Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux - Peaceful Parenting vs CHRISTIANITY! Twitter/X Space

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Nov. 13, 2025 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

01:58:09

Peaceful Parenting vs CHRISTIANITY! Twitter/X Space

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	Well, good evening, my friends.
	12th of November 2025, and we're going to launch straight into the listener, Brain Bonanza Schmorgesborg, with Jeff.
	Jeff, if you want to let me know what's on your mind, I certainly have a few things on my mind, but the first thing I'm going to have on my mind is Jeff's thoughts and questions.
	If you want to unmute, I'm all ears.
	All right.
	Jeff is not with us.
	Is Jeff with us?
	He is not.
	He wants to be.
	He is here in spirit.
	All right.
	Reynard.
	If you want to unmute, you can tell me your thoughts as well.
	Good evening.
	Can you hear me?
	Yes, sir.
	Go ahead.
	How you doing?
	I'm well.
	How you doing?
	Not too bad.
	I have a question about the human conscience and how strong the conscience is.
	When we're talking about, say, Christians, if they're harmed or something like that, they have the, I don't say the luxury, but they have the ability to say, well, I'm going to put it in God's hands.
	I'm not going to judge.
	I'll leave it up to God.
	But if you're a non-believer, you don't really have that option.
	And I used to think that, you know, I think I used to think, I used to think, or I made the mistake of thinking that a lot of people think like myself.
	And if I do something wrong, my conscience will just bother me and it'll compel me to make things right.
	When you see a person that makes a mistake, they do something wrong, and they don't make things right.
	Is it a situation they don't have a conscience?
	Can you just sit back and say, well, in the fullness of time, their conscience will get the best of them.
	They will make things right.
	How strong is that conscience?
	And can we rely on people eventually coming around and doing right?
	No.
	No, we can't.
	I mean, how old are you?
	I am 52.
	52.
	Okay.
	So how many times has it happened to you that someone has done you wrong and then later come back to make things right?
	I would say it's a coin toss.
	Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't.
	All right.
	That's not answering my question, though.
	How many times have people done it?
	How many times?
	A handful of times, maybe.
	Well, you said it was 50-50, right?
	So give me an example of one.
	And obviously, you know names and all that, but give me an example of someone who has done you wrong and has, of their own volition, at some point later, come back to ask for your forgiveness, to make restitution, to give you some reasonable assurance that it's not going to happen again, whatever they did.
	Can you give me an example of that?
	There have been, I mean, I have an example of, you know, a friend of mine that it's sort of a couple's things.
	My girlfriend was friends with his girlfriend and the two girlfriends had some problems and then we had a falling out.
	And then he called me up and said, hey, we can't let something like this get between us and kind of gave an explanation and apologized, that sort of thing.
	But he didn't do you the wrong, right?
	Well, he did in the sense that I guess he did wrong by, I guess, taking his girlfriend's side.
	And he called me up and he kind of, you know, was very aggressive with me because he just believed what his girlfriend said and didn't take my side or didn't listen to anything.
	And then eventually he called back and he apologized.
	Okay.
	Did he make any restitution?
	Well, we're still friends to this day.
	Did he make restitution in the sense of paying me back?
	No, he just.
	It could be, you know, I'm really sorry I got you some tickets to your favorite band or let me take you out for dinner or, you know, something to say, I'm sorry.
	And more than just the words, right?
	Because the injury was substantial.
	If he snarled at you because his girlfriend lied, that's a pretty substantial injury.
	Personally, myself, if I had done something like that, I would send a gift basket.
	I would take the person out for dinner.
	I would buy them something that they loved or give them a big gift certificate or something just to say, look, it's more than just words.
	Now, I'm not saying that's an absolute for everyone.
	I'm just saying that that would be my standard.
	But so he apologized because he let his, hopefully by now, by then ex-girlfriend sway him into thinking negatively of you, right?
	Yes.
	Now, let me be cynical for a moment and ask, do you think he had any ulterior motives?
	In other words, had the girlfriend broken up?
	Did he need something from you?
	Was he lonely, isolated, out of friends?
	Was there some reason other than pure conscience that he got back in touch with you?
	Well, we weren't out of touch for a long period of time.
	I think it was one of those situations that it was just a he says, she says thing between the women.
	And he did sort of cover himself by pretending to be upset with me and my girlfriend to sort of cover himself.
	And then I guess later on he apologized.
	Can you, I'm not, this is very abstract to me.
	And can you give me any more specifics?
	So when you asked the question, was he covering for himself?
	And it was a while ago, but it was something to the effect of the two women.
	There was something, there was some issue where the two women, there was some sort of secret or something that only my girlfriend at the time knew.
	And it got back to his girlfriend.
	And then the girlfriend confronted him.
	And then he accused me of saying something like that.
	It was a while ago.
	It was a while ago.
	So because he was in trouble with his girlfriend at the time, then to protect himself, he said, those guys, they're troublemakers.
	And let's just stay away from both of them.
	Okay.
	Why did he come back to you?
	Why did he come back and apologize?
	In your mind.
	Or what did he say?
	I think in my mind, there's a group of us who are friends and probably the other friends knew that what he did was wrong.
	And, you know, I don't want to say I'm a stand-up guy, but they we wouldn't have been, I mean, we're all, there's a group of us and we wouldn't have been able to coexist together and everybody knowing that he was wrong.
	Okay, let me reframe it.
	I'm not asking the question well enough.
	I apologize.
	So your question is about conscience.
	Did he call you and apologize because he was tormented by his conscience or for some other reason?
	I doubt that he was tormented by his conscience.
	Maybe this wasn't really a good example, but I doubt that he was tormented by his conscience.
	Okay, so your question was not about, well, people, you know, maybe his girlfriend broke up with him, he was lonely, or whatever.
	There could be any number of reasons, right?
	So what I'm asking for is examples, and anyone can call in and talk about this.
	Examples where somebody calls you up specifically because their conscience has been tormenting them and they wish to make amends.
	Well, you had a show recently when you were talking about female happiness and unhappiness and being on antidepressants, that sort of thing.
	And you talked about a situation that you had where you was with a woman, you lived together, and she you worked a lot of hours, yet she wanted you to do half the housework and that sort of thing.
	So let's use, let's use an example of, say, a woman who we used to hear these, these, these stories about women saying that they don't get paid for the amount of housework that they do and housework is about worth $100,000 or something like that or whatever.
	So let's say, you know, you have a family and a woman is just inundated with this propaganda and she's angry enough, she's upset, and there are problems in the marriage and they end up getting divorced.
	And then they get divorced.
	And then now she sees that the grass isn't greener.
	It's hard to pay bills.
	The children are unhappy, broken home, this sort of thing or whatever.
	The woman that, you know, some women will just pretend and say new beginnings of living my best life and just try to keep up this image that they're happy.
	But then you have the situations where they can't possibly be happy when you see your kids being dysfunctional, your bills, it's decorated poverty because now you're paying bills.
	It's easy when it's two versus one, or whatever the case may be.
	The woman that just pretends like everything is okay in the face of the kids being upset and financial distress, that woman that continues to pretend and play that role versus the woman that picks up the phone and apologizes and tries to make restitution or at least acknowledge that she was wrong.
	Yeah, but every example you're giving me is not somebody who's tormented by their conscience.
	It's a woman who's like, well, I thought I'd get a better guy.
	I didn't get a better guy.
	So I want to come back to you.
	That's not conscience.
	That's just a practical recognition of limitations.
	Okay, well, I'm thinking perhaps a woman would be tormented by her conscience.
	You said to me, 50-50 people come back because they're tormented by their conscience.
	And I'm asking you for examples of people who are tormented by their conscience and you don't have any.
	And it's not some big criticism.
	I'm just saying, I don't, I mean, I don't experience it, but people coming back.
	I mean, obviously, friends and family and so on, that's fine that they do that as I do that.
	But your family of origin, people as a whole, friends, business colleagues who've done bad things or who've done wrong things and so on, they don't apologize.
	I mean, they might apologize if it's to their strategic interest for some reason.
	Right.
	So I had a friend when I was in my teens who had a really bad temper and was kind of mean.
	Like I mentioned the story years ago, but we went dirt biking in November and I didn't have any gloves because we were broke, right?
	Didn't have any gloves.
	And he had these big giant hockey mitts and I would be like, every now and then, my hands were like these frozen white claws, you know, like half planet claws.
	And I remember saying to him, hey, can I just warm my hands up in your gloves for just a couple of minutes?
	Then we, you know, and he's like, well, where are your gloves?
	Why didn't you bring gloves?
	You know, like, he's just kind of mean that way, right?
	And this is the guy.
	This is the same guy who I got into this big fracas with because we were biking home or biking back to my place.
	And I swerved because there was a stone on the sidewalk.
	I swerved and he almost ran into me and he got really angry at me because he said I'd cut him off.
	And I said, no, no, no, you were tailgating.
	And anyway, it just went kind of nuts.
	He was like throwing his bike all around and so on.
	So I stopped.
	I stopped hanging out with him because it's just like, no, I, you know, I, I mean, like, like most British people or people raised in England, I'm really nice and I'll give, you know, give you the shirt off my back and help, help, help, until such time as I get that you're taking advantage of me or you're dysfunctional or you're rude or whatever it is.
	And then I'm like, my heart just, it just closes.
	Like it's like an ice wall just comes right down.
	And, you know, you're kind of dead to me.
	And so I didn't hang out with him.
	And then I think it was a year or two later, you know, he called me up and he was like, hey, man, I think you still have a football of mine and I need it back and blah, blah, blah.
	And I didn't have his stupid football and wouldn't, you know, but, you know, he basically, I could tell, like he wanted to, you know, he wanted to hang out and be friends again, but he wouldn't say it honestly and directly and openly.
	And other people, people in the business world who did me wrong, never heard a thing.
	Every now and then, someone will call you up and they might pretend nothing happened or they might say, I'm sorry about the way things ended or I'm sorry about the way things turned out.
	Like some general, I'm sorry the weather was bad on the day of your wedding, nothing personal that they've done.
	But as far as people actually calling you up and saying, you know what, I've really been thinking about what I did.
	It's really tormenting me.
	I really did not live up to my values.
	I did the wrong thing.
	I did you wrong.
	I'm really sorry.
	Let me make it up to you with no expectations.
	No, it's almost like somebody might apologize and then they need a job or they need a recommendation or they need a reference or they need something, right?
	Or a loan.
	Sort of we're past loan phases in my life now, but no, people, they don't.
	I mean, my father died, never apologized.
	My mother has never apologized.
	My aunts, my uncles, cousins have never, never apologized.
	Cousins, less so because they were kids too.
	But yeah, nobody, nobody, nobody apologizes.
	Nobody is racked by conscience.
	And I've not noticed much of a significant difference between the atheists and the Christians with the caveat that the Christians really should, right?
