Stockholm Syndrome.
Have you ever wondered if Stockholm Syndrome is actually real? The startling truth might shake your understanding of this widely accepted psychological concept.
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You are listening to the why Smart Women podcast, the podcast that helps smart women work out why we repeatedly make the wrong decisions and how to make better ones. From relationships, career choices, finances, to faux fur jackets and kale smoothies. Every moment of every day, we're making decisions. Let's make them good ones. I'm your host, annie McCubbin, and, as a woman of a certain age, I've made my own share of really bad decisions. Not my husband, I don't mean him, though I did go through some shockers to find him, and I wish this podcast had been around to save me from myself. This podcast will give you insights into the working of your own brain, which will blow your mind. I acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which I'm recording and you are listening on this day. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. Well, hello smart women, and welcome back to the why Smart Women podcast.
Speaker 1:Today I am broadcasting from Sydney, new South Wales, australia. We are midwinter here and it has been bucketing now for what feels like about 12 years. Apparently, we've had the wettest August since I don't know 1837 or something, so we're very much looking forward to the sunshine. So, to bring some sunshine into your lives, my friend Kat Mack, who resides in currently sunny Canada, sent me an article about the Stockholm syndrome a couple of weeks ago, and then I messaged her and said this is very, very interesting and I think it's relevant to women's decision making. So we've decided to have a chat about Stockholm Syndrome. Hello, kat, hi, how are you, annie? Well, thanks for asking.
Speaker 2:No, the horror is persistence, almost.
Speaker 1:I have actually had a cough and had various things, including covid um, for the last seven weeks, so I'm a little bit over it and looking forward to um an end to my asthma, but I am treated um properly with medication, so I'm okay. How are you?
Speaker 2:you know I'm hanging in there the best I can.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. I don't know if anybody who any listeners who are who have listened to most of my episodes may remember Kat who was treated with a herbal was. It herbal Was?
Speaker 2:it herbal.
Speaker 1:Yeah, herbal medicine. How many years ago? Oh, forever ago, when I was 21. Yeah, years and years and years ago, not that many years.
Speaker 1:No, she's 23 now she's just turned 23. No, years and years and years ago, and it has completely ruined her health, as per my last week's episode, when we talked about the fact that supplements and vitamins and everything under the wellness umbrella are worth now worth something like $6.7 trillion as opposed to Big Pharma, which everybody loathes and detests in a reactive manner, which is worth, I know, maybe $1.7 trillion. So that's just a little bit of the appeal to nature buyers. We've got going on there, but we're not talking about that today. We're going to talk about Stockholm syndrome. We could.
Speaker 2:We could talk about it because we could talk about anything, and I'm sorry that my story has traumatized you all so much.
Speaker 1:I was so traumatized it took me weeks to get over it. So Stockholm syndrome most of us have probably heard of it. I never assume that everybody has heard of it. So would you mind describing um Stockholm Syndrome and how it has now embedded itself um in our collective cultural history?
Speaker 2:absolutely um. When I reached out to you initially, I was letting you know that I had just discovered that stockholm syndrome wasn't real which has just made me want to lie down, I grew up with it, um, and I'm like what, what do you mean? It's not real, but the definition of stockholm syndrome?
Speaker 2:yeah, for those who don't know, is it's a psychological response where hostages develop positive feelings and an emotional bond with their captors. However, according to Britannica, the definition has now since been expanded to include prisoners of war, cult members, domestic abuse victims, even sex trafficked and abused children.
Speaker 1:Right, so okay. So this definition, which is hostages will develop a positive feeling towards their captors, has now been expanded. So, if we can go back, back, back, back back what happened on that day in Stockholm that has now spawned such a wide and varied interpretation of the woman's response.
Speaker 2:Well, I never knew the origin story, so I'm just going to dive in like I do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, do.
Speaker 2:I want you to dive.
Speaker 1:I want some diving.
Speaker 2:Because I went into newspaper archives and I read everything that was coming out of Stockholm at the time. This happened in August of 1973.
