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Ruby Franke & Jodi Hildebrandt, Part 5
62 Plays2 months ago
We are back and chattin' about our fave gal pals, Ruby and Jodi. Actually, we are talking about the Hulu docuseries Devil in the Family: The Fall of Ruby Franke. We discuss episode 1, and talk through how some of opinions and ideas about the Franke family have changed.
Check out our YouTube channel, Fixate Today: Grey Matters
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Transcript
Introduction to "Fixate Today Gone Tomorrow"
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to Fixate Today Gone Tomorrow. I'm Nikki, and I'm here with my Aunt Joy. We are two neurodivergent ladies who obsess about various topics. Joy is autistic, and I have ADHD, and we are letting our hyperfixations fly.
Focus on Ruby Frankie and New Developments
00:00:15
Speaker
Today, we are fixating on Ruby Frankie.
00:00:29
Speaker
Welcome back, everybody. We are going back to our first series because there's been some new information and a docuseries and weird connections that I keep accidentally making that made me re-hyper fixate on this.
00:00:44
Speaker
Yeah, this is cool. And actually, one of the main characters wrote a book, which we might get into a little bit more later, but yeah gave a new, yeah, Sherry wrote a book and so definitely gave some new perspectives too on some of the things that happened.
00:00:55
Speaker
Yeah, we definitely want to do a deep dive on the book itself, but we'll talk about it as we're going through everything. um So just a quick reminder of who Ruby Frankie is. She is a Mormon, well, was and a YouTube influencer. They were a family vlog channel.
00:01:14
Speaker
And a couple years ago now, oh last year, oh, my gosh, time makes no sense. Last year, it was discovered that she was brutally abusing her children with her BFF slash therapist slash question mark what else they could be, Jodi Hildebrandt.
00:01:35
Speaker
We did a big old deep dive on who Jodi is, um the history of the Frankie family.
Exploring New Insights in Media Coverage
00:01:41
Speaker
we've So that's what we're returning to. think last month, Hulu ah released docuseries called Devil in the Family, The Fall of Ruby Frankie.
00:01:52
Speaker
And also, yeah, or if anyone wants to go back and listen to our podcast, It was one of our, ah actually, it was our first, right? Our first subject matter for our yeah YouTube, I'm sorry, for podcast.
00:02:03
Speaker
We were very new and very fresh at that time, but the information is there. um And hopefully we've gotten better in our presentation. Yeah, I think, Will, there's a lot of like kind of new stuff that maybe there's some new perspectives and i don't know. Maybe we'll have different points of view. i don't know for sure.
00:02:24
Speaker
um there We certainly have seen a lot more from them from this family with this docuseries. So for the first couple episodes, I think we're going to do five new Ruby and Jodi episodes.
00:02:36
Speaker
The first three, we're going to talk about the docuseries. We're going to talk about each episode. So I am going to mention the sources I'm using. Mostly for these episodes, it's the docuseries, The ah Devil in the Family.
00:02:50
Speaker
But I'm pretty sure that other stuff I've worked on is going to like seep in. So I just want to make sure I've cited everything. So I also used Law and Crime Network, Hidden True Crime, the podcast Mormon Stories.
00:03:04
Speaker
um It's not on here, but I am heavily into the podcast someplace underneath right now that's actually also deep diving these topics.
Summary of Docuseries "Abundance"
00:03:12
Speaker
um I use Salt Lake City Tribune, Mother Jones, Time Magazine, and the books Under the Banner of Heaven by John Krakauer, My Story by Elizabeth Smart, and The House of My Mother by Sherry Franke, and Wikipedia.
00:03:29
Speaker
All right, so episode one of the docuseries is called Abundance. First, right off the bat, the identities of the four minor Frankie children are hidden. They have their faces blurred the whole time, and they never use their names, which I think was so wise of the filmmakers to do.
00:03:47
Speaker
Yeah, they do a really good job, yeah. They do a really good job that. The series opens with Sherry Frankie, who is the eldest daughter of ah Kevin and Ruby Frankie, saying, quote, I do believe Satan is a person.
00:04:00
Speaker
Then it cuts to, um we see the video of the youngest boy going to to the neighbor to get help. We talked a ton about this video. just It still is heartbreaking.
00:04:12
Speaker
Just for anybody... who hasn't thought about this or doesn't know the full story but the background. Nikki, you wanted to actually describe the scene of him walking up to the neighbor. You're better at describing things.
Ruby Frankie and Family Dynamics
00:04:23
Speaker
Yeah, he so he is emaciated. This I think he was 12. He probably looked about seven. Yes, he did. In the video. He's in an oversized button up shirt.
00:04:35
Speaker
I don't think socks or shoes or maybe just socks. I can't remember. I think he had socks on. I think he had some socks on And remember, we're in the desert. This is Utah in the desert in summer.
00:04:45
Speaker
Desert. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so this little boy, he you could see he's got like things on his legs and wrists. It looks something, some sort of ligature or something on him, but you can't see what it is. It's from a ring door camera or a security camera at the neighbor's home.
00:05:02
Speaker
And he had knocked on, this was not the first um first neighbor he had approached. So he I think there was at least one other who was not home. And these homes are far apart.
00:05:13
Speaker
It's not like you're going next door at your neighborhood. No, they're easily a couple acre lots, I would say. Yeah. So he ah rang the doorbell.
00:05:25
Speaker
The homeowner didn't answer right away. So he started leaving. And a man comes on the ring audio part of the camera and just asks what he needs. And he says he just needed a favor.
00:05:39
Speaker
or he said he needed two favors. And then he said, never mind, I just need one favor. Will you take me to the police? And he said it with so much respect and so polite. Yeah. In the moment, especially.
00:05:52
Speaker
at that point, the neighbor, you can just see melting a bit. Yeah. It's still like, you know, we don't see the whole video at this point, but that's the thing that like, ah it just gets me every time seeing the man break down and then seeing the wife just like turn into like super mom asking about his allergies and stuff because she wants to give him food. All right. So um also very early as Sherry is talking, she only refers to her mother as Ruby. She never calls her mom.
00:06:22
Speaker
I've noticed that with other, you know, like with the Vallow case, I assume that's just a ah means of distancing oneself. Yeah. I do find it interesting, though, that.
Religious Influence on the Frankies
00:06:34
Speaker
Yeah. And she's still like, even though I think present day, her relationship with her father is is in a much better place and improving, but still calls him Kevin also. That is interesting.
00:06:45
Speaker
So we see, like, this is horrific. They show these, like, idyllic neighborhood scenes that And as they're showing him, they cut to images of this little boy's wounds that are horrific. It's duct tape. it's It's plastic wrap. It's handcuffs.
