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Nov. 8, 2020 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

01:58:02

"JUST TELL THE TRUTH" Freedomain Call In

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	No. What I mean, like, everyone's in a movie now because, you know, when there's a movie, what happens when someone coughs?
	Oh, yeah. It's like there's a dramatic pause.
	Everyone stares at the guy. Well, even if it's not a pandemic movie or anything, like, if you're in a movie...
	You know, the moment that somebody makes googly eyes at someone else, they end up sleeping together in three frames over.
	And in a movie, the moment somebody's like, you know, like they never cough without three scenes later coughing up blood into a handkerchief, right?
	Yeah. All coughs lead to death in movies.
	And it's the same thing with like now everybody's like, oh, pandemic!
	Don't cough! Cough means death.
	Yeah, you have to basically ward off death by joking about it, right?
	Right, right, right. No, it's like in every World War I movie, the younger brother who's eager to go to war, you know what happens to him.
	Oh yeah, he mounts the trench and goes...
	Yeah, like the cynical older brother who's wary and, you know, Mel Gibson in Gallipoli.
	The older brother who's wary and skeptical, he's the one who survives, but the younger, idealistic, for God, king and country...
	Right?
	I mean, it's a terrible...
	My daughter and I are actually going to do a show on movie cliches.
	And I guess we've kind of noticed a few over the years.
	And when we watched the remake of Mulan, it was like, it was just everywhere.
	Women can do everything.
	Men are idiots, right? And yeah, so these kinds of cliches are just kind of all over the place.
	And once you see them, they kind of lose their power.
	But of course, a lot of people don't really see them, right?
	Right. So, on that, I know you're going to do a show on it, probably, or at least it's going to come up into cliches to talk, but Mulan itself, I have no intention of plans of watching it.
	Is it as sort of bad as it sort of would you expect, or was it actually pretty decent in some ways?
	Well, it's, I mean, it's a visual feast, for sure.
	And, you know, I mean, the acting is all pretty solid.
	And another cliche that we kind of noticed was like every, quote, evil female has a justifying backstory.
	Like, I'm bad, but here's why.
	And they usually reform before the end of the movie and turn good.
	So if an evil female character is introduced, like this is all the way from Maleficent to like, if an evil female character is introduced, they're always given a justifying backstory.
	And usually they will reform before the end of the movie, right?
	That's how it works.
	But male characters are just causelessly evil and never reform.
	They're just born evil.
	And so there's no backstory.
	Like, why is there a bad guy in?
	Why is the bad guy bad?
	in Mulan.
	No reason.
	laughs He's got acne. I don't know.
	There's no reason. But why is the witch bad?
	Well, there's a reason.
	She's always got to be given a backstory that justifies it, and then through that she gets to reform herself.
	But the bad guys, it's just physics.
	Just physics of male evil.
	There's no predictability to it.
	Anyway, all right. But then they're not really evil.
	I'm sorry? But then they're not really evil.
	Yeah, yeah, no. Then they're just like, I don't know, birds of prey or something.
	It's like wolves. They're just broken robots.
	Yeah, yeah, yeah. It just causes the evil because...
	Oh, man. And always smelly.
	And of course, the female evil is never grimy.
	But male evil always looked like they rolled in grit and have, like, oil worked into their pores and stuff like that, and bad teeth and bad breath.
	But female evil always still has age-defying makeup.
	It's just, hey, man, don't blame me.
	I didn't make the rules. It's just the physics of the moral universe.
	And, you know, movies are so boring now, too, because you know everything that is going to occur before it occurs.
	Like, you know, you know, you know, that, you know, like, I don't know, like, they have some minority character or whatever, or some, it always has to be following a particular narrative.
	It always has to be following a particular, like, modern sort of positive cliche.
	And the writing is always so defensive based upon, I don't know, you don't want to annoy some pressure group or some upset bunch of leftists or whatever.
	So you've got to conform to all of that.
	And that's why I'm sort of enjoying, I don't really watch movies that much anymore.
	But when I do, I sort of dip into older ones where at least there was a bit more authenticity to the human condition rather than, well, we don't want to make this group mad and we don't want to make that group mad.
	So we'll write this, that and the other.
	And it's all just, I don't know, it's just, it's so grindily predictable.
	Yeah, I'm wondering if you're going to do any comparison between, like, previous cliches and, like, the new crop of cliches, like, because some of the stuff you mentioned is more recent, especially, you know, like, stupid men are just sort of even causelessly evil, I think, although that's not necessarily perfectly modern, if that makes sense.
	Well, I blame a lot of it on The Godfather, which was a pretty seminal turning point in movie Evil, where, you know, Evil now is cool.
	Evil is honorable.
	Evil is noble. Evil is wealthy.
	Evil avoids consequences.
	You know, like in the past, it was always like, well, the bad guys get punished, the good guys win.
	And the transition movie was The Untouchables with Kevin Costner and Sean, I guess now the late Sean Connery, where, you know, the Elliot Ness is fighting all of this prohibition stuff because, you know, drinking is just evil and blah, blah, blah.
	And he gets into all of this death and murder and all that.
	And then at the end of the movie, when prohibition is repealed, people say, well, what are you going to do now?
	He says, I guess I'll have a drink. There's no moral, right?
	He's like, now it's legal. I can do it.
	It was all just slave of the state stuff.
	And that was sort of, there was no moral principles.
	It was just, I'm a slave to the laws and I will kill people when the government tells me to.
	And then when the government tells me to stop killing people, I guess I'll just have a drink.
	Like, he's morally empty. I know the Untouchables came after him.
	The Godfather. But in The Godfather, I mean, it was really radical.
	And it's a real shame that such cinematic and acting talent was attached to that movie because it really did turn evil into something kind of cool.
	Scarface kind of did that too.
	I remember being in Mexico and seeing these endless posters of Scarface, you know, like the Al Pacino character because, you know, he's considered a hero.
	And in fact, Marlon Brando's portrayal of Don Corleone was so respected by the Italian community that Marlon Brando never had to pay for a meal in an Italian restaurant for the rest of his life.
	Because they're like, hey, you made us Italians look good.
	It's like, really? Is that where we are?
	That, you know, the way you look good is you have a charismatic mafiadon?
	I don't know. It's just kind of funny that way.
	But anyway, North and South Italians are kind of different that way.
	And probably imagine this came more from the South.
	But, all right. I guess we'll do art analysis perhaps another day.
	But let's move on.
	It is... Saturday, election plus five.
	Is it election plus five?
	Man, oh man. And, um, I guess everyone's, I mean, it's funny because it's not a narrative that it's been called for Biden, like the newspapers have some capacity to call the election.
	And, uh, I guess there's a whole number of lawsuits pending and all that kind of stuff.
	And, uh, Yeah, it's pretty brutal what's happened to American democracy, but given that I'm off politics, it's fine.
	You know, I get the vaguely nihilistic statement of it is what it is, which is, you know, kind of true.
	And, you know, stuff that goes to the courts is almost beyond the realm of philosophy at this point because it just comes down to legal interpretation and then enforcement.
	You know, whether that occurs or not, we'll see.
	But, yeah, it's basically legal analysis, court-appointed guns to enforce one way or the other.
	And that's not where...
	Philosophy doesn't reach down that dark into the tunnel of coercion.
	So anyway, let's move on with the mission of the show to improve the lives of people directly and personally through the power of philosophy.
	James, let's get it going.
	All right. So this morning we have a listener who writes in.
	My wife and I are dedicated to raising our children according to their principles of peaceful parenting, which was not very difficult when our little lad was the only child, but now as our baby girl has joined the family, he has now become increasingly jealous and abusive towards her.
	At 19 months, he is only semi-verbal, identifying objects and simple properties such as hot, cold, and ouchy, but not emotions.
	Our six-month-old sissy is often hit on the head.
	We have taught him to give her a kiss on the forehead when she cries to help encourage empathy, but lately he has even bitten her on the forehead, nose, and face while doing so.
	We are at our wits' end trying to figure out what he needs so that he does not feel this jealousy.
	We have followed the advice of various sources such as Peaceful Parent, Happy Kid, and tried working with the advice of others in the community.
	But there seems to be something fundamental that we have not identified at the root of it.
	We would like to get your assistance to see what principles we should follow.
	And my understanding is that he and his wife are available for the call, and I think the little one's around, but we'll see.
	Well, good morning, Orr.
	Good afternoon, good evening, good day.
	How are you guys doing? Hey Steph, how's it going?
	It's good. Alright, good to hear.
	So yeah, my wife will be here, but semi-here because of the kids.
	Our little girl's being put to bed.
	We're trying to see if she's going to bed right now.
	And my little lad right here is playing with the chair.
	So we're here.
	And so she might be a little transient.
	No worries at all. So, can you tell me a little bit more about the birth of your son, what was going on in your guys' lives, that kind of stuff?
	Sure, absolutely. So, my little boy, he is 19 months old.
	When he was born, he was born, oh, let's see here.
	He was born, he had swallowed the meconium, and he was a breech baby.
	So, that being the case, he was in the NICU five days.
	And I remember being by his bedside and just because everything looked really scary because it looked like he wasn't going to make it at the very beginning.
	And I told him, I love you with all I have and all I am and would do everything I can to make sure that he's a happy, healthy little boy.
	So fortunately, after a couple of days, he was able to get discharged from the NICU and we were able to get out of the hospital.
	I'm sorry, just for those who don't know the acronym, of course, but you've gone through this kind of stuff.
	It gets imprinted in your brain.
	That's needle intensive care.
	Is that right? That's correct, yes.
	Okay, so what was the story when he was in natal intensive care?
	What was the setup?
	Was he isolated?
	Was he separated?
	Were you able to hold him? Did he get skin contact?
	That kind of stuff? Oh yeah, I tried doing as much as I can of that with him.
	So what happened is, so he would go into the natal intensive care unit, And with that, he was on oxygen the entire time, but any opportunity that I had to hold his hand and to, you know, cuddle up next to him and do everything I can to interact with him because my wife, she was recovering from the C-section.
	And so I just spent, I mean, I barely slept.
	Just I would wake up and go be with him as much as I could and then see how my wife was doing and just kind of alternate as much as I could.
	I lived off those, uh, Those Uncrustables, the Smucker's Uncrustables that they have on the little fridge, or in the little fridge for fathers there.
	Oh man, that's pretty much it.
	Right, right. But yeah. So with that, you said you were able to hold his hand?
	What other physical contact were you able to have with him?
	With his hand, I was able to, for periods of time, maybe an hour each day, was to be able to hold him and cuddle with him and do what I can.
	There was a lot of oxygen tubes coming out off of him.
	Or oxygen tubes and, you know, a few other diagnostic tubing.
	And so with that, it had to be kind of arranged for me to hold him.
	So I did that as much as I could.
	And how much was that?
	Oh, like I said, maybe an hour, two hours a day.
	And how was he being fed?
	So he was being fed.
	What? He was tube fed for those few days.
	So tube-fed, meaning it went into his arm or down his throat?
	Yeah, in his nose, the nasal way, and it goes down into his stomach.
	And then after a couple days, after he was discharged, we were able to breastfeed for a little while, but that did have to be supplemented with...
