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June 14, 2025 42 mins

With another Father's Day in the books, Ben, Noel and Max hit the new studio for the first time, exploring the history of this paternal partner to the slightly-more famous Mother's Day. Featuring a cameo from the one and only Matt in this week's Classic episode.

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Fellow ridiculous historians, we are returning to you this weekend
with a celebration and a classic episode. Happy Father's Day
to all the fathers out there.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
Dude, have you seen the movie The Miami Connection? Have I?
Why am I asking you? I don't know? It's okay.
It's an eighties absolute.

Speaker 3 (00:22):
Bonkers B movie that involves ninja's and like some tough
fighting guys who are in a hair metal band called
Dragon Sound.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
But there's this one plot line.

Speaker 3 (00:33):
This one dude from Dragonstown I think, is the keyboard
player who's trying to find his father and at one
point he gets a letter in the mail and it
gets this really heartwarming scene where he goes, he opens
the letter and he goes, my father, and then he goes.

Speaker 2 (00:48):
Oh my god. Just just look up that scene. It'll
warm your damn heart. It's so good.

Speaker 3 (00:54):
It's a terrible movie that was made by a taekwondo
master to promote his taekwondo school.

Speaker 2 (01:00):
Back amazing. It's got songs that are about the stuff
that happens. Right.

Speaker 3 (01:05):
I love that we'll fight the ninjas and we'll get
the cocaine.

Speaker 2 (01:09):
It's so good. That's great.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
We hope that you enjoy our exploration of Father's Day.
A few years back. We were surprised to find that
Father's Day, which we've always accused of being kind of
a hallmarket in creation, Father's Day, was not immediately popular
when it was proposed, originally because people thought celebrating your

(01:35):
father was a little too effeminate.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
Let's roll that beautiful Father's Day footage.

Speaker 1 (01:45):
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to

(02:12):
the show Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much
for tuning in. Let's hear it for our super producer,
Max Live Williams.

Speaker 3 (02:22):
I was gonna say, Max Liar Williams, he's not to
be trusted. He gave us this big countdown to our
first session in the new studio, and turns out he'd
been recording the whole.

Speaker 2 (02:31):
Time, the whole damn time. God forbid of those outtakes
that are making into the world. Oh yeah, it's gonna
be over for us.

Speaker 1 (02:38):
It's true though. I'm Ben gar Nol. We are here
in person at the New studios. This is for any
longtime listener. This is the first time you and I
have recorded in a actual podcast studio instead of something
we bootlegged totally.

Speaker 3 (02:56):
Not to mention the first time Ridiculous History has recorded
in person.

Speaker 2 (03:00):
In over a year. I'd say we dabbled, you know,
post pandemic.

Speaker 3 (03:05):
In our previous offices, but frankly, we just kind of
gotten so used to the workflow being able to podcast
in our underwear, it was a hard sell to leave
the house.

Speaker 2 (03:12):
But now we're here, pants and all. How do you
know I have pants? I'm a different don't need to know.
It's true.

Speaker 3 (03:18):
We can't see below the bells on Max. He's in
a whole glass you know, booth situation. It's very I
don't even.

Speaker 1 (03:24):
Know we're another camera. He refuses to turn it on,
but there's a camera that lets us see what Max
is doing.

Speaker 2 (03:30):
Pants cam.

Speaker 4 (03:31):
Yeah, well, actually it's only the upper half, so you
still want to know, all right.

Speaker 1 (03:35):
Well as you are, as you are probably aware by
the nature of the title. Here, folks, in typical Ridiculous
History fashion, we are celebrating a holiday after it happens
only a couple of days though, we're getting closer and
to get all.

Speaker 2 (03:52):
Time you want me about it.

Speaker 3 (03:53):
We're recording it well before the holiday. The holiday falls
this coming Sunday. We're recording this on a Thursday, and
you'll be here on a Tuesday. Wrap your brain around
that this is.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
The world in which we live, and this is a
holiday that is I think it's the pepsi to the
Coca cola that is Mother's Day.

Speaker 3 (04:13):
Yeah, it was a well meaning idea that wasn't immediately
adopted until people figured out how they could make a
buck off of it, that's right, and then followed by
backlash against those well meaning aforementioned well meaning folks.

Speaker 1 (04:27):
It's Father's yes, plus their hearts. Indeed, Noel as as
a father, I think you were telling me off air
that you forgot about the holiday until until your family
reminded you.

Speaker 2 (04:41):
Well, isn't that as it should be? Well?

Speaker 3 (04:42):
What am I going to be counting down the day
as to Father's Day? Where is my whatever you get
on Father's Day.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
In my card? I'm not petty, I'm petty in other ways.
Ty would be good. I'm not a tie guy, though,
maybe a money clip.

Speaker 1 (04:56):
Yeah, maybe you could get into cravats.

Speaker 2 (04:59):
There you go. Isn't that the same thing as It's.

Speaker 1 (05:02):
Just like it's a fancier but somehow lazier.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
What's the short time? Ascott the Fred wears on Scooby Doo.
Oh Ascott, Yeah, you could get it, Askedcott. That's definitely
a choice. I gotta say, though, Father's Date.

Speaker 1 (05:17):
It's funny because, like a lot of people, I don't
think we really explore the history. Most times you just remember, oh,
that day's coming up, and you remember it like right before.

