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July 14, 2019 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

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Marriage is Terrifying - Freedomain Radio Call In Show, 7 April 2013

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	Good morning, everybody. It's a new month of the year for us all.
	Hope you're doing well. It's Steph.
	It's the 7th of April, 2013, and we have a full deck of fighter pilots of psychological self-knowledge freedom warriors up.
	So, rather than me doing a big intro, I will move right on to the first caller.
	How's it going, Steph?
	It's going very well. How are you doing?
	Doing good. Okay.
	I guess I was calling in today.
	I had an issue as far as like last weekend going on.
	I've been listening to these podcasts maybe since last June.
	And I think I've probably listened to about a little bit over a thousand of them.
	But I was at my grandparents' last weekend.
	And sorry about the dogs barking.
	We were talking about multiple subjects as far as religion and things like that.
	And then it got on to as far as raising kids and that.
	And my grandpa went on to say something that anyone knows how to raise a kid and basically it's stupid that I'm even worried about it or researching anything.
	You know, as far as, like, non-spanking, all this kind of stuff.
	And it kind of proceeded into us getting into an argument.
	Which, in this kind of, like, set in a bunch of stuff in my mind with the rest of my family and stuff.
	Which has also been, like, my parents.
	I've talked to them about this stuff.
	And they've probably listened about...
	Both of them, I think, are around the 200s that listen to the podcast and us talking about this stuff.
	But it kind of seemed like...
	Then after this happened, it seems like they're more about talking about it than actually living it, I guess.
	Right, right, right.
	Yeah, and I think you sent it.
	Oh, I was going to say, for me, I guess my main question is how do you judge?
	I know that stuff's hard and it takes a lot of time to process through.
	Everything and like how do you judge others to whether they're like trying or they like you know basically almost like being like a tar baby by getting you to try to like waste your time like trying to change something that's not that's a that's a great question it's a great question well we either make progress or we make excuses right so the first thing to look for for insincerity in the realm of philosophy is excuses are you receiving any of those Yeah,
	I mean, oh, here's stuff like, you know, that they just don't quite understand it enough, or this, or you've got to give them time.
	But then, you know, when the question comes, well, what part don't you understand?
	You know what I mean? You could figure that out or talk about it.
	And then, you know, it doesn't seem like they have, like, an actual part.
	It's like actually doing something is the problem that they don't understand.
	Right, right.
	So would you say that your grandparents, the typical thing would be that your grandparents are more on the aggressive side and your parents would be more on the appeasement side?
	Yeah, I think like, you know, I was kind of thinking back about the whole incident.
	And I was thinking like, because I had got like really mad and generally like raised my voice.
	Well, he was kind of, you know, I felt like saying that, you know, it's kind of like, I guess, as you kind of go through this, you kind of see, like, a bigger picture.
	And it's like, you try to make, you try to, like, not see, you know, the bad parts in some people like that, that you're, you know, like, say, a grandpa or something like that.
	But then, you know, you kind of, like, when someone puts out that attitude and you kind of, like, comes forefront there of, like, It's one thing to not know and to treat kids badly or not do a good job as a parent or anything, but then to put down trying to be better at it is to me what the big issue is.
	It's almost like in that moment you see the wrath that that caused throughout a family.
	Or even in my own life, I feel like just listening to this stuff is like I wasted so many years.
	I've done things that I wish I wouldn't have done and wasted years of my life.
	I'm lucky that I haven't had kids, haven't done any of that, like getting kids or anything.
	But it's kind of like almost in that moment.
	I don't know if other people don't see that, but that's kind of how it appears to me.
	It's those kind of attitudes and that kind of bullying when someone's trying to do better.
	It's almost to keep them down.
	Right. And that's where I kind of see him as like, you know, it's kind of like bullying.
	And whereas I see like, you know, maybe my parents and stuff is like, they're not so much as that.
	But they're scared to like, would be scared to like confront him about that.
	Right. Right.
	I mean, there's a huge number of issues that are embedded in this.
	Let me just take a swing at a few and obviously get your feedback as we go forward.
	Now, there are people who, the way that they're The way that they choose to survive how they're raised is they simply try to appease whoever has the most power in any given situation.
	And so what they do is they scan for the least mature, the least rational, the most bullying, the most aggressive person in the environment and then they will attempt to appease that person Now, the appeasement can take a variety of forms.
	It can be... They can appease a bully by joining in with the bully, you know, holding down victims and ganging up and all that kind of stuff, emotionally or physically.
	Or it could be, if they're a little bit more sophisticated, what can happen is they want to appease the bully, but they want to keep their knowledge of appeasing the bully away from themselves, which means that if they're in a situation...
	First of all, they'll try and create Situations where the bully will not be provoked.
	But if the bully is provoked, they will tend to kind of go neutral.
	In other words, they don't want to stand up to the bully.
	But at the same time, they don't want to join in with the bully.
	They're kind of halfway, you know, ghosts between the living and the dead.
	And so those kinds of situations can occur.
	And a huge amount of what is called politeness, what is called culture, What is called emotional intelligence, a huge amount of that is simply designed to not put appeasers in difficult situations by provoking a bully.
	And so, when you start bringing up aggression within a family, there are the bullies and there are the appeasers.
	Now, the appeasers desperately don't want you to provoke The bullies.
	And in general, in, you know, casting the net very wide, the appeasers tend to be a little bit more on the female side and the bullies tend to be a little bit more on the male side in various instances.
	In some instances, it's reversed, of course.
	But what happens is when you bring all of this stuff up, a huge fantasy castle is threatened.
	Because everybody lives in the castle called...
	I am loved and people are good, right?
	And these two things are the central pillars of everybody's fantasy castle.
	I don't mean that all love is a fantasy, but just in general, right?
	I'm just speaking in broad generalities, particularly for dysfunctional families.
	I am loved and people are good.
	Now, the I am loved is pretty important.
	I mean, there are very few families who outwardly deny that they love each other and say that they couldn't care less about each other or whatever, right?
	So that's generally, in dysfunctional families, that's a propaganda that's put forward.
	So I am loved. And the second thing is, and people are good.
	Because to be loved by bad people is a mark of shame, not of honor, right?
	I mean, if evil people are very pro-you...
	That's not good. That's not good for you at all.
	I mean, that's like being Mussolini to Hitler.
	I mean, Hitler was very pro-Mussolini when Mussolini gave him some support in the 30s.
	And to his detriment, Hitler actually remained loyal to Mussolini, you know, killer to killer throughout the Second World War.
	It was one of the things that contributed to the eventual speed of his downfall.
	So you can, you know, gain loyalty from evil people.
	And gain affection from evil people, but nobody wants to be conscious of that kind of love.
	So, I am loved and people are good, right?
	These two things are wrapped up in everybody's family identity.
	Hopefully, truly, but again, we're just going to focus on the dysfunctional aspects of that.
	Now, love involves differences.
	Everybody thinks that love involves similarities, but I don't really think that's true.
	I mean, love in action involves differences.
	I mean, if by some, I don't know, hell or heaven sent miracle, you had someone in your life, you agreed with that person in everything that they said, obviously there'd be affection, there'd be attachment and so on, but you'd never have any disagreements to work out.
	Now, obviously this is impossible because, I mean, People continually say, I don't agree with everything that Steph says.
	It's like, well, welcome to the club.
	Neither do I. Because I certainly don't have all the same opinions I had 10 or 15 or 20 seconds ago.
	Or minutes or years.
	So, what happens is, it's the difference where love shows up.
	When you disagree with someone, that's where love is really enacted.
	You don't need love to disagree.
	Get along with people who all have the same opinion.
	So, for instance, I mean, if you think of some sports game with the usual rabble-rousing idiots out there practicing their ancient art of preparatory warfare, painting themselves blue and chanting nonsense and so on, well, they all get along, right?
	Because they all agree our outfits, the outfits of the guys on our side of the street are the ones we're cheering for, we all cheer for them, right?
	So they all get along, but it's the team on the other side or the team with the different Cotton that they're worshipping that they have a problem with so that they don't really need a lot of love to get along because they're all getting along, right?
	I mean they all agree that on this particular sports configuration So it's in the difference of opinion that love shows up and wherever you see people afraid of having differing opinions you see that They are afraid of their knowledge that they are not loved because To not allow or explore a difference of opinion is to not allow for the existence of somebody else in your conscious space.
	And so when you disagree with someone in a family, if that person is aggressive or abusive or bullying or cold-hearted or, you know, what have you, then what you're doing is you're raising a light on the darkest corner of family life, which is Am I actually loved?
	And being loved means are disagreements welcome in my relationship?
	Because if you can't disagree with someone, then you live in a tyranny.
	If you can't disagree with someone, then you live in a tyranny.
	And if you live in a tyranny, then you are only loved to the degree that you erase yourself and conform to the rational expectations of bullies.
	And that ain't love, obviously, right?
	That's like calling a water that you pour into a container a chunk of ice that keeps that shape even if the container is taken away.
	No, I mean it's just a fluid that has to wrap around irrationality and aggression.
	Now if somebody in your life demands that you not disagree with them, gets angry and offended and outraged should you disagree with them, then that person is not a good person.
	It's pretty narcissistic.
	It's somebody who does not have the maturity, wisdom, and ego strength to handle, and in fact, to welcome the disagreements.
	I mean, I find it, I mean, when my wife and I disagree with each other, that's the major ground of fertility in our growth as a loving couple.
	When my daughter disagrees with me, I'm quite delighted.
	I think it's wonderful.
	When people disagree with me as a whole, I think it's a great opportunity for learning.
	And so the question of disagreements within families, within friendships, within work environments and so on, it's really important.
	When I was a boy in my early teens, I had a friend whose name was Jamie.
	And Jamie tragically died years later after I was no longer his friend in a motorcycle accident.
	But he was a bully. And, you know, my brother was away.
	I guess I needed another one.
	And I remember one time we were biking home.
	And he was biking behind me.
	We were just on little dirt bikes.
	Not motorized, just pedal bikes.
	And I guess I was 12 or 13.
	And there was a pebble ahead of me or some little rock ahead of me on the sidewalk and I swerved.
	And He almost crashed into the back of me, right?
	And he said, man, you cut me off, you know, and so on.
	And I said, you know, I suddenly realized that I was in an impossible situation.
	Like I had to swerve to avoid the stone, otherwise I could have pitched over my bike.
	And I said, no, man, you were tailgating.
	And man, you wouldn't believe what an incredible eruption this brought.
	And that was the end of our friendship.
	I mean, he ended up like screaming at me, throwing his bike around and so on, but I maintained that he was tailgating.
	I mean, he was riding too close to me.
	I had to swerve, so I did not cut him off.
	He was tailgating. But the idea that I would disagree with him and stick to that disagreement, and I didn't scream at him or anything, but I did hold firm to my position.
