Speaking the language of dysfunction, passing legislation to ban child abuse, humans being descended from extraterrestrials, empathy in communicating shocking topics, good needs evil, intrinsic value, sustainable living, free stuff for idiots and working through relationship anxiety before making a big commitment.
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| Good morning, everybody. | |
| Hope you're doing well. | |
| It's Stefan Molyneux from Free Domain Radio. | |
| The 26th of January, 2013. | |
| Oh, generally. | |
| Generally, January. | |
| It'd be the cruelest month. | |
| So if you have, you know, people blow their wallets into the stratosphere over the course of Christmas and then find themselves cancelling Free Domain Radio subscriptions. | |
| Shockingly! | |
| I guess I shouldn't be a materialist. | |
| Can't complain. | |
| But if you do have any extra shekels rolling around the old savings gourd, if you could go to fdrurl.com forward slash donate and to help out with a subscription or a donation, it would be Much appreciated. | |
| Mike has some very expensive habits that I was not legally aware of prior. | |
| Because he's not here today. | |
| He's actually heading out to take in a cultural event that involves a fair amount of body oil and skin-on-skin action. | |
| He'll explain it, I'm sure, next week. | |
| So, kind of funny this morning. | |
| So, this morning I... I came down to get my coffee and gruel and diet of a non-epicurean philosopher. | |
| And my daughter is playing a game called Shiny the Firefly. | |
| And in it, you have to lead your babies to safety. | |
| So she says, good morning, Daddy. | |
| I... I killed one of my babies. | |
| Because, you know, if you... | |
| Whatever. | |
| Spiders get them or something like that. | |
| And I wasn't sure if she was going to be upset or not. | |
| And then she says, but it's okay. | |
| I have three or four more. | |
| And that's led to a rousing discussion of medieval birth rates and exactly why we spend so much time and attention on her because she's an only child. | |
| And then she asked me about the show I did last night. | |
| I did a show on Justin Bieber. | |
| And I was sort of trying to explain jealousy to her. | |
| She's got a friend... | |
| Who's doing pretty well in letters. | |
| And Isabella has this competitive streak that makes Donald Trump look like either Beavis or Butthead. | |
| I can't tell because I can never really tell them apart. | |
| And so I was sort of trying to explain jealousy to her and said, you know, like if your friend was doing really well in letters and could even get the letters... | |
| That you couldn't get, how would you feel? | |
| She said, I feel upset. | |
| Is that jealousy? | |
| I said, yeah, kind of. | |
| You know, like someone's doing better than you and you... | |
| You know, and I said, so what would you do? | |
| And she said, well, Daddy, obviously I would have to... | |
| Go and eat this girl's letters from her brain so that I would have them. | |
| So we've started with infanticide and cannibalism. | |
| Brain eating. | |
| So I'm waiting for her to come down the hallway like a tiny little zombie going something like this. | |
| So it was a fun morning. | |
| So I hope you're doing well. | |
| We've got a bunch of callers for the show this morning. | |
| I'm sorry that we're mulling over adding another call-in show. | |
| I really like them. | |
| They can be a little tiring after the fourth hour, but I really do like chatting with you guys in these shows. | |
| So we're thinking of adding another show because right now we're booked into March for people to call into this show, which I consider great. | |
| And did you know we did like Almost 800 gigabytes of downloads of the podcasts in one day. | |
| In one day. | |
| And there's been hundreds of thousands of downloads of that little comic book I wrote, The Handbook of Human Ownership. | |
| And I'm also considering writing another one called The Handbook of Child Ownership, which would be bad parenting advice. | |
| And the parenting book is coming along, which is great. | |
| The documentary will be coming along. | |
| We have got the right animators, but I need to go through the script and redo everything, figure out what's possible and what's not, because we've got some new capacities from the animators. | |
| The technology has changed, of course, since I started doing the documentary. | |
| Always the challenge, so I'm sorry about that. | |
| It's taking so long, but we're working on it. | |
| Anyway, let's move on. | |
| James standing in for mic today. | |
| Good morning, James. | |
| How are you? | |
| Morning, Steph. | |
| I'm doing very well this morning. | |
| Thank you. | |
| All right. | |
| So, we shall hopefully do well and good this morning. | |
| So, who do we have? | |
| Numero uno, Don Firstes. | |
| Numero uno, Don Firstes, is El Lucas. | |
| Sorry, just Lucas, not El Lucas. | |
| Hello, El Lucas. | |
| Hi. | |
| Hi, good morning. | |
| What's on your mind? | |
| Good morning. | |
| I finally got to talk to you. | |
| Yeah, I'm in Australia, so it's a bit hard for me to keep with the time. | |
| Okay, I had three subjects. | |
| I actually had one, original one, but then I saw a video that you put up a few weeks ago. | |
| By the way, can you hear me? | |
| Yeah, go ahead. | |
| Hello? | |
| Okay, sorry. | |
| So yeah, and I felt compelled to say something about it because I felt like I was being indirectly quoted there. | |
| It was, I don't remember the name of the video, but it was about, you said something about the comments on the Paul Walker case. | |
| Yeah, you don't need to give me all the background, just get straight to the question, please. | |
| Sure. | |
| You said something like, oh, because I said 16 years old was the legal age or something, now it was status or something. | |
| I sort of said that in the comments and the reason why I said it is kind of Sorry to interrupt you. | |
| This is a general comment to everyone who calls in. | |
| Please, please, just get to your question. | |
| The shows are long enough without all of its background. | |
| You don't have to give me the background, you don't have to give me your life story unless I ask for it. | |
| And I'm not criticizing you, I'm just sort of pointing out in general. | |
| If you could please, please just get to the question. | |
| I would hugely appreciate it, as would everybody else who would like to get on as well. | |
| Sure, yeah. | |
| Okay. | |
| In that video, you said that for a 16-year-old girl, to make that kind of judgment would be ridiculous, impossible. | |
| Remember that? | |
| Yes. | |
| And then after that, you said that your own daughter would never... | |
| Make such a call. | |
| Like, it would never do such thing because you have been preparing for that all her life. | |
| If she had to face that sort of thing, she wouldn't do it. | |
| So the thing is, for this situation, you put her in a situation that is an impossible standard. | |
| Do you agree with that? | |
| What is an impossible standard? | |
| Well, if you can... | |
| I have your quote here. | |
| If you cannot... | |
| If you cannot make that kind of judgment when you are 16, how could your daughter? | |
| That's it. | |
| Sorry, if I cannot make that kind of judgment, how can my daughter? | |
| Not you. | |
| If a 16-year-old girl cannot make that kind of judgment, how could your daughter? | |
| That's what I'm asking. | |
| But that's not my question. | |
| It's just because I felt compelled to say that. | |
| Wait, are you kidding me? | |
| We still don't actually have... | |
| Wait, wait. | |
| I've been talking to you for five minutes. | |
| No, no, sorry. | |
| This is one question. | |
| This question is real. | |
| You do have my question. | |
| Sorry. | |
| The thing is, this is not the reason for my call. | |
| I've asked you three times now. | |
| You need to clearly and succinctly ask me a question that I can answer and then stop talking. | |
| Okay. | |
| You said a 16-year-old girl cannot make that kind of judgment. | |
| And then you said your daughter would never make that kind of decision to go with... | |
| Yes, you've told me this three times already. | |
| Okay, sorry. | |
| We're going to have to move on. | |
| I think I get the pattern. | |
| Sorry, James. | |
| I apologize for this, but you're repeating now for the third time exactly the same statement. | |
| I have a question. | |
| You just have to answer it. | |
| You're not asking me a question yet. | |
| Just ask me a question. | |
| You're giving me statements and background now for the third time. | |
| Ask me the question. | |
| I just asked you. | |
| Don't you think that's an impossible standard? | |
| I don't know what you're asking. | |
| What is an impossible standard? | |
| If you said a 16-year-old cannot make that judgment, If the time comes when your daughter has to make that kind of judgment, it will be impossible. | |
| Do you agree? | |
| What will be impossible? | |
| For her to make that kind of judgment, to go with someone like Paul Walker, for example. | |
| You mean if someone like Paul Walker wants to date my daughter when she's 16? | |
| Exactly, yeah. | |
| But she won't want to date him. | |
| Obviously, she'd be interested in him. | |
| I'm sure he'd be attractive, but she won't want to date him. | |
| But why not? | |
| Because she won't speak the language of dysfunction. | |
| Like if some really attractive guy who only speaks Japanese comes up and asks my daughter out, and she doesn't speak Japanese, is she going to end up going out with him? | |
| No, but you said yourself that we cannot expect a 16-year-old to make that kind of judgment. | |
| Well, I mean, I'm talking about the average 16-year-old, right? | |
| I mean, the number of children who are raised, like my daughter is raised, probably one in a million. | |
| Your daughter would not do that. | |
| Your daughter would be able to make that kind of judgment. | |
| Is that right? | |
| Well, I think in consultation, yeah. | |
| I mean, she may be attracted to the guy. | |
| I mean, she'll be a human being. | |
| She'll have hormones. | |
| You know, he'll be an attractive guy. | |
| But she will have been exposed by that point to 16 years of a wise and mature father who is married to a mother who is almost the same age. | |
| And she will find the guy creepy. | |
| I mean, he'll be attracted to him for sure, but she'll find him creepy. | |
| And I won't need to tell her that. | |
| That simply is a matter of exposure. | |
| Alright, I get it. | |
| Every time I interact with my daughter, I'm teaching her a language of interaction, which is functional and mature and helpful and benevolent and wise, at least I hope. | |
| And then if some 32-year-old creep comes along and wants to date her when she's 16, he'll give her the willies. | |
| Alright, okay. | |
| I just saw another question on this subject. | |
| What if she decides to go with him? | |
| Would that be okay with you? | |
| I'm not sure what you mean by okay with me. | |
| I mean, would you feel okay with her decision? | |
| Would you feel alright? | |
| Oh, no. | |
| No, not at all. | |
| I would not want a 32-year-old guy dating my 16-year-old daughter because either he is as immature as a 16-year-old or she's as mature as a 32-year-old. | |
| Alright. | |
| Okay. | |
| Now, if he is interested in someone who's so much younger, the question is why? | |
| I mean, it's almost impossible for there to be any kind of equality in a relationship with such widely divergent life experiences, such widely divergent economic opportunities, and such widely divergent wealth as someone like Paul Walker. | |
| There could be no capacity for equality in a relationship like that. | |
| So my question would be, you know, like, the question I had for bullies when I was younger, which got me punched in the stomach once, I'm so glad I said it, was, why don't you pick on someone your own size? | |
| I was like, well, why don't you date someone your own age? | |
| Does Paul Walker have no access to attractive women approximately his own age? | |
| Of course he does. | |
| I mean, he's Paul Walker. | |
| So why is he constantly sniffing around high schools? | |
| Well, because he's a creep. | |
| Anyway, go ahead. | |
| Okay, that was all I had to say about this. | |
| I just felt compelled to say something because I was in the middle of those comments. | |
| But my original reason to call would be this. | |
| I have this kind of theory and I would like to get your opinion on it. | |
| Is that okay? | |
| It's quick. | |
| It's not going to take you forever. | |
| Again, I have to ask you again. | |
| Don't give me background. | |
| Don't tell me anything. | |
| No background, nothing. | |
| Just ask me the question. | |
| All right. | |
| Do you think the state could work as a stepping stone for a free society? | |
| For a free society, it would grow out of the state instead of battle the state until it dies, if that makes any sense. | |
| Do you mean out of political action? | |
| Well, in a way, yes. | |
| I was just looking into Sweden and how prisons have been closing down there. | |
| Are you aware of that? | |
| I'm not, no. | |
| Well, they've been closing for the past, I don't know, 10 years, prisons there. | |
| And one of the reasons, I think, I mean, there are probably many reasons, but one of the reasons is one thing you keep bringing up is that they've made it illegal there to hit children. | |
| Is that right? | |
| Yes. | |
| So I would say this is sort of one of the consequences of that. | |
| And I think this new generation there, I've read an article on it, and it says they are a little bit more like resistant to powers, you know what I mean? | |
| Like resistant to authority. | |
| Right. | |
| So what I mean is, I think, I don't know if that's true or not, but I think the population is growing out of this state. | |
| Does it make any sense? | |
| So is your question, would it be valuable to advocate for something like a ban on spanking? | |
| Well, I mean, yes, but only because I think that the non-aggression principle is not something natural, it's something that you learn. | |
| You're not born with it, you learn it. | |
| And to learn that you would have to go through some sort of culture, right? | |
| The culture would have to teach you that. | |
| And I think in the world we live now, I don't think this kind of culture would just come out of nowhere. | |
| It would have to probably come from state or maybe some agreement between the society. | |
| Sorry, why do you think that the non-aggression principle is unnatural? | |
| Well, because as most species, we had to fight our way through nature to exist, to survive. | |
| So I think violence is somehow in our nature. | |
| Well, no, no, no. | |
| Come on. | |
| I mean, we adapt to our environment, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| I mean, it's like saying, look, some kid was raised Jewish and therefore Judaism is in our nature. | |
| So when we are in a violent environment, we tend to react. | |
| And scientists can see this happening with epigenetics, right? | |
| With aggression genes being turned on through exposure to violence. | |
| So we adapt to our environment. | |
| If our environment is peaceful, then we are peaceful. | |
| If our environment is aggressive, then we are aggressive. | |
| We are mirrors of our environment. | |
| And I think this is fairly well established in science. | |
| No, that makes sense. | |
| My daughter is not aggressive. | |
| Even remotely a violent person. | |
| I've never seen her be violent. | |
| And so the idea that it's... | |
| And I don't sit there and lecture her every morning about, you know, don't hit, don't push, any of those kinds of things, right? | |
| And if someone is aggressive towards her, like at a playground or something like that, she just comes to me and we deal with it. | |
| So it's not... | |
| She doesn't retaliate. | |
| She doesn't hit back. | |
| Not that she's ever been hit, but, you know, if some kid jumps on her by accident or something like that, she'll come to me and we'll talk about it. | |
| We might talk about it with the kid or his parents or whatever, but... | |
| I don't see that it's not natural. | |
| Go ahead. | |
| Okay, maybe it's not. | |
| Maybe it's just like one of our many mechanisms of defense or adaptation. | |
| But anyway, if that's the case, the virus is still pretty much around all over the place. | |
| So, to get out of that situation, I think we would need some sort of evolution, some sort of development in culture that would repel that, right? | |
| And where would that come from? | |
| I think we have the answer on how to improve things, right? | |
| I mean, I don't think we need to reinvent the wheel as far as that goes. | |
| So how do we improve? | |
| Let's say that the government runs the post office. | |
| How do we improve the post office? | |
| How do we make it more responsive to the customers? | |
| Is this a question for me? | |
| Well, if it's run by the government, is there a way to get it out of the government? | |
| Yeah, you privatize it, right? | |
| In other words, you make the relationship voluntary and not compulsory, right? | |
| Sure. | |
| Now, you don't need to go and pass laws saying be efficient. | |
| You don't need to go and pass laws saying be responsive to your customers. | |
| All you do is you replace the coercion with voluntarism. | |
| You replace that which is not voluntary with that which is voluntary. | |
| And improvements happen if they're on accord, right? | |
| So when they wanted to improve the economy in China or in India, they simply, they didn't pass laws saying you have to be more profitable, you have to be more efficient. | |
| They didn't create the bureaucracy of economic growth. | |
| They simply replaced coercive relationships with voluntary relationships. | |
| When women wanted to improve marriage, they wanted to improve women's experience of marriage, they did not pass laws because there already were laws against spousal abuse issues. | |
| So they didn't go and try and get more laws to make marriage better. | |
| All they did was they went for no-fault divorce, which is a woman can leave a marriage with full legal rights for no specified reasons. | |
| Before, it had to be basically abuse or infidelity were the two major causes, and you kind of had to prove them. | |
| And if you couldn't prove them, then, you know, sorry, you made a vow. | |
| If you enter into a 99-year lease and you want to break that lease, you have to prove wrongdoing on the part of the other person. | |
| You can't just say, well, I did sign up for a 99-year lease or I did sign up for a four-year lease of my car. | |
| Let's say you lease a car for four years and then you say, I don't want to do this anymore. | |
| Well, you have to prove there's something wrong with the car or they lied to you about something. | |
| You have to prove wrongdoing in the formulation or the execution of the contract if you want to just unilaterally break the contract. | |
| And so what women did was they said, okay, well, we just want to be able to unilaterally break our marriage vows. | |
| Now, I mean, this is true for men as well, but there's women who were focusing on getting no-fault divorce. | |
| And so, women understand, and I think we all understand, that you don't need to pass a lot of laws regulating every detail of marriage life. | |
| If you want to improve marriage, you simply make it voluntary. | |