Speaker 2 (05:29):
At least I usually because Google changes their luck. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:35):
I was informed that I will be taken to a
brunch on Sunday, the Father's Day. And I honestly they
said it like as though I were supposed to know
when that was going to be, and I had no
idea because I needed to put it in my calendar
to some degree. And I just they gave you the date,
and there it is, and I'll show up.

Speaker 1 (05:53):
Oh good, your presence is the president. Yeah, so okay,
as we as we learn with Mother's Day, you described
that heartbreaking kind of commonality they have. Father's Day is
kind of recent too, I guess, in the grand scheme
of things, I thought for a long time I thought
it was like an early eighteen hundred's Day.

Speaker 3 (06:12):
I don't think I had much of a concept for it.
I just always lumped it in with kind of the
greeting card holidays of the world, you know. Woodrow Wilson,
as we mentioned in the Mother's Day episode, described Mother's
Day or as a way to recognize that tender, gentle army,
the mothers of America. And it turns out part of
the backlash around making Father's Day a thing was that

(06:34):
it was like two like it it was for girls.

Speaker 2 (06:39):
I will not be recognized by my family.

Speaker 3 (06:42):
I will be recognized by my labors and the flat
of my brow.

Speaker 1 (06:47):
You shall have one firm handshake upon your eighteenth.

Speaker 3 (06:51):
Birthday, and then we will never speak again exactly.

Speaker 2 (06:55):
And yeah, it's weird.

Speaker 1 (06:56):
People said, well, this feels kind of effeminate because we
have this association with Mother's Day.

Speaker 2 (07:03):
It came first, did come first? Did come first?

Speaker 1 (07:06):
And Father's Day then became an interesting concept that not
everybody was on board with. We know that people were
trying to make Father's Day a thing in the early
nineteen hundreds, I think in West Virginia in nineteen oh eight. Yeah,
they were really trying to make fetch happen Father's Day. Fairmont,
West Virginia, July fifth, nineteen oh eight. Grace Golden Clayton

(07:30):
Love fabulous old timy name suggested to a local Methodist
minister that services beheld to commemorate and celebrate the fathers
who lost their lives in a deadly mind explosion. Hundreds
of dudes. Three hundred and sixty one dudes. So this
is this is a very well intentioned thing, as you said,

(07:51):
but it's coming out.

Speaker 2 (07:52):
Of a tragedy.

Speaker 3 (07:53):
Could have made it just a memorial for the thing.
You not necessarily have to lump in all fathers here.
But again, but a little, a little weird, just just
it feels like maybe that wasn't going to stick.

Speaker 2 (08:07):
And it sounds like.

Speaker 1 (08:08):
Different local communities had their own kind of Father's Day
esque things for a while, just like in the case
of Mother's Day, there was this unofficial push to make
it a national holiday that occurred on the same day
for everyone across the nation. And a guy that we
are going to cover in an upcoming episode, William Jennings Bryant, Yeah, yeah,

(08:31):
he was a huge Father's Day fan. He was saying,
you know, if you think that's effeminate for kids to
love their parents, then you got work to do.

Speaker 2 (08:40):
That's more of a you thing, that's not a nus thing.

Speaker 4 (08:43):
Also touched the silver. Also, I have to backtrack, guys,
because we mentioned Woodrow Wilson and I didn't say anything.
All right, Woodrow Wilson, go fuck yourself. Yeah, not a
great guy, boyhood home. I've already mentioned all that stuff.
Here's another president, though, with cool nickname that I was
not aware of. We've got we've got Woodrow go fuck
yourself Wilson, and then we've.

Speaker 2 (09:05):
Got Calvin Silent cal Coolidge. Did you ever hear that before?
I haven't heard me.

Speaker 1 (09:11):
I haven't heard Silent Cal, which is really but I
do know why he has the nickname. He's a famously
uh yeah, task turn famously urst guy one time and
Max you know this story too. Uh he was at
Coolidge was at a party Silent Cal and someone said,
I bet I could get three words out of you,

(09:32):
and he looked at them and he kind of like,
I guess what you call it in the drag community.
He read them and then he went, you lose.

Speaker 4 (09:39):
So there's another story about him, and it's basically so
he became president when Harding died in office.

Speaker 2 (09:44):
He was Harding's VP.

Speaker 4 (09:46):
It was like the last year Harding's first term and
he just kind of got reelected because he was already
on there. I yeah, this guy seems fine enough, but
he didn't really have interest in actually being the president.
So I think this story is pretty hypocryphal. But supposedly
he like handed one of his aids and letter and
gotten a boat and rowed out into the middle of
a lake and the letters said I am not running

(10:08):
for reelection.

Speaker 3 (10:09):
He just rode away and left hallelujah, Calvin wrote, rode
the boat ashore. I was thinking though, the three words.
Think he also could have said go fuck yourself. That
would would be but then he would have lost because
he would have said three words, but it would have
been mean. Yeah, it would have been an own but
also like a self owned kind of.

Speaker 2 (10:26):
He was like the yin to.

Speaker 1 (10:27):
Churchill's Yang of snarkiness who you know, come along later.
But uh, silent col so, I don't want to derailist.
That is a really cool nickname.

Speaker 3 (10:36):
Uh. He was a fan of Father's Day, right, Yeah,
And that's what it takes to get these things to
pick up steam.

Speaker 2 (10:42):
You gotta have some high powered uh supporters.