	Oh, yeah, that's right. You did breastfeed in the hospital.
	So she did breastfeed in the hospital.
	Here, if you want to tell him that.
	Okay. Okay. Hello.
	Hi, nice to meet you.
	Thanks for taking the time to come.
	Go ahead. Yeah, nice to meet you.
	Yeah. I was in the hospital and after a while they had him on the nasal tube for breast milk.
	Oh, okay. And then I was able to breastfeed him, but it was very hard.
	Right. So, sorry.
	You were pumping your milk and then they were feeding him through the nose.
	Is that right? Yes.
	Yes. And did you get a chance to do...
	And then I had to walk up there after my C-section, after I felt like I could walk and do that, I'd go up to the next floor and I would breastfeed him and...
	It was a very, very hard time.
	Oh, I'm so sorry, yeah.
	It's my first C-section at home.
	It's something you look forward to, of course, for months and months or years, perhaps, you know, holding your baby and all of that.
	I mean, that kind of introduction to life is really brutal, and I'm, you know, my massive sympathies for all of that.
	Yeah, I had the staples, so it was kind of hard to walk up and...
	I go up the elevator sometimes.
	It was a struggle the first week, but after that I got better.
	He was in for nine days in the NIC, right?
	Rather, five days in the NICU and then two additional days that we got, was it afterwards, right?
	Yeah, afterwards to just kind of have general recovery.
	Okay, so he was out of sort of isolation.
	You could hold him more and all that kind of stuff after the five days?
	Mm-hmm. Yes.
	Got it, got it. And then for the next month and a half, I'm sorry.
	And then for the next month and a half, he was on oxygen.
	So we had to have a tank that we'd put, you know, bring around with us.
	Mostly we just stayed at home, but yeah.
	I got it.
	And... How was your guys' level of sort of stress and upset and tension and all of that during this time and I guess the couple of months afterwards?
	It was pretty hard but very stressful for both of us.
	Pretty much me too just recovering.
	We had to have him in the bedroom a lot and His oxygen tube just didn't go as far as we wanted it to go, so I was kind of like, on the sensor.
	I was on his foot.
	That was annoying.
	Yeah, there was an oxygen sensor that would attach to his foot, and what it would say is, you know, if his oxygen saturation level went below a certain percentage, I think it was 89%, then it would beep.
	And so none of us would really get much sleep, because it would go many times during the night.
	So the oxygen was being fed through his nose, is that right?
	Yes, the oxygen was being fed through his nose.
	Wow, okay. Wow, and so it would dislodge or loosen or whatever, right?
	Yeah, yeah.
	You'd have to put, like, little band-aids on the side of his face to hold it in place, so...
	Yeah. So, I mean, certainly not the easiest start to this cozy room we call existence, right?
	Yeah, it wasn't easiest.
	Did you guys have, is there family around or friends or people who could sort of help you out with this or was it a bit more solitary?
	Absolutely. No, it was, we had a lot from my side of the family and my wife's side of the family and we had some friends as well, just everyone.
	So, we did have a lot of decent support.
	So, We're LDS, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and so people in the ward, which is basically the geographic area, congregation that's in the geographic area, they would bring us meals.
	And so that was quite a lot of help in regards to just being able to eat in that regard.
	And how did things play out, I guess, after the oxygen nose tube was removed after about six weeks, I think you said?
	How did things play out after that?
	Everything was a little bit easier.
	Just kind of focused on getting killed myself, and he was doing fine, and so he's just grown into a big boy.
	Yeah, it's been fine.
	Well, there was the thing with his head.
	Oh, yeah. Then there was...
	He preferred to sleep on a certain side of his head, and so what that did is that started to distort the shape of his head, and we were really worried about that, and they wanted to get him either a helmet, or after a while, they were thinking maybe they needed to do the whole, like, crack his...
	I don't know how to explain it, but basically crack his head open and re-form it.
	And he would have the helmet in either case.
	But we were thinking about it as much as we could and made the decision not to do that.
	And his head has formed just fine, and he seems to be happy and healthy.
	Yeah, I mean, just for those who don't know, and again, I'm no expert on this, so look up any sort of whatever you need to for this kind of stuff, but the baby's head has to fit through, this giant brain has to fit through a woman's vagina.
	And I'm sorry if I'm giving you PTSD, my friend, but this is your wife I'm talking to.
	But it's a big brain that's got to get through the vagina.
	And one of the ways that it makes the journey is that the baby's head The baby's skull is not fused in the way that an adult's skull is.
	It's more flexible because it kind of needs to go into a bullet shape, so to speak.
	Probably not the right analogy, but, you know, a torpedo?
	That's even worse, right? But it kind of has to mold itself to get through the woman's vagina or through the birth canal.
	And then... After the baby is born, the skull is still kind of soft, and there's a different bunch of plates, if I remember rightly, that end up forming together.
	And guys, correct me, wherever I've gone astray.
	But, yeah, so if the baby continues to sleep on one side, then there is a concern that the skull is going to fuse together in a way that's not...
	I mean, very few people end up with the perfect Charlie Brown round head or whatever, but...
	I think the concern is that it might end up somewhat off in terms of its rotundity.
	Did I sort of get that correct?
	Yes, can you hear me? Okay, okay.
	One sec. There we are.
	So it must have been us who dropped out.
	Okay, yeah. Just make sure there's nothing else running on the network if you can.
	Perfect. Yeah, we don't have anything else running.
	Yeah, so after the six weeks, sorry, I was just talking about the sort of baby's skull and how it doesn't fuse together until later on after birth, and you want to make sure it doesn't end up looking like an egg or, I don't know, a pretzel or something.
	Exactly. And as far as mood, personality, I mean, one of the reasons I'm a bit grateful about having only one child is I've always been kind of curious about how much of the effect the environment has on the personality, right?
	Because there seems to be, from what I've read, there's almost no...
	Aspect of personality that's not affected by genetics.
	And I'm always kind of curious, you know, if we had two kids or three kids or four kids, then it would be very interesting to see how their personalities were different based upon a relatively similar environment.
	I mean, there's no such thing as the same environment because the second kid has the first kid ahead already and so on, right?
	But what was your perception of his sort of personality and all of that through this process and beyond?
	Yeah, so my perception of his personality has been very interesting.
	So according to what my mom describes me being like when I was a kid, he's seemingly a carbon copy, in many senses, in regards to that.
	But I imagine...
	Well, basically, he is very active, very smart, like incredibly smart.
	So for me, when I was young, my mom would have stories of being about his age where I would crawl on top of the fridge or have a butcher knife in the goldfish bowl, just basically getting everywhere and doing everything.
	And he seems to be following suit of that.
	There are places that...
	I don't think there's many places that he can't go right now.
	And the only thing that's really stopping him is that we have these...
	They're doors, basically.
	We have doors kind of sideways blocking off certain areas, and that's the only thing that's stopping him from getting over.
	But even then, he's been starting to figure out how to move stuff to climb on top and get where he wants to.
	And for our little girl here, she seems to be a lot like her mother, where she's...
	Well, in this case, she seemed to have picked up a lot of emotion as well, so...
	Before she started getting used to it, unfortunately, she was very emotional, I guess you could say.
	She would be very vocal about her displeasure.
	But I'll let my wife kind of explain a little bit more, at least her perceptions.
	Yeah, he's exactly more like his dad.
	And, yeah, pretty much more like me.
	She's very calm.
	But very emotional.
	Sometimes can get into everything.
	I'm sorry to interrupt.
	If you could just say... I'm sorry.
	Yeah, just say son and daughter if you could.
	Our little boy. Our little boy.
	Can get into everything.
	And our little girl can get into some things now.
	She's six months.
	And she's just very...
	She's rolling now, so that's how she, um, use her mobility.
	Yeah. That's her, her first mobility is, uh, yeah, rolling.
	And, um, yeah, and I'm just joking.
	I don't know what else to say.
	Well, it's kind of funny in a way, right?
	I mean, we try to avoid cliches.
	We try to avoid cliches in life, but they tend to creep up on us.
	Because you have an aggressive explorer for a son and a very emotional daughter, right?
	Yes, yes. So, both of them...
	Let's have the forehead.
	Both of them are very...
	Hard.
	You need diaper change.
	Yeah. Anything else, John, that you can think of?
	This is really hard for me.
	You're doing wonderfully.
	It's totally fine. If there's any consolation, I've had to do shows with my daughter when she was little in the room.
	It can be quite exciting.
	Everything's totally fine. Your family is not an interruption of this show.
	This is the cause of the show.
	Don't worry about that at all.
	With regards to your son and what he's seen or experienced, has he had any particular Exposure to aggression or, you know, has he seen any sort of aggressive cartoons or have them in songs or any place that he might have picked up?
	And again, it may be entirely his sort of nature, which is fine too, but do you think he's had any environmental exposure to aggression in the family or media or anything?
	Not that we've seen.
	He's been... Pretty good.
	We've been really good.
	Sorry, the shows and stuff that we let them watch are things like, I think I told you it's Bluey.
	So it's basically, it's a show that has a bunch of kids' games that can play, but particularly it helps teach the parents also the kinds of games they can play with their kids.
	And that one has no violence that I can readily perceive.
	Yeah. Okay.
	And when...
	I'm sorry if I missed this in the initial message, but when did the physical aggression begin with yourself?
	I'm just trying to think.
	I think it was when he was about...
	Oh, yeah.
	When he became more mobile.
	So 15 months?
	Yeah, so he was 15 months and she was probably 3 months old.
	And she was, yeah.
	Or rather, 2 months old.
	Yeah. Because they're 13 months apart.
	So, I think it was when he became more mobile, so 15 months.
	And how did he greet the arrival of his delightful sister?
	He didn't like her very much.
	I think one of the first impressions that I remember seeing of him is he was...
	When was...
	How old was he when he seemingly trembled with rage?
	He was 16 or 17 months, maybe?
	It seemed like he was trembling with rage at one point.
	Do you remember the situation for it?
	Because we were...
	Giving her more attention, I think.
	I think it was just more attention.
	Yeah. You were giving him, so he got really upset.
	Wait, so you were giving him more attention or her more attention?
	Her more attention, because she needed our kind of hands-on attention at the moment, because she was doing something or another.
	And so, he saw that, and I remember perceiving, almost like a physical...
	I don't recall any particular reasoning why.
	I've never been angry, even visibly angry at my wife or at him, so I'm not sure where it would have reasonably come from.
	Reasonably? I'm sorry. He's a toddler, right?
	I mean, he's not reasoning things out, right?
	Right, that is true.
	He's not reasoning things out.
	He is feeling his pure emotion.
	Yeah, and listen, just so you know, and I'm sure you're aware of this, but just to sort of remind everyone, we evolved as a species in situations of extremely scant resources.
	And so everyone's like, oh, they're as close as brothers.
	And it's like, well, siblings, you know, half of sibling relationships are abusive.
	And that's not even by free domain standards.
	That's just by like typical run-of-the-mill general psychological standards.
	Like half of sibling relationships are actually abusive, and I think by free domain standards, that number would probably be quite a bit higher.
	And one of the reasons for that is that siblings compete for resources.
	And it's kind of programmed into us in a deadly foundational kind of way.
