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May 25, 2008 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

01:34:24

1075 Sunday Call In Show May 25 2008

Animal rights, long distance relationships, gas prices and talking to friends and family about anarchy.

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	Well, good afternoon, everybody. It's Stefan Molyneux on the 25th of May, 2008.
	I hope you're doing very well. We've had to abandon the Skypecast piece of crap software for a regular old conference call, so thank you for your patience.
	As we get started today, I don't have anything particular to start with other than to say that if you check your inbox, if you are a board member or board user, there is an email from me which is to remind you to RSVP for the 2008 second annual Free Domain Radio BBQ. And you can RSVP through that.
	And if anybody remembers the website, if you could type it into the chat window, then I'll read it out there.
	I can't remember. I do remember that it ended with Free Domain Radio, but I can't remember what it started with.
	So, if you could remember it, I would appreciate that.
	And if you could RSVP, we do need to have some sense of how many pieces of sushi to order.
	So if you could let us know, that would be fantastic.
	And... So, other than that, there is a slightly exciting, or mildly interesting, new feature.
	Thanks again to James for helping me polish it off with some fabulous Ajax.
	And apparently it did need divine intervention from a Roman god, I think that is, Greek god?
	It's at freedomainradio.com forward slash referral, and you can use it to send your favorite podcasts, videos, books, and feeds to, should I say friends, or is it more accurate to say friend?
	So I just wanted to...
	I just wanted to mention that that is there, freedomainradio.com forward slash referral.
	I really appreciate it if you could send some links around.
	That frees me up to spend more money on the self-tanning cocoa butter that I so desperately need to reduce the goose egg glare polish of my forehead.
	So if you could do that, I would really appreciate it.
	And that's about it.
	If we have questions or comments from people, I'd really appreciate that.
	Feel free to speak your mind and control, or dare I say man, the airwaves.
	I have a question? Why, sure.
	Steph, what is your view on whether animals have rights in the sense of, is there such thing as animal morality or morality for animals?
	What is your view on that?
	No, I don't believe that there is.
	And I'm sorry, we've already done this show twice before.
	In fact, I think three times.
	Sorry, there's no way you'd know if you haven't been here.
	But no, the short answer for me is that you need a social contract to have a...
	You need the ability to reason and compare actions or proposed actions to abstract standards, which as far as I understand it, only animals have.
	The question as to retarded people and children is that children have the potential...
	To grow, obviously, into rational adults, and the retarded people are still far more intelligent and able to enter into certain kinds of basic moral contracts compared to, say, chimpanzees and so on.
	So that's sort of the basic...
	I do believe that we should treat animals with kindness and humanity until such point as we put some form of horrible electricity into their brain.
	So I don't believe that human beings should be cruel to animals, but it is a...
	It's a horrible state of nature, you know, we just by the by.
	Yeah, we live next to a pretty wooded area and just, yes, we have a bunny, a rabbit, who took up residence.
	A fox had had his way with our good friend, Mr. Bunny, and left another messy and eviscerated corpse on the backyard, which I then had to go out and finish off eating.
	So it was a difficult...
	Nature is just completely ugly and vicious.
	And so for me, I'm very happy to stay as far away from it as I can and to procure my food from the grocery store.
	So I think that, you know, I think there's some consciousness just in general that we should have with regards to animals like...
	Christine is a vegetarian, and she wasn't actually until she saw how I ate meat, and that actually made her not eat for quite a while.
	But I think it's okay to keep your animal consumption to a minimum.
	I'll have sort of meat once or twice a week maybe, and mostly because I do a lot of exercise and I just need the protein.
	But yeah, I think sort of keep it to a minimum and treat animals well, but I don't believe that animals have the capacity for ethics.
	Okay, thanks. Sure, no problem.
	And we'll see if anybody remembers the show where we had the animal rights question come up, or the shows.
	If you could post that in the chat window, I'd be happy to call out the number.
	Remember, you can use The Philosophysician, freedomainradio.com.
	forward slash F-H-I sorry, P-H-I-P-H-Y to do your text searches.
	I actually just contacted a company today that has technology that scans your podcast and looks for keywords and builds up a search directory which of course would involve the most unholy cuss words at FDR but there may be other things which we can use that for as well and I thought that was pretty cool so hopefully they will get in touch with me and give us a test drive that would be pretty cool so Thank you very much for your question.
	If somebody else would like to step up, that would be...
	Oh, what am I thinking?
	The print version Of Everyday Anarchy is out, and it's actually $8.99.
	It's a pocketbook.
	It is the cutest damn thing that you ever did see.
	And so you can actually roll it up and really, really meet women.
	If you roll it up, front pocket, and walk with that slightly tilted sideways kind of approach, that cowboy thing, I think that will be really cool.
	is that Everyday Anarchy in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?
	So that's available at freedomainradio.com or you can go to stores.lulu.com forward slash freedomainradio to pick up your copy.
	The audio book and PDF, of course, is still free, but the print version is a nice little handout for people who you think prefer that sort of medium.
	So if you want to pick up a couple of copies of that, I would certainly appreciate it.
	And we've had over 4,000 copies Free Domain Radio Books downloaded for free.
	That is, of course, entirely dependent upon the kindness and generosity of the donators.
	So remember to dig in if you can.
	If you haven't donated in a while, I hugely appreciate it.
	It is how we're able to get so much great material out to so many people for free.
	And commercial free, as it still remains.
	So that's it for me. If you have another question or comment, please feel free to yawn and go up and speak.
	No, seriously, don't feel pressured.
	Nobody has to say anything.
	We don't have to do a show every Sunday.
	I mean, don't freak out.
	It's not a bad thing. If nobody has anything to say, nobody has anything to say.
	We shan't cry.
	Just to mention, there are three new podcasts out, which I think are very good.
	One is called The Breakup.
	The other is called... Fierce Joy vs.
	Depression, and the other is called James and Beth and Death, and I hope that you will check those out.
	There were some really great listener conversations in those, so thank you very much to the participants.
	I hope that they were helpful and you might want to check this out.
	Okay, you know what?
	I'll jump in here because obviously no one's talking.
	Well, I mean, sorry to interrupt.
	I mean, do you have a real question or are you just sort of making something up to fill the void?
	Because there's no need for that. I mean, we could just not have a show on the Sunday if you don't feel like it's hugely organic for you.
	Well, I mean, it's a question.
	It wasn't, like, incredibly pressing, so I wasn't going to bring it up.
	But since no one else is speaking, I suppose we can bring up the not-so-pressing question.
	Let's not-so-press.
	Absolutely. Go ahead. I have a question about what you think of long-distance relationships.
	If you think they're worth it, if you think they're not worth it, blah, blah, blah.
	And sorry, do you mean by that sort of like...
	I mean, because for me, what is a long-distance relationship is like when I'm working upstairs and Christina is working downstairs and she's actually out of my sight.
	What I've done to try and deal with that is I've put up a fairly complicated series of mirrors from the upstairs.
	They sort of go down in a daisy chain to the downstairs so that I can make sure.
	Or sometimes I see her going off to pick up the mail, which is a little ways down the street.
	And then if she's within range, she hears a wet thud as her husband comes up like a bird against the window because she's gone.
	So is that what you mean or is it even further away than that?
	A little further than that.
	Typically, what I consider a long-distance relationship is where you don't get to see the person very often.
	One of my best friends, Natasha, just got into one.
	And so I want to know what you think about it.
	About your friend Natasha's relationship?
	Well, just about long distance relationships in general so I can...
	Well, I think that long distance relationships are a completely wonderful thing to do under one condition.
	As long as medical science...
	Can increase our longevity to the point that we live forever, then I think that long-distance relationships are a really fantastic option.
	Assuming that we're mortal and we're going to die, then I consider them to be an enormously horrible waste of life and time and heart.
	So, does that help?
	Yeah. Well, I mean, I have had some experience with long-distance relationships.
	I was in one off and on for years in my 20s, and...
	There's a couple of distortionary factors with long-distance relationships that I'll mention, and then you can let me know what you think.
	Long-distance relationships are kind of like parenting every other weekend.
	It's really tough because there's no rhythm, and the time that you have together is made less real by a number of factors that I'll sort of mention here.
	At least this was my experience. The first is that, particularly when you're When you're younger, when you get together in a long-distance relationship, of course, it's a sex-drenched flesh orgy for the most part, and that tends to take down some of the natural intimacy that can occur that is more day-to-day.
	So there's that disorientation, right?
	Where it's like feast or famine as far as the flesh pits go.
	So that's a challenge for sure.
	The other thing too is that there are a lot of tensions that go on in long distance relationships.
	But then when you get together, it's really hard to deal with your issues because you feel like, wow, we only have two days together out of the month or out of every two weeks.
	And so you feel like, well, you know, I don't want to cause any problems.
	It's like trying to discipline your kids when you get them every other weekend.
	It's like you just don't want to be the heavy, so to speak.
