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July 14, 2023 - Dennis Prager Show
01:22:45
No More Culture Wars
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Dennis Prager here.
Thanks for listening to the Daily Dennis Prager Podcast.
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subscribe at prager-topia.com Well, hello, y'all.
A good Friday to you.
Another week is coming to an end.
You know my theory that life goes by, by the week.
Days are their normal length.
Years are, but the week zooms by.
And with it, everything else.
So...
I don't know if this story deserves to be called the most bizarre of the week.
It will not sound bizarre, but I will explain to you why.
This is the headline from the New York Post.
Disney CEO Bob Iger doesn't want company, quote, drawn into any culture wars during DeSantis' feud.
Disney boss Bob Iger says he doesn't want to be drawn into any culture wars as Disney continues to weather a battle with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis during an interview at Sun Valley's summer camp for billionaires.
In a Thursday sit-down with CNBC, Iger said of last month's neo-Nazi protests outside of Walt Disney, I've got to see that.
There were neo-Nazi protests outside of Walt Disney.
And let's see.
Nazi flag wavers.
This is from the headline.
Outside Disney World identified as hate group Order of the Black Sun.
How many were there?
Let's see.
An investigator they formed earlier.
These individuals are well known to us.
It doesn't say how many.
But I'm looking at a picture and there are five.
A big Nazi flag and five of them.
So, let me understand this.
Bob Iger used them as a factor in what he was about to say.
Five Nazi demonstrators?
This is what he's fighting?
Does he believe that?
Who was it?
Was CNBC? Does CNBC believe that?
Disney is fighting Nazis?
Not regular Americans?
Who want...
Let's put it this way, who want to be called ladies and gentlemen and boys and girls, who don't want woke, stomping on normative values, content coming from Disney.
The very reference to the Nazis is so demagogic that it leaves one speechless.
That was horrifying, Iger said.
I don't really want to engage in the specifics.
None of this makes sense to me.
What does it mean he doesn't want to engage in the specifics?
The specifics of what?
Of what the battle is about?
What he's putting out there as Disney?
Except to say that it is not our goal to be involved in a culture war.
Really?
That would be like saying...
I'm not comparing, of course, in terms of violence.
The issue is not violent anyway.
But it would be as if Japan had said after Pearl Harbor, listen, we don't want to be involved in a war with the United States.
You declare war on the United States, Bob Iger, and then tell us you don't want to be involved in a culture war?
Iger echoed the sentiment when questioned on the House of Mouse's ongoing legal dispute with Florida Governor DeSantis.
The last thing I want is for the company to be drawn into any culture wars, he told CNBC, of Disney's First Amendment case against DeSantis that was filed in April.
I'm not sure that was handled very well, Iger told CNBC, of Disney's response to DeSantis' hotly debated legislation that has been branded by critics as Don't Say Gay.
Oh, God, Don't Say Gay.
It's an odd article on the New York Post, which is usually spot on.
Don't Say Gay has nothing to do with Disney, as far as I understand.
It has something to do with schools.
Where they don't want transgender, they don't want LGBTQ subject matter in early grades.
I don't think there should be straight subject matter in early grades or any grades.
I was opposed to sex ed from the very beginning.
I don't remember when it started, but I knew it was the wrong thing for schools to be teaching.
Prior to sex education, the vast majority of Americans knew that sexual intercourse produces children.
While admitting to CNBC interviewer David Faber that Disney didn't respond well, Iger said that it was in Disney's right, it was Disney's right to speak out.
Yes, well, I'll tell you what I think is happening. - Yeah.
Disney is losing money.
Disney on its theme parks compared to the past.
There are fewer people going.
I think if you care about this country, you should not set foot in Disneyland or Disney World.
They are way more dangerous than Bud Light to the society, given the...
Content that they produce.
And he's realizing, perhaps, perhaps, I don't know.
He is perhaps realizing that you can't crap on what Americans cherish and then there will be no response.
There are a lot of us.
By all accounts, half of us.
If half this country Believes that sex is fixed.
You're born a boy, you're born a girl.
End of issue.
And you try to teach otherwise at Disneyland or Disney World or through your content, a lot of people will find you repulsive.
There has been an alarm set off.
Among the cowards, Bob Iger, in my opinion, I have no proof.
My suspicion is that Bob Iger cares about LGBTQ issues like you care about bicycle sales in Thailand.
What he is is a coward, like virtually every CEO, every president of a university.
In other words, the elite are composed of cowards.
The American Medical Association, who are run by young, woke nihilists.
That's the state of America.
Just like at Bud Light.
There's a young woman who thought it would be just charming to have a guy who says he's becoming a girl on a Budweiser, on a Bud Light beer can.
She believed it.
She probably went to some elite college where she learned that, that you can become a member of the other sex, and not only can you do that, but it is normal and beautiful and should be celebrated by society just as they did in the Netherlands this past week when they crowned a man as Miss Netherlands.
He looks like a woman.
There's no way around it, but he is not a woman.
This is not an offensive statement.
It's not meant to hurt his feelings.
It is meant to protect truth.
You cannot become the other sex.
Maybe if you could do a brain transplant and a chromosome transplant, along with all the other genitalia transplants, maybe that is possible.
He has the same brain he had as a man.
Tell me we are not our brains.
Everybody knows that we are our brains much more than we are our body.
Well, there is a male brain and there is a female brain.
It is amazing to me that this is almost never raised as an issue.
Who knows?
Maybe one day there will be brain transplants.
Think the human species will be richer for that?
And what if you would like to undo it?
Do you get back your original brain?
And where do you get the female brain to begin with?
Where do you get it from?