Speaker 3 (10:44):
And even though silent Cow didn't say a whole lot,
maybe didn't really want to be president. He did seem
to take the whole Father's Day as a national holiday
concept and run with it, but not enough that it
actually happens.

Speaker 1 (11:04):
Yeah, it's it's weird because we know Wilson was on board,
Coolidge was on board. But if you look at the
origin story of Father's Day, you see that there are
two stories of when the first legit Father's Day was celebrated.
In some versions of the story, you'll hear about celebration
of Washington State in June nineteenth, nineteen ten, a resident

(11:26):
of Spokane with another great name, Sonora smart Nod.

Speaker 3 (11:31):
I'm going to be that, actually, guy Ben, If I
were a Washingtonian, I would chastise you and say it's
actually Spokane.

Speaker 2 (11:38):
Spokane. They will come at you for that. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (11:42):
I only found out because I did a podcast that
was based in and around I remember that Spokane.

Speaker 2 (11:46):
I'm glad you said someone.

Speaker 4 (11:47):
I'm going to be in Spokane later this year.

Speaker 2 (11:49):
Well, now you can talk like a local.

Speaker 1 (11:51):
Thank you to the good Thank you, Nolan, thank you
to the good people of Spokane. Indeed, so Sonora smart
Dodd though that's a good name. Fabulous right She Okay,
she was listening to a mother's day sermon at a church.
It's nineteen oh nine, and she says, hang on a
sick mothers are getting all this praise, and I'm not

(12:12):
against mothers, but I think fathers should get their own
day as well.

Speaker 3 (12:17):
Yeah, you know, equal time. It's like running for office
right now. Sonora's father was a real man's man, WILLIAMS. Smart,
Mister Smart, a Civil War veteran, a widower. His wife
had passed during childbirth of their sixth child, as was
much more common in those days. He raised six children

(12:39):
by himself on their farm, on their homestead in Washington State.
And you know, I think where you're seeing where we're
going with this here, he's a great example of like, look,
fathers can be mothers too, which might have added to
the objections.

Speaker 2 (12:58):
That's a good point.

Speaker 1 (12:58):
Yeah, And she said, you know, my dad's awesome, and
I want to show appreciation for all the hard work
he did. It's incredibly it can be incredibly difficult being
a single parent, especially to six children. So she says,
I want to pay homage to him, but I also
want to say it's for other dads in general, because

(13:19):
I don't think I can make me liking my dad
specifically a national holidays totally.

Speaker 3 (13:24):
They definitely could have made the mind explosion that killed
four hundred you know men, at least a regional day
of mourning, right, But a holiday is celebrating one dude,
you know, who experienced personal tragedy.

Speaker 1 (13:38):
Not really how these things work. Yeah, it's tough, you know.
She initially said, Okay, we're going to do it on
June fifth, that's the anniversary of my father's death, and
we'll celebrate Father's Day throughout all the land. But eventually,
I think due to some some cross wires and planning
or scheduling, you know, local government, is do I have

(14:00):
this celebration? Got moved to the third Sunday in June.
So it's one of those confusing ones. I don't understand them.

Speaker 3 (14:08):
One reason I'll never be able to tell you what day,
you know, any of those types of holidays are on,
because first of all, I'll never remember which Sunday in
June we're talking about, right, and second is the third
It's like I just don't remember things with numbers in
them typically anyway.

Speaker 1 (14:21):
Like and thinks like Thanksgiving is probably one of the
big examples of that in Easter two.

Speaker 2 (14:27):
But Thanksgiving.

Speaker 1 (14:29):
I'm always like, well, I just I guess I need
to make sure I'm not doing anything for four Thursdays.

Speaker 2 (14:35):
Because it's one of those on a Thursday.

Speaker 3 (14:40):
I definitely if you look at my Google history, plenty
of what day is Thanksgiving this year, you know, try
to get that lockdown in advance.

Speaker 2 (14:49):
But yeah, it's true.

Speaker 3 (14:50):
There was some cross wires, you know, local government being
what it is, third Sunday in June, as is often
the case with regional celebrations, the clergy back debts, and
that's also a part of what led it to kind
of take off. And the very first official Father's Day
was celebrated on June the nineteenth year of Our Lord,

(15:14):
nineteen hundred and ten. That was the month of the
birthday of Dodd's father. Close enough, close enough birth month.
And like we said, silent cal is a fan of
Father's Day in general. He supports this date. He supports
this observance. And fast forward nineteen sixty six, President London,

(15:36):
big Jumumbo, big Jumbo Johnson is Jumbo or Dumbo Jumbo
is definitely we did think about it, Yes, he said, Okay,
I'm issuing a presidential proclamation recognizing this as Father's Day.
It becomes a national holiday. In nineteen seventy two, when
President Richard Nixon tricky Dick and do great impressions of him,

(15:59):
he signed legislation saying the third Sunday of June is
gonna be Father's Day. That's according to the one story,
go Dick, he's tricky, he did that one thing.

Speaker 2 (16:08):
That was kod. I guess I don't know.

Speaker 3 (16:11):
We're not really taking a stance on Father's Day here,
by the way, that is not for us to decide.

Speaker 2 (16:15):
No, No, that's that's that's for the.

Speaker 3 (16:17):
Father's I would just say in general, holidays of this
ILK are are odd.

