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Jan. 7, 2024 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
01:36:53
YOU NEVER IN FACT SELF ATTACK!
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Time Text
Well, well. Good evening, everybody.
Sorry for the slightly late start.
It is Friday Night Live, 17th of November, 2023.
Let's get straight to your comments and questions.
Good evening, good evening, everybody.
Thank you for the start-off tip.
I would appreciate that.
If you could help out the show, yeah, let me tell you, man, I was kind of wiped today.
Well, my whole family's sick.
My daughter's just getting better.
My wife has a cough that sounds like Satan is trying to turn her inside out and wear as a hand puppet.
I am okay, though. Throat's a little funny, but probably just going to be fine.
So, yeah, I was pretty wiped today.
I just finished up.
What have we done? I've done like eight hours on the French Revolution, and let me tell you, it's grim and dark and ugly stuff, and it's like scraping the hideous bottom barrel of the worst kind of human motivations.
So, yeah, it's bad.
It's bad. Let me gauge how valuable it would be for you if I could unplug your habit of self-attacking.
How would it help you?
Would it help you if I were able to unplug from you self-attack?
All right.
Now, would you say that I'm fairly good at not self-attacking?
Would you say I'm fairly good?
Other than self-attacking myself with massive weights and protein powders.
Would you say I'm fairly good?
I mean, I criticize myself.
I change course when necessary.
But I think I'm fairly good at not self-attacking, right?
Now, this wasn't always the case with me.
I was a bit of a racket smasher when I lost a game of tennis when I was a kid.
So, all right.
It looks like it would be good.
Now, remember this when it comes to have a tip.
If I can help you stop self-attacking.
All right. Let me ask you this.
I want to sort of get where the audience is so I can gauge my response.
You're not sure what self-attacking means exactly?
Would it be helpful?
Do you want a definition of it first?
Self-attacking is when you try to alter your own behavior through punishment and rage.
I'm so stupid! You know, that kind of stuff.
Idiot, right? How could I have been so eh?
Negative self-talk.
I'm not worthy of anything.
Nobody's going to love me. I'm incompetent.
I'm an idiot. Like when you just verbally abuse yourself.
You verbally abuse yourself.
Right? There's no encouragement.
There's simply punishment.
Right? Okay.
Hit me with a why if you've ever toyed with ideas of self-harm.
Self-harm means more than just verbal, but physical.
Anything to do with, like, cutting or highly dangerous behavior, drinking too much to the point of danger, getting in fights, even exercising to the point where you hurt yourself, just a sort of grim desire to harm yourself.
And it doesn't mean cutting, although it can, but it could be any kind of Any kind of stuff like that.
Okay, so we've got some of that.
Eating foods I'm allergic to.
Okay. So, I mean, like most of us, I think you have some habits of self-criticism.
And some of you have some habits of self-harm.
Can I lift this log for you, my brothers and sisters?
Okay. Can I lift?
Ah, hello Alan, nice to meet you.
Welcome. Welcome from Australia.
I'm going to lift this log for you, and it's not even going to take that long.
And if you meditate on this, and if you internalize, this is how I released myself from self-criticism, to the point where even when the world itself savagely attacks me on an unjust basis, I don't turn on myself.
Right? Right? Does that make sense?
Yeah, overwork, overdrink diet soda, yeah.
Yeah, please try and stay away from diet sodas.
I'm telling you, diet sodas, easy habit to kick.
Easy habit to kick. Yeah, following politics, yeah, that's a form of self-harm for sure.
Diet sodas, pretty easy habit to kick.
Just get yourself... A soda maker.
My opinion, get yourself a soda maker and you get free soda and you can throw in some lemon juice or whatever it is, some little flavor if you don't find it.
But yeah, diet sodas are not particularly good for you.
All right. So, is overworking and burning myself out a form of self-attack?
No. Overworking and burning yourself out is a form of trying to avoid self-attack.
Oh, I failed. I could have worked harder.
I should have done more. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Right? You switched to salsa?
Yeah. I'm a club soda guy.
To me, club soda with a splash of OJ is heaven on earth.
And you can also get them, you can get like bottles now.
I'm also a bit of a kombucha guy, so I'll mix in water and kombucha together.
So I kind of like that stuff, so.
All right. Workaholism is escapism from a bad marriage.
That's very true. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
If you have a bad marriage, you can found a company.
Alright, I just want to make sure that we're all on the same page when I get started here, because this is going to be life-changing.
I have one of those. I've gotten adapted to a large CO2 tank.
It's like three cents a cup or something.
My God, man, how much do you drink?
What are you, a dolphin? What's the difference between seltzer and club soda?
One is a drink, the other one is the lead singer of a rockabilly band.
Ho ho ho, stray cat strut, I'm a lazy cat.
First stream hit 50 likes.
So here's a freebie, you filthy animals.
Well, thank you, Josh. Always very, very kind.
Somebody says, I keep thinking about really bad things that happen.
I will be relaxed and it comes up.
Last month, don't stop.
It's like I want to hurt myself.
How can I stop? I will tell you.
How do you know whether you're self-attacking versus healthy self-criticism?
Well, healthy self-criticism encourages you and is a positive experience.
Finally donated after yesterday.
Thank you, sir. Thank you, my friend.
I appreciate it. I've got to tell you, November is a lean month.
It's a lean month historically.
It gets usually a little bit better around Christmas time, but I do keep a bit of the eye on the donation, and it ain't a joyous thing.
It ain't a joyous thing.
And I was just saying earlier, if you missed this, I just finished up.
I did like eight or nine hours on the French Revolution, and I just finished that up today.
Oh man, it was brutal.
It was brutal. It was really, really hard to get through.
It was... No tip November, yeah.
No tip November, that's right.
No tip November.
That's pretty funny.
Alright.
So, why do you self-attack?
Let me just ask where you're coming from, though.
What are your theories as to why you self-attack?
Why do you self-attack, do you think?
What are your thoughts? When did you Why do you think carrying my parents' legacy?
Okay, that's fairly...
Because of the past, you know, that's not particularly specific.
I'm just curious, when did you...
Why do you think you self-attack?
Because of lack of respect for yourself?
Because it, quote, helps someone else?
Internal parents? These are all very generic answers.
Childhood trauma, yeah, bad things happen, therefore bad things happen, right?
Avoidance learned helplessness.
Right.
Right.
So all of these things are why you did self-attack as a child.
Why do you self-attack as an adult though, right?
If you still believe in Santa at the age of 25 and somebody says, well, why do you believe in Santa?
You say, well, because my parents told me to believe in Santa.
Okay, well, your parents told you you were bad.
Why do you still believe it?
That's the question, right?
Part of me wants to yell and abuse Don't want to give that up. Because you get punished for being successful.
Right. Habit survival mechanism.
I mean, the stream's working for everyone else, so I can't...
You switch browsers, reboot.
There's no live tech help here, right?
Sorry. I mean, unless it's not working for everyone.
Okay. So you'll just have to listen and watch it later.
But if it's working for everyone else but not for you, then the problem, obviously, is at your end, and I don't really know how to do that, right?
All right. So, I want to tell you a story.
And this is a story of you.
And I'm going to ask you for a real big favor here.
I'm going to ask you for a real big favor.
All right? Stop typing.
Everyone. This is the listening time.
I don't say this. How often do I say this, right?
This is the stop typing time.
Okay? Because you really, really, really, really, really need to listen to this.
Because this is your life on the line.
This is your future on the line.
All right? And also, stop asking for tech help and, like, just do me a favor.
Just concentrate.
All right. I'm going to, in fact, just get rid of the browser because I don't want to be distracted.
And I'm going to suggest don't play video games.
Don't do something else.
Really, really listen. If you can watch, watch.
And look at all the people who just can't take any coaching.
