Ashley:
00:00:04
Hi there, Taboo Science listeners.
Ashley:
00:00:06
This is a very special Q& A episode where I talk about my experience
Ashley:
00:00:11
making the Philias miniseries all about the science of kinks and fetishes.
Ashley:
00:00:15
If you're brand new to the podcast, I'd recommend pressing stop on this
Ashley:
00:00:19
one and listening to another just to get a feel for what this show is about.
Ashley:
00:00:23
You can always come back to this one if you want to.
Ashley:
00:00:25
The first episode of Philias is the episode entitled, How Many Kinks Exist?
Ashley:
00:00:30
And that's a great place to start.
Ashley:
00:00:33
For this episode, I recruited podcasting celebrity, Taboo Science
Ashley:
00:00:37
listener, and my co worker, Arielle Nissenblatt, to interview me.
Ashley:
00:00:42
I hope you like what you hear.
Ashley:
00:00:44
I'll be back at the end to let you know the future plans for the podcast.
Ashley:
00:00:47
Take it away, Arielle.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:10
My name's Arielle Nissenblatt.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:11
I am a big time podcast listener.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:14
I have a podcast recommendation newsletter called Earbuds Podcast
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:17
Collective, and I've been working in the podcast space since 2017.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:21
Right now, I am Ashley's coworker at Descript.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:24
I am on the community team there.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:26
So I live and breathe podcasts, both in my professional and in my personal life.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:30
And I am here today.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:32
Because I am going to interview Ashley about Taboo Science.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:35
I have been listening for a few years now.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:38
I am especially a huge fan of the series that just wrapped up that
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:41
I think we're going to be spending a lot of time talking about today.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:44
And I think everybody should be a fan of the show.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:46
So I'm here to spread the word.
Ashley:
00:01:48
Yay.
Ashley:
00:01:49
I'm super excited to talk to you.
Ashley:
00:01:51
So let's get started.
Ashley:
00:01:52
Get into it.
Ashley:
00:01:53
Let's go.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:54
So we have a bunch of questions here today, some that I
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:01:58
have written, some that you have written that you kind of want to ask yourself,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:02:01
but you're going to have me do it.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:02:02
Then we also have a bunch of questions from the internet, both from YouTube
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:02:06
and from social media, from the people that have been following
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:02:08
Taboo Science for some time now.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:02:11
So let's get started with some questions that I have for you.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:02:14
First, I think, this is front of mind for me, is why did you
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:02:18
decide to do a miniseries on kink?
Ashley:
00:02:21
Yeah, I guess I wanted to do it because I have this really big database
Ashley:
00:02:27
of different topics that, um, are options for covering on the show, and I
Ashley:
00:02:33
started adding a lot of different kinks.
Ashley:
00:02:35
And I realized that I could just dive into all of them in one miniseries.
Ashley:
00:02:39
There's also just sort of a strategy to it.
Ashley:
00:02:42
I had heard that, that miniseries are a good way to like market your
Ashley:
00:02:47
show and to do something new and, um, get people like reinvested in it.
Ashley:
00:02:52
And so I thought this would be the perfect way to, uh, to kind
Ashley:
00:02:55
of, yeah, to figure it out.
Ashley:
00:02:56
And what I didn't realize, uh, overdoing a miniseries, is that it's, it's really cool
Ashley:
00:03:03
to start seeing the patterns between the related topics and you kind of become a
Ashley:
00:03:08
little bit of an expert in the thing that you're covering versus covering a bunch
Ashley:
00:03:15
of disparate topics and kind of having to learn on the go every single time.
Ashley:
00:03:18
You start to be like, oh yeah, no, I remember this fact from this other
Ashley:
00:03:22
topic and so we can tie them together.
Ashley:
00:03:24
Um, so I, I really loved it.
Ashley:
00:03:26
It was, it was great.
Ashley:
00:03:27
I, I want to do it again.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:03:28
In the past, did you do any miniseries that made you want to do
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:03:32
this miniseries or is this your first one?
Ashley:
00:03:34
This is my first one.
Ashley:
00:03:35
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:03:36
Cool.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:03:37
Mini is an interesting word because you did a lot of episodes on Kink.
Ashley:
00:03:42
I did, yeah.
Ashley:
00:03:43
I guess it ended up being
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:03:44
How many
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:03:44
all together?
Ashley:
00:03:45
Nine?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:03:46
That's a lot.
Ashley:
00:03:46
Let me make sure.
Ashley:
00:03:47
Arielle Nissenblatt: That's a big miniseries.
Ashley:
00:03:48
Yeah, yeah.
Ashley:
00:03:49
I think it, I meant for it to be smaller than this and then, um, I
Ashley:
00:03:55
ended up, kinks just kept coming up.