00:07:02
Speaker
And we see Ruby and Jodi being arrested. All right. So then we meet Kevin Franke. And in my notes, I wrote this because I texted this to Joy, too. And I said, hear me out. Kevin Franke with a beard's a little handsome.
00:07:16
Speaker
I mean, and he is. He is. He is. I mean, a bit. I don't forgive him, but I'm just saying. I don't. No, no, no. love I much prefer a bearded man. I know we differ on this. Generally speaking, yes, but he does look nice. So one thing that we get to hear from in these documentary in this documentary is there are conversations with couples in the neighborhood who are kind of privy to some of the things going on.
00:07:39
Speaker
The neighbors call the neighborhood that they live in Happy Valley, Happy Valley. It's this perfect, safe, peaceful neighborhood. Everybody knows everybody. Everybody's friends with everybody. It's like a family.
00:07:51
Speaker
and you know, in the midst of that, they cut to this LDS therapist and fellow Springville resident, Brandon Patrick. So I, you know, just going back to the neighborhood a little bit. Yeah.
00:08:03
Speaker
I can relate. Like, I think that we've lived in a place that's kind of has that feeling. And I've always, I feel so safe in our little bubble of perfection community.
00:08:14
Speaker
just, I feel so safe. It never even occurs to me to to think ne negative thoughts about anyone or think, um be worried about anyone um and being dangerous or ah theft or anything along those lines.
00:08:27
Speaker
But I also understand the difference, um, and believe keeping your outside appearances up because everyone expects that to you. And this family did a great job of doing it.
00:08:40
Speaker
And then balancing that with your inside feelings and how your family actually, actually, um, runs and but yeah i do see that um and i because i've often said my kids have grown up it says here cultural bubble i that's exactly what it is yeah and i always wanted my kids to grow up around diversity and then you you really don't realize so it was no diversity like it was not diversity at all it was not diverse at all yeah and that's what this neighborhood looks like too yeah So Brandon describes ah the happiness of community members being paired with, as you said, living in the cultural bubble of perfectionism.
00:09:17
Speaker
And the reason of this need for perfectionism is that they're in Utah, which is the capital of the Mormon church. So I do want mention something that I didn't realize until recently. I watched this twice.
00:09:31
Speaker
And I'm wondering if the reason Kevin agreed to do this was because they don't to demonize the Mormon church much more than this section.
00:09:42
Speaker
They don't super blame the Mormon church or, you know, suggest any of the ways that the beliefs or the ways they were raised within the Mormon church could have played a hand in this.
00:09:54
Speaker
So are you saying you think that that was something Kevin wanted to stay away from
Privacy and Impact of Family Vlogging
00:10:01
Speaker
in the telling of this story because yeah he's still a member of the church. the Interesting that you say that because as I was looking back, I was thinking, well, you know, for for this whole thing being about their, you know, the religion and reading the Bible and that really being at the core of this, you don't see a whole lot of like them actually going to church or so I agree with you and I do believe. um and right And in the book then, Sherry's very devout.
00:10:28
Speaker
And has no, yeah yeah, very devout. And none of this has, her relationship with the church is still very intact. Yeah. She does call out in the book um some of like the systems of inherent oppression and, but it's more about how she navigates through that to kind of get beyond it.
00:10:44
Speaker
And, but it's never too much about this specifically about the impact of the church on family vloggers or this need to be perfect um because,
00:10:57
Speaker
The highest level of glory that a Mormon can achieve is only through perfection. They have to be the perfect mother, the perfect wife, the perfect husband, the perfect follower. And as soon as you're not perfect, that's a sin.
00:11:09
Speaker
Which is, it's hard to understand. Yeah. And Brannon says that, you know, the Mormons go on missions. I think when they're 21, everybody has to go on a mission and they get sent somewhere in the world.
00:11:23
Speaker
And he says this isn't like necessarily to... recruit new members, it's really to show how perfect their lives are. And then people will be attracted to that level of it, not so much like the religious side of it.
00:11:38
Speaker
They're like, these people have it together. We should look into what they're doing. It is interesting that their missions. Can you, so Brandon Patrick, how did, can we talk, how, how does he fit into this? It seems like he just kind of popped up.
00:11:51
Speaker
Is he just so narrating or? Nope. So he, an LDS therapist. So that's a very like niche. He has a good perspective on it. He worked with Jodi. Okay.
00:12:03
Speaker
So later on in the series, we'll talk a little bit more about that, but he's got this really unique experience. perspective and he lives in the area okay so i think you just happen to be somebody who
Chad Frankie's Therapy and Family Control
00:12:15
Speaker
it's a lot of weird information about all of this and fits into the narrative and to me it makes me question you know as he's specifically an lds therapist What do you think about, is it prudent to have a therapist tied um to a given religion, do you think?
00:12:36
Speaker
Or is this creating more of a like an identifi identification as a group versus individual? What are your thoughts? You're religious, I'm not. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's that's tough. I would say probably it depends on what you're seeing the therapist for. Like if my husband and I had to go in for any sort of marriage counseling, we'd probably start with our church elders and see where they would recommend we go.
00:13:03
Speaker
But like i see a secular therapist myself. Yeah, I just. ah So but it's hard. I think it opens a lot of space for abuse of that power, as we've seen. Yeah, yeah. um And just in my read like my studying of coercive control in the church, um it does create that separation of us versus them.
00:13:24
Speaker
And they're just like so many times that. Victims have reported something to their church or their church counselor that it goes nowhere. Like it doesn't get reported to police.
00:13:35
Speaker
So there's definitely a conflict of interest that can be ah taken advantage of. So it's, you know, I think it's I think it's really difficult, especially if you have your your trust in.
00:13:50
Speaker
your church and you believe everything in your church, it is a gray area. Yeah. ah Yeah. It just makes me wonder, yeah, if you can focus truly on one's individual needs or I guess, yeah, if you're only doing it with respect to the church beliefs.
00:14:07
Speaker
instead Yeah. Yeah. I think, yeah, I think it's, it's really you're going to your therapist probably. And if you want, you know, the Mormon perspective on this or, um but it also becomes a thing of like, you've already had these beliefs ingrained in you.
00:14:24
Speaker
And if there's a chance that your therapist is going to be like, well, you're a sinner, that's not going to help anything. Yeah, yeah and their definition of sinning all the time. And yeah, it does seem like almost everything's a sin. Yeah. in Anything is not perfection.
00:14:38
Speaker
Okay, sorry. So we were talking about the missionary work. A sect of this missionary work came when M. Russell Ballard, who's the head of the church, encouraged families to participate on the internet to spread the word of Mormonism.
