The Cut - The Cult of the Provider Man

In 2022, Karla Elia was 22 and desperate to leave her parents’ house. She was disillusioned with school — it would only put her in debt, anyway — and tired of her job as a leasing agent for a rental property in San Diego. Her solution? Find a man who would provide for her. On Bumble, she met a 24-year-old in the military. Out on dates, she made it a point never to talk about her past, only how he fit into her future dreams; he showed her his credit and savings account, and Elia decided she could live within his means. Four months later, they were married. She sat in her car and recorded her revelations. “I just said, ‘Ladies, I found a way for you to attract the man of your dreams,’” Elia tells me. The video went viral. Elia completed a “relationship-coaching program” and started selling her expertise online. Though she doesn’t believe in contributing to the household bills, she couldn’t help but capitalize on the business momentum. “I said, this is a great opportunity for me to serve women and make it my long-term career,” Elia tells me. “What better ways to spend my days of —” she puts it in air quotes — “work?” Her follower count rose to 1 million.

Today in dystopian news, a number of homeless people have been sent out of Edinburgh to make room for Taylor Swift fans attending the Eras tour, and Tribeca Festival will screen AI-generated short films, because of course. Meanwhile, a Hyundai manufacturing plant in Alabama allegedly employed a 13-year-old child to work over 50 hours per week on an assembly line. See how newspapers around the country and the world covered Trump’s guilty verdict. The “birds and the bees” talk needs to evolve. Find a third place. And another day, another study reaffirming the benefits of the Mediterranean diet.

Sign up to get Brooding, a subscriber-only newsletter interrogating modern family life, written by Kathryn Jezer-Morton.