Ashley:
00:03:56
I just had to, there were more and more that I wanted to do, so, yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:04:01
Okay, so now let's get into the content
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:04:03
of the miniseries on kink.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:04:05
Did you have any preconceptions at the beginning of your exploration
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:04:10
into these taboo topics that were shattered or that were reinforced?
Ashley:
00:04:15
So I think, like, I've always been very open minded about kink and, like,
Ashley:
00:04:20
I think it's very, you know, what people are into is, like, that's up to them.
Ashley:
00:04:25
It's not, you know, I'm not gonna yuck your yum, but I definitely had a few
Ashley:
00:04:30
that I was like, well, that one's weird.
Ashley:
00:04:32
Or like, that one's, I mean, people are, I don't know, I don't know about that one.
Ashley:
00:04:35
Like, why would anybody be into that?
Ashley:
00:04:37
Or, um, and I definitely had some just like judgy thoughts that
Ashley:
00:04:41
I just couldn't get rid of, um, about, about a few different ones.
Ashley:
00:04:45
And, um, I, I shattered them completely.
Ashley:
00:04:49
Like, I just, I mean, it completely, learning about all of these
Ashley:
00:04:52
kinks kind of made me realize that, like, they're all the same.
Ashley:
00:04:55
It's, it's all the same.
Ashley:
00:04:57
It's all just stuff that we're kind of, we find ways, I don't
Ashley:
00:05:03
want to say we're wired for it.
Ashley:
00:05:04
So it's like, I'm trying to figure out a better way to say it.
Ashley:
00:05:06
Like, we all just, we grow up, we experience the environment, we experience
Ashley:
00:05:13
things that turn us on, that kind of wire our brains in a new way, and
Ashley:
00:05:17
then we're into that thing, and then that thing is the thing that brings
Ashley:
00:05:20
us pleasure, and, and it's like, it doesn't really matter what it is.
Ashley:
00:05:24
Some people have things that are really common, some people have
Ashley:
00:05:27
things that are like way more niche, but they're, they're all kind of
Ashley:
00:05:31
just flavors of the same thing.
Ashley:
00:05:33
Uh, so I, I feel like now if I learn about a new kink that I've never heard of
Ashley:
00:05:37
before, it, it, I process it a lot better.
Ashley:
00:05:41
I process it of, of just like, oh cool, that's, that's very cool that,
Ashley:
00:05:44
that someone could be into that.
Ashley:
00:05:45
I, I totally understand.
Ashley:
00:05:47
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:05:47
Our brains work in mysterious ways.
Ashley:
00:05:49
They do.
Ashley:
00:05:49
They do.
Ashley:
00:05:50
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:05:51
I first was exposed to the kinks beyond, you
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:05:56
know, the classic ones that you hear of, like, feet, foot fetishes, which
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:00
is, I think, your last episode.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:01
It was your white whale, as you called it.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:02
It was.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:03
Um, and some of the other, like, I don't want to call them mainstream,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:08
they're not mainstream, but they're kinks for a reason, right?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:11
They're paraphilias for a reason.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:12
ABDL, I heard about for the first time listening to Dan Savage's podcast, Savage
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:19
Love, and a bunch of other ones like that.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:22
I learned by listening to Dan Savage in like 2016, and I, that's what first
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:27
exposed me to this, so I feel like me listening to Your miniseries, I
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:32
was sort of desensitized to the, oh my god, people are into that, right?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:35
So it's very interesting and I'm curious how other people took it.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:39
Did you get any people reaching out to say like, this is either
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:42
super inappropriate or appropriate?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:06:44
Did anybody get mad?
Ashley:
00:06:45
So the only one that anyone ever got mad about was the zoophilia episode.
Ashley:
00:06:52
And a good number of people got mad about that one.
Ashley:
00:06:54
Really?
Ashley:
00:06:55
What, on YouTube?
Ashley:
00:06:56
On YouTube, on, I got some Instagram DMs, uh, and I think the big thing was there's
Ashley:
00:07:03
a consent issue there with animals.
Ashley:
00:07:04
Right.
Ashley:
00:07:05
And which I, you know, I tried my best to, to, to, you know, cover that and kind of
Ashley:
00:07:09
show where you did, where they, you know, where this community is coming from there.
Ashley:
00:07:14
Um, and I think a lot of people thought that I didn't come out
Ashley:
00:07:17
strong enough to say that like, it's wrong, but like, that's not
Ashley:
00:07:21
really what the show is there for.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:07:24
You're not an activist in this.
Ashley:
00:07:25
Yeah.
Ashley:
00:07:26
Like I'm, I'm here to humanize groups of people and I
Ashley:
00:07:29
humanized that group of people.