00:14:55
Speaker
He actually called on Mormon families to go on YouTube and share their families, share their day-to-day lives. Look how wonderful everything is. Show off that you're making all this money. show all This is all things you're showing off, and it's because you're Mormon.
00:15:13
Speaker
And I will say, you know, without stereotyping, Mormons do jet generally tend to have an outwardly quote unquote perfect life. They tend to, you know, have nice large families, be well put together.
00:15:28
Speaker
it is something you see across Mormon community, I think. And as far as missions go, that is one thing I never within this series, we never, never really came up, I don't believe, but is a big part of the LDS community.
00:15:42
Speaker
I thought the boys went when they were younger. I thought maybe they went when they were the year after high school. and I'm not sure. um But I don't think it ever came up with Chad. I guess he was below that age. And the girls definitely, they don't go until they're 21. But yeah, I was just surprised we that it I didn't hear of it coming up. Yeah, that was interesting. And I i do think that ah and this is completely speculation, but I think the church will maybe give some leniency to kids who have experienced some sort of trauma ah publicly.
Pursuit of Perfection and Family Tension
00:16:15
Speaker
So and I always this always makes me laugh. Elizabeth Smart went on a mission. Elizabeth Smart was the girl in the early 2000s. She was kidnapped out of her bedroom window by a Mormon extremist that we're actually going to talk about.
00:16:29
Speaker
Way down the line. I bring her up a little bit. Yeah. And it was a very, her family is very devout, very devout LDS followers. um So, you know, she was rescued. She does all of this amazing work now for missing children.
00:16:44
Speaker
But when her mission came around and she said she wanted to do it, she got sent to Paris. And so I do think that, uh, The Mormon Church could perhaps let Chad and Sherry not do a missions trip unless they truly wanted to.
00:17:00
Speaker
Yeah. And I also think, did you ever hear about Kevin or Ruby having done one? Oh, no, actually. I just know that the mission is a big part of, generally speaking, the timeline process.
00:17:13
Speaker
of getting married. Like it yeah it's a very specific, like after mission, especially the the men who have gone on mission are much more respected and are, I guess, better, better catches in the Mormon world. And that's what, you know, usually there's a like a timeline that these kinds of marriages take. And, but yeah, I never had heard about if either of them had.
00:17:37
Speaker
I wonder if there's something like if you get married before the age, because they got married super young. Yeah. If you get married, then maybe you don't go on a missions or you do it together. Like I know Ruby's parents like now do missions trips, but it's not like their mission. Yeah. It's kind of a little bit of a different. And honestly, Kevin's family didn't seem as devout.
00:18:01
Speaker
um Maybe I'm misinterpret that, but they didn't seem as devout. Yeah. With the church. So um that could be a possibility too. And I think there's a financial factor, of course. Oh, yeah.
00:18:12
Speaker
Of course. So back to the episode. We cut to this wild... So I will say, before we go into this, the Frankie family gave the documentary makers thousands of hours of footage that's never been seen. It was never uploaded to YouTube. It was like cutting room floor stuff.
00:18:32
Speaker
So we see this video of Ruby just like sitting in a room filming by herself. And she's trying to seem like... fun and silly and it's just so i i got so uncomfortable i hate stuff like that but she's like stumbling over her words and she's trying to do this like solo like intro video or something or it was like something about scheduling like how i schedule all of our kids we're so busy one of her first attempts which we can understand now that we've started trying to do this
00:19:04
Speaker
So she's trying to do this
Sherry Frankie's Perspective and Family Consequences
00:19:05
Speaker
by herself. She's like holding these markers up in like this completely unhinged crazy way trying to be like silly and fun. And she then screams at her family that she's filming and they need to be quiet.
00:19:18
Speaker
And you hear Kevin respond by saying, he's just trying to get the kids ready for church. And it's like the this he's doing in terms of the LDS faith, he's doing her job of like getting the kids ready and out the door. And she's just like disengaged trying to film this.
00:19:34
Speaker
But he's probably in the l again in the LDS eyes like doing like they're trying to go to church. Stop filming. Let's go to church. And it almost feels like she's creating her character.
00:19:45
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And then the irony being she's developing this picture perfect character of a mother she wants to be. And then the camera's off and she's screaming yeah and well and then she looks incredibly sad like she's just like makes this face like she looks kind of away and it's just this sad face then she's back up and does the thing so after this kevin says that ruby's sole ambition in life was to be the perfect mother and you know she wasn't getting enough praise and attention until she got on youtube
00:20:18
Speaker
And he called her unstoppable when determined to achieve something. So once she started getting accolades on YouTube, she was like, this is it. Let's talk about the word per the idea of a perfect mother for a second.
00:20:30
Speaker
Yeah. My thought is anytime I hear somebody who wants to achieve being a perfect mother, they focus so much on what their quote unquote parenting should be like.
00:20:41
Speaker
Yeah. That then there's trouble. I mean, some of the most troubled fan families I have seen, it's been those who have, sought to be perfect that's showing i don't think there is a perfection and and the more you work for it you i think you get away from just the love and support and the natural growth that you have gets mixed up in these other ideas that you have about what perfection looks like yeah and it's very outward it's like the image of being the perfect mother whereas i think
00:21:16
Speaker
I'm the best mother for my kids. Yeah. If that makes sense. Like I would be a terrible mother for somebody else's kids, but I'm my, like, I don't, and I'm by no means perfect. I just think I'm the best mom I can be to those, those kids that are mine.
00:21:32
Speaker
Well, like outwardly we're a mess. Yeah. And that's fine. Well, and you adjust as you go and you adjust to who they are, who, I mean, who they're born to be. And
Public Backlash and Family Downfall
00:21:44
Speaker
yeah, there's not one answer across the board. And there's certainly not amongst individual children, even within a family. And I think it's that, that you have to kind of be able to accept that and not, not have one idea of what motherhood looks like and i also think like the idea of being a perfect mother kind of takes the individuality away from the kids oh yeah because it's not about being the best mom to each kid it's about being the perfect mother and therefore all the kids are going to get parented the same because exactly she's doing it right
00:22:17
Speaker
yeah, she's doing it her way or, or no way. So yeah, I know. I, it's just something I found very interesting throughout, you know, throughout my, cause I, cause I guess we kind of raised our children a little different and we were more, um, lax than most families, but at the same time, we're very close and our kids did all the right things because it was just about honesty. Right.
00:22:41
Speaker
and And, that was what Like we basically just haveve always had one rule. Just don't lie. You just be honest and we'll work through the rest. And I think, yeah, sometimes when um the more you think you need to parent, you need to discipline, you need to guide, ah can get it can get out of control. and And it could be, yeah, you just lose the lose the child's personality in and there.
