Latest news with #Bashan
Yahoo
25-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Is your partner 'stream cheating'? They may be guilty of this modern relationship crime.
It goes by many names: 'stream cheating,' 'Netflix adultery' or even 'binge betrayal.' It's that moment when your partner dares to watch your show — the one you swore to experience together — without you. It may sound silly, but in the world of modern relationships, it's a crime that can test even the strongest couples. 'Watching shows is a way for us to wind down and a way for us to bond,' Emily Wilbanks, a Houston-based nurse, told Yahoo Entertainment about how she and her fiancé approach the subject. 'When a show is watched without the other person, it takes the fun and enjoyment out of it. It's like, what was the point of that?' See for yourself — The Yodel is the go-to source for daily news, entertainment and feel-good stories. By signing up, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy. Cary Chandler, a librarian and graduate student based in Boston, has been on both sides of the crime. 'I consider watching a good show together quality time, which is one of my love languages,' she told Yahoo Entertainment, noting that stream cheating is an 'unspoken taboo' in her relationship. 'When I 'stream cheat,' it is intentional, and I know I'm doing something wrong,' she said. 'If my wife and I are in a fight, I might watch the next episode of Severance without her and then confess my betrayal to her the next morning, knowing how disappointed she will be.' One couple based in New York, Meghan Miles and Aaron Downs, a TikTok influencer, have their own way of dealing with binge betrayal. 'With our shows, we're very much about watching them together,' Miles told Yahoo Entertainment. 'It's the best feeling in the world to have a show at the end of the day where we have something to watch, so honestly, if I found out that he watched an episode without me, we'd probably get in a playful argument. It loses its magic!' 'It's less special,' Downs added of making the decision to watch alone. 'There's a level of trust in it. Bingeing is something we do to spend time together. It's a way we can connect and talk about the show as we're experiencing it together.' Dr. Frankie Bashan, a board-certified sex therapist and clinical psychologist, explained that the emotional sting of stream cheating has less to do with the show and more to do with what it represents. 'It is a betrayal, because you're engaging in something together that you're experiencing in the moment, real-time, where you're relating to each other about what's happening,' she said. 'It's a time for quality connection.' With technology pulling us in different directions, prioritizing 'sacred quality time' with your person is more precious than ever, said Bashan. 'Part of it is a boundary thing,' Bashan explained about the act of skipping ahead without your partner. 'Depending on your attachment style, it can trigger anxiety, it can trigger fear of rejection or fear of abandonment.' Sabrina Zohar, a relationship expert and host of the podcast The Sabrina Zohar Show, agrees, stressing that these feelings are rarely about the film or show itself. However, people can take the 'betrayal' in different ways. 'For some people, it's not a big deal,' she told Yahoo Entertainment 'They'll be like, 'You know what? I don't really care, babe. You can watch this on your own,'' which gives the partner a pass. For others, added Zohar, being faithful is about 'mutual respect and keeping these small bids for connection.' Believe it or not, there's actual brain chemistry behind why skipping ahead without your partner feels like betrayal. According to Bashan, watching a show with your partner can trigger the release of neurotransmitters like dopamine, norepinephrine and oxytocin — chemicals responsible for pleasure, bonding and trust. 'There's chemical secretion that's happening,' she explained. 'There's a biophysical change happening in the brain. And in this day and age, look at all of the scary stuff around us. We're wanting more of that hit because it feels good, it's comforting, it feels safe, it feels loving.' With all the streaming shows and digital apps at our disposal, it's easy to watch shows secretly without your partner — but doing so can disrupt vital bonding moments, said Zohar. Decades ago, families had no choice but to watch together, at the scheduled time in the week when a new episode of a show was broadcast. Modern couples have the luxury of being able to binge whenever they like, on their own devices. 'In our parents' generation, watching shows was something that you looked forward to. You'd sit on the couch together as a family and watch it — and you didn't have a choice, because there was one TV in the house,' Zohar explained. 'Now, I just think it's exacerbated because we have streaming services, and there's so much more content that we can watch at any given time.' While hard numbers on stream cheating are scarce, a 2017 global Netflix survey found that out of 30,267 U.S. couples surveyed, 48% of partners admitted to streaming infidelity — a sharp rise from just 12% in 2013, when 'bingeing' was in its infancy. Adding to the drama, 36% never confessed, and nearly half of offenders (48%) said they had cheated more than once. More recently, a 2023 Shane Co. survey of 1,000 Americans who live with their partners found that 38% would be upset if their partner skipped ahead in a show they watched together. Among those who did cheat, 58.9% came clean and watched the show again with their significant other, while 18.6% admitted to playing innocent, pretending they hadn't seen it and rewatching anyway. To avoid the emotional gut punch of stream cheating, Zohar suggested setting clear ground rules upfront. 'I will check with my partner and say, 'Hey, what shows are off-limits for my trash time?' He'll say, 'You can watch your murder mysteries, but keep this, this and this for us.' And I say, 'You got it.'' At its core, stream cheating is about connection more than it is TV. 'It's really about: Do I feel like you see me, hear me and understand me? Do I feel like you respect me? Do I feel like you consider me in situations?' Zohar said. Bashan touched on the importance of perspective. 'If your partner isn't able to course-correct, then what happens?' she said. 'I think we have to let them do their thing and revisit — or maybe there's something else we can do together that can be safer for the two of us.' Setting boundaries and honoring shared rituals strengthens relationships, Zohar added. 'Speak up about it,' she advised. 'We always want to start with 'I' statements: 'Hey, I know it's just a show, but I really love watching this together. It's our thing. Can we keep it that way?''