	Anyway, so I ended up not being his friend anymore, and He sort of called me a couple of times over the next little while, wanting to get together and so on.
	I didn't really want to, because I recognized, like, I kind of got that this was not going to be a good thing for me.
	And so the question of disagreement is really, really important.
	And whenever you...
	This is why so many people suppress disagreements.
	This is why, if you look at the endless garbage detritus trivia...
	That people waste their precious lives not talking about.
	Oh, it's fine weather for this time of year.
	How about them J's?
	I can't believe Barack Obama got into office!
	Right? Whatever nonsense is passing through conversation these days, it's because people don't want to expose topics that might cause disagreement.
	Because if the disagreement is punished, Then the illusion of being loved by good people is shattered.
	And so those are a few thoughts that I've had about what may have happened in your family interaction.
	This doesn't mean that everything's irreparable or anything like that, but those are my thoughts about it.
	But is this anywhere useful to the truth for you?
	Yeah, I think it's somewhat similar.
	Me and my fiancé had actually watched it.
	I wasn't sure exactly what it was, but we had just watched it.
	The Matrix again the other night, but I was telling her that's what it almost seemed like for my family is like kind of after this it was like their interaction with me is like They want me to go like see him or something or just say it's like okay or something like there's some kind of disruption going on like almost a disruption in there like matrix of something like that I need to apologize to him and or go talk to him or just kind of like make it water under the bridge and And I'm like, well, I said, I don't see why I was wrong in this conversation.
	I mean, if he's thought about it and he thinks that, you know, he sees where I'm coming from, that, you know, I mean, obviously it wouldn't be a dumb thing to do is to research how to raise a kid properly or, you know, trying to do your best or something like that.
	But it's like, it's kind of like they're looking at me like the onus is on me to, like, make it right.
	But, like, it's...
	Almost like not for me, like they want me to do something like for them.
	It's like I'm not...
	I mean, that kind of makes sense.
	It's kind of... But you see, why is it that you would be required to apologize?
	Right? I mean, this is an important question.
	Because appeasers...
	And again, I'm trying not to put any sort of moral judgments.
	I'm just sort of identifying characteristics, at least as I see them.
	But appeasers, you see...
	We'll always try to get the least dangerous person to bend to the most dangerous person.
	Right? So in a way, it's a mark of honor that you're the one who's being asked to apologize for being the victim of bullying.
	Because if they were swarming over to your granddad and saying to him, you have to apologize to your grandson, that would be because...
	You were less rational and more dangerous than he was.
	And this is one of the main problems in dysfunctional relationships, is that the more mature you are, the more rational you are, the more you are victimized.
	Because they know you're not going to scream at them, or I don't know what your granddad would do, but they're aware that you're not going to be as aggressive and as destructive or possibly as abusive.
	As the granddad, and so you're the one who has to bend.
	You're the one who has to change.
	And this constant wrapping of rational people's souls around the prickly irrationalities of other people are what appeasers are constantly doing.
	And you understand that your grandfather's power comes largely as a result of the appeasement of your parents.
	He knows that they're going to start working on you so he doesn't have to lift a finger.
	But the argument that everybody knows how to raise children, I mean, gosh, you don't even have to be into peaceful or philosophical parenting or this conversation or anything like that.
	I mean, if everybody knew how to raise children, why on earth are there so many different styles of raising children?
	I mean, you don't even have to think for more than a second to figure that one out, right?
	I mean, if everybody knows innately or instinctively how to raise children, then...
	Why do some parents abuse their children?
	Why do some parents spank?
	Why do some parents not spank?
	Why do some parents send their children to public school or private school or homeschooling or unschooling?
	Why do some children travel with their parents and other parents stay home?
	Why do some, in some families, two parents go to work?
	In some families, one parent goes to work.
	In lucky families, no parents go to work, right?
	I mean, that doesn't even take any philosophical understanding or any research or any statistics to rebut.
	So, I mean, of course nobody knows how to raise children.
	That's like saying everybody knows which god to worship.
	Well, no, because there are 10,000 gods, and agnosticism and strong and weak atheism are the third-lasting religion.
	So, of course people don't know which god to worship.
	Does that make sense? So, of course people don't know.
	I mean, of course people don't know instinctively how to raise children.
	Yeah, I mean, that's kind of like what the feeling was.
	And then that's kind of what I saw more as like, because it wasn't like anything even controversial.
	It was, you know, we were having a discussion.
	And then one of my cousins said something, well, you know, because I was talking about not spanking or something like that.
	And she said, well, I can't wait till you have kids.
	Like, you know, it was like people do.
	And then they try to act like...
	You know, you're going to change everything when you have kids because, you know, you just don't know what it's like or something.
	But she doesn't have kids either.
	And I was saying, you know, I'm really looking forward to it when I do, you know, have kids.
	And, you know, it's exciting to me.
	And then my mom had said something about how I'd been reading, you know, some different books.
	I watched some DVDs from that Dr.
	Faye Snyder. Just trying to get information and stuff.
	And then these podcasts and things like that.
	But then for him just to say that, I mean, there's nothing even controversial saying that.
	It was just like research and stuff.
	And then just to come down and like put that down and just, I don't know.
	And that's where I felt like, you know, maybe part of it was me.
	You know, it was really negative towards me.
	And then that's when I told him, I said, well, you didn't know how to be a good father, you know.
	And then we kind of went down that road and me saying the reasons why he wasn't.
	But it was kind of like... I'm sorry, who were you saying that to?
	Enraging. My grandfather.
	Well, you get that's pretty inflammatory, and I'm not blaming you for it.
	I just, in the awareness of the conversation, you get that that's pulling a grenade out, right?
	Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I know that.
	I mean, particularly if it's true, right?
	Yeah. Yeah, no, and then I was given the reasons why, so it was...
	I mean, it went real inflammatory.
	I mean, you know, I know that.
	That's what, like, raising the stakes was like, just me is kind of like, almost like, I just, like, pulled a grenade right there.
	It's like, okay, this is it, you know, kind of thing.
	And I'm not sure why I didn't, you know, did that.
	Let's just poke around that moment for a second.
	Because, I mean, I don't have any problem with what you did, but not that it would matter if I did, right?
	But But the important thing is to know why you did what you did.
	So, why do you think you said that in that moment?
	I mean, if you've listened to a thousand podcasts, you know that that's either going to be a breakthrough or a deal breaker, right?
	You know, it's just...
	You know, I think it's just from being over there and then just, sometimes I'm like, I'll get, yeah.
	Honestly, after thinking about it, I mean, I'm not sure of time, but thinking back about it, I think it was, like, just kind of the culmination of that conversation.
	But I think it's, like, going over there is probably the only, I mean, like, within the last five months.
	I mean, if Is anywhere that I've went where someone would like say something like that would be to his, you know, like to me or like, you know, kind of as I saw that as like, you know, disparaging something good that I'm doing is kind of almost, you know, morally, you know, wrong to me in my mind, you know.
	And it's like, I think I was more, you know, mad at myself and maybe I'm blowing it up so I wouldn't go there anymore, you know.
	It's like, why would I keep going to a place where a person holds these kind of values?
	That's kind of what I came up with afterwards.
	It was kind of almost being mad at myself for being there.
	I mean, why would I be there where someone would talk like that?
	Now, you said that in this interaction, your parents were pretty quiet, right?
	Well, it was just my mom was there.
	But you said she was pretty quiet?
	Yes. No, she was like, I mean, like when I looked at her face, once this thing started, you know, she just went like, it was almost like a look of like, fear and like, like, just scared, like didn't know, you know, what to think, you know?
	Do you think you were channeling her?
	I never thought about that.
	It's just like...
	Look, if you see someone who makes your mom scared, Then it seems to me that you would want to protect your mom, right?
	Or stand up for your mom.
	Yeah. Yeah, I don't...
	I mean, I'm thinking about that now.
	Like, you know, maybe...
	Well, that's one of the things, too, is like, because...
	Now, as far as with...
	You know, if you just ask, like, some...
	A person that my mom knows, they would say that she's very controlling and strong and you don't see her vulnerable or anything like that really ever.
	I have two siblings even with them.
	Me and her have a pretty good relationship.
	I mean, even since I was young, we'd talk, and she'd always, you know, kind of listen to me, not to say it.
	Obviously, she's done plenty of stuff that, you know, wasn't nice to me that, you know, we've talked about now.
	But, yeah, you know, dealing with her parents, like, she can't, or, I mean, obviously she can, but I'd probably make an excuse for her, but she is, like, scared to, like, talk to him.
	Like, she's scared to talk to her dad.
	And, you know, or even, you know, really to be vulnerable about, you know, how she was affected as a child and what happened to her, you know?
	Right. So it could be, I mean, the people who are the quietest in a disagreement are sometimes the ones who are controlling it the most through projection, right?
	And so...
	It could be that your mom, like, you know, in a sense, you could be saying to your granddad, well, look, there were problems with your parenting, and do you know why?
	Because I'm having a disagreement with you, and my own mother is afraid to say anything, to come to the defense of her son, to reason with you.
	That's how scared she is of you.
	Don't you think that's a bit of a problem?
	Yeah, yeah, I mean, that kind of, like, just, like, kind of hit for as far as, like, kind of how I felt in the moment, like, I've seen her, you know, and part of the thing was, too, is, like, you know, he wasn't, he was, like, this is, you know, stories that I've heard, you know, over the time, is, like, that he would go and, and he would go out and, like, drink a lot.
	He was, like, an alcoholic, but he wasn't, like, abusive or nothing.
	He just kind of wasn't there, but, you know, and that made it dysfunctional between Him and my grandma.
	And so there was a lot of this stuff.
	One of the things I brought up to him was that he was an alcoholic and that.
	And then he's like, well, then he's saying he was an alcoholic.
	And my grandma and my mom were there.
	And I was like, ask them.
	They're the ones that have told me.
	And then they're all just sitting there quiet.
	They don't say anything. It's like, you know, you guys are the ones giving me this information.
	You know, everyone likes to complain about this stuff, but no one likes to talk to the actual people, you know, who it affects.
	Like, you know, if I have a problem with my mom, I shouldn't tell, you know, my cousin to tell her.
	You know what I mean? Or just complain to somebody else like I should go talk to her about it.
	And, like, no one, you know, does that.
	No one talks to them about, like, how stuff affects them, like, you know, what's going on.
	You know, what their feelings are about stuff.
	It's like that's, you know, very difficult.
	Like, no one really does that in our family.
	Well, you said he was an alcoholic.
	He wasn't abusive, right?
	Yeah. Yeah.
	I don't agree with that at all.
	In fact, I don't think I could more strongly disagree with that.
	And it doesn't mean I'm right. I don't have any technical definition of the term.
	But to me, alcoholism is one of the greatest curses and plagues In the world, and it is uniquely destructive in families.
