Modern Wisdom - #716 - Scott Galloway - How Can Men Take Charge Of Their Lives?

Episode Date: December 7, 2023

Scott Galloway is a clinical professor of marketing at the New York University Stern School of Business, a public speaker, entrepreneur and an author. Despondency and cynicism are everywhere online. Some of the most popular modern trends are those that tell people to not hope for the best and that things can never get better. Thankfully I don't agree, and neither does Scott. Expect to learn why Scott recommends all men watch the movie Her, the problem with the left’s view on masculinity, what we should be teaching men about how to age gracefully, why we are experiencing a lack of good role models, they keys to networking without being a weirdo, whether you should ban your staff from sleeping with each other, the pillars of masculinity and much more… Sponsors: Get 10% discount on Marek Health’s comprehensive blood panels at https://marekhealth.com/modernwisdom (use code: MODERNWISDOM) Get 10% discount on all Gymshark’s products at https://bit.ly/sharkwisdom (use code: MW10) Get over 37% discount on all products site-wide from MyProtein at https://bit.ly/proteinwisdom (use code: MODERNWISDOM) Extra Stuff: Get my free Reading List of 100 books to read before you die → https://chriswillx.com/books/ Buy my productivity energy drink Neutonic: https://neutonic.com/modernwisdom - Get in touch. Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/modernwisdompodcast Email: https://chriswillx.com/contact/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What's happening people? Welcome back to the show what my guest today is Scott Galloway, he's a clinical professor of marketing to New York University Stern School of Business, a public speaker, entrepreneur and an author. Dispondency and cynicism are everywhere online. Some of the most popular modern trends are those that tell people to not hope for the best and that things can never get better. Thankfully, I don't agree. And now that does Scott. Expect to learn why Scott recommends all men watch the movie her, the problem with the left's view on masculinity,

what we should be teaching men about how to age gracefully, why we are experiencing a lack of good role models, the keys to networking without being a weirdo, whether you should ban your staff from sleeping with each other, the pillars of masculinity, and much more. I very much appreciate Scott's position. He is a man ardently from the left and ardently pro men and ardently pro family. It's an interesting and increasingly rare blend at the moment and I think he's got an awful lot of interesting stuff to add.

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That's my super secret product page that has everything I use and recommend and then use the code modern wisdom at checkout for that maximum discount that is at least 37 cent off everything bit.ly such protein wisdom and modern wisdom. A checkout. But now ladies and gentlemen, please welcome. Scott Galloway. Scott Galaway, welcome to the show. Chris, here's the only podcast I will do except anyone who asked me, anyone, anyone. I'm a whore.

Let's be honest. Yeah, the slut of the podcast. I am. But I'm an expensive whore. That's my thinking. It's like I class hucker, I think, that technically referred to us. We all do things for money. We don't want to do.

And I feel it's that I'm a whore. But as I've got an older and gained some currency, I'm an expensive whore. You know, Peaky Blinders, you've seen that? I do, that guy is a Oppenheimer. Killian Murphy, yeah, yeah. Killian Murphy says he's turning to grace that is this prostitute girl working in his bar and he says, we're all hauls grace,

we just have different prices and we sell different parts of ourselves All of us do things I'm I think prostitution should be legalized. I've never understood why it isn't I think sex trafficking should absolutely be illegal and people should be put in prison And I think that's a perfect example of how when something is made illegal social media supposedly solves the impossible in about 24 hours, and I think we should make a lot of things illegal. But I think people should be able to do what they want with their body. And I think if you look at a lot of relationships, it's kind of, I don't know, a couple, the shades of gray between that and prostitution are pretty difficult to

to suss out. God, I'm sure this is a hay cram and we're getting all sorts of shit. Well, look, you're from the left. So I think I'm safe. I've got my leftist card fully front and center today. I remember, I heard you say that you think all young men should be required

to watch the movie her and take a class on dating dynamics. Why? Like, I think that the ability to initiate contact with strangers, go up to a friend and say, hey, do you want to go to a golfing this weekend or do you want to hang out, go to a football match this weekend? I'm trying to encourage my boys to talk to strangers. And I think the most rewarding relationship in life is a romantic and potentially a sexual partnership that results in kids and a family. I do think that that I didn't think it was going to be the most rewarding thing in my life and it ended up being the most rewarding in my life. And the reason why I have such an outstanding partner is because I learned early how to endure rejection