	I think that with long-distance relationships, there's a real kind of air of unreality to them, of artificiality.
	It's like trying to judge your life by when you're on vacation, so to speak.
	So I think that there's not...
	That way of settling into a sort of easy and negotiated day to day existence.
	And so I think that they're pretty problematic as a whole.
	And I think that what happens is because of that artificiality, people end up in these tortured, you know, drag-on kind of, we'll figure out a way to be together that can go on for months or years, and you don't have quite enough information to make a good decision about whether the relationship should continue or not, so they tend to drag on and continue far longer than they would.
	You can't fix them and you can't break them.
	I guess that's the problem that I have with long-distance relationships, or at least that's what I've sort of experienced.
	And that's what I've sort of heard of.
	But that's just my thoughts.
	I'm certainly happy to hear what you think.
	Oh, wait. Christina, you want to hold my hand?
	I don't need hand-holding.
	The other problem that I have noticed with long distance relationships is that, first of all, it's not for the insecure.
	Anyone who has problems with feeling wanted and desired and who suffers from problems of jealousy or envy, long distance relationships are not going to help with those issues.
	Simply because you just don't know what the other person is doing.
	You know, every night of the week or every weekend, that kind of thing.
	The other problem with long-distance relationships is that they end up, they tend to be sort of, when people get on the phone with each other or on Skype casts, I guess these days, is reports of what I did today.
	I did this, I went there, I saw this person, we talked about this thing, and very little emotional connecting tends to happen in that kind of a relationship.
	It's very difficult to establish the level of emotional connection With a long distance partner, if you haven't had the close intimacy, the regular frequent visual contact, if that hasn't been established from a relationship where two people are in the same place, it's very hard to establish that long distance.
	Those are just my thoughts.
	Gotcha. And I agree.
	We all know that I just had that wonderful discussion with Steph over...
	Sorry to interrupt, but this is the most crucial question that you will probably get asked this week.
	Did you agree with me or with Christina?
	Christina, yours...
	I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I think Skype just kind of crashed out there for a second because I think I heard something that could not conceivably have been correct.
	And my name, remember, is not Christina.
	Go ahead. I didn't quite grasp what you said.
	I'm not going to lie. My attention faded in and out because my medications have not hit yet.
	Sure, let's blame the medication.
	I think that's a very kind view.
	I do appreciate it. It's there to blame.
	I might as well. I definitely agree with what Christina was saying largely in the fact that in any relationship where you don't see the person every day, it's hard to emotionally connect with them.
	I was trying to explain that with Natasha, because she is definitely more naive than I am now.
	And I was just trying to think of some better way to tell her.
	Because, I don't know.
	I mean, the guy that she likes is great and whatnot.
	How long did she know this dude before they did the long distance thing?
	Um... Two months?
	So they were together, like, in the same neighborhood for two months, and they were dating for that two months?
	Is that right? No, they were friends for that two months, and right as he decided to leave, he asked her, and she said, yes, of course, and I went, are you an idiot?
	Hmm. Sweetie, but do you think you have doom written all over it?
	Oh, she was just saying that, I'm sorry, apparently you find it trouble paying attention to me, and Christina seems to have the same issue, though she doesn't have the excuse of medication.
	No, somebody. She was just saying that her friend knew this guy as a friend for two months.
	Then just before they parted, he said, you want to be my girlfriend long distance?
	And she was like, yay, lovely.
	I mean, that doesn't seem to be like a particularly good scenario.
	No, not particularly. Well, first of all, you can't pry people who are, you know, if they're totally addicted to making the beast with two backs with each other, whether remotely or locally, there's nothing you can do to pry people apart who want to be together.
	So, you know, sometimes it's just you just have to grit your teeth and watch people run their head into the wall until they get tired of it.
	Right, but as a friend, I feel like I should voice my opinion about it to her, but I wanted to voice it in a way that she would think I'm not just sitting there and calling him names and whatnot and calling their relationship names.
	I wanted to make it a valid opinion.
	I just had no way of knowing how to formulate that.
	The thing that I would suggest is that If you ask...
	I mean, she's getting something out of it being long distance, for sure.
	Right? Right.
	Well, she has to be, or else she wouldn't have said yes.
	Right, right. So, it could be that she has trouble maintaining boundaries in a relationship, and therefore, if the guy is long distance, he's sort of easier to manage, if that makes sense.
	Right. Well, it helps that he's her first boyfriend ever.
	So... Right, so the distance might work for her in a way that it's not overwhelming to her.
	Right. So it may not be bad from that standpoint.
	I just think it's not extremely healthy to have the first person you've ever decided to be romantic with nine hours away from you.
	Well, I agree with that.
	We'll see each other probably once every couple of months.
	And do you think she's putting off?
	I'm sorry to interrupt. Do you think you would be able to get into her head enough to roleplay?
	I think I can try.
	It helps that she and I have known each other since we were like five.
	But I just, I want her to understand that all the complications that are going to go into it is to go forward with it.
	And it's early enough right now.
	You can't change people by telling them what the problems are going to be.
	I mean, if you're close...
	So let's give it a shot.
	I'll try being you. Okay.
	Alright, I'm just loosening up a little here.
	Getting into character. Okay, so...
	No, just kidding. I won't do that.
	Shut up! Won't have a valley girl off, how's that?
	No, you shut up. Anyway.
	So, okay, so you'll be all like...
	Okay. So, her name is Natasha, is that right?
	Yeah, call her...
	Yeah, Tasha.
	It's more like it. Natasha, you remember that time in Golgotha where we told each other we had a French kiss?
	Oh wait, sorry, that's a different call.
	Oh my god, that's disgusting!
	Just kidding. Okay, so Natasha, you're dating this guy long distance, right?
	Yeah, we just started like a week ago.
	Right, right. And how do you feel about that?
	Tell me what you like about him.
	Tell me what went through your mind when he asked you and that kind of stuff.
	Well, I really like him.
	I think he's a really sweet guy, which is important to me.
	He's very Christian, has great Christian values.
	I don't know, I just think he's really nice.
	He asked me and I said yes.
	Now, I mean, would you, I don't know, because some people like this and some people don't, but do you think that you would prefer it if he was closer, or do you kind of like it having that kind of distance, which allows you to have a bit more space?
	Well, I don't know. It just started, and we were really great friends, which is important to me.
	Well, sure, but I mean, the friendship side of things, you can have long distance, right?
	Yeah, we could.
	But I guess that it'd be important to me, if he wants to have a relationship, then I'd want to have one too.
	So is it that because he wants to have a relationship, you want to have one?
	Yeah, I think so.
	And I think he'd be a good guy to have a relationship with.
	But I'm sorry, I just didn't understand.
	Because you said, if he wants to have a relationship, then I guess it's good to have one.
	Yeah, I think so.
	But that just sounds a little bit like you're going along with his desire to have a relationship.
	I don't think that's the case.
	I just want to make sure I understand it.
	I just think that it's important if he likes me that much to like him that much too and to like him back that much.
	So you like him because he likes you?
	Well, yeah, I mean, of course he likes me.
	Well, sure. And so why shouldn't I like him back?
	Well, I'm sure that there would be boys who would like you that you wouldn't like back, right?
	Yeah, but he's a nice guy, and he's everything that I've ever looked for in another guy.
	Everything? Yeah, I think so.
	Okay, and that may be the case.
	Obviously, my opinion doesn't matter, but I just want to understand what you mean by everything.
	Because, I mean, you haven't known him that long, right?
	No, I haven't. But, I mean, like, I met him through the church, and so we really got to know each other really well.
	And that's important to me.
	You mean in the two months that you were around each other?
	Yeah, I think so.
	And when you were around each other for the two months, I mean, how often did you see each other?
	We saw each other like four or five times a week.
	And for how long in those times?
	About an hour to two hours every day.
	And was it just the two of you or was it a bunch of other people?
	No, it was a bunch of other people.
	It'd never just be the two of us if we weren't dating.
	Okay, and then how long was it before he left that he asked you to be his girlfriend?
	About a week before he left.
	And did you then spend more time one-on-one with each other in the week before he left?
	Yeah, we went on a couple of dates and then he had to leave.
	And when was it that you began to find yourself physically attracted to him or romantically attracted to him?
	Was it when he asked you out or was it before that?
	I think it was before that, like a month before.
	And why was it that you didn't say anything to him?
	Well, because I didn't want to tell him if he didn't ask me first, because I'm just not that kind of girl.
	I want the guy to work for me, not me to work for the guy.
	Okay, I think I understand.
	So then you went on a couple of dates, and now you have the belief or you feel that he is the guy who has everything that you could want.
	Yeah, I think so.
	I mean I don't know for sure, but he definitely seems like it so far.
	I don't know what to say to that.
	I mean, that's so crazy. I mean, sorry, I don't mean to laugh at you, Natasha, because, I mean, I understand that you feel strongly about this and that, but, I mean, you can't be.