You do a swap with a woman who says she's a man?
Wow.
I'll read to you DeSantis' comment, take your calls, and we continue on the Dennis Prager Show.
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This is from two years ago in City Journal-Aid.
Disney executives have elevated the ideology of critical race theory into a new corporate dogma, bombarded employees with training on systemic racism, white privilege, white fragility, and white saviors, and launched racially segregated affinity groups at the company's headquarters.
The man who wrote this piece, the well-known Christopher Rufo, has obtained a trove of whistleblower documents related to Disney's diversity and inclusion program called Re-Imagine Tomorrow.
That's it.
Re-Imagine.
These are brainwashed young people.
They have a minimal vocabulary.
It is a woke vocabulary.
It is a New English.
Re-Imagine Tomorrow.
Because they're so bored with today.
Their lives are so vapid that they need to reimagine tomorrow.
Hmm.
I've never reimagined.
I don't think I've ever reimagined anything.
I'd like you to ask members of your family next time you're together.
What have you recently reimagined?
Reimagined Tomorrow, which paints a disturbing picture of the company's embrace of racial politics.
The core of Disney's racial program is a series of training modules on anti-racism in one called Allyship for Race Consciousness.
Allyship.
Yes.
In fact, we'll be cruising on an ally ship.
One of the Prager cruises is going to be on an ally ship.
Did you ever in your life hear the term ally ship?
I'm telling you, it's exactly what Orwell said.
There's just new speak.
It is a new way of speaking the language.
If you control the language, you control the culture.
Ally ship for race consciousness.
Do you understand that Disney wishes to increase race consciousness?
Isn't the ideal in life to decrease race consciousness?
This is another one of the almost infinite number of examples where liberals vote the antithesis of liberal values.
Liberals are the country's problem.
Conservatives vote what they believe.
Leftists vote what they believe.
And liberals do not vote what they believe.
The whole point of the American experiment and of the human experiment is to downplay race.
And Disney increases race.
It is an ideal of the Disney Corporation.
And then Iger says yesterday, I don't want to engage in culture wars.
Really?
Then stop teaching race consciousness to all your employees.
Why is that a moral ideal?
I want you to think of your race.
And anyway, it's a lie on the face of it in any event because they don't want whites to think about being white.
Except insofar as it is evil.
The company tells employees that they must, quote, take ownership, is another new speak.
I need to write a glossary, like I did for the Wall Street Journal in the 1990s.
A new glossary of the English of woke.
This is another one.
Take ownership.
Wow.
Of educating themselves about structural anti-black racism.
Structural.
What if you are an honest Disney employee?
How do you go about your day?
They should not rely, quote, not rely on their black colleagues to educate them because it is emotionally taxing.
The contempt the left has for black people is only rivaled by the Ku Klux Klan.
If you think I am exaggerating, how can I prove to you that I am not exaggerating?
The left and the Ku Klux Klan have similarly low views of black people.
Emotionally taxing for a black...
This is whites telling whites that it's emotionally taxing for blacks to explain to you systemic racism.
Is it emotionally taxing for a Jew to explain anti-Semitism?
Is it emotionally taxing for a woman to explain sexual harassment?
How can we never hear that?
Why is it emotionally taxing for blacks?
I'll tell you why.
Because it's emotionally, it's actually, how should we put it?
It is intellectually taxing for anyone, white or black, to explain systemic racism.
Since outside of the left there isn't any.
There's racism.
But systemic racism?
If your child wanted to go to a prestigious college, do you think it would be advantageous or disadvantageous to claim to be a racial minority?
Just asking.
On a Prager 776. By the way, I'm going to Israel with you in the fall.
There's a banner at DennisPrager.com.
Stand with Israel.
It will be a trip you'll never forget.
We return in a moment.
So Bob Iger, the CEO of Disney, this strikes me as just remarkable.
He doesn't want to be involved in culture wars, but he doesn't specify who started the culture wars.
He doesn't mention one example of anything Disney has done.
Here's just a random report.
It's from a website called inthemagic.com.
Drag queens are coming to Disney+.
Disney Plus has a wide variety of shows on its platform, ranging from beloved classics to nature documentaries to action-packed superhero epics.
Now drag queens are looking to enter the fray.
With the different franchises and IPs the Walt Disney Company has acquired, there is something for everyone, and anyway, that's just an example.
They couldn't leave well enough alone because that is not the nature of the left.
This is a big deal.
He is at least acknowledging it's not good for Disney to be in a culture war.
Well, don't start them.
That's the answer that one should give.
Alright, let's leave it at that.
Here's a...
Here's a difficult story for me to bring to you.
This is actually from a left-wing source.
How do you resurrect an empty church?
America's aging houses of worship face a stark choice.
Sell, redevelop, or pray for a miracle.
On June 25, Summerfield Church in Milwaukee held its last Sunday service.
The rough-cut sandstone church, with its bright red doors and stained-glass windows, was built in 1904 to house the state's oldest Methodist congregation and occupies a prominent corner lot a few blocks north of downtown.
By this spring, the congregation had dwindled.
Wow.
To 11 members.
None younger than 65. According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, and the repair bill to get the water-damaged structure ship-shape was $1.3 million.
With that, Milwaukee loses not just a church.
But also a cooling center during heat waves, a place where hot meals were served until 2 a.m.
on snowy nights, a meeting point for Alcoholics and Narcotics Anonymous.
Wow.
As for the physical structure itself, which is a mental landmark for locals, if not an official one protected by city law, that's not yet clear.
It is a story replaying over and over in cities across the United States where older churches have been hammered by neighborhood change and maintenance costs.
Anyway, it's happening all over the United States.