Yahoo
25-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Is your partner 'stream cheating'? They may be guilty of this modern relationship crime.
It goes by many names: 'stream cheating,' 'Netflix adultery' or even 'binge betrayal.' It's that moment when your partner dares to watch your show — the one you swore to experience together — without you. It may sound silly, but in the world of modern relationships, it's a crime that can test even the strongest couples. 'Watching shows is a way for us to wind down and a way for us to bond,' Emily Wilbanks, a Houston-based nurse, told Yahoo Entertainment about how she and her fiancé approach the subject. 'When a show is watched without the other person, it takes the fun and enjoyment out of it. It's like, what was the point of that?' See for yourself — The Yodel is the go-to source for daily news, entertainment and feel-good stories. By signing up, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy. Cary Chandler, a librarian and graduate student based in Boston, has been on both sides of the crime. 'I consider watching a good show together quality time, which is one of my love languages,' she told Yahoo Entertainment, noting that stream cheating is an 'unspoken taboo' in her relationship. 'When I 'stream cheat,' it is intentional, and I know I'm doing something wrong,' she said. 'If my wife and I are in a fight, I might watch the next episode of Severance without her and then confess my betrayal to her the next morning, knowing how disappointed she will be.' One couple based in New York, Meghan Miles and Aaron Downs, a TikTok influencer, have their own way of dealing with binge betrayal. 'With our shows, we're very much about watching them together,' Miles told Yahoo Entertainment. 'It's the best feeling in the world to have a show at the end of the day where we have something to watch, so honestly, if I found out that he watched an episode without me, we'd probably get in a playful argument. It loses its magic!' 'It's less special,' Downs added of making the decision to watch alone. 'There's a level of trust in it. Bingeing is something we do to spend time together. It's a way we can connect and talk about the show as we're experiencing it together.' Dr. Frankie Bashan, a board-certified sex therapist and clinical psychologist, explained that the emotional sting of stream cheating has less to do with the show and more to do with what it represents. 'It is a betrayal, because you're engaging in something together that you're experiencing in the moment, real-time, where you're relating to each other about what's happening,' she said. 'It's a time for quality connection.' With technology pulling us in different directions, prioritizing 'sacred quality time' with your person is more precious than ever, said Bashan. 'Part of it is a boundary thing,' Bashan explained about the act of skipping ahead without your partner. 'Depending on your attachment style, it can trigger anxiety, it can trigger fear of rejection or fear of abandonment.' Sabrina Zohar, a relationship expert and host of the podcast The Sabrina Zohar Show, agrees, stressing that these feelings are rarely about the film or show itself. However, people can take the 'betrayal' in different ways. 'For some people, it's not a big deal,' she told Yahoo Entertainment 'They'll be like, 'You know what? I don't really care, babe. You can watch this on your own,'' which gives the partner a pass. For others, added Zohar, being faithful is about 'mutual respect and keeping these small bids for connection.' Believe it or not, there's actual brain chemistry behind why skipping ahead without your partner feels like betrayal. According to Bashan, watching a show with your partner can trigger the release of neurotransmitters like dopamine, norepinephrine and oxytocin — chemicals responsible for pleasure, bonding and trust. 'There's chemical secretion that's happening,' she explained. 'There's a biophysical change happening in the brain. And in this day and age, look at all of the scary stuff around us. We're wanting more of that hit because it feels good, it's comforting, it feels safe, it feels loving.' With all the streaming shows and digital apps at our disposal, it's easy to watch shows secretly without your partner — but doing so can disrupt vital bonding moments, said Zohar. Decades ago, families had no choice but to watch together, at the scheduled time in the week when a new episode of a show was broadcast. Modern couples have the luxury of being able to binge whenever they like, on their own devices. 'In our parents' generation, watching shows was something that you looked forward to. You'd sit on the couch together as a family and watch it — and you didn't have a choice, because there was one TV in the house,' Zohar explained. 