Look at all the people who can't take any coaching.
Well, it's your choice. It's your life.
All right. I'm going to tell you a story, the story of you.
If you witnessed a crime, a deadly crime, and the criminals who committed the crime...
Do for a simple, obvious fact that you had witnessed that crime, you would be pretty nervous, right?
you would be pretty nervous, right?
The criminals would always be nervous that you would go to the police and be a
material witness to the homicide, the rape, the crime, whatever had been
committed.
And you would feel edgy.
And you would also be kind of in a no-win situation.
Because if you go to the police, the criminals will hunt you.
If you don't go to the police, the criminals and your conscience will hunt you.
Does that make sense? You saw a crime.
Let's say you saw a murder, right?
If you don't go to the police, the criminals will hunt you and you'll feel bad.
if you go to the police you might feel better in terms of a conscience
but you will feel much worse in terms of danger so you're in a situation
where you can't win you can't make a good choice
There are no good choices in this situation, right?
There's no good choices in that situation.
You can't win because you witnessed a crime.
No matter what you do, no matter which way you turn, no matter which way you try to sleep, no matter what time you wake up, what time you go to bed, the thought will be constantly niggling and nagging at your mind like the old Baldur's Gate tadpole.
It will be niggling at your mind that you could be doing something better, you could
be doing something different, and you are in fact doing something wrong or negative
or harmful to yourself.
So in other words, once you've witnessed a crime, you're kind of screwed.
Now maybe, just maybe, You go to the police and the police deal with it in some magnificently positive way and you don't get attacked by the criminals or they don't find you or something and they go to jail, right? But then, of course, they have friends, they have family.
It just goes on and on and on.
Or maybe you go into a witness protection program and your whole life turns over but you've got to spend the rest of your life looking over your shoulder.
There's no good choice. Once you've witnessed a crime...
There's no good choice. You can't win.
You can only lose to varying degrees.
Now, why do I use this analogy?
You know, you know, you know.
He knows, you know.
You have witnessed a crime.
You've probably witnessed countless crimes.
you probably can't even count the crimes that you have observed
the crime that you've ever witnessed is abuse against yourself as a child
almost certainly for most of the people in this chat statistically for most of
the people in the world I'm just gonna say everyone although I know it's not
everyone.
You've witnessed a crime which means now there are no good solutions.
Thanks.
you How do the criminals get you to stop going to the police?
They get you to worry.
They get you to criticize yourself.
They get you to attack yourself.
That way, you don't go to the police.
They also try to make sure that everyone around you colludes with them, not you, colludes with the criminals, not virtue or you or morality or self-protection or righteousness or anything like that.
So that you will be isolated if you go to the police.
You will have to go into a witness protection program.
You'll have to give up your life.
You'll have to give up your family.
You'll have to give up your friends. You'll have to give up your neighborhood, your community, your job, your education, your schooling, everything.
and go live in the arse end of nowhere probably in Nebraska and start an entirely new life always looking over your
shoulder now
we have to in this analogy assume that the criminals can't just kill you
Thank you.
For some reason. It could be that you're the son of somebody famous.
It could be that you have some hold over them.
It could be that you have some dead drop letter that if you say, if I die, then this letter goes immediately to the police with all the details and blah blah.
Like, it could be all of those things, but for some reason they can't kill you.
Because that would be the usual habit and tactic of criminals when there's a witness to their crimes.
crimes just kill them. Dead men tell no tales all that kind of stuff right?
you are the witness
to a terrible crime spree called your childhood
The crime committed by, most likely, if this applies, your parents.
If it doesn't apply, let it fly.
No biggie. And what is the solution?
Well, there's no police to go to, because when you go to people and you say that you've been abused, most people will maybe listen a little bit, kind of roll their eyes, kind of blame the victim, kind of move on, kind of shrug, kind of blame you maybe a little, and you'll get no comfort, no alliance, no sucker, no support.
If you go to the people who abused you, You will get gaslighting, attack denigration, threats of abandonment, threats of abuse or abuse.
You'll be called a liar.
Your reputation will be trashed often for others and so on.
So, if you understand that as an adult, if you're a victim of child abuse, you are a witness to a crime.
Now, I want you to picture this.
I'm going to shift the scenario slightly so you can understand self-attack.
I'm going to shift the scenario slightly.
In this scenario, you have time-stamped, annotated, incontrovertible Video of the abuse that you suffered.
Maybe it was physical abuse. Maybe it was verbal abuse.
Maybe it was sexual abuse. Maybe it was neglect.
Could be any number of things.
You have video.
It's uploaded.
It's processed.
Thank you.
And you have two screens open.
In one screen, you have the publish button for the video.
And in the other screen, you have the link that goes out to all family members.
Whatever happened, whatever happened, you have the video.
Maybe it's a montage. Maybe it's a whole series of videos screaming, hitting, beating, assaulting, sexual assaults, whatever it is.
This is what happened, right?
If it doesn't apply, let it fly.
You have in the one screen the publish button and on the other screen you have send the video link to everyone, your parents, your parents' parents, Their siblings, cousins, friends, church congregationists, the priest, your teachers, whoever.
Whoever is relevant, whoever they've crossed paths with, whose opinion they even remotely care about.
Now, I want you to picture...
the parents in your head when you're about to click these two buttons
publish video send to everyone your parents know
are you with me on the journey?
Do you see why I asked you not to type?
You're about to share incontrovertible proof Of the abuse that you suffered.
And your parents' reputation will be revealed.
Their actual, well, your parents' reputation among any decent people would be shattered.
You have absolute proof.
Now, criminals only commit crime with the expectation of getting away with it.
If you know for sure you're going to get caught, you really don't generally commit the crime, right?
So they think they're going to get away with it.
Turns out, Turns out you had Sixth Sense style, right?
You have hidden video, you have camera footage, you've edited it all together, and it's unmistakable, and it might as well have been signed in affidavit format by a Supreme Court justice.
You have incontrovertible proof of exactly who your parents are and what they did to you.
The sickness, the violence, the beatings, the neglect, the assaults.
And you're about to reveal it to everyone they know.
To everyone they know.
The facts of how they parent it.
Are you feeling uncomfortable yet?
I know I am. It's chilling, right?
Absolute proof. It goes out to everyone.
My family. What it's like at dinner time.
What it's like at night time.
What it's like when they lose their tempo.
What it's like when they're drunk.
What it's like when they hit you.
What it's like when they assault you.
What it's like when they, whatever, molest you.
God forbid. Wish he would.
Well, he does, to be fair.
You're about to... Reveal your abuses, nature, characters, actions, habits, behaviors, and evils, and violence to the world, to their world, to their bosses, to their co-workers, to everyone.
Everyone! We'll see.
Now, we all have internalized parents.
We have to. We have to.
In a good way, this is how culture continues and so on.
And in a bad way, this is how abuse tends to cycle.
We all have internalized parents.
Now, When you are, you know, hands shaking, you're about to push, you've got click, click, publish, share, publish, broadcast.
What are your inner parents doing in your head when you're about to do this?
I'll go back to the chat here because I want to get your thoughts on this and thank you for your patience while I
Give you this liberating elegy
What are your parents doing in your head when you're about to share incontrovertible video of their abuses assuming
that they were abusive You
Bye.
What are they doing?
What are they saying? They're screaming stop.
They're saying no.
Screaming to stop. Chambering a bullet, panicking and bargaining.
Sabotaging you. Screaming no.
They won't care and will attack you.
You know, they'll care. I imagine them staring at me saying nothing.
That's not a thing.
That's not real. This is great.
Coming at you hard. They're saying we weren't that bad.
Or are you sure? No, they can't say that.
Stay with me. Because you have video.
All you're doing is sending the video.
Screaming and baring teeth like an animal.