	Because when you're scant of resources in the family, nobody wants to be the runt of the litter because the runt of the litter usually doesn't make it, right?
	So I think that's really important to sort of process that...
	He was kind of born into a situation that his body probably perceived as scarcity, right?
	Because his body doesn't know anything about...
	I'm sorry, would you guys mind?
	I hate to ask if you could just mute while I'm talking.
	Sorry about that. Yeah, thanks.
	Yeah, I meant to be muted.
	Let's go get there. Okay.
	So, your son's body doesn't know anything about Natal Intensive Care Unit.
	It doesn't know anything about breech birth.
	It doesn't know anything about need for oxygen or sensors.
	Your son's body would probably have been born into a situation that deep down he would have perceived as resources are somewhat scarce because there was a lot of stress and danger in his birth.
	And, you know, that usually is interpreted as...
	Scarce resources. So, if your body, I think, is primed for scarce resources or lack of parental attention, and a lack of parental attention usually has to do with scarce resources as well, because your parents are working all the time to provide food, which means resources are kind of scarce, or there's a huge number of other siblings, which means competition for resources is fierce.
	And so deep down, his body may have reacted to sort of the initial six-week stress of his birth and early toddlerhood or early infancy with, okay, resources are scarce.
	And then I think that turns into a situation where the competition that is perceived to be coming from The sibling is that much more intense.
	And so as you're paying more attention to the sibling, if his body is like scarce resources, as you're paying more attention to the sibling, his anger and desire to protect his own access to resources is probably quite high.
	And that would be one guess.
	Obviously, I have no expert in this.
	It's just my amateur opinion over the internet as usual.
	But that would be my one guess.
	I think there's a lot you can do about that.
	But I think that would be the one situation where I would look first for the aggression, if that makes sense.
	That makes some sense here, yeah.
	A lot of sense, actually.
	Now, with regards to your own upbringing, that is you and your wife's, were there any markers or environmental indicators of scarce resources when you were kids?
	So, for me, when I was young, let's see here, when I was little, we grew up out in the boonies on the West Coast, and But I think during my time when I was born, we were starting to do reasonably well.
	My father worked in the defense industry in aerospace.
	And so with that, he made a decent chunk of money in regards to that.
	And even as time went on, more and more, we seemed to be doing better off in that regard.
	I would say we were upper middle class on my side of the family.
	Yeah, I mean, besides...
	Perhaps I'm resorting to stereotype again, but we have Scottish heritage on my dad's side of the family, so he was very seemingly tight-fisted with expenditures.
	So, for example, you know, we'd go and get to McDonald's as a family.
	We'd get to Happy Meals, and that would be between the four of us kids.
	You know, we'd be split in that.
	And so there was...
	Enough provided for us, but there also was a seeming perception of scarcity to some degree.
	And for my wife, I'll let her describe that.
	Let's see, both my parents, they worked in the school district.
	My mom was a teacher at high school, pretty much most of my life.
	She's still teaching.
	She works at another high school.
	My dad, he was in the janitorial area where he was the head janitor a lot of the time.
	He worked at many different schools.
	My life was, you know, it was reasonably good.
	Like... You know, I was brought up in a good family and loved very much.
	And even though they were off, you know, working, you know, I felt lonely sometimes, but I always had friends around and brother and sister to take care of me, older brother and older sister.
	So it was tough, but...
	You know, you got to do what you got to do to make money.
	Well, no, technically, I mean, technically, you don't.
	Technically, you don't need both parents working for most people in the West.
	I mean, say, oh, well, yes, but if you want a nice house and you want two cars, like, yeah, for sure, if you want a lot of money.
	But in general as well, if you look at child care costs as a whole, usually in particular...
	This is connected for me. Can you hear me now?
	Hello, can you hear me? We can hear.
	We're just seeing if the connection issue is still happening.
	No, can you hear me? We can hear you, yeah.
	We also have the kids making noise at the moment.
	No, I can hear. If you could mute when I'm talking again, that would be great.
	So, you don't need two parents working to raise children in the West.
	I mean, as you know, the West is pretty wealthy, even with taxes and all of that.
	And for the most part, having a second parent working, usually the mom, by the time you factor in extra costs of the second job and childcare expenses and so on, it generally doesn't make much money.
	you don't make much money by having the woman work and certainly for the first couple of years of a child's life my recommendation from the very beginning of this show has always been one parent should stay home i mean for the most part it should be the wife uh the mother because she's breastfeeding and and that's pretty significant to uh to child development and so on But...
	For the first couple of years, yeah, of course.
	I mean, as the mother should stay home.
	Now, that's kind of an old school way of looking at things because there was all of this propaganda starting in the 50s about women got to go to work and you can't trust your man.
	And I mean, you can see all these endless Nicole Kidman starring movies of women being betrayed by their white husbands.
	It's always the same. That sort of thing, right?
	But this mistrust, you know, if you've got to have your own income because he could just dump you for a younger model and you've got to...
	So this sort of trust thing has been kind of whittled away and there's been a lot of propaganda about get out there and work stuff, which, you know, I'm speaking to your wife here, you know, this may have been more the case with your...
	But I think the important thing to recognize deep down is like what happens to the child's sense of the world if the child's parents are mostly absent.
	So you have to sort of look at how we evolved.
	Now, I'm not saying we've got to live exactly as how we evolved, right?
	I'm fine with a smallpox vaccine.
	I think it's a good thing. But we do sort of have to look at how our lives evolved.
	How our bodies, how our unconscious developed.
	And for the most part, of course, women were full-time mothers throughout most of our evolution.
	They didn't have jobs. I mean, they had jobs insofar as, you know, there'd be some hunter-gathering stuff that would be going on.
	They'd go and get, you know, the herbs, the roots.
	They might have a little vegetable garden and so on.
	But it was the men who were hunting and raising the livestock and fixing the fences and taming the horses and, you know, whatever else happens in my basically city-fied life about our evolution.
	But So the question would be for what signals does mother absence give to the baby?
	What? Because we're not born...
	I mean, it's the amazing thing about our lives, and it's true for most mammals and maybe even some non-mammals, but we're born not knowing what kind of world we're being born into.
	Is it a world of peace?
	Is it a world of war? Is it a world of plenty?
	Or is it a world of hunger?
	Is it a world of health?
	Or is it a world of disease? Is it a world of strife?
	Or is it a world of peace? I mean, we don't know.
	And so we're born, and these sort of antennae come out from our bodies and probe, what kind of world am I going to have to grow up in?
	What kind of world am I going to have to adapt to?
	And that world generally didn't change.
	If it was a world of...
	Hunger, right?
	So, I mean, Scottish people are kind of famously cheap, right?
	There's an old story.
	When I was a kid growing up, there was the Englishman, the Irishman, and the Scotsman jokes.
	And one of the ones I remember was a friend, the Englishman, the Irishman, the Scotsman are at a funeral.
	A friend of theirs has died. And the Englishman says, because he wants to show off his wealth, he takes out 50 pounds and throws it into the grave and says, there's something you can buy drinks with in the afterlife.
	And the Irishman also wants to show he's wealthy.
	Takes out a hundred pounds, throws it into, that's like dollars for those who, throws it into the grave.
	There's something for you to buy some drinks for in your old age.
	And then the Scotsman says, I got that beat.
	And he writes a check for a thousand pounds and throws it into the grave.
	Because, you know, it's cheap and you can't cash a cheque when you're dead.
	Or the other one is Englishman, Irishman, Scotsman walking down the street.
	The robber comes out and says, Give me all your cash!
	And the Englishman hands over £10.
	And the Irishman hands over £20.
	And the Scotsman turns to the Englishman and says, Ah, here's that £30.
	I owe you. Because you're going to lose it anyway, right?
	But look, I mean, Scotland is at like the...
	Northern foreskin penis end of England and it's bloody cold and it's a harsh climate and you've got to preserve your resources.
	It's hard fishing, it's cold weather, it's hard growing season, it's thin soil, it's you know, it's brutal.
	So you've got to sort of think, okay, from your baby's standpoint, what would be going on in the world that the mother would be absent for the vast majority of the day, right?
	Why would the mother be gone?
	Why would the mother be absent? Well, so from the baby's standpoint, and again, this is more for your wife growing up, but the baby interprets mother absence as things must be pretty bad out there.
	I mean, how low on food are we that the mother has to not be around the baby?
	Why? Because she's got to go hunt with the men?
	Because she's got to go and try and trap some rabbits?
	Because, like, what the hell is going on that mom is gone for most of the day?
	Now, we can say later on, well, you know, but I was a feminist and I wanted to be equal to a man, and there's mistrust of the patriarchy, but none of that matters anything.
	None of those intellectual abstractions mean anything to the baby.
	The baby is just scanning.
	It's like deep down in the reptile brain of the baby, the deep mammal brain of the baby is just scanning and saying, okay, what kind of environment?
	Are we in an environment where there's peace, stability, and plenty?
	Okay, well then I'll make sure I'll turn on puberty later.
	And childhood stressors lead to, we know this, right?
	I mean, the whole Bomb and the Brain series, which I've got on Library, on Bitchute and other places, the whole Bomb and the Brain series goes into great detail about how much changes in a child's physiology when they're exposed to early stressors.
	And mother absence is a significant early stressor for a baby, a very, very significant early stressor for a baby.
	And so if your Parents are working.
	I believe that you interpret that as, man, things are tight.
	Holy crap. It's so bad that the mother who's desperately needed to protect and breastfeed her children can't even spare the time to be around them.
	So this is a time... And, you know, you sort of look at this.
	The kids that are coming out of these mother-working families are often, you know, they're pretty stressed.
	They're pretty susceptible to propaganda.
	You know, a lot of these hard leftists and medium leftists and so on.
	And it's kind of rough.
	And... To me, it's one of the greatest tragedies of the modern world.
	It's just how babies are growing up, just passed around like hacky-sacks in a way.
	And so, from that standpoint, looking at your own upbringings, it's funny because you talked a lot about money, which I understand, but of course kids don't really understand the concept of money.
	All they can do is probe whether the parents are there or not.
	They can probe the level of stress that the parents are experiencing, and they can probe all of the signals about whether they are...
	Going to be growing up in a situation of peace and plenty or scarcity and conflict.
	And, you know, hypersexuality comes out of this kind of scarcity situation, right?
	Because if your lives are defined by scarcity, then you want to kind of just have a lot of Sex have a lot of kids and, you know, like the rabbits, right?
	As opposed to the R selected versus the K selected and all of that, which is why puberty hits earlier.
	Promiscuity tends to, and you don't tend to, it tends to increase, and you don't tend to look for sort of long-term consequences that much, which is why trauma as children is also associated with, you know, drug addiction and other forms of addiction, gambling, sexuality, as I mentioned, alcoholism,
	smoking, and so on. So, When it comes to resources, it's not money, fundamentally, because, you know, the poor little rich girl cliche of the girl whose parents are very wealthy, and she's lonely because she's raised by nannies.
	They come and go, right?
	And so for a kid, if you've got nannies, right, or just a succession of caregivers, your body interprets that deep down as they're dying, right?
	Right? And that's pretty bad.
	That's pretty bad if you have a succession of caregivers.
	If you're in daycare, then there's usually...
