Welcome to the first edition of Charcha Weekly, a hot and crisp newsletter for the nosy millennial on the go. Here we skim through major headlines, share our favourite things to do while hustling through another work-week, and hold hands as we navigate life through a crumbling economy and wounding planet.
First times can be messy, so here is roughly what to expect from this newsletter. For one, there will be news (bummer, I know). Every edition will have a feature story rounding up the biggest drama on the internet that week. Following this will be two smaller news stories worth noting (smaller not in gravity, but in my personal knowledge thereof). Next will be recommendations corner, where I list out a few odd things that kept me entertained that week. This could span TV, movies, YouTube, apps, books, recipes, or a tune that kept me buzzing. To tie it up, I’ll leave you with a cool link; sometimes I might plug my art account (sorry). Overall, we’ll have a good time.
With that out of the way, let’s nosedive into edition one of Charcha Weekly. Get cozy with a beverage and enjoy!
Story: Rahul is a Cheater! Rise and Fall of the Wife Guy
A Wife Guy is a man who owes his fame and online brand to being married to his wife. The term has loose origins, but if you’ve ever seen Ned Fulmer on screen, you’d think he coined it for himself. One of the four in the formerly-Buzzfeed presently-independent comedic group The Try Guys, this self-titled ‘legend of love’ has crooned passionately in audience-packed live tours about his wife, signed TV deals and released cookbooks on Date Night recipes alongside his wife, documented the full extent of their two pregnancies and the process of picking, buying and renovating a home with his wife… the list is endless, but it suffices to say that the man’s brand, career, identity and contribution to his group is inextricably linked, if not exclusive to, his wife.
So when news broke that Ned cheated on Ariel Fulmer with a younger employee and possibly other women through the years — it emerged as more than just a case of infidelity.
This one stings…
There is nothing inherently novel, shocking or turbulent about infidelity in marriage any more. Non-monogamy and an exploration of love outside conventional institutions is inarguably the social zeitgeist. Speaking strictly for myself, an account of X having cheated on Y does not shock me any more than it feeds my already growing apprehension of long-term monogamy — “ah, of course”. Or the more recurrent “fuck men!”. So when I hear of vastly impersonal versions of such account, like Adam Levine sending fuckboy texts to some woman with an absurd body, or John Mulaney posing beamingly with his child born distinctly out of wedlock, I feel nothing but an urge to go on twitter and fill up on the jokes. This time was different.
Ned Fulmer represents a band of men I didn’t fully register the dangers of, until now. The guy that could wax lyrical about how much in love he is with you, only to go seek it for himself elsewhere. The guy that can build an audience of millions on the back of his exemplary marriage, on the sole lure that we might have our own one day, only for all of it to be hollow. What also broke with such a marriage, is the illusion and promise of love and soulmate-ship that Ned and Ariel offered us for close to a decade. We ate that shit up.
Family Guys
Another horror that leaps out at me is the fragility of blasting parasocial relationships on full display for an audience of millions, without accounting for exit options. For example, the Try Guys have been doing stupid shit for cameras for eight years now, but as they started to form relationships outside of the quartet, the horizon of willing participants on their videos also expanded. Ariel Fulmer was most camera shy in early days but now marshals an interior makeover series and Date Night recipe videos almost on her own. We’ve seen Wesley Fulmer since when he was a kicking foetus in Ariel’s womb, who now makes salads alongside dad on YouTube. We were even made privy to the recent arrival of Finley Fulmer, as if close family. The Fulmers are irretrievably of the ranks of a ‘family channel’, unsuspecting members of which can never really escape the public eye. Wes and Finn never asked to be hoisted in front of the camera, or be made to learn of dad’s infidelity through a twitter meme, no?
The same patterns repeat with the other three Guys, whose partners, pets and parents have all become part and parcel of the Try brand — the partners have even come to have their own podcast where people tune in by the thousands. This absurd display of parasocial relationships, a strange all-my-decks-on-the-table-for-you-to-see approach, has worked well for the Try Guys. The group sells so much more than their comedy: it sells a life replete with love, family and lots of ad revenue money. It’s sickly, but it works — ask any of their 8 million subscribers. But if shit goes south with any of these partners, pets or parents, how do they leave without announcing their departure and reasons thereof to that big a world? Is that a fair burden to place on loved ones for sake of brand and online identity? Well, maybe the coin is that good.
What about her?
Not to be remiss of party number two in this mess: one Alexandria Herring. A young and lively Try Guys Producer, Alex appears in many food videos for the channel, and commandeers the rest from behind the camera. She famously produced a video where Ariel delivers a touching monologue on her body image issues post pregnancy, and insecurities around being less-than for Ned (all while Alex was having relations with him — sure gives me the ick). It is also worthwhile to recount that Alex has been engaged to one Will Thayer, her beau of eleven years, through all this.