Red-faced father, I brought you into this world, I can take you out, that kind of thing, right?
Pressuring you to stop or being manipulative, saying we love you, blah blah blah.
Putting the blame on me and making it all my fault.
I don't think anyone would care.
No. That's dissociative.
Of course they would care. Of course they would care.
I think in the end, evil people always have a justification, and that's why they don't truly care or empathize.
My mother once acknowledged the abuse and simply said, I thought you wouldn't remember.
Yeah, but I'm sorry for that, and that's sad, but this is not what we're talking about.
You have the footage.
You have the footage.
I mean, you realize there are accounts in social media that simply repost other people's videos and people completely freak out.
that videos that people voluntarily record and upload and share
and they still freak out.
even these are voluntary things right?
Would your parents attack you
if you could push a button and reveal their abuse to everyone they
care about or are dependent on?
Bye everyone.
Right.
They would, right?
They would.
Do you get what I'm getting at here?
you That's your self-attack.
That's your self-attack.
It's the constant pressure your parents put on you to shut the fuck up.
Yes, they're the ones attacking you.
They have to keep you down so you don't say anything.
They have to keep you down so you don't have allies.
They have to keep you down so you keep your secrets.
You're not attacking yourself.
I mean, what animal does that?
Do you see beavers waking up in the morning and just deciding to gnaw on their own arms?
Do you see snakes chewing on their own tails?
Do you see birds trying to peck off their own wings?
Is it bad that I'm laughing at this?
It's so true. They would say they were helpless and that I'm inherently flawed for being critical of them.
No, you're not staying with the analogy.
Sorry for the impatience. Stay with the analogy.
This is not about you and your history.
We're trying to break you and your history and your stories.
Stay with the analogy, please.
What would they do if you're about to expose them to everyone?
What would they do? Anything and everything.
They'd be destroying the computer, they'd unplug, they'd leap over, they'd yank the mouse from your hand.
What if they were in the room? What would they do if they were in the room and you were about to go click, click?
All the video of all the abuse would go to everyone.
What would they do? Would they let you click?
Come on, people.
What would they do?
They would do whatever it took to keep the crimes silent.
you They would do anything to stop it.
I mean, it would be a very dangerous situation, you understand?
It would be an incredibly volatile and dangerous situation.
Now I know I added in that they're in the room, but that's because people were telling
me all about this historical stuff and past stuff and I'm like, I need you to get the
vividness of the danger in the moment.
That's the most interesting man in the world.
I don't always lie, cheat, gaslight, and ruin your life, but when I do, it's your fault.
That's funny. But this could be a mortal situation.
This could be a very dangerous situation.
If they had to physically injure you to prevent you from sharing the video to their friends, relatives, parents, pastor, congregationalist, boss, whatever, right?
If they had to physically harm you to prevent you from sharing the video, would they do that?
And that just could be grabbing you and dragging you back from the computer.
That could be pushing over the chair.
Would they do it? Would they harm you to avoid revealing their abuses?
Well, of course they would, because they already harmed you by being abusive before, right?
All right.
So... Let's follow this through to the end.
Does this make sense so far?
Are you kind of getting the perspective that's going on in your head?
Are you getting the characters in your head?
Because we've got one step further to go.
And how are you guys doing?
You doing okay? This is fairly intense stuff.
Well, it's intense stuff because it's fair.
I think my mother would take a more sophisticated approach and it would be as life-ruining as possible.
No. Stay with the analogy.
She's in the room. You're about to click.
What would she do? Oh, sophisticated and there'd be a back...
No. What would she do in the moment to avoid this video getting out?
I'm putting her in the room with you.
Well, this is heavy, but it's about to get lighter.
Later.
Okay.
Now, let's take them outside of the room.
Let's take them outside of the room, but they're on speakerphone and you're telling them what you're doing, right?
So they can't stop you physically.
They're on speakerphone and you say, Mom, Dad, by the way, I got all these videos of you hitting me, of you screaming at me, of you neglecting me, of you...
And neglect, I know, is a tough one, but just imagine you've got something there, right?
Of you assaulting me, of maybe there's sexual abuse or whatever.
I got all the video.
I'm about to publish it.
I just wanted to let you know.
It's going to your parents, your boss, your co-workers, your family, like everyone, right?
It's going to my siblings, your siblings.
They're on speakerphone.
What do they say?
What do they say when you say, I'm about to click send?
And let's say that you gave them 10 seconds of the video or something like that.
You dropped a 10-second video so they could see the kind of stuff that was going out.
Them screaming or hitting or whatever they're doing, right?
What would they say to you, knowing that they had a very short window to try and get you to stop sending the video?
What would they say? Yeah, they'd say stop, of course, but my parents encouraged drug use at 15, all in the attempt for me not to talk, right?
She would shame, yell potential physical violence, attack once I'd left, make calls, pit people against me.
You're such an idiot.
You're making it all up. Right.
They'd bribe. You're so ungrateful.
Should scream, cry, apologize, be hysterical, threaten.
You can't.
Right. Forgive me?
Mmm, that's tough, man.
That's tough, because that would be to try and forgive in an extremity and with no acknowledgement of wrong.
You're an evil person if you send that.
Where did you get that video?
Yeah, I don't know. I had a nanny cam.
I had a little stuffed toy and I recorded everything.
They tried to get me to date a single mom?
No, no, no. What would they do in the moment?
What's their long-term strategy?
My God. Beg forgiveness?
Maybe. But they wouldn't have time.
They need you to not click that in the next 10 seconds.
No, no, they're on speakerphone, sorry.
They only have their words to get you to stop revealing their crimes.
No one's perfect, let it go.
No, that's not strong enough. They need you to not send these videos absolutely desperately and totally.
What do you want me to do?
Nope. You've got 10 seconds.
What are they going to say? You think you're a Christian but you don't honor your parents.
Jesus wouldn't like this. You're a bad Christian.
You're effing awful. Please don't do this.
We're sorry. What do you think this will do?
No one will care. Turn the situation around.
You'll go to hell if you click that button.
Well, that's projection, right? They'll go to hell.
Right? You were a bad kid.
What option did we have?
They would threaten your children's lives.
Well, that's not shocking, but very extreme, of course.
You don't understand. I had to do that.
Please don't. Let's talk through this.
I think my father would respond more predictably.
He would just yell and slur at me.
You effing asshole, we will ruin your life if you do this.
I think that's probably closer.
There's no time for apologies.
There's no time for pleas. There's no time for negotiation.
When time is short, what's the go-to position?
No, when time is short, what is the go-to position?
If you've got 10 seconds, there's no time for negotiation or pleas or apologies or long-term plans.
Yeah, threats. Yeah, that's right.
There's threats. Attacks. No, how could you do that to us?
No, that they...
It's attacks.
It's threats. No, they can't flee.
They can't flee. They have to get you to stop immediately, unquestionably.
Well, initiate the use of force, but they're not in the room in this, like they're on speakerphone, right?
What would they do? You're going to ruin our family and ruin my life.
Why are you so vindictive?
No, no, no, no. We're not in the realm of manipulative self-pity because that's not going to be strong enough to get you to stop the click.
They'd scream verbal abuse.
A threat of equal magnitude to their consequences.
Boom! I'm sorry you got that so deeply, but I'm proud of you for what it's worth.
Yeah, a threat of equal magnitude to their consequences.
Honestly, I'm a pretty good wordsmith.
I could not in a thousand years come up with a better phrase than that.
A threat of equal magnitude to their consequences.
That's right. That's right.
I mean, if you had abusive parents, they were willing to beat you up over dropping a dinner plate.
You think destroying their reputation, what would they do?
In the shortest time frame at the highest stakes, my mother would go full Kathy Bates.
Yeah, yeah. In the movie Meserie, yeah.