	The Christians really should.
	And so I don't see it.
	I'm, I would say, you know, I don't want to be like, oh, I'm so good.
	But I'm pretty good at if I, if, if something's troubling me, I will, I will apologize.
	I will apologize.
	And like many years ago, I met up with a family and they had a kid who had a neurological challenge.
	And I, at one point said, maybe try this or whatever it is.
	And then like later in the evening, I just said, you know, like, I'm really sorry about that.
	You've been dealing with this for a long time.
	And here I am bunging in with no knowledge and giving you advice, which is very insensitive and wrong.
	And I'm really, really sorry about that.
	I apologize.
	You know, maybe it came from a good place, but it doesn't really matter because it's kind of insulting to say to you, oh, just try this or have you tried that.
	When of course you have.
	I mean, you've been living with it for a long time.
	So, I mean, that's just an example from some years ago that I remember just apologizing for.
	And so I do, you know, apologize and so on.
	And because it bothers me and that had sort of been sticking in my head.
	And I was like, I didn't think really of much of it at the time, but as sort of the evening went on, my conscience was like, you know, that really wasn't very good.
	It wasn't very, it wasn't very polite.
	It wasn't very respectful to give people advice on something they've been dealing with for a long time.
	So, I mean, I think I, you know, I've apologized here on the show to people that I have been short or what do they call it in English? Stroppy.
	I've been strappy with.
	I mean, apologies are necessary for the inevitable frictions of life.
	We can't spend our lives entirely worrying about what everyone else thinks and feels.
	Otherwise, we don't really exist ourselves.
	But at the same time, we can't be indifferent to particularly what loved ones think and feel because we need to have their happiness and consideration in our minds, all this kind of stuff.
	So I don't, I don't see, and I'm not hostile to apologies.
	I'm not like, oh, I'm going to grind your gears if you apologize to me.
	But I am skeptical of apologies.
	I'll be straight up.
	I call them BNAPs, bullshit non-apologies.
	Well, I'm sorry if you were upset by my honesty, you know, like that sort of like, I'm sorry that you're so pathetic and thin-skinned that you can't, you can't take any criticism.
	Well, I'm sorry that you just reacted so strongly to the comments that I made.
	Like, you know, just that it's all an insult wrapped in a pretend apology.
	And I'm very skeptical of apologies because I prefer a gap, a sort of vaguely credible gap between the apology and the ask.
	You know, hey, man, I'm really sorry about the way things ended.
	Could you give me a reference for a job that I want?
	Or could you get me a job or, you know, that kind of stuff.
	So normally, and I'm very skeptical when it's just words, right?
	If someone has done me some, you know, significant harm and they're just like, well, I'm really sorry.
	And then there's nothing.
	It's like, you know, it's like if I borrow your car, as I've said before, like if I borrow your car and I put a big dent in the side because I turned too sharply and I drop it off and I say, hey, man, I'm really sorry about the dent in your car.
	And then I just wander off.
	It's like, no, you've got to fix the car.
	I mean, you know what I'm going to say, I'm sorry.
	And it gets you off the hook for everything, right?
	I'm sorry, I forgot armed robbery was illegal.
	It's an old Steve Mudd routine.
	But so I'm skeptical of apologies.
	I find them to be very manipulative for the most part.
	Again, excluding loved ones and close friends.
	But, or if they're not manipulative, then they're too little.
	And then what happens is if somebody says, you know, I'm sorry, they did me some significant wrong or harm.
	And then they say, I'm sorry.
	I'm like, and then they get annoyed because it's like the words, words are cheap.
	Anyone can like words.
	I'm sorry is like, I love you, right?
	You can, you can mean it or you can just use it to get into somebody's pants, right?
	So I am skeptical with regards to forgiveness.
	I'm skeptical with regards to apologies.
	It doesn't, yeah, I'm sorry.
	I'm sorry you just can't let things go.
	I'm sorry that you're holding on to this for so long.
	And if somebody tries to apologize to me and includes an insult in it, yeah, I mean, again, the Anglo-Saxon ice wall just comes down, like the white cliffs of Dover, but with a glacial front.
	It just, like, do not apologize to me.
	You know, I'm sorry that you're so thin-skinned that you took what I said personally.
	I'm really sorry that you misunderstood what I was like, oh, fuck off.
	Just don't, don't do it.
	And so most people, what they do, and I've never had a good apology more than 24 hours after the wrong.
	Because what happens is if someone wrongs you, then if their conscience bothers them, they either let their conscience guide better actions or what they do is they redefine what they did as just being honest and blunt.
	You know, you see this all the time in online communities when we used to run a message board.
	This was constant.
	Somebody would come in and be a real troll and we'd try reasoning with them and then they'd get banned if they were still continued to be a real troll.
	And then like, hey, man.
	And they didn't come there and say, you know what, I was too harsh.
	I was, you know, I was, I was obviously stirring shit up.
	And I'm really sorry about that.
	I'll do better.
	No, it's all like, oh, well, I mean, what a tyrant.
	He claims to believe in free speech, just bans me just for asking questions.
	I mean, good Lord.
	You know, just this like kind of punchable stuff.
	So in terms of people, again, people, family, and close friends, it's great, although we don't usually have much to apologize to each other for.
	But strangers, oh, God, no, business people, people who've done you wrong, people who have, you know, never, never, never.
	It doesn't, it doesn't, I don't wait for it.
	I don't look for it.
	I don't expect it.
	And I'm never disappointed, if that makes sense.
	Sorry, go ahead.
	So any insight on your behalf on people who may have done wrong and they know they've done wrong, but they just won't apologize?
	Is it pride?
	Is it ego?
	Well, they won't have to find themselves as having done wrong.
	People have this amazing ability to reverse things in their mind where they have done wrong and they flip it so that it's the other person's fault, that their quote wrongness is a mere shadow cast by the bad actions of others.
	Of course, the most common one, let's take a real typical example.
	The most common one that people know about is the girlfriend cheats on her boyfriend, right?
	He cheats.
	She cheats on her boyfriend and she's done him wrong.
	But what happens then?
	Well, he wasn't paying attention to me.
	We weren't close.
	We were on a break, you know, like whatever it is that they, they will just redefine it so that somehow they're not in the wrong.
	I mean, talk to people about their divorces.
	You've got two people who are perfectly in the right and yet it didn't work.
	It's amazing.
	Absolutely amazing.
	Or if somebody gets fired, oh, my boss was here.
	My boss had it in for him, man.
	He just, he hated me from the very beginning for no reason, blah, blah, blah.
	It's never a question of like, well, gee, what did I do that get fired?
	You know, and, you know, sometimes the boss does have an interview or whatever, right?
	But people would just redefine what they did as not wrong.
	Like the people who deplatformed me, they weren't like, oh, you know, we're censorious bastards who are stripping people of their right of free speech.
	No, no, no.
	He is a bad guy and he's provoking this or that or the other and he deserves to be silenced.
	And, you know, they justify what they're doing as the good, as the right, as the noble, as the just.
	And they do that by dehumanizing the other, right?
	Because if you've done someone wrong and you, vanity, your ego, your fragile, whatever it is, self-esteem can't handle the fact that you've done something wrong, which means you're inhuman to yourself, right?
	We've all we all do things that are wrong.
	We all make mistakes.
	We all step on other people's toes.
	We're all occasionally rude or thoughtless or careless or whatever it is, right?
	Things that we can apologize for.
	That happens.
	I mean, the only way to not do that, as I said before, is to not live or have opinions or say anything at all.
	And then you just don't exist.
	It's a real robbery of the world.
	So if you have a fragile ego and you can't admit fault, and usually where this comes from is If you have a family that takes apologies and grinds your balls into dust forevermore, right?
	Like if you say, I'm sorry, then you'll never be allowed to be right again.
	Oh, so you think you're right, just like just like you were when you had apologized for me before.
	And then you just can't apologize because it's going to be used against you.
	And again, if somebody does that, like if I were to apologize to someone and they were just to take it as, oh, I'm so superior and you're such a piece of crap and they grind me about it forever, I would just not have anything to do with that person, but you're kind of stuck with your family.
	And so if you have parents who don't apologize and who brutalize you for apologizing, then you will view apologies as kind of like suicide.
	And then you get this brittle ego thing where you can't admit fault.
	And the more that you justify the wrong things that you've done so that the other person becomes at fault and you're absolutely in the right, the less you can apologize because you cannot reverse that trend.
	Our justifications become our physics, and you can no more reverse those bad habits than you believe you can jump up and just keep going up, if that makes sense.
	Yeah, I got you.
	I got you.
	Okay.
	Okay.
	All right.
	Well, thank you.
	All right.
	I appreciate that.
	Thank you.
	It's a great, it's a great topic.
	All right.
	Will.
	Will.
	We are back.
	I believe I've chatted with you before.
	What's on your mind, my friend?
	Oh, thank you for having me on, Stefan.
	Like, I really appreciate being back on here.
	What's on my mind was actually many different things I would say.
	is it a justified use of force to chainsaw someone's head off if they steal $15 from you?
	But besides that, like, in my mind, I'm like, Okay, come on, man.
	What are you doing?
	Are you trolling here?
	Not exactly.
	Yeah, kind of.
	Come on.
	You're kind of trolling.
	I have like a different one.
	No, no, no.
	Hang on.
	Hang on.
	What is your purpose here?
	What do you want to talk about?
	Well, what do you want to talk for?
	Let's go with that.
	All right.
	In terms of justified use of force, in terms of because it's like one area where I kind of don't agree with is going to be in terms of proportionality.
	Like, so for instance, like you can't really finish a fight if you're going to be proportional with it, if like shit really does hit the fan.
	So like, but besides that analogy, I wanted to use was going to be okay.
	Let me let me ask you this.
	What is a big issue in your personal life?
	I assume that you don't have $15 with somebody currently trying to steal it and you've got a chainsaw in your hand.
	So let's try doing some real philosophy rather than some troll philosophy, if you want.
	If not, I'll move on to someone else.
	But what is an issue in your life that you think philosophy might be able to help you with?
	Right now, I would say probably only the Jeet Kune Do philosophy of like Bruce Lee, where he says, ignore all the BS that you can't really use and just take what works.
	Okay, maybe you're not understanding.
	Hang on, hang on.
	You're not Bruce Lee, right?
	So maybe you're misunderstanding what I'm saying.
	Do you have an issue in your life that you think philosophy might be able to help you with personally?
	Not directly.
	Okay.
	All right.
	Well, I will invite you to check out my self-defense work.
	I've done a lot of work on self-defense, and I would be very happy to have you check those out.
	And you have any questions, you can call back.
	All right.
	The Liberty Lines, the Liberty Lines.
	What is on your mind?
	Give it away, give it away, give it away now.
	But you will need to unmute.
	I might have to have a policy if people can't handle the technology of unmuting to just ban them because it's a big waste of everyone's time to have people come in here who can't seem to handle the tech.