	You can't be. You know, with all due respect, and this is your first boyfriend, and I definitely want to, you know, I want to be, I mean, I'm happy for you that you found this, but...
	With two or three dates, you simply cannot fathom or plumb the depths of another human being's soul to a degree of compatibility.
	It just can't happen. Well, I don't know if he's going to be the right person for me, but I think he definitely could be.
	It's not like I'm in love with him yet, but I definitely really like him.
	And what is your thoughts about the future of the relationship, right?
	So how is it going to work from here?
	Like, he's nine hours away, and how long is it going to be before you guys can spend quality time together?
	Well, I don't really know.
	He's supposed to come back in August for a visit.
	But after that, I really have no idea.
	I just figured I'd take it as it went.
	And, um... So there's no plans for you guys at the moment or there's nothing that is in the works where you can see a time where you can spend time together?
	No, I don't think so.
	Not in the immediate future.
	And what does immediate future mean?
	Like within the next month.
	Well, a month, okay. But in terms of being in the same city or being able to spend more quality time, is he going away to school?
	Are you in school? What is the situation?
	How long do you think it could be before you could reasonably have a life together?
	Well, he's transferring schools and I can't transfer and I don't want to transfer either.
	So probably three years until he graduates now.
	Okay, so you're hoping, and just, you know, again, with all too sensitivity, I'm saying this because I care, right?
	And that doesn't mean that anything that I'm saying is right.
	These are just things that I sort of think and feel about it.
	But the thing is that you had a couple of dates and you're hoping to have a three-year or more long-distance relationship based on a couple of dates.
	Well, you asked me when was the next time that we'd probably be in the same city together, and so that would be like the closest that I could ever think of, regardless of how long it goes.
	Okay, but I mean, that is, I mean, just so you understand, right?
	Like, it's sort of like an inverted pyramid, right?
	It's going to be a couple of years until you can spend sequential time together that you know of, and this is a couple of dates, right?
	Yeah. Yeah, it was just a couple of dates.
	Right. So, I mean, obviously you wouldn't get married to a guy based on just a couple of dates, right?
	No, of course not.
	I mean, I wouldn't be able to know someone that well.
	But I think we can, like, get to know each other on the phone and stuff like that.
	Okay, and what are your phone calls like?
	Um, well, we talk a long time, and we talk about everything and anything.
	And they're really, like, it's nice to talk to him and get to know him as well.
	And you talk to him about your feelings and he talks to you about his feelings as well?
	Well, we talk about our days and what's happened and, like, what's going on in our heads and what we're thinking about.
	And, like, we're just getting to know each other more.
	Sorry, so you do talk about your feelings?
	Yeah, a little bit.
	A little bit. Because that's the big difference, right?
	You could talk about thoughts and ideas if he were just your friend, right?
	Yeah, but, I mean, how can someone just be your friend if there's, like, feelings involved in it?
	We don't have to voice them, but they're still there.
	But why wouldn't you voice them?
	Well, because you don't need to voice something to know it all the time.
	But why wouldn't you voice it?
	Well, I just told you.
	I'm sorry. I'm sorry if I misunderstood.
	If you could repeat it, I'd appreciate it.
	Well, you don't always have to say something in order to know that it's there.
	Oh, sure. But I wasn't saying that you simply put on the, you know, the 12-inch disco loop of I love you or I care for you or I feel for you or whatever.
	But what's wrong with saying it if it's what you're thinking and feeling?
	I mean, in the moment.
	True, true. I guess we're trying to get to know each other's histories more or something.
	I want to know where he came from and what got him to be who he is.
	Right, right. And I mean, that's a challenging thing to do in a sense after you're already committed to a relationship.
	Yeah. Yeah, I guess.
	And are you guys in an exclusive relationship?
	Yeah, we are. I would never let him go off with someone else if he's dating me.
	That'd just be disrespectful.
	Well, but you guys aren't dating exactly, right?
	Because you can't see each other.
	True, but technically we're together.
	And that's what's important.
	Well, actually, sorry. Technically you're not together.
	Technically you're nine hours apart.
	I mean, the reality of that, right?
	Doesn't mean you don't hate each other or anything, but the technical part is definitely that you're not together, right?
	Yeah, but we said we were together, and we've told each other that we like each other enough to be like boyfriend and girlfriend.
	Sure, no, I just mean, but you're not dating, and technically you're not together, right?
	Because you can't date. You can talk on the phone, right?
	Yeah, I guess. And that this is a commitment that you're kind of, because it's fairly clear that it's, I mean, to most people it's fairly clear that it's hard to move a relationship forward when you're long distance, right?
	Yeah. Because you're not with each other in different situations, you're not meeting family, you're not going camping, you're not, you know, doing all the stuff that couples do.
	It's kind of hard to move a relationship forward long distance.
	Doesn't mean that that's the end of the world, right?
	But it's hard to move it forward, if that makes sense, because you just can't spend time together, right?
	Yeah, it does, I guess.
	Right, so what's happened is you've kind of gotten into a relationship that implicitly has a multi-year commitment, right?
	Yeah. Based on a couple of dates.
	And that's why I said you wouldn't marry a guy based on a couple of dates.
	But in this situation, you're kind of getting into a multi-year commitment to somebody based on a couple of dates, right?
	Yeah, I guess so.
	But I mean, I still really like him.
	Well, nobody's saying that you don't, but it's important to look at the fact that you're getting into a multi-year commitment to a relationship based on a couple of dates.
	Yeah, I guess. But then what would I say to him?
	I mean, it's not like he doesn't like me or something.
	Well, but that's... I mean, he has to like me a lot to even ask me in the first place.
	Sure, but whether he likes you or not, to me anyway, isn't the question.
	I fully accept that you guys like each other for sure.
	I mean, I'm happy about that.
	I think that's wonderful. But the romantic part involves proximity, right?
	Yeah. Because if he was in jail for the next 60 years, you wouldn't say, let's be boyfriend and girlfriend, right?
	Well, I would never say that to someone who was in jail.
	Okay. If he went on a missionary...
	trip to darkest Africa for the next 20 years, you wouldn't say, let's be boyfriend and girlfriend, right?
	No, probably not.
	Well, you wouldn't, right?
	I mean, can we at least establish that?
	Okay, no, I wouldn't.
	Right, because we recognize that you can be friends with someone long distance, of course, right?
	Yeah. But the romantic part of a relationship requires proximity.
	Yeah, okay. I get that.
	And again, I'm trying to watch out for your heart, and I could be completely wrong.
	This is just my opinion, right?
	But if you like him like he's a great human being, then you can be friends with him, right?
	Yeah. But if you like him like a romantic thing, but you guys can't spend any time together, then it's a big commitment.
	To get involved with someone to be exclusive long distance for the next several years based on a couple of dates.
	My thought, my feeling, my thought, my feeling, it's just my thought, my feeling, would be why not just be friends with the guy and get to know him.
	You can do all of the stuff like finding out how he became who he is, where he came from, what his values are in his history and his life and so on.
	You can do all of that without romance, right?
	Yeah, I guess. Okay, sorry, I no longer know what she's going to say now.
	Right, right. Yeah, sorry, Christina just wrote down, you're going to miss out on so many other opportunities.
	I think it would probably be a bit soon to say that, because she does sound kind of puppy love wedded to this other guy, right?
	Yeah, she definitely is, from what I've talked to her about it.
	With the questioning that you were going down, the path that you were going down, just eventually that you would get to that...
	Yeah, like, who are you not going to miss?
	But that's the thing to get with people who get into long-distance relationships.
	I mean, if they say, yes, I know it's a three-year relationship, but he's worth it.
	Yes, I know it's a three-year commitment to exclusivity without proximity, but he's worth it.
	That's one thing, but it's where people shy away from those basic truths that it's important to try and pursue them as gently as you can, if that makes sense.
	Yeah, definitely. I mean, it gives me some good ideas on how to approach it with her.
	Which is important. I've known her since she was 5 years old.
	We've been literally best friends since we were 10 or something.
	So I think I owe her as a good friend to try to hash it out with her and make sure that she understands that she's going to give up on a big part of being 19.
	If she does this. Well, sure, but right now, my caution about that, though, is that right now, she's kind of puppy-loved with this guy, and so she would view that as a kind of, you know, well, you love this guy, but think about all the other guys you could hook up with, you know what I mean? Right.
	Across that way. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
	Okay. It's better than the way I was going to approach it.
	That's what's important. Yeah, I mean, and she sounds, I mean, the way that you were portraying her, she sounds kind of delirious, right?
	Well, it's not that.
	It's more of the fact that when she decides something, she goes in completely head over heels into the decision.
	But it sounds like the guy decided here, not her.
	Well, I think that the way that she was telling me is she believes that she decided it as well, which is difficult.
	Because I have the same opinion as you.
	I think that it was largely his decision that she kind of went along with it because she thinks he's this great kind of person.
	But at the same time, if you talk to her, she fully believes she made the decision by saying yes to him.