| Now, I'm not saying I agree with the no-fault divorce. | |
| It's just one example. | |
| And after women gained a greater right of divorce, I mean, up until the early 1970s in Canada, you could only get divorced through an act of parliament, because vows were actually taken quite seriously, which I think is an important thing. | |
| It's not something that should be state-enforced. | |
| So when it comes to improving parenting, we simply replace automatic or involuntary relationships with voluntary and chosen relationships, which is why I keep saying to people as adults, they're complaining about having abusive parents, you don't have to see your parents. | |
| Because you simply replace the coercive or the automatic relationships. | |
| That's true for adults, but for children it's not the same. | |
| But you can't do anything. | |
| I mean, look, let's say you pass a law against banking. | |
| Let's say you pass a law against banking. | |
| First of all, it is really tough to enforce. | |
| Yeah, sure. | |
| I mean, really tough to enforce. | |
| Secondly, even if you could enforce it, all that would happen is parents would switch to verbal abuse. | |
| Possibly, yeah. | |
| Well, no, certainly. | |
| Because if you're aggressive towards your children, if you're violent and aggressive towards your children, then you will simply find ways of hurting them that don't leave marks and then just call them liars. | |
| And, you know, you can't, I mean, what are you going to do, drag kids through courtroom processes for that? | |
| Yeah. | |
| Or you just don't give them any toys. | |
| Or you just verbally aggress against them. | |
| And can you pass laws saying, well, parents can't say these and these and these words to their children? | |
| No. | |
| No, but you do help children. | |
| This is what I'm trying to explain. | |
| And by trying to explain, I don't mean I'm right. | |
| I'm not trying to explain to you that I'm right. | |
| I'm just trying to tell you what my perspective is. | |
| Okay. | |
| You do help children. | |
| Okay. | |
| Look, let's say that the post office is told, all the post office employees are told, that in five years they're going to be privatized. | |
| The whole thing is going to be completely privatized. | |
| What do you think they're going to do, the average employee? | |
| They're going to freak out. | |
| Right, but what are they going to do? | |
| They try to work better, I think. | |
| Some of them, at least. | |
| They will improve. | |
| Knowing that there is voluntarism down the road, they will work to improve. | |
| Some of them will get fired, because I've been through that. | |
| Yes, some of them will get fired, for sure. | |
| But it's the best chance for them to improve. | |
| And so, the parents, if the idea of the voluntary family The voluntary family, as it percolates through society, and I'm a very small component of that idea. | |
| There are many, many people talking about it. | |
| Dr. | |
| Phil talks about it in the largest, most popular daytime talk show in the world, is the Dr. | |
| Phil Show, and he's continually saying to people, if your parents are abusive, don't spend time with them as adults. | |
| I don't say that. | |
| I just say you don't have to. | |
| So he's a way bigger advocate of the voluntary family than I am. | |
| And so what this does is for parents who have children, they realize that, let's say the kid is 12. | |
| Well, in six years, the family is going to be privatized, right? | |
| So they're going to improve their parenting. | |
| It is the best way. | |
| To improve parenting is to continually talk about the voluntary family and to practice it. | |
| So this is the best way, in my view. | |
| Again, other people can go and try and get spanking banned, but I believe in consistency of principles. | |
| Go ahead. | |
| Okay, so what I was saying is, okay, it doesn't have to be a law. | |
| It can be just a campaign or it can be an educational thing that goes around schools. | |
| It could be many things. | |
| It doesn't have to be like a law saying, oh, you have to be a good parent. | |
| Because, of course, that would not work at all. | |
| Okay, good. | |
| I think we're in agreement. | |
| Okay. | |
| But the thing is, The same way you don't have to... | |
| What you said now is you privatize the family. | |
| You know that many businesses fail, right? | |
| I mean, it would give the family the chance to fail, I guess. | |
| And that's not necessarily a bad thing. | |
| But what I'm saying is I don't think that sort of culture would come from nothing. | |
| I think... | |
| I don't know, I think the state would somehow have to be a stepping stone there and the population would have to grow out of it. | |
| But it would repel the state. | |
| After that point, it would seem unnecessary, obsolete, and then they would be in a free society or something similar to a free society. | |
| Okay. | |
| Well, I'm sorry. | |
| We've got a lot of callers today, and because she's making statements, I can't really... | |
| Sorry, okay. | |
| Can I just... | |
| You've had three questions. | |
| You've had three questions. | |
| Please. | |
| Okay, but you have to be quick, and you have to... | |
| Just don't make statements like, well, I think that we need that. | |
| It's not a statement. | |
| It's actually... | |
| It's not a statement. | |
| It's something that I need to ask about my wife. | |
| I'm having some problem with her. | |
| Oh, sorry. | |
| I'm afraid we're going to have to reschedule that. | |
| I can't go with three questions and then problems with my wife because that's going to take... | |
| No, it's not a problem. | |
| Just ask a quick advice, if you could give me one. | |
| Okay, quick advice. | |
| Let's go. | |
| Well, okay, she's having some problems of anxiety and we cannot go to a psychiatrist now or any specialist because we are in Australia but she doesn't speak English very well. | |
| Would you have me any advice for that? | |
| Sorry, why can't you go see a, is there nobody, psychologist around who might be able to speak your wife's language? | |
| I don't think so. | |
| Well, have you look? | |
| No, but it's, well, okay, I can look, but, okay, all right. | |
| Yeah, I would say look for a therapist. | |
| And there are some therapists who will offer Skype sessions. | |
| So you're not limited geographically. | |
| So I'm sure that you can find a therapist who will be able to speak your wife's native language. | |
| But I think that would be the most important thing. | |
| You have a world of therapists really to choose from because a lot of them do offer remote sessions where you get eye contact and all that through video cameras, through webcams and that over Skype. | |
| So I would definitely look into somebody who can speak your wife's language for sure. | |
| If one day I have time, I will call again to talk about that. | |
| Alrighty. | |
| Well, I certainly wish you the best, and thank you so much for your call. | |
| Thank you. | |
| Bye. | |
| Bye-bye. | |
| Alright, next up we have Drew. | |
| Hello. | |
| Hello, Drew. | |
| How are you? | |
| Oh, fine. | |
| I thought I'd just go straight to the point. | |
| I thought we could have a debate on evolution. | |
| I believe that... | |
| We're genetically engineered by extraterrestrials, and that evolution from common ancestor didn't happen, and I thought I'd bring up points to support that. | |
| Hang on, hang on, hang on. | |
| Maybe you'd like to ask me what I think of that before you plan? | |
| Okay, sure. | |
| I heard you before, you said you believed in evolution, right? | |
| Alright, so can you tell me what the evidence is for these space aliens? | |
| One argument against it is that it's extremely unlikely. | |
| Do you believe that or can I skip that? | |
| Well, something which is unlikely but which has happened is not irrational, right? | |
| So it's unlikely that any individual person is going to win the lottery, but people win the lottery. | |
| Well, yeah, but still, like, for example, if the pyramids could be explained by aliens, but if it's more, if it can also be explained by ancient people working really hard with lots of slaves, if it's unlikely aliens exist, then the more logical explanation would be that no aliens, because of odds, right? | |
| I don't know about that. | |
| Let me just ask you a question though, if you don't mind, before we get into that. | |
| Okay. | |
| Could you tell me about your relationship with your parents when you were a child? | |
| Kind of. | |
| They were involved, but I'm not emotionally connected to them. | |
| Right. | |
| Can you tell me a little more about that? | |
| I appreciate you. | |
| I mean, I know it's a bit of a left-field question, but I would just like to get some context for how you learn to interact with people. | |
| I'm not criticizing. | |
| Yeah, I'm kind of learning to interact with people kind of mechanically. | |
| I've tried to get a little better about that, like recognizing emotions. | |
| I've moved into college now, so I've lived away from my parents for a couple years, so... | |
| That kind of helped. | |
| Right, and the reason I'm asking that is, have you listened to this show much before? | |
| Yeah, for like four months now. | |
| Okay, great. | |
| Well, I appreciate that. | |
| I hope that you're finding some value in it. | |
| Do you know that it's obviously a pretty nutty topic, which doesn't mean wrong or bad to talk about, but it's a very unusual topic to bring up, talking about space aliens driving evolution? | |
| No, that instead, not evolution, they just recreate newer models of species, so it kind of looks like we evolved. | |
| Right, but you understand that that's quite unusual. | |
| Sorry, that's quite unusual. | |
| Yeah, that is. | |
| And so you know that it is an unusual topic to talk about, right? | |
| Yes. | |
| And so I'm just sort of trying to help you at least understand how it might be easier to talk about things with people. | |
| Okay. | |
| Which is, you bring it up like it's not unusual. | |
| Okay. | |
| And that's hard. | |
| I think that's hard for people to sort of understand. | |
| Right, so if I start talking about anarchy with people, I have to sort of address their existing perceptions of anarchy, or I have to say, yeah, it's a weird topic, it's an unusual topic, or you're going to have some reactions to the topic of anarchy that I understand, or I'm bringing up something that is going to be a challenge, and so on, right? | |
| I don't just say, well, we should abolish the state and everything would be great, right? | |
| That would be startling to people, right? | |
| Yeah, but if you get exposed to a lot of anarchy arguments and you listen to it regularly, you start to normalize it, so... | |
| Well, yes, but this is what I'm telling you, is that if you want to talk to other people... | |
| So I have to talk like I'm crazy? | |
| No, you have to... | |
| You don't have to do anything. | |
| I'm just trying to give you some advice on how to communicate. | |
| You have to understand... | |
| Hang on. | |
| I'm trying to talk here. | |
| You have to bring things up like... | |
| Okay, Steph, you accept evolution. | |
| I know that there's some strong arguments for evolution, some strong evidence, but I'm going to bring up a topic that is... | |
| It's going to be quite startling and unusual for you. | |
| But I promise you, I've looked into it. | |
| I've got good sources. | |
| I've got good research. | |
| But just saying, I want to argue that space aliens... | |
| Guided our development and it only looks like evolution and then just start without getting my response is not a very effective way to communicate. | |
| I'm just telling you. | |
| Okay. | |
| Right? | |
| Because you need to sort of ask me, you know, introduce the topic to me with a knowledge that it is an unusual topic. | |
| Right? | |
| Okay. | |
| And so this is why I'm asking you when you were a kid, you said that you weren't particularly emotionally close to your parents. | |
| Is that right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| Okay, can you tell me a little more about that? | |
| How did that show up? | |
| Well, it kind of did stuff with me. | |
| When I was really little, I really loved to play board games and card games. | |
| So we'd do that together, but I don't know if I was too emotional with them or kind of felt distant, especially getting older. | |
| I couldn't really bond with them. | |
| And do you remember how you were disciplined as a child? | |
| Mostly really little timeouts and then older, like taking video games away. | |
| Alright, so no spanking or anything like that? | |
| Well, like one memory a long time ago of being spanked, but I think that was it. | |
| I asked them if I was spanked when I was really little and they said no, so... | |
| But you remember one time? | |
| Uh, barely, yes. | |
| But, like, he apologized after saying he overreacted. | |
| So when they said that you weren't spanked, either they don't remember something that you think they would remember, or they were lying. | |
| Well, I talked to them, like, maybe they just didn't think it was that big of a deal that one time... | |
| No, no, no, that's a binary question. | |
| Was I spanked when I was a child? | |
| Yes, one time is the answer. | |
| Well, I was asking both my parents. | |
| My mom said no, I wasn't spanked, but I remembered it was by my dad and he didn't answer, so he might have dodged it not wanting to answer. | |
| Right. | |
| And do you remember your parents asking you about your feelings? | |
| I can't really think of time when that, no. | |
| Do you ever remember as a child being upset and your parents noticing and doing something about it without you telling them? | |
| Maybe when I was really little, I think so. | |
| Like, if I'm like crying, they would do something. | |
| I agree with that, but what I'm saying is that when it's not obvious, in other words, you're not crying, you're just sad, did they ever notice it and do something about it without you telling them I'm sad? | |
| If it's not obvious, no. | |
| Right. | |
| Now, do you think that's a possible thing to do, or do you think that's not a possible thing to do? | |
| Um... | |
| Depends on how well I guess if you're really interactive you could ask every so often how you're doing anything bother you and if they made it feel made me feel like I could trust them with things then I would say something so I guess it would be possible well and I appreciate you saying so you could continue to ask but what I'm asking is do you think it's possible to know that someone is sad when they're not crying without asking them It's | |
| with a lot of practice or if you're trained to recognize it, yes. | |
| Right. | |
| Right. | |
| So it is. | |
| Now, it doesn't actually need really a lot of practice. | |
| It needs that mirroring when you're an infant and then you kind of have it for life, sometimes whether you like it or not. | |
| Yeah. | |
| So, and do you know why I'm... | |
| You're obviously a smart fellow. | |
| Do you know why I'm asking you all of this weird, annoying, perhaps tangential stuff? | |
| To know where I'm coming from? | |
| Well, yeah, that's kind of generic, but why in particular am I asking you about this stuff? | |
| The topic I brought up seemed abnormal, and you wanted to know if there was an explanation for that in my childhood? | |
| Yeah, that's fairly abstract. | |
| I can be more specific, and then maybe it'll make some more sense. | |
| Okay. | |
| So you began your topic without empathy for how me or the Free Domain Radio listeners now and forever would absorb the topic. | |
| Okay. | |
| I mean, it's a pretty wild claim, because you're claiming knowledge of the existence of aliens, which is a pretty wild claim. | |
| I think we would have heard about that. | |
| It doesn't mean it's impossible, but it's a pretty wild claim, and you didn't seem to know that it was coming across as a really wild claim. | |
| So what I'm asking is if your parents had the capacity to understand how you felt. | |
| In other words, did they show empathy towards you when it wasn't obvious? | |
| You know, I mean, you go to a pure psychopath and you show a picture of a crying person and you say, is that person sad, right? | |
| And they'll say, well, yeah, because, you know, that's the sign, right? | |
| But if the person is just looking a little muted, then you can say, well, yes, I think, you know, a sensitive person would say, well, yes, I think that person is sad. | |
| And my daughter looks at a picture where somebody is just looking a tiny bit sad, and she says, I think that person is sad. | |
| And we've practiced this, you know, like, show me your sad face, show me your happy face, show me your whatever face, right? | |
| And she's very good at figuring out how people feel without asking them, just by looking at facial expressions. | |
| You know, 90% of communication is nonverbal, which is why this show can often be a challenge, right? | |
| But she's good at pointing it out and I can sometimes notice when she's upset, when she's not saying anything or if she just seems a bit muted. | |
| I mean, I'll just ask her if you do feel upset or whatever, right? | |
| And sometimes I'll ask her if she feels upset and only then does she look up and she then feels her sadness and then we talk about it. | |
| So, all of this stuff is very possible to be very sensitive to how you appear to other people. | |
| And I think the more unusual a set of ideas you have to propose, the more sensitive you need to be to how other people will perceive you. | |
| And my guess is that this topic probably alienates you from some of the people around you. | |
| Which, again, is not an argument for the truth or falsehood of the topic, but does that happen? | |
| Um, I usually don't bring it up. | |
| I think I've only told a few people this ever. | |
| And how's that gone? | |
| Um, they don't believe me. | |
| They don't reject me or anything. | |
| Yeah, but does that mean, do you feel satisfied that the topic is explored? | |
| Do they, right, all that kind of stuff? | |
| Not deeply explored, but just, I got it out there. | |
| And does it return as a topic of conversation or not? | |
| Well, one of it was with the person who went to my college, but then dropped out, so I don't see him anymore. | |
| And the other two I told my family, who is religious, so that kind of separates us. | |
| Are you an atheist or agnostic? | |
| Yeah, technically atheist. | |
| I prefer non-religious. | |
| Because atheism is often associated with evolution, so I prefer non-religious, but both are technically correct. | |
| Right, okay. | |
| And do they know about your irreligiosity? | |
| Yes. | |
| And what do they talk about? | |
| Do they ask you about it, or what are their thoughts about it? | |
| They don't really talk about it. | |
| I told them, like, okay, you can believe what you want, and then that really brought up. | |
| Right, and when you did talk about it with them, what was their response? | |
| Like surprised. | |
| Go on. | |
| Um... | |
| I guess that's... | |
| They weren't really disappointed. | |
| Like my mom said, she'd pray for me. | |
| That's about it. | |
| Wow. | |
| I mean, that's... | |
| So you really didn't talk that much about this very important topic, right? | |
| Right. | |
| And how do you... | |
| What do you think about that? | |
| Um... | |
| I don't know. | |
| Well, no. | |
| See, I asked you a feeling topic, and you replied with a knowledge topic, right? | |