Ashley:
00:07:31
And that's, I mean, I, I was successful in that.
Ashley:
00:07:33
And I think there were still a lot of people who thought that that's not.
Ashley:
00:07:37
what I should have done.
Ashley:
00:07:39
And yeah, you know what?
Ashley:
00:07:40
I, like, to be completely honest, like, that's, that's still on my mind.
Ashley:
00:07:44
I'm still constantly processing that, because this is, some of this stuff
Ashley:
00:07:48
is the most controversial topics that I've ever covered in my life.
Ashley:
00:07:52
Uh, so that's a new skill that you have to learn.
Ashley:
00:07:56
that I feel like I am still learning, um, so I'm not saying that those people are
Ashley:
00:08:00
like 100 percent wrong, but I do feel like that's not the purpose of my show, and if
Ashley:
00:08:06
you want to hear a show that goes after zoophiles, you can find a ton of them.
Ashley:
00:08:11
There are a lot of people who are, who are against that.
Ashley:
00:08:13
Arielle Nissenblatt: Villainize, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ashley:
00:08:16
I mean, otherwise, the feedback has been people, it's mostly people
Ashley:
00:08:22
emailing me saying like, this was such a humanizing episode, like, I feel
Ashley:
00:08:26
like I, you know, either they're in the community or they had heard about it,
Ashley:
00:08:30
and they just, they really appreciated how like nuanced and, um, sensitively
Ashley:
00:08:37
I, I covered a lot of the topics.
Ashley:
00:08:39
So yeah, I mean, most of the feedback has been good.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:08:42
So in past episodes, you know, all of the other taboo topics
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:08:47
that you've covered leading up to this.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:08:48
What would you say, on average, how many emails would you get per episode?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:08:53
How many comments would you get on YouTube?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:08:55
And then, what I'm getting at here is, how much did it spike from this miniseries?
Ashley:
00:09:00
Yeah, the, the feedback has spiked a lot, uh, from this miniseries.
Ashley:
00:09:03
In the beginning, there still was, you know, I mean, it ramped up.
Ashley:
00:09:06
Um, and actually YouTube, the, I've had this whole process with YouTube
Ashley:
00:09:10
that maybe I'll, I'll mention too, but like, with YouTube, the The
Ashley:
00:09:14
feedback has just skyrocketed.
Ashley:
00:09:17
Yeah, generally, like, per episode, maybe I'll get two to five emails, and
Ashley:
00:09:24
then YouTube comments go from anywhere from 10 to, boy, I think the biggest
Ashley:
00:09:30
one has like 50 on it, or maybe more.
Ashley:
00:09:33
I haven't actually looked recently, but, um, yeah.
Ashley:
00:09:36
Lots of, lots of feedback.
Ashley:
00:09:37
Lots of, um, lot, a lot more feedback than I am used to as a podcaster, for sure.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:09:41
I think a lot of podcasters have trouble getting
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:09:45
any feedback at all, but if you decide to cover a topic that you
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:09:51
know a lot of people are going to have opinions about, that's one way.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:09:53
That's one way, and you do it well.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:09:55
That is one way of getting people to slide into those DMs.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:09:59
Totally.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:09:59
Um, Ashley, do you have one?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:10:02
Most important thing that you've learned.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:10:03
Can you pinpoint a few lessons or one particular lesson?
Ashley:
00:10:07
Yeah, I think the biggest thing I've learned is
Ashley:
00:10:10
that we all experience shame.
Ashley:
00:10:12
I think, I think this, this podcast has really given me an education in shame.
Ashley:
00:10:17
Um, and that shame is something that when we experience it, our Knee jerk
Ashley:
00:10:26
reaction is to hide it and to cover it up and to not address it and doing
Ashley:
00:10:32
that causes all of the problems.
Ashley:
00:10:35
It's the, it makes, it just seeps into every part of your life and
Ashley:
00:10:40
it, it poisons your relationships and it, and it just makes it so
Ashley:
00:10:45
that you can't live as a full human.
Ashley:
00:10:47
Um, and I think that what I've learned is that if you are experiencing shame,
Ashley:
00:10:52
the best thing you can do is talk to someone about it that you trust,
Ashley:
00:10:56
either a friend, if you have someone that you trust, or, or a therapist.
Ashley:
00:11:00
Um, and obviously with kink, it's like you have to find the right
Ashley:
00:11:03
therapist because therapists can also cause, cause harm with that too.
