Strangers on the Internet

Historically, dating has been deeply entwined with going out for a drink. But what happens if one of the two dating parties has opted for a life of sobriety? And what are the pros and cons of replacing substance use with romance, or what is the effect of infatuation on the brain? Irina and Michelle discuss with California-based social worker and addiction specialist Felicia Hermle how to handle re...

While a cute pet picture can attract someone to your dating profile, pets can also be a major hindrance in romance. What happens when a significant other's pet prevents spontaneous travel or acts up jealously when someone comes over? What are reasonable expectations for how pet owners and non-owners should adapt to each other in relationships? Irina and Michelle--both long-time pet owners--break d...

Irina and Michelle sit down with sexual abuse and online harassment expert Prof. Mary Anne Franks from the George Washington University Law School to take stock of the state of Internet safety (or lack thereof) today. Mary Anne explains why "revenge porn" is generally a misnomer, why women are particularly at risk in a variety of online settings, and what has made it so difficult to pass federal l...

Comedian Allison (Alli) Goldberg is on a mission to make dating fun again. Once named one of the top 10 funniest women in NYC by Time Out NY, the now-Los Angeles based performer delights her public both on the stage and on the air. A friend of previous SOTI podcast guest Talia Lerner, Alli tells Irina and Michelle why dating provides such fertile material for her work from her matchmaking live com...

In the fourth part of this coverage of the sexual misconduct allegations against ex-George Mason University law professor and former FTC Commissioner Joshua Wright, Irina has a conversation with Dilan Esper, an experienced litigator in areas that include defamation law and the First Amendment. Dilan walks listeners through Josh's highly unusual defamation legal complaint against two of the women w...

In the third part of this coverage of the sexual misconduct allegations against ex-George Mason University law professor and former FTC Commissioner Joshua Wright, Irina speaks with a victim of judicial harassment and retaliation, attorney and activist Aliza Shatzman who founded the Legal Accountability Project. After graduating from the Washington University School of Law in 2019, Aliza began cle...

Following up on our last episode in which Prof. Christa Laser discussed her sexual misconduct allegations against ex-George Mason University law professor and former FTC Commissioner Joshua Wright, a second alleged victim of his speaks out in full for the first time. GMU adjunct professor Brandy Wagstaff opens up in this exclusive interview about her alleged sexual relationship with Josh during he...

On this Breaking News episode, Irina interviews patent law scholar Prof. Christa Laser about her sexual harassment allegations against just-departed George Mason University antitrust law professor and former FTC Commissioner Joshua Wright. In a tweet (accompanied by a screenshotted email) viewed by hundreds of thousands of people, Christa described how Josh asked her out on a date while GMU hiring...

Matchmaker, matchmaker, make me a match! Irina and Michelle delve into whether it's wise to matchmake your friends and how to minimize the risks to your own friendships if you're going to do it. How do you choose whom to match? Should you remain involved after the initial introduction? The Dating Professors dish about how they themselves have been matchmade (but both only sort of) and what would m...

Irina and Michelle catch up with law professor and Internet law scholar Derek Bambauer as he reviews his dating life in Tucson, Arizona before his big move across the country to Gainesville, Florida. Derek talks about his mostly positive experiences meeting people online, his penchant for women in academia, and the challenges of making schedules work when both daters have kids. He also uses his sc...

The Internet is abuzz with discussion about allegations by Sarah Brady, a University of Hawai'i law student, that her ex-boyfriend and celebrity Jonah Hill emotionally abused her and dressed up the abuse in therapy language. According to screenshots of text messages she posted publicly, he designated it "boundaries" that she should not post swimsuit pictures of herself on social media, model, surf...

On this episode, executive and relationship coach Dr. John Schinnerer tells us what we need to know about how men can achieve true emotional growth and meaningful lives. An educational psychologist and expert consultant for the Pixar movie "Inside Out," John first made a name for himself in the area of anger management; he later expanded his work into high performance, stress management, positive...