Speaker 1 (16:21):
They're often I mean reformative. The creator of Mother's Day
was right. They become commodifications, they become cash grabs, you know.
But but the heart of it, again, it's a cool idea.
It's it's nice and as cool as Sonora's smart DoD
wasn't is she wasn't the first person to have this idea, right,

(16:41):
or wasn't the only person.

Speaker 3 (16:43):
No, again, it's it's I'm not trying to again, not
trying to be a jerk. Here a poopoo anybody's idea,
But this isn't exactly the most creative, you know, unique
singular idea to ever be funk. It's just like, hey,
what if we had a day that celebrated father Yeah,
you call it Father's Day?

Speaker 1 (17:03):
You a slot in anything, you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (17:06):
Yeah, So it's really all just about like who had
the gumption to really get it together and push for it.
That's really more what the story is rather than who
came up with the idea, because it's just as a father,
not particularly creative. So yes, to your point, of course,
there are several origin stories to Father's Day. We talked
about the Fairmont Father's Day celebration. We have three years

(17:30):
after the Fairmont event, a Chicago activist SJW by the
name of Jane Adams two D's requested of the local
legislature a city wide celebration or the very least recognition
of Father's Day.

Speaker 2 (17:47):
But she was denied.

Speaker 1 (17:49):
Dang, Chicago shut her down. Let's see, that's early nineteen hundred,
so she probably couldn't pay off the bribes.

Speaker 3 (17:56):
Oh yeah, that's like, well, yeah, I mean it's not,
is it, Tammany. No, that's a little earlier. It's Chicago
has been a hive of scum and villainy politically for
a long time. So maybe that she just didn't grease
the right palms or pay the veig. Yeah, that's a
I don't think that's a hot take of fortunately either.
We do know other people tried to create their own

(18:18):
versions of Father's Day. We'll get to I'll tell you,
we'll get to my personal favorite in a little bit.
But we also need to shout out Vancouver, Washington resident
JJ Behringer, who read something in a local newspaper and said,
all right, we're going to hold a Father's Day celebration
at my church, Irving Methodists, and we'll call it the

(18:39):
first Father's Day event. Not because he was a jerk,
it's because he did not know other people that had
this idea before he got to wonder too the religious
angle here with like some of these Methodist ministers sort
of spearheading this. You know, there's of course the Holy Trinity,
Father Will signed the Holy Ghosts and is a very
patriarchal kind of a canon.

Speaker 2 (19:01):
Let's say.

Speaker 3 (19:01):
You gotta wonder if that was part of why they
were like pushing for this. Yeah, Father's Day, it's got
a nice ring to it when did it become the
Holy Spirit instead of the holy good question. I'm sure
we could could ask doctor Internet that and it would
spit it right back.

Speaker 2 (19:13):
Out our chat cheapt Maybe it would make something up.

Speaker 3 (19:17):
That's been my latest interest in the whole chatbot thing
is it's just we talked about it on stuff that
I want you to do it. The idea of of
chatbots hallucinating things out of whole cloth.

Speaker 2 (19:26):
I love it.

Speaker 1 (19:27):
Of making up entire entirely fraudulent court cases.

Speaker 3 (19:31):
Event yeah, exactly, and not not after being asked to
invent something or tell me a story. Like people are
using these of this tool to legitimately cheat at homework
or like you know, writing legal briefs, and it is
biting them in the butt because apparently old chatty as
you call them sometimes, is improvising.

Speaker 1 (19:52):
Let's ask chat GPT to make holidays for us and
report back on it.

Speaker 2 (19:57):
That'd be fun.

Speaker 1 (19:58):
That'd be fun. Let's okay, here's the favorite one though.
Here's a favorite one, and I think you love this
one too. Because people couldn't communicate as easily as as
our research associate Jeff points out, they ran into problems
figuring out who was first to the postal Father's Day. Yeah. Right,

(20:18):
So in nineteen fifteen, this guy, uh, the ironically named
Harry C. Meek says, I am the inventer of Father's Day.
I'm making it up. It should be on my birthday.

Speaker 2 (20:31):
Cool. Yeah, neither neither Meek nor mild in the eyes
of the of the Father. Just the hutspah of it.

Speaker 3 (20:40):
On my birthday. I mean, surely it wasn't a self
aggrandizing request. He just figured, you know, everybody's got that
same birthday, right, Like, you know, it's just he.

Speaker 1 (20:49):
Pushed the Lions Club to acknowledge that he started Father's Day.

Speaker 3 (20:55):
Yeah, he spent and this was not just like a
one day, you know, like wild hair that he got,
Like he made this like a pursuit. You know, he
pushed this line for quite a few years. And again
that's what it takes. People that insist upon themselves, people
that just won't let things go. Those are the people
that history remembers the most pedantic ones among.

Speaker 1 (21:18):
Us usually, yeah, quite often, you know, the people who
raised enough of a fuss. And as you said, there
was this backlash against Father's Day, and part of it,
this is a really interesting thing brought up in Almanac
dot com. So when you give a shout out to
Arelio C. Scott, who wrote this article, she points out,

(21:39):
know all that the idea of fatherhood fundamentally change. It's
not viewed as a like a feminine model with flowers,
but it's a day that celebrates this idea of dadness.
And a lot of my friends who are fathers, yourself included,
will say, well, my kids are being very sweet and

(22:00):
I love them, but how many socks do they think
I need?