Speaker 1:So August of 1973. Okay, long, long, long time ago.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't feel bad for not knowing about it.
Speaker 1:No, Okay, fair enough.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so Jan Eriksson Olsen, a convict on parole, tried to rob and I'm probably going to pronounce this wrong the Virgis Credit Bank in Stockholm, sweden.
Speaker 1:Right, so he's on parole. Did you say he's a convict on?
Speaker 2:parole. So he's a badden. He's a bad guy. He goes into the bank, tries to rob it. He takes four bank employees hostage, three of them women. One man Got it and somehow make sure all your listeners are sitting, because somehow he managed to negotiate to have his friend Clark Olofsson be released from prison. To assist him In what? In the hostage?
Speaker 1:negotiations. Hang on, hang on. He's in the bank. He's taking these women hostage and one yes and one man. So three women, one man they're all and they're obviously frightened and not having a very good day. And then he says to the police I want my friend who's currently in prison to be released to help me what with With the hostage negotiations. Okay, it's making a lot of sense, go on. That's why I said sit down.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because this is Clark. Olofsson was Sweden's first celebrity gangster. Is he the one that's in prison? Yes, he's the guy in prison. He's the friend in prison, and he was in prison for bank robbery, burglary, assault, oh, and killing a police officer. So he's lovely. Yeah, he's not the nicest man, and somehow he negotiates to get this guy out of prison and into the bank. They let this happen, right.
Speaker 1:So then the second guy gets out of prison, comes into the bank with the first guy who's out on parole. Got it Okay, so they're inside the bank.
Speaker 2:They're inside the bank and they're demanding money and safe passage out of the country.
Speaker 1:And and from so, do we know how, at this point, how long they've been inside the bank?
Speaker 2:Oh well, the two men held the hostages captive for six days in the bank vault, okay so you don't access. No access to a bathroom, food or even water.
Speaker 1:The police wanted to starve the captors out hang on when they're all in the bank vault? Yes, and these hostages, so that the police can't shoot them.
Speaker 2:They're hiding in the bank vault with the hostages with the hostages, and the hostages have no food, water or bathroom facilities right and they have two armed men, both who are violent offenders, both who have taken shots at the police holding them hostage, got it. And when the police finally did provide a bit of water, the captors drank it all Right, okay.
Speaker 1:So it's nice, right, lovely situation Again not nice men.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and one of the hostages. Her name is Kristen Enmark. She was outspoken about the police's incompetence and stated that she feared the police more than the captors, because the police were showing little concern for the hostages' safety. Obviously, they let a murderer come into the bank what the hell? The police would also aim their guns at the captors even though the hostages were also in the line of fire. The hostages saw the captors as being more rational than police negotiators, and so they started to negotiate their own release.
Speaker 1:So when they're in a bank vault, how are they communicating with the police? Is it on a telephone? How are they pointing their guns at them? Do we know?
Speaker 2:Well, they were like any. Anytime they moved around the bank, that's when the guns were being pointed, got it. And then, like two policemen did get shot by the captors, dead, or I believe, in the hands, or one was hand, one was arm. So they weren't killed, but they were shot.
Speaker 1:One of them I believe it was Clark, had a semi-automatic weapon so that the guy that they let out of prison, he came with a weapon, or he was well, no, the the other. Yawn, eric, he's, he's a gun he's hi welcome out of jail. He's a gun.
Speaker 2:Yeah, got it or a couple of guns. I had two. Wasn't very clear on exactly how many guns they had.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so they're stuck in there for six days. Yeah, go, yeah Lovely and at one point.
Speaker 2:They had to have access to the phones because Kristen phoned the prime minister of Sweden demanding that he get the hostages out safely. And not only did he say that he couldn't or wouldn't do it, he said that she should resign herself to dying. Quote at her post. Like her job is her her post. Excuse me, rather than have anyone give in to the captor's demands but, excuse me, you already gave in to one demand when you let Clark Olofsson out of prison. Let Clark Olofsson out of prison. So Wow, wow, wow, uh-huh. So what Kristen said is okay, if you can't do it, make me prime minister for the day and give me my own fate, and I will do this. But of course he wouldn't give her that power either.