Why do people try to find love on reality TV? Irina and Michelle asked that and many other questions of Stuart Chaseman, the middle-aged Chicagoan musician and entrepreneur who quickly emerged as the fan favorite of the Netflix show "Jewish Matchmaking." While TikToks declared him a male role model to emulate, conservative pundit Ben Shapiro singled him out for only wanting to date women with libe...

On this episode with guest law professor Nancy Marcus from the California Western School of Law, the personal is the political. Nancy tells Irina and Michelle about her own life as an out bisexual and polyamorous person, as well as about about her public writings and advocacy on these topics. While bisexuality has increasingly become more accepted, the same is less true for the various forms of et...

This episode provides a special interview with the top 1% podcast (over a million downloads!) "Ex-Wives Undercover: Liars, Cheaters & Love Cons" hosts Amber Rasmussen and Athena Klingerman about how their ex-husband Brandon continued freely harming women and children despite seventeen protective orders in three states against him. After law enforcement in the state of Washington and elsewhere...

For this episode that will leave you breathless, Irina and Michelle get to speak with NYC-based sociologist Dr. Robin Rogers. She tells the tale of how she escaped her marriage after her then-husband developed severe schizophrenia, became violent, and killed the family pets. Robin not only got through the six-year court fight to maintain sole custody of her two sons but in fact managed to thrive d...

Dating apps are not the only place where strangers meet on the Internet! On this episode, Irina and Michelle have the chance to host couple Jane-Ashe and Damon who met in a Facebook group tied to a nerdy fandom podcast (Binge Mode). Damon hadn't had much luck with dating apps, while Jane-Ashe got tired enough of people wasting her time that she became a sugar baby to at least be paid for her effor...

Irina and Michelle welcome international sex robots expert Dr. Kate Devlin, who explains the current state of technology and her views on the moral panic surrounding parasocial relationships with robots. Kate believes that most of people's fears about sex robots or AI replacing human relationships are overblown in a world in which even carrying around and finding a place to store a robot (the clos...

On this special episode, Irina and Michelle sit down with popular feminist cartoonist and writer Lily O'Farrell, who has amassed over 300K followers on her VulgaDrawings Instagram account. We talk about the British artist's earlier days in the comedy world, encounters with the incel community, recent book "Kyle Theory," and love-hate relationship with dating apps. Why did Instagram try to shut dow...

This episode features director Anna Pakman and actors Bree Klauser and Melissa Jennifer Gonzalez, who are all part of short film "Cripfished" (an entrant in the 2023 Easterseals Disability Film Challenge). This romantic comedy tells the fictional story of Logan, who fakes being blind on a queer date with visually impaired Amy because the latter only wants to go out with disabled people. On the pod...

In this episode, Irina and Michelle have the pleasure of talking to Nick (a pseudonym), a Jeopardy champion in his late 30s whose work has taken him from academia to the policy world. Originally from NYC, he has tried his luck at dating all across the country and abroad. Nick talks about the difficulties with finding a significant other who shares his interests and values, as well as with staving...

On this special episode, Irina and Michelle talk to writer, director, and performer Aimee Lutkin. Her memoir "The Lonely Hunter: How Our Search for Love Is Broken" has made waves through its poignant account of how society treats the perpetually single. Aimee discusses how the world is structured around couples and how marriage has morphed over time in ways that can leave people feeling more isola...

In this episode, Irina and Michelle explore why dating app providers behave the way they do and why they don't do more to protect their users. Irina talks about her legal research into this area and what has happened when victims have tried to hold providers accountable via the courts (spoiler: not much). The Dating Professors also examine the cultural implications of bad behavior on apps, such as...

Irina and Michelle sit down with the show's first solo male guest: George Mason University's Prof. Ilya Somin, who decided to put his scholarly chops to use in the romantic arena to increase his odds of success. He turned to both the academic and popular literatures to develop his rationalist approach to dating and shares his wisdom with listeners looking for love. How should one cope with rejecti...

In this episode, Irina and Michelle discuss how to handle mental health issues in dating and relationships. Given that half of the population will receive a mental health diagnosis at some point in their lives, to what extent does there continue to be meaningful stigma around this issue? How early in dating should you disclose a mental health condition? And which mental illnesses are less likely t...