	All right.
	Looks like he's not answering.
	All right.
	Eddie, what is on your mind, my friend?
	Do not forget, is the unmute.
	Yeah, you can speak.
	All right.
	Stefan, I'm so sorry.
	Yeah.
	Is it complicated?
	I haven't used called into anyone on X. Is it really complicated to talk?
	It's not, but this is actually the first spaces I've ever joined.
	So even though it's probably quite intuitive, maybe it's kind of chopping up to nerves or other things.
	But it's actually great.
	Yes, you might sound for a very long time.
	Anyway, go on.
	Appreciate it.
	Yeah, yeah.
	So my question was actually related to peaceful parenting and your thoughts on that.
	I do personally feel like this was a method of parenting that gave license to parents to kind of not follow good just parenting best practices and ended up with a bunch of terrorizing children.
	And I'm really curious your thoughts on that.
	Well, in order for you to get my thoughts, you'll need to provide some of your own.
	That's just a wild, contextless accusation, which is fine to start with, but I'm going to need some more details.
	So just more details on the idea of peaceful parenting?
	But you're just saying peaceful parenting has produced wild children.
	It's like, okay, well, tell me how.
	How has peaceful parenting produced wild or out-of-control children?
	And what have you seen?
	And why do you think this, you know, just, you know, it's like, it's like somebody calls you up and says, you're guilty of something.
	What is your response?
	And it's like, well, what does that mean?
	I mean, I'm not in a Kafka novel, so just give me some more specifics.
	What is it that you have seen?
	And what is it that you think is the causal effect of peaceful parenting and these wild children?
	Fair enough.
	Okay.
	Yeah.
	So my perspective would be that children, they do need some type of boundaries.
	And children are also at a developmental stage where they actually cannot handle the level of autonomy and freedom that peaceful parenting seemed to afford to them.
	And so because of that sort of lack of proper guardrails, so to speak, children in their natural selfishness would take advantage of that in many ways and use their sort of whatever tools they had at the time, which are obviously a level of immaturity that they would have to manipulate to get the things that they want.
	And obviously kids' levers for what they want are very simple, you know, insomuch that, you know, I want that candy, I want to play the video game longer, I don't want to go to bed, those types of elements.
	And my understanding of the methodology of peaceful parenting would be to not to give kids more autonomy, to allow them to be able to sort of make more choices.
	And that, you know, because of those methods, That my observation has been that those kids tend to rule their parents more than the other way around.
	And the parents are horribly stressed because they feel like they need to accommodate the child at every given turn.
	And hopefully that's enough detail to give your thoughts on.
	Sure, I appreciate that.
	What is the essence of peaceful parenting?
	What's its foundational principle?
	You said, what is the sorry, say that one more time?
	What is the essence of peaceful parenting?
	What is peaceful parenting's foundational principle?
	That's a great question.
	I don't know if I've thought deeply enough to have a solid answer for that.
	I don't know if you have a thought.
	Do I have a thought?
	I wrote the book.
	Of course, I have a thought.
	Okay.
	Sorry, I didn't know.
	I had no idea.
	Yeah, I've written, I originated the term peaceful parenting and I wrote the book peaceful parenting.
	So I have an idea.
	Interesting.
	Well, this is going to be a great conversation because I do think that I do disagree with you, but I'm very excited to be open-minded about the conversation.
	Beautiful.
	Okay.
	Where do you stand politically?
	Libertarian leanings with generally conservative principles, if that is enough.
	Okay.
	Do you accept in general the non-aggression principle, which means it's immoral to initiate the use of force or fraud against others?
	So I would say yes, with the caveat that children, because of their developmental age, are not capable of handling that level of freedom.
	And so I would not apply if there's a more broad envelope or excuse me, umbrella that that falls underneath such that children, then that needs to be applied to children.
	That's where I would draw a different distinction.
	Well, and I completely agree with you, of course, that moral rules that apply to adults don't always apply to children, right?
	Adults can have sex.
	Children cannot consent to sex, which is why it's rape or statutory rape or child molestation.
	Parents can sign contracts.
	Children can't sign contracts.
	Parents are usually responsible, or adults are usually responsible for paying their own bills.
	Children are not.
	So I completely agree with you that not every moral rule that applies to adults applies to children.
	Are we in agreement on that, right?
	Yes, definitely.
	Okay.
	And certainly there are freedoms and responsibilities that parents have that adults have that children don't have, right?
	Yeah, absolutely.
	Okay.
	So the foundational ethic of peaceful parenting is you cannot use violence against children.
	That's it.
	Okay.
	You can't use violence.
	Sorry, go ahead.
	Yeah, well, you know, gosh, this is such an exciting conversation to have.
	I don't think you realize, like, I have followed you for a very long time.
	So just to get that out of the way, but this is really, really fun.
	So thank you so much.
	But at any rate, so definitions, right?
	That's where I'm imagining we're going to go next, because how we would define violence would be the next kind of logical step.
	Well, sure.
	Okay.
	Do you want me to do it or do you want to do it?
	Well, I think because you have, well, because you kind of started the kind of logical process of kind of getting to that point, if you would put your thought out, that would be helpful.
	Yeah, I mean, violence would be the intentional infliction of physical pain, not for healing or self-defense.
	Okay, so physical violence in this case.
	Yes.
	Okay.
	All peaceful parenting does is say, don't use violence against your children.
	That doesn't mean no boundaries.
	That doesn't mean no negotiations.
	That doesn't mean no authority.
	That doesn't mean no rules.
	Let me ask you this question.
	Have you ever been a boss?
	I have.
	Okay.
	Now, did you ever use violence against your employees?
	That's illegal, so no, of course not.
	Well, no, no, no.
	That can't be right, my friend, because if you weren't allowed to use violence against your employees, they're running wild.
	They're stealing, setting fire.
	There's no boundaries.
	You can't have any possible influence on their behavior unless you can beat them up.
	Right.
	So again, I do think that we really need to, this is just my personal opinion, but I think the analogy that you're using is still not quite commensurate because, again, we're not talking about adults.
	We're talking about children.
	I understand.
	As much as I do understand the analogy.
	Hang on.
	So, you know, we're two intelligent people here.
	You don't need to remind me of the case I made about 45 seconds ago.
	I'm aware of that.
	Right.
	But what I'm saying is that there are ways of influencing employees that do not require the use of violence, right?
	Yes, that is fair to say.
	Okay.
	Are there ways of influencing children without using violence?
	Yes, there are some ways.
	Okay, so give me some examples, if you don't mind, of ways that you can influence children.
	And again, I appreciate the conversation as well.
	Ways that you can influence children without using violence.
	Certainly.
	The obvious choice would be something that would be considered a privilege of some sort.
	You know, a child wants to go and go to a birthday party.
	However, they've decided to make some poor choices.
	So that privilege has now been revoked.
	In the future, they may decide to make better choices so as to not lose that privilege.
	Okay.
	So what else?
	Other examples?
	Yeah.
	Sure.
	Let me think.
	Sometimes additional work can be given.
	You know, sorry, you've done the thing that you should not have done.
	And now you have to, you know, mow the lawn every week instead of every other week.
	And, you know, not have to, you know, your brother will not mow the lawn this week.
	You will have to mow it for him because of what you had done.
	Okay.
	And don't want to tax your brain.
	Are you a parent yourself?
	I have four kids.
	Ah, okay.
	Congratulations.
	So privilege, additional work given like chores and stuff, maybe withholding of allowance or what we used to call in the UK pocket money, something like that?
	Yeah, we don't do allowance for our kids, but certainly if we did, I could see that being one.
	Okay.
	And being grounded?
	Sorry.
	It's funny.
	Your audio earlier was perfectly clear, and now there's a bit of an echo to it.
	I'm not sure why.
	I hope that's not on my end.
	Could you repeat yourself?
	I'm so sorry.
	Sure.
	What about being grounded?
	Oh, yeah, certainly.
	You know, I would, sorry, I thought that my One of the birth, you know, not being able to go to the birthday party, sort of adjacent, but yes, certainly grounded in some fashion would be one, I suppose.
	Okay.
	And what about being sent to bed without supper or being made to stay at the table until you finish your food or something like that?
	Yeah, I mean, I think those are certainly appropriate.
	Going to bed without supper, it would probably be something akin to, I'm not going to eat the food that I've been given.
	And I would say, well, then that's the food that we are serving.
	And if that's what you want to do, then that is up to you if you want to go to bed without eating.
	Something along those lines.
	Okay.
	Now, it's not that we have not provided them with some form of sustenance.
	No, I get that.
	So which of the, and of course, we haven't talked about spanking and so on or physical force, like, you know, the timeout where you pick the child up and put them on the naughty chair or whatever.
	Which of these disciplinary methods were inflicted on you as a child?
	All the above.
	And what about?
	And I deserved every one of them?
	What about spanking?
	Yeah, all the above.
	I deserved every one of them.
	And I felt like I turned out very well adjusted, all things considered.
	So you were spanked as well?
	I mean, that would be something that I would not be comfortable sharing.
	Okay, so but all the other ones.
	Hey, look at that with boundaries.
	But so all of the other ones were inflicted upon you, right?
	Uh-huh.
	Okay.
	Can you give me an example of what kind of conflict or what kind of disobedience you would be punished for?
	Oh, so like when I was growing up, what I would have gotten spanked for, is that what you're saying?
	No, it could be spanked.
	And I know you don't want to talk about the spanking, which is fine, although I guess you just kind of did.
	But, you know, the boundaries, sorry, the privileges taken away, additional work given withholding allowance, if that was the case, being grounded, being sent to bed.
	What would you be punished for as a kid?
	What sort of transgressions did you commit?
	Certainly.
	I mean, the laundry list, right?
	Lying to my parents, saying I was going to be somewhere and then not ending up being there, not calling home, treating my siblings either unfairly or being mean to them or hurting them in some fashion.
	You know, not getting schoolwork done on time, you know, fluffing off responsibilities, all of those types of items.
	Okay, got it.
	And what happened between you and your siblings?
	Sorry, say again.
	What happened between you said treating siblings badly or being mean?
	What happened between you and your siblings?
	Oh, so I mean, I had two other brothers and two sisters growing up.
	We did not fight a lot, but we did get on each other's nerves from time to time.
	And, you know, would we, you know, do things to each other in anger?
	Sure.
	I mean, I remember being mean to my little brother, and we had a chicken coop out back, and we figured out a way to lock him inside.
	And he was in there for, I don't know, 10, 20 minutes until we let him out.
	And he, of course, bratted us out like any good little brother would.
	And we got in trouble for it.
	So things like that.
	I mean, guess, I don't know.
	If there's a specific example that you'd like me to, you know, pull up, I can.
	I just don't know what you're what do you if you're searching for something.
	Oh, of course I'm searching for something.