Churches have been on the edge of a cliff and COVID was a blast of air blowing them off, said Rick Reinhardt, a consultant who has worked with the United Methodist Church.
Hmm.
That's right, COVID. Because most priests, ministers, and rabbis were sheep, it's very painful because they're among my favorite people, clergy.
I came to really adore clergy.
During my ten years of doing a radio show on ABC Radio in L.A. where I began my career, for ten years every week I would meet with clergy.
Protestant, Catholic, Jew, and over the course of time, every other religion in the world, to discuss the great issues of life.
It's an incredibly popular show, and it was life-shaping for me.
And one of the results was a real affection for clergy.
Well, it's very possible to like people who, when tested, acted sheep-like.
That's the nature of life.
I wonder if they would do it again.
I do wonder.
I'm curious.
Was it Eric Pataxas wrote a letter to the American church?
Very important book.
Important thinker.
What the...
Failure was during COVID. To obey irrational non-religious authority.
By the way, the Mormon Church, which I adore, they did the same thing.
There were very, very few, but there were.
There were clergy who said, I'm sorry, you're not going to tell me to close my church.
No one is forced to come.
But there was no scientific basis to close the church, let alone a religious one.
Here's the headline.
Maybelline, excuse me, maybe he's born with it?
Fury at Maybelline for using bearded men to promote new makeup line.
Do you not understand how many bearded men are using women's makeup?
How many?
A hundred?
How many?
This is all a concerted effort to destroy the male-female distinction.
It has been going on since the 1970s.
I wrote about it in the 1980s, and I predicted the chaos that would ensue.
The cosmetics company has come under fire after two men with beards were used to promote its new products.
Let me see this.
Can I see a picture?
Oh my God.
Guy with a beard doing his eyelashes.
See, I'll tell you what it is.
I get it.
Women have written in to Maybelline and said, you know, single women have written in, and they said, you know, the men that I'm meeting, they refuse to use makeup and do their eyelashes.
This is not the kind of man I want.
I want a man who does his eyelashes.
And that's how this happened.
Women are lamenting.
The fact that the men they're dating are just too masculine.
So they want guys with beards doing their eyelashes.
For the record, I have contempt for the guys doing that.
I'm reading a book about the end.
Bill O'Reilly's book about the end of World War II in the Pacific.
You think any of the guys who fought on behalf of our country, you think one of them did their eyelashes?
Sean, you've got a lot of friends who do their eyelashes.
What's your take on this?
Yes, you did yours this morning.
You're one of the models because you're bearded.
Yes, that's right.
I hadn't thought of that.
I work with a model.
You know, every guy, you know, let's admit it, every guy likes to be with models.
In posts to its Instagram page, it used two male Maybelline partners.
What the hell does that mean?
To promote a lipstick and applicator.
Well...
So you know for certain the following.
Some young, woke female at Maybelline came up with this idea.
That's who did it.
I don't know it for a fact.
But I believe it is an echo of Bud Light.
Cosmetic giant Maybelline has been slammed for using men, some with full beards, to promote its new product lines.
To whom?
This is a purely profit motive question.
Profit motive basis.
To whom are they appealing?
Will women buy eyeliner?
And lipstick from Maybelline because they watch a bearded man use it?
Will men use it because of that?
Who exactly are they appealing to?
The answer is virtually no one.
But the point of the woke is to destroy society as we know it.
Not to sell products.
This has nothing to do with selling product.
Nothing.
It has to do with destroying the male-female distinction.
It bothers them.
The brand had makeup artist Ryan Vita, a Maybelline partner, promote a new lipstick in two promotional videos shared to its Instagram page.
In another post last week, makeup artist Zach Taylor was also used to promote a new summer product the brand has launched.
The move immediately sparked an avalanche of comments from social media users who slammed the brand for using men.
Oh, I really love this guy with the beard putting on his lipstick.
Oh.
It's so appealing.
So who would want to kiss him?
Let's try to figure that out.
Would a heterosexual...
Look, we have four choices, basically speaking.
Heterosexual women, gay women, heterosexual men, gay men.
Would the typical heterosexual woman wish to kiss a man with eyeliner and lipstick with a beard?
My suspicion is no.
Would the gay female, my suspicion is no, because he is a male.
So we have two left, gay men and straight men.
Would a straight man want to kiss any man, lipstick or no lipstick?
No.
I'm talking about on the lips.
Men hug and kiss other men frequently.
But we're talking about on the lips.
So who's left?
Gay men.
I know a fair number of gay men.
I believe that they are as turned off by this guy.
As I am.
Are there any gay men who would like to kiss a lipstick male lip who is bearded?
Maybe.
But it is, remember, gay men is 3% of the population approximately.
The number of gay men who want to kiss a man with lipstick is very, very small among the 3%.
So, dear listener, Maybelline has no interest in selling the product.
They have an interest in destroying the male-female distinction.
Because everything the left touches, it destroys.
there is no other reason.
Hi, everyone.
We are approaching the second hour of the show.
As we conclude the first hour, I'm Dennis Prager.
The second hour is the happiness hour.
Disruption at German airports as climate extremists glue themselves to runways.
They're gluing themselves to runways.
You must understand that in the post-religious age that we have, we are not bereft of religion.
These activists are as religious as Martin Luther or St. Augustine or some great rabbi.
These are profoundly religious people, but their religion has nothing to do with the Bible, has nothing to do with Judeo-Christian values.
It is a new world.
The post-Judeo-Christian, post-Biblical, post-Christian world in which we live produces people who yearn to fill their empty souls with some meaning.
That's what these, I am sure, young people, Who glued themselves to German airports.