| I said, how do you feel? | |
| And you said, I don't know. | |
| Okay, how do I feel? | |
| Well, that I can't really connect with them, because if I can't talk to them something this serious, then how can I have an emotional connection with them? | |
| Yeah, I mean, it's a big topic, right? | |
| I mean, I assume you were raised religious, you went to church and all that, and Sunday school maybe, and all that, and you don't believe. | |
| That's a big deal, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| And so, is there anything of importance that you do talk about with your parents? | |
| How I'm doing in school, that's... | |
| Yeah, not important. | |
| Go on. | |
| Oh, if that's not important, then no, we don't talk about anything important. | |
| Right. | |
| Right. | |
| And how do you feel about that? | |
| Kind of, maybe kind of empty-ish, like if I can't, a lot of things I think is important, they don't, so we can't really talk about anything serious. | |
| Just out of curiosity, why do you think you can't talk about anything serious? | |
| What problems would it cause or what negative things would result? | |
| I don't know. | |
| Once I tried to talk politics and I tried to bring up a libertarian issue, I first went back and forth a little, but then once I made a good point, they kind of retreated and didn't want to have the discussion. | |
| And so you brought up a good libertarian point. | |
| Sorry, go ahead. | |
| I'm sorry, what did you say? | |
| No, go ahead. | |
| They're fine talking about issues like this, but once I start making good points and I think they might don't want to talk about it because they're afraid they might realize they're wrong, so they just don't talk about it. | |
| That's what I think. | |
| It's like my mom, we did talk a couple of religious dates, but I don't think she would want to talk about it if she's afraid she might be wrong kind of thing. | |
| Right. | |
| Right. | |
| And so it's, you know, parental withdrawal, in my opinion, is always kind of punitive. | |
| Because we're so dependent on our parents for growing up that when they withdraw from us or refuse to participate with us, they're training us in a pretty powerful way to not pursue those particular topics, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| And that's really rough on a kid, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| Yes. | |
| I mean, you obviously, I mean, you care about where we came from. | |
| You care about the universe and life in the universe and the origins of species. | |
| And I mean, you care about libertarian issues. | |
| You thought about religion and atheism. | |
| I mean, you are a deep guy in your thoughts, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| And when you bring that depth to people, they recoil in a way, right? | |
| With your parents. | |
| Yeah. | |
| They shut the conversation down, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| And I imagine that you don't feel very comfortable pursuing that and saying, wait a minute, why are you shutting the conversation down? | |
| This is important to me. | |
| That's kind of rude. | |
| Yeah. | |
| You sound sad to me. | |
| Again, I can't see your face, but... | |
| Yeah, a little bit. | |
| Thinking about that, that is kind of hard. | |
| And what do you think would happen if you were to say, listen, I mean, you know, I don't just want to talk about nothing. | |
| You know, we've got a short life and... | |
| I think they'd say, I don't want to talk about this or something. | |
| Right, but why? | |
| Okay, so you be your parents or whoever is... | |
| Let me just do a quick roleplay here just so I can sort of understand the map of this resistance. | |
| So they say, I don't want to talk about it, and you say, well, I do, and what would they say? | |
| I don't know what they would say. | |
| Would they accuse you of being rude? | |
| Would they say, no, we've already said we don't want to talk about it. | |
| The second one, they already said they don't want to talk about it, that one. | |
| Or most likely something along those lines. | |
| And then you would try to sort of say, well, why don't you want to talk about it? | |
| Or can we talk about why you don't want to talk about it? | |
| And they would say no to that as well? | |
| Yeah. | |
| And then what I would say... | |
| I would say, let me ask you this. | |
| Sorry, just outside of the roleplay. | |
| When you were a kid, did you want to go to church? | |
| So little, I don't usually know, but I kind of enjoyed Sunday school because they kind of ask you about your opinion, which is something that doesn't usually happen. | |
| Right. | |
| Yeah, okay. | |
| But church, not so much, right? | |
| And did you ever express to your parents that you didn't want to go to church? | |
| By the time I was in high school, yes, but they made me go anyways. | |
| Right. | |
| Yeah, because you said you were so little and now you're talking about still going to church in high school, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| To the day I left for college, still making me go to church. | |
| And why... | |
| Hang on a sec. | |
| Let me just sort of make sure I get my question phrased correctly. | |
| I always want to make sure I'm asking questions without trying to have the, quote, preferred answer embedded, so I want to make sure I ask the question the right way. | |
| Because I genuinely want information, not confirmation, right? | |
| Right. | |
| And so you would tell your parents that you didn't want to go to church, and what would they say? | |
| You have to go? | |
| Pretty much. | |
| Or at first they try and manipulate me into going, and then if that doesn't work, then they're like, yes, you have to go. | |
| Ah, okay. | |
| So the universal statement of that is, other people must do what you want. | |
| Well, I think they're thinking, well, I'm the parent, so I make the rules kind of thing. | |
| Well, a parent is not a moral category, right? | |
| Right. | |
| I mean, you don't get to strangle some guy and then say, well, I'm a parent, and they say, well, okay, then you can go free because you're in a separate moral category, right? | |
| Right, but they're religious, so honor your mother and your father. | |
| They can believe that with their religion. | |
| Right, but philosophically speaking... | |
| Right. | |
| Right? | |
| Well, and also, of course, I mean, that's just one... | |
| I assume that they're Christians, not Jews, right? | |
| Right. | |
| Okay, so they're down with the New Testament, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| And so Jesus said he has come to bring a sword to the world. | |
| He has come to set sons against their fathers and children against their parents and so on, right? | |
| So he has come to create intergenerational warfare because, of course, he was trying to convert Jewish kids into Christianity, which meant that they had to not honor their mother and their father but go for what Jesus claimed was the truth and not for tradition, right? | |
| So if you're a Christian, you don't get to say, honor thy mother and thy father. | |
| The entire goddamn foundation of Christianity is disrespecting the multi-thousand beliefs of Jewish parents, right? | |
| In that way, yes. | |
| Wait, in what way? | |
| Okay, yes, yes. | |
| In that way, like, if you go to the other angle, you see the ass of the elephant, right? | |
| That is the truth. | |
| Christianity arose... | |
| Out of discarding the virtue and value of parents. | |
| It is an anti-parent religion, and it's explicitly an anti-parent religion. | |
| Jesus explicitly says that he's come to set children against their parents. | |
| Yeah, I guess I forgot about that part. | |
| Yeah, a lot of people do, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| Well, of course, now Christianity has become conservative rather than revolutionary, so now it praises the past, but of course the foundation of Christianity is overturning the absolute morality of parents completely. | |
| And so for Christianity, if you follow Judaism, you go to hell. | |
| So the parents who don't teach their children about Jesus are condemning them to hell. | |
| So it's not just disregard your parents. | |
| It is your parents are leading you to everlasting torment and hellfire, and your parents are in league with the devil, right? | |
| Because they're not accepting Jesus, and anybody who doesn't accept Jesus goes to hell. | |
| So Christianity is founded on your parents are evil. | |
| This is what's so funny when... | |
| Christian parents get upset with me. | |
| It's like, well, I'm sorry that I listened to your God and you didn't, but this is the reality of the foundation of the religion. | |
| Your parents are evil. | |
| Break with them, fight them, avoid them, condemn them and their multi-thousand year tradition of Judaism and follow this new guy with the cool sandals, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| It's funny to me when I say, question your parents, and the Christians get all butthurt about it. | |
| It's like, but! | |
| This is the whole point of your religion. | |
| This is why you have a religion. | |
| This is why you're Christians. | |
| Oh no, now we can't do it anymore because now we've become the tradition. | |
| So now tradition should not be questioned. | |
| Then why aren't you Jews? | |
| Well, because we had someone overturn tradition and call parents evil. | |
| I don't call parents evil, I just say it's voluntary. | |
| That's evil anyway! | |
| Oh my god. | |
| I mean, oh my god. | |
| I mean, it is predictable. | |
| I mean, because everybody just uses standards to pursue immediate self-interest and pretend that it's... | |
| I mean, I get it, but it's still... | |
| At the root of it, it's completely mental. | |
| Anytime you try to bring any logical consistency to this stuff... | |
| So the rule is other people must do what you want. | |
| Parents cannot be claimed as a moral category by Christianity because Christianity only exists as a religion by calling parents evil. | |
| And Christ very explicitly made that point. | |
| It's not being buried or lost. | |
| I have come to set children against their parents. | |
| I have come to bring a sword to the world. | |
| He was a fighter. | |
| He was a revolutionary. | |
| Much more fundamental than anything I ever talk about because the stakes for anything I talk about are not heaven and hell other than your life. | |
| So if your parents say, well, I don't want to talk about it, then you can just say, well, the rule is that other people have to do what you want. | |
| This is why you made me go to church. | |
| So now you have to talk about something I want to talk about. | |
| Yeah, I don't think that would work. | |
| Because even when I point out things in the Bible, people in general, they usually say, oh, you took that out of context or something. | |
| Oh, yes, the magical phrase, out of context. | |
| Right. | |
| Because the Bible is all full of context. | |
| Absolutely. | |
| Yeah, no, I've heard somebody from Christian years ago saying to me, Well, if you take things out of context in the Bible, then it's an atheist work. | |
| Because you can say, well, the Bible says there is no God. | |
| But if you omit the beginning of the sentence, the fool in his heart has said there is no God, right? | |
| Then whatever, right? | |
| And it's just like, oh my, oh man, really? | |
| Really? | |
| Well, you know, if you reverse all the moral statements of the Communist Manifesto, it becomes the Capitalist Manifesto! | |
| Well, yeah, you can play word games with anything! | |
| I mean, if you replace I love you, if you just replace the four-letter word love with hate, then you get the opposite. | |
| And therefore, it's a bad marriage. | |
| And it's like, what? | |
| Is this what you people do? | |
| Just sit around and play word games? | |
| I mean, there's no context in the Bible whatsoever, because it is work that, like a fly's eye, is developed to be impressively multifaceted and appeal to the widest possible section of the population, knowing the diversity of human thought. | |
| So, yeah. | |
| So they would quote Bible, and they would simply refuse to talk about anything of substance or depth, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| Okay, so this is... | |
| Let me ask you this. | |
| Is this a more important and enjoyable and useful conversation than aliens and evolution? | |
| It's like comparing apples to oranges. | |
| They're just good in their own way. | |
| Okay. | |
| Well, let me make it useful for you then, hopefully. | |
| Make it more useful. | |
| You do not speak depth well. | |
| Because you don't have much experience speaking depth, right? | |
| I don't have much experience speaking Japanese. | |
| I don't speak Japanese well, right? | |
| Right. | |
| And the reason I'm saying this is you have something important that you want to communicate. | |
| Yes. | |
| And it's a very deep topic. | |
| The origin of the species is a very deep topic. | |
| Whether other intelligent life forms exist in the universe, which of course they do. | |
| I mean, statistically it would be impossible that they didn't, right? | |
| I mean, as close to impossible as you can get, blah-de-blah-de-blah, right? | |
| And this impacts upon biology through questions of evolution. | |
| This impacts upon sense of identity. | |
| This certainly impacts upon religion. | |
| And this impacts upon, you know, a pretty fundamental question. | |
| I'll be alone in the universe. | |
| It's a fantastic question. | |
| I... I don't think the aliens will come. | |
| As genetic tinkerers, I think the aliens will come with a gigantic maul because they have to be traders. | |
| They have to have free markets. | |
| Otherwise, they'll never develop the technology necessary for space travel. | |
| It's always the military that comes. | |
| The military, I mean, they can't even buy a hammer for less than $500. | |
| The idea that they're going to, of their own accord, without the free market, build spaceships. | |
| The only way that you're going to... | |
| It's trade. | |
| They're going to come with them all and they're going to want whatever we've got. | |
| Not our baby's brains or anything. | |
| We're not traitors. | |
| Because it's traitors who get things done. | |
| It's traitors who build things that last. | |
| It's traitors who innovate. | |
| It's traitors who move the whole goddamn species forward. | |
| All these resentful trolls sitting on our fucking backs complaining about the free market while gobbling up the cell phones and internet and porn produced by the free market. | |
| It's just horrible. | |
| Anyway. | |
| So you do not speak depth very well, and I say this without a shred of criticism or negative intent. | |
| I say this out of affection and out of a desire to help you get what you want. | |
| You don't have experience talking about deep topics. | |
| Because deep topics were avoided and forbidden in your household. | |
| Does that make sense? | |
| Yeah. | |
| And it's not a deficiency on your part, it's a tragedy on your parents' part. | |
| I mean, it is wretched for parents to not talk about deep topics with their children, to not teach them the language of... | |
| Intimacy is depth. | |
| Look, this is why I said talking about how well you do in school doesn't count. | |
| You can talk about how well you do in school with your teacher, with a guy on the bus, a guy on the plane, with your hand puppets, and it's fine. | |
| It's not like it's unimportant information. | |
| My wife and I will sometimes discuss the weather. | |
| Like, doesn't it feel like the whole world is in a deep freeze and I'd sure like to get out of the prettiest space station in the known universe known as my house, which I cannot leave because it's minus 25 outside. | |
| But we will talk about very deep topics and very personal topics because having the range is good. | |
| It's positive. | |
| So you don't speak depth. | |
| Right? | |
| Right. | |
| But you want to. | |
| So you need to recognize that you don't speak depth. | |
| And learn how to speak depth so that you can effectively communicate the important things that you want to communicate. | |
| I have the podcast or the show or the conversation with the deepest topics. | |
| And it's very successful. | |
| And so I hope that you will accept my experience in this. | |
| In that I grew up in a household, you could kind of talk about deep topics, but it was very conformist, though. | |
| In other words, my mother would talk about deep topics, but if I disagreed with her, she would explode in rage. | |
| So it was deep but terrifying. | |
| It was lost in the minds of Moria without a light. | |
| Okay, we're deep. | |
| I'm scared. | |
| So that was sort of my experience. | |
| Exposure to depth with accompanying side order of terror. | |
| So, if you have not had experience growing up talking about things that are deep, things that are important, things that are foundational to knowledge and personality, then you just don't have a lot of experience. | |
| Which is why I was startled, and everyone in the chat room was startled, when you brought up... | |
| This topic as if it was a perfectly natural engine just launched into it without getting any feedback, right? | |
| You don't lack intelligence. | |
| You don't lack capacity. | |
| It's just like if I don't know When you go to Japan, there are all these formalities, right? | |
| Like you have to do things a certain way. | |
| You have to use certain words. | |
| There are particular rituals of approaching people of higher status or whatever, right? | |
| I don't know those things. | |
| Like I would just barge in, scratch my groin, sit down, put my feet up, and start chatting. | |
| And they'd be like, what crazy big-nosed foreign person is this who doesn't know anything about anything? | |
| And they would immediately be off-put, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| And because I don't know those particular rituals, right? | |
| And so if I wanted to be effective in communicating in the Japanese community, what would I need to do? | |
| Learn Japanese and their community and their norms. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Now, if you want to talk about depth in society, listen, you are not alone in this at all, my friend. | |
| You are truly not alone in this. | |
| This problem... | |
| Of depth avoidance. | |
| You know, there's a reason Jesus walked on water and didn't go deep, right? | |
| It is impossible to maintain fantasy in the face of true emotional intimacy. | |
| Right? | |
| This is why fantasy, as I've always argued, alienates, disconnects, and isolates people. | |
| Right? | |
| Cults isolate people. | |
| Fantasy isolates people. | |
| Fantasy is a cult. | |
| Whether that fantasy is nationalism or racism or religiosity, it isolates people because there's so much you can't talk about. | |
| Once you make an ideal the impossible, intimacy becomes impossible. | |
| And the whole world recoils from depth because in depth is common humanity. | |
| In depth, we are all one. | |
| We all shit, we all fart, we all fuck, we all die. | |
| We all think, we all fear, we all love, we all hate. | |
| In depth, there is no hierarchy. | |
| In intimacy, in connection, there is no hierarchy. | |
| And so, all hierarchies must alienate people from connecting with each other, from speaking openly and honestly about thoughts and feelings. | |
| Right? | |
| And so, to connect is to dissolve the imaginary pyramids of artificial privilege. | |