Change the subject. I don't know what that means.
They certainly wouldn't change the subject.
Desperate, hateful screaming.
Yeah, you're going to effing die if you do that.
You were always a bully.
No, you see, it's not direct enough.
They have to get you to stop, and this is not a conversation.
They have to get you to stop and it's an absolute emergency and they have 10 seconds
And all of the usual tactics won't work because you have video
They can't gaslight you because you have video.
They can't tell you it didn't happen because you have video.
They can't lie to other people and say it didn't happen and you're crazy and a liar because other people are going to get the video.
They are going to be fully exposed, irrevocably.
Fully exposed. No gaslighting.
No manipulation. None of any of that is possible.
They can't lie their way out of it.
They can't manipulate. They can't bully.
That's just right. Could bribe?
Yep. That could be the case.
That could be the case.
But if you say, there's no money that will stop me.
We will kill you. I'll kill you.
Threats of violence. They could bribe.
Absolutely. No one will believe you.
No. My God, man.
Stop! Stop with your history scenario.
Stay with this scenario.
You've got video, hours of video.
They're on the videos.
Screaming, yelling, hitting, beating, assaulting, molesting, whatever it is.
Others did worse. That's not going to stop it.
I mean, not that this would ever happen, but if some kid of mine was like, you know, I'm just going to release videos of our interactions, I'd be like, okay, people want to see me making dad jokes and you rolling your eyes and us playing games and, you know, today I did the French Revolution, which was a long time and it felt like an eternity, and then I went for a nice long walk with my daughter.
She picked up some tofu.
I had a little pad thai.
And then we went to a candy shop where I didn't buy anything and she bought a couple of little things.
And then we walked around some more.
We were just chatting. And then we came home and we played some cards.
And yeah, I mean, good lord.
Oh no, video of...
Right? Others did worse.
Nope. No, because you've got the video.
See, you're going back to past manipulations, and I'm trying to get you to current threats.
So video of their severely abusive habits is published and revealed to everyone.
Yeah, death threats and all that, right?
If you try to stop me from pushing this button, I will unleash hell about you all.
I don't know. Is that your reply to them?
Lots of blaming. No, they don't have time for blaming.
I'm going to destroy your reputation and your name.
Ask them to let them see the video and let them learn together from it.
I don't understand that.
I will never speak to you again if you send that.
I will never support you or give you anything, ever.
Right. Do you know why?
And look, I don't know your parents, obviously, right?
Now, Why will the threat of withholding affection not work in this scenario?
Remember, abusive people are very cunning.
They know exactly what they can get away with because they get away with so much, particularly in families.
Why? I'm not sure what you're referring to, Jared.
Why will a threat of withholding affection not work?
And they'll know that.
Every response we've come up with are literally our self-attacks.
Bingo! Why would the threat of, I will never speak to you again and I'll never support you or give you anything again ever, why would that not work in this scenario?
Why would parents not? Because the threat of withholding affection reveals a lack of affection to begin with?
No! Anthony, that's closer.
Those are absolutely best answers so far.
No.
All of this.
God! You guys are good.
You're so freaking smart.
I'm getting a sunburn here.
Massive brain mega fusion supernova head.
No. The reason why threatening to withhold a faction wouldn't work is you just fucking spent a week editing together all of the abuse they did to you.
You follow? You're not sending videos you haven't reviewed.
You've edited them all down.
You've picked out the stuff that is most vivid, most powerful.
You've spent a week or two editing all this stuff down.
You've uploaded it. You've reviewed it.
So when you've just got 20 hours of people abusing you and they say, well, I'm not going to be nice to you.
I'm going to withhold my affection from you.
You've just spent weeks reviewing and editing video of them abusing you.
Do you follow?
It's hard to get into this scenario because this is unraveling your self-attack.
It's not self-attack! Do you understand?
This is not a theoretical situation.
This is every day!
For you, for me, every day.
Every thought, every concern, every anxiety, every worry, every burden you hold,
every lie you tell to hide the crimes.
You think this is a mental exercise?
I'm sorry, I don't mean to laugh because it's serious shit, but this is not a mental exercise.
Steph, I fear the video will not ruin their reputation.
It will. It will.
It will ruin their pretense at a reputation.
But there's more.
Hit me with a why if you're ready for the next part.
It's not anyone else's business.
It doesn't matter. If they've claimed to be good parents, they've already opened up conversations about parenting with other people.
Okay, you ready for the next part?
So you say to your parents, I've got all this video.
I'm going to send it. It's you screaming, yelling, abusing.
I'm going to send it to everyone because you've been telling everyone that I'm crazy and you're great parents, that I'm a problem and you were great parents.
I'm just correcting the record.
You opened up this conversation.
I'm just closing it off with actual facts, right?
And they're screaming at you and they're threatening you and they're yelling at you and they're
whatever abusing you and God knows what they're saying in their panic and their freak out
and so on, right?
And then you can absolutely say, mom, dad, two things you need to know.
you Two things you need to know.
Number one, I don't actually have any video.
I don't actually have any video.
That's number one. Number two, I'm live streaming this to the family.
And I've recorded this. This is the video.
...
...
You screaming abuse at me, threatening to harm me, assault me, kill me, threaten, destroy my reputation.
I mean, sorry, I don't actually have any video from the past, but I'm actually live streaming this to the family.
And I'm recording it, and now this is the video I'm going to send.
Twist, baby! Now, I fudged that a little by saying you spent weeks working on...
I get that, right? So, please understand, I'm not M. Night Shyamalan here, but that's the twist, right?
That's not video. I just wanted you to believe that that was so that you could reveal yourself on this live stream
BOOM! Right?
They're admitting they know it's wrong when they threaten you for exposing them.
Got their conscience at that point.
Like a cop lying in an interrogation to get a confession.
Yeah. Yeah.
Oh yeah, your partner's already confessed and he's gonna get good time, but if you confess you can get good time.
Now, did you feel the little flash of victory here?
Gotcha, you manipulative SOBs.
Probably quite literally S-N-D-O-Bs.
You felt that little flash of, ah!
For once, the children win.
Yeah, we have footage of you robbing the bank, so just stop lying and admit it.
You know that falsehood is often a way to get to the truth, right?
I mean, I've written some really great and powerful truths in my novels, and they're all falsehoods.
Do you realize this whole scenario is a falsehood, which is a great fucking truth, is it not?
You're not attacking yourself.
You're being attacked to shut you the fuck up because you witnessed thousands of crimes over many, many, many years.
You feel emotional?
This is great. Yeah, it is.
In lies there is truth sometimes.
You're not self-attacking at all.
You're just self-attacking.
the witness to an attempted murder of the soul.
Oh Evan, dissociating...
Would the world be a better place if everything was recorded?
Stay with your feelings, man.
Don't go theoretical on me, bro.
Don't dematerialize.
Don't despawn. Don't intellectualize.
Don't philosophize. Stay with this.
I'm not suggesting you do anything wrong.
This is just a mental exercise.
I have no idea what you should do with your family.
And recording people without their permission can break the law, so I'm not giving you absolutely any advice on what to do.
This is absolutely a mental construct, right?
How do you stop self-attacking those deaf?
Oh my gosh, really?
Oh my gosh.
Oh, the rubber bones.
I just spent 40 minutes telling you it's not self-attack.
Yes, but how do I stop self-attacking?
Oh my gosh.
Your abusers are attacking the conversation by making you pretend to play dumb.
Right? Damn, if that didn't throw the inner parental voice for a loop.
Really revealed its presence.
Thank you. I was doing great for a long time, says someone, and I was assaulted six weeks ago.
Minor assault. And I spiraled into sept destruction?
Self-destruction, I assume, that is.
I tried to resist, but it's taken time for me to claw my way back.