	I mean, I worked in a daycare. There's a lot of rotation among the staff because it's a pretty low-rent position.
	And so you bond with people and then they vanish.
	Well, why would that happen in a tribe?
	Well, because there's disease, there's war, there's famine, there's predation.
	Maybe they got grabbed by some neighboring tribe and used as sex slaves or something for the women and maybe used as slaves, economic slaves for the men and so on.
	And so when it comes to resource, the fundamental resource that the baby is looking for is parental time and attention.
	And so when you guys were growing up, I guess that's sort of my refined question.
	I'm sorry I wasn't clear about it before.
	My refined question is how much individual parental time and attention did you receive when you were very young?
	Hey, Steph. So for me, when I was growing up, the parental time and attention I received was pretty good.
	My mom was available pretty much non-stop because she was a stay-at-home mom.
	And with that, I was able to grow up and get taken care of by her.
	I would say, you know what, there is a factor that may be affecting it as well.
	So... And this would stem from her history as well.
	I'd say she had a degree of agoraphobia.
	So when my mom was growing up, she had...
	So to have her behave, my grandma would say, for example, if she's acting up in the store, hey, everybody's looking at you, everybody's seeing what you're doing.
	And so with that, that caused her to have a lot of...
	Well, problems. Can you get that turned off?
	Thank you. So with that, she had a lot of self-consciousness in regards to that.
	So I would say she developed a degree of agoraphobia in regards to that.
	So I don't recall much of that growing up, but now seeing the signs later on, I would say that that was somewhat the case.
	But I had three sisters, two older, one younger.
	And so my oldest sister...
	She would be able to, you know, to help in that regard.
	So she's about five years older than I am.
	So I would say to a degree there was some that was tasked upon her to be able to help with us.
	But my mom would, you know, she would Basically force herself to do a lot of things to take care of us because we were important to her.
	So if I understand this correctly, agoraphobia is more than just, I don't particularly like to go outside.
	Like it's a really, it can be crippling for some people for sure, right?
	And although it prepared them well for the pandemic, I suppose.
	But with your mother, I mean, so agoraphobia would transmit itself to children as the world is dangerous, right?
	That is true, yes.
	Right, right, okay.
	So that the world is dangerous is a transmission of the need for either submission or aggression.
	So if the world is dangerous, there's two ways that you can survive, right?
	Because you can't negotiate on an equal basis with human beings when the world is dangerous.
	So your twin strategies are you submit or you are aggressive.
	In other words, it's sort of like in prison, right?
	You either have to become someone's girlfriend or you have to be someone's boyfriend, right?
	You can't sort of be just equals.
	And I guess my question is with regards to you, if this formulation is correct and, you know, it's not obviously absolute or black and white, when you look at your sort of upbringing, was there any sense that you had about, okay, when I go out into the world, can I negotiate as an equal or do I have to be the tough guy or do I have to submit or anything like that?
	We've actually already spoken on this before.
	This is Leon from three years ago from the furry conversation.
	Yes, I thought I recognized the voice, but go on.
	Yeah, so my mother would use a lot of reading books and movies and shows and stuff to escape from the scary world, I guess you could say.
	And so I did develop that to a degree as well.
	So with that, I didn't have the male peership that I needed to develop healthy...
	Sorry.
	Properly healthy relationships between male peers and also to a degree with my father in that regard.
	So yes, this is that situation.
	But also, and maybe we'll go into this a little bit later, but since that point I have done a couple of different things, but particularly I am doing some talk therapy to work on that.
	Okay, so with regards to parental attention from your wife whose parents worked, what was that like?
	I'll have to get her in just a second.
	She's putting the baby down.
	Putting her in.
	So from what I understand of her situation, that her parents both worked during her time growing up, so she did have, like she mentioned, her siblings to help out with her.
	But I'll let her kind of expound on that a little bit more when she gets a moment.
	Yeah, sure. But siblings, it's not like they don't count, but they don't solve the problem.
	Right? So if parents are absent, then also, you know, what happens is too, so when parents are absent from their children's lives, and again, I know that they weren't completely gone, but, you know, for a parent an hour, sorry, for a child, an hour is a week, like a toddler, right?
	I mean, if you say to some toddler, I'll be back in an hour, I don't really understand that, right?
	So for kids too, toddlers, They're also programming themselves for, okay, what it's going to be like when I'm a parent, right?
	And again, assuming that nothing changes in the environment, which it rarely did, in human history.
	The kids are saying, okay, well, my parents clearly don't have a strong enough bond with me to stay home with me.
	In other words, they're not sacrificing.
	Like, either things are really scarce, and the only way they can care for me is not seeing me.
	Just kind of dump me on the siblings or dump me on whoever, right?
	Then things must be super scarce, right?
	Now, if they're not scarce, though, then it means that I'm growing up in a situation where the parent-child bond is just not that strong.
	And that's pretty important, right?
	Because... If the parent-child bond is so strong that the mother can't leave the child, but the situation is so scarce in terms of resources that it means that the family starves to death, then the parental bond is fatal.
	It means she should be out gathering nuts and berries and doing whatever to get food.
	That's how scarce things are.
	But instead, she's home with the baby and everyone's going to die.
	So parental bond then becomes kind of fatal.
	In the situation where there are a lot of resources, or at least a reasonable amount of resources, Thank you.
	The parental bond is still very weak.
	Then that just means that there's a culture of not bonding with your children or not putting your children's needs first.
	You know, it's kind of funny, right?
	Because there's a whole court standard in the West, which is really subtle and subjective and, you know, obviously messy, called, you know, we want to do what's in the best interest of the child, right?
	That's sort of the legal standard in divorces and stuff like that.
	There's a whole cottage industry, which probably actually buys some very expensive cottages of evaluating this and making recommendations from psychologists and social workers and all that.
	But, you know, if we sort of, if we were to organize, and this is partly sort of what I'm writing about in the book Peaceful Parenting, but if we just said, okay, best interest of the child, that's a legal standard, what if we just make that a personal standard?
	You know how, like, it's like a legal standard not to murder people, maybe we can make that a personal standard too.
	But with...
	the best interest in the child, for the child, without a doubt, is parental, specifically maternal, constant attention when they're young.
	You know, because life is all about pay me now or pay me later, right?
	You can enjoy your smoking and then you get lung cancer.
	You can enjoy your eating and then you get fat and diabetic and whatever you get.
	You lose toes and so on, right?
	But it's all about pay me now, pay me later.
	So the women can say, oh, I'm going to just go out and work and, oh, kids don't care.
	They're resilient, right? People say, oh, kids are resilient.
	It's like, no, no, it just means your conscience is looking for latitude, right?
	But what is in the best interest of the child is...
	To model a parental bond so strong that when the child grows up, it retains the ability, he or she retains the ability to bond strongly and make decisions based upon the best interests of the other person, and in particular, of course, the children.
	So just let me know when your wife toodles back and we'll pick it up with her.
	But siblings don't count. Again, it's not like they're immaterial, but the parental bond is what counts.
	Siblings can't breastfeed, obviously.
	And siblings themselves, if we say that a 10-year-old can raise a child, then obviously a 10-year-old can drive, a 10-year-old can vote, a 10-year-old can sign contracts, because all of these are far less important than raising a child.
	So the devolution of parenting into the hands of siblings is, to me, the height of irresponsibility.
	It's very destructive to the relationship between the siblings, too.
	Because siblings should be playing together and to give one sibling authority over another sibling creates the seeds of what can turn into lifelong conflicts.
	It's unfair to a brother or a sister to say, you raised a child or you're primarily responsible for the child or you're significantly responsible for the child.
	I'm not talking like on occasion or here or there or, you know, the older sibling, you know, keep an eye on your younger brother.
	That's totally fine. I mean, that's natural and that's fine.
	But if significant parenting responsibilities devolve, On to the sibling.
	The younger sibling is going to experience a lot of hostility and anxiety and is going to experience a lot of resentment from the elder sibling who feels like I could be out playing, but I've got to watch little Johnny or Jesse or Susie or whatever.
	And so saying, well, you know, my sibling stepped in where my parents weren't around, it's like, well, that's not solving the fundamental problem.
	In fact, in many ways, it's making it worse.
	Yeah, and my wife has returned.
	If you don't mind doing a real quick iteration for her to hear to respond to.
	Sure. So, with regards to resources, it's not primarily money.
	It's parental time and attention, and I guess I'm just sort of curious what that was like for you as a kid.
	As long as I can remember, I think when I was a little, like...
	When I was a little kid, my mom did Young Mothers, and I was able to be with her there.
	I don't know what that is.
	Young Mothers is just women who have had children at a very young age, so like a teenager, 16.
	She was a teacher there.
	At this young mother's place, and I was just able to be with her and around her, which was kind of nice, um, to be around her and then just, you know, to be with other kids my age,
	too. So, I just remember she worked a lot with, like, childhood and, um, you know, childhood development stuff, and, um, I'm just processing.
	But she's just been a teacher all my life.
	I think she went to college kind of like when my sister was born.
	And then I think she was at home more with her and my brother.
	And then I feel like she's just worked all of my life.
	So it's kind of hard.
	Why did she – I'm sorry to interrupt.
	Why did she work so much rather than spend time with her kids?
	Just like insurance stuff.
	I guess they had a lot of bills and things that they had to pay off.
	I think it was part of my grandpa too, her dad.
	Who was kind of strict on her.
	Like she needed to go to college.
	She needed to, you know, get a job so that she could provide for her family because she's the oldest in her family of eight.
	Eight children. So she had a lot of pressure on her growing up too.
	So that could be part of it.
	But what about you? What about you as a kid, right?
	So as a kid, your mom's going to work.
	Yeah. And you're hanging on to her leg, begging and pleading with her not to go.
	And she goes. I mean, what was that like for you emotionally?
	I mean, deep down, what did that make you think about your mom and your bond and your relationship and all?
	What I can remember just as a kid is that it was very emotional.
	Like, I didn't I didn't want to be away from her.
	I really loved her and, you know, we're really close.
	Me and my dad are really close too, but, you know, a kid always loves their mom.
	But being in preschool, at least there was a preschool and a high school she worked at, and I was able to be in that little preschool.
	And then when I got older, I was able to go to preschool and kindergarten at the same time.
	So she would be able to take a break from her classes and be able to take me over to kindergarten, which was nice.
	Because we were able to kind of talk about things that happened that morning.
	Yeah, but it's emotional.
	I'd say, you know, very sad.
	Sorry to interrupt. What do you think deep down you thought about your value to your mother if she kept leaving?
	Sorry, repeat that again?
	What do you think deep down you thought about your value to your mother if she kept leaving?
	My value? Can you express more?
	Well, okay, so let's take a sort of silly example, right?
	So, let's say, you know, back when you were a single young lady, that you would go on a date, and let's say ten minutes into the date, the guy says, oh, you know what, there's a...
	Yeah, I'm sorry, I've got to end the date.
	There's something on TV I wanted to watch.
	And he just gets up and leaves.
	How do you feel the date went?
	That would be horrible, I guess.
	Well, what would you interpret about what the young man said and did?
	He doesn't care about me.
	He's not having a good time.
	Maybe he's just making some excuse.