But Alex, most importantly, is an employee of the company Ned founded, is younger than him by many years, and is rightfully recused from the wrath of the internet in this matter. The fact is that Ned had relations with an employee, in keeping with his past habits and drunk tendencies, and this employee only happened to be in an unhappy relationship of her own at the time. To me, this is not a taali-do-haath-se-bajti-hai scenario. This is a classic case of men wielding authority and power, in both professional and personal lives, over women only professionally subordinate to them. This is about Ned Fulmer being an utterly unprofessional man-in-power — throwing away his company, audience, fans, family and integrity for a brief salacious powerplay.
So now…
Ned has been terminated from his audience-facing roles at Try Guys, but continues to hold stake at the parent company, 2nd Try. The statement came mere hours after rumours made rounds on twitter, but it’s said that they knew for several weeks. So did Ariel, who was seen posting about homemade pizza nights up until things blew up online. A fresh video now shows the couple walking up to their Tesla, all smiles and waves at the paps, setting off to pick kids up from school. It sure does not inspire feminist confidence. Whatever the outcome of their personal lives, one thing has been made clear — men are bad, husbands are worse, but men who can’t shut up about being husbands are the real fucking devils.
Quickie 1: Maybe say feminazi?
Italy just appointed its first official girlboss. Problem is, she’s a bit scary. Twitter warned us there’s shady shit afoot with the Italian elections, but CNN comparing her to Mussolini makes one sit up straight.
Giorgia Meloni of the ‘ultraconservative’ Brothers of Italy party secured a clear victory in Italy’s general elections this week and now awaits parliamentary vote of confidence to assume prime minister’s office. At the heart of Meloni’s politics is a familiar stay-where-you-are belief system, that shuts out immigrants and shoos away rescued refugee boats from Italian shores. I say ‘familiar’ because Italy is notorious for taking anti-immigration stances through the years — the Island of Lampedusa, a geopolitically sensitive port in the Mediterranean, has seen many crackdowns and blockades in recent history (such as the blockade of Sea-Watch 3 in 2019) to prevent rescued refugees from entering national grounds. With Meloni’s upcoming reign, there is a terrifying promise of permanent refugee blockades on all Italian ports.
Meloni openly heralds neo-fascism in Italy, marked by her tricolour-flame insignia that’s reminiscent of the Mussolini reign, her very loud dismissal of “illegals”, queers and sex workers, and blood-boiling ‘feminist’ takes on why abortion is the woooorst *eyeroll*. What’s interesting is while the rest of the world seems to be freaking the fuck out about this, Italians seem pretty chill and maybe even nostalgic. Native libs are rooting for Miss Girlboss to slaaaaay as their first woman premier. Boomers seem happy to finally have their own petite Trump who speaks to true caucasian values. Looks like, as with other 90s trends, fascism is back in vogue. And just like Trump’s America, Bolsonaro’s Brazil or NaMo’s India, Italy wants in.
Quickie 2: All’s well that ends Veil
The #MahsaAmini tag you’re seeing take over your instagram and twitter feeds, accompanied with farsi text and several thousand likes, is not annoying advertising. It’s a shrill scream for attention amid a world of apathy about what’s happening in Iran right now, and we need to listen.
Mahsa Amini was 22 years old when she was arrested for not wearing the hijab one afternoon in Tehran by Iran’s morality police, the Guidance Patrol. She succumbed to inhumane treatment and police brutality two days later, on 18 September 2022. Iran quickly erupted in protests against gendered violence and a larger question of the mandatory hijab, which have now escalated online and offline. Women are shunning the hijab, baring their heads, chopping off their hair in public — all very punishable offences in Iran. Law enforcement is dealing with it in the worst way possible: deploying metal pellet guns, tear gas and water cannons to break up protestors, with official orders asking them to “confront [protestors] mercilessly, going as far as causing deaths”. Naturally, they’ve killed 83 people to date, and gravely wounded in the hundreds.
Fight against the hijab in Iran has undoubtedly excited many beer-bellied uncles in lighter countries (and the saffron ones in India). This could mean that schools, offices and public spaces could ask hijabi women to not put that weird thing on their heads because even their ethnic nation doesn’t want them to. White feminists also seem beyond excited to liberate hijabi women’s scalps. But point to note is that this is inherently not an anti-hijab fight. Women in Iran aren’t chopping off their hair because they hate the feel of cloth over their heads, and hijabi women in France aren’t fighting the law because they love the sun protection. This is about one thing alone — choice. Women in and out of Iran want to do with their body and put on their body as they please. They don’t want to be ostracized as minority for covering their heads, and they don’t want to be arrested and killed for not.