	It is abusive. To be a parent and to be an alcoholic is to be abusive, and there's a number of reasons for that.
	First of all, I mean, from the least important to the most important, it bleeds money in productivity, causing financial instability.
	More importantly, The emotional state of the drunkard is frightening to children because they recognize somebody who's out of control and not knowing when it's going to end and how it's going to end.
	And everyone thinks that the drinking is the major problem.
	Of course it is, but then there's the hangover the next day.
	But most importantly, sorry, more importantly, though not most importantly, more importantly, also there becomes the big elephant in the room that no one can talk about.
	So you train children to silence and avoidance of an essential truth.
	And the person who stays with the alcoholic is even worse because they're sober.
	At least the alcoholic has the excuse of being drunk half the time.
	But the person who keeps children in the proximity of an alcoholic is even worse than the alcoholic.
	I mean, that's knowingly exposing your children to a brain-destructive toxin.
	But most abusively, of course, is that the alcoholic is emotionally unavailable to the children.
	And neglect is, as far as I understand it, the worst kind of abuse.
	We know that neglect is the worst kind of abuse because children will act out in order to avoid being ignored.
	They would rather be hit than neglected.
	So, again, I don't know how bad this was, but to me, if you say he was alcoholic but not abusive, that's a contradiction in terms.
	Yeah, I'm sorry. I should clarify that.
	I didn't mean it as non-abusive.
	I should say not physically abusive.
	I should say that. You know, I was just, I guess, for the stereotype.
	You know, that's just as far as what it's, you know, told to me, obviously.
	Well, I mean, you're just trying to rescue a situation, right?
	So if I never hit my daughter but screamed in her face every day, would I then get to say, well, I wasn't physically abusive?
	Well, I was. Because my screaming at my child changed her brain.
	changed her nervous system permanently so it is physical abuse to fail to provide what is necessary for children's development and the fact that it is in a sense passive people sometimes think it makes it better but really it makes it worse the stuff which is not provided to children is far more damaging than the negative stuff that is inflicted on them in my understanding of the research and of course people can correct me if I'm if I'm way off but I mean,
	if you look at the situation now where you stood up to someone who was spouting abusive and destructive lies, like everyone knows how to parent and you don't need to learn anything and spanking is fine.
	This is evil stuff to be spouting.
	And... I'm sure, like, look at the amount of contradictions that your mom had to, and is still having to go through, to attempt to deal with this situation.
	Which is, obviously, she, when you were a kid, I would imagine she told you to stand up for what you believe in, right?
	Yeah. And here, in this instance, you were standing up for what you believe in.
	And not irrationally.
	You weren't like, you know, the moon landing is a hoax, you bastard.
	I mean, so you were standing up with facts, with good arguments for what you believe in, and she betrayed you.
	And she's continuing to betray you by demanding that you apologize for speaking the truth to somebody who was saying some pretty immoral stuff.
	So, on the one hand, you know, stand up to bullies, stand up for what you believe, and do the right thing.
	And then in this instance, oh, you stood up for what you believe in and you did the right thing.
	Well, I'm going to abandon you in the moment of conflict and then attack you afterwards.
	I mean, that's pretty painful, right?
	Yeah. Yeah, and that's the thing.
	So I can even hear when you're saying this, and she's probably going to listen to this, but it's that she wouldn't see it as demanding.
	She'd be like, oh, I'm not going to...
	I would never make you have to do something like that or ask you to do something you wouldn't want to do, but it would mean a lot to her.
	But see, that's a contradiction.
	Do you want to play your mom and I'll play you?
	Because that's a pretty big contradiction.
	I'm not going to ask you to do something you don't want to do, so I'm just going to ask you to do something you don't want to do.
	I mean, to keep those two things, let's double think, right?
	That's pure 1984, right?
	Yeah. Do you want to try role play or do you want to...
	Sure.
	Okay, so you be your mom and how is she telling you to apologize?
	Well, so she hasn't told me to apologize.
	It's basically they just want me to go there and like, you know, basically act like there's nothing wrong now.
	You know, and that's the thing.
	And now he's like, he's got sick, so he's like in the hospital.
	And so there's like, and there's, you know, all the guilt that comes along with that.
	But like, would you...
	So if I was like talking to you and say...
	Were you going to come by and see your grandpa?
	Well, if we can have a continuation of the conversation, I think it would be a good thing to have.
	I mean, obviously, I touched on some pretty serious family issues that go back generations, you know, to his childhood and his parents' childhoods and way back.
	So I would really like to have a chance to continue to clear this stuff up because I don't think it was particularly satisfying the last time.
	Well, we can't talk to him about that stuff right now.
	You know, he's sick, he's on steroid medications, and he's a little bit confused.
	But I know you love your grandpa.
	Why don't you just come down here and you can see him?
	How do you know that I love him?
	Well, I just know you do.
	Well, I know, but how do you know that I do?
	I actually said that to her.
	It just kind of went blank and switched to something else.
	No, no. I mean, look, I understand that.
	Like, you're supposed to love your grandpa and all that kind of stuff.
	And obviously, you know, as you're playing as you, I have an attachment and this and that.
	But I can't love him equally if he advocates hitting children.
	I can't love him equally as if he doesn't advocate that.
	Like, the two can't be equal.
	There's not a category called grandfather that I love, which is completely unaffected by what my grandfather does.
	The fact that you were terrified of him does not make me like him a huge amount, right?
	Because you're my mom, I love you, and anyone who scares you does not rise to number one in my fanbase when I'm around them, right?
	Because I could see how scared you were.
	And I got a sense of how scared you were growing up and all that.
	So if somebody hurts or frightens someone that I love, then I kind of have a split, right?
	Like a dichotomy, so to speak.
	Because I can't love someone who bullies someone I love equally to the person that I actually love, right?
	So I can't love him for bullying you or frightening you throughout your life, right?
	As much as I love you, because that would be a contradiction.
	In other words, I love you and I love someone who harms you or has harmed you at the same time.
	That can't fit.
	Does that make any sense? Yeah, yeah.
	Now, sorry, is there anything else you wanted to say about that?
	Just one last thought.
	No, nothing else about that.
	I have sympathy for everyone involved.
	I mean, I don't want to sound like all kinds of Buddhist or anything like that.
	I mean, it's a deep tragedy for everyone involved.
	It's a deep tragedy that this stuff wasn't dealt with before your grandfather got sick.
	And of course, if it is going to be, you know, talk it over with his doctor and say, listen, we've got some conversations that might be upsetting, but, you know, stuff we need to talk about, you may want to wait till he gets better or, you know, you can talk to the doctor and say, Is this going to be destructive to his health if he gets upset and all that?
	And if the doctor says yes, then I would refrain myself at that particular time until he gets better or whatever.
	But you can still talk about it with your mom and your dad and your siblings.
	But I will say this, that I think it's kind of impossible to understand families without understanding that They are a quasi-monopolistic religious cartel, for the most part. Again, this is generalizations focusing particularly on dysfunctional families.
	So we all know that there's not much point going to the post office and demanding better service, right?
	Why is that? Well, I mean, I guess because they're going to get paid whether you go in there and mail stuff or not.
	Yeah, because, I mean, they can't get fired.
	Customer service business.
	How they behave doesn't matter.
	Like, I've had the occasional problem with the Canadian healthcare system, right?
	Because it's communist, right?
	It's a terrible communist system.
	You know, there's three places in the world where you are legally prohibited from buying your own healthcare.
	North Korea, Cuba, and fucking Canada, right?
	So, it's a terrible system.
	And it works about as well as any communist system does.
	And that doesn't mean that it always works badly, because even in the communist system, in Soviet Russia, there were some good doctors, some people who actually cared about their patients and tried to do a good job.
	But if you're in Soviet Russia in 1950 and you're lining up for two hours every day to get a loaf of bread, does it do you any good to yell at the shopkeeper?
	No. No.
	No, because the system as a whole is terrible.
	And individuals may try to provide good service within that system, but yelling at any individuals when there's a bad system is kind of wretched, right?
	I mean, you know, whenever I talk about how terrible education is, people say, well, I know some good teachers.
	Well, so what? I mean, the whole point is that bad systems don't work.
	And a system's quality is defined by its voluntarism.
	Let me say that again. This is one of the most important things I ever say.
	A system's quality is almost completely defined by its level of voluntarism.
	Voluntarism is quality.
	Now, we have a system in this world where parents and grandparents basically can't be fired.
	And they can't be fired Largely because there is a religious cartel called honor thy mother and thy father, which is the 110 commandment we have yet to do much with, to examine much, rationally with.
	You know, we've examined the husband-wife one and we've said, well, no, if your husband is bad or your wife is bad, then you should leave.
	But with regards to the parent-adult-child relationship, We still have, essentially, a religious public monopoly.
	And so, in a weird kind of way, getting angry at the individuals involved, well, emotionally resonant and not unimportant at all, is certainly not going to solve the problem.
	It's like getting angry at a post office worker or someone at the DMV because it's slow.
	Well, it's slow because it's not...
	It's not voluntary, right?
	I mean, there was nothing that anyone in particular could do to make communism work.
	Communism always fails, miserably, bloodily, destructively.
	And it's the system as a whole, it's the premises that underlie the system as a whole that needs to be changed.
	Now, the adult-child-child relationship is not voluntary, right?
	That's fine. That's the way it is.
	Can't be changed. It's like getting angry that women have to have children.
	Well, that's the way that Zeus made it.
	Not much we can do about it. But I know, I know for a simple, economic, philosophical fact, that if I simply assumed that my daughter was going to have to spend time with me, no matter what I did, no matter how I acted, do you think that my parenting would improve or not improve?
	Not improve. Right.
	The moment you say to someone, no matter what happens, you can't be fired.
	We all know that job performance is going to decline for most people.
	And so the promotion of volunteerism within the family, this is why I keep hammering on the same point.
	It's not to punish anyone.
	It's not to cause problems.
	It's simply because the world cannot improve until parenting improves.
	And parenting cannot improve until voluntarism is injected into the relationship.
	The privatization of the family away from the religious cartel is the essence of improving the world.
	It is what hinges the difference between war and peace, between freedom and slavery, between debt and wealth, between liberty and tyranny.
	It is that important. The introduction of voluntarism in the family is the most fundamental fork in the history of humanity that will lead us to Genuine, real, sustainable, virtuous, peaceful freedom.
	Or not. And so this is why I keep hammering this point.
	It's not because I like to be controversial.
	It's not because I want to cause problems within families.
	It's simply because I really, really care about whether hundreds of millions of people live or fucking die.
	That's why I do it.
	Because I really care about hundreds of millions of people, no joke, whether they live or die.
	And after...
	All the research that I've done over many decades, reading The Origins of War and Child Abuse, reading Robin Grille's Parenting for a Peaceful World, highly recommended.