	I'm asking questions.
	And I appreciate your honesty.
	So what would you lie to your parents about?
	Sorry, see, and again, the echo is Somebody I could fix it.
	What would you lie to your parents about?
	Stefan, I am so sorry.
	Could you repeat yourself one more time?
	No problem.
	What would you lie to your parents about?
	Oh, yes.
	Okay, gotcha.
	Yeah, that I had done, you know, homework X and did not do said homework, right?
	Something maybe along those lines.
	Okay.
	And sorry, go ahead.
	Yeah, I mean, I'm trying to think of anything else.
	You know, other times if there was like a treat in the house, something sweet, you know, there would be a moment where you'd try to sneak something and then parents, of course, would go around asking, well, who took, you know, said treat.
	And, you know, in my house, there was two additional childs, two just two additional children that lived there, which were, I don't know, and not me.
	And they always seemed to do all the bad things, fortunately.
	Right, right.
	Okay.
	So when you give me an age, roughly, when you were taking treats.
	Sorry, say one more time.
	I'm so sorry.
	How old were you roughly when you were taking treats and lying about it?
	Oh, my goodness.
	That was so much clearer, by the way, whatever you did.
	I don't know.
	I mean, anywhere between five to ten.
	Okay.
	Got it.
	Now, if you had gone to your parents and asked them about having a treat, what would they have said?
	Probably no.
	And would you have understood why they were saying no?
	Yes, probably, but in my selfishness, would have wanted the treat anyway.
	Well, if aggressive parenting works, let me ask you this.
	When did you stop getting punished?
	Well, I think I would need a little more information on your question.
	Do you mean when did I stop getting punished specifically for stealing treats?
	Or when did I stop getting punished at all as a child?
	Or when did I stop getting punished in some specific way?
	When did you stop getting punished over the course of your life with your parents?
	When did they stop punishing you?
	Oh, okay.
	Probably 17.
	This is my best guess.
	I'm 44, so it's a bit ago.
	So pretty much your entire childhood, you were punished, right?
	If you want to think of it that way, I would say that I received consequences fairly.
	Hang on, another way of looking at it.
	We already talked about punishment.
	Why are we changing the definition now?
	Okay, I don't mean to move the goalposts if you feel like that's what I'm doing.
	If you want, I do, I don't know why the terminology, and I think, I imagine you're driving at age, at least to some degree, but somehow the terminology, at least within the scope of getting older, somehow takes on a different connotation of some kind.
	Hence why I was trying to maybe reframe it.
	And so I'm not trying to, again, be squirrely about it at all.
	No, you aren't.
	But you're not an adult looking back.
	No, to be fair, you are, because I said, when did you stop getting punished, right?
	And you said 17.
	And then you're saying, well, I'm going to change the definition of punish, but then how do you know to answer 17 if you don't know what punishment is or you want to change the definition?
	Okay, again, not and Stefan, like I said, I've seen you for many years, so I'm all about debating and arguing in good faith.
	So whichever direction we need to take the conversation, you let me know.
	I'm happy to make sure that I'm not.
	If I say, how old were you when your parents stopped punishing and you said 17, and then you want to redefine what punishment is or change it or consequences or something like that?
	Everything that you gave me, these are punishments because they're the infliction of negative stimuli to change behavior, right?
	You're given additional work.
	You don't want to mow the lawn.
	You're grounded.
	You can't eat.
	You are not allowed to go to a birthday party or something like that, right?
	So this is the infliction of negative stimuli in order to change behavior, right?
	Yes.
	Okay.
	Okay.
	So would you say that it is very effective to punish children if you still have to punish them until they're almost adults?
	I would what I would say is that that method, it changes over time.
	And so I do think that it's not a it's not indicative of a lack of effectiveness, but more that a parent is being vigilant throughout the growing up process that allows them to continue to give that punishment.
	Or I mean, again, I don't want to try to reframe it, but I think that if that's the word that we're going to use, then okay, I would, you know, I want to, I want to try to sneak in things like guidance, but we'll stick with punishment.
	No, because guidance, guidance, hang on, guidance you can give without punishment.
	Like you go to a guidance counselor, he doesn't lock you into a chicken coop or whatever, right?
	I know that wasn't punishment from your parents, but guidance, that's the question of the spare the rod, spoil the child.
	The rod is supposed to be guidance or wisdom.
	So you can give guidance to people without punishing them, right?
	Yes, but could punishment be considered guidance?
	I would argue that it could be, inso much that, and not to, I don't want to take us off in a too different a direction here, but I would say that in some ways, parents are giving a microcosm of the world in some ways in their household and in parenting, such that children begin to understand that life itself and the way that you operate and move about in society to some degree will have consequences or punishments.
	We'll stick with punishments.
	And that if you decide to hit somebody, then you will, in fact, you know, have somebody that either might want to hit you back and or that punishment would be you going to jail for some period of time.
	So in parents creating sort of a sense of that there are boundaries within this household.
	And as much as it's appropriate, they mimic those boundaries of the world so that as children grow up, they begin to get a sense of what those are.
	That's where I feel like punishment does offer a sense of guidance in that it is, in fact, sort of showing you where those guardrails are.
	Okay.
	And I do appreciate what you're saying, but I just, we can bookmark that for a second because By the time, if punishment worked, if you were being taught something for, let's say that you started getting punished at the age of two or three, right?
	So by the time you're 17, you've had 15 years of punishment.
	Right?
	Yes, but I think it is very fair to point out that it's not punishment for the same precise exact thing.
	Come on, come on.
	Again, we're intelligent people.
	I'm aware that the punishments you get at the age of 17 are for different actions than when you're two.
	Okay, I fully concede that point.
	Okay.
	All right, fair.
	Okay, sorry.
	I don't mean to belabor that.
	That's fine.
	So if we're talking 15 years of trying to teach you to be a better person, 15 years of trying to improve your behavior and you're still being punished, does that give you any doubt as to whether it works well or not?
	I would not have any doubt that it isn't.
	What am I trying to say?
	I don't think that given your line of argumentation that I would have any doubt that punishment isn't doing something very positive for that it did something very positive for me over that period of time.
	I feel like it's very much, why does it still need to be inflicted after 15 years of, and this isn't just average 15 years.
	Because young people, because I was a young dumb teenager that so these aren't just average 15 years, like somebody goes to jail from 30 to 45.
	And we're talking formative years from infancy, toddlerhood, all the way through the latency period, through puberty, through adolescence, right?
	Into being an adult.
	So if punishment worked, why after 15 formative years, do you still need to be punished?
	This is like saying, I've spent 15 years raising you to speak English, but you still have to look at a dictionary and have your English to whatever translation book around after 15 years.
	Now, if 15 years of trying to teach someone something and you still have to punish them, that means that the punishment is not working very well.
	Now, you could say this is the very best that we have to offer as a society, but I don't believe that to be true.
	But, you know, 40%, I'm not saying this is you, 40% of parents are still spanking into junior high and high school, hitting, right?
	And so if punishment works, then why is it still being inflicted when you're almost an adult?
	So I would say two things.
	Number one, I think young people are inherently very foolish in a number of ways, even at older ages.
	And there's still plenty of things that they decide to do that are short-sighted, selfish, and dumb.
	Okay, so hang on a fact.
	Sorry to interrupt.
	So after 15 years of training, children are still almost adults.
	They're still acting impulsively.
	So the punishment has not prevented them from acting in a self-destructive, selfish, cold-hearted, immature, short-sighted fashion.
	So after 15 years from two to 17, after 15 years, the problem has not been solved.
	I don't see, I think this is where we're maybe going to disagree much more fundamentally, is that it's not a problem that can be solved because humans are fallen in their very nature.
	And this is probably going to go in a whole nother direction here.
	But I do think that if that's what you're driving at, then fundamentally we may disagree that I think humans are inherently sinful.
	And because of that, there is no sort of fixing that problem.
	Okay, so then how does it square with your assertion that you've turned out well?
	If you can't solve it, how have you turned out well?
	That's a perfectly, perfectly good question.
	So when I say I've turned out well, what I mean is that the sort of the method that my parents used did allow me to see the world as it exists, I think in a realistic sense.
	And that in my, you know, in all of that, giving like the importance of like, you know, don't lie, don't cheat, don't steal, those types of things were all a part of how they raised me and how those consequences would come into play.
	And so when I say I turned out well, is that I do believe that those principles are still ones that I very much closely adhere to now.
	And I think if I had not been sort of raised with a firm hand, then I don't think there was anything wrong with that.
	I don't know if I would have embraced that or seen that as fully.
	And I don't think I'm articulating the whole idea of you doing well.
	Yeah, you're doing great.
	But I would argue, and sorry to sound harsh against your parents, but I would argue that your parents didn't teach you any of those things.
	Your parents didn't teach you don't lie, don't cheat, don't steal.
	All your parents taught you to do was don't get punished.
	Right?
	What was it that you said?
	You said, I don't know, and it wasn't me.
	That was all that the parents heard.
	Your parents didn't teach you don't lie, don't steal, don't cheat.
	They didn't get you internalized moral values.
	They just said, we're going to punish you if you do those things.
	So what do you do?
	You seek to avoid punishment.
	That doesn't internalize morals, does it?
	So I don't think it's, I think that the idea of understanding those morals and how they were taught, I think that there's two separate things happening there, right?
	My parents, as Christians growing up, and I'm trying to remember, Stefan, atheists, yes, no?
	Raised Christian.
	Okay, but like currently you are an atheist or no?
	Correct.
	Okay, perfect.
	So I think in that regard, you know, my parents, obviously the Bible is a part of our life.
	And all of those things, all those lessons kind of went along with me as I was growing up.
	And I don't think that there was this idea that punishment is the formation of those morals.
	It was a natural consequence for the things that I had done at the time.
	And yet I still believed that all those principles in terms of, you know, don't lie, don't cheat, don't steal, those types of things, that those were put in me irrespective of punishment, but reinforced through it.
	Does that make sense?
	So it's two, maybe, I don't want to say two halves to a whole, but certainly the fact that that formation of those principles is happening is not just this sort of like A, A plus B equals C. You know, you lie, so you get punished and then you don't lie anymore.
	That's not the whole picture, right?
	So, you know, I don't know if that helps maybe flesh that out a little bit more.
	Okay, let me ask you this.
	Were you ever punished as a teenager for lying to your parents?
	Oh, yeah.
	Okay.
	So let's say you were 17 and you were lying to your parents, which means that your parents have been trying to teach you not to lie through punishment for 15 years and you're still lying.
	Uh-huh.
	Is that effective teaching?
	15 years.
	15 formative years where they have complete control over you and you still haven't learned the lesson after 15 years.
	Is that good moral instruction if after 15 years you're still lying?
	So I think the question that I would pose back to you, if I'm not dodging your question too much, would be, is it such that there is no, well, I don't want to, I know a lot of logical fallacies, so I'm trying not to put them out there.