'Now, I just think it's exacerbated because we have streaming services, and there's so much more content that we can watch at any given time.' While hard numbers on stream cheating are scarce, a 2017 global Netflix survey found that out of 30,267 U.S. couples surveyed, 48% of partners admitted to streaming infidelity — a sharp rise from just 12% in 2013, when 'bingeing' was in its infancy. Adding to the drama, 36% never confessed, and nearly half of offenders (48%) said they had cheated more than once. More recently, a 2023 Shane Co. survey of 1,000 Americans who live with their partners found that 38% would be upset if their partner skipped ahead in a show they watched together. Among those who did cheat, 58.9% came clean and watched the show again with their significant other, while 18.6% admitted to playing innocent, pretending they hadn't seen it and rewatching anyway. To avoid the emotional gut punch of stream cheating, Zohar suggested setting clear ground rules upfront. 'I will check with my partner and say, 'Hey, what shows are off-limits for my trash time?' He'll say, 'You can watch your murder mysteries, but keep this, this and this for us.' And I say, 'You got it.'' At its core, stream cheating is about connection more than it is TV. 'It's really about: Do I feel like you see me, hear me and understand me? Do I feel like you respect me? Do I feel like you consider me in situations?' Zohar said. Bashan touched on the importance of perspective. 'If your partner isn't able to course-correct, then what happens?' she said. 'I think we have to let them do their thing and revisit — or maybe there's something else we can do together that can be safer for the two of us.' Setting boundaries and honoring shared rituals strengthens relationships, Zohar added. 'Speak up about it,' she advised. 'We always want to start with 'I' statements: 'Hey, I know it's just a show, but I really love watching this together. It's our thing. Can we keep it that way?''
The Guardian
21-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘This could have all been avoided': how Creative Australia allowed itself to be blind-sided over its Venice Biennale pick
A week after Creative Australia controversially dumped artist Khaled Sabsabi as Australia's representative for the 2026 Venice Biennale, Richard Bell still can't understand the decision. The Kamilaroi, Kooma, Jiman and Gurang Gurang artist has a long history with the Venice Biennale and Australia's peak arts funding body – in 2019, he crashed the prestigious showcase after being passed over to officially represent Australia. He's shocked that Creative Australia would allow itself to be blind-sided by criticism of Sabsabi's past work, and its refusal to answer predictable attacks with a nuanced conversation. 'This could have all been avoided,' Bell says. 'Creative Australia should have known that they would come after this work, and prepared the minister. 'They could just say, 'Actually the work's almost 20 years old, you're supposed to be talking about the proposal to go to Venice next year, and this so-called 'leader of the terrorist group' at the time, wasn't listed as a terrorist group until 14 years later'.' Sign up for a weekly email featuring our best reads The furore began shortly after Sabsabi and curator Michael Dagostino's selection was announced on 7 February, when Yoni Bashan, a columnist at The Australian, received a 'flurry of messages'. Bashan's background was in crime and business reporting, and last year was given the Sir Keith Murdoch award by his employer for his reporting of the conflict in Gaza, where he was embedded with the Israel Defense Forces. According to The Australian's daily news podcast, the tip-offs drew Bashan's attention to the 'really unusual decision' by Creative Australia to award the prestigious spot to Sabsabi. Sabsabi's selection was the result of the same process that saw Archie Moore win the prestigious Gold Lion at last year's biennale, but Bashan had little familiarity with Sabsabi or Creative Australia — which he has described on the podcast as 'another obscure government agency amply funded with millions and millions of taxpayer funds'. 'I'm not an arts reporter, I write business gossip in The Australian. This is all a bit too flutey for me, this sort of stuff,' Bashan said on the podcast. Bashan said that when he first investigated Sabsabi's work, including a 2007 video work entitled You, he found it 'a little bit ambiguous' whether the art was in support of Hassan Nasrallah, the now deceased leader of the terrorist group Hezbollah, or not. It didn't matter. 'I'm a journalist. I'm not an arts patron. Me as the writer, as the journo, it's not for me to figure out or solve the mystery of what Khaled Sabsabi thinks about Hassan Nasrallah.' As the starting point of a media and political storm that has upturned Australia's art world, this incuriosity would become a defining theme. In the Senate last Thursday, Liberal senator Claire Chandler reduced Sabsabi, an artist with a complex, decades-long body of work, to 'a person who highlights a terrorist leader in his artwork'. Within hours, Sabsabi and Dagostino had been dropped by the board of Creative Australia. Elizabeth Ann Macgregor, who headed Sydney's Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) at the time it acquired You, says the debate has ignored the original context and impact of his work. 