Speaker 3 (22:05):
Hi borderline resent being taken to brunch. That's a woman's meal.
I'm just joking. I am very much joking a brunch,
A big fan of brunch. But no, it's funny, right
because the fact that even has to be explained, or
it's it's it's inherently absurd, right, It's like, it doesn't
have to be. It's it's not the same, and and

(22:28):
and it's about the person. What if your dad likes flowers, right,
give the man flowers, Give the man.

Speaker 2 (22:33):
What do you want? If your dad wants a spa day,
send him to a spa.

Speaker 3 (22:37):
I will be the first one to admit I get
pretty regular pedicures and I love a good massage or
a spa day.

Speaker 2 (22:43):
No, and it's it's very true.

Speaker 3 (22:44):
But this idea of this feminine model, you know, this
this precursor you know in Mother's Day being problematic for
like or somehow challenging the masculinity of you know, fathers
is absurd to me. But you know, we got to
think about the time, right.

Speaker 1 (23:03):
Sure, Yeah, And I guess there were more of what
we're often called traditional gender roles, right there were. There
weren't as many women in the workplace. The modern role
of the father, you could argue, as does Aureliacy Scott,
has changed more of a partnership, which I think is
probably healthier for everybody. Sure, right now we're co parenting,

(23:27):
you know what I mean. Now it's not just some
guy working nine to five or whatever coming home and saying,
where's dinner? Why does this kid have a seat? This
thing is dirty, I'm getting drunk and going to sleep.

Speaker 3 (23:40):
So I think what we're saying, what this article is saying,
is that it evolved in a positive direction, yes, to
to look at mothers and fathers on more of an
equal playing field. So what I was railing against was
sort of the initial backlash of like, how dare you
celebrate me, you know, in the same way as you
would have a mere woman.

Speaker 1 (23:58):
And that's that's so vawd. That's part of it because
we know people. Okay, I'm a little torn about this.
So the initial people objecting to Father's Day, we're doing
exactly what we're talking about. They said, this is a
sentimental attempt to emasculate us almost with flowers and with giving.

Speaker 3 (24:17):
Of gifts, which is crazy Mechagin, gifts are awesome inherently
I love free stuff.

Speaker 2 (24:23):
Yeah, it's great, and it's also thoughtful gifts. That's that's
the key, right.

Speaker 3 (24:28):
I Really I'm against kind of like holidays that require
some sort of like pat you know, the expected gifts
like flowers, you know, I mean, you know, flowers are cool,
and if you want to get somebody flowers, get them
something based on like a color you know they love,
or like a particular flower you know that makes them happy.
Don't just grab the nearest bouquet and shove it in

(24:50):
their face. I would typically. I mean, I just think
gift giving is such an opportunity to show somebody that
you think about them and that you're aware of aspects
of their personality.

Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yeah, and also, I don't think you should have to
tie it to a holiday. No. I think the coolest
gifts are, you know, in the for no reason at all,
not because you're in trouble, not because someone decided it
should be an official day for something. Do something nice
for people you love.

Speaker 3 (25:15):
I get my kid and my partner and friends' gifts
all the time, you know, just because, And honestly, for
holidays and stuff. I'm typically the guy that's stopping at
the grocery store on the way home to grab something
because I'm fulfilling that expectation, and I frankly kind of
resent that.

Speaker 1 (25:31):
Then here's the valid here's the valid part of the
argument for people who had a backlash against Father's Day
that I think we both can agree with. They said,
we know about Mother's Day, it's a grift, and Father's
Days no different. These holidays are proliferating and they're all
just a gimmick to sell more stuff. And hey, we

(25:52):
the fathers are also paying for the Father's Days as
the sole breadwinners of our family.

Speaker 2 (26:00):
Am I paying for flowers for myself?

Speaker 1 (26:02):
They said, Uh, so, I get the I get the
anti capitalist part about it, The anti commodification. But yeah,
I think maybe people were a little insecure or a
little caught in their preconceptions about masculinity.

Speaker 2 (26:16):
They were in their feelings.

Speaker 3 (26:17):
They were in their feelings a little bit. Yeah, yeah,
but not in like a touchy feely.

Speaker 2 (26:22):
Kind of way.

Speaker 3 (26:22):
No, No, in a very emotionally damaged way. And I
didn't kind of think I caught this in the Mother's
Day episode. But this idea, I mean maybe maybe it
came up briefly specifically for Mother's Day, But in the
nineteen twenties and thirties, there was actually a movement to
get rid of both of these holidays entirely in favor
of combining them into a into one Parents' Day.

Speaker 2 (26:46):
How that go that take off? I only I've heard
of Parents Day.

Speaker 1 (26:56):
It's around in other countries. Maybe, yeah, you know, parents
are generally a good thing, So you're right, though it
did not encounter near the success of Father's Day, let
alone Mother's Day. It's strange to me that for a
while during that time period, during the twenties and thirties,

(27:17):
every year the Mother's Day occurred, these groups would protest it.
They would be pro Parents' Day groups, and they would
go to Central Park because they liked having problems, I.

Speaker 2 (27:28):
Guess seems so.

Speaker 3 (27:29):
I mean, the idea of there being a Parents Day activist,
this guy Robert Spear who said that both parents should
be loved and respected together, like at the same time,
I don't know about it. You know, it's I guess
that's sort of like a killing two birds with one
stone situation, you know, one holiday to rule them all.