	I'm trying to be careful in what I say.
	That not that there's no teenager that's ever lied after a certain point because they were trained so well, but is that not an uncommon misgiving of teenagers, no matter the parenting style?
	Well, but then your whole thing was that peaceful parenting produces out-of-control kids.
	And you're saying, but kids are going to line them out of the parenting style.
	So then I'm really confused at this point.
	No, so I would, so, okay, the argument then at that point, or at least the statement that I was making, which is wild, Stefan, I had no idea that you wrote that book.
	And though I have listened to you for a while, so maybe you had said it long ago and I had just forgotten.
	I hadn't listened to you in a while.
	But that is just a random thought.
	I was like, what could I ask Stefan?
	I've always had this thought about peaceful parenting.
	So that's, as much as that doesn't sound like it should be coincidence, it was.
	My point in saying it, though, was I think the idea was on net that there were more, that I would, I feel like I have observed more parents that have tried to use that and maybe they have applied it wrongly.
	Maybe that's what's happening.
	If I were to put a charitable spin on it.
	You're douching.
	Sorry, bro.
	You're pulling a neo-ninja move on me, right?
	All right.
	Because if you don't want to do that, so you say all teenagers lie regardless of parental instruction, then if all teenagers are going to lie regardless of parental instruction, then why use punishment?
	Why use force or spanking or confinement and grounding and naughty chairs?
	And like, why use that?
	I mean, I don't agree that the outcome is the same.
	But if I say, look, after 15 years of being taught not to lie, you were still lying.
	And you're like, well, all kids lie.
	Everyone lies regardless of parenting style.
	Then the firm hand or whatever the punishment parenting style doesn't work.
	Or you have to say that, well, I was still lying after 15 years of being taught not to lie.
	But boy, those peacefully parenting kids, they're lying even more.
	What you did is the very best possible outcome because it's the minimum amount of lying because of the fallen nature of man and Satan's temptations.
	And I mean, I get all of that.
	And I'm not saying this cynically.
	I'm really trying to sort of understand your point of view.
	But it is a fact, and this is fairly well studied, that when you use spanking against children, you get very short-term compliance, but long-term, they simply figure out it's a game of cat and mouse.
	They simply figure out what they can get away with and they simply change their strategies and change their behavior.
	So force or a punishment doesn't work.
	And my argument would be it doesn't work because you're still doing, you're still lying after 15 years of punishment.
	I mean, that's wild.
	I mean, again, I do think that because like I said, I'm trying to argue in as good a faith as I can manage.
	And if I go off the reservation, I apologize.
	I do think that I do think that the fallen nature part does come into play somewhat.
	As crazy as it sounds, this idea that, well, the way that I was raised is going to be imperfect, but it is the best possible outcome.
	And this idea that peaceful parenting provides an outcome, but in my opinion, a worse outcome.
	I don't think that that's a completely unreasonable argument to make, necessarily.
	And I honestly, and this is, again, just my observation.
	I do feel like, and again, maybe they're misapplying it, but I do think that the other parents, and I've got four kids, I've met many other parents, some of which have tried those types of, I don't want to get into specifics because I can't speak to them directly, but it seems as though they had some embracement of this idea of peaceful parenting, what little they either understood about it or what little maybe I felt that they were applying it.
	And it seems as though they had children that really struggled with any type of impulse control whatsoever.
	Yeah, I mean, sorry, that's kind of anecdotal, but let me ask you, let me ask you this.
	Does man's fallen nature ever get cured in this mortal realm?
	No.
	No, I agree with you.
	Man's fallen nature is in the nature of being a human being.
	It is the nature of being in this veil of tears called the material world.
	So man's fallen nature continues from birth until death.
	Do we agree with that?
	Yes.
	Okay.
	Do you think that power tends to corrupt people?
	I think the way that you're phrasing it specifically, yes.
	Okay.
	So taking into account man's fallen nature, man's propensity to sin, do you think that people who are given permission to use violence become better or worse on average, given that we have a fallen nature and power tends to corrupt us?
	Oh, interesting point.
	I can see where you're going with that.
	So because parents can use violence, it makes them worse parents.
	No.
	Morally, that would be by definition.
	But that's kind of what it's about.
	No, no, but what I'm saying is that you can't say we have to use aggression against children because of man's fallen nature, because I would say There's no greater power disparity in the world throughout history.
	There's no greater power disparity than between parents and children.
	A man who beats his wife, she can get a shelter, she's got independence, she can go on welfare, she can call the cops, right?
	If children are being mistreated, like there's almost nothing they can do.
	And so if it's man's fallen nature that is your concern, and by the way, it's my concern as well as a moralist, right?
	So if man's fallen nature is your concern, then giving parents the awesome power to use violence or aggression against their own helpless and dependent children is more likely than not going to bring out the worst aspects of the parents or at least less good aspects of the parents.
	So I don't see that the fallen state of man, the fallen nature of man, the sinful nature of man, the greedy, violent, impulsive, lustful side of man, the desire to dominate others, which is obviously a pretty awful sin.
	I don't think handing the power of violence or aggression over to parents is going to do anything other than, in general, stimulate the darker sides of their nature because giving people enormous power and no consequences, right?
	Because let's say you, I'm not saying you, let's say that someone beats their kid, there's no consequences.
	I mean, almost no, I mean, almost, almost never will it be a problem because, you know, parents don't get arrested for that kind of stuff and kids don't talk about it and nobody comes to their aid and so on.
	So giving parents consequence-free power of violence and aggression against their own helpless and dependent children when they have the most power they will ever have in their life, to me is a broad invitation for Satan to come through and mess up the family.
	Interesting line of thinking.
	I do see why you would say that.
	And I do think that I do think it is a very in having kids in general is an immense responsibility.
	You would agree?
	Oh, yeah.
	Right.
	So I think in that, I think only this is going to sound probably quite superior, although I don't mean it to sound that way.
	I think only those people who are it's not that I don't think there are other moral people out there that this would also apply to,
	but I do think that the moral anchor, which I would call the Bible at that point in terms of how that could be applied to raising children properly in love and with great care and thoughtfulness, it can be done.
	It is an immense and awesome responsibility to wield that in such a way that is responsible and loving.
	And again, in the kind of way where I would call it love inso much that if somebody, if you, if a bridge is out and you say nothing and the car drives off, you have not loved that person.
	Maybe it's not a perfect analogy, but something akin to that.
	I don't want to go on too long to say too many things.
	Right.
	You're dodging again with all due respect, right?
	So how?
	Because you're not answering the question, which is that if man is sinful by nature, does it help or harm his likelihood for sin to give him coercive or violent power over helpless and dependent creatures?
	Right.
	I hear what you're saying there.
	Let me, let me, just while you're pondering that, just for the audience, you and I, I won't speak for you.
	I certainly have known and have had many conversations over the years with people who were beaten by their Christian parents because the Christian parents, you know, spare the rod, spoil the child.
	It is better to harm your child physically than let him grow up to be immoral.
	And there is a lot of justification within the Christian community for very aggressive and violent treatment of children.
	And even if you are an angel, and listen, I'm not accusing you of anything negative.
	You might be a perfect guy.
	And there are definitely Christians out there who are good parents this way.
	They don't ever lose their temper.
	They don't ever hit.
	They don't ever yell.
	They will calmly explain to their children why they're about to spank them and then they will spank them and then they will explain to them why it happened and they'll be in control the whole time.
	But that's not very common.
	That's not very common.
	And so my concern.
	Sorry, go ahead.
	Yeah, I will say, as much as that does sound very unlikely, and again, I have no reason to lie to you because you don't know who I am.
	So what does it matter, really?
	But that is genuinely how my parents treated the situation.
	It was always my father.
	We always went privately into his room.
	We did talk about exactly what happened.
	He said, you know, why and the what and all the details.
	And he was always very, he really was always very calm about it.
	There were times when he was frustrated, but I never felt like as a kid, even once, that that influenced to any great degree that I could perceive that that was being done because of that.
	In lieu of that model, you know, I do think that it is possible.
	And I understand what you're saying.
	Yes, based on temperament and many other factors, this is a, it could be a big minefield for people to use those types of methods with their children.
	Yes, given the fallen nature of man, I think that the sanctification process that is walking with the Lord properly, though, in and being applied correctly, it can be done.
	Well, of course, it can be done.
	Would you say, what percentage of Christians would you say apply spare the rod, spoil the child in as calm and self-controlled a manner as your father?
	That's a great question.
	I don't even know.
	I don't even know if I could wager a guess on that.
	And I see probably where the lining of thinking is going, right?
	So then on net, if it's worse to go down that road than not, then the not just on percentage would be a better avenue to go down.
	Does that kind of where you might be going?
	So, yeah, I mean, the case would be that power tends to corrupt.
	And if there's ways to raise children that don't involve violence or coercion, then that's for the best to have as a standard because there's not a lot of people who are going to handle that kind of awesome power over their children with the dignity and grace of your father.
	And so it might be fine for your father with regards to Christianity, but it's sort of like, you know what?
	It's kind of like this.
	It's kind of like coercion against children is like a giant buffet.
	I don't know if you've been to like all-you-can-eat buffets, right?
	Oh, yeah.
	Right.
	How's your belt doing at the end of the all-you-can-eat buffet?
	Wait, sorry, say that again.
	How's your belt doing at the end of the all-you-could-eat buffet?
	Poorly.
	Yeah, I mean, it's hanging on like grim death, right?
	It's like Superman, it's like Spider-Man in the front of that subway car, right?
	Okay, so it certainly is true that there are people who go to an all-you-can-eat buffet and have a little bit of meat and a little bit of salad and maybe a tiny dessert.
	And that's all they eat, right?
	Just remarkable level of self-restraint, you would say.
	Amazing, amazing levels of self-restraint.
	However, I think it's been scientifically proven that most people overeat at an all-you-can-eat buffet, right?
	I think that that's a reasonable assertion.
	So my argument is your father went to an all-you-can-eat buffet a couple of times a week and never overeat.
	Like, man, fantastic.
	Good for him.
	But do you think it's a good idea in general for everyone in the world to eat every meal at an all-you-can-eat buffet that never empties?
	Right.
	So this is an interesting line of kind of questioning here.
	And I do think that it's going to come down to, again, and you probably have the stats on this better than I, right?
	So I would say, no, that's not good.
	And I know, you know, obviously we understand the analogy that you're referring to.
	However, my question would be, and again, you probably have stats to back this up.
	Given that, then the idea of peaceful parenting and its actual outcomes, you know, in aggregate, is that in aggregate actually better in terms of actual outcomes?
	And I imagine you're going to say yes.
	And I imagine you could provide reasons as to why.
	Have you ever been tested for allergies?
	No.
	Because I think you're allergic to following any argument to its conclusion.