| And your goal... | |
| I believe is to connect. | |
| The important thing in what I do is not even so much the content, it's the form that matters. | |
| People can disagree with me all they want, but for God's sake, talk to each other about childhoods. | |
| Talk to each other about deep thoughts, feelings, disappointments, alienations, connections, frustrations, hopes, dreams, fears. | |
| Talk to each other. | |
| Talk to each other. | |
| Connect with each other. | |
| There's nothing wrong with small talk. | |
| Nothing wrong with it at all. | |
| Small talk does not overturn the conversation any more than froth on the top of a wave overturns an ocean liner. | |
| But connect in a deep way and hierarchies dissolve in connection. | |
| I mean, I want people to talk deeply and thoughtfully about experiences and ideas and hopes and dreams, because through that process, the iron grip of the cult of fantasy, of delusion, of artificiality, of indoctrination, of propaganda, dissolves in connection. | |
| So, I really want you to have that connection with people, I really want you to have that connection with people. | |
| But the first thing in achieving mastery is recognizing deficiency. | |
| Humility is the foundation of excellence. | |
| And I would argue... | |
| I can't tell you anything definitively about yourself. | |
| I hope you understand that. | |
| I'm simply telling you my opinion. | |
| So if it's not true, discard it completely. | |
| But I can't imagine, given your history, how you have... | |
| The capacity to connect with people at a deep level, not only because your own personal experience is anti-depth, not just non-depth, it's anti-depth. | |
| Children want to talk about important things, right? | |
| Children want to know why is there war. | |
| Children want to know. | |
| Where did the world come from? | |
| Children want to know. | |
| Why are parents in charge? | |
| Children want to know, why do I have to go to school? | |
| Children want to know, why do I have to go to church? | |
| Right? | |
| Children want to know all these deep things. | |
| I mean, this wasn't like you turned 18 and suddenly began to wonder where you came from. | |
| You want to know! | |
| So let me tell you something. | |
| This is the last thing I will talk about and then I will get your feedback, but I really want to tell you something. | |
| Dreams occur in waking life. | |
| Ooh! | |
| Let me make sure that that statement comes across clearly. | |
| The things that we're passionate about can be read in psychological terms in the same way that our dreams can, as expressions of early childhood experiences, right? | |
| Sorry, I just saw this in the chatroom. | |
| Steph goes balls deep. | |
| That is an impressive way of putting it. | |
| So, you talked... | |
| I always try to listen to what people are saying at every level. | |
| Now, when you're saying to me, space aliens were responsible for our development... | |
| I look at that, first and foremost, because of your youth and because of your lack of self-knowledge in this particular area, which I completely understand and sympathize with, I first hear that as like I would hear a dream. | |
| Like if you called me up and said, Steph, I had a dream about space aliens developing mankind, then what I would say is, how is your relationship with your parents? | |
| Look, space aliens are very often unconsciously a stand-in for parents. | |
| Why? | |
| Because they have superior technology, they have superior abilities, they're often vastly above us in a hierarchy of some kind. | |
| As, of course, gods are as well. | |
| That's so obvious, right? | |
| God the Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost. | |
| It's all family stuff, right? | |
| So when you say space aliens are responsible for human development, What I hear is, I could not talk to my parents, right? | |
| Because space aliens are much more powerful than us. | |
| They guide our development in the same way that parents guide our development individually. | |
| In your approach, space aliens guide our development as a species. | |
| We can't talk to them because they're space aliens, right? | |
| They don't talk to us. | |
| They have trouble empathizing with us because they are a different species. | |
| They are manipulating and controlling us and you said that your parents stop manipulating and then end up with a simple statement of banning. | |
| So they manipulate us in the same way that our genetics were manipulated by space aliens and we have no particular contact with them because they're space aliens. | |
| They lack the ability to connect with the human because they're not human. | |
| Now, this has no bearing on the truth or false statement. | |
| Of your proposition. | |
| But I do find it interesting that what drives you intellectually also seems to me in full accord with your isolated and unempathetic emotional history with your parents. | |
| And if your parents were called to you as a baby... | |
| And you talk about space aliens manipulating human beings in a kind of cold way, right? | |
| Manipulating human beings. | |
| And prior to our memory as a species, it could be that you're actually getting an unconscious echo of your parents' treatment of you when you were an infant. | |
| And this is the kind of depth that I would suggest that you explore within yourself before you begin bringing Deep topics to other people. | |
| You have to make sure that the deep topics are not deep because of your own personal trauma, because of your own personal history. | |
| Because if you have not processed something emotionally in your history, and you say you can't feel it or connect with it, I'm going to ask you about that. | |
| If you have not processed something emotionally in your history, you will recreate your trauma in other people. | |
| And when you first began talking with me, and you can listen to this back in the show, when you first began talking with me, I experienced intrusiveness, a lack of empathy, and I felt invisible in the conversation because my natural responses were neither anticipated nor asked about. | |
| You just went on with your own preference without any empathy, and I think that's your parents'. | |
| So my concern is that you're recreating your own childhood experience with these ideas with other people, and that's not going to be good for you or for other people or for the ideas that you care about. | |
| Does that make any sense at all? | |
| Yeah, it makes some sense. | |
| All right. | |
| So, yeah, I mean, if you're in school, you can talk to a therapist about these issues, you can journal, you can... | |
| But I would dig deep into your own personal history and just make sure that you're able to communicate from a clear and uncluttered and empathetic place. | |
| But I don't think you can achieve anything good in the world without first developing your own empathy. | |
| And given your upbringing, which I think is tragically lacking in empathy, in fact, it's anti-empathetic, In that when you bring up topics that are important to you, it's not indifference, but rejection. | |
| We won't talk about this, right? | |
| And kind of an authoritative bullying of that. | |
| So that would be my suggestion, if that makes any sense. | |
| Okay. | |
| I think the empathetic thing, I've gotten better for small things, like recognizing people's emotions, like everyday scenarios, just haven't had experience on topics like this. | |
| Right. | |
| And I want you to be able to achieve your goal of communicating deep things to people. | |
| So I would definitely recommend this as a pursuit. | |
| Before you can change anybody's minds, you first have to connect with them, in my opinion and experience. | |
| Okay, so then I guess you want to postpone... | |
| Just debate to another day. | |
| I'm happy to talk about it, but I would do a bit of self-work first, in my opinion, and then I would be happy to talk about it, but I don't want to participate in anything which may be, maybe, a recreation of early experiences of alienation. | |
| So, yeah, do a little bit of work on that. | |
| Please, I mean, honestly, it's an interesting topic, and I'd like to know more about it. | |
| Okay, so I'm sorry. | |
| I know it went on a bit of an odd tangent, perhaps, but I hope that was helpful, and if we could move on to the next caller, I would really appreciate it. | |
| Thank you so much for allowing me to hijack your conversation and take it in a different direction. | |
| I really appreciate that. | |
| I know that that was perhaps a little odd, but I really, really appreciate your trust in that. | |
| Okay, bye. | |
| Bye-bye. | |
| All right, next up today we have Jonathan. | |
| Jonathan, you're up. | |
| Good morning, Stefan. | |
| Are you there? | |
| Good morning. | |
| How are you doing? | |
| Good. | |
| My name is Jonathan. | |
| I would like to do a brief – my argument is about – excuse me. | |
| I advocate a small amount of sociopathy and corruption as an inevitable and necessary construct on a small scale and therefore a good thing. | |
| And I have a brief statement to back up that claim. | |
| So evil is good? | |
| Not evil, but I view corruption as inevitable, as part of our biological function. | |
| I mean, look... | |
| Evil is good is not, I mean, not necessarily wrong. | |
| I mean, polio viruses are bad, except in small doses, which give you immunity to the polio through vaccinations, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| So polio can be very good in small doses. | |
| So is this your sort of argument? | |
| Well, also that parasite, that parasitism in biology... | |
| It's a one-way street, but at the same time, parasites are a way of showing the viability of the host, the health of the host, and that when a host is about to die, I think parasites naturally reproduce and kind of overtake the host in the natural reproductive cycle in order to spread itself to another host that perhaps will consume it. | |
| And I think that this parasitism is also... | |
| You know, comes into being in terms of socio-economics, and that corruption on a small scale is always there, and in a viable host it's kept in check, but as the host dies, in this case you could argue for the United States government, the corrupt entities that have the most access to the most resources grow and feed larger as they sense the natural death of the viability of that host. | |
| Alright. | |
| Why is this topic important to you? | |
| I'm not saying it shouldn't be. | |
| I just want to know why it's important to you. | |
| Because... | |
| You could have talked about anything, right? | |
| And this may be a perfectly great topic. | |
| I'm not criticizing the topic at all. | |
| I just want to know why it's important to you. | |
| Well, it's important to me at this moment. | |
| I don't know. | |
| I read Zero Hedge every morning. | |
| I try to keep on to the financial news and I try to make sense of the world. | |
| And I always hear people who try to talk about utopianism and the free market, which I do agree. | |
| But I think they have a myopic vision in that they always think, well, if everyone played by the rules, everything would be great. | |
| But I think it's inevitable that no one – that everyone will never play by the rules. | |
| Well, the more people who play by the rules, the more valuable it becomes to break the rules, right? | |
| So if you're the only thief in the world, because everybody else respects property rights, you have a completely easy time being a thief. | |
| And there are no thieves, right? | |
| And let's say you could magically eliminate all corruption from a system. | |
| I think that would inevitably lead to a weak kind of system. | |
| That thievery and corruption in the long run strengthens the system because it creates feedback loops that we as humans develop security from. | |
| Security to counteract the corruption. | |
| It might take years, it could take centuries, but I think inevitably society does improve from this corruption. | |
| Oh, yeah. | |
| I mean, with the caveat that there's no such thing as society, right? | |
| Individuals suffer enormously from it, but you could say society as a whole, right? | |
| Yes. | |
| Oh, yeah. | |
| Look, I'm completely aware, and it's actually a core part of my documentary. | |
| I'm completely aware, and have talked about it extensively, that when you make the world more virtuous, you increase the rewards for evildoers in general, right? | |
| So, virtue is a stimulus to vice, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| The more people who respect property rights, the easier it is to be a thief. | |
| Again, if you're the only thief in the world, nobody's going to lock their stuff up, and they're going to just assume they lost it, you know, if something goes missing. | |
| Yeah, yeah. | |
| It's like that movie, The Invention of Lying, right? | |
| Exactly. | |
| Which starts off strong and I think ends pretty weakly, but... | |
| So, yeah, when I talk about being virtuous, I'm fully aware that it's like taking cow shit and smearing it on a field for evil, right? | |
| Virtue is the manure for evil weeds. | |
| Which is why I also talk about identification of evil and self-protection, right? | |
| And also why UPB is so essential to the spread of virtue in the world. | |
| UPB? I mean, there's no thief equivalent to the government, and the government claims that it does what it does out of virtue and practicality. | |
| And so, if you don't give good people the intellectual ammunition and the emotional skills to detect and defang evil, then yes, you are rubbing children with marinade and throwing them into a lion's den when the lions are hungry and dressing them up as Siegfried or Roy or whoever it was that was bitten by the lion. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Yeah, I'm fully aware that telling people to be good is a great strategy of evildoers, right? | |
| A lot of evil people in the world generally – I mean, the smartest evil people in the world encourage people to be good. | |
| Yeah, I mean – Because it reduces competition. | |
| Yeah, it reduces competition for the evil they want to do, right? | |
| Exactly. | |
| One of the greatest adaptations of humans is hypocrisy. | |
| It's something animals aren't capable of. | |
| So, yeah. | |
| Oh, yeah. | |
| Especially moral hypocrisy. | |
| Moral hypocrisy, you know, stealing is wrong. | |
| So I'm going to steal off a parent's hitting is wrong, but I'm going to hit. | |
| I mean, this hypocrisy is the most powerful tool that evil has. | |
| And then any time you point that out, people just say, well, that's an ad hominem, man. | |
| That's a two-cork, man. | |
| Well, of course, they usually don't speak lit in that if they're using the word man. | |
| But people would just say, well, that's an ad hominem. | |
| And an ad hominem is an argument that is invented by evildoers so that their own personal hypocrisy is considered irrelevant to the discussion. | |
| But I'm just working on a short philosophical paper Which is going to hopefully destroy that fallacy that the criticism of an individual's hypocrisy does give us the right to discard his moral theories. | |
| Not just practically, but rationally as well. | |
| So I'm sort of working on that. | |
| But yeah, you tell people to be good without giving them the tools to disarm the moral arguments of evil. | |
| I mean, you're just setting them up for further predation. | |
| Let me tie your hands behind you. | |
| Now go fight the zombies, right? | |
| I mean, that's terrible. | |
| I also believe that part of the reason we have corruption is the fact that life is inevitably chaotic. | |
| We have these periods of equilibrium and then we have destruction and disaster and war. | |
| And in these disaster situations, having some sociopathic bent can be inevitably a great... | |
| What's the word? | |
| Advantage over those who are too generous. | |
| Yeah, I mean, if you look at the nice guy during the time of Genghis Khan who respected women and who would buy them flowers and attempt to woo them, his genes spread a whole lot less than the rape horde of the Genghis Khan brigade, right? | |
| Yeah, yeah, yeah. | |
| And so, yeah, I mean, absolutely. | |
| I fully accept and agree with you there, which is why I have a program for eliminating evil that is to do not with encouraging good people to be good, but not just that, but encouraging. | |
| Encouraging and giving good people the tools to expose the greatest predations of evil, which is why this show bothers bad people more than any other show that I know of. | |
| Nobody gets that angry at MSN or Fox, but people really hate this show, which is natural. | |
| I take a mark of pride in that I'm doing something very useful and good. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Also, I just want to talk briefly about Bitcoin. | |
| I know you're a big advocate of it. | |
| I do agree that it has a lot of positive qualities. | |
| I just – one of the things that it lacks from the Aristotelian point of view is the intrinsic value, and I know it doesn't – it lacks the gold. | |
| Well, I argue gold does have intrinsic value, but it has the divisibility, portability, durability. | |
| Part of the problem also with Bitcoin is, since it's such a small market... | |
| No, no, hang on, hang on. | |
| Sorry, you're just blowing past that. | |
| Sorry. | |
| So, according to the Aristotelian argument, Bitcoin lacks intrinsic value because it lacks material value? | |
| Like it's not a physical thing like gold, right? | |
| Yes, yes, yes. | |
| Okay. | |
| But, I mean, I made this argument before. | |
| That is not an argument against its intrinsic value. | |
| That is an argument for its intrinsic value. | |
| Uh-huh. | |
| Because it cannot be stolen. | |
| Uh-huh. | |
| Gold can be stolen. | |
| And it regularly is by governments, right? | |
| So gold can be identified and found and stolen very easily, right? | |
| And so you can't steal a Bitcoin in the same way. | |
| Sorry, go ahead. | |
| I think you can steal Bitcoins. | |
| I mean, hackers, I think, have stolen Bitcoins. | |
| And the government can confiscate Bitcoins. | |
| No, no, no. | |
| I mean, hackers have stolen Bitcoins because people transmit their Bitcoin identifier in clear text over Wi-Fi. | |
| I mean, that's not people stealing bitcoins, that's like people leaving their wallet on a park bench and then crying thief, thief, thief, four days later, right? | |
| So people who don't secure, right? | |
| If I leave my car running on the street in a bad neighborhood and then go away on a week's vacation, it's not going to be there when I get back, right? | |
| But if I lock my car in my garage, it probably is, right? | |
| The guy, Dead Pirate Roberts, whatever, that guy who ran the Silk Road, his was confiscated by the FBI. So it could also be confiscated by the FBI. I don't know the details of that, but I would assume that they had his computer with all his Bitcoins on it, and it was not secured, and it was not protected, and it was not encrypted, and all that kind of stuff. | |
| So yes, Bitcoins can be stolen if you don't take the most rudimentary precautions. | |
| Well, they also... | |
| But that's true of gold as well. | |
| If I leave gold in a mall, if I leave a bunch of gold coins in a mall, people are going to steal those too. | |
| But that doesn't mean that there's something wrong with gold because if you leave it in a mall, people will steal it. | |
| Yeah. | |