I'd say I'm like 70% recovered.
Right. Who's ordering you to be in a situation where you get assaulted?
The person says, I wasn't trying to play dumb.
I can't stop the bad thoughts.
No, you were. You were.
I mean, you're not dumb. You're here, right?
Top 1% of intelligence I grant to everyone here.
But you are trying to play dumb.
Because if I make an entire lengthy speech about how it's not self-attack, and then you say, but how do I stop self-attacking?
Who's attacking you?
Doormaster, who is attacking you and why?
Should be a short movie. That would be a pretty funny short movie.
It would be a great way to get pursued through the streets by angry parents with pitchforks.
Why do you attack yourself? You don't attack yourself.
Attacking yourself, saying I self-attack, is another way your parents attack you.
Ellen, hang on.
Hang on. Let's not make it about you.
A lot of people are getting value out of this conversation.
I got your question. We'll get there.
I just self-attack.
You understand? That's another attack from outside, saying that you just self-attack.
I just wake up in the morning and I just scream at myself.
I don't know why. I just self-attack.
I just... I don't know what's wrong with me.
Heaven, you can't stop self-attacking because you're not self-attacking.
You're self-attacking.
You're self-attacking.
...
Thank you.
All right. Hit me with a Y if you had an older brother.
Or have. Hit me with a Y. You're feeling instant relief?
Yes. Good. Good. I told you I'd get you there.
Trust in me.
Oh, sorry about that note.
Do you have an older brother?
Or it could be an older sister, probably an older brother.
Usually it's an older brother. All right.
Hit me with a B. Hit me with a letter B if your older brother ever grabbed your hand, used it to hit you and said, stop hitting yourself.
Right? Just, you know, used your hand to hit you and said, stop hitting yourself.
Hit me with a B if that ever happened.
Pretty common, at least it was when I was growing up.
Yeah, it's the kind of thing, right?
Hey, did you stop hitting yourself, man?
LOL, yeah. Oh, so LOL. Right, okay.
So, you understand the analogy here, right?
So, a family member is grabbing your hand, using it to punch you, and saying, stop hitting yourself.
B-b-b-b-bad to the bone.
I got in a physical fight over stuff like that.
Yeah, for sure. For sure.
Yeah, you've probably seen it.
Stop hitting yourself, right?
So this is self-attack.
Now, if you were to get older and your brother would grab your hand and use it to hit you and say, stop hitting yourself, and you'd get older and you'd say, you know, when I was younger, I had this weird habit.
Like, I just stopped hitting myself for no reason.
I must have been weird.
I must have been trying to punish myself.
I just would stop beating up on myself, fight club style, for like no reason.
All gendered bad siblings did it, I'd say.
Yeah, yeah. Or you get an older brother who comes and sits his fat ass on you on the couch and then says, you should get up, man.
You look uncomfortable. Why don't you get up?
You should just get up. Can you even breathe?
You don't look comfortable. They're just squalling all over you, Jabba the Hutt style, right?
You get this shit all the time with dysfunctional siblings, right?
I could tell some tales, but I won't I could tell endless tales of this kind of stuff.
But we all understand it, right?
Well, you know, I would just sit on the couch even though I was really uncomfortable and couldn't even breathe.
I would just sit on the couch. I don't know why I wouldn't get up.
Well, maybe because you got a fat ass on your chest, right?
I mean, dysfunctional siblings mess with your sleep, they mess with your food, they mess with your health,
I mean, everything, right? So, if you had a sibling who grabbed your hand, hit you with it, and said, stop hitting yourself, do you sit there when you're older and say, I just I just would hit myself as a kid
and I would go through this whole 40 minutes this is why I was a little
That's why I said you're playing dumb, right?
Because I go through this whole 40-minute explanation of, no, no, no, you weren't hitting yourself, right?
You weren't hitting yourself. You were being hit by your brother who was claiming you were hitting yourself, right?
So you weren't hitting yourself, right?
And then you immediately come back with, after my 40-minute explanation, you immediately come back with, but yeah, but why did I hit myself as a kid?
Well, I'm not playing dumb. Like, I just don't understand.
Why would I hit myself as a kid?
kid it makes no sense I just did 40 minutes on it was your brother doing
this right playing dumb doesn't work here
It never does. It never will.
Never, ever allow yourself to play dumb.
Never allow yourself to say, I don't know about your own life and your own history.
Never, ever, ever play dumb.
Never give yourself the out, which in fact is just giving other people out.
Never give people the out of blanking out, of gassing out in your head, of despawning your thoughts and memories and, well, I don't know, I don't understand.
Don't give yourself that.
Don't gaslight yourself with fog, right?
Thank you. Welcome and thank you for the tip.
I appreciate that. You're not attacking yourself.
You're being silenced by criminals.
No.
We're talking about self-attack.
You're trying to avoid the witness protection program.
And what is the Witness Protection Program in this analogy?
in the analogy of having witness crimes and knowing criminals and having the capacity to reveal their crimes at
any time, what is the witness protection program in this analogy?
Lola. How do the Kinks open their shows in Los Angeles?
How do the Kinks open their shows in Los Angeles?
Hello, LA! Boy, there's a 60s joke.
Actually, this is so good it's unreal.
Oh, it's very real.
And you're right. This is why I say this is the best show that will ever be.
So the self abuse is fulfilling the wishes of your abusers.
Self abuse is four words and four words only.
you Self-abuse is four words and four words only.
Anybody want to guess what they are?
Self-abuse is four words and four words only.
See, I need 40 minutes to tell you four words, but it's a thing, right?
Self-abuse is four words in four words only.
What is it?
Shut the F up.
Bye.
you Somewhat. Four words is the essence of what you refer to as self-attack.
Are you ready? Hit me with a Y if you're ready.
Last Velcro off. Are you ready?
No, the camera recording is different from the camera broadcasting.
All right. By the way, y'all, I'm still donating the value of the likes on this stream.
Now, this is the donation where you say, how much am I worth?
How much are you worth? How much are you worth to have this release from you?
Okay. What you call self-attack...
Is a constant threat in your head, criminal saying to you, you talk, you die.
You talk, you die.
You talk, you die.
Am I wrong?
Tell me I'm wrong.
You talk, you die.
You talk you die It's living under the constant threat of violence
For being real a violence for honesty a violence for truth a violence for speaking your mind a
Violence for telling your history of violence for revealing your abuse you talk you die
How does the stream have fewer likes than the broken stream before it even started well
Who knows yeah, you talk you die stitches. I'm sorry Snitches get stitches and end up in ditches, right?
What do criminals do with witnesses?
They threaten them with death, right?
You can also look at it like loan sharks.
What do loan sharks say? Pay us the money or we break your kneecaps.
and if you resist that we'll just kill you.
I always know when I'm getting really close to a core truth because people dissociate and get intellectual
and ask for, why do children universally experience this, that and the other as
criminality.
I'm not.
We can also do five words, if you like.
Oh, if you like, what do you know?
Do you know what the hell I'm going to say?
Do, re, mi. Right.
We can do five words. And it's a very real thing.
This is part of what you call self-attack, right?
Are you ready for the five words that characterize what you call self-attack?
Here we go. Here we go. Satellite radio.
You'll get hit with the boom.
Only one truth can survive.
Only one truth will survive.
Do you follow? Only one truth will survive.
Our truth or your truth.
But we ain't both coming out of this room alive.
Only one truth can survive.
Thanks, Dormaster. I appreciate you coming by.
Go get some sleep. 3.30 a.m.
for you. Please go get some sleep.
Sorry it was such a late show tonight.
There can be only one.
Only one truth will survive.
And this is... it's...
You or us. Two truths go into the wrestling room.
Only one will emerge.
Five to one, baby.
One in five.
Yeah.
No one here gets out alive.
