Did You See? with Jena and Michelle

Did you see the buzz about the new trad wife novel, Yesteryear?

What is it about trad wife influencers that's so captivating – even to die-hard feminists? In this episode, Jena and Michelle dive into the world of trad wife content: where it comes from, how it evolved from family vlogging into a warmly-lit homesteading aesthetic, and why so many people find it hard to look away. That conversation serves as the backdrop for Yesteryear, [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/780686/yesteryear-a-gma-book-club-pick-by-caro-claire-burke/] the buzzy debut novel by Caro Claire Burke. [https://www.tiktok.com/@caroclaireburkeee] Its heroine, Natalie, is a modern-day trad wife influencer who wakes up in 1855 and has to survive the reality she'd been romanticizing online. Jena and Michelle discuss what the book gets right about performance in life and online, where it falls short, and why its premise was compelling enough for Anne Hathaway to purchase the film rights while the manuscript was still a first draft. IF YOU WANT TO STAY SPOILER-FREE WHILE LISTENING, SKIP AHEAD FROM 26:20-34:30. They also explore the growing scrutiny of momfluencers and family vlogging, and what impact it can have on the children who appear in their parents’ content. Plus: Pope Leo has spoken on AI and humanity, and Stephen Colbert says goodbye to The Late Show.  Find us on Substack! * Michelle Ciulla Lipkin: https://michelleciullalipkin.substack.com/ [https://michelleciullalipkin.substack.com/] * Feed for Thought by Jena Wuu: www.feedforthought.com [http://www.feedforthought.com] Read our writing about trad wives:  * From #childlesscatladies to #childfreebychoice (Part I), [https://www.feedforthought.com/p/from-childlesscatladies-to-childfreebychoice] Feed for Thought, [https://www.feedforthought.com/] 2025.  Check out our recs:  * Like, Follow, Subscribe [https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Like-Follow-Subscribe/Fortesa-Latifi/9781668080504?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=23865952718&gbraid=0AAAAADv-uEkCIDQ7jZCMcSuWlj8FsS0lE&gclid=CjwKCAjw5s_QBhAdEiwADD_gBqGdaUxUfVCG4txAAFstN8vEplkjxYkCcgntzneD3WK4VlkUKDj8_BoCpXIQAvD_BwE] by Fortesa Latifi, 2026. * The House of My Mother: A Daughter’s Quest for Freedom [https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-House-of-My-Mother/Shari-Franke/9781668065396] by Shari Franke, 2025.  * Bad Influence: The Dark Side of Kidfluencing, [https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/bad-influence-the-dark-side-of-kidfluencing-release-date-news] 2025.  * The Devil in the Family: The Fall of Ruby Franke [https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/13/arts/television/the-devil-in-the-family-ruby-franke-hulu.html], 2025.  * Educated [https://tarawestover.com/book] by Tara Westover, 2018.  * An Update on our Family, [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-sbt3TN6L4] 2025. Want to learn more?  * The Caro episode, [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-caro-episode/id1761438573]Diabolical Lies, 2026. * Child Influencer Project - UK and Ireland, [https://www.essex.ac.uk/research-projects/child-influencer-project] University of Essex. * I was raised in conservative evangelicialism. Yesteryear missed its mark. [https://www.the-pom.com/p/i-was-raised-in-conservative-evangelicalism], The Pomegranate, 2026.  * Meet the queen of the ‘trad wives’ (and her eight children), [https://www.thetimes.com/magazines/the-sunday-times-magazine/article/meet-the-queen-of-the-trad-wives-and-her-eight-children-plfr50cgk] The Times, 2024.  * MomTok is the apotheosis of 21st-century womanhood, [https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2024/10/momtok-secret-lives-of-mormon-wives-review-feminism-beauty-domesticity/680410/] The Atlantic, 2024.  * The rise and fall of the trad wife, [https://www.newyorker.com/culture/persons-of-interest/the-rise-and-fall-of-the-trad-wife] The New Yorker, 2024.  * Shari Franke tells all, [https://open.spotify.com/episode/1EFSbIOml0QOp4LrobkaHd] Under the Influence with Jo Piazza, 2025.  * She gave birth two weeks ago. Now she’s in a beauty pageant., [https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/30/style/ballerina-farm-mrs-world-hannah-neeleman.html] New York Times, 2024.  * The trad wife paradox, [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-trad-wife-paradox-with-anne-helen-petersen/id1710609544?i=1000666979786] What Now? with Trevor Noah (guest: Anne Helen Petersen), 2024.  * TN bill regarding children in social media content heads to gov’s desk, [https://eu.tennessean.com/story/entertainment/2026/04/14/tn-sets-limits-on-monetized-content-featuring-kids-what-to-know/89588100007/]The Tennessean, 2026.  * Utah passed a law to protect child influencers, [https://www.teenvogue.com/story/utah-passed-a-law-to-protect-child-influencers] Teen Vogue, 2025.  * Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke review – the downfall of an all-American trad wife, [https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/apr/16/yesteryear-by-caro-claire-burke-review-the-downfall-of-an-allamerican-tradwife] The Guardian, 2026.  * Yesteryear with Caro Claire Burke: trad wives, secret lives, and twist ending, [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/yesteryear-with-caro-claire-burke-trad-wives-secret/id1350320411] Be There in Five, 2026.  Links from the open: * Anthropic co-founder Chris Olah’s remarks on Pope Leo XIV’s encyclical “Magnifica humanitas,” [https://www.anthropic.com/news/chris-olah-pope-leo-encyclical]Anthropic, 2026. * Magnifica Humanitas, [https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/encyclicals/documents/20260515-magnifica-humanitas.html] The Holy See, 2026.  * Main takeaways from Pope Leo’s encyclical on AI, [https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/25/us/pope-leo-encyclical-highlights.html] New York Times, 2026.   * Only in Monroe, [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJTXB5uT_C4&t=339s] Monroe Community Media, [https://www.monroecommunitymedia.org/] 2026. * Wanton destruction of CBS property – Letterman & Colbert toss stuff off the roof of the Ed Sullivan, [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBKWKu2Rqxc] The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, 2026.