| And that also argues for the fact that its intrinsic value is not negated by it being stolen as well. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Yeah. | |
| So, yeah, if you're careless with your bitcoins... | |
| And you can align this with your gold. | |
| Yeah. | |
| I mean, if I leave my gold in a field and I can't remember where it is, that doesn't mean that gold no longer has intrinsic value. | |
| Right? | |
| So its immateriality is its intrinsic value in the same way that the immateriality... | |
| Well, the one thing I should also argue... | |
| Unless we figure out a way to create a supernova... | |
| In a machine, we can't create gold, but we can create clones to Bitcoin. | |
| I think there's about 50 or 60 of them right now. | |
| So what? | |
| Look, there's lots of currencies around the world. | |
| That doesn't mean that each currency has no value. | |
| No. | |
| You could have theoretically infinite copies of Bitcoin derivatives. | |
| Well, yeah, but that's like saying that everyone could invent their own language, and therefore human beings will never be able to communicate. | |
| I mean, that's just not what's going to happen in the world. | |
| People are going to flock to that which has the most established value. | |
| People aren't going to put their money into some guy's MyCoin thing that he runs on some 286 from his basement, right? | |
| They're going to look for... | |
| That which has the most stability, the greatest acceptance, and so on. | |
| So there is a... | |
| As you know, the value in wide adoption is huge. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Right? | |
| The value in wide adoption is huge, and it's almost irreplaceable. | |
| You know, nobody's going to come up with some alternative to TCP IP or Ethernet. | |
| It's just too widely adopted. | |
| It's not really going to happen. | |
| Uh-huh. | |
| So, I think Bitcoin being first out of the gate and having the widest acceptability and the widest user base, of course, what also happens is the more people who have investments in Bitcoins, the more that they're going to work to maintain the value of Bitcoins, which means if someone comes up with some cool new thing, they'll put it into Bitcoins. | |
| It's adaptable, right? | |
| Yeah, but there's lots of other coins, and there's about 10 or 11 I could see coming up and getting the same value as Bitcoin, especially if Bitcoin becomes too... | |
| It's price is so high. | |
| And it also can be manipulated. | |
| I think Reggie Middleton and Max Keiser are creating some kind of market where you can short it, like a derivatives market for Bitcoin. | |
| Shorting it is great. | |
| Shorting Bitcoins is fantastic because it means it's going to stabilize the price. | |
| This is one of the reasons why Bitcoin, I think, has become more stable is that people are shorting it. | |
| Shorting it means that you make money when it goes down. | |
| I mean do you think that it will have the stability of a fluctuation of 3% per year? | |
| Because I think you would have to have something close to that because if you had a Bitcoin that doubles in value within a week or halves in value a week, it's something that would be hard to trade for a tangible object, no? | |
| Sure. | |
| Yeah, I mean, but I've made the case before that computers double in power every year. | |
| They're an incredibly unstable and deflationary good. | |
| But people still buy computers, right? | |
| You know, if you spend a thousand bucks on a computer now, you know you're going to get one twice as good this time next year. | |
| Yeah. | |
| But you still will do it, right? | |
| The computer industry still... | |
| I mean, the reason why you will have a computer twice as good next year is because so many people are buying it this year that they give money to the hardware and software companies to innovate and all that, right? | |
| So, I mean, if you look at computers, they halve in price every single year. | |
| Yeah, but if you're... | |
| Sorry, go ahead. | |
| No, but if you're going to buy something with the bitcoins and the seller receives those bitcoins and it halves in value, I don't think you'll... | |
| See the value in that. | |
| Oh, come on. | |
| I mean, I don't know if you've ever done business on a long-term scale or at an international level, but you just take that into account. | |
| If you know that the value of Bitcoin is going to be doubled next year, in other words, it's doubled every year for the past 10 years, you just take that into account, right? | |
| When you make your sale. | |
| In fact, you'll be able to sell things cheaper to people because you know that the value of what they're paying you in is going to increase. | |
| Yes, but that's assuming you know it's going to double in a year, and Bitcoin can double in a day. | |
| It can go down half in a day. | |
| I mean, it has. | |
| Yeah, I mean, it hasn't done that quite as much. | |
| And of course, it's doing that not because of anything to do with Bitcoin. | |
| It's doing that because governments are making stupid, ridiculous central planning decisions with regards to... | |
| The tradability of Bitcoin, like China says to its banks, you can't trade Bitcoins anymore. | |
| You know, the government sees a Silk Road. | |
| I mean, it's all just... | |
| But that's because Bitcoin has value. | |
| I mean, so you can't blame Bitcoin for attracting the interest of governments. | |
| They wouldn't care about it if it wasn't important and valuable. | |
| I agree. | |
| I just think possible another evolution in the Bitcoin would be a hybrid... | |
| If you could develop a cryptocurrency that has a connection to a gram of gold or a gram of silver. | |
| Already done. | |
| Already done. | |
| People are already working on that. | |
| And I wish them luck. | |
| No, I do as well. | |
| I wouldn't touch it with a 10-foot pole. | |
| Why is that? | |
| Because that which has tangibility can be stolen by governments. | |
| And regularly is. | |
| I mean, this is not unprecedented, right? | |
| They seized Swiss bank accounts, they killed the Liberty dollar, they shut down e-gold. | |
| Like, all this crap is going on. | |
| I can't remember if it's e-gold or something else. | |
| No, I know, but if the government declares that bitcoins are a conduit of criminal activity, would that not negate its value as well? | |
| No, it would increase its value. | |
| Even if it became illegal to own them? | |
| Especially if it became illegal. | |
| Really? | |
| Well, have you heard of the war on drugs? | |
| What happened to the price of heroin when the government made it illegal? | |
| And you're saying normal... | |
| Wait, wait, wait. | |
| What happened to the price of heroin when government made it illegal? | |
| Oh, it went up. | |
| I agree with that. | |
| And through the roof. | |
| But I don't think Walmart would take an ounce of heroin for a new car, right? | |
| Yeah, but so what? | |
| It still means that once you make it illegal... | |
| I mean, look, do you think the mafia is interested in bitcoins? | |
| Of course they are. | |
| Yeah. | |
| I mean what a great way to run a criminal enterprise. | |
| But if we're talking about adoptability on a large scale, if you make something illegal, it's still going to be done by the mom and pop. | |
| They're going to take something that they could wind up in jail for and buy a new refrigerator. | |
| Sorry to interrupt. | |
| You're not looking at the whole picture of the economy. | |
| You're just looking at the above-the-table legal, right? | |
| So do you know between a half and a third of the world's economy is black market or gray market? | |
| Oh, I know that, especially in the third world. | |
| Yes. | |
| Yeah, so I mean, what do they care? | |
| I mean, it's better for them if the government declares it illegal. | |
| It's better for criminals. | |
| Yeah, because then the criminal element will have a more stable currency than if everyone else is trying to elbow them aside and change its value. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Well, I guess you could argue then you would have another prohibition. | |
| And during that time, criminality grows exponentially. | |
| Of course it will rise. | |
| Absolutely. | |
| I mean, if you fence off the economy as a whole and Bitcoin becomes the tool of trade in the third world and so on, then of course criminal activity will get a lot more efficient because they'll be able to spend more time and energy hitting people in the knees with a baseball bat rather than laundering money. | |
| Of course. | |
| So you will be recreating Al Capone's and Ed O'Bannon's, basically. | |
| And so what will happen is people will kidnap other people and force them to cough up their Bitcoin address in order to steal their Bitcoins. | |
| Yeah. | |
| But there is also, because Bitcoins are so valuable, there is hesitation in the West to... | |
| You know, when you're governments, it's really important that your cows never touch the electric fence. | |
| What they think is just some pretty little wires to keep the wolves out. | |
| That's how governments sell the electric fence. | |
| Now, of course, it's to keep the cows in, but you don't want your cows touching the electric fence if you're the government. | |
| Now, if you do something like ban bitcoins, then the cows will suddenly have touched the electric fence. | |
| So you have to keep your cows away from the electric fence. | |
| And sometimes the cows touch the electric fence. | |
| You know, like when Barack Obama openly lies about you keeping your doctor and your health care plan and all that. | |
| It's just shit, right? | |
| Too much of the matrix has been revealed, right? | |
| And this is why now the government is paying Hollywood studios to make movies and TV shows praising Obamacare, right? | |
| Get people back away from that fucking fence, right? | |
| So if you ban bitcoins, it gets people a little bit too close to the fence. | |
| You have to have – it's got to be a foggy whip. | |
| It cannot be straight on the back with razor wire. | |
| I just think if the government were to ban bitcoins and it became an illegal currency, I don't think it would go away. | |
| I do think it would be adopted by criminals. | |
| But if Walmart and Ford and GM doesn't accept it, which it wouldn't be able to because obviously it's illegal – I think it would be somewhat of an effective way to eliminate its universal adaptability. | |
| Yeah, of course, but so what? | |
| I mean, you said yourself earlier that Walmart doesn't accept heroin. | |
| Yeah. | |
| But if Walmart did accept heroin as a currency, the price would be way lower. | |
| The price has gone up. | |
| The statistics for heroin in the 1960s was you could get three hits of heroin for 25 pennies. | |
| After the government made it illegal, one hit of heroin cost you 10 pounds. | |
| Oh, yeah. | |
| I mean, there's nothing better for illegal drug trade than to make it illegal. | |
| I mean, the illegality of it is the best thing for the price. | |
| I don't argue there at all. | |
| Yeah. | |
| But I think, for me, especially in third-world countries and places outside of America, that if you... | |
| Like, this is my theory on... | |
| The cryptocurrency backed by gold. | |
| Chris Martin, or Chris Martinson, he had... | |
| Martinson, yeah. | |
| Yes, with the P-Prosperity, he just came out with a new currency. | |
| It's basically a dollar. | |
| It looks like a dollar, whatever, but it has a gram of gold encased inside of it. | |
| And so I think that's a good idea, but it doesn't have the ability of a cryptocurrency that can be zapped back and forth globally and not be traced. | |
| But what I was... | |
| Possibly, maybe I'm wrong, is that you could adopt that part of it where you have stacks and stacks of this paper, which has a gram or an ounce of whatever, gold and silver, and you place them in vaults all around the world, in places that would allow it, and each and every bill would have an algorithm unique to itself that can be verified through a machine that goes through each one. | |
| Sorry to interrupt you. | |
| I don't want you to give away a business plan if this is something you're going to do. | |
| No, no, no. | |
| It's just a theory. | |
| I could be completely idiotic about it. | |
| I don't know. | |
| Why don't you do it? | |
| I don't know if I have the skill set for that. | |
| I wish I did. | |
| So what? | |
| I mean, Brad Pitt doesn't know how to work a camera. | |
| It doesn't mean there are no Brad Pitt movies, right? | |
| Uh-huh. | |
| Uh-huh. | |
| I mean, just find people who can. | |
| I don't want you to... | |
| Like, if you've got a really great idea... | |
| Then I don't want you to sort of hand that out like candy. | |
| I think we can all agree that Bitcoin is a great experiment. | |
| I think everyone can agree that it's really cool that it's there. | |
| So I would... | |
| And it is expanding. | |
| My goodness. | |
| I mean, Newegg takes it. | |
| Tiger Directs. | |
| Oh, I agree. | |
| They take it. | |
| There are like 20,000 merchants across the world who take bitcoins, and those bitcoins do get spent. | |
| So I think, I mean, we can all be happy that it's there. | |
| I mean, what an amazing and cool thing it is that... | |
| We have open source, encrypted, anonymous currency that is accepted by 20,000 merchants around the world. | |
| I mean, we all got to admit that's pretty cool. | |
| Maybe it's a bubble. | |
| I mean, nobody can know the future to that degree. | |
| Maybe it's a bubble. | |
| Maybe it's not. | |
| I've never told anyone to buy bitcoins and I've never predicted the future price. | |
| I don't know. | |
| But I think they're really cool things to be around and it's a great example of how spontaneous order and voluntary collaboration Can occur and how an entire currency system can be developed without paying people to develop it. | |
| I mean, I know they profited from Bitcoin mining early on and so on, but they had no way of knowing that when they were... | |
| Developing it, and finally, anything which sticks it to the financial banksters and threatens their oligopoly, I think is delicious no matter what happens. | |
| Shot across the boughs, right? | |
| I agree 100%. | |
| I'm just trying to figure out how long it's going to last, what its value is going to be in the future. | |
| It's pitfalls. | |
| I'm just throwing them out there. | |
| Yeah, no, I appreciate that. | |
| And everyone should take that into advice and figure that out. | |
| But it is very cool. | |
| And the fact that in the third world, people can get access to sophisticated financial services without assholes in suits, I think is a delicious and wonderful thing. | |
| You've got to remember to look at this from the third world as well, where a burner cell phone can be your secure wallet and your entire IPO. So, you know, it's not just us here in the first world who need to evaluate the value of Bitcoin. | |
| I think looking at it from other perspectives is important as well. | |
| All right. | |
| Was there any other questions you had? | |
| No, that's it. | |
| Thank you. | |
| Thank you, Stefan. | |
| Thank you. | |
| Great call. | |
| And seriously, think about this business idea of yours. | |
| Well, if you know anyone who might be interested, you can let me know. | |
| Well, just post it on the message board and tell people that you'd like to talk about it for, and I think that would be important. | |
| Really? | |
| Okay. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Oh, totally. | |
| Listen, I mean, if you've got a great idea, you do it, for heaven's sakes. | |
| I mean, you live once, and find a way to make it happen if you've got a great idea. | |
| Can I ask you one more question? | |
| Sure. | |
| You were born in Ireland? | |
| I was born in Ireland, Sonia. | |
| Ah, so was I. I was just curious, how long were you there for? | |
| I think it was a matter of weeks. | |
| I mean, I went back every summer. | |
| I went back every summer when I was a kid, but it was not long. | |
| I think my mom was on the way to England. | |
| If memory serves me right, family law is that my mom went into labor on the plane and they had to emergency land the plane. | |
| Obviously, I've been inconvenient to everyone from the very beginning. | |
| So, yeah, that's apparently the story. | |
| And so then we sort of moved on and went from there. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Ah, okay. | |
| Alright. | |
| Thank you, sir. | |
| Thank you. | |
| Alright. | |
| Alright, next up is David. | |
| Yes, hello. | |
| Stephan. | |
| Hello. | |
| Yes. | |
| Hope you're doing well. | |
| I'm well. | |
| How are you doing? | |
| Good. | |
| Thank you. | |
| I appreciate y'all's patience. | |
| I could not mute my phone. | |
| Skype wasn't cooperating. | |
| But at any rate, I had... | |
| One comment, a side question, and one main question. | |
| So I saw you on Joe Rogan the first time and it introduced me to you and your thoughts and it's been a great ride. | |
| Definitely appreciate it. | |
| And I didn't know who Peter Schiff was and I saw him on the show yesterday and I saw you on It's kind of weird, right? | |
| So you find me on Joe Rogan, and then you go back to Joe Rogan to see Peter Schiff, and then I'm filling in for the Peter Schiff radio show, and it's like, whoa! | |
| I know, but what spoke volumes for me was when he said how he was basically a fracker. | |
| He's involved in the business, and It's kind of seemed real contradictory, controversial, kind of shit-and-where-you-eat type thing. | |
| But that's another topic. | |
| But at any rate, I thank you very much for hosting these shows. | |
| Take the time away from your family and anything else you're involved in. | |
| Hopefully it's paying off. | |
| I plan on contributing more in the future. | |
| Thank you. | |
| If you're just starting, listen for a while and find out if I go off the rails. | |
| That's important. | |
| I'm dead serious about this. | |
| So whenever I would get into someone when I was younger, like, oh, this person's really cool, right? | |
| I like the way they think. | |
| And then I'd listen to them or read them, and then at some point I'd be like, what? | |
| What are they saying now? | |
| Let me rewind that. | |
| Did I get that right? | |
| Yes. | |
| And make sure I don't go insane at some point. | |
| This is important because throw your support behind me if you think I'm generally consistent and have good stuff to say. | |
| I appreciate that. | |
| But listen enough that you feel confident so that you don't donate and then next time I talk about how killer whales should run nursery schools or something. | |
| Like whatever stupid shit I might come up with. | |
| You know, be skeptical, you know, and all that. | |
| So, like, I've watched a couple of people online. | |
| I want to sort of get into names. | |
| I'm like, wow, that's a really, you know, cool and insightful analysis. | |
| And then I do a Google search or I look at some of their other videos and it's like, whoa, I guess they have an evil twin who also speaks on the internet because the stuff they're saying now is mad. | |
| So, yeah, be skeptical and keep listening. | |
| There's a flip side to every flip side, eh? | |
| Yeah, I guess so. | |
| I'd like to meet you in person and hand you a $50 bill or something. | |
| No shit. | |
| I mean, going through all this PayPal, I'm trying to get that coordinated or whatever to donate, but... | |
| You can email Michael, operations at freedomainradio.com. | |