	He brought up something that she had already wanted.
	And I'd also like to thank you for one of the most challenging roleplays I've ever had, insofar as, you know, hot Christian on Christian action is not the easiest thing for me to get behind, if that makes sense.
	So thank you for an exciting and challenging roleplay.
	No problem. I mean, I love her to death, but she was one of those people that was raised completely in the church, and I'm already trying to work on that, but this one just came up.
	She was raised completely in the church?
	She was raised in the church.
	You know, with all due respect to her intelligence, and with no disrespect to your friendship to her, she sounds a little retarded when it comes to this stuff.
	In a good way, maybe, but just a little, like, does not know.
	Like, it's like, it's dreamy, you know?
	It's just like, it's like this guy thundered by on his white horse, you know, with those tight leggings that only have men as hetero as fairy tales, but it's like, I just swept her up and she's thundering off.
	I mean, it's like a fairy tale, right?
	There's not a lot of practical, watch-your-heart kind of stuff here, right?
	No, there isn't. And I think that largely has to do with the fact that, um...
	It's literally the first guy that she's ever liked, and sorry, my voice is totally dying.
	And I mean, I was the same way when I hit the first guy I liked, and I was even 18, and I totally went that, oh my god, he's dreamy, and that whole thing.
	So... It's difficult.
	I think the phrase that you're looking for is McSteffy.
	That's what I'm trying to put out in the world.
	But so far, it's not taken off except in my own household where it is sometimes quite somewhat derisive.
	But I just sort of mentioned that.
	McSteffy is definitely an interesting one.
	Not going to lie. Thanks.
	Okay, well, do let us know how it goes.
	And I certainly do appreciate you.
	It's a challenging task.
	I think it's a worthwhile task that you've got.
	And, you know, my sort of experience with this kind of stuff is that the best thing that you're going to be able to do is to set up a perfect, aha, I told you so, hips cocked, hands on waist kind of thing for later on, right?
	Yeah. But it might be that you only plant seeds that will take months to grow, right?
	And that's sometimes the patience that we need with these kinds of interactions.
	You certainly can't... I mean, if she's doing the whitewater rafting hormone thing, first puppy love attachment, I mean, if you stand between her and this guy, there'll be like an atelier-sized hole right through your middle.
	Yeah. But you can...
	It's like turning a supertanker sometimes, right?
	It's just like a little bit nudge here, a little bit there, and suddenly it'll happen.
	But patience will be the key, I think, here.
	I mean, I'm fine with it.
	If she does want to go for it, then that's her decision.
	And as a friend, I have to respect that and respect her enough to let her make her decisions.
	But I'll definitely be there for when it crashes and burns.
	Well, there is another approach which would be much more efficient, though, which would not require you having to go through any of this.
	What, just not be her friend?
	No, no, no, not at all.
	Be her friend, but go to the root or the core of the issue, of which this is only a symptom.
	Um, sorry, what would that be?
	There is no god. Oh, I'm already attacking that one.
	Don't worry. There is no God.
	There is no God. Because if you get her to understand that there is no God, then his Christian values will seem to be pretty much akin to, you know, unpleasant ways of taking opium in every orifice, and then she won't be so attached to this guy and his values, right?
	Right. But that, of course, is the road less traveled, and it's up to you which way you go.
	Oh, no, I'm already talking to her about the fact that she's a diehard Christian, and...
	That's taking a lot of time and effort.
	But now that this has popped up, I'm trying to see if I can at least stop this a little bit before that goes too far.
	So that when hopefully she does accept that Christianity is not the best way to go, she doesn't have a complete meltdown and drags her emotional self romantically down the drain.
	And how old is the guy?
	Um, he is...
	Crap.
	I think he just turned 20.
	Okay, now I'm casting my mind back down the ladder of years to when I was 20.
	Another thing that you can do, of course, is to say to her, um, if he's pure, then you won't be able to seduce him.
	So you should try just to check his purity.
	Great. If I remember anything about 20, purity was not my middle name, and I would say that that would pretty much separate the wheat from the chaff as far as that goes.
	Yeah. So yeah, we've given you a couple of different options to work with here, one of which is actually useful, but do keep us posted and let us know how it goes.
	It's very interesting. Will do, and thank you.
	No problem. It's pretty much like talking to a mirror when I put on the Valley Girl pants.
	So, okay, well if we have anybody else who wants to follow that rigmarole, I'm more than happy to answer any questions or listen to any comments if anybody else has.
	Abstract question.
	Yes. I know you like these lately.
	You had a...
	Sorry, but I'm going to continue as a Southern California girl.
	But just because I'm in the character now, so let me just adjust and go ahead.
	Okay, let me change the format of the question then.
	Like, totally, there's this oil thing and...
	Oh, oil? Like, I get this oil on my T-square on my face.
	It's like, it's ridiculous.
	Anyway, sorry. Oh my god.
	Well, you had a presentation, and I don't think you've come out with it yet, as far as I know, on the oil prices.
	And before you do that, I thought I'd ask this question just in case it was relevant or important to address.
	You talked about bidding.
	And return on investment and stuff like that.
	And I don't understand the bidding process as far as – I guess is it done by country or is it done by certain companies?
	I don't understand the whole bidding for oil process.
	Well, I don't either, and I don't think any human being in the world does because it's so complex.
	Another thing that has occurred is the commodities market, which is about buying futures in a product, has taken over the oil market considerably, which always happens when the price goes up because it's a way of trying to manage price.
	Which is about saying, I will buy the oil at this price and I guarantee to sell it to you at that price in the future.
	So I buy an oil at $100 now and I'll sell it to you for $110 in the future so I can make money if it's lower.
	So there's a lot of options and commodities trading and all this kind of mess that goes on in the oil bidding.
	But at the end, somebody has to want to use the oil for something, right?
	Oil is not just a bunch of stuff that goes around in barrels around the world.
	Somebody has to open that barrel, do something useful with the oil, right?
	Convert it to WD-40 or gasoline or plastic or, I don't know, whales or whatever the hell they make out of oil.
	But... So, at some point, a consumer has to want to use the oil.
	And it is the consumer and the price that the consumer is willing to pay for the oil that determines all of the other stuff that leads up to delivering it to the consumer.
	So, what it means is that people in China and in India are willing to bid more for the oil than they were previously.
	And that is because they expect higher profits.
	Ah, okay.
	I guess that makes more sense then.
	And of course, I mean, everybody on YouTube who followed me down 8 million rabbit holes is turning on me on this one because it's a visceral issue for people.
	They get upset, right? And they say, well, but you ship oil around the world.
	Sorry, you have to use oil to ship whatever you make, the laptops and this and that around the world, so it can't be efficient.
	And I don't know what it is with people.
	They say, well, it can't be efficient to ship things from China to North America.
	It's like, dude...
	Pick up half the things you own and look at the maiden sign.
	Are you going to tell everyone who's doing that that they're being efficient sitting in your freaking computer typing about the economics of things?
	The fact is that if stuff does get delivered from India and China to North America, guess what?
	It is efficient. Because otherwise...
	It wouldn't happen, right?
	So, of course, what it means is that they have fewer regulations, they have lower taxes, they have a much cheaper workforce, and so the higher price of oil doesn't matter much relative to the cheapness of their labor, the cheapness of their tax structure, and so on. So, for sure, the price of oil is not going to affect the value of what it is that they can produce, because if they bid up oil...
	It's true that the price of oil goes up and they have an additional oil shipping cost, but, I mean, shipping a laptop in a supertanker, what, 12 million laptops in a supertanker, it's like a tenth of a penny per laptop.
	Oh, the price has gone up by 5% or even 100% doesn't matter, right?
	Two-tenths of a penny per laptop, it doesn't really matter.
	Because when the people in India and China bid up the price of oil, they are also bidding up the production costs for everyone else around the world.
	So they're actually making other people less competitive at the same time as they're increasing their own cost.
	So that stuff's a wash. The only thing that then becomes really important is the cost of transportation, which is why you don't get a lot of cows shipped over from India, because that would be expensive, but you get transistors and memories and sometimes the raw parts for laptops, or maybe they put them together over there.
	but all the stuff that is really, really cheap to send over, all of the electronics, that's why all that stuff is made over there because it's so cheap to ship it, right?
	So, yeah, it always surprises me when people say, well, it's not efficient to ship things from China and India.
	It's like, well, why are trillions of dollars being shipped then?
	If you're so wise and it's inefficient, how do you have the brainpower that outmatches, you know, 100,000 million business people out there all trying to make a buck?
	Right, exactly.
	I also got the argument that because the price of oil is going up, and even though production and supply is going up because the price of oil is going up, I mean, the price of oil is going up because the supply the price of oil is going up because the supply and production is going up, therefore the production and supply of goods and the cost of goods is going down.
	I'm sorry, you said at the beginning that the price of oil was going up because the supply was going up?
	I think you mean down there, right?