	The facts are about as incontrovertible, the Bomb in the Brain series, fdrurl.com forward slash bib, please check it out.
	The facts are about as incontrovertible as they can possibly be.
	That it's better parenting or a smoking crater where the future will be.
	And I simply...
	Cannot conceive, and I'm really open to hearing this, I simply cannot conceive of how to improve parenting in the absence of promoting voluntarism any more than I can conceive how to improve the quality of the post office without privatizing it.
	In other words, without taking it from a government cartel to a voluntary free market association.
	And if anyone can find out a way to keep something socialist or communist or fascist and have it continue to improve to the point where it reaches the quality of a free market interaction, you all please send me those studies.
	And I will change my mind.
	But I know of no such studies after having read about this stuff for about 30 years.
	The way that you solve cartels is you voluntarize them.
	You privatize them. That's how you improve quality.
	Now, I have no doubt that for the people who are part of that monopoly, part of that cartel, part of that government union or that public union, privatization kind of sucks.
	I get it. I really do.
	I really do. But I was taught when I was young to do the right thing and to stand up for what I believe in.
	Everybody told me that. Everybody taught me that.
	And if people don't like the fruition of the lessons that they provide to the young, then they should be honest with the young and say, no, don't stand up for what you believe in.
	Go along with the herd like I do.
	Don't question the assumptions like I do.
	Don't upset anyone like I do.
	Be a lemming, be a sheep, be a leaf floating on the foaming stream of culture heading off the waterfall to the infinite depths of future tyranny.
	But I really listened to what I was told.
	I was told adult relationships are voluntary.
	That's why everyone around you is divorced.
	That's what I was told.
	I was told that if you are not satisfied with a relationship, you should end it.
	That's what I was told. And that's what I grew up with in the 70s, when the divorce rate went up 300-400%.
	And everyone around me were single moms.
	And dads were not only not there, but they were not ever there.
	They were gone, baby gone.
	Because I was told, stand up for what you believe in.
	Do the right thing. Don't join gangs.
	Reject people who advocate the use of violence.
	I was told that. You know, if somebody wants to go beat someone up, don't go with them.
	If somebody advocates violence, don't have anything to do with them, Steph.
	Little Steph. My daughter likes to play with me as a little boy, and she calls that little boy Little Steph.
	And she likes to show Little Steph stuff and play with Little Steph and so on, which is actually a huge amount of fun for me.
	But that's what little Steph was told.
	And, you know, all I did was listen.
	And most people, they really don't like it when you listen to their moral instruction and then act on it in a way that's inconvenient to them.
	Suddenly, the morals change, but you're never told that they change.
	You're just told to ignore it, which is what you're being faced with, right?
	Yeah. And just you saying that, and it kind of just brought up another feeling as far as for me, is that It's like, in listening to this stuff, and I've seen it with my own eyes, is dealing with people.
	And I do believe, I honestly believe that, that it would change the world, just the better parenting and stuff like that, and the Bomb and the Brain series.
	And I've actually watched that with my parents, you know, so I know my mom's aware of this stuff, and she agrees with me.
	So then to, like, her be there, and then him say that, and her just be quiet, it's You know, and that kind of goes back to my whole thing of this stuff.
	It's like, are you just saying it or do you not believe it?
	I mean, because it doesn't matter if you have every bit of information in the world how to do everything.
	Like, if you're not going to stand up for it, then nothing's going to ever change.
	But look, I mean, with all too sympathy to your mom, if your mom could speak up, then the bomb in the brain would be somewhat falsified, right?
	Do you see what I mean? The negative impacts of bad childhoods do show up.
	That's how we know. If your mom was raised by a destructive alcoholic and she was able to fully stand up to him, to confront him, to support her son, to not have to take his side in irrational disagreements, then everything that psychologists talk about in terms of childhoods Would not make any sense.
	It would be like finding some communist country where everything was way more efficient than the free market.
	So on that, I feel confused.
	What would I expect out of her then?
	Well, I would say that freedom in relationships is don't expect something out of her.
	Just be curious. What are you feeling now?
	How do you feel now? What did you feel in that interaction?
	Just be curious and try to understand curiosity.
	If a defense can be penetrated, curiosity is the only thing that will penetrate it.
	Ask her about her childhood.
	Ask her about her experience. That to me is much more important than confronting her father.
	To have expectations is not to have a relationship.
	A relationship is communicating honestly and openly and with vulnerability in the moment.
	Expectations are about control.
	They are also subtle signals to manipulate others.
	So try to abandon expectations as much as possible, I would say.
	And simply work on intimacy and honesty.
	I guess on that note, as far as like...
	I feel like that's hard for me and I don't know where that comes from as far as the expectations but I feel like part of me too is with my parents and stuff is I want to you know, part of me wants to believe that they are working in a sense to learn this stuff and that they do agree with it and stuff and they have apologized to me and I've been able to open my feelings to you know My thoughts about my childhood with them and everything.
	But I don't want to also feel like I'm making excuses because that is what I want, I guess.
	I don't know. But let me put a possible mild correction in front of you and see if it makes any sense.
	You are looking at your parents relative to the values that you have proposed and that they approve of, right?
	So you're comparing your parents to To values, right?
	To what? Can you say that again?
	To the values, right?
	To the values that you've proposed and that they, to some degree, have accepted, right?
	I think that a deeper and richer kind of empathy would be that their dad is really sick, right?
	He's in hospital. And When people are under stress, their relationship to their values tends to change to some degree, right?
	I mean, sometimes it can be hard enough sticking up for what you believe in or what you know is true, even when you're sort of relaxed and calm.
	So the fact that their father is very sick brings up all kinds of questions of mortality.
	It also brings up, like anything that changes in a relationship kicks up a lot of old wounds if they're there.
	Which is why people tend to be so static in their relationship.
	So when you go over, you just talk about the same stuff, or you go to the same places, it's all a ritual.
	You have to do the same thing all the time.
	Because if there's any changes, then people's control over their own histories begins to weaken, and stuff comes up which is unexpected in that.
	I mean, one of the definitions of dysfunctional relationships is rigidity, inflexibility.
	We all get old. We all get sick.
	We're all going to die. That brings a lot of change to relationships.
	And when change occurs in relationships, a lot of old stuff can get kicked up.
	So, if I were you, and I don't know what anyone should do, really, but if I were you, I would really sit down and talk to my mom and my dad.
	You know, how is it for you that granddad is sick?
	Let's put all that other stuff aside.
	I mean, this guy was a Living God to your childhood.
	And how is it for you that he's sick?
	I mean, that I think is probably having a lot to do with things at the moment.
	Also, when people who were abusive as parents, when they get old, they gain some power back, right?
	Which is called illness.
	And so it could be that there's a reawakening or a reinfliction of old power because your grandfather is sick.
	Right? I mean, talk to anyone who's had problems with their parents.
	I mean, when the parents get old and sick, it's really tough, right?
	Because suddenly there's this power again which there hasn't been for decades.
	Yeah, I actually work in a nursing home as far as a The elderly and stuff and families and all that kind of stuff.
	Yeah, so, I mean, I want to make sure we get to the other callers, but I would certainly recommend, and look, first of all, if your parents do ever listen to this, like, massive congratulations on looking at this material.
	I hugely appreciate it.
	I'm sure your son does as well.
	Huge congratulations.
	Massive sympathies for growing up in the chaos of alcoholism.
	An alcoholic household.
	That's just wretched.
	I mean, that's just wretched and terrible.
	It is an evil, evil juice that the devil shits into the cups of way too many parents.
	And so I'm really, really sorry about that.
	And I'm really sorry, of course, that your dad is sick.
	That really does bring up a lot of stuff.
	So, you know, just lots and lots of sympathies, lots of lots of respect, lots of congratulations and thanks.
	And I hope you guys have a good conversation about this because, you know, speaking about mortality is really, really important.
	And people who fail to process mortality are the only people who can genuinely handle repetition without going insane.
	Repetition, like just doing the same stuff all the time, talking about the same stuff all the time, avoiding anything important all the time.
	All that happens because people's emotional growth gets stuck in a toddler view of mortality, right?
	My daughter says, so-and-so died, but after a long time, they will come back, right?
	And so, when we feel that we're immortal, which is a very early stage of emotional development, when we feel that we're immortal, we can handle repetition.
	Now, when mortality arises through the illness of an elder often, or our own illness sometimes, when mortality arises, we panic.
	So you said earlier, I've wasted years.
	That's a good kind of panic to have.
	That's a good kind of panic to have because it's a recognition that we don't have an infinite series of years coming spitting out.
	It's not a Las Vegas machine where we just keep getting coins forever.
	We're all going to run out.
	We're all going to Run or fall or slip or merge into that great brick wall called the end of me.
	And that's one of the things that I think motivates us to enrich and to deepen our experiences.
	Repetition is only tolerable by people who think they have an eternity in which to deepen.
	And the problem is, of course, we don't.
	And if you avoid depth and connection for long enough, you end up unable to do it.
	And that's, I think, pretty tragic.
	So, anyway, I hope that you guys have a great chat about it.
	And I'm very sorry about the topic, but I'm very optimistic about the possibility of connection.
	All right. Well, thank you, Steph, for your time, man.
	Welcome. You're welcome. And if you get a chance, do drop me a line, operations at freedomainradio.com, and let me know how it goes.
	All right. Thanks. Next up, we have Adia.
	Hello. Can you hear me? Hello.
	Are you doing this fine Sunday morning?
	I'm very well. How are you doing?
	A little bit harried.
	I was trying to get on earlier, but I had some other important things to take care of, but now I'm here.
	Other important things?
	Well, thank you, Steph, for that vote of confidence.
	So what's that? Before I even had a chance to get my issue out.
	This is a follow-up of an email that I sent earlier, so they recommended that I... I call into the show and it is a great honor and a privilege to be able to call in.
	I have been listening to your stuff for a couple of months and I have to give you tons of kudos for bringing philosophy to a wider audience because I myself am a philosophy major and I have been immersed in the subject for many years.
	Ah, good, good. Well, thank you.
	So the question I have and it's a good thing I caught the tail end of the previous caller because it's Part of that's been on my mind for a while and I wanted to know if you had any specific guidance or advice to somebody in my stage of life.
	I am 41 years old.
	I'm not married. I don't have any kids and I don't have any desire to have kids.
	So marriage is kind of sort of on the plate and after I turned 40 I've been thinking about a lot of things.
	I guess that's around the age when you start to To reassess your place in life and where it is that you want to go.
	So I'm sort of satisfied in career but not entirely and kicking around the idea of starting my own business and getting into entrepreneurship, something I really haven't done in the past.
	But it's more or less trying to decide what to do in the next 20 years of your life.