Speaker 4 (27:49):
But it feels like this guy just want to be
mad about something.

Speaker 2 (27:52):
It's a little bit of what about.

Speaker 3 (27:53):
As I completely agree and as we know that did
not take off, you know, because what about you know,
parents who are divorced. Yeah, maybe it's a good thing
that you can honor them separately.

Speaker 2 (28:05):
You know.

Speaker 3 (28:06):
I think maybe if there is a debate or a
question around it, is it is the gendered aspect of it.

Speaker 2 (28:12):
You know what I mean?

Speaker 1 (28:13):
Maybe, But how who cares? Here's what happened the Great Depression.
That's one of the reasons Father's Day is still a
big thing, because think about it, you're a business, you're
an ad company, and you have to somehow get out
of the red and into the black ink. So they
double down to try to make Father's Day what they

(28:34):
thought of as a second Christmas for dudes.

Speaker 3 (28:37):
Yeah, because you know, all these cliche ideas of gifts
are supposed to get your dad. Those hold true for
any gift giving opportunity. You know, socks in these days, pipes,
you know, like slippers, ties, ties, but then nobody really
even wants and that if you're gonna get it, you're
gonna get one for yourself because these are like things

(28:57):
that require you to have a little bit of awareness of,
like your own personal style. The joke around these gifts
is often people are giving you these things and you
will never wear them, right.

Speaker 1 (29:07):
Right, Like, thank you for this shar truce and green
polka dotted ascot. I'll treasure it forever.

Speaker 4 (29:15):
That sounds really nice, just being frank right here. I
really like if you guys got that for me, I
would appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (29:22):
Oh god, now we have to remember what I described. Okay,
shartruse and green polka dot.

Speaker 4 (29:27):
I mean, Ben, It's not like we have a like,
you know, recorded version of you saying it or anything.

Speaker 1 (29:32):
Oh that's right, never mind, why are we even bothering
with long term memory?

Speaker 2 (29:36):
So yeah, who needs it? Yeah? Who needs it? Soon
we'll have implants that'll do it all for us.

Speaker 4 (29:41):
Or we can just ask chat GPTMM, pair it.

Speaker 3 (29:43):
With a nice voice mimicking software, and you know we're
we're relevant at that point.

Speaker 2 (29:49):
Oh come on, maybe not irrelevant.

Speaker 3 (29:51):
We still have to like talk at the bot to
train it to sound more like us.

Speaker 1 (29:55):
Oh boy, yeah, I mean, you know you're talking about
aims transforming over time, and that's what I happened over Father's.

Speaker 2 (30:01):
Day saying no attention to the man behind the.

Speaker 1 (30:06):
What do you think before we get to the end
of Father's Day? I think we'll still be around.

Speaker 2 (30:10):
I doing some gallows humor here. I do think we'll
be right.

Speaker 3 (30:15):
I mean me personally as a consumer of podcasts, and
it's of culture. Like if I found out that someone
had replaced my you know, Folger's crystals with Taster's choice
and didn't tell me, I'd be pretty pissed.

Speaker 1 (30:26):
Yeah, and I would also be really suspect I'd be
I'd also be sad if I was listening to a
show that I was a fan of and I learned
that with like the darkest version of that is, a
legendary host passes away and then AI is used to
just keep making episodes of them after death.

Speaker 2 (30:45):
People are kind of losing their their stuff over the
headline saying that Paul McCartney is it was it was
a date through his support by AI technology being used
to create a quote unquote final Beatles. So what if
you read below the headline, you really They actually just
used AI as a restoration tool to lift out a

(31:05):
vocal that John Lennon made as a demo while playing
the piano and singing on like a pretty low fire
recording setup. So they cleaned it up, separated it from
the piano, and allowed it to be used in a
multi track recording capacity. Is the song going to be
any good?

Speaker 3 (31:19):
I don't know, irrelevant, but they didn't like do a
Tupac hologram version John Ryan's voice, And I frankly think
most people who are actual fans of art and culture
won't stand for that. You know, I would like to
think that, I would like to I would like to
think that as well. And you know I mean full disclosure, folks. Yes,

(31:39):
this episode is entirely created and hosted by chat Chipet.

Speaker 2 (31:44):
Yep, where were we gonna go with that?

Speaker 1 (31:47):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (31:47):
Well, segue did a segue? Okay?

Speaker 1 (31:49):
So things changing Father's Day got tainted. People would say,
you know it, it became a money grab.

Speaker 3 (31:58):
I think you set it up perfectly, this idea of
it being a second Christmas, you know, to buy a
lot of these, like frankly, you know, sharper image type objects,
you know, for dads that they probably don't even want,
and it's just obligatory kind of gift giving and that
suits the companies more than it does the dads, frankly.

(32:18):
And then once that becomes really really clear, it does
start to have a bit of a taint to it,
doesn't the Yeah, I mean.

Speaker 1 (32:25):
Just just send your dad a text and say something
that you think is cool about him, and make sure
it's sincere. Don't You don't have to wait for a
specific day to do that, you know. And of course,
like all of these holidays, like we learn with Mother's Day,
Father's Day is not just celebrated in the US, and

(32:45):
it's not just celebrated at the same time. People all
around the world celebrate something like Father's Day at different
periods in the year. Have you heard of this practice
of wearing a red rose if your father's alive and
a white one if he's dead. Not that seems frankly, invasive,
it does.