Speaker 1:So she's doing, she's doing yeah, I'm wrong, so she's doing pretty well, considering she's probably been without food and water and for six days and she's all of, I think, 23 years old.
Speaker 2:Oh my god, okay, and what must their families have been going through anyway, olsen? So the original jan eric olsen, the original guy who came in, said in an interview in the beginning that he could have killed all the hostages, but it became more difficult as he got to know them and developed a bond with them, and the same emotional bond was not true for the hostages. So this whole thing, stockholm syndrome, where we go oh, the woman falls in love with this mean bad boy. No, that's not how it went down at all.
Speaker 1:So when we, when we say um Stockholm syndrome, which is, which is um a very oft used phrase, what is the implication of Stockholm syndrome? What are they saying about her in that situation? What is it? What are they accusing her of?
Speaker 2:Basically that she decided that this bad person was a good person or that she could fix him. And you know, some have said that they fell in love with their captors, and none of that is true, because Kristen and Mark spent decades maintaining that she had no affinity for her captors. She only did what it took to stay alive during the ordeal right.
Speaker 1:So the implication is and the and the. The narrative goes that she, being a woman, um, um, had fallen in love. So she developed this very, very strong um relationship, or this strong feeling, and she'd actually fallen in love with her captor.
Speaker 2:And that's what they call Stockholm Syndrome. And how did this get all twisted right? Because that's, of course, where my mind went to next. One of the reasons that they get accused of this is because, when they did finally escape out of the vault, the hostages were heard screaming don't kill them. They didn't hurt us. But that makes a lot of sense because, first of all, when there's tear gas everywhere and people can't see properly when you're screaming, that helps people locate where you are. And if the police had just fired willy nilly, the hostages could have easily been killed. So it makes sense that they scream something.
Speaker 1:So just just let me get this straight she's, she's in this situation. They eventually get out, there's tear gas, to your point. They're saying they're yelling things out like don't shoot them, but no one has looked at the secondary explanation for that, which is what they're doing is trying to identify where they are.
Speaker 2:Yep Right.
Speaker 2:By where their voice is Niles Bergeron for the mislabeling and creation of Stockholm Seldrum. Who is this you're talking about? Niles Bergeron was a criminologist and psychiatrist who was working with the police during this hostage taking, did a great job, and he invented the term. He was analysing the hostages' actions and reactions, without ever speaking to them, I might add. He just made assumptions.
Speaker 2:Right Now, all smart women know that when you're in a situation and you feel that your life could be in danger, we appease the perpetrator in an act of self-preservation. Now, that is that right. The fact that they didn't attack the gun-toting captors and spoke with them tried to sort of befriend them. In a way, it likely saved everyone's life. These four people were locked in a bank vault, starving, living in filth, because they were having to use the bathroom without any facilities. Um, they were, you know. They had these gun-toting captors and I don't know. It's just they were begging for their lives and there was reports that the hostages had um ropes tied around their necks so that if gas was used they would get hung, and just horrible things like this was an absolutely traumatic event for them, and so what the women have done to your point, which is, what women do is they have intelligently tried to appease their oppressors.
Speaker 1:um, and in the clip you sent me, um, the psychologist talks about the fact that Kristen never took her eyes off the gunman and that has been interpreted that well, that's because she loved him. But to the psychologist's point, what she's doing is she's watching where the danger is. She's keeping her eye on the threat and then she's using all her intelligence to actually appease in that situation.
Speaker 2:And military experts at the time said that this hostage taking was no different than a prisoner of war situation, and they didn't agree with Niles Bergeron. But here comes Stockholm syndrome. Here comes Stockholm syndrome, and part of it may be because none of the four hostages testified against their captors, but I think that's more likely a result of them all being really ticked off at the way the police and government bungled the entire ordeal more than anything like oh no, they're my friends, I'm not going to testify?