'You cannot judge a work of art by a few images online I'm afraid, that's the nature of art,' Macgregor told the ABC this week. 'Once people have the opportunity in a gallery to see the work in its full context and indeed to see other works by the same artist … they very rarely jump down your throat about it.' You was displayed at the MCA for three months in the 2009 exhibition Making it New: Focus on contemporary Australian art, where between 8 September and 11 November a total of 61,276 people visited the exhibition. Those 61,276 people could have read the accompanying panel, which drew attention to the 'purposefully ambiguous' depiction of the 'spiritual and political leader'. Prophetically, the text explained that You was a comment on how media coverage can turn people into heroes or villains and 'its ability to generate suspicion or panic through the intensive repetition of imagery on our television screens, day in and day out'. Djon Mundine, Bundjalung artist, curator and recipient of the Australia Council's Red Ochre lifetime achievement award in 2020, was first exposed to Sabsabi's work over a decade ago while working at the Campbelltown Arts Centre, where You was on display in a group show with other artists from Western Sydney. 'I thought the artwork was actually a great piece of work, it was the first time I'd seen digitally manipulated imagery, really,' Mundine says. The apparent 'charisma' of Nasrallah's portrayal was created in a time where positive representations of Lebanese people in Australia's public sphere were rare, he added: 'There wouldn't have been a lot of Lebanese heroes you would have found in Sydney, not many teachers or artists.' Like Bell, Mundine also notes that the wider Hezbollah organisation was not proscribed as a terrorist group by Australia until 2021 (the Australian government had, however, listed its External Security Organisation military wing as a terrorist organisation in 2003). Nasrallah was killed in September last year by an Israeli strike on southern Lebanon. His funeral is scheduled for 23 February. But not every viewer agreed with Mundine's interpretation. A piece published by online journal Memo on Thursday quoted Western Sydney University academic Cecelia Cmielewski, who viewed You as a critique of Nasrallah, interpreting the venerating light as 'laser beams of hate'. Sign up to Five Great Reads Each week our editors select five of the most interesting, entertaining and thoughtful reads published by Guardian Australia and our international colleagues. Sign up to receive it in your inbox every Saturday morning after newsletter promotion As the Memo article's authors Rex Butler and Paris Lettau note, these layers of irony and ambiguity, and the time and thought required to interpret them, are essential to appreciating Sabsabi's earlier work. The MCA says that according to its records, compiled from visitor comment books and contemporaneous reports by gallery staff, there were no noted incidents or negative reactions while You was on display. Mundine says the Campbelltown exhibition had a similar response. 'It was never thought, from my memory, that it was dividing society at all – and see, that's such a white-bread place too, Campbelltown,' Mundine says. Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email Speaking to Guardian Australia on Tuesday, Macgregor also commented on Thank You Very Much, a second video work by Sabsabi that Chandler characterised in parliament as 'promoting Osama bin Laden and a series of 9/11 images of the aircraft hitting the twin towers'. The 18-second-long Thank You Very Much consists of shaky, frenetically edited footage of the World Trade Center attacks, and concludes with footage of the then-US president, George W Bush, thanking the American public shortly after the attack. Within a few months, Bush had launched a series of military responses, from Afghanistan to Iraq, that would have a profound impact on members of the Arab diaspora around the western world, Sabsabi included. 'It's a quote from George Bush, yes,' Macgregor said. 'So it's irony.' 'So when you read that, you know, you get a shiver – but that often is the point with art. You have an initial reaction, and then you have a chance to see it. And you often have a chance to be in a gallery, where there are people to talk about it.' For Mundine, You became the start of a long relationship with Sabsabi, whose work has evolved to explore more conceptual and spiritual themes, and a diverse range of mediums including choirs and live performance. 'My conversations with him were about somebody who is into Sufism, and he has always been this quite peaceful person. But we also talked about football teams … he's just a good bloke, that's all.' At the time, the work inspired no backlash in either the media or the art world. 