	Wait, I had it backwards.
	Yeah, because people say, oh, it's peak oil, and the amount of oil is declining, and therefore the price of oil is going up.
	Well, that may be true, but that doesn't explain why it has happened in the space of eight months or ten months, it's doubled or gone more than double in price.
	I mean, the price of oil, if peak oil has occurred, and I don't know whether it's true or not, it doesn't really matter, is that...
	It won't be catastrophic.
	It's not like everybody says, As you keep putting more and more shells and it becomes harder and harder to find the pistachios, you're never going to keep looking until you find that one last pistachio because that could take weeks, right?
	You're just going to stop looking. It's going to decline over time.
	So, peak oil itself alone does not explain Why the price of oil has risen so precipitously so quickly.
	The only thing that can explain that is massive increases in demand.
	And maybe there's been a slight decline in supply as well, but massive increases in demand, and that's very clear from looking at the The amazing growth that is occurring in India and China is like six, eight, ten percent a year, outstripping by two or three or four times what's going on in the rest of the world.
	And they're right at that beginning phase of industrialization, so their thirst for oil is nearly bottomless.
	But of course, they're only able to bid for that oil if they can produce things efficiently, which means sell them to the first world.
	What about the argument that because the price of oil is increasing, it's going to be injected into the dropping prices, keeping things the same?
	If things were the same, then nobody would be investing in India and China.
	They're only investing in India and China, thus giving them the amount of capital to bid the price of oil up, because it'll be better.
	So, if I had one business investment which said, you can invest in this company in Houston that's producing laptops and you'll get a return of 10% a year, or you can invest in some company you've never heard of, in a country you've never been to, in a business environment you don't know about, in a language you don't speak, and it will also give you 10% return, I think.
	Which would you go for? The Houston?
	Of course you would, because it's local, you understand it, it makes sense, it's in a culture you understand.
	So when money flows from the first world to the third world, which is where it's going, which gives the third world enough money to bid up the price of oil, to buy it, to produce more stuff, it's because the returns in India and China are big enough to justify going over the language barrier and figuring out the culture and sending people out there to set up these deals and making your contacts.
	It has to be a much more significant return for investors to go over those cultural hurdles.
	Oh, right. Or else it wouldn't be happening.
	Yeah, no, because the cost of doing business in China compared to the cost of doing business down the street is much higher, right?
	Right. I mean, when I... Because I was in...
	China in the year 2000 for business for a couple of weeks and I mean you got to hire all these translators.
	There's lots of cultural issues.
	I've never drank that much before or since and I'm not much of a drinker so it's tough on the liver.
	You have to have all these transplants.
	It's tough all around to just get the hang of it and there were tons of people out there beating the bushes trying to figure out how to make all this work.
	And it's really hard.
	So the only reason people would go over there is because the returns are multiple times higher than you would get in North America, which means that they're much more efficient at producing things that they can sell to North America than North Americans are.
	And this, of course, sorry, this is the big final screw you to the West that India, because, I mean, India had a local cotton industry that was completely decimated by tariffs, right?
	And so now they're just returning the favor a couple of generations later.
	So it's just the way these tides work, right?
	What with technology, you mean?
	Oh, yeah, yeah. It's like, okay, you steal our jobs, no problem.
	We'll just lie here patiently and then wait and return the favor, right?
	And of course, they're not stealing jobs, right?
	They're taking some people's jobs away, but they...
	And the other thing, too, people say in the YouTube comments, they say, well, I don't buy a laptop, so I don't get the benefit.
	And it's like, oh... Oh, God.
	Yes, but everybody you buy from buys laptops, right?
	So you will get the benefit whether you buy a laptop or not.
	The prices will go down in companies because they have to spend less on laptops for their employees and all that stuff.
	Oh, yeah. And I've noticed.
	I mean, I watch the price of technology just because I'm a geek, right?
	And, I mean, over the last year, the price of laptops is ridiculous.
	So cheap. So cheap. Yeah, I haven't...
	I'm not a big laptop fan, but...
	I mean, just to say, I got a dual-core advanced Pentium processor with a beautiful widescreen, a built-in webcam, a 250-gig hard drive, built-in sound, built-in wireless, built-in Ethernet, built-in modem, and 2 gigs of RAM and an operating system for $699.
	I mean, it's ridiculous. That's awesome.
	And this is an obscure off-brand of some kind?
	Oh no, it's a Toshiba.
	Oh, Toshiba? Huh.
	Well, actually, I think they're a Scottish company, though.
	McToshiba, I think it was originally.
	So why is that...
	And that's not even from India, then?
	Oh, I guarantee you that was not made in North America.
	There's no conceivable way that that could have been that price if made in North America by all these...
	Heavily protected unions and environmental regulations and this, that, and the other.
	High taxes. Right.
	Yeah, that makes sense.
	So they made it over there.
	Oh yeah, for sure. They either made it over there or it was assembled here, but I'm guessing that...
	I mean, this is what unions do, right?
	They protect the jobs of the few at the expense of the jobs of the many, right?
	It takes a long time to be felt.
	Well, of course, the other thing that's happened is the American protection for the farms has caused massive amounts of dumping in foreign markets of American food and European food and British food into these markets, which has meant that a whole bunch of people have been driven off the land. which has meant that a whole bunch of people have You can't compete with free or heavily subsidized food, even if you live in India or whatever, right?
	So what's happened is it's driven a lot of people off the land into the city.
	So when you can't make it as a farmer, you just go to the city.
	That's what everybody does, right?
	That's what the foundation of the Industrial Revolution in England was, right?
	They partitioned off the land.
	It got more efficient.
	They didn't need as many farmers.
	So all the farmers went to the cities, which drives down the price of labor, which means that it's much more possible for you to invest in capital upgrades and start producing a lot more because the price of labor is being driven down.
	So this is another way in which, of course, subsidies screw the average American, right?
	Because they have to pay for all these farmer subsidies.
	These farmers then have all this excess food dumped on these third world markets, which then drives the third world farmers into the cities, which drives down the price of labor, which means that American workers are that much less able to compete with foreign workers.
	So it's a horrible, horrible tide that, you know, the evil that this money does after it's been stolen is endless.
	Do you think it's possible to have all of this in a self-contained argument without having to know everything you just told me?
	Well, I have put the oil one up.
	Oh, you did? It's not a perfectly self-contained argument because I'm trying to keep them relatively short.
	But, yeah, it's 12 minutes.
	You can give it a shot. Lots of people disagree with it, but no one has actually come up with any, at least, arguments that I would consider to be valid.
	But you can give it a shot and have a look.
	Oh, that's totally surprising.
	I'm shocked. Yeah.
	Yes, YouTube PhDs.
	Well, no, it's a tough argument to get a hold of, right?
	Because it is hard to look at rising prices as a good thing.
	I mean, it just is, right? It requires some real conceptual intelligence that, of course, a number of people have pointed out that my conceptual ability to do this It might be somewhat accelerated by the fact that I don't drive to work anymore, but let's just say that that may be the case.
	Maybe not. Oh, you did put it up.
	I just totally didn't see it.
	Okay. Well, I mean, I think the only video based on your Google tickles off YouTube has been the Hot Asian Girls one, right?
	That's the only video that you've actually seen.
	Oh, right. That's right.
	That's why. Yeah, the Hot Asians...
	I think the word hot is the keyword, and not so much Asians, but just about any insert, insert anything here.
	Right, hot, non-Asian, highly disappointing, bald philosophers.
	I think that was probably the keyword that tipped you off.
	Right, the keyword for sure.
	Alright, well that's my abstract question for the day.
	Alright, well thank you very much.
	I appreciate it. Alright.
	I have a question for somebody who's on the call, but I don't want to interrupt if anybody else has an issue or a question.
	Hello. Hello. You said that the, you predicted that the American state would die in about 10, 20 years, right?
	I think I was 5 to 15 about 3 years ago, but yeah, that was my, about 2 years ago maybe, but yeah, that was my sort of completely off-the-cuff, total nonsense prediction, but yeah, that's where I sort of put my stake in the ground.
	But you've said we will not have a true free market society for at least a hundred years.
	What's been bugging me is what happens in the time in between.
	Well, I think that's written on us, myself.
	I mean, like, right after...
	America collapses, then what?
	Do we have civil war or something like Russia?
	There's no possibility of civil war because there's nuclear weapons.
	Civil war is never going to happen in any country where there are nuclear weapons.
	War doesn't happen between nuclear powers.
	Nuclear weapons have rendered all but proxy wars obsolete.
	Which is why there could be no better thing for international stability than for everyone to get nukes.
	But that's another argument.
	But no, it's not going to be civil war.
	And America's not going to collapse, right?
	I mean, it's not going to sink into the ocean.
	The bridges aren't going to fall down.
	People aren't going to explode in the streets.
	The buildings aren't going to collapse.
	Yeah, but the state is just a thought, right?
	The state is just an idea.