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, I mean. Yeah, I mean there's so much evidence I was reading about it whereby it's really handy for the police right to you know they can benefit from framing hostages as bonding with captors, because it then shifts attention away from institutional failures, you know, and an adequate police response and on to women's supposed. I mean this is so interesting. So, away from institutional failures, like you know, the police screwed up and let's make it about women's supposed pathology. I mean, it's just so such a classic reveal about the, the societal attitudes towards female victims, is it not?
Speaker 2:absolutely, and to say that abuse victims or people who are being sex trafficked or abused children are doing anything except what they have to do to survive is a huge disservice to these people who have already endured too much pain and suffering. And to label it as Stockholm syndrome is insulting. To me, it sounds like just another case of gaslighting and mansplaining, and it's it's.
Speaker 1:It's certainly leaning into the gender stereotype, isn't it Absolutely, that women are more likely to be labeled as sympathizing with captors because of cultural tropes about female empathy and dependency? I mean, and we know that these stereotypes absolutely mirror biases that lead, you know, clinicians, to psychologize women's physical symptoms, do we not Absolutely?
Speaker 2:And I don't know about you, but I mean, I've seen dozens and dozens of doctors in my lifetime and I have had maybe I know I've had one, possibly two that haven't gas lit me at some point point.
Speaker 1:And how has that? What has been the? How has that gaslighting taken place?
Speaker 2:What's the sort of stuff that was said to you? Oh well, a prime example, because you know I've got many Good. Okay, me too. I went to my doctor, my GP, and I told her I said look, I'm not functioning properly, something is very wrong. I'm not able to breathe properly, I have no energy, I'm totally lethargic, I can't think properly. She sent me to a psychiatrist saying I was probably depressed, when in fact I was extremely anemic. I needed IV infusions to get my iron back up. I have asthma, oh, and I have this lovely tracheal stenosis happening. So, if you can picture, like pinching a straw, that's what I'm trying to breathe through. But that's not why I was lethargic. No, no, no, no, no, I had to be depressed yeah, like, are you kidding me?
Speaker 1:so just around that whole dismissal of women's pain. So an editorial on gendered pain noted that women are more likely to experience chronic pain, yet face skepticism from health care providers, and these biases lead providers to downplay or exactly what happened to you to psychologise women's pain, you know so it's especially. This is especially relevant when we're talking about cardiovascular issues with women. It takes way, way, way longer to actually diagnose that a woman may have an issue with their heart than men.
Speaker 2:Going back, you know in in time when you look at media movies, tv, whatever. What are the signs of a heart attack? Those are the male symptoms of a heart attack. 100 women have very different signs of having a heart attack, but those aren't ever portrayed.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's so true, this notion of. Even if you look for an image of a heart attack, it's invariably going to be a man doubled over, isn't it Clutching his chest, or?
Speaker 2:clutching his left arm.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's right, whereas often with women it's it's sort of vague, vague symptoms. Like I know, nausea can be part of a, a chest complaint in women um extreme fatigue back pain, you know, and yeah, those can be pain.
Speaker 2:You know, that can be several different things, obviously. But that doesn't mean you dismiss, it, doesn't mean that you reject it outright because, oh, it could be nothing. It could also be a heart attack. And if it was a man and the roles were reversed, would they do an EKG?
Speaker 1:probably um. So there's data around young women 18. They call young women 18 to 55. Okay, um, yeah, I'm still young, you're so young? You're a baby, I'm not. So young women, I don't know why they're young at 55, 18 to 55, any, I'm going with it. I'm presenting with chest pain, waited 29 longer for heart attack evaluation than men and were less likely to receive electrocardiograms will be admitted. And it gets worse if you're a woman of color.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and women of color faced even longer waits. Yeah, so, and as we know, delayed assessments lead to way poorer outcomes. Yeah, and sometimes death, and sometimes death, that's right. Do you know about the Cassandra syndrome?