That's what they're doing.
They're protesting against the most polluting form of transportation.
They should go to private airports with the woke billionaires using their planes to demand tougher government action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions because we all know That if only fewer planes flew, we would have a cooler climate.
China is burning more coal than ever.
But they don't dare protest where there really is serious carbon emission.
Because they're scared of the Chinese communists.
They're not scared of the German government.
Who's scared of the German government?
Well, I am.
Because they have pursued policies that have been so destructive.
That, however, is another matter.
I wish I could see a picture of these people.
I bet that, I mean, you do too.
They're young, I assume.
I presume that...
They're mostly female, but I don't know how many there are.
I can only tell you how good they feel about themselves.
Happiness Hour coming up.
Yes, it is. it is.
Yes, it is.
It's the Happiness Hour on the Dennis Prager Show. - Hello?
Every Friday.
Join me, please.
It's the happy, happy, happy, happy hour.
Yes, it is.
The happy make the world better.
The unhappy make it worse.
You have a moral obligation to act happy even if you don't feel it.
You can't inflict your bad moods any more than you can inflict your bad odors on others.
That's the way it is in life.
Should be pursued.
It is a virtue.
I can't emphasize it too strongly.
That the happy make the world better and the unhappy make it worse.
Today's subject...
I'm Dennis Prager, by the way.
Today's subject is in my book on happiness.
It changed my life when I first realized its importance.
It was taught to me by a Buddhist.
In my third year at college, I was in England, the University of Leeds, and I studied, among other things, comparative religion.
A man by the name of Trevor Ling, who wrote a very, very terrific book, I'm going to look that up.
I wonder if it...
I know.
I doubt it's still in print.
But he was a major, major Englishman who converted, if you will, to Buddhism.
Wow, they don't even have it listed.
They think, did you mean Trevor Lang?
Wow.
He is, let's see, let's see if I can get this up.
Trevor Ling, there we go.
Books.
Yeah, he has one on the Buddha.
But they don't show the one that I used for religion.
I'll try to find it, because you should read it.
He said one day, according to Buddhism, there are two reasons for pain.
Desires and expectations that are not fulfilled.
Therefore, the Buddhist goal, he said, is to get rid of desires and get rid of expectations.
I have a virtue, a gift, I call it what you like.
When I hear a good idea, I don't forget it.
I forget names.
I forget dates.
I forget a lot of things.
But I don't forget a good idea.
Because I wanted always to be governed by wisdom.
And that changed my life in a nutshell.
I dropped all expectations and I kept my desires.
So I accepted half the Buddhist doctrine.
The more expectations you have, the more unhappiness, the more ingratitude, the more anger.
It's a pretty big deal.
Expect nothing, you can't be disappointed.
I know it sounds odd even.
What?
I should have no expectations.
That is correct.
Because the more you expect, the less you'll be grateful for.
If you expect to get something tomorrow and you get it, why will you be grateful?
If you don't expect it and you get it, you will be grateful.
Like health.
You expect to be healthy tomorrow?
Okay.
Then why be grateful?
It's when you realize you could lose your health any day of your life that you can walk around in staggering gratitude.
Wow.
Nothing bad happened.
So I was thinking of this in a discussion very, very recently.
In fact, the next Dennis and Julie podcast will be on this, well, related subject.
It's not on this entirely, but it's about God and suffering.
It's really intense and wonderful.
Hour and 15 minutes.
You should all listen to the Dennis and Julie podcast.
And I mean it.
It's a side of me that can only come out if somebody extracts it.
As much as I try to be open, I am, after all, doing the show alone.
But when somebody elicits things from you, even more comes out.
So it's...
It's powerful about me, about her, about life.
So I noted in the discussion on God and suffering that I noted this in passing, really.
People have expectations of God.
And when they're not fulfilled, they drop religion.
Not everybody, but many.
They expected God to do X. He didn't do X. And they abandoned God, religion, the Bible, etc.
I don't have such expectations of God.
My expectation of God resides in the afterlife.
I believe that God is just and...
People will have merited what they get or don't get.
Obviously, many, many people, including religious people, don't agree with me.
But that doesn't matter.
That's not my subject.
My subject is expectations, even of God.
This is not a theology hour, but I wanted you to see that the expectations issue has caused a lot of people to abandon religion.
God didn't come through with what they expected Him to do, and that's it.
I don't have such expectations of God.
I believe I could be, on my way home today, I could be hit by a drunk driver and be killed, be paralyzed, be brain damaged, a whole host of horrible things could happen.
I don't expect God to protect me from drunk drivers.
Maybe He does.
I deny that He does.
I'm saying I don't expect Him to.
Vast numbers of people who are good people have had horrible things happen to them.
And I'm not sure why I would be immune.
That's my...
Theological nutshell, or my theology in a nutshell, on that aspect of theology.
But I'm using this to show you how powerful and how destructive expectations can be.
A lot of people have abandoned religion because God didn't come through on their expectations.
And it's true in life as well.
We expect certain things and life just didn't deliver on those expectations.
But if you didn't have those expectations, maybe you would just celebrate life.
And that's my attitude.
Everything else is Whipped cream with a cherry on top.
Everything else is gravy.
Everything else...
I'm starting to get carried away, as I often do, into the realm of the absurd.
So I will leave it at those two analogies.
1-8 Prager 776. 877-243-7776 If nothing's horrific, life is terrific is one way of putting my outlook on life into words.
I celebrate the non-horrific.
I don't walk around with disappointment.
Because my expectations were not fulfilled.
If you can adopt this, I promise you, you will be a happier human being.
All right, my friends.
Can you do it?