Ashley:
00:11:07
But yeah, I think it's like, Shame is such a universal and um, and also the reaction
Ashley:
00:11:13
to shame is such a universal and I think it's, it's just I've realized like how
Ashley:
00:11:17
important it is to like, get that out of your system and like, because as soon as
Ashley:
00:11:21
you let it out into the world, it really, I think, from what I've heard from all
Ashley:
00:11:25
the people I've talked to is like, as soon as you get it out, you find out that
Ashley:
00:11:29
it's actually not as bad as you thought it was, and suddenly it dissipates.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:33
Yeah, I mean, that's part of why podcasts like this
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:36
and Reddit forums and other sorts of groups are so important for people to be
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:40
able to search for online so that they don't feel alone, so that they don't
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:43
feel like something's wrong with them.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:45
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:45
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:46
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:46
For sure.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:47
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:47
So thank you for creating.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:51
Ashley, how did you get people to talk about such sensitive
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:55
topics on this podcast?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:11:58
And, where I'm coming to from that is, I know that you work really
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:12:03
hard to, you know, source the right guests for the right episodes.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:12:08
You, and you, and you Go after them and sometimes it takes a really long time.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:12:12
So, you had a combination in this series of like professors and people
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:12:15
who've done research and then people who are advocates for the community,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:12:19
the kink community that they're in.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:12:20
So, how did you find all of those guests?
Ashley:
00:12:22
Yeah, so I, from the very beginning, I took my kind of template
Ashley:
00:12:27
from my asexuality episode, which was the first time that I had had a researcher and
Ashley:
00:12:33
someone from the community in the episode.
Ashley:
00:12:35
And I felt like it made it so well rounded and you got to hear the science,
Ashley:
00:12:39
but you also got to hear the emotion and like the personal experience of it.
Ashley:
00:12:44
And I knew that I wanted to do that with this.
Ashley:
00:12:46
Um, so the researchers were relatively easy as long as I could, you know,
Ashley:
00:12:51
convince them that I'm not a crackpot and I'm, I'm gonna make their, their research,
Ashley:
00:12:55
you know, make, make them look good.
Ashley:
00:12:58
And then, um, and the way that I did that was Every time I got another researcher
Ashley:
00:13:03
on board, I would just send that list to the next person, be like, I have these
Ashley:
00:13:08
people who are going to talk to me.
Ashley:
00:13:10
And sometimes they'd be like, oh, yeah, no, I, I'm a big fan of that person.
Ashley:
00:13:13
I'll go on your show.
Ashley:
00:13:15
So that really worked.
Ashley:
00:13:15
And then for the people to, from the community, that was something that I, I,
Ashley:
00:13:22
it took me a really long time to crack that because nobody wants to talk about,
Ashley:
00:13:28
you their private life on a podcast.
Ashley:
00:13:30
Uh, and so I didn't really know.
Ashley:
00:13:32
I, at first I was like, maybe Reddit, like maybe I can find, so I, I sent
Ashley:
00:13:37
some things out to people on Reddit and I never got any responses.
Ashley:
00:13:40
And, and I knew a few people who were into some of these things.
Ashley:
00:13:44
I won't say who, but like one of the, one of the people that I interviewed
Ashley:
00:13:47
on, on the show actually has, is like a very longtime friend of mine.
Ashley:
00:13:50
And I was just like, Oh yeah, definitely.
Ashley:
00:13:52
I'm going to talk to them about this.
Ashley:
00:13:53
But finally the way that I cracked it was podcasters, like.
Ashley:
00:13:57
Podcasters, there are already people who are podcasting about this.
Ashley:
00:14:00
Yeah, they're already, they're already out there.
Ashley:
00:14:02
Maybe their faces aren't, aren't out there, but their voices are out there.
Ashley:
00:14:05
And they, they seem like they would be happy to, to talk to me.
Ashley:
00:14:09
And that ended up being a really nice double edged sword because not only
Ashley:
00:14:14
were they willing to talk about it and able to talk about it, but also, you
Ashley:
00:14:17
know, you know, you know, of all people,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:14:20
Are you talking cross promos?
Ashley:
00:14:21
Yeah, like getting other podcasters on your show and then they
Ashley:
00:14:24
talk about it on their podcast and then other people come on to listen.
Ashley:
00:14:26
So.
Ashley:
00:14:27
That was a, that was a great, like a winning strategy that I landed on
Ashley:
00:14:31
that I was, I was super happy with.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:14:32
Audience growth.
Ashley:
00:14:32
Yeah,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:14:33
yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:14:34
That's great.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:14:35
Any other controversies that stand out to you?
Ashley:
00:14:38
I had a couple comments about the furry episode.
Ashley:
00:14:41
Hmm.
Ashley:
00:14:41
Um, just in like, like privately from people.
Ashley:
00:14:44
Hmm.
