Danswers 15: Sadantha Kaldan Returns!

I've got one thing to say, I love my country of USA and all the things that they give me, but I've never liked doing the pledge or standing for the star spangled banner. Both of those things just seem super strange to me.

That beach-pickup-story was hilarious. Thanks to whoever send that.

I can't speak to Samantha's intended meaning, but I think she was getting at the problem being something that the writer needs to resolve, not that there is necessarily some sort of moral problem with their boundaries. I agree with you that if the writer isn't comfortable with it and can't bring themselves to push their boundaries in that way they should not be pressured into it, however I think that Samantha is very much right that if that is the case then they need to 'get out of the way' to let Polly free herself up to find a relationship that better serves her needs.

Another great episode. Glad to have Samantha back.

@d_w: Same, all throughout highschool most people in my school would stand up for it, but not saying anything. I have no problem doing it now that I serve in my town's local government.

Also I have to agree with someone else up there with the "Polly" answer. That really threw me off and seemed totally out of character for this podcast.

Good on almost all counts but not sure what the shoe conspiracy theory is all about. Shoes are often uncomfortable and often dirty. Completely rational and practical reasons to want to take them off.

Samantha, you're the best. You really are.

At least how I read it the Polly answer was more about not getting in her way with a potential relationship that will never come to frution.

Either you gotta try something new and see how it feels or get out of there in respect to her.

Antyhing else is just stringing someone along that you're not up for a real thing with.

Great to have Samantha back on the show,and she is totally right about have male voices speaking out against things that guys do. As a male, I am thankful everyday that I had a great mother that pretty much raised me herself to teach me the right way to do everything.
Also when I went to middle school, I stopped doing the pledge of allegiance, as I did not feel like it was important for me to do, and being in Alabama, I got some stares. Turns out when I went to high school I became the class president and had to recite the pledge everyday

The listener Danswer at the end has to be the cutest story ever.

@bylaska:I think what they were thinking of is this weird status where no shoes is a form of dress code. Like it's supposed to be a thing where people are supposed to be relaxed and take it easy...but if you don't relax and take it easy by taking off your shoes it might be an issue based on company standards. It would be theoretically better to have an environment where you can take off your shoes, wear sandals, only wear socks, or wear shoes based on what you want to makes you comfortable and not what somebody else or The Company says.

Speaking as a person who hates wearing socks and shoes around the house, I would probably like that type of setting myself. Or at least I like the idea of having your feet breathe. I'm not sure if I would be down for that in an office setting with other people.

@clagnaught said:

While I don't entirely disagree with this notion I do feel that one justification for keeping an environment either all shoes or no shoes, is that when you don't have shoes on you generally want to have the floor be clean enough that your socks / feet doesn't get dirty from walking around, and keeping the floor clean is not going to be easy if some people are walking around with outdoor shoes on.

If everyone is wearing shoes then having the floor be a bit dirty is no big deal, and of course if nobody is wearing shoes then keeping the floor clean will be a lot easier in general.

It should be noted that I live in a place where outdoor shoes tend to get dirty quit quickly, and I don't know if that is the case in a city like San Francisco. But I would imagine that it is at least part of the reason why a company would not want to have a mix of shoe and non-shoe wearers walking around.

One thought I also had about this was the bathrooms. Almost all bathrooms have some kind of nasty going on, so can you imagine walking into a bathroom at work with only your socks or barefoot? That's just not right. But if it lead to the office being cleaned more frequently, that would be a nice bonus.

"Whack-off stuff" Oh, God, I'm losing it.

Man, the pledge of allegiance always made me feel super uncomfortable; glad to hear I wasn't alone in that. Weird tradition.

Amen! She is one of my favorite guests

This is the Radiolab/Invisibilia episode Samantha talked about featuring the person who felt they switched between being male/female. It was a pretty interesting episode. Both Radiolab and Invisibilia are great shows/podcasts.

http://www.radiolab.org/story/invisibilia/

LOL love this show, always a great time when Sadantha shows up. :)

Always cool to see Sadantha on the show =)

When I was really young I remember seeing brief snatches of things on tv like the pledge of allegiance, soldiers saluting the flag, flags on coffins etc. This combined with me just learning about religions for the first time at school, and I somehow formed the idea that Americans worshipped flags.

Where can i find that mask?

Very glad to hear from Samantha as usual. I've always tried to be understanding and knowledgeable about transgender issues, but I never felt like I truly comprehended what it meant to be transgender until I heard Samantha go into details. There's so few that are willing or able to speak publicly about it (understandably).

I always wondered about the benefits of having wine would also be about the same benefits if you had grape juice every day

Great episode, love to hear Samanthas views on things as always.

I wish they would hurry up with the 2nd season!

I love Sadantha!

As always a joy when Samantha is a guest on a podcast here.

Also "We are back, every two weeks at giantbomb.com". Um...something tells me that wasn't true.

Hey, now that GOTY and the holidays have passed...new episodes coming soon? Please? :-)