It's not self attack.
Please don't insult yourself. I'm sorry.
Don't mean to laugh. Don't insult yourself.
It's not self-attack. It's not self-attack.
You know, I witnessed a murder and I'm very much afraid that I'm going to shoot myself three times in the back of the head.
I don't know why. I'm just going to shoot myself in the back of the head.
I don't know why. Yeah, I witnessed three guys rape a girl, and I just have this weird feeling I'm just going to drag myself up to the top of the roof by my shirt collar and just throw myself off.
I don't know why. I mean, I just do this out of nowhere.
It's bizarre. Do you see how insane that sounds?
I have information that could lead to the arrest of...
right.
I saw my neighbor burying a body.
He saw me watching him bury the body.
I just feel like I'm going to cut the brakes on my own car for some reason.
Steph, I appreciate how you walk people through the thought process instead of just giving
the answer right away.
Sure, yeah, I mean, you got to...
You've got to get people out of the theater, out of the cave.
Like, you ever do this thing where you watch...
Oh, gosh, I remember I watched two movies.
One of them was, I think, called City Hall with John Cusack, a completely forgettable movie.
There was some other movie. For some reason, I can't honestly remember many, many years ago.
I watched two movies, like Noon and 2 p.m.
or whatever. I can't remember why.
And, of course, you know, you come out and the sun...
You can see every spot that's ever existed from the womb onwards in your eyeballs or whatever.
So, you're pulling people out of the cave, you've got to take it step by step.
You can't just yank them out and throw them into the heart of the sun, right?
Self-attack.
Without that step through I wouldn't have got that emotional reaction with the twist.
And that's why, and again, sir, thanks Bethany.
I appreciate it. That's why I have to keep dragging people back into the scenario.
Because if you don't stay in the scenario, you can't get the payoff.
Because then you're just thinking outside.
Because you understand, how much do your parents, if your parents were abusive, how much do they want you to go through that scenario?
How much do they want you to stop self-attacking?
Because you're not self-attacking. You're not self-attacking!
It's not self-attack. Self-criticism, yes, because that's yourself wanting to improve.
No better place to be on a Friday night.
Or any night I choose to livestream cheesy cheese.
Thank you very much. Cusack was in a number of films in the 90s.
Yeah, then he went kind of satanic and mental.
Yeah, that kid went truly off, right?
As usual, Steph, this was gold.
Thank you, I appreciate that.
Now...
Are you ready for one more?
This is like a little thing you know like the little video they show at the end of the credits.
Thank you.
You ready for one more?
Alright.
Have you ever noticed that parents who constantly criticize children want to stay in touch with
them a lot?
Thank you.
Parents who seem to have nothing good to say about kids, their own kids, they just, you know, want to check, want to call, they want to come over, they want to see you, right?
Do you know why they do that?
I mean, you know, if I've got a lot of criticisms of people, I don't hang out with them, right?
Yeah, why do parents who don't seem to like you or have much positive stuff to say about you or family members as a whole, why do they want to see you?
Right? Why do they want to keep jacking up on you?
Why do they want to see you all the time?
Phone you, see how you're doing, come on over, blah, blah, blah, right?
Why? So they can continue tearing you down.
Maybe. Maybe.
Yeah.
If you saw a crime, you saw a barb, you
Assault someone, beat someone up, do something worse.
And Bob drops by once in a while and says, yeah, just, you know, coming to see how you're doing, coming to check up on you and, you know, just wanted to, you know, maybe you can make me some tea and we can hang for a few minutes.
What's Bob doing? What's Bob doing?
Yeah. Make sure you're keeping the fuck quiet and to remind you To remind you to keep the fuck quiet, right?
Again, tell me if I'm wrong.
I'm happy to hear if I'm incorrect.
You still keeping your mouth shut there, Sonny?
You still doing the wise thing?
You still doing the right thing? It could be bribery.
It could be any number of things.
But no, they need to know that their secret is staying safe.
That's what they need to know.
They need to know that their secret is staying safe.
They also, and how do they know, how do they know whether their secret is still safe?
How do they know? What do they do to find out if you're still going to Keep quiet.
How do they know? These aren't awkward pauses.
They're just pauses. If you're still self-attacking or censoring, Chris, I will come over there and I will rip that word out of your filthy mouth.
You're not self-attacking!
You're not self-attacking!
Get my wife's name out of here.
That's fine. I appreciate it.
I'm just kidding, right? It's tough to change.
Yeah, they pace you. So what they do is they come over and they try the old shit and see if it still works.
They try a couple of put-downs.
They try a couple of insults.
And just make sure that shit still works.
Because if it still works, they're safe.
Right? If it still works, they're safe.
Does that make sense? Do that shit over again.
Over and over and over. Just come in and keep pressing the bruises.
make sure they're still bruises, right?
They see if you still to self attack.
Ha ha ha.
Ginger! Joe! Stop it!
It's not self-attack. Hey, are all the old tricks still working?
Is this mechanic still working?
Is our secret safe? Is the crime never going to be revealed?
Is the crime never going to be committed?
Do you, I mean, you understand why the world went apeshit on me, right?
Like, it literally went apeshit, right?
You know why the world went apeshit on me, right?
I mean, I do. Do you know?
you know why, right?
the world is largely composed of criminals or criminals to be
facts straight-up facts
Anyone who doubts that over the last couple of years was obviously living in a cave.
I mean, one of the gravest crimes that I was...
Convicted of, so to speak, was saying to you and to the whole world and to tens of millions of people, it's not your fault that you were hurt and you don't have to lie about being a victim of crime.
It's not your fault you were hurt as a child and you don't have to lie about being the victim of a crime.
You don't have to falsify and pretend everything is fine when you were the victim of a grievous
crime.
And I did it in a way that was not bombastic or hysterical or weird or bizarre.
It was very normal. See, look, when I'm talking about these things, Do I come across as crazy, unhinged, weird and disturbed?
I'm not like, hello darkness, my old friend.
I'm not doing it. It's just straight up facts, right?
I'm not raging.
I mean, I'm passionate, of course, and I'm excited, and I'm interested, and I'm deep,
and I'm emotional at times, but it's not crazy stuff, right?
It was the normalcy.
Thank you.
I remember many years ago, someone in the media who shall remain nameless said to me, he said, the strangest thing about you is how not strange all of the things you say are.
You know, there are some people, you know, like, I mean, Alex Jones is very bombastic and so on.
And, you know, I certainly have my moments and all of that.
But I'm just, you know, I don't feel weird about any of this stuff.
And that's what's so strange to people.
Like, I talk about this stuff.
I don't feel threatened by it.
I don't feel weird about it.
I'm just telling you the facts as I see them and making hopefully a good case.
And that's one of the things that's very strange is normally people who are
dealing with very dark topics end up dark or weird themselves, right?
But Nietzsche is useful as sort of fortune cookie aphorism stuff, but I'll tell you one of the Nietzsche quotes that I'm going to get it correct, right?
I want to get it correct.
It was a good quote, and it had a huge impact on me when I was a kid, right?
And he said, Beware that when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster.
For when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
Beware that when fighting monsters you yourself do not become a monster
It did to really jump from from Nietzsche to Jurassic Park that guy in the first Jurassic
Park I think he's Australian or something like that and he's out
there hunting the dinosaurs and Then the dinosaur sneaks up and he says hi
clever girl, right?
What do you mean clever girl?
He wants to die?
He wants to die? So...
Yeah, I want to stare into the heart of darkness.
I want to do what I can to help as many people as I can to escape violence and crime and degradation and humiliation and all of that.
But I'm willing to look deep into monsters, but not at the expense of my own humanity.
I'm willing to wrestle evil, but not at the expense of my own sanity.
Calvin, nice to see you.
Hey, Steph, thanks for the truth bombs.