	Yeah. But he's not, you know...
	Because, you know, if the date's going well, you don't want it to end, right?
	Yeah. Yeah, no.
	And eventually you don't want to end it enough that you get married.
	Now you can't end it, right?
	Right, so when a mother and the child always, always, always experiences it as abandonment, if the mother leaves the child on a regular basis, what does the child, specifically you, experience as to the value you have to your mother?
	She's abandoning me.
	Well, either there's something incredibly important that she has to do every day, or she just doesn't care about me that much.
	At least she cares about me less than this mystery thing she's going to, right?
	Yeah. I mean, that's just a basic fact.
	If the guy leaves the date because of the television show, then he cares more about the television show than you or the date, right?
	Yeah. So the big mystery to kids is, okay, why is mom going?
	Why is mom leaving me all the time?
	That's a big question. So what happens is a lot of times the kids say, well, I mean, there's obviously something super important.
	Maybe she's a superhero. Maybe she's holding up the world.
	Maybe she's making sure gravity continues.
	Like maybe something super important, right?
	But then what happens is you get a little older and you realize that your mom...
	Was leaving you or abandoning you, so to speak, for what?
	Oh, well, you know, she's a teacher.
	It's like, okay, so she cares about instructing kids, but she cares about instructing strangers' kids more than she cares about me.
	That doesn't make sense to a kid, right?
	Yeah. And then you find out that, well, there's a lot of bills to pay.
	It's like, yeah, but those bills were mostly optional.
	And as it turns out, mom didn't end up paying that many bills after taxes and expenses and travel costs and clothing costs and lunches out and all of that, right?
	And mom didn't really... So what the hell was you abandoning me for?
	That's the big question, right?
	That kids have to sort of puzzle through when they're little.
	Yeah, yeah. And how did you puzzle through that?
	Uh... I'm trying to remember.
	It's been, yeah, a very long time.
	But I remember I just had friends, I guess.
	I would go play with my friends a lot.
	No, no, hang on.
	Those are practical things that you did in consequence.
	I'm asking you about the emotional processing.
	Come on, you're supposed to be the emotional one.
	It's like asking your husband to build a bridge.
	It's just kind of crazy.
	So, emotionally-wise, I just...
	I think I'd bottle it up sometimes.
	Okay. And then I would emotionally...
	Yeah, I would emotionally, you know, let it out eventually.
	And then I'd tell my mom, you know, this is how I feel, blah, blah, blah, blah.
	And then she would, you know...
	She tried to comfort me as much as she could.
	But I just, I held it in.
	I just was one of those kids who, you know, I just hold it in to the very last moment and then I let it out.
	Yeah. Right, because if you say to someone, don't go, the person goes.
	Oof. Oof, right?
	Yeah. And if it's your mom, and you say to her, as millions and millions of kids across the West say every day to their moms, Mommy, don't go.
	Don't go. Please don't go.
	Stay with me. I love you.
	Don't go. Don't go.
	Please, Mommy, don't go. Stay with me.
	I love you. And the mom pries the kids' hands off their leg.
	Yeah. And leave.
	Close the door and go.
	I mean, kids sink into anxiety and depression, right?
	Because they've got no hold of their mothers.
	They can't trust the bond. Yeah.
	And why is mommy going?
	So they invent some big story and then they find out when they're older that mom went for, you know, maybe the equivalent of $5 or $10 an hour.
	Yeah. You know, if someone came along to you and said, I'll give you half a million dollars to leave your husband.
	What would you say? Um, no.
	Right. I love him.
	But your mom took five or ten bucks an hour to leave her children.
	Yeah. What the hell?
	Yeah. I mean, if somebody said, I'll give you $1,000 to leave your husband, you're like, hmm, you know, $1,000, that's not bad.
	I could invest that and get $1,100.
	I mean, how would your husband feel if you were like, oh, you know, honey, somebody offered me $1,000 to leave you, and I'm like, that's pretty good.
	I'm off. I mean, he'd feel like crap, right?
	Yeah, he'd feel really crap.
	Alright, so somebody's offering your mom, hey, here's five or ten bucks an hour after taxes and expenses to leave your kids.
	And they're like, yeah, sounds good to me.
	I'm in. Yeah.
	I mean, that's crap, right?
	Mm-hmm. It's terrible.
	Yeah. That's great for the powers that be, except for the parental bond and...
	And the thing is too, it doesn't even work out to make any money for the family as a whole in general, right?
	Because just pouring more women into the workplace simply drove down the wages of men.
	It's just supply and demand.
	So if women weren't in the workplace when the kids were young, the wages of the husbands would go up proportionally and they'd end up making the same if not more money.
	Uh-huh. So, the reason I'm talking about all of this, right, obviously, is where does this kind of aggression come from with your son, right?
	Well, I believe that it would come from a perception of scarcity, which might be the echoes of harmed or scarred parental bonds with you guys when you were kids.
	And it also comes out of, obviously, a lack of empathy, right?
	And I'm not saying he's unempathetic, but just in the moments that he's aggressive, right?
	Aggression is very much the opposite of empathy, right?
	Because if you really care for someone else, then you can't hit them or scratch them or bite them or whatever, right?
	So what I'm looking for is places where bonds may be weak, places where empathy may be diminished, And also, I'm looking for signals of scarcity that your son may have experienced.
	So that's kind of why I'm sort of probing these old wounds, you know, which I know is not fun, but obviously it's quite important.
	Yeah, Steph, I'm not entirely sure where the wounds are for our current relationship with, you know, me and my son and my wife and my son, because...
	Right now, in terms of time that I can spend with him, so just due to the situation of how much he wants to play with me when I'm at home and how much I do play with him at home, I can't work from home.
	So if I'm on the computer, he's going to be reaching over this door that we, well, that we tried before to segregate or separate where I have to focus on my work.
	He would reach over and say, Daddy, Daddy, you know, just Call for me constantly, and I, you know, it's hard for me to deny him in that regard.
	So I have to physically go into the workplace, and I'd say right now with the amount of work that I do, I'd say it's somewhat irresponsible, the amount of work that I do.
	So I'll go in, let's say, 8.30 in the morning.
	I'll be in, and I'll be home by...
	Noon or so.
	So technically, you know, the employer wants the eight hours a day, but with the overall goal period, so we'll say a six-month period, they have certain goals set out for me to accomplish.
	I work in, well, we'll just say sales.
	So with that, I have had a very surprising amount of luck in regards to success.
	So right now, towards the end of the year, I'm pretty much on track for accomplishing my goals as what I would accomplish or what they would want me to accomplish in an 8-hour day.
	So for me, I'm getting home 1230.
	So I'm getting in 830, coming out 1230, and a good chunk of the time, I'm not necessarily working when I'm there.
	But that's a different story.
	But basically, I'll come home, and the second I get home to the second he goes to bed and she goes to bed, I am on them.
	Like, I am playing with him.
	I am... Taking care of her as best I can.
	We'll just go outside.
	He's my best friend.
	My little boy is my best friend.
	I'll come home. He's usually waking up from his nap about that time.
	We'll go outside. We'll play in our park that's 50 feet away.
	We'll go walk around. We'll point out stuff.
	Right now, we walk in front of each of the cars that are in the parking lot area.
	I'll point out the different logos of the cars.
	He knows the word logo and He'll say some of the logo names or the maker or whatever brand names of cars.
	And we'll do tons of little activities like that.
	So at work, I printed out...
	I'm sorry to interrupt.
	I get the picture and I just want to make sure that we don't try and deal with where it doesn't hurt.
	So I get all of that and I appreciate you telling me that.
	I really do. It's very helpful. But here's my question.
	When do you get angry at him and he knows it?
	When he hits her.
	Okay, so how does that play out?
	So let's say he's just hit her.
	Tell me what you would say and do.
	Yeah, let's say, for example, they're both playing in the mirror that we have laid out on the ground that's, you know, kind of vertical, and they're looking at themselves in the mirror and playing.
	She has a toy.
	He will take her toy...
	And she will, you know, I'll try and get her just a replacement toy as quick as I can.
	Wait, wait, hang on, hang on, wait, wait.
	Why would you get her a replacement toy?
	So that way she still has something to be occupied with.
	Ah, so, but what you're doing is you're removing from her the negative stimuli in her, sorry, you're removing from your son the negative stimuli that he's creating in your daughter.
	That's true. Yes.
	So for him, it's like, well, you know, it's no problem to take a toy because she'll just get another one.
	That's true. Dang, yeah, that is true.
	So, also, there are times where he'll look at her.
	They're playing. They'll be playing right, you know, next to each other.
	He'll look at her, and then he'll hit her on the head, slap her on the head, randomly, seemingly randomly.
	And we've been trying to work on this one for quite some time.
	Of, like, why, you know?
	We've tried increasing the amount of time and attention we give him.
	We've tried... Hang on, hang on.
	I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry.
	Sure. So he hits her on the head, and your response is to increase the amount of time and attention you give him.
	Dude. Yeah, that's...
	Dude. Yep.
	So you're rewarding him. That's rewarding.
	Yeah. Because we had times where we'd say...
	Well, we had a time period before where we would take him away and say no hit and put him in his crib and isolate him basically from everybody else.
	And he would cry and, well, I'd feel bad, particularly bad, and we just weren't sure if that was the appropriate way to go because I think in Peaceful Parent, Happy Kid, it says to...
	Or we understood it as if he hits her, take her away so that way he doesn't have more opportunity to hurt her.
	And that's how we interpret it.
	And then talk to him and say, yeah, as best we can.
	Okay, now, listen, you guys are fantastic parents.
	I really want to just mention this.
	Because, you know, if I'm going to rag on you a little, it's only because I have the obvious outside eye.
	And so none of this is obvious and you guys are fantastic parents.
	I just want to mention that up front, right?
	Just to be really clear about that.
	And this is like parenting jujitsu.
	Okay. Peaceful parenting is not pacifist parenting.
	The first virtue is honesty.
	Honesty. Yep. Honesty.
	You are angry at your son when he hits your daughter.
	Of course you are. Yes.
	Right. So I think if you move into abstract strategy and you deny your son...
	The emotional reality of your experience, he's not getting the right signal to adjust his behavior.
	Okay. We have had time to...
	Sorry, go ahead. Sure. We did have a time in the beginning where we would do a purely emotional response.
	She would be crying, and I'd holler at him.
	I'd yell at him and say, no hit.
	I've had times where I use my scary voice, and it...
	Well, it wasn't like a tactical use of my scary voice.
	Well, to some degree it was.
	But I just let him have the full force of my emotion.
	I just say, you know, no hit.
	Well, I'll just go with my full expression.
	No hit! And so I just use my angry voice.
	And see, he's already paid attention to me right then and there.
	He was playing on the side.
	But yeah. It's okay.
	Well, see, now, that's the challenge, right?
	So the challenge for a kid is, Daddy is solving...
	My aggression with aggression.
	Yes. Right.
	Right? Because, you know, I mean, again, back to the sort of evolutionary situation of the species, it's like, no, I'm going to be very sensitive to my other siblings' needs and give them all my food.
	It's like, great, and I'm dead, right?
	Exactly. So he's just, like, he's just trying to figure out.
	I had a parent that I knew some years ago.