00:23:05
Speaker
yeah definitely ah all right so then we go to january 2015 which is their first ever video posted to youtube and it's a gender reveal cake cutting for their youngest child um again at this time you can see ah sherry and chad's name and faces even though they were minors but they're participating in the documentary so i assume they gave permission for that but you don't see all the other kids faces are blurred so this is ah We learned the name of their channel is Eight Passengers because they're just in one family, living this life together, traveling together, trying to make it together, i guess.
00:23:45
Speaker
In a big van. Right, in a big van. So Ruby says, quote, we're here to show that happy families are a reality. Just a big, I don't know if I'd call it a peeve, but to me, whenever you have to point out that you're happy or your family's happy. Usually means that you aren't.
00:24:01
Speaker
I always think truly happy people don't
Conclusion and Future Exploration
00:24:03
Speaker
have to tell people they're happy. Yeah. um Kevin says that the family wasn't poor. They were comfortable. They lived simply. Kevin had just finished his PhD at the time of this first video. So he was in school for ah a lot of the kids being little and they managed.
00:24:17
Speaker
Chad says, quote, she really was the best mom. I love that. No. I love that and I hate that. i know. Sherry and Chad grew up as best friends, which also I love.
00:24:30
Speaker
um A lot of their relationship reminded me of your two older kids. Yeah. I i mean, i there's nothing I think as a parent you can hope for.
00:24:40
Speaker
or love seeing than your kids being close to one another. um i will say, like, I was thinking, do you think that that relationship kind of made Ruby jealous in a way?
00:24:53
Speaker
Their closeness. I think so. Yeah. And I don't think it was necessarily that, like, they loved each other more than her. I think it was, I think she recognized pretty quick. She had to, like, kind of isolate all the kids from each other and, like, pit them against each other a bit. Yeah.
00:25:08
Speaker
yeah And it was more that they would join forces and she was kind of afraid they'd be against her. And they kind of were. They but kind of were the outside thinkers. um I mean, i guess they were the oldest too, but no, I mean, I just, yeah I was just thinking about that today as like, the I will say there's times I am slightly jealous, you know, like my kids live apart now and then, you know, they call each other several times a day or whatever.
00:25:34
Speaker
And I get a call once a week and I kind of think, well, I mean, Yeah. Don't call me several times a day. Right. Maybe more than once week. No, mine my kids are all still at home and my older two are 18 months apart.
00:25:50
Speaker
And as soon as we brought um our middle child home from the hospital, we told our oldest, this is your best friend. And it's like one of the best things we could have ever done because they are best friends.
00:26:02
Speaker
They make each other crazy, but they like look out for each other. They're taking care of each other. Like even in a big friend group, they've like got eyes on each other. yeah I mean, it is a beautiful thing to see.
00:26:13
Speaker
Unfortunately, I'm not sure that um that Ruby saw it that way. Yeah. So Kevin shares that Ruby filmed everything and he was very uncomfortable.
00:26:24
Speaker
um He was very awkward on film. I almost said at first, but I think he was throughout. Yeah. He got a little better at hiding it, but even like some of the later videos, he was still like, seemed uncomfortable, not as bad, but still was like, eh.
00:26:39
Speaker
I feel like he didn't, again, like develop his character the way yeah Ruby saw it because was still hanging on to the fact that this is just our family, not... yeah Yeah, not a reality show where we have roles that we are meant to play.
00:26:55
Speaker
So they cut to this this clip that it's Ruby and Kevin like talking about. Oh, gosh, I don't remember. They're talking about something and Ruby's talking and she's expecting Kevin to just like jump in and he like doesn't know what to say.
00:27:11
Speaker
And she gets so annoyed with him when he doesn't engage with the camera how she wants him to. And he like they don't cut or anything. It's just like she's like rolling her eyes and staring at him. And he's like, OK, I'll do it. i'll They call it picking in. I'll pick in like he's going to. They're going to start over and he'll start if he starts the whatever the dialogue. It'll be less awkward. He's like, I'll do it. Don't worry. I got it.
00:27:34
Speaker
And it's like it's just it felt so uncomfortable. Because he wants to please her. Yeah. To this day. Yeah. We'll get to it. But to this day. Right.
00:27:45
Speaker
um I will also say as far as the, I mean, I do see how they show that yes, the camera was that all the time. And up I hearken back to, I was someplace where there was an ongoing vlog.
00:27:59
Speaker
And I will say, even at that, it was not on all the time. It wasn't a family. It wasn't, but there was distinct times. um It was real, but it's not all the time. Every move you make, you're not having to be on at all times.
00:28:13
Speaker
And it seems to me like this family almost did. Yeah. It was like, if she missed a cute moment, she couldn't forgive herself. So she had to make sure the camera was always on for everything. Yep.
00:28:24
Speaker
So Kevin says that Ruby wanted him to be the strong, perfect family man. And he said, quote, I am a nerd through and through. Which I appreciated that little bit of humility um because I'm still mad at him. So I'm glad that he's got some introspective.
00:28:40
Speaker
Yeah. They met August of 2000. Kevin said he was incredibly insecure and he was willing to change who he was to be whoever Ruby wanted. He said that at the time he was showing interest, she had five guys wanting to court her.
00:28:56
Speaker
we hear that language again of courting, not dating. And he said she had a chart in her closet of what she wanted in a partner and which guy had that attribute. It was like this wild spreadsheet in her closet.
00:29:09
Speaker
And Kevin says he took notes and studied it to make himself who Ruby wanted. Makes me think, though, who is the insecure one? Right. i mean, you can be insecure because you're a follower, but you can also be insecure and and by being non-flexible about everything. And that it's that's a not um is obvious insecurity or a way of showing insecurity.
00:29:33
Speaker
Yeah. But I still think both are. And I mean, we all have insecurities. but But I also wonder, like... Isn't this a little bit manipulative that he like studied what he needed to be?
00:29:46
Speaker
And there's maybe there's like a sense of that on both ends. Well, especially when you consider they had such a short... They they didn't have a long courtship period. So you you can you can pretend to be something for a short period of time or yeah in a relationship. I mean...
00:30:04
Speaker
And at some point that kind of starts slipping. But if you get married this quickly, you can see, yeah, he, I'm sure he could play, know, stick to what she wanted easily for while. And then maybe then that can lead to disappointment down the road when the real you starts coming out.
00:30:22
Speaker
Yeah. But when you say it was a short courtship, they were married December 2000. So they met and four months later were married. And Kevin said he was willing to do anything to keep Ruby's affections.