	What's going to happen is that it's going to run out of cash, and it's going to...
	International markets are totally up on the whole problem of inflation now, so if they overprint money, that's not going to work.
	So they're just going to have to start shedding state enterprises, and they're going to start selling stuff off into the private...
	I mean, that's what happens when countries run out of cash.
	They just... Transition into something else, right?
	I mean, when Russia collapsed, there was no civil war.
	There was some goofy stuff where Gorbachev was kidnapped and so on, but it's freer now than it was back then.
	So all that happens is that there's an economic limit that's hit, and the state, in order to protect itself, the ones who have the most power will protect their own domains, and the ones who have less power will end up being ejected out into the private sector.
	And this will be done with great regrets, and we have to sell off the parks, and we have to privatize this, that, or the other, and we can't afford rent subsidies anymore, and this public housing is going to have to be sold off.
	With great sorrow and regret, so to speak, all of this stuff will transition, and there will be an ejection of stuff from the public sector into the private sector, which will allow the core of the public sector to...
	Sorry, I'd like to continue, but there's an ice cream truck coming down the street.
	Could you guys talk once yourselves?
	Honey, you could either go and get an ice cream or you could listen to me waffle on about economics.
	One with the chocolate dip? Yeah, just to keep my strength up.
	Could you go get us all ice cream?
	Absolutely. It will be coming out of your CD drive in a sec.
	All right. So stuff will move to the private sector and that will allow those who have the most power to hang on to the core of their illicit income and this may actually to some degree happen even with With the private schools, right? Some aspects of schools may be privatized as well.
	We don't know. We don't know what's going to happen, what they're going to do when they run out of money.
	But there's not going to be a tyranny, and there's not going to be a civil war, and there's not going to be any of that kind of monster disaster.
	That just can't happen anymore because the weapons are too powerful.
	I mean, that's why it didn't happen in Russia, right?
	Because let's say that the Communist Party wanted to take power and somebody else got a hold of two nukes.
	It just wouldn't happen. That's why Russia disintegrated in a mostly peaceful manner.
	So there's going to be a collapse of the existing growth of the state and a retrenchment of the size of the state.
	And then, of course, what everyone is going to do is they're going to say...
	Wow, I guess we dodged that bullet.
	The state is smaller, so I guess we're done, right?
	And then the whole goddamn thing is going to start up again, and it's up to us, I think, to intervene as strongly as possible to try and help people understand that that's not how it should go.
	We're going to have another Ron Paul.
	Oh, yeah, there's going to be a whole sequence of Ron Pauls after this, right?
	And, of course, the Libertarian Party is going to claim all kinds of victory when the state begins selling stuff off, right?
	And all the free market economists are going to say, ah, you see, the government is finally listening to us until the government starts privatizing universities.
	And then they'll be like, oh, my God, this is a complete threat to freedom of academic inquiry.
	And I told that kind of Weasley shit that they do.
	Yeah, I wouldn't fear about it.
	I mean, the internet has changed everything, right?
	The internet has changed everything, as far as communication goes.
	The monopoly of the Catholic Church could in no way survive the printing press, and the monopoly of status ideology can in no way survive the advent of the internet.
	As someone who is, to my own small degree, at the forefront of trying to communicate philosophy on the internet, which would be completely impossible under any other conceivable circumstance, there's no going back and...
	This military invention is going to undo the military in the long run.
	That would be ironic, the Libertarian Party in rule.
	Oh, yeah, of course.
	And then they'll just start doing what everybody else does, right?
	Because the original Libertarian Party was the Founding Fathers, right?
	And look what they did. Look how successful they were.
	Oh, yeah. Just by the by, I've got a whole bunch of podcast notes for stuff that I'm sort of cooking in my mind.
	Yeah. One of the ones that I'm talking about is that nobody calls me a rich man if I say that I've decided not to go and take all the gold from Fort Knox.
	I'm a rich man, but I choose not to take that gold, because obviously I just don't have any access to that gold, so it doesn't accrue to my wealth.
	It's not part of my property.
	So just for the founding fathers, they say, well, we want a small state, and that's of course simply because They couldn't have a big state, right?
	Because they didn't have the power, right?
	So they say, well, you know, we've decided not to tax people at 50%, and that's because they would have been shot in the nuts if they'd tried, right?
	So it had nothing to do with any kind of ideology, sort of what I'm working with as a thesis.
	I need to find some more proof for it, but...
	It doesn't have anything to do with an ideology of small government.
	It's just like, well, we're the new gang in town, and our hold over the country is incredibly precarious, and therefore we're going to talk about a small government because that's all we can afford.
	And that would be really...
	People in power always take as much power as they can possibly get away with, and when they can't get away with it, they talk about the virtues of small government, but it's just a practical necessity rather than an ideological goal.
	They just go with whatever is popular.
	Okay. Well, that's not exactly what I'm saying, but certainly they will certainly talk the populist talk, for sure.
	Right. Well, okay, Ali.
	All right. Well, thank you very much.
	And is there anybody else who had a question or comment that I'd like to raise at the moment?
	All right.
	I had a question for David N.
	I think you're on the call at the moment.
	Thank you.
	If you have your mic.
	This would be you. Boda?
	Uh, David Ngo?
	Hello. Hello, are you there?
	Uh, yeah. Oh, fantastic.
	Great. Good. What happened, honey?
	I didn't see you running down the street screaming after the ice cream truck.
	What catastrophes have occurred?
	The ice cream truck did not come around the circle.
	You could ram it. We have two cars in the driveway.
	Sorry about that.
	I wanted to talk to you about this thread, this Tyler thread that was cooking around this week.
	Oh, sure. This last week.
	Because you had some criticisms of me in that thread, and Ford is obviously a pretty sucky way to deal with these kinds of issues, but if you could sort of talk about it with me here, I'm sure that would be better for me, just so I could sort of understand what the criticisms were in more detail.
	Yeah. I mean, I think it was just – I was just confused because we had the podcast where I sort of asked you about the debating tips.
	And I thought they were really good in terms of getting someone else to sort of see your side in a way that is more, I guess, curious and Socratic and sort of just getting them to think about their own, I guess, assumptions as opposed to you just sort of spouting out answers to them.
	And so I thought that was really good and it was a really great approach for me to sort of change my way of sort of discussing issues with people.
	So I was very excited about that.
	And so I guess when I saw the Tyler thread, I thought there was a conflict there.
	I thought that there was something not like right about that.
	But what I later realized was that it was just kind of like...
	It's a choice, right, that everyone has whether to expend energy, that amount of energy, in terms of getting them to think, to be, like you say, a force for truth or not.
	And so I guess it's everyone's sort of choice as to whether they want to put that amount of effort into it.
	And so I had not sort of made that realization.
	I was just sort of applying this, oh, so everyone should be treated the same in the sense of you should put that amount of effort So as far as I understood it,
	you were taking the approach that, and I certainly do remember our call, but you were taking the approach that everyone should be, if you have a disagreement with someone or have a criticism of someone, that you should always treat people as far as this curious and Socratic and don't impose answers or judgments on them.
	Right. That was my assumption before.
	Can you help me understand something?
	Sure.
	Well, if that was your approach, that you should always, if you disagree with someone, you should always take the curious and Socratic approach where you don't impose answers but rather ask questions, why didn't you take that approach with me?
	That's an interesting question.
	Yeah, I mean I guess that would have gotten to the realization a lot quicker.
	And I mean, I'm just curious, like genuinely curious, because it is a...
	I mean, if you say to me, well, Steph, you were saying that you should always treat people this way, and I believed you, but then you don't treat me that way, it's hard to put those two together.
	And I don't mean this in any huge critical way, it's just that logically it's hard for me to follow, and it's interesting why that exception would be made, if that makes sense.
	Right. I mean I was pointing out – I guess I was pointing out what I thought to be a contradiction and then I was like – it was a bad way to ask that question in a way.
	I'm not sure that you did ask a question.
	I think I did.
	I said, this is what you told me before.
	This is what I see now.
	How do those combine together to make a cohesive sort of theory?
	I don't think it was quite that gentle.
	I mean, I don't want to pull up a thread, but my sort of emotional memory of it is it wasn't quite that gentle and curious and open.
	I thought that you were coming in with some conclusions about what it is that I was doing.
	And it was not Curious or Socratic.
	And I felt that there was answers that were imposed.
	Like, I don't think you came in and said, I can't quite figure out how these two go together.
	But I think it was, you know, Steph, you said this here, and you're not doing it here.
	Right. Well, I think...
	By doing that, you also weren't doing it, right?
	Right. No, I totally agree.
	And I genuinely am curious, because obviously you're a very intelligent and consistent fellow, right?
	So, I'd like to ask a few questions.
	I mean, this is genuinely curious, because I think you're worth it.
	I didn't necessarily think that this other guy was after a while, but I think you are, so I'll put the time in if you don't mind.
	Oh, sure. Do you have religious people around you in your life?
	No. And is your girlfriend's...