	Because every time we get close to a conclusion, you go off on some other tangent, brother.
	Oh, I do.
	Because we're trying to talk about this all-you-can-eat buffet, right?
	And now you're like, ah, but the outcomes of peaceful parenting, I need the data.
	It's like, we're not, you know, I keep having to, I feel like I'm lassoing you and pulling you back.
	I got to gore me with a horn or something.
	I'm pulling you back to the debate because we keep jumping out when we're trying to get to a conclusion.
	Right.
	And I'm not trying to do that.
	I understand where you're landing.
	And I think what I'm trying to do is then push the conversation forward to the next, what I would see as the next step.
	And if it, again, yes, okay.
	And fair, you know, the idea of an all-you-can-eat buffet as it relates to the analogy that we're talking about, yes, on net, that would not be good.
	Okay.
	My argument is, look, your father was obviously a very intelligent man, a very noble man, a man of great integrity and willpower.
	Fantastic.
	So he can go to the all-you-can-eat buffet and he can not overeat.
	Right?
	So my argument is that if you say to everyone, right?
	I mean, you're a very intelligent family, right?
	So if you say to everyone, just go to the all-you-can-eat buffet, look, there are people with IQ85, IQ90, IQ 95, 100, 105, and so on, they're going to pick out.
	They're not going to have that same level of self-restraint, right?
	And so my argument would be outside of just sort of the pure moral argument that aggression against children violates the non-aggression principle, because I know that we haven't made the case that it should cover children as yet.
	But what I would say is that it's like turning the economy over to some guy to run the whole thing, he can type whatever he wants into his own bank account.
	Can tell everyone to take whatever job he wants.
	He can allocate resources wherever he wants.
	And it's like, okay, maybe you'll get some super genius angel who's incorruptible, but not likely, right?
	And once that power exists, it's going to corrupt people, right?
	So if maybe your father, if he was given the ability to type whatever he wanted into his own bank account with no legal consequences, maybe he would just type his own paycheck in and nothing else.
	But that's very rare.
	What's much more common is that people take power and abuse it.
	And that's part of man's fallen nature.
	Jesus could handle power.
	Moses could handle power.
	Paul, Peter, the saints could handle power, but we remember them because no one else can, right?
	I mean, we're not good with power as a species.
	And so rather than saying, well, we have to use aggression against children because we're prone to corruption and immorality and evil, I'm saying, well, that's exactly how the evil is going to manifest.
	In other words, you're saying, well, I'm going to give people this great vast temptation of an all-you-can-eat buffet of using aggression against helpless and dependent children because I knew a couple of people who were fine with it and didn't overeat at the buffet and were controlled in their levels of aggression.
	My argument would be power corrupts people and you have to give them the rules that say no power.
	You cannot use force.
	You cannot use violence.
	You cannot use aggression because it messes you up.
	It messes your kids up.
	And the very rare people who can somehow do it responsibly is almost like a lure for everyone else to just storm in.
	Hey, you know, those three guys don't gain any weight every time they go to the all-you-can-eat buffet.
	So I can just, let's open it up to everyone.
	And then you're, you know, your town goes to a BMI of 666 or something like that, right?
	So I'm just sort of talking about the devil corrupts people through power.
	And if you give people the power of violence over their own children, it will corrupt people on the whole, on average.
	Just as you, if you give, you know, if you give a million dollars to people, a few of them will use it incredibly responsibly, right?
	They'll invest, they'll save, they'll give some to charity, they'll, right?
	But most people just blow it.
	I mean, we know this from people winning the lottery, right?
	So power corrupts most people.
	And the fact, and I understand where you're coming from, that your father handled and your mother handled power.
	Well, it sounds like good for them.
	But most people don't.
	And it's not worth it, even if it did work, even if you could teach someone to not lie for 15 years.
	And this is the best that you can do, right?
	It's the best you can do is just keep punishing them and maybe eventually they'll stop lying, but you just got 15 years of punishment and they're still lying like a rug.
	Even if that's the best you can do, unfortunately, you are giving permission to people who the devil, they're going to listen to the devil.
	Your child is disobedient.
	Your child is, you know, back talk, right?
	You say back talk, like the child isn't even allowed to argue back or debate back or say that the parent is wrong and it just escalates and you are destroying far more families than you're saving by giving this terrible power to people who because of their fallen nature simply will not handle it.
	Fair.
	Now, I was going to, I would say, in the famous words of Thomas Soule, there are no solutions.
	There are only trade-offs.
	Trade-off in you had to be a little bit more powerful.
	Yes, sorry, sorry.
	But he was not talking.
	No, no, it's not.
	He wasn't talking about morality.
	He was talking about economics.
	So he wasn't saying, well, the trade-off is we'll just let people axe murder because prisons are expensive, right?
	Like there's no, this is not about I think this principle can still apply.
	And so I agree with you.
	Yes.
	No, I don't mean trade-offs in regards to morality specifically, but what I mean is methodology, right?
	This idea of peaceful parenting or not, right?
	That, okay, so this idea that if, you know, the, I'll stick with it, the punishment model or, I mean, what, what, do you have a blanket term that you typically use for what is not peaceful parenting?
	I guess not peaceful parenting?
	I don't know.
	No, aggressive parenting or coercive parenting.
	Because people think that peaceful parenting means no consequences.
	Of course there are consequences.
	There's just not punishments because that's what life is.
	Right.
	Okay.
	So what I meant by Thomas Soule's quote is, okay, so ultimately, you know, you could have two methodologies, but like ultimately, like, what are the outcomes of both?
	Right.
	So it's not just that, you know, we can have this idea that there is a criticism of a coercive parenting situation, you know, as defined.
	That's fine.
	We can have the criticisms of that, but ultimately, there is going to be different, you know, disparate outcomes between those two.
	What are the outcomes?
	What is the justification?
	You know, is there this, you know, if I had come to you and said, oh, my parents peacefully parented me and I was still lying by 15, would we call that anecdotal?
	Or would we say that peaceful parenting also has holes and flaws?
	And this last point I would mean very genuinely that I do think that if there is some type of model that is peaceful parenting as people apply it or understand it,
	I really do think that there's this misapplication of what peaceful parenting is in some fundamental way that my observation, again, anecdotal as it may be, produces children with very little impulse control whatsoever.
	Sorry, you're saying peaceful parenting produces children with no impulse control?
	Yeah, and I'm not saying that in any absolute terms.
	I'm saying my observation is that my observation has been that the children tend to rule the parents more than the parents rule the kids.
	And I don't mean rule, again, in any heavy-handed way, but it's like the children are ordering the parents around seemingly.
	And I'm using loose terms.
	I'm not trying to get too deep in the weeds on the semantics, but that vibe is what I'm trying to describe seems to happen more often.
	And again, I don't know if you have heard of that before.
	Is that a misapplication of what peaceful parenting is supposed to be or what's occurring there?
	Well, I can't obviously speak to situations that I don't know about.
	There is unparenting where people believe that children can just raise themselves.
	I think that's appalling.
	And that's incredibly abusive.
	There is neglect.
	Neglect is one of the worst forms of child abuse.
	And listen, to the credit of Christian parents, the Christian parents invest very heavily in the instruction of their children.
	And of course, there is coercive elements for a lot of parents, but it is foundationally a moral approach to instruction.
	So, you know, the Christian parents, of course, they bring their children to church.
	There's a Bible study.
	There are youth groups.
	There's lots of conversations at the dinner table about right and wrong, good and bad, and integrity and corruption.
	And so Christian parents put a lot of effort into training their children up on abstract virtues that a lot of secular parents don't.
	So I really want to be clear about that.
	If I had the choice between being raised by a Christian family or being raised by an atheist family, I would choose the Christian family, just to be perfectly clear about that because of that sort of very significant and deep investment in conversations about morality and truth and honor and respect and dignity and all of these things that the Bible is beautiful about.
	So I just want to be sort of clear about that.
	Now, with regards to children dominating the parents, I think that generally happens in families where the parents are not investing in the children.
	You know, the sort of the poor little rich girl scenario or it was actually a guy who introduced my wife and I, by coincidence, came from a very wealthy family.
	And he said, but I was incredibly lonely.
	You know, I got a new bike every Christmas, but I was just lonely because the parents were out working all the time.
	And so a lot of times what happens is parents where they're both working and there's nannies, there's daycare, there's after-school programs, and the parents maybe, maybe get an hour or two of unstructured time with the kids a day where both parents are working, there tends to be a lot of guilt.
	And there tends to be a desire to not have any negative interactions in the rare times when the family is together doing stuff.
	And so there's a fear of any negative or difficult interactions, largely due to parental absence.
	I've certainly seen that quite a bit.
	And people will go from, you know, human nature is a pendulum, right?
	So people would go from very aggressive parents to extremely permissive parents.
	And that is also just terrible.
	It's another side of the same coin because as you, I mean, quite rightly and nobly point out, life has consequences.
	If you smoke, you're probably going to get sick.
	If you overeat, you're going to get fat.
	If you don't exercise, your bones are going to get soft and so on, right?
	And if you don't work, you know, he who does not toil shall not eat.
	If you don't work, it's going to be kind of tough to stitch together a decent life for you and your family.
	So life absolutely totally and certainly has consequences.
	And you shield your children from consequences when they're very little, right?
	Obviously, you don't expect your baby or your toddler to mow the lawn, right?
	So you shield your children from consequences when they're very young to keep them alive, right?
	You baby proof the place and so on, right?
	And then when your children get older, they start to accrue consequences because I sort of think of it as you start with a plane on the runway and it's still, right?
	And you say, eh, start it going, right?
	But you don't take off until it's hit a certain speed and then it can fly, right?
	So you want to start introducing consequences to your children as they age to the point where as they move out into adulthood, they have internalized the morals.
	They have internalized the ethics.
	Because of course, if you fear punishment rather than doing something wrong, then you will simply avoid punishment and you will not internalize the moral values, which is why I think a lot of teenagers who are punished for lying are still lying because it's like, well, can I get away with it?
	And so on, right?
	So I don't think that works.
	But if you introduce consequences to children, and we can get into more detail if you're interested, but if you introduce consequences to children as they age into adulthood, then by the time they get to adulthood, they're out there in the world, then they have internalized good standards and good values and they will reference those.
	Does that mean they're perfect?
	Of course not.
	I'm not perfect.
	Maybe you are.
	I'm certainly not perfect, but I sort of do my best.
	So if there are parents whose children are running wild, it means that those parents, those children are not connected with their parents.
	They are not being introduced to consequences for bad behavior by their parents.
	And it is actually preferable for children to be punished than to be ignored.
	So I would consider unparenting or not being honest with children about choices and consequences and not allowing consequences to begin accruing to children.
	You know, everybody has this, oh, I don't want my children to suffer.
	And it's like, well, you know, they've got to ride their bikes.