Can you drop expectations?
Happiness Hour on the Dennis Prager Show.
Hi, everybody. everybody.
The Happiness Hour, second hour every Friday, and it is about expectations.
The more you have, the less grateful you will be.
The fewer you have, the more grateful you will be.
The less angry you will be, the less disappointed.
They're useless expectations.
I can't think of one good thing about them.
I mean, expectations is not...
Let me explain that.
You expect something to happen.
So you take it for granted that it will happen.
Now, that's different from assuming.
When I go on a plane, which is almost every week of the year, and it averages out to every week of the year, in fact, It's about a hundred times a year.
When I go on a plane, I assume I will arrive at my destination.
That's true.
I mean, not having expectations is not the same as losing your mind.
If I assumed, if I thought it was a 50-50 chance that I would arrive safely, I wouldn't have entered the plane.
So, of course, I make certain assumptions about life, but in other ways, I just don't have them.
I don't have them about my health.
I am very healthy.
I'm very lucky.
And I assume the odds are I'll be healthy tomorrow.
But one day, I won't be.
I mean, it's just inevitable.
It's just the way life works.
And so I am incredibly grateful if I wake up healthy.
And you just can't make these expectations.
You can't have them.
And certainly of others, because you can only control yourself.
You can't control others.
And I gave the example of people who have expectations of God.
God doesn't, quote, come through, unquote, and then they drop belief in him.
I don't think it's a...
I don't think it's theologically or logically acceptable to have such expectations of God.
All right, let's see here.
Let's go to your calls.
I'm just checking here where I should go.
Let's go to Chicago and Andrea.
Hello, Andrea.
Oh, it's an honor to talk to you, Mr. Prager.
I'm a hospital chaplain, and I totally agree with you.
I think gratitude is so much better than expectations.
It's so presumptuous to expect God to do anything if you don't ask Him.
And even if you ask him, you ask him with open hands.
So there's a big difference between asking for protection and presuming God will protect you.
So that's just my comment.
But I totally agree that gratitude is so much more powerful than expectations.
And they are mutually exclusive.
They are.
Yes, that's right.
Well, you're good.
God bless you for your work.
Hospital chaplain.
I bet every hospital chaplain can write a book.
And you probably should, in fact.
Yeah, the expectations issue is huge.
Let's see.
Did Shelley and Danbury, Connecticut hang up?
Is that the reason for the white box?
Sean, are you familiar with the whiteness as opposed to the yellowness of line two?
Oh, no, but that was up earlier.
There must be on again.
All right.
Anyway, we'll live with that.
The Villages, Florida.
Greg, hello.
Yes, sir.
Thank you for taking my call.
Yes, sir.
I was in a real-life discipleship class at church, and a lady spoke up that had been in Al-Anon and said what she learned there was expectations were premeditated resentment.
Ah, good line.
Yes.
Is that a 12-step line?
Well, she was in an Al-Anon program where she learned it.
Yeah, that's right.
I think I once heard that, and I forgot it.
I remember the concept, but I don't remember the line.
It is really intelligent.
It is, because it has changed my relationship with my wife, my son, our friends, and with God.
That I have no expectations, and, you know, whatever happens, happens.
And I'm just more at peace and in a better place with all of them.
Well, you're a good man.
You did well.
That's right.
Premeditated resentment.
That's what it is.
You're setting yourself up.
I'm about to say something about marriage, and inevitably people think, oh, is he talking about his marriage?
I have a terrific marriage.
It's not my first.
I'm no holier than anybody else.
But I... Assert this so that you one not read into, oh, he's speaking autobiographically.
I'm speaking because I have spoken to so many couples.
A part, hardly the only, but a part of the sadness that can often take place in marriage is that people have expectations of married life.
And then reality does not quite fulfill them.
I think I'm going to do some examples or give some examples on a male-female hour.
But there are romantic expectations that real life does not fulfill.
And you can still celebrate your marriage.
That's my point, though.
It doesn't mean you don't have a good marriage.
You might have a great marriage.
But what you had imagined did not transpire.
That's, again, an expectations issue.
Danbury, Connecticut, and Shelley, hello.
Hi, Dennis.
Thank you very much for taking my call.
I wanted to talk about your point about belief in God.
When my firstborn son, Nathaniel, was six years old, he was diagnosed with Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a progressive deteriorative condition that essentially travels from the feet up.
He lost his ability to walk at eight and a half.
All right, hold on there, hold on.
I didn't realize we were going to be on the break.
Needless to say, if it has to do with 12 steps, it's wise. - Nice.
I've said for decades there's more wisdom at an AA meeting or at a 12-step meeting, any 12-step meeting, than at any university in this country.
They're the anti-wisdom places.
They truly are.
It's sort of you are taught mostly by fools, and you are taught to be foolish.
So that line, that expectations are premeditated resentment, is brilliant.
Another brilliant 12-step line.
This is the Happiness Hour, and it is about not having expectations.
And I know I am on with Shelley in Danbury, Connecticut, who I recall, when I had to interrupt you, sorry.
It was about your child, your firstborn, who at about seven developed a type of muscular dystrophy, which ultimately took his life, correct?
Correct.
And what I want to say, he died at age 21. By that point, he lost his ability to walk at age eight and a half, and he was paraplegic until he became fully quadriplegic and died at age 21. And I have to say that not that I didn't feel and there wasn't anger at God,
But my thought is that if I believed in God in all the years growing up when I used to watch the Jerry Lewis telethons and see boys with muscular dystrophy, how I'm supposed to not believe in God just because it happened to how I'm supposed to not believe in God just because it
And I think that then what happens if you come from a place of belief in God and have gratitude to God, then when you go through something that's really devastating and having a child, it was not hereditary, it was spontaneous mutation, a child with a progressive it was spontaneous mutation, a child with a progressive deteriorative condition that ultimately was fatal, then you have to ask yourself, what is it that God wants of me?