'No one attacked him at the time, particularly, when he did that work – so why now?' Mundine says. Mundine was thrilled to hear of Sabsabi and Dagostino's selection and, like Bell, was shocked by Creative Australia's 'cowardly' reversal days later. 'It showed a very clumsy handling of the whole thing,' he said. 'They should have been aware of some of this, that he'd be immediately attacked.' Over at The Australian, the reluctant art critics who launched the attack on Sabsabi's selection continue to show little interest in the complexities of his work. Reflecting on his depiction of Nasrallah, the column has since declared that, 'if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, then it's probably outright hero worship.' For Bell, the fact that a few words from two journalists was enough to make Creative Australia's leadership abandon Sabsabi, Australia's art community, and the complex nature of art itself, remains inexplicable. 'Virtually the whole of the art world, the Australian art world, they've rallied behind Khaled,' he says. 'And yet that counts for nothing.'
CBS News
14-02-2025
- General
- CBS News
6 green flags to look for in a partner, according to relationship experts
Daters are often aware of red flags, behaviors to avoid or undesirable traits in a potential partner. But what green flags, or positive traits, should singles be on the lookout for? Frankie Bashan, a clinical psychologist, board-certified sex therapist and relationship expert with over 20 years of experience, said shifting your focus from red flags to green flags can lead to more successful dating. "You want to be looking for all this from the outset," she said. "Because we're wired for survival, what do we notice? We notice the orange and red flags right away, and it often scares us, so we foreclose opportunities." Instead, she encourages people to suspend immediate judgment and be curious. "I'm noticing this, but I'm not going to make a definitive answer just yet. Right now, I'm just taking in information," she advised thinking. "Our brains don't do it automatically. It has to be intentional." Here are some green flags to look for. Reliability While showing up late or canceling a date last-minute may be a red flag, doing the opposite is a green flag. "Do they commit to a date? Do they show up on time?" Bashan said of indications someone is reliable. Trustworthiness As they share information about themselves, Bashan said you want to see if they're consistent in their stories. "Figure out, is this somebody that is trustworthy?" she said. Values relationships Having and valuing relationships outside of a romantic partner — like friends and family — is another green flag, according to Bashan. "Is this person somebody who can have sustainable, long term relationships?" she said. "Not everybody has family that they're close to for one reason or another, but do they have chosen family? Do they have friendships that they value and that are important to them, that they invest in?" Reciprocity Someone who's not afraid to let you know that they're interested is another green flag. "When you're sharing about yourself, your interests, your desires for relationships, what you're looking for — they're listening," Bashan said. "They're not just waiting for you to finish so that they can give a response and focusing on how they want to respond to everything. No, they're actually attentive, focused, curious about you." Boundaries Being able to set (and respect!) boundaries is another green flag, according to Wendy Walsh, a relationship expert at the website DatingAdvice and psychology professor with a doctorate in clinical psychology. "There's been some talk on social media about people who trauma dump on dates," she said, explaining this isn't the way to go. "They think they're being open, authentic and vulnerable, but what they're really doing is disclosing too much, too soon." Or, if your date asks you something you're uncomfortable answering on a first encounter, take note of how they respond to you setting a boundary of not sharing that part of yourself just yet. Balance of dependance A relationship is about growing both together and independently, and Walsh said it's a green flag when someone understands and demonstrates and appropriate balance. Picture a Venn diagram with the circles representing the individuals and the overlapped area representing the relationship. "Relationships are unhealthy when the two circles completely overlap. Psychologists would call that the enmeshed. They're so enmeshed that nobody can remember whose problem is whose, and they start to control each other, and what ends up happening is the individual starts to die," she said. "Now picture the two circles right beside each other, but not overlapping. And now you have individual growth, but you have no relationship security."