Ashley:
00:14:44
Uh, who maybe were in the community or adjacent to the community who actually
Ashley:
00:14:51
sort of pushed back on me saying that it's not a fetish because they're and and I've
Ashley:
00:14:59
I've tried to kind of wrestle with this too because it is very clear that there is
Ashley:
00:15:02
a furry fetish and it is very clear that like furry pornography is a huge part of
Ashley:
00:15:08
that community and The media has been so awful to furries that there's this, like,
Ashley:
00:15:15
knee jerk, like, pushback on, like, No, no, no, this is totally not a sex thing.
Ashley:
00:15:19
There's no sex involved.
Ashley:
00:15:20
Uh, this is all about just, just fun animals.
Ashley:
00:15:22
And it's like, um, some people kind of were suggesting that I was,
Ashley:
00:15:27
I didn't actually delve into the sex part as much as I could have.
Ashley:
00:15:32
Um, or, or even not, not delve in, but just, like, I think I was protesting
Ashley:
00:15:36
too much that it wasn't a sex thing.
Ashley:
00:15:38
Whereas, like, the sex thing actually is a bigger part of the
Ashley:
00:15:41
community that I portrayed and
Ashley:
00:15:43
yeah, um, and I think what that was just like, I really wanted to do right by my
Ashley:
00:15:49
guests and my guests were saying that
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:15:52
there's a line.
Ashley:
00:15:53
Yeah, it's hard.
Ashley:
00:15:54
It's hard,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:15:55
right?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:15:55
There's a line.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:15:56
You're also not employed by a journalistic outlet that makes it so that you
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:01
must equally represent both sides.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:03
This is up to you.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:04
Ultimately, it's tricky.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:06
You can not.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:07
You can put disclaimers in there.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:08
You can say, here's my methodology.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:10
Here's my ideology.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:11
Here's why I'm thinking this, but that would be a boring episode.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:14
So you put out the episode that is entertaining and is educational and
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:19
is respectful to the people whose time you are asking for as your guests.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:23
And then also your listeners.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:24
I think that providing them with a product that teaches them is great.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:28
And then obviously you are.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:30
admitting to some of the potential shortcomings by having this episode.
Ashley:
00:16:35
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:37
So let's now move to some questions from listeners.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:41
Are you ready?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:41
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:42
Okay, this question comes from Paul, who is your follower on Twitter.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:50
Paul asks, what was the most surprising thing that you learned, and what was the
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:16:53
most fascinating thing that you learned?
Ashley:
00:16:55
Hmm, I, I learned a ton of fascinating things.
Ashley:
00:16:58
I think the thing that comes to mind most right now, that I actually, it
Ashley:
00:17:02
didn't make it into an episode, um, but I think I might make a YouTube short
Ashley:
00:17:06
on it or something, is that in the ABDL community, the diapers they buy, are
Ashley:
00:17:14
made by the same companies that make like medical supply diapers and they, these
Ashley:
00:17:21
companies basically, they saw that there was this community that was buying their
Ashley:
00:17:27
diapers not for a medical need and they were like, oh, Well, what do they want?
Ashley:
00:17:33
Like what we should talk to them.
Ashley:
00:17:35
And they did some user research and they're like, Oh, they
Ashley:
00:17:38
want cute pictures on them.
Ashley:
00:17:40
They want cute colors.
Ashley:
00:17:41
Like, okay, we'll do that.
Ashley:
00:17:42
And they made like a bunch of lines of different cute ABDL diapers,
Ashley:
00:17:48
which I feel like if you look at so many other industries where as soon
Ashley:
00:17:53
as anything, like, for example, I'm listening to a wonderful series on the
Ashley:
00:17:57
history of the magic wand vibrator, uh, and, and what they did, the Hitachi.
Ashley:
00:18:03
Hitachi makes all sorts of like kitchen machines and stuff like that, and
Ashley:
00:18:07
they had this personal massager that ended up becoming this, this like
Ashley:
00:18:11
legendary thing in the sex world.
Ashley:
00:18:14
And they were like, Oh, we're just going to stop making it because we
Ashley:
00:18:18
feel uncomfortable about that, even though it was selling incredibly well.
Ashley:
00:18:21
And someone actually, a different company had to, had to come in
Ashley:
00:18:24
and be like, do not do that.
Ashley:
00:18:25
Like, sell it to us.
Ashley:
00:18:26
We'll, we'll continue to make it.
Ashley:
00:18:29
Like that.
Ashley:
00:18:30
Like capitalism didn't save the day there, right?
Ashley:
00:18:32
It was just sort of like, they're like, no, no, no, we're,
Ashley:
00:18:34
this is associated with sex.
Ashley:
00:18:35
We don't want to be associated with sex, which is what so many companies would do.
Ashley:
00:18:38
And I think it's so cool that this diaper company was like, yeah, okay, cool.
Ashley:
00:18:44
We'll make some stuff for you.
Ashley:
00:18:46
Great.