What is it that God wants of Nathaniel?
What is it that God wants of my husband and my wife?
And then you begin to realize, and you really become, Nathaniel ended up with having a phenomenal life and a phenomenal impact on everyone he knew.
And I think that that is...
The point that ultimately one has to get to is in terms of the gratitude.
It's an understanding that we'll put on this planet to influence the good and to try and make our mark in the best way we can with the people that we touch.
And that's what tragedy does have the potential to do.
It takes a lot of effort and belief and movement on a person's inner being, but that's what we need to do.
You're a beautiful woman.
I presume a beautiful family.
Thank you for calling.
I'm humbled by people who've gone through things like that.
By the way, you're allowed to be angry at God.
Just...
Just wanted to pick up on one thing that she said.
If you actually have a real relationship with God, it must include anger.
You have anger at humans, why wouldn't you have anger at God?
Okay, let's see.
Louisville, Kentucky.
John, hello.
Thank you, Dennis.
I have two statements.
First of all, it seems to me that it's still a desire to want to get rid of desire.
I've always felt that way about the Buddhist admonition, and a better attitude is to become better at fulfilling desires without going to pieces if you don't get what you want, and that would be another desire of mine.
Secondly, I have all kinds of expectations.
I do have an expectation of good health tomorrow and next week.
Because of the things I do to have good health, but I'm smart enough to know that if something goes wrong, again, I'm not going to go to pieces.
So I don't really understand what you're talking about with the expectations.
All right, so stay on and I'll explain.
I just want to make it clear.
I thought I did, but I should repeat it.
I do reject the teaching about desires.
I have many desires.
I have no expectations.
Let Dennis be Dennis.
Let Dennis be Dennis.
Hi everybody, it's the third hour on Friday, ergo it is...
The whatever is on your mind hour about you, about me, about life, about death.
I've been saying the about life, about death since the beginning.
We do talk about death because it's part of life.
Anyway, whatever is on your mind, and certainly fountain pens, audio equipment, photography equipment, classical music, and enjoy the music.
Oh, and photography.
Photography.
And I am joined by Julie Hartman.
Julie and I do the Dennis and Julie podcast.
Something I am immensely proud of.
Those hour and 15 minutes, sometimes hour and a half, with no breaks, are really...
are joys for us.
And I believe joy is for the listener.
Or a watcher, as the case may be.
So, I have invited Julie to be with me on the third hour of many of the shows in the following couple of weeks.
And Julie, great to have you.
You love the third hour.
Oh, it's so fun, especially this third hour.
That's what I mean.
I meant the third hour Friday, yeah.
Yes, because call in on any subject.
What could be more fun?
You know, because I've said it, but you may not know, that is how my first years of radio was.
Really?
Oh, yeah.
It was the most difficult change in my radio career.
You don't know this.
I don't think any of the listeners know this.
By the way, this is a perfect example.
One of the great things Julie brings to me is you hear stuff that I would never have thought to say but for a person asking me about it.
But I found it very difficult to move toward the one topic or two topics or three topics, whatever, per hour as opposed to call in on whatever you want.
It was a very tough change.
I felt constrained, and I'm a free spirit.
You get it, right?
Oh, if you look at my show, Timeless, I mean, it's just one different topic after the next.
I talked about Islam one time.
I talked about Machiavelli the next time.
I did a show on owls.
I did a show on magic.
I did a show on the Scopes Monkey Trial, because you and I are just interested in a wide variety of things.
By the way, what did you say about owls?
Oh, I think they are the most magnificent animals in the world.
First of all, in their beauty.
And second of all, in their intelligence.
And third, just the way that they are physically constructed is really, I think, evidence for a god.
Do you know that their ears are...
First of all, way in the back of their head, their ears are also kind of misaligned.
They're not symmetrical like ours are.
One is really high up and then the other one is really far down.
Really?
Yes, Google it so they can hear a wide range of sounds.
And there are feathers inside the ear canal that facilitate sound coming effectively.
To an owl's ear.
That's why they can hear a mouse from 300 yards away because they have...
Why aren't they going nuts from all the noises they hear?
I don't know.
It's a good question.
And their wings make no sound.
They are both so good at sensing sound, but when they fly, they're almost silent.
And that's what enables them to catch prey.
Why are they going...
Yeah, that's exactly, it's amazing.
That came on as I asked the question.
Why are they doing that?
I don't know.
Oh, you didn't get an answer to that one.
I'll have to do an Owl's Part 2. Owl's Part 2. So here's an interesting thought.
We used the word bird brain.
That's an insult.
Not with owls.
With most birds, yes.
No, but even...
No, but for example...
What was it?
Hawks?
Oh, excuse me.
Parrots.
Parrots are brilliant.
They are?
Well, I guess it makes sense because they can say things back to...
Well, they say things.
They react, like, coherently.
I ever tell you about the cursing parrot?
No.
Okay, this is...
Sean, are you aware of this story?
The cursing parrot?
Okay, you're right.
He says he can't wait.
Okay, so I was in Florida at the zoo.
This is many years ago because my son just turned 40, my oldest son.
He was about three.
This was a long time ago.
I was visiting my parents who lived in Miami Beach at least half the year.
So we were visiting and...
David was in a stroller.
We were at the zoo.
And along the walkways, at least at that time, were parrot cages.
So there would be parrots along your stroll through the zoo.