Also, a little update. I was a caller a few Sundays back with seven years alone.
I've got two appointments, but for therapy next week.
Beautiful man. Congratulations.
Well done. Well done. Well done.
If you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.
Abyss is the wrong word there.
If you explore evil, evil also explores you, is the way that I would put it.
If you go exploring evil, evil will also explore you, looking for a fish, a crack, a way to get in and infest you, right?
If you fight a virus, the virus fights your immune system, tries to get past.
Now, because I don't want...
Yeah, like in nefarious. I don't want the pursuit of virtue, which is inevitably the opposition to evil, to be ugly or different, right?
You differed from so many other philosophers online.
You got at the family. Juxtapose that against individuals like rationality rules who would waste your entire life on sophistry and midwittery.
It feels healthy the way you express your information.
Yeah. For whatever reason, I don't know, I'm always loathe to expose deepest thoughts for fear that it could be used against me.
But I'll err on the side of a lack of caution.
Evil doesn't really scare me.
.
And it's funny, you know, because in that I have, I think, something a lot closer to what Christians have.
And the Christians are not that afraid of evil because they recognize its inevitability and you're going to be persecuted, right?
You're going to be persecuted for doing good.
That's the foundation of the religion.
And, of course, they expect it and they're honored by it and it gets them to heaven, right?
Stephen Woodward, is that Rationality Rules?
I don't even know what he's doing.
I think I did a couple of videos on his videos.
We did a debate, I think, on UPB where he admitted that rape, theft, assault and murder could never be UPB. But I don't know what he's doing.
Is he still doing...
Oh, how did he do on COVID? How did, oh good old, I haven't thought of him in forever, but how did good old rationality rules do on COVID? That was the big acid test for me.
Like COVID and the vaccine, like that was the big acid test.
Right? The number of people who failed that test is appalling.
It's just appalling. It wasn't even a complicated test.
Sorry to be laughed. It wasn't.
How did he do on COVID? Because he's all about the science.
He's a science guy, right? Anyway, it doesn't matter.
I mean, I'm probably not going to...
But no, that's the big acid test.
And it's not even...
Oh, he sided with the regime.
So, and it's not even...
If you got things wrong on COVID, okay, whatever, right?
That sucks. And if you got things wrong on COVID and you got things wrong on the vaccine, then the problem is that should provoke a crisis of self-examination.
It should provoke a crisis of self-examination, which is, how on earth could I have gotten it so wrong?
It's like, you know, what did I say about, I don't know, George Floyd, right?
George Floyd, I had cops on and we talked about it and it's like, yeah, no, he didn't seem to die from the knee.
Oh, look what they just revealed now, and Chauvin is trying to overturn his conviction based upon this, that he didn't die from the knee.
He didn't die from asphyxiation, right?
So, if you get major things wrong, You know, what did I say?
I said, with Trump in office, there would be no wars, because he's a builder.
There would be no wars, and there were no wars.
I mean, I don't get everything right, obviously.
It's a ridiculous thing to say, to even think that I would get everything right, but in the major things, I've done very well, very well.
And if you have gotten something catastrophically wrong, then there should be a fair amount of humility and self-examination.
To say, oh my gosh, how did I get this so wrong?
Anyone who stayed on YouTube, yeah, I mean, YouTube was, I think to stay on YouTube you had to side with the regime.
It's just the way that it is.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, I occasionally I go through the list of things I got right and it's
it's pretty long.
hehehe Long, long, baby.
Long. I actually got a really good message about, oh, man, it was the best message I've got so far about getting back on Twitter, and it was like, ooh, that's a good argument.
That is a good argument.
I was like, mmm, Daddy can taste the...
Reason dripping like wasabi off that one.
I don't know. Are you interested?
Do you want to hear the argument?
Oh gosh, where did I get it?
Where did I receive that argument?
I can't find it, but I remember it fairly well.
So, I will get it.
So, it was not consequentialism.
So, the argument went something like this.
Elon Musk has sacrificed tens of billions of dollars, his reputation, he's fighting an incredible fight, he's opened things up to the free market of ideas, and you're holding off for an apology that legally he cannot make.
Because to have an apology for lying about you or whatever would be – to expose himself to legal liability, he wouldn't be allowed to do it.
It would be fiduciary misconduct and he would – so he's up there heroically fighting and you, for some principle that can't possibly be – Our holding off and letting him take all these bullets when you could be up there fighting the good fight.
And he's doing all this risk and he's surrendered a huge amount of money and time and peace of mind.
And look at him in Lex Friedman's podcast.
He's very sad and says, most people think they want to be me, but they don't really want to be me.
And, you know, he's heroically stepping forward front and center to open up free speech.
He's restored your account and you're just holding off for some time.
Fairly petty requirement that you know can't be satisfied.
And if you don't want to do it, just say so.
But if you do want to do it, don't just make up some impossible rule that people can't satisfy.
Does that sort of make sense?
Yeah, it is a good...
It's not consequentialist.
It's somebody's doing something brave and heroic and needs your help.
And, you know, in a sense, you were abandoned and you didn't like it.
Why would you abandon someone who's taking such a good argument at a good stand, right?
Does it seem compelling to you?
Hit me with a why if it seems compelling.
I mean, yeah, I thought it was a pretty good argument because, you know, it arouses the warrior hero in me who wants to not abandon others on the field of blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, right?
And it wasn't consequentialist and it wasn't all of that, right?
You're not going back to Twitter.
You're joining X. But yeah, and it was respectful.
Not that that's essential, but it helps.
And it was passionate and it was evocative.
And yeah, it was just really, it was a really good, a really good, a really good message.
Honestly, good argument.
Good, and I really, really appreciate.
I mean, the fact that it's a thought-provoking argument with an angle I hadn't thought of before.
I don't want to sound very well. I haven't thought of it.
It's brilliant. But it's a really, really, it's a really good argument.
As far as the counter-argument goes, would it break fiduciary duty to apologize in private?
I don't know.
It's funny, you know. Do you feel like anything is private anymore?
I mean, unless people are going through a body scanner and leaving everything behind, do you feel like, isn't everyone concerned that everything's being recorded?
Every, you know, every message, every email, every someone's got...
Like, does anything feel private anymore?
I don't know about that anymore.
I mean, even when I used to go and give speeches and so on, I'd be like, yeah, well, someone could be recording, like, even just a private conversation.
And, you know, I'm not going to be like, turn in your phones and put them in a whatever box or whatever it is, right?
So... Yeah, so I don't know that he would do that, right?
And Elon is certainly taking some risks these days.
I mean, especially these days, right?
So, it's very interesting.
The Twitter files revealed that intelligence agencies were viewing people's DMs on Twitter.
Yeah, the Faraday cage.
That's the one I was thinking of.
I have the one that, you know, please clean your phones.
They have more bacteria on them than toilet seats and we put them up to our face.
But yeah, Faraday cage.
You can get little UV light things that just blast them and clean them up.
My opinion, probably worth it.
Well, I mean, I've always communicated as if some judge is looking over my shoulder.
I mean, that's just been from the very beginning.
It's not paranoia. It's just, I mean, it's kind of drilled into me in the business world.
As an executive and a board member, you have to, I mean, you just, you can't put anything down in writing.
You know, there's lots of business people who just won't do emails at all because they say it just, it always ends up in court.
The stuff people write, it's just amazing to me.
The stuff people write down, like it's, yeah, it's fine.
Yeah, no problem. Let's write it down.
It's like, it's private. No, it's not.
So, I don't know that a private, whatever, but I mean, I would certainly appreciate it.
I would certainly appreciate it.
But, you know, I'm obviously a busy guy who doesn't probably even know that I exist, so.
That's why FDX used Signal.
Is Signal secure?