	They've got to fall down, get their strawberry knees and so on.
	And your children will lie to you.
	And my solution is to say, I don't like being lied to.
	Do you like it when I lie to you?
	Would you like it if I lied to you?
	Like if I said, hey, we're going to go to the park if you do your chores and then you do your chores.
	And I say, ah, just kidding, we're not going to the park.
	That would be really upsetting to you.
	So just trying to get them a sense of 360 and so on.
	And of course, children, when they're young, lying is just an experimental way of getting their resources, right?
	But I try not to apply to the radiant beauty of the human child mind the same tactics that you would use to train a pig or a dog or a horse or a cow, which is punishment, right?
	And so on, even with lectures.
	So I agree with you that there are lots of families out there where the children are ignored and neglected.
	They're raised by the internet, by strangers, by peers, by iPads, by whatever, right?
	Video games.
	And I think that's absolutely appalling.
	And Christians are, I would say, almost infinitely better than parents like that.
	That's not peaceful parenting.
	That's just not being a parent.
	Yep.
	No, I would definitely say that's true.
	I mean, I don't know, too, just a couple of things.
	As you were talking there, that I had the benefit and blessing of being raised by parents where my mom was a stay-at-home mom.
	I was actually homeschooled growing up back in the 80s, which was more rare than common.
	And my mom was a stay-at-home mom.
	And as God has been very gracious to us, my wife and I have been able to do that same thing.
	She was actually also homeschooled growing up.
	And we are, in fact, homeschooling our children.
	And she is also a stay-at-home mom in doing that.
	And so I do feel like, yes, this idea of just being sort of non-parents is just, it's a very sad thing to sort of watch where, you know, you see these kids where the parents are like, well, we can't take little Billy anywhere without his eye pad.
	You'd go crazy if you didn't have it, you know, just because they just have abdicated all, almost all, you know, authority, you know, or responsibility, I should say, in parenting their children.
	And again, Stefan, I'm not trying to poke holes or bring it back to some criticism of peaceful parenting directly.
	But I mean, I'm genuinely asking, has that ever been a theme or any kind of feedback loop that has come back to you saying, hey, we feel like we've seen people talk about peaceful parenting, but the way that they're going about it seems more permissive than peaceful, and that maybe people are not understanding what you mean.
	And again, I'm not trying to be overly critical at all.
	I just am really genuinely curious, is that something that you've heard?
	Or maybe I am just way off base and I'm living in a weird bubble.
	And I certainly would admit to that if that happens to be true.
	Well, do you think that parents ever misconstrue Christian teachings and beat their kids?
	Oh, certainly.
	So why would you point at peaceful parenting?
	I don't say spare the rod, spoil the child.
	All I say is that there are ways to interact with your children that don't involve violence and coercion in the same way that there's ways to interact with your pets.
	There's ways to interact with coworkers, with employees, with fellow citizens, with your own parents that don't involve coercion.
	If you take coercion and the inflicting of punishment by man's hand, if you take that off the table, doesn't that open up a lot of possibilities for conversation, for curiosity, for connection?
	I mean, your children should tell you the truth because they value the truth and because they love you, rather than I'm going to get swatted or locked in my room or I don't get to go to the birthday party because that's just the inflict.
	That doesn't allow them to internalize any moral values.
	So all I'm saying with peaceful parenting is what if you just take aggression and coercion off the table?
	What if?
	What if you just don't have those tools, right?
	Because all that the free market in capitalism is, well, what if you just don't use force to get what you want?
	The end of slavery was what if we just don't enslave people?
	What if we just don't use force to get these things done?
	And so with peaceful parenting, it's like, okay, the initiation of the use of force is immoral.
	And the only exception to that is self-defense.
	And you're clearly not in defense against your children.
	And they should be covered by the non-aggression principle.
	They should be.
	I mean, if we can't cover our children by the non-aggression principle, what's the point of it all?
	Because it's supposed to protect the most vulnerable in society.
	The non-aggression principle doesn't apply to the rock with a machine gun.
	I don't mean the rock, but, you know, the bald guy, Dwayne Johnson, right?
	If Arnold Schwarzenegger is strolling around town with 17 bodyguards, we don't say, wow, you know, that guy's really, he's got to be covered by the non-aggression principle.
	The non-aggression principle is supposed to protect the most vulnerable, the least able to protect themselves.
	That is children.
	If you take violence, aggression, coercion, and hitting off the table when dealing with your children, what opens up is amazing possibilities.
	You know, if you take hitting a woman over the head with a rock and dragging her off to your cave as the basis of procreation and marriage, you get all kinds of wonderful things.
	You get love poetry, you get wooing, you get roses and flowers and nice hairdos and men buy Ferraris.
	So I don't know, whatever, women buy Wanda Bras.
	So it's just a matter of saying, just take violence, take force, take aggression, take violence out of the equation when dealing with your children.
	They are covered by the non-aggression principle.
	And you would be amazed at what fantastic conversations.
	And I've got these conversations with my daughter on this very show.
	You can just do a search for Isabella or Izzy.
	And we have these great conversations.
	And I just wanted to mention, sorry, I let you have the final word in a sec.
	It's very funny.
	So what we do in my family sometimes is we'll pick a book that will be enjoyable.
	And I read it out loud because I'm pretty good with sort of audiobook readings of sort of trained actor.
	And so I was claiming to have figured out who did it in the murder mystery, right?
	Let's say the guy's name was Vladimir, right?
	And so I said, yeah, I said Vladimir did it.
	And my daughter said, no, no, no, no.
	You didn't say Vladimir did it.
	I mean, you did, but you had him mistaken for the other guy.
	And she went sort of the whole thing.
	And I said, yes, but technically I said Vladimir.
	And she said, didn't you just do three shows on how accidental answers aren't true?
	And she's like, boom, right.
	And it's like, you're right.
	You're right.
	Anyway, so it's kind of a funny back and forth.
	So I think that non-coercion works.
	I think that peace and human relations works, but not uninvolvement, of course.
	Right.
	I would point back.
	So I know I've dodged a few questions.
	I would just respectfully say I think you may have dodged mine in that I was asking if you had heard any feedback about how peaceful parenting and the idea of permissive parenting, that if there is some type of theme in terms of feedback that you have heard that people have done that in some wrong way where they misinterpret or misapply peaceful parenting and it becomes permissive parenting in some fashion?
	Well, if it's called peaceful parenting, but they've misapplied it, it's not called peaceful parenting.
	It's like if I'm colorblind and I think that the blue paint is the green paint, right?
	Then I put on the green paint instead of the blue paint.
	You can't say something's wrong with the blue paint.
	It looks green.
	It's like put the wrong paint on.
	You can't say something is peaceful parenting, but they're not doing peaceful parenting and therefore there's a problem with peaceful parenting, right?
	I'm not quite following.
	I mean, either people do peaceful parenting, which means that they peaceful parenting obviously means, I mean, in ideal form, a stay-at-home parent because you've got to, the parenting part of peaceful parenting is very important.
	You've got to have at least one person stay home.
	Homeschooling is the ideal, not just because school is gay communist these days, but just because it's a pretty wretched social environment for kids as a whole and it's incredibly boring and dysfunctional.
	But yeah, so peaceful parenting is the parenting part is really important.
	You actually have to parent your children.
	You got to be home with them.
	You've got to be involved with them.
	You've got to be in conversation with them.
	You've got to actually parent.
	So the peaceful part is obviously the no-violent, but the parenting part is as well.
	So if people say, well, I'm going to do the peaceful part, but I'm not going to do the parenting part, but it's not just called peaceful.
	It's called peaceful parenting, right?
	It's not just called parenting.
	There's a peaceful part in it.
	You've got to do both.
	So if people aren't engaged with their children and working with them to study and learn and understand the world and reason and negotiate morals and consequences, then they're not parenting.
	And so if somebody is both parenting and doing it in a nonviolent fashion, that's peaceful parenting.
	If people are not parenting in a nonviolent fashion, then that's just peaceful, but it's not parenting.
	And so the two have to be together.
	So yeah, some people will only do one or the other, but you kind of have to do both.
	Right.
	So again, to put an even finer point on it then, again, what I'm kind of driving at is, is there something within the methodology of peaceful parenting that you have heard about, where what I'm trying to describe is we have a car that is a good car and the car generally operates properly.
	However, maybe there's a design flaw that's very subtle somewhere where the car tends to drift to the left and that unless there's some real vigilance given, it is naturally on its own, even when generally trying to drive it properly.
	It's going to kind of veer to the left.
	And so it's not a perfect analogy, but that's what I'm trying to kind of point at is are there, okay, maybe this is a better, Stefan, I think I've got it.
	So are there common mistakes, maybe this is a better way to put it, are there commonest mistakes that people make with peaceful parenting that you have heard about that, And again, maybe it doesn't lead specifically towards permissive parenting, but what would you say are the human nature pitfalls or common mistakes that people make if they are to attempt to apply peaceful parenting?
	Well, I got to tell you.
	That's what I'm trying to get at.
	This is annoying as heck to me.
	I'll just be perfectly, I'm just telling you.
	I'm not saying I'm right.
	I'm just saying this is as annoying as heck to me.
	Do you think that a lot of people interpret spare the rod, spoil the child as you should hit your children?
	I know you're trying to make a point, and I'm very exactly saying that question because if you're going to have if you're going to have, well, people could potentially misinterpret what I'm saying, then you have a standard called misinterpretation is bad.
	Okay, if misinterpretation is bad, has anyone ever misinterpreted peaceful parenting to say hit your children?
	I wouldn't say that anybody would easily misinterpret peaceful parenting to say that you should hit your children.
	Right.
	So there's no chance that peaceful parenting can be interpreted to mean hit your children.
	Do you know how many people over the years who are Christians have told me that spare the rod spoils the child means they can hit their children also with implements?
	I'm sure there are, I'm sure you have heard many, many accounts of that.
	Right.
	So if you're going to say, well, people could potentially misinterpret, or is there some subtle thing about peaceful parenting that might have the car ver a little to the left?
	It's like, bro, nobody's misinterpreting what I'm saying to say beat your children, but there are literally tens of millions of Christians around the world who beat their children because of what's in the Bible.
	So if you're concerned about misinterpretation leading to negative parenting, why on earth would you focus on what I do?
	You've got a whole world of Christianity out there where people need to learn to do it better because of what's in the Bible.
	But okay, but Stefan, again, is that not a fair question, though, to say that, okay, and again, I think, again, believe me, again, if you think I'm being completely unfair and I'm doing this the wrong way, I'm open to that.
	All I'm trying to say at this point, in not so much a debate, and that is not the spirit of which I'm asking this next question, it is more in advocating for the style of parenting that you are talking about.
	Are there any cautions or, I mean, I'm really being genuine here, that are there any cautions or are there any things that you have seen over time that people, that you've gone, oh, you know what?