Speaker 2:I've heard of it, but remind me.
Speaker 1:I'm going to tell you it's really interesting. So the Cassandra syndrome is used in popular psychology describe the experience of feeling doubted, disbelieved and undermined, and this is particularly in intimate relationships. So it comes from the Greek myth of Cassandra, who was granted this is just classic who was granted the gift of prophecy by Apollo, but cursed so that nobody believed her. So she knew it was happening, she knew the truth. And how often do we come across that? So you know, in modern settings, the Cassandra is often a person in a relationship with a gaslighting or narcissistic partner, and then their perceptions, you know, are repeatedly dismissed until they end up doubting themselves. And that's, how often do you hear that? You know that whole gaslighting thing, and it doesn't matter about the context, but this is my experience, this is what I'm experiencing, where you're just being nuts, you're just being neurotic, you're just being hysterical. The notion of women, you're being dramatic, you're being dramatic, yeah.
Speaker 2:You're being dramatic. You're being dramatic, yeah you're being emotional.
Speaker 1:Yeah, dramatic and hysterical, right and emotional, I mean it's, I mean I'm sorry, didn't hysteria go out like 125 years ago?
Speaker 2:do you want to?
Speaker 1:explain the the origins of hysteria, because it's really interesting. Yeah, go.
Speaker 2:Well, really, anything that a woman had as an ailment could be, you know, counted as she's, you know got hysteria.
Speaker 1:How often Kat do we hear that we're just being accused of being, you know, hysterical or overly emotional? And the word hysterical is just so gendered and so interesting because it's come. You know, I can start that again. You know the gender bias around the word hysterical is so irritating because I know so many hysterical men, right, Right, Just look at American politicians.
Speaker 2:Men were never diagnosed with hysteria and listen.
Speaker 1:It's such an interesting word hysteria. It's initially considered a female specific ailment, typical attributed to I love this. A wandering uterus, yeah, love it, I love that. So mine always went walkabout.
Speaker 2:I don't know about yours, but it's always.
Speaker 1:I never know where it is. Where's my room today? Where's my room?
Speaker 2:you know, it's behind my left lung today, so no wonder I feel this way.
Speaker 1:Yes, and no wonder you're anxious. Um, it laid the transition to a broader concept encompassing neurological and psychological conditions in both sexes. It does not. I don't like this interpretation. It's always to do with men. Um, yep, so everything with women? I mean the whole thing.
Speaker 2:They used to just suggest constant bed rest for women because if they invented the vibrator, that's the only good thing to come out of hysteria. Yeah, yeah that's right.
Speaker 1:That's so right. Yeah, but it was actually a medical diagnosis, yeah, that you were considered to be. If you're a woman, you were hysterical and there's all those pictures of women, you know, lying on chaillanges right with one arm on their forehead because they were so hysterical they could they could barely function because they couldn't pull themselves together was men were just awesome and getting up and having their toast and marmalade and going about their day, right.
Speaker 2:Nothing ever ails the men, they're never. Maudlin they're never emotional.
Speaker 1:No, no, nothing so.
Speaker 2:I love how Stockholm syndrome has really been used to label women, even though it was three women and a man in that bank vault being held hostage. He doesn't count, like they never made reference to the fact that, oh well, he became best buddies with them and then, you know, went off and did bank robberies with them like no, he wasn't their friend.
Speaker 1:None of them were their friends no, no, no, no, no and just did what they had to do to get out alive. So what we're looking at here is that actual survival strategies are mistaken for psychological bonding. And I tell you, what else is really interesting is that it's just so typical, right? It's one male psychiatrist who didn't talk to the women, didn't talk to the guy, didn't interview them. He's just interpreting everything from outside the bank vault and then comes up, coins, a term, and then there it is now to his credit.
Speaker 2:The term he coined was something. It was the name of the street that the bank was on, and it was when they started talking about this condition outside of sweden that it became stockholm syndrome because the name of the street that the bank was on is Swedish and kind of really hard to say if you've never heard. It said right, okay, it's got lots of consonants in it, just let me put it out yeah, yeah, I bet it does.