00:30:36
Speaker
So their first viral video we see, it's a baby climbing out of a crib. And it's just this cute little video of like, she's like, what are we going to do with you? You're climbing out of your crib. And Sherry's in it, like talking about the little baby. it's It is cute.
00:30:50
Speaker
But after that, people started recognizing them. And around that time, they got their first paycheck. And Kevin said that $85 paycheck Got him hooked.
00:31:01
Speaker
I found that very ah interesting and relatable. Me too. Yeah. You see that little bit of money rolling in. He's like, okay, I'll do whatever. Take the little pressure off me. I can go along with this.
00:31:13
Speaker
So Eight Passengers LLC was born. And Sherry says the kids were employees and Ruby was the CEO. Now, I think she means this on both levels. I think she means it literally.
00:31:26
Speaker
They were staff, but obviously it's how their family was run as well. An interesting no mention of Kevin's role. That's what I was going to say. First of all, the kids ah kids were unpaid employees.
00:31:38
Speaker
and where And then where does um Kevin fit into this picture? And it's... Yeah. It's like ah Ruby's Mr. Burns and Kevin is Smithers from The Simpsons.
00:31:49
Speaker
I don't know the reference, but I'm going to believe you. So then we meet Paige Hanna. We did talk about Paige Hanna. back in our ruby and jody series she was the friend that eventually introduced kevin and ruby to jody hildebrand connections she's also i don't think they talk about it in the series but she's also the i think i'm so sorry if i'm wrong but now i'm i'm questioning myself but i'm pretty sure she jody lived with them first
00:32:23
Speaker
Yeah. And started, if you'll remember, it like started to like come on to the husband and act real weird. Yes, I i believe you're correct. Yeah. So that is who we meet. I was actually shocked to actually see her um in this because we just talked about her a lot. It was weird. I wasn't expecting it.
00:32:42
Speaker
She seems like somebody who... Doesn't mind being in the spotlight either. Yes, I agree. um But i I do think that she has a lot of guilt for her role in everything, whether she knew what she was happening or not.
00:32:56
Speaker
Yeah. So she, there are, the Hannah's are very good friends with the Frankies. And she says she was just blown away by their fame. They would, I think there's a part they go see the musical Hamilton and people are like, oh my gosh, are you with Ruby Frankie?
00:33:10
Speaker
It's just so weird. But Paige, Hannah and her husband in and of themselves were, were pretty well known and respected within the community. um I feel like they were pretty well off and had been successful monetarily. And and again, they sort of had the perfect family. yeah and but yeah But being close to the to this yeah semi-famous Frankie family definitely elevated, in her mind, elevated their social.
00:33:37
Speaker
Oh, yeah. And I bet they loved it. Yeah. That's what's not being said. Sherry shared that they started to notice that any of the thumbnails on the YouTube videos, if it featured Sherry or Chad, they would get more viewers than just Ruby and the little kids.
00:33:53
Speaker
And this was focused a lot on Chad, who is very popular, and the audience was mostly girls his age. And then Kevin very weirdly admits that he was living vicariously through Chad, who was confident and funny and relaxed and good at sports.
00:34:10
Speaker
And Ruby and Kevin admit, well, Kevin admits to exploiting this. So Chad would do these amazing, cool things that he'd never had the confidence to do as a kid and is like, well, all right, let's go make money off that.
00:34:25
Speaker
So on one end, the yeah, they are exploiting it. But then it almost comes back full circle to the being the things about him. Yep. That they don't like or that as he gets older, they don't accept.
00:34:38
Speaker
Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. Me too. The thing, same things that made him really good at at one point, then starts making him really bad at another. Yeah. Yeah. I definitely didn't think of it like that, but you're absolutely right.
00:34:50
Speaker
Kevin said in the docuseries that his kids are the only reason they got any money. They were openly making money off their kids. And he said the peak payment they got was a hundred grand or more per month.
00:35:02
Speaker
Okay. So this, this makes me think, and I know this isn't the point. That's a lot of money. Why didn't, I mean, that's a lot, a lot of money. It didn't seem like this family had a ton of savings. Right.
00:35:15
Speaker
I know. was just kind of, yeah, blown away by the number, but even blown away, like, do you, I'm pretty, live a pretty nice life and do a lot of traveling and that.
00:35:26
Speaker
Oh my gosh, I cannot even imagine getting close to that and not having, a well and you know, not having your house paid off. not I mean, they you know, even, Sherry even had a um car payment, things like that.
00:35:40
Speaker
If you're making a hundred grand a month, that is ah but kind of really, yeah. Well, and one thing that just occurred to me was like, he moved out for a year. and I paid for him to have a townhouse for a year and they told him to stop working.
00:35:54
Speaker
And so I forgot the working part. Yeah, they told him he needed to stop working. And then Ruby became ah prepper and started buying all of the things for end times. So I wonder if that has to do with it. They never really said anything about that.
00:36:10
Speaker
No. Yeah, it's just a surprisingly high amount of money to go through. I also, um not that this would even hit that either, but ah in the book also, Sherry never talks about how she paid for college.
00:36:23
Speaker
So I wonder if some of it went to that, that she's had her college paid for, which is the very least she deserves. She deserves so much more. um but And she started making her own money, too.
00:36:35
Speaker
Yes, she did. And I, yeah. So I don't know. um Which, thank goodness, well, as we go on, that she did because yeah she she needed it.
00:36:45
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. So Kevin calls this lifestyle that they've created a quote, cosmic vending machine, basically saying that they made a bargain with God. If they're faithful and share their Christianity, they don't say Mormonism. They say Christianity, which I think is interesting.
00:37:03
Speaker
Then God is blessing the family in return. And that is called prosperity gospel and is not true. It just sort of makes me cringe. Yeah, it's the same. um Kevin says that the money was never what Ruby was interested in. She was, quote, effectively America's mom.
00:37:22
Speaker
I thought was laughable. Yeah, I mean, do get this. the It does occur to me that Kevin seems more interested in the money part, but I don't think Ruby's not.
00:37:37
Speaker
Right. I mean, I i think it definitely, she she enjoyed the accolades and she, but I wouldn't say that. It seemed as if she wasn't in it for the money also. Agree. But she did. She wanted to be put on a pedestal.
00:37:50
Speaker
She said she felt like she was an instrument in the hand of God and meant for bigger things than herself. So I think her like religiosity started very early.
00:38:01
Speaker
and there's been some suggestions that her childhood was odd. I haven't seen too much more about it, but like very strict. Yeah.