	There's this thing that, you know, I say it this way, but people seem to mistake in that from time to time.
	And, you know, they should look out for that because there's a chance for a mistake there that seems to somewhat commonly happen.
	And that's, and again, I wholeheartedly admit that you're right.
	There are many and massive criticisms one could make about other ways of parenting.
	I'm more asking, do you would to advocate for the style of parenting that you're advocating for in making that case, are there any cautions that you would give people?
	Please be careful to not do this because that's not what I'm saying.
	All right.
	I'm going to, I will answer that.
	But before that, I'm going to say this.
	Proverbs 13, 24.
	He who spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is careful to discipline him.
	Proverbs 22, 15.
	Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline will drive it far away.
	Proverbs 23, 13.
	Do not withhold discipline from a child.
	If you punish him with the rod, he will not die.
	Now, do you think that people interpret that to say, beat your children?
	Sorry, say again, that last part?
	Do you think that people interpret that to say, beat your children?
	I could see how they would.
	Right.
	So if you're concerned about misinterpretation in the realm of parenting, do you think that Christianity is a little bit more popular than my little book on peaceful parenting?
	Certainly.
	Okay.
	So if you're concerned about harm coming to children because of misinterpretation of text, I'm like the last place you'd come to, right?
	Because Christians misinterpret this all the time.
	Or maybe they interpret it correctly.
	I don't know, right?
	But if you say, if you punish your child with a rod, he will not die.
	That clearly is beating, right?
	A rod.
	You're beating with implements.
	Right.
	And again, do you feel like I am saying that that criticism is not there?
	Because it's certainly, I'm not saying that that's not true.
	I'm saying that I could see, I see where you're going at that.
	That makes sense.
	I get it.
	I do.
	And so I'm not trying.
	I feel bad because Stefan, I'm not trying to be adversarial.
	I'm really not.
	And if it's become that way, I'll gladly step aside.
	And if other people would like to talk, certainly we've talked for a long time here and I would not want to have this languish in any way.
	Well, I mean, what is it that you have read or heard about with regards to peaceful parenting that you feel would cause negative outcomes or something subtle that might, as you say, veer to the left?
	Because I don't know how to answer that question because I've been very careful with how I've put the book together.
	I know you haven't read it, which is fine.
	But I've been very careful about how I communicate things.
	And is it possible for people to misinterpret?
	Of course it is, right?
	But all I can do as a communicator is say children are covered by the non-aggression principle and you need to raise your children.
	And I've provided countless examples on, I mean, one of the very first shows I did very early on, like almost 20 years ago, was called the ABCs of UPB about how to explain morals and ethics to your children.
	I've had moral discussions with my daughter live on air.
	She's been live on parenting shows where we've had a bunch of people talking about things.
	So I have been as precise and careful about what it is that I put out into the world.
	And if you're saying, well, could there be something that people could misinterpret?
	The reason why that's annoying is you and I both know the answer to that.
	It's not a real question.
	It's a gotcha question.
	Because of course people can make up whatever they want.
	They could think that I'm saying that you should try to sacrifice your children to Moloch.
	I don't know, but it wouldn't be in the text, right?
	So all I can do is say, this is what I've written.
	This is what I put out there in the world.
	And if you say, well, could there be something subtle that's going wrong somewhere that people might misinterpret?
	Like that's, I don't know how to answer that because I don't know what that is.
	Like, you know, I make a belt and I say, here's how you use the belt.
	And you say, well, is it possible that some people think that you're supposed to hang yourself with it?
	And I'm like, I just make belts, man.
	What people do with them is a little bit beyond my control.
	Okay.
	And that's, I understand the point that you're making.
	I think if there was a critical word that I'm trying to sort of point at would be, what feedback have you gotten on peaceful parenting?
	And in the scope of that feedback, like what have people told you?
	You know, has there been any theme to which, you know, again, I understand what you're saying.
	And I'm not if the perception is that it's a gotcha question, but I'm going to do that.
	Sorry, we're just going around in circles here.
	So you need to read the book and tell me what's wrong with it.
	Like, what have you heard about anything negative and blah, blah, blah.
	It's like that, that's, that's not how philosophy works, right?
	So philosophy works that I make an argument from first principles and I provide the relevant evidence, which is the book, Peaceful Parenting, which is available for free at peacefulparenting.com.
	I can't go with, have you ever heard any rumors about anything negative that might have happened because of people misinterpreting, but like that's not how philosophy works, right?
	So philosophy works.
	I make a recent argument from first principles and I provide evidence where empirically possible and peaceful parenting is divided into theory, practice, and evidence, right?
	The moral case, how to actually achieve it in the world, and the physical, sorry, the scientific and psychological evidence for the efficacy and success of peaceful parenting, right?
	There's a theory, which is all the morals.
	There's the practice, which is how to implement it.
	And then there's all the proof as to why peaceful parenting works in the real world with as many scientific studies as I could get my hands on over a year and a half.
	So that's what we debate.
	I don't do, it's almost like paranoid innuendo.
	I'm not saying that's you, but it's almost like, well, what if somebody and what if you, I mean, what I get in my inbox is like pictures of happy children and everyone's saying, thank goodness you rescued me from hitting my children.
	Thank goodness you rescued me from yelling at my children.
	Thank goodness you, I really appreciate it.
	Happy family.
	That's I continually just I get all of that stuff, right?
	I don't honestly recall, I can't think of a single, and I think I would have remembered it because I would have probably called that person or emailed them or tried to have sort of further contact with them.
	I don't think I've ever received an email from somebody who said, well, I tried peaceful parenting and my kid is now an ex-murderer.
	I mean, or, you know, something obviously maybe not quite sort of dramatic, but I don't think I've ever had anyone say, well, I stopped hitting my children and now they're running wild and they don't listen to me and blah, blah, blah.
	Because if somebody did email me that, I would have set up a call with them as soon as humanly possible, whether it was public or private.
	And I would have tried to sort of figure out what they were doing.
	But I don't, I haven't in 20 years gotten any email like that.
	And again, maybe there was one that I tried to set up a call with and forgot about it 15 years ago, but it's not something that pops up into my mind.
	And it really would, you know, in the way that we generally remember the banana that was bad rather than all the bananas that are good, right?
	So I've not received any information like that.
	And I have no evidence of anything like that.
	So I'm not really sure how to answer the question.
	And that's, you know, Stefan, even just that last little bit is actually quite satisfying to the answer in that what I hear you saying, and which is perfectly fine, that there has been virtually no feedback to that effect that people have felt like, I tried peaceful parenting and now my kids are running amok.
	And that's, that's great.
	I mean, ultimately, what I would say, like in a very pragmatic sense, right?
	That's good, right?
	Ultimately, if that lack of feedback exists.
	No, no, no, no, not ultimately.
	No, no, no, no.
	Come on.
	Not ultimately.
	Listen, I don't want to lecture you on Christianity, bro, but you cannot be a consequentialist and a Christian.
	Christianity is about doing the right thing no matter what.
	It's doing the right thing, even with negative outcomes.
	I mean, Jesus took his nails on the cross for heaven's sakes, right?
	So you can't say, well, I'm going to judge this moral position by its positive or negative outcome.
	It's not about you, you don't teach your kids that, right?
	You don't say, well, you should tell the truth unless you think that there's a negative outcome.
	Or you should not cheat people unless you believe that there's going to be a positive outcome.
	Don't you tell your children to do the right thing and to live with integrity and virtue?
	And sometimes those consequences will be really negative, right?
	I mean, so you can't be a consequentist.
	Sorry to be annoying, but you can't be a consequentialist and a Christian.
	So I put forward the moral arguments for peaceful parenting.
	And that can be a challenge for families.
	And that I accept, right?
	So if you've, if you've, not you, but if Bob, let's say Bob, if Bob has hit his children a lot and too much and too harshly or whatever it is, and yelled at them and so on, and he gets into peaceful parenting, he's got some apologies to make.
	And it's going to be difficult.
	And he's going to have to, his kids are going to be suspicious.
	They're going to be angry and upset.
	And it's going to take a while to turn that ship of sin around.
	But I can't, I honestly, I'm here to rescue you from what I think is a negative direction you're going from an ethical standpoint, which is to try and judge something by its positive or negative outcomes.
	That's not what virtue is.
	That's like saying eat what tastes good and reject what tastes bad.
	We have to eat rights, regardless of taste to some degree, right?
	Yeah, I mean, I don't think I was trying to go in that direction.
	So based on the language only, I mean, I'm sorry if it sounded that way.
	That's certainly not what I meant.
	And I don't know.
	I mean, I yeah, I mean, that's not what I was going to try to get at, but it's okay.
	No, you've got to be able to.
	Hang on.
	No, I'm not crazy, man.
	You've talked for an hour and a half about negative outcomes.
	Okay.
	I mean, come on.
	I'm a good listener, man.
	This is what I do for a living, right?
	I'm a good listener.
	And you have talked a lot about judging, well, there's these negative outcomes.
	Have you heard of any of these negative outcomes?
	Could it go a little bit to the left?
	And what about these negative outcomes?
	And could people misinterpret it and have negative outcomes, right?
	So you have, I'm not, I'm not making things up here, bro.
	You have talked a lot about negative outcomes.
	But that was not the point I was trying to make, though.
	It really wasn't.
	Well, that's all I can say is that that's what you were asking about.
	And you were trying to judge peaceful parenting by its outcomes.
	And the reason is because you haven't read the book.
	And so you can't, and there's no reason why you would.
	You can't grapple with the moral arguments because you haven't read the book.
	So you were looking for consequentialist stuff, right?
	So I think you think me more adversarial than I am.
	I really do.
	And if I'm judging you improperly, I am sorry.
	I don't want to be uncharitable at all, not in any way.
	And so if I have done that, I am very sorry about that.
	Well, don't apologize if you don't think you're in the wrong.
	That's not very, I don't think that's quite right.
	But listen, I appreciate the conversation, and I look forward to chatting again.
	And I hope that you will read the book.
	It's available free at peacefulparenting.com.
	And thank you so much.
	And let's do a quick chat in with our last caller of the night.
	And I really do appreciate these chats.
	And we have Steph something.
	I'm going to have an Eastern European stroke of some kind if I try to pronounce that.
	So did you want to?
	Yes, no.
	Are you still around?
	I'm mute, mute.
	All right.
	I think we've lost him.
	Freedomain.com slash donate.
	I really do appreciate the callers tonight, especially the peaceful parenting caller.
	I think it's just delightful to have these kinds of conversations.
	I really, really do appreciate them.
	Anybody who wants to call in and disagree and argue and debate and so on, absolutely welcome.
	I love to be corrected.
	And lots of love, freedomain.com/slash donate to help these conversations flourish.
	I really would appreciate that.
	And don't forget to go to freedomain.com slash donate.
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	Lots of love, my friends.
	We will talk Friday night.

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