Speaker 1:Okay, so they're going with Stockholm syndrome. So I guess, um, as this is a critical thinking podcast, I'm just thinking what cognitive biases are we falling for when we accept Stockholm Syndrome as an answer, without examining the actual evidence?
Speaker 2:Well, stockholm Syndrome doesn't exist, that's right.
Speaker 1:It's bogus. It doesn't exist.
Speaker 2:It's totally bogus If somebody tries to label it as that, you know that they're wrong and they haven't done the research and I guess that comes down to the okay.
Speaker 1:So you've got a, as with everything, we've got a complex situation, and then we get really reductive in our thinking, right, we get really reactive, and so then we search for something. You know, you've got a woman. For instance, you might have a friend and she's you think the relationship is abusive, and so we're looking for an explanation for that. And what we do is we use the availability bias, because it's the something that comes most easily to mind. So, instead of going, I'm going to try and ask some serious questions. Really, look at the complexity of this situation. I'm going to use the availability bias and I'm going to say well, it's just Stockholm syndrome, that's what that is, and of course it's not and it's incorrect. That's what that is, and of course it's not, and it's incorrect. And no wonder we end up with these situations where we can't extricate women out of these situations because we're so reductive in our thinking about them. Do you agree?
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and I've heard a statistic and I'm not sure how valid it is, but they say it can take an abused woman seven times it's true her abuser it's true, it's, it's absolutely true.
Speaker 1:We did, we've done, quite a lot of work um in the past, david and I doing um training for um, an organization that provides emergency housing.
Speaker 2:I would wonder if the attempts wouldn't actually be higher, because I'm sure a lot of those women end up no longer living before. You know, try number seven, or try number eight.
Speaker 1:Yes, and then of course it's then. Then again we get really reductive in our, in our explaining oh well, she's got, she goes back because she loves him. She's probably going back because she's got children, she's financially stressed, she has nowhere to go, she's not coping like this, the unbelievably complex environmental challenges on a woman that's walked away from an abusive relationship, probably with children. You know, then we end up with oh no, it's just you know, she's going back because she's, you know, she brings it on herself because she goes back to him.
Speaker 2:It's like, what supports are available there for her? Yep, you know. Does she even have her own credit rating access to funds? Yep, you know. Is he, you know, maybe he's keeping the children and she goes back to protect them? Yep, you know. You can't just look at something. Oh, it's Stockholm syndrome. No, what's really going on?
Speaker 1:Look deeper is no, what's really going on? Look deeper. But we don't. Unfortunately we don't as a society, you know, we don't want to look deeper, we just want to use confirmation bias. Um, I've seen this before. Um, women are just a bit pathetic. Um, you know, you can I've heard this so often them saying, well, you can only do so much to help them. We've done the best we can, and she keeps going back. So this notion of a gender, stereotype.
Speaker 2:Nobody ever looks at it and goes, hey, why don't we stop this guy from beating the crap out of people? Yes, it's like she goes back. How come nobody has stopped him? Yeah, it's always the victim's fault.
Speaker 1:And, of course, as soon as we then slap one of these labels on it, we're teaching women to doubt their own perceptions of what's going on. I mean, it just gets more and more confusing. We know that's what happens with gaslighting. The woman knows, or senses or can feel the reality of the situation, and yet her perception is not only diminished by her intimate partner but is then diminished by the organizations around her right.
Speaker 2:And sometimes the people around her, like in her workplace or her family or her friend group, yep, and gaslighting like because I've experienced it for me, it's from doctors. You do start to question your own sanity. You do start to wonder are they right and am I wrong?
Speaker 1:and how do you think? I'm just wondering how does that happen in our brains? What happens how? How does that doubt arise in us? Is it just too much? What is?