Women everywhere know well the dehumanising frustration of constantly being told what to wear. This is a much larger demonstration of that pent up frustration. Iran is burning in flames because the state refuses to give up control over its women — a revolution that has been long in the making. All eyes are on Irani grounds: the next few weeks could significantly alter its sociopolity. Stay tuned for updates.
D-Recs corner
Welcome to the recommendations corner, powered by the ghosts of that instagram account I ran in lockdown (RIP @disharecs). D-Recs is a better name, no? (Let me answer that for you: no).
This week I watched…
Succession, fucking finally. I watched it while being ill so it was a slower, more investigative process (i.e. I went on reddit after every episode because this brain was incapable of forming a single original thought). You don’t need a newsletter column to tell you it’s a brilliant show and three seasons pass by very, very quickly if you’re in good health. Obviously, highly recommend.
I also watched a lot of chaotic gaming on the YouTube channel Let’s Game It Out. When you give a young man with a nasal tone and a curiosity for destruction developer keys to cutting-edge video games and an audience of millions who will watch him stack giraffes up to the moon… strange things can happen. But rest assured they will make for many laughs and solid entertainment. My favourite of the lot is the tech support series, planet zoo and hospital of horror. It’s impossible not to mention so many more; it’s very good stuff, in case you’re looking to waste time.
For true crime junkies: check out Girl in the Picture, a power-packed documentary sure to keep you glued to the screen, gaping. I really liked the pace and the sheer number of plot-twists on this one. If you’re looking for something light-hearted and sprightly, I thought Janhvi Kapoor’s Good Luck Jerry was a surprisingly fun watch!
Weekly rave
This is an agenda segment where I swoon over something new I tried that week that worked better than I expected, and get everyone reading to try it too so we can all hold hands and swoon together.
For my weekly rave, I want to shout from rooftops about the joys of sesame oil as hair oil. I read about this online on Wednesday and immediately demanded a champi from maa, this time with the nutty-scented, very light to touch sesame oil from the kitchen. I let the oil sit overnight and washed it per routine the morning after, and I lack the poetic skill to aptly describe the lush, shine and fullness it left my hair with for atleast two days to follow. If my throat was well and if I had access to a rooftop, you’d hear exactly how loud and enthu this recommendation is. Get your hair some sesame magic!
Pro tip for my long-haired friends: I also learnt a cool lesson from skinfluencer mom @/komalbasith on shampoo ethic. Only the roots and scalp part of our hair has essential oils and gathers dust; our lengths are just dead protein. So, shampoo goes only on the scalp, to cleanse and restore those oils, and conditioner goes only on the lengths, to nourish those dead cells. This practice has done my hair a lot of good, give it a try.
Tune therapy
I had a weird spell of a couple months where I just… didn’t listen to music. It felt tedious to plug in earphones, all tunes seemed tired, all playlists felt overplayed. Earlier this week, on a long breezy morning walk, I willed myself to skim the surface of my liked songs and actually give them a listen. What emerged is a wonderful, beginner-friendly playlist of alt-grooves and mellow dancey music, featuring some favourite and some forgotten artists. Here’s that Spotify playlist.
Anyone who’s endured long hours of a house party with me knows the next mix of songs I’m going to plug. This music is just… wrong. It’s weird, frustrating, all of the bad things. But you just can’t fucking stop listening. Think Get Lucky by Daft Punk but beat one and three are swapped. Or the USSR Anthem, but its Britney’s greatest hits. Or my top pick of the lot, a rendition of All I Want for Christmas that puts Mariah’s original to shame. Here’s that partystopper (or pooper?) of a YouTube mix.
Can I trust you with a recipe?
The South-east Asian Larb is traditionally a fatty, spicy, zesty mince salad made with chicken or pork, eaten with rice or lettuce cups. I developed a vegetarian version after binging on a season of Masterchef Aus where they made it more than once (okay just twice, but it’s weird it happened twice). I make it out of just soya or add veggies depending on how much protein I want for the day.
Here is the link to my super simple recipe you can count on for quick rainy day dinners! It comes together in 15 minutes and feeds 1-2. Do write to me if you end up making it.
And that’s the week’s charcha!
You’ve successfully read (or skimmed through — it’s fine, we all have attention spans of a fire ant) edition one of my little homeproject. Hope the charcha brightened up your day and added small value to your life. As a thank you present, here is a link to archived Tintin comics in high quality PDF, downloadable and printable (some can be used as colouring books too). Have a cracking week, see you next Sunday!
After a hectic week & the weekend, reading this felt like breathing fresh air!