	Oh! And the kid was really manipulative, and he knew about me, and he asked for my help, and I spent some time chatting with his daughter, and then I spent some time chatting with him, and I asked his daughter, why do you do X, Y, and Z? And we talked about it for a bit, and then do you know what she said?
	Because it works. Because it works is the fundamental pre-moral mindset.
	Why is there shenanigans in the US election?
	Because it works. It's not a moral standard.
	You do what works.
	And so the question is, how is aggression working for him?
	Now, if he gets parental attention from aggression, then that's what kids want the most.
	We know that kids prefer parental attention To anything else because most times kids will act badly just to get parental attention.
	So they prefer punishment because that means that they get attention from the parents.
	And attention from the parents is what we're all programmed to achieve, no matter what.
	No matter, even if it's negative attention, better than no attention, right?
	So if a child's behavior that is negative or harmful is continuing, it's because of a couple of reasons, again, in my humble opinion.
	The first is that it gets attention.
	The second is that it gets some positive result outside of attention.
	And in this case, it would be, I guess, even more attention or playing with you or whatever, right?
	And he's just doing what works.
	And the fundamental question is, okay, well, what is it that works for him and why does it work?
	Now, if you understand, like, I've always said this about society, right?
	How should society deal with wrongdoers?
	Through ostracism, right?
	Now, ostracism combined with the power of the state is not a good thing, but ostracism in a free society is very powerful, right?
	So, if you are angry at your son, I think, I mean, listen, you get angry at clients, you don't yell at them that way, right?
	That's correct, yeah. You get angry at your wife, you don't yell at her that way, right?
	No, never. Right.
	So trying to bring these kinds of standards with relationships to children is kind of important.
	So my experience as a father is, yeah, I can be angry, but I will not use a tone with my daughter when she was your son's age.
	I would not use a tone with my daughter that I would not use with anyone else.
	Because that's, I won't say that's an abuse of power, but you can get away with it as a father in a way that you couldn't get away with it as a husband or a businessman, right?
	Very true. Yeah. So, if I did not, like, if my daughter did something I really didn't like, then I would be ruthlessly honest with her.
	I would say, I really don't like that.
	That was not good.
	I'm not happy with you right now.
	And I would honestly act on my impulses, which is, I don't want to.
	I don't want to spend time with you right now.
	Now, this didn't mean I put her in a field and allowed vultures to feast on her or anything like that.
	Didn't mean I put her in any situation of danger.
	But it's not like I'm threatening her.
	I'm just genuinely honest in the moment.
	And, you know, if your wife does something that you don't like, you might just, you know, say, you know, I'm going to take a break.
	I'm going to go read a book or whatever.
	I'm just like, let's wait till whatever, right?
	Or, you know, if somebody in business does something that you don't like, then you generally will restrict your behavior or interaction with that person.
	Now, of course, you can't do that with your kids as a whole because they're dependent upon you for survival and you love them and you've got to have a permanent relationship with them and all of that.
	So I'm obviously not suggesting you flush them like a dead goldfish.
	But in terms of, I'm absolutely not pleased.
	Now, if you understand that what kids want the most is parental attention and resources, and if you don't feel, like if you're angry at your son, because, you know, at his age, you know, no hits, you know, you can understand that, right?
	So if he's acting against your very reasonable wishes and causing harm to your sister, yeah, that's going to make you angry.
	And it is going to diminish your desire to interact with your son.
	Now, having that simple, clear, honest response is ridiculously difficult, right?
	Because for you, it's like, well, I'm going to try these strategies.
	I'm going to yell at him to dissuade him.
	I'm going to put him in his crib. These are all strategies, and I don't think that they arise from direct and clear emotional honesty.
	Yeah, my initial reaction before I started trying to look into it We're good to go.
	We just need to talk to them more and just be honest with them.
	I'm not a huge fan of timeouts.
	I know that they can work as far as retraining people.
	It's not like that's some terrible thing.
	It's not like you're initiating the use of force or anything like that.
	So, you know, the whole timeout process is, it has to be sort of regimented, and it's, you know, one minute per age, a year of age, if I remember rightly, and it has to be followed by an apology and all of that, right?
	And that, you know, that can certainly behavior modify, for sure.
	It is still an exercise of power, though, because you're picking him up and you're placing him somewhere and so on, right?
	It is, yes. I didn't do anything like that.
	Again, I have a daughter, you have a son, we're different families, so there's not a one-size-fits-all thing other than, you know, don't initiate force.
	But for me, it was, I'm not happy with you right now.
	And she reaches me like, no, I'm not happy with you right now.
	Now listen, I would say that to a friend.
	I would say that to my wife if there was any conceivable situation in which she would displease me, which is because this is being recorded.
	Impossible! No, I'm kidding, right? But I would say, look, I'm not pleased with you right now.
	I mean, you've heard me with listeners, like if I feel like I'm being run around or not getting honest answers or would have been manipulated, I'd be pretty clear.
	But I'm not using your scary voice, right?
	Yeah, and I hated to use my scary voice.
	So just use my regular tone and just be honest.
	No, no, no. So you're thinking about a regular tone like you're reading a script.
	Just be honest. I'm really mad at you right now.
	I'm not happy with you right now.
	We've talked about the hitting.
	You're still hitting. I don't like it.
	I don't want it.
	And it's not right for your sister.
	And I'm not happy with you right now.
	And then see what he does.
	Now, maybe he'll pull the pride thing and won't admit faults.
	It's like, okay, I'm not happy with you right now, and I'm going to continue to be unhappy every time you hit your sister.
	Do you see me hitting anyone?
	Do you see your sister hitting anyone?
	Do you see your mom hitting anyone?
	No! You're the only one who's hitting.
	That's not right.
	And I'm not pleased.
	And then he comes to say, Daddy, can we play?
	He says, I'm not happy with you.
	I don't feel like playing because you're hitting your sister.
	I'm not happy enough to play.
	I'm not feeling positive enough to play.
	And again, like, adjust it for your son's language comprehension and all of that.
	But to me, that's kind of honest.
	And if it's like, I've got to change his behavior, what strategies do I need to deploy to change his behavior?
	You're being sucked into his amoral universe of cause and effect, right?
	The commitment that you need to make is just to be ruthlessly honest with him.
	Now... Now, I assume that if you've done something that he doesn't like and you're in the wrong, that you've apologized to him, right?
	Because that's important to model that apology stuff, right?
	So you can say, look, when I've done something wrong, I've apologized to you.
	You hit your sister. You know that's wrong.
	So what do you need to do to make things better?
	And he'll get it at some point.
	He knows he needs to say sorry, right?
	Yeah. Sorry, hang on a sec.
	So if the sorry is genuine, right?
	You have to trust your instincts with this, right?
	If the sorry is genuine, you'll know because you'll feel better.
	If the sorry is manipulative, like, sorry, you know, just so he can get to play, it's like, I don't believe you.
	Sorry. Like, I'm sorry that I don't believe you, but I don't.
	I think you're just saying that.
	Right? So just be very honest.
	If he's hit your daughter...
	You don't like him in that moment, right?
	Or you don't like that behavior, obviously, right?
	And if he says, Daddy, come play, and you're mad at him, I mean, you don't have to yell at him like he's some errant dog, but just be honest.
	That's a really tough thing is to trust that honesty is going to work is like the weirdest thing in the world.
	It's like, well, I'm not going to have any productive strategy.
	I'm just going to have this magic spell called honesty.
	It's so against what we believe, right?
	Because if you want to dig a ditch, you don't just sit there and say, well, I'm going to be really honest about my desire to dig a ditch, and suddenly the ditch is going to be magically dug.
	Yeah. You know, like honesty doesn't move any shovels in the world, right?
	But when it comes to parenting, when it comes to personal relationships, honesty is this crazy powerful magic spell.
	It's crazy powerful magic spell.
	Because it is so authentic, it connects to people at such a deep level, that it is irresistible in your relationships.
	So as soon as you try to do something in a relationship to achieve an effect, you've lost.
	And it doesn't work.
	You may get temporary compliance, but you won't get any genuine connection that changes.
	That's true. And the hardest thing that really has been happening is he's just been so young.
	And that's been the big part of the battle.
	Because I've, you know, I've listened to a lot of stuff that you've talked about.
	I mean, probably hundreds of hours.
	And so I had just been, well, I had the false thought in my mind of, I'd have to wait until he's verbal, then I can work on this even more.
	But it's just hard to understand that it is possible at this age, even when he's only semi-verbal.
	And before that, you know, when he wasn't verbal, it was...
	Hard to trust in the fact that he would understand.
	Well, you see, but you're, again, you're...
	I'm sorry to be so annoying. I really am.
	It's really... I apologize.
	But you're saying, I can't be honest until he understands, which is putting conditions on your honesty.
	My argument is he will understand when you are honest.
	Doesn't matter how old he is.
	Now, listen, when he's a little toddler...
	Right? I mean, to take a silly example, right?
	He's a little toddler, like he's, I don't know, he's a baby, right?
	Three months old, you're changing his diaper, he pees in your face, right?
	That's funny, right? He's going to be a fireman!
	That whole Patrick Swayze line from City of God, right?
	So if you're changing your kid's diaper, and he pees in your face, it's not pleasant, but it's not like, oh my god, I can't believe he did that to me, he's so mean, right?
	Do you follow? Okay, so at some point though, like if, I'm not saying he ever would, right?
	But if your son or some kid walks up to your daughter, unzips his fly and pees on her, that's an act of crazy aggression, right?
	So your emotional instincts, your emotions will be a valid guide as to When he's responsible for what he does.
	In other words, if your kid pees in your face, your baby pees in your face by accident, it's annoying or whatever, but it's kind of funny.
	And certainly later, it's kind of funny, right?
	Now, when you start to get angry at your son, that's when you are becoming aware that he is morally responsible, or at least consequence responsible, if that makes sense.
	So this is why self-trust, right?
	This is why, and I say this, it's not like everyone who gets angry at a child is just, but you've listened to the show, you've done self-work, you've been in therapy, like you've got a pretty good handle on your emotions, right?
	So to be honest and not aim for effect, right?
	Not aim for an effect.
	Because the moment you aim for an effect, you've entered into this amoral universe of whatever you can get away with, right?
	Right. And you need him to internalize not hitting.
	So if you say, okay, well, listen, if you hit, we're going to put you in a timeout.
	It's like, okay, so I get negative consequences for hitting.
	So the best thing for me to do is to make sure I don't get caught hitting.
	Or what will happen is he will switch from hitting your daughter to saying mean things to her out of earshot.
	Because if he can get away without the time out, then he'll just...
	It doesn't deal with the coldness.
	It doesn't deal with the hostility.
	It doesn't deal with the aggression.
	It just says, okay...
	Well, I can't hit her because that's, you know, it's going to cause a problem, right?
	So there's a timeout or whatever, negative consequences.
	So, okay, I'm still aggressive.
	I just don't want those consequences.
	So I will now, my aggression will play out in ways which is harder to trace.
	It's like censoring an argument you find despicable.
	It doesn't make the argument go away.
	It just drives it underground where it can't be tracked and opposed anymore, right?
	Yeah, that's true. Absolutely.