	Sorry, when you said marriage is on the table, does that mean that you might be engageable or you might be getting engaged?
	Not anytime soon.
	Kids, I decided a long time ago that I didn't want any and as I've gotten older, it just reinforced that.
	Marriage is kind of iffy.
	This is based on your one video and some things I've been reading online about why men are shying away from marriage because it's pretty well a raw deal in today's society.
	It's not like I don't want to be in a relationship.
	But to be married and then I guess once you reach a certain age, you're kind of like, what's the point?
	Yeah, I mean marriage with the right person is the best thing ever but man, if you miss, it's just horrible.
	It's absolutely a life-wrecking institution if you go, if you get the wrong person and there are lots of wrong people out there.
	I won't even tell you how many women I dated before I got married, but it was a lot, and they were all quite mad.
	And if I had gotten married to any of them, it would have been a complete catastrophe, like, for my life, especially if I'd had kids.
	So, it's a very dangerous, you know, I mean, it's another kind of cartel, which has to do with government laws and custody laws and divorce laws and all that kind of stuff, so...
	Yeah. So yeah, I mean, I certainly respect your caution.
	There is something that happens around the age of, you know, early to mid-40s, which is something Dustin Hoffman said a couple of years ago.
	He said, you know, he said, I'm 60.
	And you know, one of the things about 60 is you can't double it and still be alive.
	And there is a sort of fulcrum in the middle of life, right?
	I'm 46. So again, maybe I'll make it to 92.
	I hope so. But maybe not.
	And so there is this thing that happens where And of course, what if I make it to 92, but I've been senile for 5 years or 10 years, right?
	That's no good. I think philosophy will help with that, but who knows, right?
	So there is something that happens.
	It used to be in your 30s because our life expectancy was, you know, 50 to 60, but now it's in your 40s where you're like, wow, you know, I'm probably more than half done.
	So I can understand that.
	You know, whether you should start your own business or not, hard to say.
	It's hard to say. Because it really depends where your values are, where your values lie.
	I very much like the entrepreneurial life.
	I don't...
	Just generally because I feel that I'm smarter than most people around me.
	And so it would, to me, be taking diet advice from a fat guy to go work for somebody else.
	It just doesn't really work for me.
	So if you have...
	People, oh, you shouldn't say that.
	It's nonsense. False modesty is just another kind of hypocrisy.
	We want reasonable evaluations of who we are and where we are.
	It's not vanity to say that you're good at something that you're good at.
	It's not vanity for me to say, I'm really good at philosophy.
	It would be vanity for me to say, I can fill Carnegie Hall with my operatic renditions.
	I think that would be irrational.
	But if you have a reasonable evaluation of where you are, if you feel that – and you have some evidence for this that you make better decisions than people around you, then I think entrepreneurship is the way to go because otherwise you simply will be in a very iceberg-strewn sea.
	You will be putting yourself in the care of a blindfolded captain of a ship.
	I would guess if you studied philosophy and you like this show, well, you're probably smarter than your average bear.
	So in which case I think entrepreneurship would make a good deal of sense.
	Thank you.
	Did you find that you were afraid when you set down the entrepreneurship path?
	Afraid isn't the word. Terrified would be the word.
	Yeah, it's complete terror.
	And terror is innate to desire, right?
	You can't want something without being afraid that you're not going to get it, right?
	So the more you want something, the more you're scared you're not going to get it.
	And there is a vulnerability, of course, in putting yourself out there and trying to succeed at something.
	If you really want it, then...
	Like once I started in the entrepreneurial world, like I went from being a junior programmer to being, you know, the chief technical officer.
	And that was a huge, huge change.
	And once I realized how much I really loved to create programs rather than modify them to be a sort of tech visionary rather than somebody who patched up COBOL 74 code, once I realized how much I loved working with people and loved talking to customers and all that, I loved once I realized how much I loved working with people and loved talking to customers and all that, I loved to travel, even liked a nice hotel once Became enormous, right?
	All love is vulnerability, right?
	If you love someone, then if you lose that person, that's incredibly painful.
	Parenting, of course, is vulnerability.
	You want the world to treat your children really well, but the world doesn't treat children really well.
	So that's a challenge, to say the least.
	So everything that you love creates in it a fear and vulnerability.
	All desire has a jetpack or shadow side.
	Of fear. Now, that doesn't mean that you spend your whole life terrified.
	I mean, I was certainly terrified to start FDR. I'm not terrified of it anymore.
	I really think I have a relaxed and positive enjoyment with the broadcast or the show or whatever it is.
	So yes, I think that fear is a great thing to guide by.
	You know, like in a sailing ship, you have where you want to go and you have the wind, which is hopefully behind you.
	And... It's your desire to get there that makes you want to harness the wind.
	So to me, when I have a goal, there's something I want to get to.
	But the wind is, to some degree, is fear, right?
	Which is the fear of not getting there.
	And the fear can help guide you.
	The fear of fear is a very helpful and important emotion.
	I mean, I think they all are.
	But, so yeah, I think fear is natural.
	Did you ever find that when you were younger that...
	To bring philosophy into this, because I've done this myself over the past several years, doing a sort of reductionistic approach where you ask yourself, what is it that I really need?
	What is it that I can reasonably have to get by in life?
	My basic needs are met.
	I have a roof over my head.
	I have decent food to eat.
	I'm able to sleep without danger of being attacked or any kinds of bad things happening to me.
	And this would be an X amount of money that I could live reasonably well on.
	And if I'm in the city, I have all the things that are available to me, cultural opportunities and meeting different people and so on.
	So you reduce it to where you find what you have, and then you can build from that and find out what your wants are versus your needs.
	Does any of that make any sense?
	Yeah, I mean, it does make sense, but I think that it's not hugely productive.
	So because every time you achieve something that you want, your former state is not what it was, right?
	So once I became an entrepreneur, then going back to being an employee would have been pretty rough.
	Right, so I could say, look, well, you know, I mean, I'm happy making, you know, when I got my first job, I made $40,000 a year.
	When I got my first programming job and because I lived in a rented room in a house, I had, you know, lots of money and, oh, this is great, right?
	Now, of course, if I were to go back to that, it would not be satisfying.
	So the problem is every time we achieve something new, Then going back to a former state that was fine is no longer fine.
	So there is no revisiting the past as it was because we now have the experience of everything that happened afterwards, right?
	The past is not a museum at all.
	You can't ever go back and see the way it was because you've changed since you were there.
	So, I don't think saying, well, I'm here and this is the minimum that I need and I can come back here and be satisfied, I think is not particularly realistic.
	I mean, it's something that we can certainly manage if we have to, but I don't think it's hugely realistic.
	Why do you think people revisit the past or get stuck in the past?
	Can you give me a context?
	Because that's a pretty broad question.
	Well, it's... Some of it applies to my own life when I was younger.
	I remember – I don't know if you've ever heard the term quarter-life crisis.
	They used to bandy about in the late 90s and early 2000s of the The people that were in a fail-to-launch mode, which I think is worse now than it was back then, like around 25, and they're like, I did everything according to the checklist.
	I graduated and I can't find a job and I have debt and I just can't seem to move forward because all the expectations that were put into me by parents and society when I was a teenager in high school, I haven't met and I'm lost.
	So then they start going back over and saying, did I do something wrong?
	Did I say the wrong thing?
	Did I have the wrong major?
	Did I move to the wrong city?
	And so on and so forth. Right.
	So if you end up in a bad place, going over the decisions that brought that about?
	Yeah. Yeah.
	But I think that for young people in particular, we get so much pressure.
	To obey those in authority when we're kids.
	We get so much pressure to obey those in authority.
	And there's a carrot and there's a stick, right?
	So the carrot is, look, if you obey largely the idiots in authority, then we're going to give you all this great stuff.
	You're going to climb into a beer commercial and live there forever.
	So if you listen to people in authority...
	We'll get you good grades, get you to a good college, get you a good job, and particularly for men, you'll be able to buy women.
	Frankly, that's what's talked about.
	I mean, nobody can be a kid.
	So when I was a kid, my mom used to take me shopping all the time.
	Oh, God Almighty, so boring.
	Anyway, but nobody who's a kid...
	Now, so you're a boy growing up, and you step into a mall.
	You step into a department store and what do you see?
	Acres and acres of useless shit for women.
	That's what you see. What's the first thing you see when you walk into the entrance of a department store?
	Women's clothes. Makeup.
	Makeup, cosmetics, false eyelashes, padded bras, clothes, creams of every description, like medieval alchemists or whatever, right?
	And it just goes on and on and on.
	Like in 70 to 80% of a department store is stuff for women.
	And then like 10% is stuff for kids and 10% is stuff for men.
	And 8% of that stuff for men is stuff that women want them to wear.
	Right? So, I mean, studies have shown that when a man's income increases, his spending on toiletries doesn't.
	But when a woman's income increases, her spending on toiletries and other stuff does.
	And so when you walk in...
	As a kid, one thing that you get is that women are very pricey.
	I mean, you see that because, I mean, just go through them all.
	How much of it is shoes and handbags and stuff and clothes for women?
	And not like practical clothes, not practical handbags, but ridiculous shit for women drives a huge amount of the modern economy.
	And I think it's really tragic that women don't get called on this stuff.
	Like, good lord, people, what the hell are you doing buying all this useless shit for vanity?
	You know, men's vanity gets called on because we have respect for men.
	It's not respectful for women to not call them on this ridiculous, you know, ecosystem-destroying vanity stuff.
	And so, for men as well, we kind of get the message.
	That, you know, women are expensive because they're kind of vain and therefore you have to have a lot of money.
	And, you know, you see this when you watch TV. 70 to 80% of the commercials on TV are for women.
	And it's pseudoscientific, useless shit to conceal bags onto your eyes.
	I mean, it's so insane.
	Color your hair just right.
	I mean, Brooke Shields was involved in some ads for eyelash extension.
	Half of them cost the eyelashes to fall out.
	I mean, it's insane. Yeah.
	You can have longer lashes because you're worth it.
	No, no, no, no, no. If you were worth it, you wouldn't need to adorn yourself with all this bullshit.
	Mm-hmm. Anyway, sorry, that's a minor rant, but so this is what young men in particular are told.
	This is why we obey authority, right?
	Now, what's the only thing worse than obeying authority and getting a pot of gold at the end of it?
	Is obeying authority and not getting a pot of gold at the end of it, right?
	Right. Very much so.
	So I think for a lot of young people, oh, did I make a mistake?
	Oh, did I should have done this? Oh, I should have done that.
	Well, that's nonsense. Tons of engineers and lawyers can't find jobs at all.
	So... I think the reality is...
	I talked about this, about why you're depressed in college.
	I mean, the reality is that the society that we live in is completely mad.
	I mean, it's a completely mad society relative to any fundamental values.
	And it's a completely hypocritical society in that all the values that we inflict on children, we refuse to live by.