| If you ever need... | |
| So usually late on a Saturday night, there's a place down in Toronto on Church Street, just down near Jarvis Street, Church Street, down near Dundas or Queen. | |
| I'm usually in a set of fishnet stockings swinging a purse. | |
| It's a Hello Kitty purse because I like to appeal to all demographics. | |
| I'm often chewing gum, maybe smoking a cigarette, and I'm in a very tight bustier and I'm philosophizing for money. | |
| We'll go down deep with you for philosophy. | |
| Thank you. | |
| That's awesome. | |
| I appreciate your sense of humor too, man. | |
| That's great. | |
| But do you have a question? | |
| Yes, I do. | |
| Yes, I do. | |
| And it kind of dovetails, I think, with what you were talking about earlier with exploring the boundaries of competition with Isabella. | |
| Because I guess... | |
| You know, and I don't want to take credit for this. | |
| I came across somebody else called Derek Jensen. | |
| I'm not a primitivist myself, but he kind of boiled his thought down to, okay, and this is what I'm asking. | |
| Do you think humans will undergo a voluntary change towards a rational and more sustainable way of living? | |
| Yeah, I think so. | |
| Yeah, I think so. | |
| But first they have to recognize that it is the state that drives overconsumption, not freedom. | |
| In a state of... | |
| Okay, I'm going to try and think of how to organize my thoughts here. | |
| For once in my goddamn life, let me try to organize my thoughts before I... So let me give you two minutes on it. | |
| So when the government prints too much money, then it stimulates consumption in the here and now. | |
| And that's actually what it's supposed to do. | |
| When you overprint money... | |
| More money goes into the system, and then inflation hits too. | |
| And inflation drives people to spend money now rather than to save it, particularly when you keep interest rates down. | |
| So normally if you inflate a whole bunch of money, the interest rates go up. | |
| That doesn't work for governments, because governments want free shit to bribe idiots with. | |
| That's basically the whole slogan of governments. | |
| Free shit for idiots. | |
| That's government in a nutshell. | |
| I'm just waiting for someone to meme that and JPEG it. | |
| But anyway, so when governments print a lot of money, normally interest rates would go up, which means they pay more in the national debt, which means they don't get free stuff. | |
| So they print a lot of money, and then they keep interest rates down, and then they use a whole bunch of bullshit numbers to hide the inflation that is inevitably resulting. | |
| And the whole purpose of the Keynesian approach to government is whenever there's a dip in consumer demand, the government should spend a whole bunch of money to raise... | |
| Demand. | |
| And anyone who's a Keynesian and an environmentalist is like a two-headed, bitch-slapped, contradictory brain, right? | |
| Because if you're a Keynesian, then the whole point is government's supposed to print money in a recession to stimulate demand. | |
| And stimulate demand means consume the Earth's precious resources, right? | |
| So 10% of U.S. housing is currently completely unoccupied. | |
| What a rape of the Earth it was to produce all of those houses which nobody is living in. | |
| That comes out of the results of government policy promoting home ownership and government policy subsidizing banks and government policy forcing banks to give loans to low-income people and government policy just printing a whole bunch of money which causes bubbles in a wide variety of places and so on. | |
| So, like, whenever the government says we want to stimulate the economy, what they're saying is we want to artificially consume resources that nobody wants to consume. | |
| At least not consume, like, they don't want it enough to actually spend their own money on it, right? | |
| It's like, well, we got a whole bunch of shovel-ready projects. | |
| We're going to build some bridges and we're going to build some roads. | |
| And it's like, but nobody wants those, otherwise they'd be there already. | |
| And so you're just going to waste a whole bunch of resources and slaughter more of the earth, right? | |
| So government is crazy, right? | |
| Government policies to support women when they make bad choices in men. | |
| The whole welfare state, which is primarily a single mom-payer state. | |
| What does that do? | |
| Well, it creates marriages sometimes. | |
| It certainly encourages the divorce. | |
| And anybody who's an environmentalist who does not focus on the necessity of keeping families together is not an environmentalist. | |
| It's incredibly bad for the environment for families to split up. | |
| Can you tell me why? | |
| At what point is it a problem for families to exist, period? | |
| Why is it bad for families to split up? | |
| Why is that bad for the environment? | |
| Oh, well, you're not using resources as efficiently. | |
| I mean, for one, you know, twice. | |
| Yeah, you need two houses, right? | |
| You now need two houses because the family has split up, right? | |
| There's lots of extra driving. | |
| You need usually two sets of toys, which, you know, obviously strips China of a lot of its lead, right? | |
| And you sort of go on and on. | |
| But it's incredibly environmentally destructive for families to split up, right? | |
| And so anybody who's not focusing on keeping families together is just not an environmentalist. | |
| So printing money, government regulations to stimulate the economy to force consumption, tariffs and taxes which distort the resource use. | |
| All resources should be used based on demand, and all that demand should be limited by limited money, right? | |
| I mean, that's sort of the basic reality of it. | |
| And so anytime you lend to a government, you are stimulating the destruction of the environment, because money is being spent that... | |
| It's being borrowed, right? | |
| Borrowing is consuming the future for the sake of... | |
| It's destroying the future for the sake of the present. | |
| It's destroying your capacity to buy in the future based upon the present, right? | |
| So you sign up for a car loan, you're destroying your ability to pay 300 bucks a month or whatever it is in the future for four years or eight years or whatever in order to have a car in here and now. | |
| There's nothing wrong with that. | |
| It's fine. | |
| But when government debt is a crater... | |
| On the tits of nature. | |
| It is. | |
| It rapes nature horribly to have all of this stuff. | |
| Common ownership also destroys preservability, right? | |
| I mean, you've seen these streets where all of these houses are sort of kept nicely, and then there's this one house where nobody lives, and it's, you know, it's a boarded up shit heap, right? | |
| And so whenever something is unowned, it tends to be either destructively unmaintained, which means eventually you've just got to tear that house down and build a new one. | |
| It's much better for the environment to maintain a house than it is to tear it down and build a new one. | |
| So that which is unowned is unmaintained. | |
| These 10% of houses are just falling into shit, right? | |
| I mean, half of them have to be torn down after a while. | |
| It's brutal. | |
| And so that which is unowned is unmaintained, which is bad for the environment, and that which is unowned is preyed upon by everyone. | |
| So if you're an environmentalist and you're not really examining the role that the state plays in promoting environmental destruction, I know that in the shift show with Rogan they talked about oil spills. | |
| Well, I mean, how many BP executives lost... | |
| Well, the answer to that would be precisely zero. | |
| How many bankers have gone to jail as a result of ripping people off the liar's loans, the robo-signing, all that? | |
| Lies. | |
| Ripping people off. | |
| Zero. | |
| And this is all state-created. | |
| I mean, the people want these guys to be hung, drawn, and quartered. | |
| The people want these guys to go to jail. | |
| The people as a whole are raging against the bankers and the predations on the body politic and the largely undereducated citizenry that they roped into these destructive loans. | |
| But nobody's going to jail. | |
| I mean, you throw 2,500 people from the Wall Street moving into jail and zero bankers. | |
| And that's because the bankers pay the government and the government protects the bankers, right? | |
| So it's the same thing is true of executives. | |
| The government owns the land where people could be drilling for oil on the American soil, which is far safer for the environment than going a mile under the water. | |
| But that's not allowed. | |
| So that's not, you know, you can't just buy the land and then go drill. | |
| And the government, of course, promotes massive oil consumption by building all these free roads, which has created a highly mobile and environmentally destructive society. | |
| And, um... | |
| The government also caps liabilities for corporations for environmental disasters, so it's never quite too expensive and so on. | |
| I just wanted to point out that the best way to preserve the environment is to privatize the living shit out of everything. | |
| If you privatize the living shit out of everything, people will spend a lot of money to buy stuff and they'll really work to maintain it. | |
| So I really, really wanted to point that out. | |
| I mean, the only sensible environmentalists are the free market people. | |
| That is what protects us from environmental degradation and destruction the most. | |
| Not to mention people who are anti-war, which of course a lot of people on the left are and environmentalists are as well. | |
| But war, of course, is one of the most destructive to the environment as a whole. | |
| I mean, more oil is used every day in Iraq alone than is used by the entire economy of India. | |
| That's just for military shit, right? | |
| So, anyway. | |
| Yeah, no, that's... | |
| And I can see that argument with the whole government issue and the spending. | |
| I mean, that's something I'm honestly new to. | |
| I mean, I'm college educated, but that doesn't mean shit. | |
| And it takes some time, like you said. | |
| And you've got a lot of work out there I still need to kind of go through. | |
| I'm not a nihilist, I'm not a primitivist, but I just, man, in this, you know, what's going on, you know, in the world, in the state of affairs, it just seems like a valid question for a kid to ask, you know, kind of like why even have me? | |
| At what point is it child abuse, you know, to even have a kid in such shitty circumstances? | |
| You know what I mean? | |
| Does that line ever exist? | |
| I mean, you seem like you're in a position where you can insulate yourself really well, and that's great. | |
| But for the average Joe, you know what I mean? | |
| I might not ever have kids just because I know. | |
| I can't. | |
| $200,000 per head just to get started? | |
| I don't see that, realistically. | |
| You know what I mean? | |
| I just don't. | |
| But your kid might be the one who... | |
| Invents fusion in a jar. | |
| Your kit might save the environment of the planet, right? | |
| I mean, you're going to bring your kid up to be a responsible worldwide citizen and want to maintain resources for future generations, so that kid is going to be smarter than you, because, you know, generationally we just keep getting smarter. | |
| He's going to be smarter than you, he's going to be more clear in his mind about truth and reason and virtue than you are, and than I was, because you're all propagandized and you're going to be teaching them the right stuff. | |
| And this could be the kid who saves the world. | |
| And, you know, trust me, just because good people don't have kids, that doesn't stop idiots from breeding. | |
| And, you know, we will get swamped at some point. | |
| So I just wanted to mention that that's not necessarily a great argument to not have kids because there are bad people in the world. | |
| I think that's just kind of letting the bad people win, in my opinion. | |
| Great. | |
| Well, then I think it becomes an either-or question. | |
| Because if you're not, if overpopulation doesn't make any sense, then overconsumption does have to at some point. | |
| So it seems like that, you know, has to be... | |
| You know, focused on to some degree and reconciled and abided by, you know, because we do live under that dictatorship as some woman, you know, kind of brought up as the one defense to the, you know, non-aggression policy is, you know, our land base is being destroyed. | |
| So if we don't have, you know, that to work with, then we're kind of SOL. We don't have a place to invent the cult fusion. | |
| You might want to read, sorry. | |
| I mean, it sounds like you've had a lot of doom porn from the environmental side. | |
| And then you've got to limit your exposure to that stuff. | |
| There are a lot of psychotics out there who used to tell children about hell, and now they tell them about environmental destruction. | |
| So really be careful and be skeptical of all the doomsayers. | |
| And you might want to read a book called The Skeptical Environmentalist by Bjorn Lomborg, where he talks about what is actually happening in the world. | |
| People scaring the shit out of you for money, I mean, it's not just a carnival funhouse. | |
| There is massive profit in terror. | |
| Terror is one of the world's great resources to be exploited. | |
| There is massive, massive profit in scaring the living shit out of people. | |
| Whether it's through threats of war. | |
| What was it? | |
| We don't want the smoking gun to be in the form of a mushroom cloud like he was going to bomb Pittsburgh or something, Hussein. | |
| Right, so scaring the living shit out of people is a hugely profitable. | |
| You think gold is profitable. | |
| Mining for... | |
| Anxiety is far more profitable than that, and so don't be an ownable resource. | |
| Do not surrender your terror to the fear merchants. | |
| It doesn't mean we shouldn't have caution and concern about the world and all of that, but just read some stuff opposed to your viewpoint. | |
| I think that's really, really important. | |
| Read some of the stuff that's happening. | |
| If you're worried about overpopulation, again, the best cure for overpopulation is privatization. | |
| Privatization increases wealth. | |
| When people have more wealth, they can better provide to their children. | |
| They have access to more health care for their children, which means they don't have to have as many children. | |
| And also when children become more expensive, when you have a free market, then... | |
| The necessity for human capital investments in your children goes up, right? | |
| They've got to be better educated. | |
| They've got to be more smart and so on. | |
| And when the cost of children goes up, lo and behold, laws of supply and demand, when the cost of children goes up, because they need more education and better skill sets to compete in a free market than they do if they're just, you know, ho-hacking surfs. | |
| I mean, ho like the... | |
| Anyway, you know. | |
| So when the price of kids go up, lo and behold, the number of kids that people have goes down. | |
| So, yeah. | |
| Yeah. | |
| I was actually going to explore some private property arguments, and then actually I had something stolen from me. | |
| I got pissed. | |
| I had to go back to the drawing board, obviously, with that one. | |
| It makes sense and really brings that home. | |
| But anyways, I appreciate that. | |
| By the way, I meant to ask you. | |
| You were going to mull something over on a past radio show. | |
| I forgot who it was about a guy who was going to jump off a... | |
| A ledge, and you were supposed to keep your mittens off of them. | |
| I was wondering if you could put any more thought into that. | |
| I think that's a couple of shows back. | |
| Just to recap very briefly, this is Dr. | |
| Walter Block. | |
| Walter Block was saying if your child is staggering towards the edge of a bridge, wanting to throw himself off, you have to stop the child, but you don't have to stop a stranger. | |
| My argument in the show was if you're causal in your child wanting to throw themselves off a bridge, then you have to stop them. | |
| And if you're a bad parent to the point where your kid wants to kill himself, well then, blah, blah, blah, right? | |
| Yeah, I agree with that. | |
| Yeah, so I came up with a better analogy, which is, I don't have to stop a stranger from jumping off a cliff unless I just injected him with a drug that makes him disoriented. | |
| Like, if he's staggering towards a cliff because I injected him, then I have to stop him, because I'm causal in him falling off the bridge. | |
| Right? | |
| So if it's just some stranger, but kids are never just some stranger because you're the parent. | |
| You've raised them. | |
| So if your kid's suicidal, you have to stop them because you're causal in the same way, or you're responsible for their death. | |
| I'm not responsible for the death of some guy I'm driving past who jumps off a bridge, but if I inject a guy with some disorienting drug and then he falls off a cliff as a result of being confused and dizzy... | |
| Then I'm responsible for his death, right? | |
| So I have to stop him because I'm causal in starting that whole process. | |
| It's the same thing with parenting. | |
| So again, it's a universal thing, and it doesn't mean that I have lower responsibilities, but rather higher responsibilities. | |
| So I don't think that Dr. | |
| Block's argument held, but that's just a mention. | |
| Yeah, yeah, I agree. | |
| I mean, because you create a child, they don't have full brain development, and, you know, you're kind of thrown to the wolves, you're responsible for them in a way, and it wasn't apples to apples compared with some guy off the streets from Random Stranger. | |
| You're just supposed to, you know, save or not save. | |
| I thought it wasn't apples to apples, but I appreciated the dialogue, definitely. | |
| All right. | |
| Oh, no problem. | |
| Thank you. | |
| I think that was it. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Appreciate it. | |
| Call in again anytime. | |
| Have a great day. | |
| Thank you so much for listening. | |
| Man, have a great day. | |
| Congratulations on that whole cancer thing. | |
| You just seem to high-step that and shake it off like nothing. | |
| Your daughter's going to thank you so much one day for creating all this content. | |
| If something does happen in the future, even if it doesn't, she still will. | |
| I mean, the cancer thing was partly luck, but it's also partly... | |
| I mean, aside from getting cancer, I lived a... | |
| A very healthy life. | |
| I mean, exercise, eat well, maintain my weight. | |
| I weigh still pretty much the same as I did in high school. | |
| So I think one of the reasons why I could kick cancer's ass pretty well was because I had a very healthy base to start from. | |
| So, yeah, but I appreciate that. | |
| Sure. | |
| Good to have that fucker in the rear view, I'll tell you that. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Thanks so much for your call and appreciate it. | |
| Let's move on to the next. | |
| Alright, next up is the last in the list, unless you want to take any other calls from the chat. | |
| We may go for a shockingly slow, short show. | |
| It's an S word, I promise. | |