00:38:13
Speaker
in the doctrines they believed and had the children learn and grow up in. So I don't know. I don't know if, um, I have heard one of her sisters say something like maybe some like unchecked mental illness, mental illness, and this like being raised so strict in their beliefs collided into this like and And we see it actually a lot of times that this is actually something with Elizabeth Smart's kidnappers. is like There's this mental illness factor that when you put very strict religious beliefs on top of it, it just creates this like horrible combination of like just this religiosity that is guiding everything.
00:38:59
Speaker
yeah And I think that is what we'll see ah come to a head. And then it's also interesting that that now they have flipped roles. In the LDS community, it's the the man is generally the breadwinner.
00:39:16
Speaker
And the woman is at home taking care of the family. Well, now now now Ruby hat is the breadmaker. The breadwinner, he said. Right.
00:39:29
Speaker
to be Actually, they did say she made good effects too. That is fair.
00:39:37
Speaker
up Sorry. Yeah. So it's kind of even more demasculating. Yeah. Demasculating. Demasculating. Yeah. Emasculated. um Or Kevin. Which is like. I don't know if I'm on Kevin's side or feeling bad for him. It's such a paradox, too, because the women traditionally in the faith are home while the men are working.
00:40:00
Speaker
So when the leader of the church says to make these videos about your life, it is going to be more the moms and wives who are leading it. And we see that. In the the content creators who are these Mormon families, it is really driven by the wife.
00:40:16
Speaker
So then when what the wife is doing is out out earning husband's regular everyday job, I can see how that's like, wow, the church is using you and not me. Yeah.
00:40:30
Speaker
I can see how it would cause that all that. I can see where it would cause insecurity in Kevin. Yeah. um So we talked to some neighbors again. They say the Frankie's had a reputation for filming without asking after they moved to their new fancy neighborhood once they started making big bucks.
00:40:46
Speaker
I'm going to give them a little bit of slack on this one because I think at the beginning, I mean, early in the in the YouTube vlogging days, maybe people were not as ah conscientious of of other people's privacy and that that has grown.
00:40:59
Speaker
Yeah, I would agree with that. They do, however, go along go on to say that the neighbors really got along with Kevin, really liked him. He was just like a normal guy. ah But Ruby wasn't well received.
00:41:11
Speaker
She seemed to be more interested in filming than like getting to know neighbors. And now this is where it becomes a question I... wonder if any of the neighbors said this or if they're keeping their perfect perfect mormon exterior and didn't actually say this but they didn't like their homes being filmed they're like kids would be in the background but as i i don't think i think that's maybe some hindsight yeah i mean again it wasn't i get it but i don't think she was blatantly i mean i don't think she was probably as conscientious as she should
00:41:44
Speaker
But, yeah. I mean, I get it. If anything, I would think she would go out of her way to avoid anybody else in their videos. Yeah, they might be they might be dirty. Yeah, right?
00:41:55
Speaker
Ew. And the neighbors say Ruby really kept to herself and just wasn't very friendly. I'm going to defend one more time here yeah as being a very much introvert.
00:42:06
Speaker
I do believe that you can be a person who stays who wants your own time and is not... not outwardly friendly with everyone. And that does not mean you're a mean person. It just means that actually usually you're uncomfortable.
00:42:22
Speaker
Yeah. Hard agree. Yeah. I'm going give her a yeah. But we are not, All over the internet pretending like we're not that person. yeah Good point.
00:42:33
Speaker
So as the kids started to grow up, they started to change their attitudes about filming. They didn't want to do it. They were complaining and they were tired. And Ruby said the kids were, the kids quote, were losing their light.
00:42:47
Speaker
And then she started bribing them. Kids would get $10 for helping with each video And soon their whole schedule and their whole world revolved around YouTube. They couldn't do anything without making sure it fit into the YouTube schedule.
00:43:01
Speaker
I mean, had to take a ton of energy for them. Yeah. Yeah. um Sherry said that the house always had to be kept spotless. They changed their light bulbs to like these bright white, like my recording studio lights I have right now, just all the time.
00:43:18
Speaker
um And she said that their house felt like a set that they couldn't be kids in. And we have remember, this it's their mom's career. It's Ruby's career at this point. But it's not the kids. The kids, that's really unfair to to them. Right.
00:43:30
Speaker
Yeah, but the kids are the one ones that are making the money. Right, right. Nobody wants to see Ruby and Kevin. No. So soon they started sharing more and more personal things about the kids. Again, we we talked a little bit about this in our ah series last year. But they she started sharing, like, Chad without a shirt on and discussing puberty. And we talked about there was a video of Sherry going bra shopping and just really uncomfortable things that they didn't want to do.
00:44:00
Speaker
So Chad started to retreat from the family, really. He said in the docuseries that he hated hated his mom for making him do all of this. And he said he especially hated how disingenuous the brand deals they got were, that it was just completely faked and scripted. Yeah.
00:44:17
Speaker
I mean, it's got to be, hor I mean, the whole thing has got to be horrifying for the kids. Can you imagine going to school? Yeah. And, you know, having everyone seen these private moments. And you can see like Ruby was just needing to escalate the content rent, right? To like keep more and more viewers. So had to get more and more private, which is which is is very sad for the guests.
00:44:40
Speaker
Yeah. Chad started intentionally making Ruby mad and making filming difficult. He would mess up his lines on purpose and just, like, not want to participate, which I feel like is a normal, like, rebellious teen thing to do. He wasn't, like, vandalizing the library. He was just, like, messing with his mom.
00:44:58
Speaker
But to her, this is not acceptable. From there, he stopped listening to his teachers and He was actually expelled from school and he started therapy. And I feel like a lot of those things, he was trying to bring attention to his I don't know if it was depression or certainly his discomfort in in this way of life.
00:45:22
Speaker
I think he he was calling out for help. Yeah. A teenage boy in this environment of like that, it's so stifled and ah Being yourself is probably not really encouraged.
00:45:35
Speaker
Probably doesn't know how to articulate those feelings to his family of like, he doesn't know how to say this is uncomfortable. and Instead, he's just going to do things to get negative attention because it's better than no attention or fake attention.
00:45:49
Speaker
Ruby got Jodi Hildebrandt's name from Paige Hanna. Ruby wanted someone to bring the hammer down on Chad. And at the time, Jodi had a lot of influence in the community.
00:46:01
Speaker
And Paige talks about how she put Jodi on a pedestal. um She was incredibly knowledgeable. She had this glowing professional history. um We know she worked a lot with the LDS leadership and they recommended her a lot.
00:46:17
Speaker
Whenever you hear about somebody needing to bring the the namer or the hammer down, have you ever heard that working with anyone? I feel like I have never heard person who say, we got to really rein them in. Right. And it actually working. And it actually working. Yeah.