Speaker 2:it. For me, it's like when so many people are telling you oh it it's not serious, oh it's not this, oh it's not that. You know you're, you're being dramatic. Am I losing my marbles here? Are they right? Are they seeing something that I'm not seeing? Because that's not what I'm experiencing and my lived experience is very much different than what all these doctors are telling me. And you start to question your own sanity and go who's right here? And so if you're in a very controlling, abusive relationship, I can absolutely see that happening a lot faster than it did with me and doctors. Yeah, you know. And it's like you start to wonder oh yeah, nobody else would ever love me. Oh, I can't go anywhere else because I have nothing, I'm worth nothing. I can't get a job because nobody would ever hire me, because I'm stupid, because that's what they get told, even though it's a lie.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they start to believe the lie these frameworks that get thrown at us, that undermine our capacity to look at the complexity of the situation and take action, whether it's medical, whether it's a situation where you're in a toxic workplace or you're in an abusive relationship. How do we? We have to do? Please come back. Please come back. I will. I've got to do a thing. We've got this thing. At the moment, I'm majorly going to digress, but I I'm allowed to. It's my podcast, so there's something at the moment. I don't know if you have them in Canada, but I bet you do, but we have sovereign citizens in Australia. Do you have them? I've heard rumblings, but, yeah, they don't believe in law or policing so they're awesome.
Speaker 1:So they won't get their car registered. They won't register their car, they're not licensed and they're just mad. They're really. And they've got this alternate legal thing and they wear uniforms with little lanyards that go local marshal and they sort of wander around the place serving people. Documents that are gobbledygook. And they got a lot worse with COVID because they were very unhappy about the vaccine mandates and there was a really excellent ABC expose on them. It was just I'm telling you it's Dunning-Kruger, live action Dunning-Kruger. Their capacity to critically analyse what it is that they're saying is so minimal, but they're in it's like a cult because they're in agreement with each other. They've got a spiritual leader who says we're out of the time of Aquarius and into some other thing and that law is no longer.
Speaker 2:Oh, that explains everything.
Speaker 1:It explains everything. And the thing is, when they are driving along unlicensed in an unregistered car and the police pull them over, they say so, you're driving this unregistered car and they say I'm not driving, I'm travelling. Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, I'm travelling. Oh, I've got a rabbit hole to go down tonight. Thank you, look at sovereign citizens in australia. And I wouldn't mind, if you don't mind coming back in maybe a few weeks and we'll just do a whole, a whole thing on cults, because I love them, because that is now turning into a cult. It's definitely turning into a cult, right for sure. What have you got in Canada?
Speaker 2:a cult oh, it's a great cult, the twin flame love cult.
Speaker 1:I think I sent you a little just tell me a quick, gracie, and we'll talk about next time. But what do they do?
Speaker 2:I love them oh well, you know, you join. You join this wonderful group to find your soulmate.
Speaker 1:It's not a cult.
Speaker 2:To them it's a group, but you know yeah sure, soulmate.
Speaker 2:And the problem? Spoiler alert. The problem was a lot more women were joining than men, oh no. And so they just decided that, well, annie and I are obviously twin flames, so we need to be married. Okay, they only believe in marriage between a man and a woman. But so, yeah, sorry, annie, you've got to change your gender. You were never a woman, you're a man. Okay, um, I'm up for it. But to the point where they have them go through trans surgery? Yeah, no, fair enough. I think that sounds reasonable, because that is clearly, you know, the twin flames.
Speaker 1:And also, you know, trans surgery is easy and not at all painful and fine, not at all it's in and out in 15 minutes.
Speaker 2:I'm sure it's fine. It's fine, oh.
Speaker 1:I'm sure it's fine. It's fine. Oh, I want to talk more about that. I definitely want to talk more about cults. I love it, and if you have a look at sovereign citizens in Australia because you're especially in WA, because they wear uniforms and have lanyards, it's already written down yeah. It's really, really nutty, but they sound, as with everything, they sound really committed and to them you know they're in a group and they belong and, as we know, we are tribally brained and we want to belong to something.