| Slippery. | |
| Justin? | |
| Yes, Justin's up next. | |
| Justin, I just did a video about you. | |
| Let's do a duet. | |
| You did? | |
| No, I just did a Justin Bieber video. | |
| Oh, yeah, I'm much older than Bieber. | |
| I have far less hair than he does. | |
| Your voice is broken. | |
| Yeah, and my voice is broken. | |
| Can you hear me okay? | |
| I can. | |
| What's on your mind? | |
| Okay. | |
| So, I've emailed you a little bit before. | |
| I'm the guy that's moving out to Montana in May to be with the girlfriend of eight years. | |
| And I found that the exercise in picking up life and making that move is causing... | |
| An extraordinary amount of anxiety and ambivalence that I'm having difficulty understanding. | |
| And this is even on top of listening to FDR for the past two, three years and following along as best I can. | |
| And moving, even just talking about it, I'm starting to get agitated. | |
| Yeah. | |
| It's no problem for me. | |
| You can be agitated. | |
| That's certainly fine with me, but go on. | |
| So, I guess my question is... | |
| I had this habit of... | |
| I mean, the question is, how do I know if this is one of those instances where I'm not listening to myself? | |
| Like, why does the fear and ambivalence exist? | |
| What is it trying to tell me? | |
| That's what I'm having trouble with. | |
| What's the disaster scenario? | |
| Uh... | |
| Honestly, it's not horrible. | |
| The disaster scenario is I go out there and it takes me forever to find a job and we don't get out on our own in a reasonable amount of time. | |
| A reasonable amount of time is maybe like two years or something like that. | |
| Because we'll be staying at her parents' bed and breakfast, like the suite downstairs. | |
| So it's not like we're going to be living on the street, you know, hunting down dogs and cats and whatnot. | |
| Right. | |
| Yeah, I mean, the best case scenario is something I'm doing the best towards working at, and I'm... | |
| I'm still pushing through it. | |
| I'm reading books about how to provide more value to an employer and whatnot. | |
| And she's going back to school to be a surgical tech, which is something she's always wanted to do. | |
| Right. | |
| So I'm actually doing things to push through the fear and the anxiety, but it just... | |
| Normally when I make a decision about something and the decision's made, ambivalence just disappears and I move forward, but it's not happening this time around. | |
| And I'm wondering if it's just because it's just such a big decision. | |
| No, I don't. | |
| I mean, I wouldn't guess that. | |
| Trust your instincts, right? | |
| At least I found talking myself out of my instincts is really a good idea. | |
| Right, yeah. | |
| Oh, I'm overreacting. | |
| Oh, you know what? | |
| I'm really not. | |
| Right, and that's where I'm... | |
| I guess that's the biggest hitch. | |
| I can't tell you how many times I've said to myself, and she's heard me say to myself, oh, I should have listened to myself. | |
| Well, I don't ever listen to myself. | |
| And I'm like, is that... | |
| Let me ask you some questions then. | |
| Sorry to interrupt you. | |
| Let me ask you some questions that may help clarify things. | |
| Yep. | |
| How do you get along with her appearance? | |
| Fine. | |
| Fine. | |
| We have conversations both on the small stuff and the deep stuff. | |
| I don't feel uncomfortable around them or anything like that. | |
| How does she get along with her parents? | |
| Pretty much the same. | |
| I mean, they have conversations. | |
| She likes being around them. | |
| I've watched them interact plenty of times, and I don't detect or observe any kind of weird, discomforting behavior between them. | |
| Good. | |
| Okay, so no history of spanking or things that need to be resolved? | |
| No, not that I'm aware of, no. | |
| We've talked about her history. | |
| What do you mean, not that you're aware of? | |
| Well, not that we've... | |
| Suddenly it sounds like you're on the stand and I'm asking you to incriminate. | |
| I plead the fifth. | |
| Oh, sorry. | |
| And there's lots of ways people plead the fifth in conversations. | |
| That's one of them. | |
| Go ahead. | |
| Not that we've pulled out of discussions we had about her history and my history and about with my parents. | |
| She doesn't seem to have... | |
| Anything in her history, as far as spanking goes, or anything like that, that she could remember. | |
| We've talked about it quite a bit. | |
| I'll accept that. | |
| I mean, I don't tell people they're wrong, but then they tell me what's going on. | |
| Okay, so there's not going to be an issue. | |
| A lot of times, if people don't have ideal relationships with their parents, because you're moving back in under the same roof, right? | |
| You're going to live in a B&B, right? | |
| Yeah. | |
| Right. | |
| Yeah, so, I mean, if she can't be herself around her parents, then you're going to lose your girlfriend by moving back into the house with them, but that doesn't sound like it's the case, and I'm not going to obviously tell you that you're wrong, so I'll accept that for what it is. | |
| So, how long have you been going out? | |
| Oh, we've been together seven, eight years. | |
| And are you married? | |
| No. | |
| Why not? | |
| She... | |
| I kind of had a big stick up my ass back in the day about marriage in the sense that it was like, oh, marriage with the state contract and blah blah blah. | |
| I'm much more chill about things now than I used to be. | |
| But within our first two years of being together, she wanted to get married. | |
| But she didn't say anything at the time. | |
| You know that you have completely not answered my question, right? | |
| Well, years ago, I was against marriage. | |
| I'm so sorry. | |
| She wanted to get married, right? | |
| Reset. | |
| None of those conditions apply now, right? | |
| So why aren't you married? | |
| You know, the only reason right now is because I'm in Pennsylvania and she's in Montana. | |
| Once we move out there, I've had considered talking to her about getting married. | |
| So I'll probably go ahead and do that. | |
| Because to me, I'm committed to her in a way that... | |
| That I wasn't before. | |
| You're together forever, right? | |
| Like, till death do you part. | |
| That's what it feels like, yeah. | |
| That's what it feels like, yeah. | |
| Well, then I would make that... | |
| Again, I mean, obviously, you know, the state, who cares, right? | |
| The state-standard way of an ancient tradition that has developed in the species for damn good reasons. | |
| You're right. | |
| And do you want kids? | |
| No. | |
| And does she want kids? | |
| She does not either. | |
| No, we've talked about that extensively. | |
| And why don't you want kids? | |
| Not that you should. | |
| I'm just curious. | |
| It was nothing that ever interests either one of us. | |
| It wasn't anything a big conversation. | |
| They were just like, oh, we just don't want kids. | |
| And we wonder why. | |
| Just the interest isn't there. | |
| Yeah, that's just synonyms for I don't want kids. | |
| Right. | |
| I just don't want kids. | |
| Yeah, but I'm just curious. | |
| I mean, is it the time commitment? | |
| Is it energy level? | |
| Is it the cost? | |
| Is it you just don't like children? | |
| It's the time commitment involved, the energy, the resources involved. | |
| And I don't think I would... | |
| And if I were to look back and speaking right now, I don't think I'm... | |
| I don't quite think I'm fatherly material yet. | |
| And why are you not fatherly material? | |
| Because of my own familial history and I still think I feel I have a lot of work to do before I would take on the responsibility of a child if I were to do that. | |
| Yeah, again, you are an absolute master of not answering questions. | |
| I'm so sorry. | |
| Thank you for pointing that out. | |
| Because of my family history. | |
| Right, right. | |
| That does not help me, because I have work to do. | |
| But on what? | |
| What? | |
| I feel like I'm going to have to get a chair, some rubber hose, and a swinging light bulb, and perhaps a German in gold-rimmed spectacles to get answers out of here. | |
| I'm giving you conclusions, expecting you to know what those... | |
| No, you're not even giving me conclusions. | |
| You're giving me synonyms. | |
| Why don't you want to have children? | |
| Because of my family history and the work that I have to do. | |
| What? | |
| You didn't tell me anything? | |
| Why do you not want to drive a car? | |
| Because I don't like driving cars. | |
| Well, thank you for adding to the conversation. | |
| I'm just pointing this out, right? | |
| So, what are the issues that you feel would make you not a good father at the moment? | |
| At the moment, I've had a history of being impatient and somewhat... | |
| Sadistic around people that get close to me, and I would not trust myself to be a father. | |
| All right. | |
| You know, you just dropped a huge bomb in the conversation, right? | |
| Yes, yes, I know. | |
| Are you aware of that? | |
| I am. | |
| And that's why you weren't giving me answers before, right? | |
| Yes. | |
| Right. | |
| Right. | |
| All right. | |
| Because I'm still not... | |
| Are you sadistic to your girlfriend? | |
| No. | |
| Of course you are, because you just said to people who are close to you, right? | |
| I used to be, yeah. | |
| This is one of the things I worked through a lot when I started getting involved in FDR and a lot of other self-reflection was getting past that. | |
| I was just angry. | |
| A very, very angry person that spilled out into the personal relationships. | |
| And why, if your girlfriend had a happy childhood, would she want to be with an angry sadist? | |
| I'm not saying that's all you were, but those characteristics were... | |
| Right, yeah. | |
| It wasn't all-encompassing. | |
| It's just when I got angry and frustrated about whatever it was, it was never directed at her. | |
| And she would usually pull herself away from the situation until I calmed down. | |
| But that's a good question, why she would... | |
| The original Norman Rockwell painting is beginning to unravel a little bit. | |
| And I'm not pulling at it. | |
| I didn't. | |
| Why would a woman who's got deep, happy, positive relationships with lovely, peaceful parents, why would she want to be around a guy who, I mean, do you just have a giant penis? | |
| I mean, why would she want to be around a guy who has sadistic rage outbursts from time to time? | |
| Yeah, and I've been told this repeatedly about people that know me, that when I describe the way I used to be to others who just don't have any idea, have any history with me, I'm always told... | |
| You're not answering the question. | |
| I'm sorry. | |
| I appreciate the description that other people may have had about you in the past, but you're not answering the question. | |
| Listen, you don't have to answer any questions on this show. | |
| You can tell me to take a long walk off a short pier and hang up, which is certainly a choice, right? | |
| But I'm going to ask the questions until you hang up or answer them. | |
| Understood. | |
| Because I am a bloodhound to try and figure these things out. | |
| I'm always intensely curious about what makes people tick. | |
| Noted. | |
| Why would your girlfriend be with someone who had sadistic rage outbursts? | |
| I don't know. | |
| Right. | |
| That lack of knowledge is probably what is making you anxious about moving in with her family. | |
| Okay. | |
| Right. | |
| Fair point. | |
| Does that make any sense? | |
| It does make sense, yes. | |
| Okay, tell me what makes sense for you. | |
| I guess I wouldn't I may need more time to write on that one. | |
| No problem. | |
| I will keep asking questions. | |
| Is she physically attractive? | |
| Yes. | |
| So she had choices, at least in the first impressions dating pool, right? | |
| I think she was overweight when she was younger, but not when she was in college. | |
| I wouldn't say she had a line of suitors. | |
| I mean, we're both average-looking people. | |
| We're not ugly, but we're not like... | |
| Hyper-attractive or anything like that. | |
| But she's attractive to me. | |
| Yeah, but one to ten, where do you guys sit? | |
| I'd say she's about a six or seven, and I'm right around the same range. | |
| Okay. | |
| So she obviously, I mean, she doesn't have like two heads or something, which would be a dating pool to, I guess, some Eastern European kink fetishists. | |
| So she had choices, and she could have chosen to date a guy who didn't have sadistic rage outbursts, right? | |
| Right. | |
| Now, what in her history made that acceptable enough that she would stay in a relationship with someone like that? | |
| From what I know in her family history, there was – neither of her parents had a temper, but it's hard to explain in a way. | |
| She doesn't recall any sort of yelling or hitting or anything like that, but she was always very, very quiet, and she would be willing – she's the middle child, and she would often be willing to kind of take – The brunt or the blame if one of the parents did get angry about something? | |
| Well, but you said they never raise their voices and they don't have tempers, right? | |
| Right, yeah. | |
| I wouldn't call them angry people. | |
| They're very quiet and they're very calm. | |
| But I think back in the day when they were younger, her mother especially may have... | |
| Yeah, so I'm going to countermand my statement because my previous statement's wrong now that I'm remembering the conversations we've had. | |
| Her mother did yell... | |
| I don't know if it was just at them, but I know she would get angry. | |
| So she would get angry at them? | |
| I'm not sure. | |
| I mean, look, all parents get angry at their children. | |
| I get angry at Isabella occasionally, and Isabella gets angry at me. | |
| I get angry at my wife. | |
| She gets angry at me. | |
| I occasionally will get angry at callers, right? | |
| Are you angry right now? | |
| No, no, I'm not. | |
| I'm not angry. | |
| I'm glad... | |
| That we're having this difficulty communicating, because that means we're breaking new ground, right? | |
| Yes. | |
| Like, how do you know you're getting closer to the North Pole if there's a grating sound on the hull of your ship, right? | |
| Right. | |
| So, no, I'm entirely pleased that the conversation is taking this turn. | |
| And you understand, I'm certainly not trying to catch you out on anything, but what I am trying to do is to give you... | |
| The questions to ask about your own history that will lead you to the kind of knowledge that will give you security. | |
| Insecurity, to my mind, insecurity usually has to do with a discrepancy between unconscious knowledge and conscious knowledge. | |
| Does that make any sense? | |
| It does, yes. | |
| Right? | |
| And so when you gave me your conscious statements... | |
| And then I asked more questions and the answers are more complicated, right? | |
| Right. | |
| Now your unconscious fully accepts that complication and is processing that emotionally, but if there's not a confluence between your unconscious knowledge and your conscious knowledge, the result is anxiety, because you're at risk. | |
| Okay. | |
| Right, like if you're walking in the bush in Africa and out of the corner of your eye you think you may see a lion and then you think, oh, it's nothing, right? | |
| Right. | |
| And you just keep walking, you're going to feel anxious, right? | |
| Because your unconscious is like, you know, I really think we saw a lion there and your conscious mind is, ah, it's nothing, right? | |
| I'm pretty sure I saw teeth and fangs. | |
| Yeah, or even if it was just something that might be a lion. | |
| Right. | |
| Like, get someplace safe, don't take the risk, right? | |
| Right, right. | |
| And a lot of manipulation and exploitation has to do with altering conscious knowledge. | |
| Unconscious knowledge can be accepted or rejected, but it can't fundamentally be altered. | |
| So to me, anxiety is the discrepancy between unconscious knowledge and conscious knowledge. | |
| Unconscious knowledge cannot be changed I mean, with the caveat that if you listen to it, it may be enriched or deepened or widened, but it can't fundamentally be changed. | |
| Like, if you have a parent who beats you, you can say to yourself, well, you know, blah-de-blah, she had a tough childhood, and it's Mother's Day, right? | |
| But unconsciously, you can't change the experience of having been beaten and the trauma and fear and anger that that provokes. | |
| Understood, yeah, right. | |
| You don't have the power to change history, and the unconscious is the true accumulation of your history. | |
| You can make up whatever story you want about it, but you can't change. | |
| Yeah, if some guy stabs you, your body wears the scar. | |
| Right, right. | |
| Your body knows that it was an injury and wears the scar forever. | |
| Now you can say, I was never stabbed, but the body still has the wound, right? | |
| You can't change that. | |
| Of course, yeah. | |
| So, the questions that I'm asking have to do with... | |
| Your conscious mind wants to portray to you and to me and to this audience a particular thing which may have to do with vanity. | |
| Vanity is always a lack of complexity and ambivalence, but that's right. | |
| She's perfect, right? | |
| My life is great. | |
| I don't have a problem in the world. | |
| Everything is great. | |
| That's all nonsense, right? | |
| If you don't have a problem in the world, then you're a narcissist. | |
| Oh, I've got plenty of those. | |
| Yeah, we've got those. | |
| So... | |
| So then, to go back, you think it's possible that, or I think you said that with conversations with your girlfriend, that her mother was more verbally aggressive in the past? | |
| I think so, yeah. | |
| If I remember correctly, and I'll ask her again, but I'm pretty sure that her mother was, I wouldn't have called from her description, I wouldn't have called her mother an angry person, but I I think she quickly got impatient and that impatience came out as anger. | |
| But I don't know if it was directed at the children in a way that was overly aggressive. | |
| That's the second time that you've used that, which is you said earlier my sadistic rage or outburst was not directed at my girlfriend. | |
| Okay. | |
| And I'm telling you, at least in my opinion, I don't see how that really matters. | |
| Like, being around somebody who is having a sadistic rage outburst is scary. | |
| Right, so this idea that... | |
| Like, if some blindfolded guy is shooting off bullets in a room... | |
| Right. | |
| And he says, well, I wasn't aiming at you. | |
| Do you feel better? | |
| Not really. | |
| Fuck no. | |
| Fuck no. | |
| Something ricochets or he hits you by accident. | |
| So the fact that he's not pointing the gun at you doesn't make it a relaxing and calm experience. | |
| I think that you use that as a way of saying, my rage or my anger did less harm to other people because it wasn't directed at them. | |
| And it's also a way of shutting down their criticism of you for having those outbursts. | |
| Because you can say, well, it wasn't directed at you. | |
| Thank you. | |
| Thank you. | |
| Right. | |
| And what you've described in terms of her mother, to me at least, doesn't contain anything like sadism. | |
| Impatience and getting upset or getting angry and so on, right? | |