	As adults. And so for young people to flounder means that they obeyed a whole bunch of nonsense in the hopes that they were going to get bribed into compliance.
	And then society got their compliance and has nothing left to bribe them with.
	Youth unemployment in Athens or Greece as a whole is over 50%.
	There's two things I wanted to say.
	No, go ahead, please. There's two things that I wanted to bring up from what you were saying.
	One was about what I was saying before about starting my own business.
	This ties into what my earlier point was where I get caught in thinking of, okay, so if I wanted to start my own business, what would I want the business to be in?
	Then you stop and notice all the things that you had described where it's What kind of business would be enjoyable to do, would be profitable, and would be not contributing to the shit that you see around you?
	Meaning something that's not involved with clothes, something that's not involved with cosmetics, something that is not involved with, and not just women's vanity, but the vanity of the people in society.
	Sometimes I think that's hard to do, to come up with an idea.
	Yeah, I mean, I'm not an idea hamster with regards to businesses.
	I mean, I didn't come up with the idea for my first business.
	I did come up with the idea for this, I don't know, I guess you could call it a business.
	So, but what I would do is, to me, what's more important than the content of the business is the relationship with your partners.
	So, again, I don't know what you should do, but if I were in your shoes, what I would do is I would start Casting about for people I really, really wanted to work with.
	Right? So if you think of the beginnings of all the famous companies, it's almost all, you know, two guys at least, right?
	Apple and Microsoft and Google.
	Two guys who had an intense partnership and who drove each other to excellence.
	And now with me, it's me in the audience, right?
	And so on. Well, you got a lot more partners there, Steph.
	Yeah, a lot more partners and very exacting and demanding partners they are too.
	I used to think being my own boss was great.
	Turns out, I'm a bit of an asshole as a boss.
	Anyway, so I would work on networking rather than trying to come up with some business idea on your own that would work.
	Networking is such a hugely important aspect of entrepreneurship and it's not something I've ever been particularly good at.
	I'm better at networking In philosophy because I care about talking about philosophy.
	So I would definitely work your LinkedIn, work your Facebook, work whatever you've got, work your local business association.
	Try and find somebody who you're really excited to work with because to me, that is the key to successful entrepreneurship.
	Okay. The second point was, again, what you had described about all the women shit that you see is I still think that there's some people, like some of the callers in your show, and I probably fell into this cap myself when I was in my early 20s and starting to study philosophy, is it's kind of taking the red pill in a different sense, where you're looking around you and starting to ask the questions of, well, is what I perceive really true?
	All those basic perennial questions that they have.
	And then you start to see around you.
	I remember I had this experience several years ago when I walked into a Walmart and I felt depressed.
	Because it was just acres of shit that I didn't need.
	And then that starts the self-reflection where it's like, what is it that I really need?
	I mean, I need clothes, I need food, I need all these things, but how much am I willing to spend for that?
	Does that make sense? Yeah, I mean, guys don't spend a lot of money, right?
	Again, not to sort of get back on the topic, but There's a theory out there, like, why is there so much money in divorces shoveled at women away from men?
	And one of the theories is because women spend so much more money than men do, that anything which gets money into the hands of women is a benefit to the economy, or at least to what's perceived of as beneficial to the economy, which is the movement of useless shit around the world rather than actual productivity.
	I mean, just imagine if all the people who were employed in creating useless, vainglorious shit for both men and women If they actually did something that was productive to the world rather than satisfying stupid vanities of immature people, then the economy would turn around.
	There's this phenomenon in Japan called grass-eating men.
	I don't remember the Japanese term for it, but it probably has been streamed in some video game.
	I'm sorry? You mean the herbivores?
	Yeah, they're called herbivores because in Japan, sexuality is associated with eating meat.
	So they're herbivores and 60% of young men have kind of given up on getting involved with women.
	And this is having a huge impact on the economy because until you get involved with women, for the most part, you don't spend that much money.
	Once you get involved with women, then you start to spend a lot of money, right?
	And so a lot of them are saying, well, you know, I grew up seeing my father tottering on the edge of mortality through karoshi, through death, through overwork, and I don't really want to have the same kind of thing, and so I'm not going to be a...
	You know, cannon fodder economic cattle provider for a family.
	And so I don't really want to get involved, you know, and I've got all these great video games and I've got my friends and I've got entertainment systems and, you know, all this kind of stuff.
	And it's a huge problem, of course.
	The economic slowdown is enormous and, you know, they have this hugely aging population.
	One of the reasons they've been in a 20-year recession, right?
	The hugely aging population and young people who are looking with increasing skepticism at...
	Particularly men who are looking with increasing skepticism at, am I going to be someone who goes to work all day, gives money to women and children, and dies 10 to 15 years earlier?
	Like, why? Why would I want that?
	And, you know, there's this men-going-their-own-way movement, which is...
	I don't know if it's a movement or not yet, but certainly something that people talk about and something that men talk about, which is that men are...
	We're kind of dissatisfied with the available options, which is, I think, a very important conversation to have.
	Women had this in the 60s where they had this click moment where they're like, oh, I'm a smart person and all I'm doing is driving my kids around.
	Well, I think a smart person should have great conversations with their kids while they're driving them around.
	But in the lack of intimacy, we end up with ambition.
	That's our consolation prize.
	If you lack intimacy, you have to end up with ambition.
	And So I think that there is this male question of, well, how much do I really need?
	And if you're looking at getting married and having kids, there is a question of how much do we really need?
	And I think for a lot of men, the idea that you just go to work all day in a culture that regularly and hysterically denigrates masculinity and basically says that masculinity is a combination of stupid and dangerous things.
	So the idea that men are saying, well, I'm going to work all day and I give my money over to a family who I barely get to see and risk catastrophic divorce and all that.
	I mean, so I think that there is a fundamental dissatisfaction.
	I don't know if this is conditioned with what you think about in terms of kids and family.
	It's a fundamental dissatisfaction that men have.
	I think it's a very, very important conversation that we all need to have.
	I mean, something's got to change.
	Basically, it's the John Galt thing, right?
	I mean, it's basically men going on strike from the economic duties associated with reproduction and the economic and legal dangers associated with modern marriage.
	There's a strike going on, and unfortunately, when society doesn't learn through reason and argument, it has to learn through bitter experience.
	And this kind of strike will...
	You know, one thing you can't force men to do is...
	I do caution men out there, for heaven's sakes, if you're going to have sex, three condoms at a minimum is a good approach.
	Because if you do get a woman pregnant, she certainly has the complete choices to have the baby, and then you can be on the hook for someone and a child for 20 years.
	It is a hugely risky scenario.
	So please, please be very careful.
	So I think that these questions that you have about how much do I need, it's pretty important.
	And men do ask those questions, I think, a lot more than women do.
	Do you think it's harder for...
	There was a commenter on YouTube I heard several months ago where he talked about the differences between men and women as far as movements are concerned, where it seems like with women there is what's called an in-group preference, I think that's a sociological term, where they will band together for the sake of the sex, not as an individual, whereas men do not have an in-group preference is because men tend to look at each other on individual merits and not as a group.
	Yeah, I mean, I think that the intimacy capacity for women is vastly overstated.
	And I don't mean that women are any less so good.
	It's just that there generally tends to be this thing, you know, like women, they're really great at talking and sharing and this and that and the other.
	Well, I've not really found that to be the case in my experience.
	I mean, I'm not saying it's hugely great with men.
	I've had In general, many more conversations about important emotional topics with men than I have with women.
	Because, at least in my experience, this is all subjective.
	I'm not saying this is true, it's just in my experience.
	In my experience, when you bring up important issues with women, they tense up.
	Because women are sort of trained to be the peacemakers and keep conflict avoidance and all that.
	This is how these fantasy structures, these fantasy castles I talked about earlier in the show are maintained.
	So... And just look at the proportion of male to female callers in this show.
	You know, it's probably 10 to 1, at least.
	And so, you know, this is a show where we do talk about very important emotional topics.
	At least, I don't think, you know, with the exception of really getting bored at deterministic trolls, I don't think I've ever really banned a topic.
	Certainly on the Sunday show, I've never really said no when I talk about that.
	So... I think women's capacity for intimacy compared to men's supposed incapacity for intimacy is not true.
	So two-thirds of American women have admitted to hitting their children three or more times a week when their children are under six years old.
	That's 150 plus headings of a little toddler every year.
	Now, I would submit that nobody who's capable of that is even remotely capable of true empathy and intimacy, who's capable of hitting children.
	Let's say you have two children, that means you're doling out over 600 hits every year to little toddlers.
	Jesus fucking Christ, I can't even believe that we still need to have this conversation in the 21st century around stop hitting your goddamn children.
	But we do. So is it really that women are so tender and intimate and wonderful?
	Well, no. Then so many of them wouldn't be admitting to hitting their children so often.
	Each child, three or more times, under the age of six.
	I mean, this is staggering.
	And I've seen interviews with high school principals and so on who basically say conflicts among boys are much easier to resolve.
	Boys don't hold grudges.
	Have a fight with someone, the next day you can be playing with them.
	But girls' conflicts are really tough because it's all about innuendo and slander and spreading malicious gossip and they hold grudges forever and so on.
	It is a different thing.
	I mean, men in general, they have a lot more experience with rejection than women do and so when women are rejected, they tend to go a little bit more off the rails as a whole.
	So, yeah, I think that the supposed intimacy capacity of Of women is vastly overrated.
	Because I associate intimacy and empathy with not hitting people.
	You know, call me crazy, but I think one of the ways.
	Do you hit people? Yes.
	Do you hit children who are dependent on you and can't leave?
	Yes. Well, you don't have an abundance of empathy.
	Sorry. That is not one of the basic correlations.
	I hit people because I empathize with them.
	No, no, no. You hit people because you can't empathize with them and you want to control them and bully them and blah, blah, blah.
	So I'm pretty skeptical about all of this and I'm certainly – and also the other thing, of course, the majority of divorces are initiated by women and the biggest issue is dissatisfaction.
	Well, if women were so capable of intimacy, then why aren't they working this stuff out?
	Why aren't they choosing a better man or working this stuff out or whatever?
	So anyway, that's just some of my thoughts about it.
	Yeah, it's interesting you bring that up because I've thought about a related issue of friendships.
	I'm sure that most of the callers have been in the same situation that when you get older, it seems more difficult to make male friends for a whole host of different reasons.
	If they're married and they have kids, of course, they're going to be spending time with them and they're going to be working late at the office.
	Based on the earlier point I brought up is if men regard each other on individual merits, then it's not a sense of, well, I just want to go out and have a beer with the guy and exchange small talk, whereas some guys might shy away from that.
	I've found that in the past couple of years that There's less pressure when you're making friends or talking with gay men than there are with straight men, maybe because of the fact that gay men are more comfortable with themselves.