I don't even know. Is Signal secure?
I mean, they used it, but no matter what's secure, somebody can just take a picture.
I give them a set proof.
I don't know. But somebody can just take a picture of the screen.
I don't know. People think, oh, it's a shelf-threading thing.
It's going to... I don't know.
But yeah, I just...
We've got this incredible conversation ability, and I assume just in general that means that nothing is private.
I mean, I wish that wasn't that trade-off, but it's worth it, nonetheless, for me as a whole.
Now, I mean, counter-arguments, there are some that are practical.
Elon Musk, obviously, is infinitely wealthier than I am, and Elon Musk can afford all kinds of security, and Elon Musk is surrounded by an infinity of lawyers and all that kind of stuff.
CDBC will make it worse.
No privacy at all with money.
Oh yeah, CBDCs get in, it's all over.
Yeah, it was a great run.
The age of reason will probably not return for.
Obviously, I remember reading a book many, many years ago that was theorizing that the government in 1984 lasted 7,000 years.
I can kind of see that.
I can kind of see that. Yeah, I mean, that's a level of control that we'll not leave behind.
Definitely not. Oh, it's not.
Signal is not secure, especially on SM platforms.
I don't know what SM means.
Small to medium platforms?
He has satellites surrounding the world as security.
I have a very great admiration for some of what Elon Musk is doing as a whole.
Signal is secure, TMU, to my understanding.
All the libertarians around here, they all use Signal.
All right. I don't think Telegram is as much, but I think Signal is.
All right. Any last questions or comments?
Tell me how helpful and how useful was this conversation about self-attack.
Please do not refer to it as self-attack.
I know I just referred to it as self-attack.
Sorry. I'll punch myself, but it'll be my brother.
Please don't refer to it as self-attack.
It's threats to keep the crimes to yourself.
It's threats to keep the crimes to yourself.
Keep quiet or die. It's not self-attack.
The only real privacy you have is in the trust in your relationships.
The only real sort of privacy you have is the trust in your relationships.
Naomi Reckwell recommends Signal.
Oh, is that right? Yeah. Alright, last questions, comments?
Very helpful talk. Well, I hope so.
And listen, you might need to think about this more than once.
You might want to write it down.
Just because you hear something and you feel a burden, you ever have this, you hear something like, oh, I feel a burden is lifted, and then what happens?
Like it slowly settles back down, like you kick up the mud in a lake, and then it sort of goes back down over time.
It's just something you need to remind yourself of, because you're reminded constantly the other direction.
So you just need to Remind yourself back to not use the term self-attack, but witness intimidation.
Does that make sense? The phrase that I use in my head, it's not self-attack, but it's witness intimidation.
Why are you up so late today?
I was planning on doing something with my daughter.
It didn't end up working out, which is why I switched it from 7 to 9.
And I tell you, I was kind of wiped after the...
I did like two hours almost on the finishing up the French Revolution presentation today, and I was just wiped.
It just... It took everything I had.
But I think it also helped to inform the sort of conversation tonight.
So yeah, oh, I'm attacking myself.
No, it's just witness intimidation.
I'm the witness to a crime and I'm being intimidated into silence.
So just witness intimidation, that's all it is.
Naomi Brockwell, that's right.
Yeah, just witness intimidation.
Yeah, okay, they're just threatening me to keep the crime silent.
I get it. No, no.
Okay, got it. I got a threat from the criminal to keep the crime to myself.
Witness intimidation.
That's all it is. You witnessed thousands of crimes over decades probably.
You witnessed a crime and you're being threatened into silence.
You don't self-attack at that point, right?
I'm so stupid because I'm being threatened because I accidentally saw a crime.
You weren't out there looking for crimes.
You're not Batman. It's just witness intimidation.
That's all it is. Doesn't that help?
It's not pathological.
This is why I don't self-attack.
It's like, yeah, I mean, people, newsflash, criminals don't want their crimes revealed and will intimidate people.
I mean, you get it, right?
We all know this. This is how criminals operate.
This is how they work. If you found this helpful and you haven't donated, come on, man.
Come on, brother. Come on.
Tell me this isn't a massive life-changing thing.
Series of arguments. Come on.
If this doesn't release you, that's on you.
Like, now you know, right?
If you don't drive where the GPS tells you to, that's on you.
But this is how to get out.
This is how to get out of this prison.
This is how to get out of the prison, to just recognize it for what?
It's just witness intimidation because you witnessed crimes.
All right? So every time you're down on yourself...
Thank you.
I appreciate that, Josh. Very, very kind.
Every time you're down on yourself, you're self-attacking, you're mad at yourself, you're feeling self-destruction, you recognize the fist that's hitting you is not your own.
You're just being intimidated into silence.
So the criminals get away with stuff.
Now, the good news is the best way to fight criminals is stop listening to them.
The best way to fight criminals is to stop listening to them.
And the real attack is them convincing you that you're doing it to yourself when you're not.
Because that way it's autonomous, right?
The best way to keep someone silent is to have them paranoid.
And the self-attack is thinking it's you.
So, all right, I know that the original crime, child abuse.
So, no, I can't tell you what to do.
I can't tell you what to do.
I can't tell you what to do.
Should you confront your parents?
I don't know. I don't care.
I don't care. Like, I care in terms of, like, it matters to you, but I care that you stop self-attacking.
I care that you stop thinking that you're just attacking yourself or you have some insecurity or you punch yourself or you dislike yourself.
I want you to stop doing that.
What you do with that knowledge, I don't know.
You know, if I break you out of a prison, that's what matters to me.
Well, where do I go now? It's like, hey, man, you're free.
If I tell you where to go, you're just back in prison, right?
So that's my...
That's my advice. Clarity of thought is all that is necessary for philosophy.
Commandment of action is the opposite because it's no longer free will.
All right, thank you everyone so much for a great evening.
Let me ask you this, sorry, just as we close off here.
How do you guys like the later night shows?
Does it matter? Do you think?
I thought this was a bit of a scorcher, a bit of a crackler, a bit of a banger of a show.
Anthony, honestly, I appreciate, listen, I really, really appreciate your kindness, Anthony.
I'd like you to take six months off from donating to the show.
I really, really appreciate it.
You're very kind, and I absolutely, deeply honor your donations.
But if you could take some time off, I know that you need some money yourself, and I would rather you apply it to maybe your career or whatever it is.
But I appreciate that. If you could do it, you know, at least six months, if you want to take a year, that's great.
But if you could hold off on that, I would really, really appreciate it.
You like the time? Love them.
Night owl. Later is better.
Kept me entertained while the baby slept.
Oh! I'm...
I'm just here to entertain you.
Like I'm just... I'm just a clown.
I'm supposed to perform for you.
Like entertain... Anyway. I can't do it, Joe Pesci.
Who am I kidding? It's a Saturday afternoon show.
Don't hit me with your weird sun-baked giant spider time travel.
It freaks me out! Either later or earlier usually stream starts when I start driving home.
You can listen in the car, right?
You can listen in the car.
All right. Well, let's think about doing a 9 p.m.
show. We'll put out a poll and see.
Good fellas. Yeah, it's a terrifying movie, isn't it?
All right. Thank you, everyone.
Lots of love. I really, really appreciate your time tonight.
Thank you for your support.
And freedomain.com slash donate.
If you're listening to this later, you know it's only here because people support the show.
And have yourselves a beautiful, beautiful weekend.
We'll talk on Sunday.
And... Voice or...
Live stream, V or L? Voice or live stream?
You tell me. Voice or live stream, V or L? Voice or live stream?
Voice or live stream?
Which will it be I like both?
Night fever, night fever.
We know how to do it.
L, L, L. All right.
Yeah, all right. Sorry.
Sorry for the voice people. All right.
Thanks, everyone. Have a great night.
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