| So it doesn't explain why the sadistic aspect would be... | |
| Why she would tolerate... | |
| It doesn't explain why she would have tolerated the way I once behaved, is what you're saying, right? | |
| Well, not just tolerated. | |
| But pursued, kissed, cuddled, slept with, loved, embraced, stayed with. | |
| I can put up with some crazy guy on the bus, that doesn't mean I ask him to move in. | |
| Can I ask you something? | |
| When I described it as sadistic rage, what kind of picture did that paint for you about me? | |
| Well, I don't know. | |
| I mean, because I know that those are just words, right? | |
| But I'm just going with the words that you're using, right? | |
| Now, either you're incorrect about the sadism, in which case you have a problem with self-criticism that's pretty big, right? | |
| I do. | |
| Or you're correct, in which case, right? | |
| Okay, so maybe sadistic is too strong or anything like that, right? | |
| Whenever I describe how I used to be, other people who've experienced it, they're like, you weren't As bad as it feels to you inside, because I'm really not an angry, aggressive person, and I don't like other people that are. | |
| But to me, the way I was behaving relative to how I am now and relative to the behavior that you put forth as virtuous on FTR and this other relationship I've seen, it makes, relative to all that, I felt like a monster. | |
| Okay, alright. | |
| So when I say it, that's the feeling that comes up. | |
| Let's say that you're correct, that the word sadism that you're using with me is a self-attack and that you weren't sadistic. | |
| Okay. | |
| Your girlfriend is putting up with you describing yourself as a sadist to the point where seven or eight years after you started dating, you're still using the term. | |
| You see, there is sadly no escape from the dysfunction, right? | |
| If you say, well, I wasn't sadistic, then you've been with a woman for seven to eight years, and you're still describing yourself as sadistic when it was incorrect, which means that she has not helped you work through the self-attack, right? | |
| Right, right. | |
| She's corrected me. | |
| She's tried to correct me. | |
| She's like, it really wasn't... | |
| I wouldn't call you abusive or sadistic. | |
| She's like, you really are very hard on yourself and you need to stop that. | |
| She has told me several... | |
| I mean, so what? | |
| That's like telling somebody who's overweight to eat less food. | |
| I mean, it doesn't help anything, right? | |
| You've got to get to the root of the issue in some manner, right? | |
| Is she there? | |
| No, no. | |
| She's in Montana. | |
| Right. | |
| She's in Montana. | |
| No, no. | |
| But, you know, if she wants to call in or whatever, it would be interesting to obviously see things from her point of view. | |
| And you theorizing about her childhood or her relationship with her mom or what her mom was like before you knew her. | |
| I mean, obviously, it's somewhat of a guessing game. | |
| But we do know. | |
| We know two things for sure, right? | |
| So, number one, you were much more aggressive when you met. | |
| Is much more too strong or just more? | |
| I was more aggressive and insecure when we met, yes. | |
| I was aggressive because I was insecure. | |
| Okay, so she passionately pursues somebody who has the characteristics of insecurity and aggression. | |
| Not only is that good enough for her, that's the best she can do. | |
| Whoever we're with is the best that we can do. | |
| Whatever job we have is the best job that we can have. | |
| However much money we have is the most money we think we can have. | |
| Because if something was better, if somebody said to you, listen, I'm going to double your pay for doing exactly the same thing, what would you say? | |
| Yay! | |
| Hell to the yes, right? | |
| Yeah, exactly. | |
| Exactly. | |
| So whatever you have is the best that you think you can get. | |
| Right. | |
| And so you were the best that she thought she could get. | |
| And I'm not saying that she's wrong. | |
| I mean, maybe you are a great guy. | |
| I mean, I have no reason, right? | |
| Maybe. | |
| But so we know that the best that she felt that she could get was you, who may be a great guy, I'm sure is, with these characteristics of insecurity and aggression, right? | |
| Right, right. | |
| I follow you. | |
| Okay. | |
| That's who she chose to be with and has chosen to stay with, right? | |
| Okay. | |
| Yep. | |
| You're right. | |
| Although, admittedly, in a different state. | |
| Right. | |
| And have you guys lived together before? | |
| We haven't, no. | |
| No. | |
| We were talking about it, but... | |
| Wait, sorry to interrupt. | |
| Is my understanding then that your first time living together is going to be with her parents? | |
| Yeah, yeah. | |
| Ooh, yeah. | |
| Bad? | |
| Yeah, well, I think... | |
| I'd feel more comfortable if she came back here. | |
| I think I can understand a little bit more of the anxiety. | |
| I think those other prior questions are useful and helpful, but I think I can get a little bit more of the anxiety now, right? | |
| Right. | |
| I'd feel more comfortable if she were to come back here and move into my place. | |
| That way it'd just be her and I, and we can, you know... | |
| It'd be our space, you know, our time, everything. | |
| Yeah, listen, I don't know. | |
| That doesn't seem very healthy to me, no matter what the parents are. | |
| They could be the best parents in the world. | |
| It just seems like if you're going to be living together for the first time, why would you want to go and move? | |
| I mean, because, you know, let's say you get married, so she's going to be a bride and a wife and all that. | |
| So she's kind of moving forward in her life at the same time she's going to move back in with her parents, which is kind of like childhood, right? | |
| Yeah, yeah, yeah. | |
| That's why I feel uncomfortable with the whole parental thing. | |
| I mean, it's like we're 30, she's 33, I'm 34, and it just doesn't sit well with me. | |
| So tell her let's not do that. | |
| Right, yeah. | |
| You know, like, let's not move on with our lives, and let's not jeopardize us living together with the complexity of you moving back in with your parents. | |
| Which, again, let's just say they're great parents. | |
| It's still kind of going into separate... | |
| You're going in opposite directions in terms of moving forward, and there being kind of a retroactive or retrograde aspect of things. | |
| Right, yeah. | |
| But certainly you need to, I mean, don't get me wrong, I really think it's important to ask these questions and to figure out why she was attracted to you. | |
| And that doesn't mean she shouldn't be attracted to you. | |
| Understanding the cause of something does not nullify the effects. | |
| Knowing what gravity is doesn't give you the power to fly. | |
| It just gives you the power to get to Jupiter if you want, right? | |
| So knowing why she was attracted to you and why she accepted gravity It's more than accepted why she praised your behavior with her presence. | |
| This is really, really important to understand. | |
| Why she praised your behavior with her presence. | |
| Everything which we continually expose ourselves to, particularly in the realm of love and romance, is what we praise. | |
| Okay, got it. | |
| Because she wasn't just putting up with you like you were some noisy guy in a class she had. | |
| Right, right. | |
| She is forsaking all others. | |
| She is with you. | |
| She is loving you. | |
| Right? | |
| I mean, so she is giving you the highest gift of herself at the same time as you have this history. | |
| She's not helped you get to the root of it to the point where you either were sadistic or you're calling yourself sadistic now when you weren't in the past. | |
| Right. | |
| Right. | |
| So these questions need to be asked and answered no matter what. | |
| The absence of knowing the real answers to all these questions about what it was in her childhood that made your behavior something she was willing to worship You need that answer no matter what. | |
| Certainly, if you end up moving in with her parents, you really need that answer, right? | |
| Because if there's stuff in her history that led her to be susceptible to some of your less productive or less functional aspects, and you don't know that, that's gonna... | |
| Right, yeah. | |
| And we've talked about it, man, at length for hours. | |
| And she's like, look, if it takes my coming back... | |
| Then, you know, to move into your place, you know, I'm back here to PA. She's like, then that's what it will take. | |
| So, yeah, she's willing to do that. | |
| I mean, I know you guys have been long distance. | |
| Has it been your whole relationship you've been long distance? | |
| Oh, no, no, no. | |
| Just to give you the brief timeline of that, we kind of grew up in the same town and whatnot. | |
| So she moved last June out to Montana. | |
| So you knew her parents when you were younger? | |
| Yeah, I've known them for quite a while, yeah. | |
| I've had many discussions with them about all kinds of topics, you know, shallow and deep. | |
| As people, I really, truly get along with them just fine. | |
| I've admired what they've done for their lives. | |
| I mean, her father was an entrepreneur and they planned for themselves very well. | |
| But like you said, there are questions there and there's anxiety there and anxiety. | |
| Trying to fight against it, like, push forward out to Montana anyways, is seemingly... | |
| No, no, don't do that. | |
| No, I mean, you will always end up being right. | |
| And just don't be right and surprised at the same time. | |
| Self-knowledge means you'll be right without being surprised. | |
| But a lack of self-knowledge means you'll be right and heartbreaking, right? | |
| You have a massive amount invested into this relationship. | |
| I do. | |
| Moving in... | |
| For the first time you lived together, moving in with her parents does not seem to me particularly wise. | |
| Nor I. And I can't give you some syllogistical argument that proves that. | |
| Right. | |
| I'm just telling you my gut. | |
| I could probably figure it out. | |
| I mean, I know I could if I had time. | |
| So don't take any of this as, I'm right. | |
| Part of me goes like, ooh, not a good idea. | |
| I mean, listen, seriously, don't you want to have loud sex? | |
| Yeah, we probably would anyhow. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Not too loud. | |
| Come on. | |
| I mean, you don't... | |
| I mean, loud sex with your parents in the house? | |
| We're kind of quiet when we have sex anyhow. | |
| We're not, like, horribly loud. | |
| I'm just not a loud, sexy person. | |
| I'm not saying you've got to do a Ricola commercial and yodel off the roof house off. | |
| I'm just saying that, you know, like, come down for breakfast in your underpants, you know? | |
| Oh, no, no, I hear you. | |
| I'm on the same page. | |
| I mean, my preference, as I said to her, is... | |
| It is for her to come back here and stay here, and then we re-establish ourselves. | |
| It's just us. | |
| What if you just want to make out while you're watching TV, you know? | |
| It's a little uncomfortable with old dad sitting there in his dressing gown, right? | |
| Right, yeah. | |
| So I'm just saying that you may – you're going to be losing a whole lot. | |
| And there is going to be a regressive element to moving in with parents – And again, this has nothing to do with the quality of parenting. | |
| It's just like, you know, if Isabella's moving in with me... | |
| When I'm 30, A, I'm happy because I've lived that long, and B, I would just say, I think that's not a good idea. | |
| Right. | |
| Because I don't want to hear her and her boyfriend making out or husband or whatever, right? | |
| I mean, yeah. | |
| I mean, you know, call me a Victorian. | |
| I'm not pretty much about sexual matters, but, you know, what if you just want to shag on the kitchen table, you know? | |
| Sometimes that can be tough when you're, you know... | |
| When your mother-in-law is having a tea party, sometimes that can pause, that can create some awkward pauses in the conversation. | |
| Sure. | |
| Yeah, yeah, yeah. | |
| Yeah, I'll have to sit down later today and have another conversation with her about it. | |
| Yeah, I would suggest. | |
| And, you know, really trust your instincts and give this relationship the best chance it can possibly have. | |
| That's what I'm trying to do. | |
| We both agree. | |
| I said to her, honestly... | |
| Parental stuff aside, you know, it does not matter where we live. | |
| It's about you, you and I being together, you know, moving forward together and committing to one another in a way that we hadn't before, you know? | |
| Yeah, listen, I mean, to give you fair warning, you're in your sort of early 30s. | |
| So if it doesn't work out with this woman, you're then going to have to find a woman in her 30s who doesn't have kids and doesn't want kids? | |
| Mm-hmm. | |
| Not easy. | |
| So really, you know, if you found someone you need or if you want kids, fantastic. | |
| And you give it the best possible chance. | |
| I mean, I think this is true with all relationships. | |
| You've got a parent you think is a jerk, give the relationship the best possible chance. | |
| Really talk to them and all that and try and sort it out. | |
| But yeah, I think that would be my strong suggestion is, you know, find some other way to have you guys live together. | |
| I mean, marry the girl, for God's sakes. | |
| You know, I mean, just do it. | |
| I mean, in my opinion, right? | |
| Don't be a pussy. | |
| But, you know, come on, it's been seven or eight years, you know, make an honest woman out of her. | |
| And I don't care if you never tell the government, right? | |
| I mean, first of all, you're going to be common law anyway, so people say, well, you're going to involve the government. | |
| Look, the government gets involved no matter what. | |
| I mean, they move in after a year or two, no matter what, right? | |
| That's true. | |
| I don't care if you never get a license. | |
| I mean, licenses don't make a marriage. | |
| But, you know, say I want to marry you, whether you get legally married or not doesn't matter. | |
| Just say, it's just, marry means I'm going to stay with you forever. | |
| Yeah. | |
| I'm not, I'm taking out my Wolfgang Puck eyeballs of booty scanning, and I'm going to, you know, you're now it for me. | |
| Forever. | |
| Forever. | |
| There's a security and confidence in all of that that can really help you lower your standards of personal hygiene. | |
| Anyway, but say to her, look, it's been seven or eight years. | |
| If you haven't figured out now whether you're going to be with her forever, then that's important to know as well. | |
| But just... | |
| Make an honest woman of her, or maybe she'll make an honest man of you. | |
| She'll be one of the three people who proposed to a man this year. | |
| Sorry, three women. | |
| I'm sure lots of men propose to each other. | |
| It becomes legal. | |
| It's definitely the thought of losing what we've built so far, especially the last two or three years, because when I first started listening to FDR, I began applying a lot of it where I was learning To my life and my behavior began to change. | |
| She was the first to notice and she's like, you've been talking about this stuff. | |
| She started listening to it herself and it's helped her a lot. | |
| She and I share a very, very solid philosophical understanding and solidarity and that's worth its weight in gold or platinum or whatever. | |
| It's very valuable to me. | |
| Great. | |
| Yeah, then hang on to her, you know, commit to her and give your relationship the best chance, which my gut instinct is to not move in with her parents, particularly if there are unknown variables to do with her childhood. | |
| Right, right. | |
| And that's really all I've got to say on the matter, but sorry, go ahead. | |
| Is your gut instinct because of the unknown variables? | |
| Is that why you think you're feeling that? | |
| Well, it's unknown variables, and when you first move in together... | |
| It's a delightful experience, and have that delightful experience in private. | |
| Okay, yeah. | |
| You know, like if you were saying, well, I'm going to get married and then move in to a frat house, I'd say, no, that's not a very good idea, right? | |
| Got it. | |
| And... | |
| Moving in with her mom and dad? | |
| No, that's, I mean, that's, it's less compatible to adulthood and maturity than, and also the fact that, is this okay with her parents? | |
| The fact that they're like, yeah, come live together with us, tells me something about their judgment as well. | |
| Right. | |
| Well, to them, they're, they're, It's an agreement that it's temporary. | |
| They said it was hard for us to get established out there, even with the money that they had, because it just takes work when you move a new space. | |
| I understand. | |
| If you guys need a base to stay to get started, then you can stay here. | |
| That's nice, but it's not... | |
| Again, I'm sure it comes from a good place and it's nice-hearted and all that, but without even talking about the... | |
| But, you know, I can see some downsides to that, you know, having a frank discussion. | |
| For them to say that, I think, would be important, right? | |
| It's a nice offer, don't get me wrong. | |
| It's this generous-spirited offer and so on, but saying, but listen, this issue is going to be your first time living together and this and that and the other, right? | |
| You know, plus, I've got to tell you, if some guy's dating my daughter for a long time and hasn't proposed, I'm having a talk with the guy. | |
| Yeah, okay. | |
| Yeah, you're right. | |
| Right? | |
| I mean, come on. | |
| I mean, do you think she's going to change in some fundamental way? | |
| I mean, are you waiting for her to grow a third boob out of her ass? | |
| I mean, come on. | |
| I mean, if she's good for you, then she's good for you. | |
| And if she's not good for you, then let her find someone who is. | |
| Right. | |
| Okay. | |
| All right. | |
| Thank you for the chat and the questions. | |
| Thank you very much. | |
| I certainly want the very best for you both. | |
| And I hope that this call helps at least give you some productive avenues of conversation. | |
| It has. | |
| I'm going to ask her if it's okay with you and her, if we can call in as a team sometime and have a chat over the airwaves. | |
| Yeah, just give a chat to send a ping off to Mike and he'll work on it. | |
| So I appreciate that. | |
| All right. | |
| Well, thank you, everyone. | |
| Thanks, James, so much for taking a break from your Sunday morning belly dancing classes to do the show. | |
| I really appreciate that. | |
| And Mike will be back next week. | |
| FDRURL.com forward slash donate. | |
| If you would like to help out the show, mostly macho-ly. | |
| I'm wonderfully appreciated. | |
| I was just thinking, I was going to tell you something weird about post-chemo. | |
| So my hair is growing back. | |
| It's grown all back. | |
| But my body hair is back kind of different. | |
| So before I was kind of like this British beluga and now I'm like this Italian brick worker. | |
| I don't know. | |
| It's just all kinds of strange. | |
| Anyway, I will end the show on an overshare. | |
| Have yourselves a wonderful week. | |
| I'll talk to you Wednesday night. |