00:46:31
Speaker
And in this case, it does not seem like his actions um were to a level that this type of discipline was warranted. No, not at all. And you can just, especially in Sherry's book, she was obsessed with being perfect, but not in the way her mom was. She was obsessed in being the perfect daughter that would Make everybody happy and okay.
00:46:59
Speaker
And when your firstborn is basically on paper perfect, and then your secondborn starts rebelling a little bit, it probably was a bit frightening.
00:47:11
Speaker
But instead of like sitting down and being like, hey, what's going on? it was like, well, we're bringing the hammer down. and and then yeah, that and Sherry's suffering so much inside, which we now realize, but that she's still getting um has this persona of being the kind of the the brown nosing suck up kid. um Yeah. But inside.
00:47:33
Speaker
ye That's not how she feels. She wants to get away from this. So no. So um at this point, after we're introduced to Jodi, we cut back to Brandon Patrick. He shares that he was licensed in 2010.
00:47:49
Speaker
And as part of his licensure, he was invited to shadow Jodi. And he was incredibly impressed with her at first. Yeah. And, um you know, she spoke with authority.
00:47:59
Speaker
She was firm in her convictions. um However, he started to notice that she convinced her clients that she could save their children. And I can see how she yeah, I could see how she would come across as successful and confident.
00:48:13
Speaker
Yeah, I wonder what what is she saving these children from? Oh, we'll get into it. You know, why do they need to be saved is the question that comes to my mind.
00:48:25
Speaker
Yes, that is very interesting. And we will talk about it. So after about a month of hearing about Jodi, Chad had his first session. And he had planned on like, he he thought he could like completely manipulate He was going to like smile and fake everything and just be like, yeah, I'm fine.
00:48:43
Speaker
Things are great. um And Jodi saw right through him and called him out for lying. And it like shocked him. He was like knocked off his feet. And he did notice after that, he saw his mother smirk at his father like, this is going to work.
00:49:01
Speaker
Well, but the truth of the matter is Jody was going to call him out for whatever he did. There was no no, no, nothing he could have done on that first, and that first interaction that would have been the right one.
00:49:12
Speaker
Yeah. And ah he scowled at Jody during, I think it was a video call. I think everything was video calls. And I think she said in front of him, Jodi said, quote, he needs an outcome because he was, quote, running circles around Ruby and Kevin.
00:49:30
Speaker
So first of all i was thinking needs an outcome. Does she mean needs a consequence? I think so. Is that what she's saying? And yeah. And then what is running what is running circles around?
00:49:40
Speaker
What does that mean? Right. It's like, he's not.
00:49:45
Speaker
He's simply not being manipulative and taking advantage of his parents. It's not true. He's being a teenage kid. um So everything was taken from Chad. He had no phone, Xbox. He wasn't allowed to do sports, which in Sherry's book,
00:50:00
Speaker
She talks more about this, but like he lost scholarship opportunities because of this. He was a he was a talented athlete. And I think it was like a sophomore junior year, which is kind of a big deal when you're trying to figure out your life.
00:50:15
Speaker
I've seen this before, though, with parents who who are trying to discipline their children and they take away so many things that they're left with nothing else to take away. And I've seen that multiple times. And the times I've seen it, really the offenses of their children really all that serious right but again they're teenagers in every case that i can think of they're boys and they're stubborn so the they're not going to give in so then yeah keep taking and taking and taking what do you do at some point there's nothing to take right so you run send your kids to wilderness camp
00:50:55
Speaker
He was sent to... oh I gotta try to say this again. Anasazi Foundation Wilderness Therapy Program. Ugh. This program was associated with the LDS yeah Church.
00:51:08
Speaker
I believe. yes Yep. There are a lot of these programs out there. And I know I still want to do series on um the troubled teen industry. ah But we got a lot of plans.
00:51:20
Speaker
Well, because to me, you know what this does more than anything? It gets... gets the kid away from you out of sight, out of mind. yeah I think a lot of times it's just, okay, we want to we want to prove that we're working on him and helping him.
00:51:34
Speaker
But you know what? For six weeks, we can do that without having to deal with him ourselves. Yeah. You know, I always, i used to watch Dr. Phil all the time. And that, I would always think that, like,
00:51:46
Speaker
Is this just kind of a break for the parents? Yes! Maybe they deserve a break, but not like to send their kids away for that long. i he have to like If things are bad enough that you feel like you have to send your kid away, you have to do some work as a parent, too.
00:52:02
Speaker
Yeah, it's the it's a break without the shame of not being able to control them yourselves, I think. other thing and i don't i think i don't I don't think they said this actually in the documentary, but I think they redecorated his room while he was gone like with the theme of the Anasazi experience.
00:52:23
Speaker
Which just struck me. That's horrible. I just thought that was really weird. That's horrible. They gave like a forest room to come home to. Like, remember how it was. I mean, just like. I can't remember who said this, if Sherry or Chad said this, but one of them said that Ruby wasn't trying to fix Chad for him.
00:52:39
Speaker
He was trying to, she was trying to get him back in line to do the content. She was trying to fix him for herself. So this is when we hear about the option Chad was given when he got home from the wilderness camp was to sleep in the living room or to sleep on a bean bag in the basement.
00:52:57
Speaker
No, I think he he had done a little pranking, right? Yeah, there was definitely that. They don't talk about that in the series, but like he was pranking. He told the youngest ah boy that he had to wake up because they were going to Disney World and they weren't going to Disney World. Yeah.
00:53:13
Speaker
Like, that's not a great thing. That's not nice to do. But this is like completely typical teenage boy thing to do to your little sibling. Actually, if Ruby was smart, she would have turned those things around ah for for views. check It's actually so. Yeah, she would have said like...
00:53:29
Speaker
Okay, I'll take him to Disney World and you get to stay home. And I'll make a video of how much fun I'm having with him. needed to pivot sometimes. ah So which Chad chose to sleep on the beanbag for seven months. And I did think it was interesting that...
00:53:46
Speaker
We get the information that he was given a choice. I don't, like, on the viewers end, that doesn't make it any better. But I wonder if Chad kind of has to, I don't know, make, like, I got a choice of if I'm going to be in the living room or the basement.
00:53:59
Speaker
Like, i have I got to choose. It's okay. It seems like he's protecting his mom a lot still. And I don't blame him for that whatsoever. Yeah. He does. Because the key to it, though, is the lack of privacy. Right. More than the actual sleeping conditions, i I would say. At his age, the lack, I mean, that's just tough.