	What's going on with your girlfriend and her family?
	What do you mean? Are they religious?
	Okay, we can ask that first, sure.
	Oh, no, I just didn't understand the question.
	What do you mean, what's going on with them?
	Well, are they religious? Oh, no.
	No, they're not. Okay. And a couple of...
	I guess about... Probably about two months ago, I think it was, you and I talked about Some issues or questions that you had with regard to your girlfriend and her relationship to her friends and her family and her dad liked her having this person so he could get cheap hotel rates and so on.
	Yes, yeah. So, sorry, is there a question in there?
	Yeah, yeah, what's going on with that?
	Oh, like how's it going?
	So she's still living with her parents, which is fine, but similar things come up every once in a while, but I think now they have a little bit more respect for her views and for her own sort of way of living, and she hasn't talked to her friend anymore.
	She basically broke it off.
	And subsequently, like, the friend that they both shared, she's also kind of cut off relationships from him, too, because he doesn't want to defu, I guess, her.
	And anyways, yeah, that's sort of the status right now.
	Okay. And do you have statists, I guess, in your life?
	Statists? Yeah, I guess everyone does.
	Well, I don't, but...
	Only your grocer probably is a status, your mailman...
	No, but that person's not in my life, right?
	You know what I mean. Right, right.
	And I know that there's some people on the board, for sure, who don't have status in their lives, right?
	Uh-huh, uh-huh. And this is not an absolute.
	It's not a good or evil question.
	What I'm trying to do is figure out why if the approach that I had suggested or that we had talked about, about curiosity and not imposing answers and the Socratic method and so on...
	Right. Why that...
	I mean, and it wasn't just you.
	It's just you, the one who happened to be on the call today, right?
	But why in that thread felt a little bit like...
	I was just about to leave and then I heard my name and I was like, ah, crap.
	Bear trap, right? But it sort of felt in that thread like there was a little bit of a, you know, let's flame up the torches and go after Shrek to some degree.
	You know, the villagers seem to be particularly aggressive.
	And this doesn't necessarily mean that you're entirely in that category, but...
	I thought it was interesting, and I was trying to sort of figure out, because the whole question, for instance, of the violence and the evil that is in the Bible is one of these great things that is really, really hard to talk about in society, right?
	Yeah, but it's irrefutable.
	I definitely agree with that.
	Well, it is irrefutable, but...
	I think that it has parallels for people in my mind.
	This is just my theory, right? It doesn't mean anything, but I think that it has parallels in people's minds either with other religious people in their life or other statists in their life, right?
	Because if I point out the violence in Christianity, Then, that sort of raises the specter, I think, for people, where they go to the status in their life and they say, well, you support the use of violence against me.
	Which is pretty volatile, right?
	Right. So, I... Yeah, I guess I'm still having a confusion then.
	So when do you state that right outright, like say, you're a Christian, therefore you're associating yourself with a philosophy that is violent, inherently violent.
	When do you start off with that and when do you actually put the effort for them to realize that themselves?
	Well, let me ask you this.
	And again, I'm not saying you have to have these conversations, right?
	And maybe you have, maybe you haven't.
	But how have you approached that with the statists in your life?
	Because it's the same for them, right?
	They support an ideology that initiates the use of violence against you for non-crimes, right?
	Right. I don't know.
	Whenever an issue comes up and the solution is some sort of statism solution, I always have a discussion and point out that it's immoral.
	Basically, taxation is the same as someone coming into your home and putting a gun in your head saying, give me your money.
	You've had these conversations with the statists in your life?
	Right. And then what?
	And then it's just sort of a, well, I disagree kind of thing.
	You mean you disagree with them or they disagree with you?
	Well, I mean both. Well, but you said about Christianity that it's irrefutable, the violence, right?
	Sure. And it's also true, in fact, it's much more explicitly true with statism that the violence is irrefutable, right?
	Uh-huh. So there can't be, like, the agree to disagree thing can't be an option, logically, right?
	Well, yeah, I mean, in my mind, I just see, like, well, they're blocking out the truth, kind of thing.
	Okay, but what you're doing is you're defining statism as adherence to an evil doctrine, right?
	And so, if you define people as holding evil beliefs, what then?
	And again, I'm not saying that...
	I'm not saying you should or shouldn't do anything with regards to these people.
	I'm just curious where it sits in your mind.
	Right. I guess in my mind, it doesn't...
	Most of the people that I really value are not statists.
	And the people who are statists, because of that and many other things that, you know, just general compatibility and values sharing, they maintain a sort of very limited relationship with them in the sense of kind of like the mailman or, you know, like it's kind of like, well, we hang out like, you know, because we, I don't know, like...
	We're in the same profession or something like that.
	You know what I mean? Like, so it doesn't really come up that often.
	And usually when it does, it's sort of a, you know, a stop point where it's like, okay, we won't discuss this anymore kind of thing.
	Okay, so if I understand this rightly, and I'm not trying to corner you, like I genuinely just want to get a mental map, and I'm not sure that I'm not getting a very clear one, which doesn't mean anything, just maybe that I'm misunderstanding.
	But is it that the people who, you know, your family and your girlfriend and your girlfriend's family and so on, that they're all anarchists?
	I mean, that to me is amazing if that is the case.
	No. No, I haven't met her parents, really.
	I have no idea what their views are.
	My parents... Sorry, I don't think it's quite true that you have no ideas what their views are.
	I mean, I'm not saying you're lying.
	I just think that that was like a quick statement, but...
	I really have not met them.
	Okay, but let's talk about the views of the people that you do know, right?
	So your girlfriend is an anarchist then?
	I don't think she knows what that even means.
	So she's a statist?
	Yeah, if it's a duality, then yeah, I guess so.
	You're kind of fogging on me here, right?
	And I'm not trying to put you into a corner.
	I mean, it doesn't matter to me whether you talk about things with your girlfriend as far as this stuff goes or not.
	I'm just trying to get a clear picture.
	Okay, well, how long have you been going out with your girlfriend?
	About six months. Okay, and how long have you been an objectivist or a libertarian or an anarchist or whatever?
	Well, I've been an objectivist for...
	You know, started into the anarchy thing when I found your stuff on...
	I don't know, actually about a year ago or a few months ago.
	Half a year ago, maybe. Okay.
	And does she know that you're an anarchist?
	Or whatever. I don't know.
	Whatever you want to call it. I'm not even sure that I'm an anarchist yet.
	I mean, it's just like I'm still learning.
	And I'm still applying, trying to learn as much as I can in terms of the arguments for and against it.
	But you certainly do accept the...
	Sorry to interrupt. But you do accept the objectivist argument that taxation is forced, right?
	Right. Right. Does she know that argument from you?
	No, I haven't really discussed it.
	Okay, and again, I'm not saying you have to discuss it or anything, right?
	What I'm curious about is why things got so emotionally charged for people, myself included, in that thread, right?
	And I don't think that anybody has to sit down and talk with anyone about anything, as far as that goes, right?
	but it is something that all other things being equal, it would be surprising that you hadn't talked about it with, let's say, your girlfriend, right?
	Sorry, I don't see the connection.
	Can you say that again? Well, this is a pretty core part of your personality, right?
	It's a pretty core part of your belief set, of your philosophy.
	Yeah, I mean, I've definitely talked to her about many aspects of philosophy.
	The taxation one specifically, I have not.
	Right, and does that seem surprising to you?
	Not really.
	I mean, we're sort of slowly learning about each other.
	Okay, and what about with your family?
	Yeah, in terms of philosophy, it's sort of a...
	I guess I have a blog and they read it every once in a while, so they know it through second hand, but we don't really...
	I mean, there's overlap and then there's not, right?
	But you define the initiation of the use of force as evil, right?
	I mean, that's not my definition.
	Certainly, I didn't invent any of that, right?
	Right. So that's something that you accept.
	And again, this is not to say that you have to talk to anyone about anything, but I don't know the degree to which people are comfortable about not talking about it with people, where they've said, I just don't go there with my family, and I'm going to accept the contradiction with my beliefs.
	I don't know that that's conscious for people.
	I think it's a big topic that people avoid.
	And then when I bring something up with someone, they get kind of all tense, right?
	No, I mean, it's a very conscious choice on my behalf to avoid those subjects with certain people.
	I'm not avoiding it with my girlfriend.
	I just haven't gotten to that yet.
	You know, we haven't brought it up.
	Okay. But with your family, I mean, it is a real tension, right?
	Like, if you say the initiation of the use of force is evil, statism is evil in practice, then surely advocating and supporting statism is not good, right?
	I mean, that's not my definition.
	Everyone gets mad at me, like, oh, I'm pushing people.
	But this is what you already believe, right?
	Yeah, yeah. So that's got to be kind of stressful, because you define something as evil, and those who support it as corrupt And then you keep them in your life, right?
	Which means either that it's not corrupt, it's kind of like, I like ice cream, you like, I don't know, sour keys or something.