Speaker 2:And I think that's a lot of brainwashing that's happening.
Speaker 1:Oh for sure, but how do they brainwash?
Speaker 2:Which is different than oh, I can tell you how they brainwash. We'll go into it. Yeah, let's do brainwashing next time, because, again, because that's a fundamental core to all cults is the brainwashing right.
Speaker 1:Because I think, like everything else, we yeah, is the brainwashing right? Because I think, and like everything else, we hear the word brainwashing and we make assumptions about what it is, but I'd actually like to unpack brainwashing next time. Should we do that? Yes, we should. Cults, sovereign citizens and brain, and and then the underlying brainwashing. Shall we do that? We?
Speaker 2:should do that fun. Your listeners are just gonna hate it when I'm on because I always traumatize you guys.
Speaker 1:Yeah I'm actually not as traumatized as I was with your 110 percent of steroids 108 prednisone a day. Yeah, yeah, I've been actually thinking of taking prednisone because I can't quite. I can't quite get on top of the asthma, but I'm trying hard not to take it.
Speaker 2:Well, a half prednisone or a quarter prednisone maybe, but you know 108, 109. Yeah, look who's counting, kat, who's counting Really, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, well, I think we've done a pretty good job talking about Stockholm Syndrome. What do you think Harrison Harry thinks it was great, so he's nodding, so let's wrap that up, harry could be like thumbs down in the corner Thumbs down, I'm ignoring him because he's a man. It doesn't matter what Harry thinks.
Speaker 2:He's like this is too much man bashing, I'm not up with it. That's right.
Speaker 1:But, I would like to say it's not all men, it's not Harry's awesome and also David is awesome and my son is awesome. Can I just say something that my son, who I won't mention his name, but he's a lawyer and he has to deal with some of the sovereign citizens in a legal setting. That's got to be fun, classic, all right. So let's leave Stockholm Syndrome where it is.
Speaker 2:It's not a real thing. Don't buy into it.
Speaker 1:I'm not going to use the term ever again. I'm never going to use it. That was the last time it's come out of my mouth. So thank you so much, except when you go to promote this. Except I'll be talking it when I promote it. Yeah, exactly. So thank you so much, kat Mac, for talking to me All the way from Canada. It's been an absolute delight, and neither of us are ever, ever, going to use the term Stockholm Syndrome ever again. For anybody out there who is experiencing difficulty in any context, please don't doubt your own experience. So often, what we think and what we feel in these sort of dangerous situations is correct, and instead of calling whatever's going on for you Stockholm syndrome, let's just say you're doing the best you can to survive. It's a survival strategy. So thank you so much, kat, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1:Oh, my absolute pleasure, I loved it. And let's get you back and let's talk sovereign citizens and cults. You want to do it, I want to do it. Okay, awesome. So thanks so much, and thanks so much for tuning in. Listeners, stay safe, stay well, keep your critical thinking hats on and see you soon. Bye.
Speaker 1:Thanks for tuning into why Smart Women with me, annie McCubbin. I hope today's episode has ignited your curiosity and left you feeling inspired by my anti-motivational style. Join me next time as we continue to unravel the fascinating layers of our brains and develop ways to sort out the fact from the fiction and the over 6,000 thoughts we have in the course of every day. Remember, intelligence isn't enough. You can be as smart as paint, but it's not just about what you know, it's about how you think.
Speaker 1:And in all this talk of whether or not you can trust your gut, if you ever feel unsafe, whether it's in the street, at work, in a car park, in a bar or in your own home, please, please, respect that gut feeling. Staying safe needs to be our primary objective. We can build better lives, but we have to stay safe to do that. And don't forget to subscribe, rate and review the podcast and share it with your fellow smart women and allies. Together, we're hopefully reshaping the narrative around women and making better decisions. So until next time, stay sharp, stay savvy and keep your critical thinking hat shiny. This is Annie McCubbin signing off from why Smart Women. See you later. This episode was produced by Harrison Hess. It was executive produced and written by me, annie McCubbin.