	Do you have any comments on that?
	Tell me a little bit more about what you mean.
	Well, again, what I was saying before is that trying to make male friends, which, you know, I have more female friends than I do male friends.
	That's been the case for many years.
	The reason being is because I felt...
	more comfortable discussing certain topics and this could just be a cultural By cultural reasons is that where you don't talk about the weather, you certainly don't talk about sports and you don't talk about cars or things that are stereotypical male interests.
	That you talk about philosophy or you talk about the arts and music or you talk about – the woman I'm seeing now is a social worker so we talk about some of the things that you talk about with child abuse since she interviews sexually abused children.
	So it seems easier to just talk and have some kind of a friendship with a woman than it is with a man.
	But I've noticed that you can get the same thing from a gay man more often than you can from a straight man.
	Does that make sense? Yeah, I mean, I certainly think that gay men have had to think a little bit more about society than most straight men, right?
	Because society has been pretty toxic to a lot of gay men.
	So, I think that...
	I mean, I like to talk with anyone who has thought about anything.
	And so, I think that...
	Certainly, my experience with gay men is that you can have some pretty great conversations.
	In the same way that you talk to people who've experienced some negative repercussions from society, you know, minorities or gay men or whatever.
	That you can, simply because they're just...
	You know, I can't...
	I mean, I really can't bear standing...
	Next to people who are just spouting the Matrix.
	You know, all I see is ones and zeros coming out of their mouth, and I see them as robots.
	I don't see them as, you know, without souls.
	They're, you know, why there are zombie films.
	And so, yeah, anybody who's thought or who's questioned anything is worth talking to.
	And people who haven't, particularly if they're older, I mean, maybe they are, but it's not something I particularly want to, right?
	So it's sort of like... I'm a pretty good tennis player and it's like, for me, conversation with most of the muggles is sort of like this.
	Like, I'm a pretty good tennis player and somebody picks up a racket, holds it the wrong way and says, I'm a great tennis player.
	I mean, what on earth?
	You can't play a game with them because they can't hit the ball.
	And then when they can't hit the ball, they get angry at you.
	I mean, like, what's the point?
	There's somebody who doesn't know how to play tennis.
	If you're a good tennis player, they may say, hey, maybe you can teach me a bit about tennis.
	And maybe that would be a fun thing to do if you care about them.
	I'll certainly do that with my daughter.
	I taught my wife how to ski and that kind of stuff.
	So we can do all of that kind of stuff.
	But the problem is the vast majority of people, they think they know something about the truth and about virtue, and they don't.
	In fact, almost everything that they believe is both truthful and virtuous is lying and a vice.
	But they don't know that, right?
	So what happens is when you start to point these things out, in other words, if you start to hit some good hits at them and they're holding the wrong end of the tennis racket and they can't hit it back, they get angry at you or they get angry at the tennis racket.
	And so for me...
	That just sounds like self-absorption.
	Well, I mean, their brains are just so broken, they can't be fixed.
	You know, like there is a point of no return, right?
	I mean, this is what I keep telling people.
	I mean, yeah, there's neuroplasticity, but as Gabor Maté points out, the part of the brain that wants to improve is usually the first part that gets broken.
	And so for most people, you know, you don't take a 70-year-old smoker and say, listen, let's get you ready for the Olympic marathon.
	It's too late. Age and the cigarette habit is fundamentally impossible.
	The change is not a lifelong prerogative, which is why I'm constantly urging people to freak out.
	Panic is your friend.
	Because you will not have forever to change and become a better person.
	So I hope that helps.
	Listen, I want to make sure I get to...
	We still get another caller or two.
	I don't mind going a little bit over. Sure.
	If we can move on, I really appreciate that.
	Thank you so much for calling in. You know, as always, fantastic, magnificent, wonderful, wonderful questions.
	Well, thank you for taking my call.
	I don't want to keep you. You're very welcome.
	Next. Next is Andrew.
	Hello. Hey, Steph.
	Can you hear me? Hello. I can.
	All right, cool. Thanks for taking my call.
	My pleasure. Well...
	Should I get right into it?
	Yes, I think that would be a good idea.
	Alright, well originally I had emailed Michael to put me in the queue for the chat and I thought like I wanted help from you, like kind of sussing out this issue at work, but things occurred in between now and then to where I realized that that wasn't really what Calling You was all about.
	I kind of now want to give a listener check-in sort of thing.
	This is how FDR changes the trajectory of a life.
	I'm just in the point where I've cultivated in myself the ability where I just dealt with the issue through calling friends.
	Talking to myself. From where I was going to where I'm at now, it would have taken me a lot longer or maybe I wouldn't have even gotten to this point if I hadn't come across FDR. That's a very abstract way of attempting to communicate something quite concrete.
	Do you want to take a swing at it and put a few more nouns in?
	Sure. So the issue at work was it's an assisted living place for developmentally disabled people.
	I'm this empathetic FDR person who's really caring about the clients, but not all the staff are that way.
	So for a while, when I wasn't as into living my values, I would just sort of look the other way on some things, like no one was shouting at the clients or hitting them, but they were not being ideal in their interactions.
	And so recently I was like, okay, this is just getting too much.
	It's like, what kind of person am I going to be if I just keep doing this thing in the future?
	So, like I reported on some bad behavior...
	And so because in this company this bad behavior was occurring, I was like, oh, I'm not sure how the boss person is going to take my reporting this.
	And I just realized, well, if this comes back to hurt me somehow, then they'll start looking for ways to fire me just because I'm someone who will step out and put myself out there to stick up for these people.
	They would rather just have people who just go along and just not bring up the stuff.
	Right. So I was in this space where I was all worried about what was going to occur and I've recently gotten into therapy and just through all the different interactions I have with my friends and everything,
	recently I've just been Really, like, rocket shipping up with philosophy.
	And, like, I feel it's just dragging me along, in a way.
	Like, I mean, for...
	I sense that, sorry to interrupt, but I can hear there's a lot of emotion under what it is that you're talking about.
	Would you like to talk about what you're feeling?
	Well, there's an anxiety...
	With, okay, now, like in the past, I listened to all the stuff from FDR, Drum of the Gifted Child, I've had chats with friends, and so I've been getting all this intellectual thing down and a certain amount of emotional stuff down.
	Went through the resistance for a while where I kind of regressed and was feeling depressed and not really doing too much.
	As far as chats and really self-reflecting.
	And then now I've gotten back to where I'm going forward with philosophy and trying to live my life with it.
	And it's exciting, but it's also like, oh my god, this can definitely...
	I can see how this is going to be uncomfortable for a while.
	If at work, I'm always calling out people on there, doing negative stuff with these clients, I can definitely see some strained interactions with that.
	Ultimately, I see it's the best thing for myself and for the clients because I don't want to be an enabler.
	No, and I mean, that's incredibly courageous, what you're doing, and I completely understand.
	It's unknown territory, right?
	Where you stand up for things that are right, and what's going to happen.
	You know, this regression thing that you talked about, I think is, I mean, everything you're saying is very interesting.
	That, I think, is even more interesting than in general.
	There was a thread a while back on the board about people who turn against FDR, FDR, FDR. You know, what happens to people who turn...
	And it's like, but there's no thing to...
	I mean, it's like, I'm really against the number four.
	But the number four is a concept.
	I mean, FDR is just a series of arguments.
	It's rational arguments with evidence.
	And it's hopefully a self-correcting conversation...
	Based upon the value that the listeners provide and the things that I learn more about, right?
	So I apologize to the gay community.
	I've done whole shows where I read out corrections.
	I read out a correction about something I said about the common law.
	So all it is is a series of rational arguments with empirical proof where possible.
	And so people who sort of turn against FDR, it's Well, it's making the fundamental mistake of anthropomorphizing three letters.
	I mean, I'm against the alphabet.
	I've really turned on numbers.
	Well, no.
	Now, if FDR is rational arguments with evidence, then the question is, why have people turned against rational arguments with empirical evidence?
	Well, because people make a huge mistake and, oh man, I've made this mistake before.
	And Ayn Rand tragically contributes to this mistake.
	People make a mistake of thinking that we have a relationship to philosophy.
	Or we have a relationship to arguments.
	Or we have a relationship to a podcast.
	Or we have a relationship to a website.
	This is false. This is false.
	You can only have relationships with people and maybe higher functioning animals.
	But you can have a relationship with ideas.
	And so people look at...
	And I don't know if you can tell me if this sort of fits with you...
	When people look at, so somebody gets into philosophy, and they're down with philosophy, and then they turn against philosophy.
	Well, they can't. I mean, philosophy is inert.
	They can't turn against philosophy.
	What's really happening, I would argue, is that the consequences of philosophy are becoming clear to the people around them.
	And those people around them Threaten or bribe them to abandon philosophy, right?
	So the people that you're complaining about or you're launching complaints about in your work, do they want you to do that?
	No, they would rather just...
	I mean, because it's difficult to interact with the clients in this different way.
	It takes a certain amount of self-reflection to get to the point where you're feeling that empathy and that curiosity about the clients and what's going on for them.
	And so it's so much easier to just, like, boss them around and, you know, kind of be mean to them.
	Sure. Yeah, certainly it's easier if that's, you know, that's the way you've been raised, that's the way you are.
	And when you say to people, I don't, you know, the way that you're interacting with these people is not right, the job aspect of it is only a tiny portion of what is going to occur for them, right?
	Right. What else is going to occur for them?
	They're going to have feelings that come up and they'll think about them as children and how they were treated and maybe it won't come up consciously but they'll definitely have that kind of unconscious reaction at least to all this stuff.
	Right, so if you say to someone to make a parallel, if you say to somebody spanking is wrong and given that The vast majority of people are spanked.
	What happens is you activate their internal parental alter ego.
	You're not talking to the person.
	You're not talking to rationality.
	You're not even talking to the parent.
	You're talking about the internalized parental alter ego.
	Same thing when you say taxation is theft.
	You are internally, you are activating An internal parental alter.
	Now, the relationship that people have with their own inner alter egos is the only really important relationship with regards to philosophy.
	There are people in your life who will benefit from your pursuit of philosophy and there are people in your life who will be threatened by your pursuit of philosophy, right?
	There are people in your workplace who will benefit.
	There are clients who will benefit. And there are people who are not treating the clients well who will not benefit, right?
	So to me, people think that you're just sailing across a clear sea towards philosophy, but that's not true.
	When you pursue truth, reason, evidence, virtue, consistency, logic, and philosophy, you're sailing against some incredibly powerful crosswinds, which is Everybody in your life whose short-term interests are going to suffer because you pursue the truth.
	Think back to the first caller.
	How happy was the granddad that he was pursuing philosophy?
	Not happy at all.
	And so people turned against philosophy.
	Well, I mean, I think the only rational way to understand that is to say...
