Natalism and The New York Times

**Josh Boerman** (0:00)
When you want to disseminate a narrative quickly and catch the ear of America's upper middle class, there are plenty of options at your disposal. But one media outlet has proven reliable over the years as a venue for the national conversation. They've published stories that were carefully massaged in the background by political movers and shakers, and then turned right back around and published the words of those same powerful people in their opinion pages. And, surprise surprise, the natalists are working this publication to their ends right now.
This week, join us as we follow in the footsteps of Barry Gibb and try to understand the New York Times' effect on men. My name is Josh Boerman.

**June Sternbach** (0:40)
I'm June Sternbach.

**Josh Boerman** (0:41)
And this is Ill Conceived, a podcast about natalism.
I'm kind of surprised that you're still in that room. I sort of figured you'd be moved by now.

**June Sternbach** (0:56)
I'm sort of like in the process of moving. I have the keys to the apartment. I have actually I got the keys like the day you're in town. So you know this already. But I got the keys to the new apartment. I've just been like so particularly busy. So I've moved some things over, just like smaller things. I don't need day to day, some like books and stuff like that. But otherwise, my room and recording setup is entirely intact.
This weekend is going to be the lion's share of my moving.

**Josh Boerman** (1:25)
What are you most looking forward to in terms of finding new domestic tranquility?

**June Sternbach** (1:30)
It's going to be just the space. I don't really know how to describe it without just posting photos. You've seen my apartment.

**Josh Boerman** (1:36)
Don't dox yourself.

**June Sternbach** (1:38)
No.
You've seen my current apartment though, Josh, in person. And the living room is just oddly shaped. And there's a weirdly large hallway that is sort of shared with the living room. Everything is just so weirdly shaped that it's hard to really do too much.

**Josh Boerman** (1:56)
The ceilings are pretty low. There's a step that tries to kill everybody who goes down it.

**June Sternbach** (2:01)
Every time you've been in town and you've been at my place, you've almost tripped and fallen over the rug, ground step. It's really odd.

**Josh Boerman** (2:09)
No, I almost died numerous times. It wasn't good.

**June Sternbach** (2:13)
No, so I'm looking forward to having a lot more space. It's a much more traditional looking older home on the inside. A deck, oh my God. Okay, sorry, I'm popping off about my new apartment. I have a deck or like a porch.
I didn't have that at my current place. If I wanted to like chill outside.

**Josh Boerman** (2:29)
Oh, like one of those classic Chicago wooden back decks that you can go out. Oh, I love that. I love that.

**June Sternbach** (2:34)
Oh dude, it's like I've been wanting that since I've moved here. Not having that at my current place is, it was disastrous.

**Josh Boerman** (2:41)
I'll tell you this, just from personal experience, homemade lemonade with a little bit of mint out on the back deck in a Chicago summer just hits different than anything else I've ever drunk.

**June Sternbach** (2:55)
It's incredible. There's something about the Chicago deck, the Chicago porch. I love, it's so charming. No other city really has them like this.

**Josh Boerman** (3:02)
I guess as long as we're talking about Chicago too.
Thank you so much to everybody who came out to our live show in Chicago. This week, I guess, in lieu of the World Famous Mailbag, which don't worry, it will return next week. We just wanted to talk a little bit about that and how it went. A lot of people like were able to show up on 4th of July weekend. And I think when we were rescheduling the show, we kind of forgot. I think that it was 4th of July weekend somehow.
At least I did.

**June Sternbach** (3:34)
I totally did. I don't really think about 4th of July that often.

**Josh Boerman** (3:39)
Oh, you don't care about America?

**June Sternbach** (3:42)
You know, I am a little bit of an America hater.

**Josh Boerman** (3:46)
Here's what I like, eating bomb pops, go into the beach, grill in a dang hot dog on the bonfire.

**June Sternbach** (3:55)
I do like a little grill situation. I did get up to a little bit of that on 4th of July, I can't lie.

**Josh Boerman** (4:00)
But yeah, what did you think of the live show?

**June Sternbach** (4:02)