Speaker 3 (33:03):
I mean, cool, let's have a conversation about our dead
dads as I was, I supposed to ask.

Speaker 2 (33:07):
Me about my dead dad's you know what that would say?

Speaker 1 (33:10):
Yeah, yeah, I don't think they thought that one threw
all the way.

Speaker 3 (33:15):
Yeah, I was just not aware of this as a custom.
But what about you know, maybe non traditional male role
models or or you know, frankly father figures, you know, like,
you know, my dear dear friend Harry, he's actually coming
to visit over Father's Day weekend. It occurred to me
like he's the closest thing I have to a father,

(33:36):
and I'm gonna he's going to the same brunch that
I'm going to. And it was just kind of a
happenstance that occurred that way. But I'm kind of glad
that it did, because I do think of him in
that same way.

Speaker 2 (33:45):
Are you going to get him a card? Hell? No?
Are you going to get him a tie? No, he
doesn't aware a tie. I'll get him a hair tie.
What's the situation? Unclear?

Speaker 3 (33:53):
But I am going to take him to brunch and
then host him my house and cook him a barbecue
and spend some good time with him. Because he's a
true friend and someone that I've always looked up to
in that way, you know, without an actual living father.
So that's that's an interesting role too, is like what
about the uncles, the uncles, the grandfathers, the families of

(34:13):
the world, you know, Yeah, they.

Speaker 1 (34:15):
Also get honored on that day sometimes because you know you,
as you go through life, you do run into people
who fulfill some of those roles.

Speaker 2 (34:26):
Right.

Speaker 1 (34:26):
You may not be able to speak with your biological mother,
you may not be on the best terms with her,
but you might have a mother figure in your life.
And the same goes with parents, with siblings, with all
all the loved ones you can imagine, so they should
be celebrated as well. And I think that's I think
that's kind of cool. I think that's inclusive. I do

(34:47):
think it's interesting that there's a Father's Day thing tied
to Roman Catholicism.

Speaker 3 (34:52):
Yeah, celebrated in countries like Spain and Portugal, observed on
the feast of Saint Joseph. It's the central if the
patron saint of fathers, manly men.

Speaker 1 (35:07):
We cut some off air time where we decided to
look up the Saint Saint Joseph why why is that
Father's Day? Saint Joseph the Worker is patron saint of
a couple of different things. They always are, right, Let's
see the patron saint of fathers nailed it?

Speaker 2 (35:27):
Got it?

Speaker 1 (35:27):
Uh?

Speaker 2 (35:28):
He is also vibes you said, the worker? You know
he is also a work patron state of workers.

Speaker 1 (35:35):
Anybody who's married, anybody who's been exiled.

Speaker 2 (35:39):
Wait a minute, what's that? Last? Yeah?

Speaker 1 (35:41):
All right, last one was a was a shyamalan for us? Uh,
the sick and the dying and patron saint of a
holy death? Wait?

Speaker 2 (35:49):
What's holy death? You know that a spell? And like
elden ring? That really does sound like is.

Speaker 4 (35:55):
That like dying with honor? If you're a cleon, I'm.

Speaker 1 (35:59):
You know, you guys are onto some great things here.
We'll have to learn more about it. I am not Catholic,
I'm not a Christian, nor I don't know what to
say about it.

Speaker 3 (36:10):
I do know what to say about the Taiwanese celebration
of Father's Day. Much like our pal who wanted it
to be on his birthday, this celebration is in fact
on my actual birthday, August the eighth, fifth day of
the eighth month, which is a fun, you know, little
little thing with.

Speaker 2 (36:25):
My birthday's eight, eight eighty three. Fun to stay out loud.

Speaker 3 (36:28):
But yeah, immediately saw this and thought of that guy
that like wanted to have Father's Day beyond his birthday.

Speaker 2 (36:33):
I'm like, we are not the same.

Speaker 3 (36:35):
It's not my idea, but like the cut of whom's
ever jib in Taiwan decided to hold it on that day. Well,
actually sounds like it was because the Mandarin Chinese word
for eight sounds like the word papa. Well, do you know,
you know, I know, you know a bit of Mandarin.

Speaker 2 (36:50):
Yeah, yeah, I know, I know a little bit.

Speaker 3 (36:52):
It's bash. Thanks Jatgypt, You're the best bah. And so
the eighth day, eighth month.

Speaker 2 (37:03):
Got it? You said twice it becomes papa.

Speaker 1 (37:05):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, And uh look here we have to
do it, noel Uh. It's our first time in uh
in the new studio. The Man, the myth, the legend, himself,
our resident rock star, Matt Frederick wearing he's wearing his
sunglasses inside. He's got a fresh haircut. Hey, Matt fresh, Matt,

(37:26):
you got something to say to the people.

Speaker 2 (37:27):
Can even hear us high over? He's so cool? He's
so cool. Listen to that. Yeah, the swagger, the swagger
in that voice. We have to figure out a way
to get Matt back.

Speaker 3 (37:39):
Well, obviously he's here. It's easier to accomplish. We can
just you know, invite him in.

Speaker 2 (37:43):
But yeah, do you want to come in?

Speaker 3 (37:45):
Come in for the second episode. We're about to do
another one. He's like, no, I've got a battle.

