Summary
There is no greater candidate for a job with the FBI… than a woman with a crush. A recent study found that Gen Z and Millennials have “alarmingly relaxed attitudes towards online stalking.” But considering we all do it…why wouldn’t we? The term “stalking” (also know as “creeping” or “lurking”) has now take on a colloquial form, as all sorts of people use the internet to gather information about other people: ex partners, future partners, the ex of an ex, prospective employees, people they think are hotter or cooler than they are. But even if “creeping” is not stalking in the technical sense, even if it’s something we all do, why are we so ashamed to do it? In this season premiere, Hannah and Maia ask whether creeping is inherently creepy, and discuss the different affordances of social media that make it the perfect breeding ground for nosiness. As these “mass personal” channels of communication facilitate parasocial relationships of even the closest kind, have we become private celebrities to each other? Or are we all, as we always have been, just massive creeps? Tangents include: Maia’s evil ex-landlord, Hannah’s sorely misunderstood Baby Jane halloween costume, and dramatic readings of some truly diabolical “creeping” anecdotes from the lovely listeners.
Support us on Patreon and get juicy bonus content:
https://www.patreon.com/rehashpodcast
Intro and outro song by our talented friend Ian Mills:
https://linktr.ee/ianmillsmusic
SOURCES:
Amelia Abraham, “12 People Admit To Their Social Media ‘Stalking’ Habits,” Refinery29 (2016).
“CMV: It's not "creeping", "snooping", or "being a creeper" to browse social media content that presumably was put there for exactly that purpose.,” Reddit (2015).
Frampton, J. R., & Fox, J, “Monitoring, Creeping, or Surveillance? A Synthesis of Online Social Information Seeking Concepts,” Review of Communication Research, 9, (2021).
“Gen Z and Millennials Accept Online Creeping and Stalking as Part of Dating Culture,” GEN Digital (2023).
Laura Pitcher, “Are You in a Parasocial Relationship With ‘the Other Woman?’” Digiverse (2023).
Morgan Sullivan, “A Love Letter to All My Exes’ Exes’ Instagram Accounts,” The Cut (2022).
Our Sponsors:
* Check out Quince and use my code quince.com/rehash for a great deal: https://www.quince.com
* Check out Ruggable and use my code REHASH for a great deal: https://ruggable.com
Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | I successfully moved. |
| 0:02.3 | And let me tell you, it ain't easy. |
| 0:05.5 | She's a big girl in her big girl apartment. |
| 0:08.9 | I got an apartment and I feel like I've rigged something because it's a pretty good deal and it's a one bedroom. |
| 0:16.8 | I just got the tour over FaceTime and I'm very impressed and I'm very jealous. Yeah, yeah. I'm, shocked. It ever happened. I was really doing some, like, back channel investigating trying to find apartments, because in New York, like, you can't just go, you can't go on Street Easy. Like, people say, oh, go on Street Easy, no. Like, if you want a rent stabilized apartment, you call random numbers in the phone book. Like, you were not, you were not on Street Easy. So that's what I did. And here I am. And I love my little landlord. He's so lovely. He put in blinds for me. To love your landlord is really a feat. It's truly crazy because my last landlord was like a damn ghoul. He was just kind of like, you know, we moved in like three days earlier or something, and he charged us for the three days, which I know it's like, okay, yes, technically that is his money. But like I feel like a lot of like small time landlords would be like, okay, yeah, and just be like nice about it because it's more about like tenant landlord relationship than it is about money. |
| 1:11.8 | Yeah, like I feel like it's more about like the long term investment of like knowing that |
| 1:15.7 | this person will want to like stay living in this place. Yeah, exactly. And my last place was |
| 1:20.6 | just like had the craziest turnover. All these like 21 year olds would just move in. They're all |
| 1:24.0 | socially maladapted and just like it just sucked. I hated it. And yeah, he was awful. I got like locked out of my apartment because there was this miscommunication with like the broker in the keys. And then I had to pay $600 to the locksmith who obviously was scamming me, but it was like one in the morning. And then my landlord refused to like reimburse me or like help me out with it. And I was like, you just are the worst. Like, so those types of people, I'm like, really glad not to be dealing with him anymore, you know? Yeah. You don't want to feel like you're just like a source of income. Like you want someone to respect the fact that you're a human being living in this place. You don't want your landlord to be like, if you died, that would just be like annoying for them, you know? |
| 2:01.6 | Like, you don't know. Yeah. |
| 2:02.0 | Now I have to like clean up the crime scene. Ugh. Yeah. He like, we met him once and my roommate was having a hard time. She like cried to him because the radiator was really loud. And he was so mean to her. It's like, ugh. Because he doesn't have to be nice ultimately. |
| 2:15.6 | There's so much demand, so little supply. |
| 2:18.4 | You're at their mercy, yeah. |
| 2:20.0 | So yeah, I'm so happy. |
| 2:21.4 | Everyone. Because he doesn't have to be nice, ultimately. There's so much demand, so little supply. |
| 2:18.4 | You're at their mercy, yeah. So yeah, I'm so happy. Every single part of my body aches and hurts. |
| 2:24.7 | Like I, because I kind of, I hired movers, but I also kind of moved myself, where I was kind of |
| 2:29.2 | bringing out my miscellaneous things that I just didn't want to pack in boxes. And I cannot tell |
| 2:33.8 | you, like my sciatic nerve, she's squealing, she's squealing. She's not happy. My whole butt hurts, you know. You're self-sufficient lady. For better or for worse. For better for worse, I've been drilling. Like, I feel great. It's really awesome. I've like mounted everything in a day. I spent like a whole day just unpacking and mounting and it felt so satisfying. I was like, I was like, I'm every woman, you know. |
| 2:56.2 | I do feel like I'll reach like grown woman status when I own a drill and know how to use it. You can definitely drill Hannah, darling. Hannah, you're good with your hands. And I guess that's what drilling requires. |
| 3:08.2 | Right. Sure. That's what they say. Hand dexterity. Yes, of course. Thank you for your confidence in me. |
| 3:15.8 | Does the drill count as a power tool? Let us know in the chat. It is. Like, the power tool, isn't it? |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Rehash, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Rehash and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.