And I pass a parrot, and the parrot is cursing.
F-U. F-U. F-U. F-U. And not saying F, saying the word.
So I stopped, and I find that stuff hilarious.
I mean, I have to admit.
So I stopped, and sure enough, FU, FU. And I looked at my parents, because I wanted to make sure I was hearing right.
I go, are you hearing?
Mom and Dad, are you hearing what I'm hearing?
Yeah.
So...
The only reason it troubled me was there were a lot of kids around, and I don't think that's appropriate.
I like protecting kids.
So there was, I don't know what they're called.
They're not called docents.
That's at museum.
But some, you know, park official walked by, and I said, I'm sorry.
I don't remember if it was a man or a woman even.
So I'll just say, sorry, sir.
Excuse me, sir.
Are you aware of what this parrot is saying?
And the guy looks at me and goes, I'm sorry, sir.
What are you talking about?
He said to me, and I go, well, here, come over here.
Just listen.
We stand by the parrot.
Says nothing.
I felt like a moron.
And I wanted to kill the parrot.
Well, they're clearly quite intelligent.
Oh, exactly.
He knew who you don't curse around.
You should have said, truth is not a left-wing value.
And then the parrot would be repeating that instead of F you.
That's very funny.
Let me understand.
So he was a leftist parrot.
Because he wouldn't tell the truth.
That's true.
You encountered a lefty parrot.
So, just for the record, this is really a riot.
My all-time favorite commercial that I had ever, ever seen was when I was in high school in New York City.
This commercial would come on.
When I watch television, especially hockey games Saturday nights, and this was the commercial.
It was for a beer you never heard of.
You never heard of Schaefer beer, right?
Nope.
Don't drink beer.
Yeah, it was in New York.
Oh, okay.
Well, that's another reason.
I think it's a New York beer.
I don't know if it still exists.
It doesn't matter.
So this is the commercial.
The guy is, the husband is sitting, he's black and white.
The husband is sitting at the kitchen table and the Schaefer beer bottle starts talking to him.
And he can't, he's blown away.
And he goes, I just have to tell my wife.
So he yells, Betsy!
Betsy!
And she goes, what?
She's annoyed that he's calling her.
And he goes, Betsy, you've got to come in.
She goes, why?
Because the beer bottle is talking to me.
And she yells back, what are you telling me?
It's a stupid, nothing, moronic beer bottle.
He's going to talk to you?
It's going to talk to you?
So she comes in and he goes, okay, talk.
And the bottle says nothing.
I thought, wait, I'm not up to the punchline.
But I thought of the parrot.
I bet.
I thought of this commercial when the parrot didn't say anything.
So she leaves the room thinking her husband's an idiot.
And the poor husband looks at the beer bottle and says, why didn't you talk?
And the beer bottle says, after what she said about me, I should talk for her.
Smart beer bottle.
Wife is Sanskrit for Flawfinder, as you once told me.
And I believed.
And you did believe.
So did your mother.
But my dad didn't.
That's right.
After what she said about me, I should talk for her.
We'll be back and I'll take your calls.
Wee-kee-kee!
Raising shame!
It's not a loud call!
Now that's what I call a death penalty.
This is the third hour.
On Friday.
Did you find, by the way, did you find the Schaefer commercial?
Oh, I wonder.
I gotta believe.
I'm gonna look for it.
That was precious.
It was TV. It was TV. Okay, alright.
It is what it is.
So Julie Hartman is with me.
We do the Dennis and Julie podcast every week.
We haven't missed one.
Despite all our travels.
And...
You did a segment on your own show, Timeless, on commercials?
On advertising, yes.
TV advertising and how it has changed.
So give a nutshell.
I'm very curious.
Okay.
Two things that have changed.
First, they used to sell the product.
Can you believe that?
If you go back to Marlboro commercials, they're talking about how much...
The filter of the cigarette.
They're talking about how long it lasts.
They're really telling you the merits of the product.
If you look at a lot of TV commercials today, you learn nothing about the product.
Look at the average State Farm commercial.
You wouldn't even know what State Farm is.
They're just trying to give you something entertaining or punchy, but they're not telling you specifically about what they are trying to sell to you.
That is an interesting difference.
I think that's true.
Another one is that...
Well, Geico as well.
All of them.
Have you seen the E-Trade commercials with the E-Trade baby?
Talk about a talking beer bottle or talking parrot.
There's a talking baby.
And you don't even learn what E-Trade is.
It's just a weird, sarcastic baby that's talking to you.
So that's changed.
And the other thing that's changed is that back in the day, they used to sell you an idealized version of life.
Like, for instance, Marlboro or Alpine commercials, you'd see a heterosexual couple on the beach passing a cigarette, driving together in the car with their children, and now you don't see any of that.
It's been replaced with sarcasm and a jaded kind of view of the world.
Oh, if there's a couple shown, the guy is an idiot.
Right.
Yeah, that's true.
Oh no, men, I don't watch TV almost ever.
I'm not saying it as a virtue, I'm just stating it as a fact.
And if I do, it's generally on the road in my hotel room and the men are depicted.
I would be very curious to know if there's any commercial that depicts a strong male model.
I can't think of one.
Have you ever heard Julie's 23?
Julie, have you ever heard of Father Knows Best?
No.
Wow.
Obviously you wouldn't have seen it, but you can see it.
So let me tell you, tell me how this strikes you.
That in the 1950s or 60s, maybe both, A very popular, I guess it would be called a sitcom, was titled Father Knows Best.
Can you imagine the different world in which I grew up than you grew up, that there was a popular show, Father Knows Best?
I couldn't even imagine it today.
Doesn't it strike?