Did you see that Australia banned social media for kids?

Australia implemented the world's first under-16 social media ban in late 2025. Now, the government's own compliance report confirmed what a lot of people predicted: a substantial proportion of Australian kids are still on these platforms. So is the ban working? And more importantly, is a ban the right answer to the teen mental health crisis? In this episode, Jena and Michelle trace how we got here, and how a deeply emotional debate about teen mental health became a mandate for governments to simply cut kids off from social media. They dig into what the Australian law actually covers, why banning access may be quietly letting platforms off the hook, and what the research actually says versus what the headlines told us. Plus: our thoughts on the new book, Yesteryear, and the Met Gala. Find us on Substack! * Michelle Ciulla Lipkin [https://michelleciullalipkin.substack.com/] * Feed for Thought by Jena Wuu [https://www.feedforthought.com/] Read our writing about social media and teen mental health: * Michelle Ciulla Lipkin's response to The Anxious Generation [https://namle.org/the-anxious-generation-response-michelle-ciulla-lipkin/], NAMLE newsletter, 2024.  * Is the online child safety debate for young people, or for adults? [https://www.feedforthought.com/p/is-the-online-child-safety-debate], Feed for Thought, [https://www.feedforthought.com/] 2026.  Check out our recs: * Is social media bad for kids' mental health? [https://opentodebate.substack.com/p/is-social-media-bad-for-kids-mental-health], Aspen Ideas Festival, 2023. * Growing Up in Public: Coming of Age in a Digital World [https://devorahheitner.com/growing-up-in-public/] by Devorah Heitner, 2023.  Want to learn more? * Anxious Generation Movement [https://www.anxiousgeneration.com/] * Health advisory on social media use in adolescence, [https://www.apa.org/topics/social-media-internet/health-advisory-adolescent-social-media-use] American Psychological Advisory, 2023. * Social Media Minimum Age: Compliance Update, [https://www.esafety.gov.au/sites/default/files/2026-03/SocialMediaMinimumAgeComplianceUpdateMarch2026.pdf] Australia eSafety Commissioner, March 2026. * Social Media and Youth Mental Health [https://www.hhs.gov/surgeongeneral/reports-and-publications/youth-mental-health/social-media/index.html], Office of the Surgeon General (US Department of Health and Human Services), 2023. * The great rewiring: Is social media really behind an epidemic of teenage mental illness? [https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-00902-2], Nature, 2024.  * We're not the anxious generation [https://joanganzcooneycenter.org/2025/11/06/were-not-the-anxious-generation/] by Maximilian Milovidov, 2025.