	Okay, so let's take this for a run.
	I am your son.
	Luke, I am your son.
	I am your son. And I've just hit your daughter.
	What is the totally honest emotional response to this?
	Little lad, I don't like it when you hit Sissy.
	It hurts so much.
	It hurts her so much, and I can see her being so sad.
	And it makes me sad, too.
	Is there any way, can you please not do that?
	Can we find something else to do?
	And we can play something else, but just, I really don't like it when you hurt her.
	Okay, that's good, that's good.
	You got the sadness, but I think you skipped out on the anger.
	And also, you were suggesting something else to do.
	In other words, you get more activities if you hit your sister.
	Oh, that's right. You get parental attention and more activities.
	That's true. Dang. Okay.
	No, that's fine. Listen, if you got it right, there's no point in having the call, right?
	No point at all. Okay, let's try it again.
	I'm your son, and I've just smacked your daughter on the head.
	Hey! I don't like it when you hit her.
	Stop that. You need to learn to play nicely with her, or else you can't play.
	Okay? Can you... Yes, please, please play nicely with her.
	Okay? Will you be nice to Sissy?
	Okay, that's a lot of consequentialism.
	Dig deep into your feelings.
	Your feelings. Just be honest about your feelings alone.
	Because this is all like, can you learn to play nice and here's the consequences and it makes me upset and I'm like...
	If you dig deep, the deeper you get into your feelings, the more you will connect with your son.
	Because if you're asking him to empathize with his sister, you have to first empathize with yourself, and then the magic transmission occurs.
	I know I'm asking for a lot of faith here, but...
	Okay, so let's try again.
	And, you know, smack!
	I just hit your daughter. Hey!
	Don't hit her!
	I... I don't like that!
	I don't like it when you're hitting her!
	That's not bad. It was a little whiny.
	And you'll get this when you hear it back.
	So the whininess comes from you feel that if you're honest with your son, you've lost power, which is why you became whiny.
	In other words, your son is now in charge.
	You're helpless because you can't inflict consequences.
	Yeah, he's grabbing my lips as we speak, actually.
	He was just twisting it with his nails.
	And now he's crying and in my shoulder trying to hug me.
	I'm sorry, I didn't realize your son was in the room.
	Let's not do this role play with him in the room because he's going to think you're chastising him.
	Yeah, that's been our part.
	Okay, so obviously I can't speak for you and I would never dare to presume to, but because your son's in the room, let me sort of say the way that I would respond.
	And now please understand, I'm not saying you have to respond like me, obviously, right?
	Because honesty is different for each person, so I'm not trying to give you a script of what to do.
	I've got a question, though.
	To me, it would be, okay, let's see something.
	I just want to make sure I get sort of into the right frame of mind and make it, again, as authentic as humanly possible.
	Okay, so a kid hits, someone hits my daughter, and I'd be like, no, no, no, no, no, absolutely not, absolutely not, no, no.
	There's no hitting here. There's no hitting here.
	I will not accept that.
	No hitting here at all.
	I don't hit you. Mom doesn't hit you.
	We don't hit each other. There is no hitting.
	That is wrong. That is nasty.
	That is unpleasant. That is difficult.
	And I am very unhappy at the moment.
	And I'm actually quite angry because we've talked about this before.
	No hitting. Now, I don't want to play with you at the moment.
	I'm upset with you. I'm angry with you.
	I'm frustrated. So whatever you want to do, you can do it.
	I'm going to take your sister and I'm going to comfort her.
	And maybe I'll spend a little bit of time with her because it's my job.
	It's my job to keep her safe.
	And right now I'm not able to keep her safe because you keep hitting her.
	It's my job to keep her safe.
	I am not going to back down from that job.
	You do not get to hit your sister.
	I'm very upset with you.
	I'm going to keep her safe.
	You're going to have to find something to do by yourself because I don't feel like playing with you right now at all.
	Now, again, I'm not trying to tell you what to say.
	Obviously, it's different for each individual.
	I wasn't threatening him.
	I was being pretty honest about my own emotional experience, and I was making a very strong commitment to keep his sister safe no matter what.
	And I was honest about not wanting to spend time with him at the moment and the need to comfort his sister.
	I don't know. Does that come across to you?
	I don't know how that came across to you, but tell me what you think.
	Well, it came across to me as very honest.
	It's such a... It's such a hard way of thinking because we've talked about this before.
	I abstract away my feelings so intensely that it's been really hard to connect with it.
	I appreciate that and I sympathize with that enormously.
	And so the stuff that I'm talking about here is like super PhD parenting.
	It's a super PhD life, right?
	Which is just how are you directly honest with people and in particular children, right?
	Now, I think...
	I do believe that that genuine commitment and connection to yourself and your upset and your anger and your frustration, I think that is going to – I think that will stop his behavior.
	Now, it may take a little while.
	It's going to take some consistent stuff.
	But I think that kind of honesty, it is – it's powerful, man.
	It's powerful. Magic.
	And again, I wish there was a better way to put it because I don't believe in magic.
	But it is a way of – Just being so directly honest that people's behavior has to change, and it's not because of consequences.
	Yeah. I just started crying.
	Yeah, tell me, what are you thinking?
	What are you feeling? Just having that honest, genuine expression to hear that, it just seems so hard to do.
	Like, so outside my...
	And I'm already abstracting in a way the feeling, but...
	No, no, keep going. Keep going.
	You're there. I just want to do that.
	I want to be able to do that with him because to me it seems like it would just unlock everything else.
	Everything else in my life to just be genuine and honest with everything.
	I've had to deny my passions.
	I've been so I'm fogged in the brain with what I want to do with a career because everything that I've experienced with my parents telling me, you know, all the jobs that they look for to help me out, the job that I have now is not the right fit, but it's...
	It was divine intervention that got me this job, but I need divine intervention to get me out of it to get me into what I should be doing.
	Because right now, I've learned to survive with sales.
	Like I said with my son, using tactics.
	I've been using tactics to work with my life, just with my situation.
	To a degree, I was blowing around like the wind.
	And... I just want to take that control.
	I want that control.
	I want to do the thing that I want.
	I want to do the thing that I like, but it seems like my brain fogs up of you don't know what it's going to be and you don't even know if there's any market for that as a defense.
	I do. I want to be honest with everything.
	My wife and I, we When we're having a conversation, we're upset with the...
	Well, I can't remember the exact situation, but basically we wrote out that I would promise to be honest with her about my feelings.
	I think it was when I didn't want to go somewhere, but I would just go somewhere with her anyway.
	And it's a lot of that.
	A lot of what I've been living is denying that true honesty because it was so...
	Dangerous. I guess you could say.
	Oh, it is. Listen, you're not cowardly about this.
	It is very dangerous, to be honest, in the world.
	We've known this since Socrates before, right?
	It is dangerous.
	Certainly within the family, it's something that you have to champion, right?
	But certainly out there in the world, and also when you were a kid, right?
	If you didn't want your mom to go, and you said, Mom, please don't go.
	Mom, please don't go. You wanted to be honest.
	You just got ignored anyway, and Mom just left, right?
	So it's painful, and this is what we're all avoiding with honesty is this early childhood stuff.
	Yeah. And like we had with our earlier conversation, I'll just kind of bring back to that.
	So since we had our conversation, I got married to my wife and was just kind of continuing on my path.
	Part of that was a coping strategy in terms of, oh, hey, yeah, I'm still talking, in terms of, well, furry pornography.
	So that was a thing.
	And so with that, I mean, it was mild use at best, but like I said, with divine intervention with my job, my boss basically said he wasn't even thinking of me.
	He was my ward employment specialist.
	And so with that, he helped me a couple of weeks before and was like, okay, you know, this is how you work out your resume.
	And he said he was sitting there.
	He got a vision of me sitting to his left in the workplace.
	He had already had a bunch of other people lined up much better qualified than me.
	But he brought me in, interviewed me, and said, okay, you got the job.
	Two months later, we're on our first work trip driving around, and he's telling me about his life, saying, this is 30 years ago.
	He's just like, you know, he was kind of a gangbanger.
	And so he would shoot at people.
	Fortunately, he never killed anyone, but he'd shoot at people, get ladies pregnant, things like that.
	And he said that he had somebody who helped him change his life in that regard.
	And so right then and there, it was like pure heart-to-heart to such a degree that I felt it.
	And I went and I talked to my bishop and I went to the, it's called the Addiction Recovery Program.
	And with that, I went there for about eight months and got the major part of the problem resolved.
	But for me, I needed to understand why.
	Why am I... You know, what in the world is the furry interest?
	Why am I interested in this sort of thing?
	And so just been digging and digging and been going to talk therapy using internal family systems to a degree.
	And with that, we're trying something experimental.
	So I do have a...
	It's like a fursuit head.
	So I have that because with that on, I... I'm more authentically me.
	And so what I'm trying to do is, like Alan Watts said in his Dreams talk, basically, is you normalize the feelings that you have while wearing, well, for me, is wearing that head to the point where it's normalized within you, and then you can start taking the head away and just being the authentic you.
	And so that's what I'm, well, that's What I'm trying to accomplish as well.
	And so that's the same thing with my emotions.
	I'm trying to be completely honest and completely authentic.
	But it's been so deeply ingrained, and like you said, it's been so deeply ingrained to not be, that it's hard.
	And I know, I believe that if I can resolve this within myself, it's going to improve the relationship that I have with my family, with my wife, with my son, with my daughter.
	And it'll go on and I'll be able to be me and I can use that to help other people too.
	Right. I mean, this is the basic equation of life.
	That honesty is a superpower.
	And as we know, every superpower brings out what?
	The supervillains. Right?
	So, a way to be dishonest is to hide from the...
	Scanning destructiveness of the eye of Sauron of the world that looks for people who are actually honest and then tries to destroy them.
	So there's risk. We're not idiots for withholding truth at times because it is a dangerous thing in this world.
	Now, with regards to your family, this is really, really important though.
	To be honest without aiming for a consequence is really hard.
	Now, I don't think it's hard for us naturally.
	But the way that we're raised, understand the other, right?
	It's just how it kind of plays out.
	But to be honest, without trying to control somebody else's behavior, oof, it's tough, right?
	It's really, really tough, but it's so powerful.
	It's so... I mean, everything...
	It's just why I can't really consume that much mainstream media, right?
	Because also, they don't write anything without searching for an effect, right?
	It's what... Diana West said about, she used to say this on Twitter, that the issue is never the issue.
	The issue is always the revolution, right, for the communists and so on, right?
	Everything that they say, everything that they do, everything that they talk about, it's all to produce a particular effect, to gain power, to demoralize people.
	It's never just an honest thing.
	And I don't...
	I mean, the lesson that I learned from that is...
	Just be honest without trying to control.
	Because as soon as you try to control, as soon as you're aiming for a consequence, then you lose the connection.
	What is it you want to teach your son?
	You want to teach your son emotional connection.
	Because once he's emotionally connected with his sister, he won't want to hit her anymore.
	And if you try to punish him, then you're denying your emotional connection to him, which is what you need to model, so that he won't hit his sister.
	And this, to be honest...
	Without trying to pull any levers, without trying to change behavior, without trying to control people.