Ashley:
00:18:46
More diapers for everybody.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:18:48
Wow.
Ashley:
00:18:49
Yeah,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:18:49
that's great.
Ashley:
00:18:50
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:18:50
So that's surprising and fascinating.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:18:54
Did you want to add something else?
Ashley:
00:18:55
Um, another one that maybe didn't make it in was that in the just
Ashley:
00:19:00
general Kinks 101, um, episode, Aella told me that violent porn is actually
Ashley:
00:19:08
most popular among women, not men.
Ashley:
00:19:11
And so a lot of people say, like, we need to, we need to stop violent
Ashley:
00:19:15
porn because it hurts women.
Ashley:
00:19:17
And she pointed out that, like, putting a stop to violent porn actually would
Ashley:
00:19:20
hurt women more because, like, they're the, they're the main consumers of this
Ashley:
00:19:23
stuff, which was so surprising to me, too.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:26
There you go.
Ashley:
00:19:26
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:27
Wow.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:27
So, not only do you teach, you also learn.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:30
Thank you to Paul for that question.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:32
Let's go to this question from YouTube, from Jasmine Stealth 1.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:37
They write, After looking at this, I looked at your web, and I wonder,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:40
with a platform like this, and being introduced to all these things, has it
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:43
affected your personal intimate spaces?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:45
Or are you just fascinated?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:47
And, of course, this is a very personal question.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:49
You can choose how much you would like to tell us, and how much you
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:19:52
would like to keep to yourself.
Ashley:
00:19:53
Totally!
Ashley:
00:19:53
Uh, so yeah, basically the question is, like, Did you introduce any of this
Ashley:
00:19:58
into your own sex life, which I'm not.
Ashley:
00:20:00
No, I didn't.
Ashley:
00:20:01
I'll just say that.
Ashley:
00:20:01
I didn't like my sex life is the same.
Ashley:
00:20:04
Um, but what I was actually expecting was for me, not for, for my libido to
Ashley:
00:20:11
just tank because I was talking about all these things and like, in like this
Ashley:
00:20:15
very clinical way and, um, and very academic way that didn't happen either.
Ashley:
00:20:19
Really, nothing, nothing is different.
Ashley:
00:20:21
There's for me, nothing is different.
Ashley:
00:20:23
You just learned.
Ashley:
00:20:23
I just learned, I learned and I felt, uh, maybe I felt a little bit more
Ashley:
00:20:27
comfortable about my own sexuality, just like, because being able to talk
Ashley:
00:20:33
about this stuff just is, you know, it's a way to break taboos, right?
Ashley:
00:20:37
So, um, it, yeah, that made me, I mean, more comfortable about
Ashley:
00:20:41
my own sexuality in my own way.
Ashley:
00:20:44
Like, personal life.
Ashley:
00:20:45
It still sucks to talk about my podcast with, like, professional
Ashley:
00:20:48
colleagues, but, um, but yeah, not a lot, not a lot changed with that.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:20:54
Does your family know that you made this miniseries?
Ashley:
00:20:58
My mom listens to every episode.
Ashley:
00:21:03
Which is a little, a little mortifying, um, but I do like to say she's the
Ashley:
00:21:09
one who taught me what circumcision was at the dinner table when we were
Ashley:
00:21:13
eating, uh, what were we eating?
Ashley:
00:21:17
Uh, okra.
Ashley:
00:21:18
It was okra in, in gumbo.
Ashley:
00:21:20
And she like, peeled off the outside of the okra to show what that, cause I, I
Ashley:
00:21:24
was like, I don't know, what is this?
Ashley:
00:21:26
No, no, she's a lawyer, but yeah, I was just, yeah, I was like, I was like a
Ashley:
00:21:32
tween and I was like, what circumcision?
Ashley:
00:21:34
She's like, well, uh, and she showed me, so she's not, she doesn't, she
Ashley:
00:21:38
doesn't blush about this stuff.
Ashley:
00:21:39
So I guess that's where I get it.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:21:43
Going back to Jasmine's question about whether
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:21:45
you introduced this into your life.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:21:47
I think another question we can pull from that is how did learning
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:21:52
about ABDL make you feel differently about motherhood because of the
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:21:57
connection to diapers, of course?
Ashley:
00:21:58
Right.
Ashley:
00:21:59
That was another one that I thought I was going to feel really uncomfortable about.
Ashley:
00:22:05
I, I really, when I got into it, I was like, this could, this could
Ashley:
00:22:09
bring up some weird feelings for me.
Ashley:
00:22:10
Um, and it didn't, it didn't because I'm just, I was so happy about that
Ashley:
00:22:15
because the thing is when I learned more about it, it's just a game.