	To turn against philosophy is such a personal way of talking about it.
	I mean, you can't turn against philosophy anymore when you turn against mathematics.
	I mean, a mathematical proposition or theorems, it's true or it's false, it's valid or it's invalid.
	Arguments I put forward, they're true or they're false, they're valid or they're invalid.
	I try to do my best. I make mistakes.
	I try to correct where I can.
	In fact, I always correct where I can.
	But turning against, all that means to me is that the inner alter egos...
	Of those who would suffer from the continued pursuit of philosophy have won.
	The people...
	Like, let's say...
	I don't know what's going to happen, but let's say you report a bunch of people and they all gang up and they find a way to get you fired.
	Well, you'd be kind of pissed at philosophy, right?
	I can understand that, because without philosophy, you wouldn't have gotten fired.
	So philosophy, you know, we always forget the backlash, right?
	So philosophy causes a counterattack from people whose short-term interests will be harmed by philosophy.
	So when people say, well, this person was very pro-FDR, now they're very anti-FDR. Well, it just means that the people around them or inside their head Who would suffer, at least in the short term, from their continued pursuit of philosophy, have won.
	Because nobody...
	I mean, you don't sort of hear, well, you know, somebody has found a fundamental logical flaw that Steph has refused to admit or something like that, right?
	I mean, I don't hear that.
	I mean, there may be. I don't know of any.
	There may be. I think I've done a pretty good job of defending my positions with a wide variety of people.
	I have people call in every Sunday.
	I don't think I've ever refused to debate with somebody who's not crazy.
	And... You know, I think I'm pretty open to...
	I'm not sort of hiding in a cave, only sending out one-way emails to the world.
	I'm engaged in a perpetual conversation.
	And so, let's say, people turn against FDR or Steph.
	I mean, that just means that the bad people in their life have won.
	And sometimes they do, of course.
	I mean, if the bad people never won, we wouldn't really need philosophy in the first place.
	Anyway, I just wanted to mention it.
	Yeah, I think that's interesting.
	There is this one thread where way back when I was first getting into FDR, it was like this thread that I read it and I was like, oh man, stuff's all bad.
	It was this thread by this guy called Bake, and it was logical criticisms of RTR, logical inconsistencies.
	So I posted this thing about it, and still, every so often, I'm totally not in agreement with that post anymore, but people, they try and get in touch with me, like, hey, I really like that post, and I'm thinking some of the same things.
	I'm just like, have you seen any of my posts since then?
	Like, I made hundreds of posts where I'm just pursuing this FDR philosophy stuff.
	And so I'm just like, where's your curiosity?
	Well, sure. I mean, look, I mean, yeah, when you promote...
	When you promote...
	Philosophy is really about self-confidence.
	I mean, to me, it's one of the essential characteristics.
	And self-confidence is simply a refusal to bow to bullshit.
	That's all it is. And knowing that it's not just willpower, but there's good reasons as to why you don't bow to bullshit.
	Now, bullshit slingers don't like people who don't bow to bullshit.
	Of course. Of course not.
	And so people who are controlling and manipulating other people in their life, if philosophy gives them self-confidence, gives their victim self-confidence, then...
	Right?
	I mean... Of course they're not going to be happy about it.
	Of course. And now, of course, that doesn't mean that everyone who disagrees with me is a bad person.
	Of course not. I mean, I disagree with me and I don't think I'm a bad person.
	And, you know, people are welcome to come on the show and disagree with me and so on.
	But... I mean, they generally don't, right?
	Because I'm quite confident in what it is that I put forward.
	I've had tons of experts on.
	I've gone through all the data.
	I've presented the data. I've provided all my sources.
	I am not a bullshit artist.
	And the majority of my positions, I have found substantial scientific agreement or expert opinion agreement.
	So... So, I mean, the other thing, too, is that people who disagree with me will tend to try and isolate my perspective or my opinion.
	So, for instance, they'll say, well, you know, Steph's wrong about spanking.
	It's like, well, no, I'm certainly making a moral argument, but what about all the data?
	Does that count?
	But they'll say, They'll try to isolate so it's my opinion.
	I just like Steph's opinion or Steph's perspective on spanking and blah, blah, blah.
	But what they won't do is write to the people who've been on my show, like Elizabeth Gershoff and other people, and say, your methodology, your meta study of spanking studies, your methodology is flawed because of X, Y, and Z. Right?
	I mean, it's called shooting the messenger, right?
	So I bring all the statistics and data about spanking, the expert opinion, the studies, and then people somehow just say, well, Steph's wrong about spanking.
	I mean, but I'm simply reporting the data and making the moral arguments.
	The moment somebody tries to, and this is a generally good life rule, the moment somebody tries to conflate a person with an argument, they are wrong.
	They are confessing a failure To rebut an argument.
	So, if somebody says, I disagree with the data that Steph has presented and here's why, I think that's a fine thing.
	I think that's a fine thing.
	But if somebody says, I disagree with Steph about some fact that I have presented, then what they're doing is they're conflating or they're mixing the evidence with the person.
	And that's a shitty, cowardly way to avoid dealing with the facts and the data.
	I mean, it's cheap sophistry 101, right?
	Yeah, that makes me think of...
	Sorry, go ahead. I was going to say that makes me think of when the thing that I reported last week, like one of the staff, I went up and I was like, you know, I don't know how the management would deal with this or whatever, but, you know, what you're doing, I don't think it's right.
	I think it's wrong. And another staff came in with, oh, well, we had a meeting and we determined that it was in her care plan.
	And so that's it.
	And I mean, I thought I was like, well, no, just because it's in her plan doesn't go against the argument that it's not right.
	Right. Yeah. So that's a way of avoiding the actual argument.
	Yeah. A fine lady has just posted on the chat, most people do not know how to debate in a truly rational way.
	It's kind of an art in a way. We do not train people to do this.
	I don't agree with that.
	I think most people are exquisitely aware of how to debate in a truly rational way.
	Because they are experts at avoiding rationality, which means they must know what it is.
	I mean, it's like if some guy says, I can't see the ball that you're throwing at me, but every time you throw the ball at him, he dodges in a Keanu Reeves Matrix-style manner, then clearly he can see the ball.
	So I don't think people do know how to debate in a rational way because they're such experts at debate.
	You know, it's like saying, I don't know how to defuse this bomb, but every time this bomb is about to go off, I can defuse it.
	Like, wait, wait. If you can defuse it, right?
	So I think people can see rationality, at least in the outlines.
	And if they could just use that avoidance instead of avoiding in pursuit, I think that would be much, much better.
	But I mean, I say this is 30 years of debating with people.
	People are experts at defusing rationality, which means they must understand it at some level.
	Right? Sorry, go ahead.
	We still have one more caller and I want to make sure we get to four today.
	We'll go a little bit over. That's okay.
	Is there anything else you wanted to ask?
	No, just, I mean, I wanted to come in and say thanks.
	Like, where my life was going before FDR, I mean, I was doing psychedelic drugs, distancing myself from myself, trolling the internet to level up on people and Being small in my work,
	and so just coming into FDR just like exploded all that stuff and just like revealed it for what it was as like just this big avoidance of myself and the truth.
	And so...
	Yeah, I just want to really say thanks for the profound effect that FDR has had on my life.
	Like, I'm in therapy. I've got relationships with great friends.
	I'm starting a business with one of my friends.
	So, yeah, I just wanted to give you massive, massive thanks.
	Wow. And, you know, I appreciate that.
	And, you know, good for you, man.
	That's what an incredible series of things to do.
	You know, I think that the people who are In your facility where you work are incredibly lucky to have you and It is it's great.
	I mean, I'm I'm very proud of What this community is able to achieve in terms of practical I think that we should be incredibly proud of that.
	I mean, I just got an email from YouTube.
	Somebody said, every video I've seen from you has been a wonderful, illuminating, and frankly, a pure joy to watch and listen to.
	I'm 20 and my first words and thoughts on this earth question the state of our world.
	I'm pursuing a master's degree in history and yearn to join you in the ranks of educated and enlightened individuals who seek to rescue the abominations of a world.
	The course of mankind has brought us to.
	P.S. The importance of the messages in these videos is second only to food, water, and air, no doubt.
	I mean, that's great stuff to hear.
	A lot of these kind of messages.
	And, you know, I would guess a thousand parents a week are stopping to hit their children.
	Unfortunately, I mean, there are a thousand new parents a week or more who are still pursuing that.
	But nonetheless, it is...
	It is fantastic. And everybody who posts, who donates, who supports, who is involved in the conversation is part of spreading the nonviolence message, particularly towards children.
	And I think that's something to be enormously proud of.
	And the courage that you're taking in pursuing people who are harming those under their care who are particularly vulnerable, being as they are aged and so on, is something enormous to be proud of.
	I hope you go to sleep every night with the satisfaction of a life well lived.
	I think you've earned it, and I really, really congratulate you on taking philosophy so seriously.
	Thanks. I appreciate that.
	I'll let you get to the next caller.
	Thanks. Bye. Thanks.
	Now it turns out I'm out of my queue.
	Did we have... I thought we had four today.
	Anyway. But no, we're done.
	Well, thanks everyone. Bye. Well, thanks everyone.
	I hugely appreciate it.
	The documentary is still...
	Oh, fourth it came by and then dropped off.
	Well, it's good. It means we answered his questions beforehand.
	Yes, so thanks everyone so much.
	The documentary, I'm afraid, is still being worked on.
	The music is taking a little while, but I think it's going to be worth it in terms of quality.
	I think that's really, really important.
	I think the music is going to be It's going to be a very, very important aspect of what is going to be coming out in the movie and still want to get it right.
	It's being recorded, of course, with some amazingly talented musicians, which I am incredibly happy about.
	And so I may, in fact, believe it or not, end up I think it'll work out.
	I mean, the musician who's actually doing it, his name is Peter Drunkle, and the producer of the music is Sean Lennon.
	So I'm very, of course, excited and happy to be working with these luminaries.
	And so I think it's worth getting it right.
	So I might be down there.
	I'm going to meet up with them, of course, when I'm in New York later this month for Anarchy in New York City.
	I may actually be singing a song with Sean Lennon.
	He's going to write, I think, a song for the closing of the documentary.
	So that's all very exciting and very positive.
	And I really, really want to thank, of course, Sean and Pete for contributing massively and incredibly professionally to the documentary.
	And so I really appreciate that.
	And have yourselves a wonderful week, everyone.
	Still happy to be taking donations.
	It's been a fantastic week for donations.
	Thank you.
	Thank you. Thank you to the other people who sent in Donations yesterday.
	Joshua, thank you.
	Big kisses. I will get your poem.
	Oh, Andrew. Andrew, I'm going to get you a limerick to say thank you.
	And have yourselves a wonderful week, everyone.

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