Speaker 2 (37:49):
I got He's gonna surf.

Speaker 1 (37:51):
He's got a skate. I think he surf on a phone. Okay, okay,
that guy is too cool for school. Really, And like Taiwan,
Thailand has their own Father's Day and Thailand is tied
to the birthday of a former king whose name I'm
going to attempt and mess up. It's cool, let's both

(38:13):
try it. So boom.

Speaker 3 (38:18):
Yeah, don't boom ball sound like a Mario character, like,
you know, like the giant bomb guy with the crown
I forget his or it feels.

Speaker 1 (38:28):
Like the big sport in like a children's sci fi
show We got to play?

Speaker 3 (38:35):
Yeah, exactly, dude. I discovered a new sports when I
was in Philly. There were these like weird curved tables
with a it's just like a ping pong table. But
they're curved and apparently you kick a ball on it
and bounce it. It's like ping pong or pickleball, but you
play it with your feet. And apparently it is from

(38:55):
from Spain or that's cool. And I've never seen these
tables anywhere. They look kind of like in your skate rams.
So anybody out there that knows what the hell this
thing is, let let us know.

Speaker 1 (39:04):
And anyone who can help us with pronunciation of names
the tyroyal family, let us know, because I have to
learn that stuff.

Speaker 2 (39:13):
I have to go.

Speaker 1 (39:15):
I don't think I told you I'm going to I
have to. I have to go to Thailand, have to
go to Tylober.

Speaker 2 (39:21):
I'm sorry. That's rough. That's awesome, that's really exciting.

Speaker 3 (39:27):
Godspeed, and yeah, just you know, surely there's a chat
GPT out that.

Speaker 1 (39:34):
I could just uh, I could have like a little
thing around my neck.

Speaker 2 (39:38):
It's just chat gpt.

Speaker 1 (39:39):
Instead of like a slate with some chalk, you know, right,
But that day entirely, the December fifth day is always
Father's Day, and.

Speaker 2 (39:50):
I like that December fifth. Leave it at that.

Speaker 1 (39:52):
It doesn't have even that third or fourth thing, you know.
That's that's too complicated.

Speaker 3 (39:58):
Same with the Taiwanese deal. A boom remembered it easy.
Is also my birthday eighty eight also is good luck?
Hey cool, no wonder I've been coasting through life. I
think these many years four as bad. Okay, I said
it's visible by four. I know, but it's double Oh,
it's double four. So it's good.

Speaker 2 (40:16):
You know. We might have to come back to their south,
we might have to workshop. We might want to leave
this one alone. We don't want to uncover any Pandora's
box type situ.

Speaker 1 (40:24):
Yeah, but we do want to wish everybody a halfy
belated Father's Day, A happy Father's Day to you know,
a happy Father's Day to your entire family.

Speaker 2 (40:36):
Max, Max, your cat dad. I think you've described yourself as.

Speaker 4 (40:40):
I am a cat dad. And also sometimes I feel
like I'm y'all's parent, y'all, like I'm more of a
parent's day than a Father's Day to y'all. But I
get that feeling a lot of times, especially when it's like,
you know, trying to find Noel and getting into the
right studio.

Speaker 3 (40:52):
Somebody are always smacking me in the back of the
head and calling me a giant disappointment.

Speaker 4 (40:56):
Yes, n let's hr is listening to this episode and.

Speaker 2 (41:00):
Don't listen our show. Also, I'm older than you.

Speaker 4 (41:02):
Bro, you both are older than me, but I'm still
your father, all right, you're.

Speaker 2 (41:08):
You know what?

Speaker 1 (41:09):
Big thanks to super producer Max Williams, Yeah aka Dad, Big, Big,
thanks to uh Big, Thanks to Alex Williams, who composed
the track. Big thanks to pal Matt who just uh
just has such infectious energy.

Speaker 2 (41:22):
He does he does.

Speaker 3 (41:24):
He is a walking plague of a human in the
positive sense, positive play, positivity play. Thanks to uh Chris
frosciontas here in spirit he's Jeff Coates, Jonathan Strickland. I
bet you we can get him here in person too. Yeah,
you can press to digitate him from one of these
nice you know and deployment of that word.

Speaker 2 (41:41):
Into one of these mic positions. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (41:43):
Also, I owe him an email, so that'll be good time.

Speaker 2 (41:47):
Don't sleep on that, man, I gotta stop. I gotta
wake up.

Speaker 1 (41:49):
I can't keep sleeping on responding to those emails, and
we can't keep sleeping on this new studio. No, this
has been such a fun time. I feel like we
portrayed ourselves a little because we're both all three of us.

Speaker 2 (42:05):
Max to came in and saying, all right, this is
gonna be short.

Speaker 1 (42:08):
When you know what I mean. We got and we got,
we condensed our research. We're gonna make it a punchy
thing about Father's Day and still punchy.

Speaker 3 (42:14):
Uh not in the like lack of sleepway, but like
in the listen to these punchy characters have a good
time talking about stuff.

Speaker 2 (42:20):
And so we liked that and I'm excited.

Speaker 3 (42:21):
It sort of feels like we're opening a new chapter
of the show being here in person with each other and.

Speaker 2 (42:29):
Out with you. We'll see you next time.

Speaker 1 (42:30):
FOS.

Speaker 3 (42:37):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
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