	It's either not corrupt, in which case the whole system of ethics kind of falls down, right?
	Or it is corrupt, but having corrupt people in your life is okay, or something else, but there really is a conflict, right?
	I mean, it's not my conflict, I don't make it up, it is, right?
	Oh, I mean, I definitely agree that there's a tension and that at least in the sense that there's certain subjects that you sort of avoid with certain people.
	But I think there is, I mean, again, I don't know whether this is right or not and whether this makes sense, but at least in my life, I temper the amount of closeness that I have with someone based upon the amount of values that I share with them, right? You know, obviously someone's status, you know, communist and religious or whatever, I don't know.
	Then that's like the least amount of like connection I could possibly have with that person.
	The more that they share values with me, the more that actually that connection grows, right?
	But I feel like there's a lot of these gray areas where like, you know, We, you know, share one thing that's pretty good, the other thing's not.
	And so that sort of limits the extent and potential of that relationship.
	Well, but it's not just that the values are not shared, right?
	it's that the values are diametrically opposite, right?
	I mean, to give you an example, right, I mean, this is a silly example, but we'll just use it for the sake of the metaphor.
	If I had a whole bunch of podcasts urging people with guns to go and shoot you, I mean, it wouldn't be like, well, Steph and I just don't quite share the same values, right?
	I mean, it wouldn't be quite like that, right?
	Well, I guess I don't see it as that directive of threat in my life.
	You mean if I were doing that?
	Oh, no, no, no. In that analogy, absolutely.
	But I don't see that amount of threat in someone just not even, you know, just someone growing up with the government always being there and not really questioning it.
	Well, sure, but I mean you can make that clear for them, right?
	Right. I mean, this kid on the thread, this Tyler kid, I mean, he grew up with the religion and these, what were they, Jesus Christ, Latter-day Saints, lunatics, right?
	And I just, you know, I said, since he pressed me as to why I wasn't responding, I said, because you're praising people who adhere to a doctrine that commands my death.
	I mean, that's kind of offensive to me, right?
	So you can make it clear to people fairly quickly, right?
	So, I mean, that's the heart of my question, right?
	Like, do you make it clear to them immediately?
	Is that, like, the first thing that you present to them?
	Or do you try to go at it sort of in a more, you know, Socratic sort of, you know, ask them questions and let them make the argument for you?
	Well, but I'm not sure that you're doing either.
	What meat?
	What?
	Sorry, say that again.
	Well, I'm not sure that you're doing either because you said there's just topics that you avoid or things that haven't come up yet, right?
	Right, right. So to me, it's not a real question because it's not like you're saying, well, I'm trying one and it's not working quite as well as the other.
	It's like, to me, that's sort of like, it's just important to recognize that, and again, this is not a criticism, it's just an empirical fact that you're avoiding this contradiction, right?
	And that, to me, is not a bad thing.
	It's just an empirical or observable reality.
	Right. And the reason that it's important is not because you should go and talk to anybody or this or that or the other.
	The reason that it's important is I was trying to figure out on this thread why everybody started getting mad at me rather than, say, the cultists who'd raised this poor kid into this horrible brain-fried reality, right?
	Oh, no. I mean, absolutely.
	That is a far worse crime than anything you could have possibly done.
	Well, but nobody got mad at these kids' parents.
	And also, everybody claimed to care about this kid.
	And I gave where he was located.
	And I don't know anybody when to go and actually talk to him.
	So there was something that just didn't quite add up.
	And my sort of thesis is that people feel upset.
	There's a lot of tension around this, avoiding that which you define as good and evil in your relationships with people.
	Just saying, okay, I believe that this is good, I believe that this is evil, and I have real proof that I can get across to people in about five minutes, but I dance around it all the time, or I avoid it.
	So this tension between believing in the ethics of something and not acting on the ethics of something, I think, is kind of boiling around in people's hypothalamus or something, the medulla.
	Down in the base of the brain.
	And then I think that when they see me step up, whether harshly or not, we could debate that.
	But when they see me step up, I just lay it out and say, well, you know, you're praising these people as wonderful who adhere to a belief that commands my death.
	I mean, that's just a fact, right?
	And as you say, it's irrefutable.
	And then people got really mad at me.
	And that just doesn't make sense logically, right?
	I'm certainly not the bad guy for pointing out that Christianity is violent.
	And it is pretty impolite to go to an atheist forum and talk about how wonderful and moral your Christian parents I would not go to a forum that is like blackpower.org and talk about how wonderful my KKK family member parents are.
	That would just be dickish, frankly.
	It would not be impolite for somebody to point out that that was offensive on that board.
	So the fact that everybody got mad at me was completely irrational, in my opinion, right?
	And it's not because y'all are bad, irrational people.
	It's got to be something else, right?
	right and that's why I was sort of asking you about how you were with this kind of stuff in your life yeah but I mean obviously there's certain people that you don't even like want to get into conversation with writing I mean, sometimes people just aren't even worth, like, even what you said, like, it's not even really worth going into that.
	But what does that have? Because nobody said to me, Steph, I don't think that it was worth getting into a conversation with this guy.
	That wasn't their criticism, right?
	So I'm not sure what relevance that is to what we're talking about.
	Right. And look, I don't want to put you on the spot.
	This is just my thoughts. I mean, you can take your time and think about it, and I could be completely wrong, but that's just sort of the thesis that I was trying to work with based on the information that I was getting that I couldn't quite put together.
	Right. I'm sorry.
	I'm not making any more connections than I had when I first started this conversation.
	Well, that means that I'm either completely wrong or I'm completely right.
	No, it does, right? Because it means that I'm either completely off base, right?
	Or it means that I'm bang on, right?
	And that it really is a very stressful, intense place in you where you compromise that which you consider to be the good for the sake of social convenience, right?
	And certainly, the Randian approach to that is not very kind, right?
	How Rand would judge somebody who betrays what she would call the good?
	I'm not saying this is you, right?
	But it's just the paradigm, right?
	How Rand would approach or portray somebody who portrays the good for the sake of social convenience, it would not be kind, right?
	And as an ex-objectivist, or as an objectivist plus 5% or whatever you'd want to call me, that was certainly something I was aware of when I was in that mindset.
	Right. So where do you define someone, quote unquote, being in your life as opposed to the mailman or the person sort of having financial transaction with or professional transactions with?
	Well, I think that, you know, with all due respect, I'm not going to answer that because I think that certainly girlfriend and family would count as that.
	And I think that you're trying to create an intellectual distinction to debate the gray areas rather than look at the stuff that's squarely on one side or the other.
	Okay. Okay.
	That's fair enough. I mean, certainly, mailman, not so much in my life.
	Wife, in my life, right?
	I mean, that much we could certainly agree on, right?
	Sure. No, absolutely. A guy I pass on the sidewalk, not so much.
	People I invite into my house as friends, yes, right?
	Yeah. So, I mean, there may be great areas, you know, where I give the mailman, you know, a Vulcan neck pinch out of fun and give him a piece of pound cake at Christmas.
	Christmas, I don't know, right?
	But that's not where we're debating, right?
	Right.
	But, I mean, again, I don't want to, you know, push you into a corner and And again, I'm sorry that you had to sort of take the brunt of these questions.
	It's just that nobody else called in.
	And I'm going to be honest, I thought that you'd be the most reasonable person to talk about.
	And I think that you are, right, in this issue.
	So we can stop this here and you can just sort of mull it over and then tell me just how ridiculous the thesis is or whether there's any validity to it later.
	Okay. Yeah, I don't think I'm going to get anywhere soon in terms of any new thoughts on that.
	No, no, I appreciate that.
	And thank you so much for your patience.
	I really do appreciate that.
	And I certainly didn't mean any disrespect or hostility in the way that I was approaching it.
	So I hope that that came across.
	Oh, yeah. I mean, same on my side.
	No hard feelings. All right.
	Well, thank you. Thank you very much.
	And I've finished my swinging bear light bulb rubber truncheon foot in the bucket of waterboarding of a kind listener.
	If anybody else had any questions or comments or issues, I think we have time for one more.
	No? Okay. Well, thank you everybody so much for dropping by this Sunday, the 25th of...
	May 2007. Please remember to drop by freedomainradio.com forward slash referral.
	And if anybody who was on the call earlier remembers the name of that website where I put in the RSVP referral for the barbecue, if you could remember, if you're coming up for June the 7th to the barbecue that is going to be there, I would really appreciate it if you could give me...
	Oh, I think I actually do have the link.
	Yes, I do. The link for giving me an RSVP to the barbecue is the following.
	www.amiando.com If you could give me your RSVP. If you're looking for or have a ride, there's a car pool section there as well.
	I think that a few enterprising listeners have also added a jetpack section, but remember that is entirely experimental.
	So if you have legs or wish to keep them, you may want to put that further down on your list of transportation options.
	And I really do appreciate it.
	Pick up your copy of...
	Everyday Anarchy, the print version.
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