00:54:18
Speaker
And I for sure would be like, at that age, the living room where everybody is or the basement where some people go sometimes. Yeah. So Chad was given one more chance before he was going to be sent away to a military camp in Virginia.
00:54:31
Speaker
And this scared him enough that he began shaping up to how Ruby wanted him to be. And in this, he accepted that Ruby would always pick Jodi's suggestions, thoughts, beliefs first over anybody else.
00:54:46
Speaker
So he was learning and he was learning that she would follow through. And that. It wasn't just. Yeah, it wasn't just a. It wasn't just a threat. Right. She she would. Yeah. Yeah.
00:54:56
Speaker
Especially if it was that Jodi's suggestion. And it didn't matter what he if he said, like, whatever you're doing is painful. Be like, well, Jodi said to do it. Mm hmm. ah So it didn't matter.
00:55:08
Speaker
so that's the beginning of what we're going to see escalating. But he was still fairly devoted. Even Chad was still fairly devoted to Jodi at this point. Oh, yeah. And it gets it increases because this is when we start seeing him in the YouTube videos, frequently on a computer.
00:55:29
Speaker
And so they're just doing their regular family vlog and there's Chad sitting on the computer again. And he was on calls with Jody ah for any time he was seen on the channel on a computer.
00:55:40
Speaker
That's what he was doing. He was having his quote therapy. And I think he had to at some point pay for it himself. Yeah, they made him pay for it eventually. So Chad said like in the beginning, she was really kind and caring and encouraging.
00:55:54
Speaker
um She wanted him to pursue a more spiritual lifestyle. And he started luar learning about truth and distortion. We talked so much about those words in our series.
00:56:08
Speaker
But these are the kind of buzzy words that Jodi used in her ah connections teachings. Living in truth is living that perfect, sinless life. Being in distortion is accepting worldly things as the truth and not following the perfect guidelines set out for you by Jodi and thereby your parents.
00:56:34
Speaker
Essentially, they're catch-all words for anything Jodi thinks is good and anything Jodi thinks is bad. Yes. ah So at this time, Chad was working really, really hard to get back in his good graces. And Ruby's response was that, quote, Jodi is one in a million.
00:56:51
Speaker
It seemed to Chad that that his mother ah thought Jodi was the reason that he was getting better. And he, because of this hard work and devotion to Jodi, he got his bedroom back finally.
00:57:03
Speaker
And I find it interesting. I'm not sure if it was, again, in the docuseries, but by this point, they had ah somebody else who was editing for them. And they didn't realize that whoever was editing was going to include this this part where... I didn't know that.
00:57:24
Speaker
Wow. Because I was like, why would you post this? yeah ah So what we're talking about is the video that I would say caused the downfall of this family.
00:57:34
Speaker
um I think it would have happened regardless of this video, but this video is like the beginning of the end. So this is the video where Chad revealed that he had gotten his bedroom back after sleeping on a beanbag for seven months.
00:57:46
Speaker
And it received huge backlash. So Ruby did take the video down and she just, she wasn't prepared for how harsh it got.
00:57:58
Speaker
So after that, people started scrutinizing more of the videos, including the one where she refused to bring the youngest child's lunch to school because she was supposed to make it herself.
00:58:09
Speaker
And Kevin said she was devastated to be seen of as abusive. And initially, They framed this backlash to, I think, kind of justify it to themselves as a religious family becoming a victim of cancel culture.
00:58:25
Speaker
Now, in the series, Kevin says he recognizes that that backlash was valid. And then ah immediately as he says that, it cuts to a clip of Ruby yelling at one of the kids for being nervous and not wanting to do the video.
00:58:38
Speaker
And Ruby says, like, be he yourself. And the little girl says, I am being myself. And Ruby says, well, then change it. And I have to believe these negative feelings from the public where we're building because, yeah, this I mean, yes, it is a serious video. And I mean, she's done a lot of things.
00:58:58
Speaker
There's been a lot of videos that could be perceived as yeah borderline abusive. and So I find it interesting that this one was the one that finally crossed the line. Yeah, and it it made people, you know, they found the video of Ruby threatening to cut off a stuffed animal's head.
00:59:14
Speaker
And they they started but kind of going back and scrutinizing more. Yep. yep And Kevin says that there were horrors going on in the home that he wasn't fully aware of.
00:59:26
Speaker
Got some questions about that. If the whole YouTube sphere is seeing some of these things happening, he has the ability to see what's happening when he's not home. Right. Right. i mean It's basically they're on camera 24-7. And is he pretty checked out? is that but Or head in the sand?
00:59:44
Speaker
Or complicit? And I think that's always going to be the question about Kevin. and it's probably How complicit is he? A little bit of all of them, I think. Yeah. So basically what the kids started learning is that love is obedience, but if you disobey, you will fear the parent.
01:00:00
Speaker
They started being beaten more. There were spankings, being whipped with a belt, um just more explosive anger outbursts from Ruby, especially against Chad.
01:00:13
Speaker
Sherry said that she would try to support Chad and that she has a memory of cleaning blood off of a wall after he was beaten. felt bad for Chad. And I know. I still do.
01:00:25
Speaker
um Although he does seem like if you go on his social media now, he's living his best life. So Sherry, we end this episode with Sherry saying she doesn't blame how far Ruby went on Jodi.
01:00:36
Speaker
She said that Jodi set off things that were already in Ruby's heart. That is where we end episode one. And they're Ruby's kids. i i I believe the same thing. Yeah, Jodi... May have pushed her introduce some thoughts, but when it comes down to is there Ruby's kids and Ruby's family. and And it was her who brought the pain to them.
01:01:00
Speaker
Yeah. And sometimes, and we've seen it over and over, like just in the true crime sphere, two people get together and it explodes in the worst possible way. And often there's one who has a, like a, like a very outgoing personality.
01:01:16
Speaker
that Yeah. That's what something and we can talk about that later, but a lot of these, we kind of hear the same thing with a lot of these, yeah the pairing up of one person who's got this very gregarious yeah personality. and And then the other who's got maybe a little bit more passive, wicked thoughts, but passive outwardly, but like, has it in. Yeah.
01:01:37
Speaker
Yeah. yeah And yeah, it happens a lot. And a lot of times I don't think this is the case. I think that things would have e kept continued escalating even without Jodi. But a lot of times in situations like that, the kind of more passive one probably wouldn't have actually done anything if they hadn't met this more loud, aggressive, boisterous one. Yeah.
01:01:59
Speaker
It was synergy. Gross. Gross synergy. Yeah. All right, guys. Thank you. all right. We will be back next time. We'll talk about episode two.
01:02:19
Speaker
you