Ashley:
00:22:19
It's just, it's, it's so far removed from actual babies
Ashley:
00:22:23
and actual, like any of that.
Ashley:
00:22:25
It's like, Um, I mean, I love, you know, to bring in Dan Savage, you know, kink
Ashley:
00:22:30
is cops and robbers with your pants down.
Ashley:
00:22:32
Like that's, it's a, it's a game, it's a role play.
Ashley:
00:22:35
Uh, it doesn't really have a lot of connection to real parenthood,
Ashley:
00:22:42
real babies, real diapers.
Ashley:
00:22:44
Um, so it actually, I was fine.
Ashley:
00:22:46
I was, a lot of this was like that.
Ashley:
00:22:48
A lot of this, I was like, oh, I don't know.
Ashley:
00:22:50
And then it was great.
Ashley:
00:22:52
It was great.
Ashley:
00:22:52
And then you were fine.
Ashley:
00:22:53
Yeah.
Ashley:
00:22:53
You're so resilient.
Ashley:
00:22:55
Actually, I will say the one that I did have to do a lot of thinking about, coming
Ashley:
00:23:00
back to this topic again, bazoophilia.
Ashley:
00:23:01
I had to, of course, I think it took me, because they, they pitched me on that.
Ashley:
00:23:06
And I, at first I was like, no.
Ashley:
00:23:09
And then.
Ashley:
00:23:10
I thought about it for a few weeks, and then I decided to do it was basically like
Ashley:
00:23:14
I had to just educate myself for a little while and kind of come around to it, which
Ashley:
00:23:19
I think was one of the reasons that some of these comments were frustrating because
Ashley:
00:23:24
I think I may have started out where they were, and then I thought about it.
Ashley:
00:23:27
Like, I really put in some hard work.
Ashley:
00:23:30
You did the thinking, yeah.
Ashley:
00:23:31
Yeah, and so the, I just saw that these people hadn't thought
Ashley:
00:23:34
about it, and it was frustrating.
Ashley:
00:23:36
But also, like, yeah, they just haven't had as much time with it as I have.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:23:40
Yeah, they need to be exposed to it.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:23:41
And then, maybe over time, their minds open a bit.
Ashley:
00:23:44
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:23:45
But they would probably say, I don't want
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:23:47
to open my mind to this, right?
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:23:48
There's a lot of layers here.
Ashley:
00:23:50
True.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:23:50
We have one more question from a listener.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:23:52
This one comes from Oliver, who sent in the question via email.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:23:56
I'm curious whether there are any kinks slash fetishes you wanted to
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:23:59
cover but couldn't, or any newly emerging kinks which need more
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:24:02
research before they can be covered.
Ashley:
00:24:04
So there's so many kinks that need more research.
Ashley:
00:24:06
There are just, there are just a whole, there's a whole ocean of kinks
Ashley:
00:24:09
that have not been looked at at all research wise, um, and so that's,
Ashley:
00:24:14
that's why this is a mini series, right?
Ashley:
00:24:15
It's like, I can't do an entire podcast that's like 100 episodes
Ashley:
00:24:19
long on this, um, whereas, you know, some people, some people have.
Ashley:
00:24:23
Why are people into that?
Ashley:
00:24:24
Tina Horne's podcast that she, she just talked about on the most
Ashley:
00:24:28
recent episode, they do talk about.
Ashley:
00:24:31
different kinks, but they don't have that research angle.
Ashley:
00:24:34
So they, they have a little bit more freedom there.
Ashley:
00:24:35
But for me, I, yeah, I'm, I'm limited.
Ashley:
00:24:38
But one that I really wish that I had covered was actually sent in by,
Ashley:
00:24:42
by someone via email, was basically like, salirophilia, or like a love
Ashley:
00:24:46
of just, you know, gross stuff, um, which kind of goes in with,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:24:51
you alluded to that.
Ashley:
00:24:52
Yeah.
Ashley:
00:24:52
Yeah.
Ashley:
00:24:53
So I got, I like touched on it, but like people, you know, they, they were asking
Ashley:
00:24:56
about like people who buy soiled underwear on the internet, like what's up with that?
Ashley:
00:25:01
Or like, it's like dirty bath water or things like that.
Ashley:
00:25:04
Yeah.
Ashley:
00:25:05
Yeah.
Ashley:
00:25:05
And I, I, I looked into it and it's just, there isn't a lot there.
Ashley:
00:25:09
I would also love to do one on, on just like pee fetishes.
Ashley:
00:25:12
Not a lot there either.
Ashley:
00:25:14
Um, yeah.
Ashley:
00:25:15
Those are, those are the two, like, just the gross stuff, yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:25:18
That one gets a lot of coverage in media, I think,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:25:22
the pee fetish, but yeah, I guess not enough people doing research on it.