Oh, it does, absolutely.
I'm happy that you never heard of it, so I'm getting your spontaneous reaction.
I should go back and watch it.
Here it is.
Robert Young and Jane White with Eleanor Donahue, Billy Gray and Lauren Chapin in Father Knows Billy Gray and Lauren Chapin in Father Knows Best.
Even that music sounds so light and happy and magisterial.
You don't even hear music like that opening shows anymore.
It is fair to say that I grew up in a different country than you did.
I would say that the only consistent, and I say this with sadness, obviously, I don't think I'm exaggerating, is that they both spoke English.
Oy.
Well, you ask the question a lot on Dennis and Julie.
Who is it worse for?
Someone like you, who knew a good America and now has seen it turn for the worse?
Or someone like me, who didn't see the America that you saw?
And I don't have an answer.
I think it's worse for you, actually.
Well, so...
And you think it's worse for me.
Yes.
Because an argument could be made.
That's a great subject.
Because I am a big believer that memories matter.
That is a really good subject.
A very big subject.
Most people don't think that way.
They think, what's today, that's all that matters.
I believe the past in general and the past in Dennis' life matter.
It's a really great subject.
We'll do it another time.
Okay, let's see here.
Pasadena, California.
Steve, hello.
Yeah, hi, Dennis.
Thanks for taking my call.
I had an interesting experience about a month ago.
I had my annual physical.
And after we did the blood work and everything was fine and we went through it, the doctor actually sat down with me and we just talked like two guys at a bar about current events.
It also happened to be around the time that the protests were taking place in Glendale about the curriculum.
In the schools over there, and the parents were outraged about some of the things that were going on.
But I was just, when I left the office, I was astounded on how personal and how interesting the conversation was.
And it occurred to me, I just wondered how many other people are having the same experience with people that are sort of confidants, professional, not personal.
But people that they have a professional relationship with that take this opportunity to express their feelings about these issues that are going on.
You mean the wokeness?
Yeah, there is a doctor in my life like that.
But it is not common.
Okay, this is the hour you set the agenda. this is the hour you set the agenda.
And I'm with Julie Hartman.
We do Dennis and Julie together, and we're doing a lot of third hours together.
And let's see here.
Tom in Alvin, Texas.
I shouldn't take his call, but I will.
Hello, both of you.
So, first of all, answer your question about owls and why they say who, who, who.
It's just like Dennis.
They have trouble remembering names.
But the reason I call...
Well, I want you to know Julie found that funny.
Well...
That is the reason.
That is the reason to have Julie on.
One of us should find that funny.
I want everybody to understand why I said to Tom in Alvin, Texas that I shouldn't take his call.
Tom is the most regular correspondent I have, other than some hating stalkers.
But Tom is funny.
And very bright.
And very bright.
And wise.
Really?
Wow.
Oh, yeah.
Is that why you called to get complimented?
I have to get him somewhere.
All right, that's fair.
Well, are you married?
Yes, I am.
Oh, that was just a bitter joke.
And it's not even true in my head.
That's correct.
Okay, yeah.
So the reason I actually called is that I've watched you on Salem News Channel a lot of times.
And by the way, you're not on for the third hour for some reason.
That's correct, yes.
It's not on the video third hour, correct?
Right.
But I've noticed that you have all these impressive works decorating your set.
Lots of books from authors you interview, your Bible commentary, your happiness book.
Wow, you really pay attention.
I generally don't listen.
I just look at the pictures.
Okay, that's fair.
That was a good line.
Sean liked that one.
Julie didn't laugh, but Sean did.
I smiled.
So you're two for three.
All right.
But mixed in with all of those, probably behind Julie right now is a picture of the Three Stooges, and I was wondering what the story of that is.
Where is this?
Where is a picture?
Oh, there they are.
You're right.
Where?
Between happiness is a serious problem and Deuteronomy.
It's exactly where they belong.
If the three stooges knew they were on video next to a Deuteronomy commentary.
Gosh, I never noticed that.
Yeah.
Oh, it's an image of what Alan and I do to Sean.
That is hilarious.
Well, I'm happy we have a Three Stooges picture up.
You know what?
You talk about different country.
The Three Stooges is as different from today as Father Knows Best.
Can I say something?
You're going to be shocked.
I don't really know what the Three Stooges is.
Okay, so there you go.
No, no.
I'm sorry.
But I don't watch a lot of TV. No, no, you've disappointed Sean.
I've heard of them, but who the heck are they?
So now you have to...
All right, first of all, you should know something.
Most overwhelmingly, the audience was male.
Okay.
It is male humor.
Okay.
Punching each other, pulling each other's ears.
It is mostly for men.
I enjoyed them.
As opposed to just...
They didn't crack me up, but you know what we used to play?
Can you find the...
All right, now, girls, let's do it.
A-E-E-E-E-E-D-I-D-G-E-D-I. They take over a girl's school.
Oy.
Yes, they teach them.
Whenever I used to talk about colleges or any academic life, this was our theme song.
Do you have it there, Sean?
You didn't get the first part, though.
Now, girls, all right, let's review it.
All right, too bad.
So he's teaching them the alphabet.
Get the idea, girls?
Now we'll all join together on the letter D. Oh, yeah, so he does, I'm sorry.
It's preposterous.
Julie, just believe me, it is completely preposterous.
But it gives you an idea of the carefree age.
It's carefree humor, in effect.
Just being silly.
There's no vulgarity.
They're not angry.
They're just silly.
By the way, it is fitting that they're next to Deuteronomy.
There were three Jewish guys.
Most people don't know.
I don't know why I know.
Dennis Prager here.
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