	To just be honest is very hard, but it's so powerful that it is as close to magic as I can conceive of.
	And this is why, you know this, right?
	This is why the Bible says, Thou shalt not bear false witness.
	One of the fundamental... Like, if you're testifying at a trial...
	God forbid, right? If you're testifying at a trial and your goal is to get someone convicted, that's going to affect your honesty.
	You can't bear false witness.
	If your goal is to get someone exonerated, then you're not going to be honest, right?
	So, thou shalt not bear false witness, to me, translates into, do not be honest or do not deploy your honesty as a method of controlling others.
	Do not try to gain some effect out of being honest.
	Just? I mean, what did Jesus?
	Jesus, of course, came and said, basically, morality is universal.
	It shouldn't be thou shalt not kill Jews, it should be thou shalt not kill.
	Morality is universal, and morality is a choice.
	No one's going to kill you if you decide not to become a Christian.
	There's no penalty of death for apostasy.
	Morality is universal.
	That's a true statement. And he knew that there were going to be significant negative consequences to saying morality is universal.
	I mean, in my own tiny way, I've experienced those as well.
	But it is. Morality is universal.
	Sorry, Dick, it just is. And the whole foundation of Christianity is the proposition that morality is universal.
	And that statement has been said despite the fact that, of course, Christians have been persecuted and remain the most persecuted religious group in the world today.
	So if it was for consequences, you would never say morality is universal because you get much more praise and pomp and power, prestige and money for saying there's no such thing as morality, morality is subjective, everything is for the revolution and we don't have any scruples and will to power and Nietzsche and blah, blah, blah. But to be honest, without trying to control anyone, this is why I keep saying to everyone, and have from the very beginning of the show, when I made a vow, I will never, ever use honesty to control people.
	Never, ever, ever.
	And you cannot find an instance in the entire history of my show where I've used honesty to control people.
	I've been tempted, and I've probably stepped into the muck once or twice, but that's my general commitment.
	My major commitment is I will not...
	Like, so when I was being honest with the little roleplay about your son hitting, I repeatedly said, I'm not trying to tell you what to say.
	This is my experience. It's going to be different for you.
	I'm not trying to give you a script.
	I'm not trying to, okay, just, just, I don't want you playing this as your ringtone every time.
	My little speech there, I don't want you playing that as your ringtone every time your son hits someone because that's not giving him connection to you, right?
	He doesn't need connection with me.
	He needs connection with you. And so just this general principle.
	To be honest without trying to control anyone, without saying my honesty has to achieve X, Y, or Z effect.
	My honesty has to stop my son from hitting my daughter.
	My honesty has to get my wife to change.
	My honesty has to get my friend to confess.
	My honesty has to get blah, blah, blah.
	The moment you do that, you can't be honest.
	Honesty is the commitment to the word itself.
	Honesty is the commitment to...
	vulnerability and the power that comes from vulnerability in the naked expression of your emotional state and your intellectual state and to be honest without trying to change anyone or anything It's a strange power.
	It's almost, I mean, it's the closest thing to a miracle or to magic, as I said before, that I have seen or experienced.
	It is amazing.
	And for many people, it's incredibly anxiety producing.
	And I think that's why you got emotional earlier, because you're like, okay, what have I been taught my whole life?
	Have I been free to be honest?
	Have I been free to express myself?
	Have I actually had free speech?
	This has come down to a very fundamental thing.
	Do I actually have a First Amendment in my life?
	Do I actually have freedom of speech in my relationships?
	Can I just be honest without trying to manipulate or control or change?
	It's like the guy.
	He's trying to just sleep with a girl and just say whatever, right?
	He's not being honest because he's got a goal.
	He's just trying to get her to take her panties off, right?
	Or, you know, some guy who's recording his estranged wife during some divorce proceeding, and he's not being honest in the conversation.
	He's trying to get her to do something so it looks bad in court or whatever crap goes on with the ubiquitous 1984-style recording devices everyone has these days, right?
	But can you just be honest?
	And it's a great deal of sorrow that we experience when we look back upon our lives and say, God damn.
	The way that my family is structured, the way that school is structured, the way that society is structured, the way that everything is structured.
	Most people don't taste one goddamn honest word between birth and death.
	They don't know what it is to say something honest, true, without manipulation, without a desire for effect, simply to state the facts of their own thoughts, emotions, and existence.
	They don't know what it is, and they will never know what it is.
	And you just got a sip of that.
	And you're like, holy crap.
	It moves you, right? Completely.
	Very much so. The one time, or rather, one of the times that I remember being completely honest, during that trip, yeah, during that trip, he, my boss, my boss, I recommended that I write down each and every single thing, like anything that I could remember that was considered, you know, a sin in that regard.
	So, for example, you know, I was on a plumbing job once where I was with somebody in the ward, like I said, the geographical congregation, and he was a plumber, and I'd worked with him, and we went out on a job site, and they had a copy of Diablo II at the job site.
	It was somebody's house. We were installing a water heater.
	And I took it, you know, and had it, played it for a couple hours, felt bad, and returned it, but I never told anyone.
	And the not telling anyone, I didn't realize up until I wrote it down and wrote all the other sins, basically, alongside it, and was able to tell my bishop about that.
	I didn't realize that I had had that sort of heavy feeling on me for not...
	Being honest and telling somebody about it.
	And particularly for a game that sucks.
	I'm sorry, Diablo fans, it blows.
	It blows chunks. You just wander around shooting at things.
	It's like mindless. It's like ridiculous.
	And I'm sorry. I've tried it a couple of times.
	Diablo 3, I think, was the last one I tried.
	It blows. It blows serious chunks.
	So I'm sorry that you sold your soul for such a crappy game.
	No, I'm just kidding, right? But yeah, I remember when I was a kid, a teenager, a friend of mine.
	No, I was a teenager.
	Yeah, it was in my late teens.
	And I got a job chipping up someone's basement.
	You know, they have this, sometimes this chipboard or these like wooden slats in basements.
	And my job was to chip that up.
	And I was in there and They would leave for the day and they had an Amiga and I booted it up and I played around with it.
	I wasn't supposed to. I didn't take anything.
	But yeah, I remember booting up this Amiga and playing around with it because I was always curious about Amiga and I loved computers.
	And yeah, that was something I did.
	You know, it was wrong because it was not my property and it wasn't something I was supposed to be doing.
	But yeah, it happens.
	Anyway, so yeah, we've all had these little kind of hiccups and all that.
	But sorry, go ahead. Yeah, just being honest with the bishop.
	And having written all those things out felt very liberating.
	And I think carrying that principle forward into every other aspect of my life, like you said, is a superpower.
	And I want to get that superpower.
	Well, you already have it.
	You already have it within you.
	Yes. All you have to do is take the circuit breakers off, take the dampers off, and be willing to experience...
	The emotions that arise when we finally get the desert drink of honesty in our lives, right?
	It's a very emotional experience.
	It's a destabilizing experience.
	I mean, I remember when I was first going through this process when I was in therapy.
	Oh my gosh, I was at...
	Oh man, I just popped in my head.
	I was just starting to be really honest with people in my life.
	And what happened was I was working away when I was running this software department, the company I co-founded.
	I was working away on a very difficult technical problem.
	And I used to listen to music.
	And this is an old album by now, but the Bare Naked Ladies' first album called Gordon, which is very good.
	I saw them live when I was in New York for business many years ago.
	Pretty good band live. But this first album they had called Gordon is a great album.
	It's a great album. And some of the songs are comedy songs, and some of the songs are very, very serious.
	And one of the songs that is, to me, very serious is called Good Boy.
	When I was young...
	Anyway, it's a really good song.
	You should go listen to it. And the singer is really, really good.
	And it's quite a passionate song about the consequences of not being honest.
	I couldn't tell you I was wrong.
	So basically, I lay awake all night because I couldn't be honest, because I couldn't admit it.
	That I was wrong. I just couldn't sleep and these are the negative consequences, but I can't be honest in my life.
	It's a really, really good song. It's called Goodbye, Berenaked Ladies.
	You should look it up. And anyway, so I was listening to this song and, you know, this got Enid on it and Hello City and a bunch of other stuff.
	And it's kind of cool, kind of jazzy.
	It's a clever band. Anyway, so I'm working away on a technical problem and I've had some intense therapy that week.
	I did like three hours of therapy a week.
	It was quite a lot. And I got the headphones on and the song comes on And it's also a bit about exams and, you know, everybody who's been in university, maybe even high school, you have this exam anxiety afterwards.
	And the song comes on and it's like being, like the emotions came up in me.
	It was like being kicked in the chest by a horse.
	And I had to get up.
	And I had to kind of half race to the bathroom.
	I had to sit in the stall and weep, like just racking sobs.
	You know, when you actually start to become honest, it uncorks a lot of pain, a lot of humiliation, a lot of fear, a lot of subjugation.
	Because to be honest is to be strong, is to be in a position of power, not power over others, but the power of being unafraid of negative judgment.
	But to be afraid of negative consequences is a reasonable thing, right?
	Otherwise, you just do crazy, foolhardy things and get injured and die.
	But to be crazy scared or to be scared of a negative judgment, that's a different matter, right?
	And the reason we aren't honest is we fear negative judgment.
	Now, unfortunately, society is moving to the place like they're now I'm not talking about politics in your personal life, right? To be honest without trying to control people is a position of being unafraid.
	And when you remove a fear that you've had or you confront and act against a fear you've had your whole life, it's going to uncork a lot of emotions.
	And that's why people avoid The truth is they're avoiding the truth of their own subjugation and how humiliated they felt in being attacked for being honest in their lives and how little truth we can speak between birth and the grave.
	So to be asked to be dishonest with your son, to be this direct and not try and control his behavior but just simply state the truth of your experience.
	Yeah, I mean there's no doubt that it's going to be a very emotional thing and he may see you burst into tears and that's fine.
	That's fine. Parental tears are not going to drown him.
	But yeah, so that's my suggestion.
	I think if you really connect with yourself, if you really connect with your son, that will teach him the empathy that will have him refrain from hitting his sister.
	Thank you, Steph. You're very welcome.
	Will you keep me posted about how it goes?
	Absolutely. Will you give your kids a hug and a kiss for me?
	I really enjoyed.
	I love this phase. So for people who don't know, if you don't have little kids around, there's this phase where they make sounds all the time.
	Why? Because they're learning how to speak.
	And, you know, they need to.
	You want them to make those sounds all the time.
	And it's really, it's a delightful phase.
	And I really, I miss that.
	I miss that phase. You know, hopefully I can...
	I have grandkids at some point and go through it again, but it's a beautiful phase.
	So please thank your wife for her participation in what for her must have been a rather surreal experience.
	Please, you know, thank your kids for their patience with the conversation, and I really, really thank you for bringing this topic up.
	It is, as always, an amazingly powerful thing to do, and I appreciate it.
	Sure. Thanks, Steph. Thank you very much.
	You're welcome. Thanks, everyone, so much.
	Come on. You know there's nothing else like it in the web.
	Nothing else like these conversations are occurring anywhere.
	That's why no one's stepping in to take my place on social media.
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	Take care, everyone.
	Love you much.
	Bye.
	Well, thank you so much for enjoying this latest Free Dementia on Philosophy.
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