Ashley:
00:25:26
Yeah, I was able to do a tiny bit for that, like, sampler
Ashley:
00:25:29
episode that I did, but I would have loved to do a whole one.
Ashley:
00:25:31
Oh, well.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:25:34
Okay.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:25:34
Those were our questions from your audience.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:25:37
Thank you to Paul, JasmineStealth1, and Oliver, much appreciated.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:25:43
And I think more people will probably have questions as they
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:25:46
continue to discover your podcast.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:25:47
So where can they go to continue asking those questions?
Ashley:
00:25:51
Yeah.
Ashley:
00:25:51
Email me at ashley@tabooscience.show or just tweet at me at Taboo Science.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:25:57
Awesome.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:25:59
Ashley, any other questions, comments that you'd like to make before
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:26:03
we close out this Q& A episode?
Ashley:
00:26:05
Hmm.
Ashley:
00:26:06
I feel like I just want to make it clear that like, I am a straight married
Ashley:
00:26:13
mother that, like, got into this, so it just feels, it feels very, as much
Ashley:
00:26:20
as I've always been interested in this, and I am a Dance Savage listener, and I
Ashley:
00:26:23
just like, like to think and talk about this stuff, I feel like an outsider.
Ashley:
00:26:27
I feel like an outsider looking in on these, these different communities, and,
Ashley:
00:26:30
like, I Like, at first, it started, it would, like, make me blush, and I feel
Ashley:
00:26:34
like I've, I've become desensitized to it a lot over, over the time.
Ashley:
00:26:37
Except at work.
Ashley:
00:26:39
Except at work!
Ashley:
00:26:39
And so, yeah, um, people are like, oh, what is your podcast about?
Ashley:
00:26:43
And I was like, let's change the subject!
Ashley:
00:26:45
Uh, but, um, it's been so fulfilling and great, and I've loved everyone that I've
Ashley:
00:26:53
met through it, um, and I, you know.
Ashley:
00:26:56
Yeah, it's, it's, it's changed me a bit.
Ashley:
00:26:59
Um, so that's been, yeah, it's been really nice.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:01
And you even got to tackle your white whale of
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:04
doing an episode on foot fetishes.
Ashley:
00:27:06
Yes.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:06
So if you haven't listened to that episode yet, listeners,
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:09
viewers, definitely go back because that's, uh, would you call that your, it's
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:13
your white whale, it's your magnum opus.
Ashley:
00:27:15
It was, it was my white whale because It was first on my list.
Ashley:
00:27:18
I was like, obviously I'm going to do one on foot fetishes.
Ashley:
00:27:20
And then I just could not get anyone to respond to me to go on it.
Ashley:
00:27:24
And, uh, eventually I pulled it, I pulled it off.
Ashley:
00:27:27
I finally got, you know, Justin Lehmiller and, and Tina Horn on there.
Ashley:
00:27:32
But, um, yeah, it was, I was actively attempting to do that while
Ashley:
00:27:37
creating the rest of the season.
Ashley:
00:27:38
And finally, finally, I got it all together.
Ashley:
00:27:41
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:41
So podcasters, creators, if you have a specific
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:45
interview in mind, keep pushing.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:47
You never know when it'll come through and make a really great episode.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:51
Yeah.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:52
Well, Ashley, thank you so much for making this mini series and for inviting
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:56
me to ask you questions about it.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:58
I really appreciate it.
Arielle Nissenblatt:
00:27:58
And I look forward to the next mini series and regular episodes.
Ashley:
00:28:01
Yay.
Ashley:
00:28:02
Thanks so much, Arielle.
Ashley:
00:28:03
This was great.
Ashley:
00:28:10
Thanks for listening.
Ashley:
00:28:12
Hope you sated your curiosity.
Ashley:
00:28:14
If you have more questions, definitely reach out.
Ashley:
00:28:16
How to do that, again, is by emailing ashley at tabooscience.
Ashley:
00:28:20
show or tweeting at tabooscience.
Ashley:
00:28:23
This is the final, final episode of Season 4, Philias, and I will be
Ashley:
00:28:29
taking a long break before Season 5.
Ashley:
00:28:32
So, if you want to stay updated on what's next, subscribe to the newsletter.
Ashley:
00:28:36
Just head to tabooscience.
Ashley:
00:28:38
show and enter your email address in the newsletter box.
Ashley:
00:28:41
In the meantime, why not give the show a rating and review on Apple Podcasts?
Ashley:
00:28:45
It'd be really nice.
Ashley:
00:28:47
Thank you, truly, for listening.
Ashley:
00:28:49
When we come back, I hope you tune in to Season 5.
Ashley:
00:28:53
I won't tell anyone.