and how to initiate, even be all used to word, aggressive with strange people. I would email people I didn't know and ask for a meeting at a venture capital firm. I would, when I was a senior in high school, I wouldn't get invited to parties, you know I would do, I would show up uninvited. And it was embarrassing for about five minutes

and then I went in and no one was gonna kick me out and I had a great time. I was always aggressive and I've always been aggressive professionally and personally and if you want a punch above your way to way class get used to rejection and initiating conversation and of course and as you appointed out eloquently, people claim that somehow this is a bad thing and then every survey shows that women want men, in most cases, to initiate the contact and express the interest. So I think to teach a young man, to go up to force himself, when I used to walk into a bar when I was a young man, I said, within 15 seconds, my dad taught me this. You need to start talking to a strange woman,

within 15 seconds of walking into a bar, if you're there before your a woman that's a stranger or it's specifically find a strange woman an unusual woman Who just seems very very strange and weird now Will you walk into a bar if you're in a strange set a social setting you walk into a party any room go up Immediately to a stranger doesn't necessarily have to be a strange woman and start talking to them And I think those skills and that confidence and quite frankly that ability to reject or endure rejection are a key component of professional success. The difference between people who make good money at work and people who make outrageous money, it's only one thing.

They're willing us to endure rejection because that is a key component of selling. And selling is the difference between being the CFO, the COO, and the CEO. And you might decide, I'm just not up for that. But the reason why the most over-compensated people in every organization relative to their talent are all one person, one title, and that sales person, is they are willing to endure rejection. And if you want to be over-compensated

or you want to romantically punch above your weight class, then get used to rejection. And if I'm trying to get my boys anything, it's the ability to endure rejection. It's the same for friends. So many of the people that I've connected with as friends have come about from me, not caring about sending a DM. This is why here's my hot take of the week. Everybody should become a club promoter for at least two months at some point in their life, because if you've given out wristbands on the street

for some dead-ass bar or club to try and get people in, hey guys, where are you going tonight? Right, I know that you're going to the club that's really busy and you know the name of and is highly reliable for a good night. But how about you come to this one that you've never heard of before, down a dark alley, like the online

lack of rejection or lack of fear of rejection that you go through from just sending DMs. So many of the good things that have happened in my life have come about you to random DMs. And the same goes from friends too. So many of my best friends we met via the internet and they said, dude, I love this thing that you do, well, we met at this place and then you have a bit of resonance online, you turn into real-world friends and these are now some of my best friends. So it's business, it's relationships, it's friendships, it's money, it's adventures and opportunities. Yeah, 100% and unfortunately you start to lose that as you get older because your ego grows. When I was young and I was hungry for money, I used to just constantly ping strangers, send out emails, send out proposals.

This is how I can help your firm. Or my friend knows you, can we grab coffee? I was really aggressive. And now that I've got an older man, I have some success. I've lost some of my ego's grown. And I'm like, I'm not gonna reach out to them. But what you said about friends was some people who are quote unquote them.

I reached out to the, I don't think it was anything wrong with us. I somehow got introduced to the owner of Chelsea and it was a big, my son is a huge Chelsea fan and it's been such a difficult season for him. I mean, it's just been so hard on him. And last night, the whole household was on eggshells because, you know, they went up to one and he's like, we're going to blow it again and you see this 13-year-old pacing back and forth in front of the TV and we're just freaked out that they're going to, you know,

Tottenham, which is the better club this year. And they won and he jumped up and down and he was so, like, literally dropped to his knees and was so happy and I put it on video and I texted to this guy who I introduced, I don't know that well, the owner of Chelsea. And he texted me back right away and it's like, and we should get together. And it's like, I'm not sure my whole life I would have had that confidence. And what you realize is that

people of any stature or standing It might mean more to people and you should probably make an effort to be more generous to people who don't have that sort of status Or power, but what you realize is everybody wants friendship. Everyone wants to be congratulated I mean, I got to think that I was thinking about top of the way that I for a billionaire He has taken so much shit this year. I don't think he can go to Chelsea games because he gets such grief. I mean, crime or river, but it is never, it is never, I don't think you can be too, kind of, I don't know, wanton or reckless with compliments for reaching out to people.

Now, what you went, what you talked about teaching mating dynamics. I think a huge gift for young men that they need is how to express interest in friendship interest in potential romantic interest with while making that person feel safe and What what a lot of young men I've been taught and you've talked a lot about this is that expressing that sort of interest automatically deems you a predator, or that it's something wrong. And that's just not true.

And even in work situations, you have to be more thoughtful about it. You have to tread more lightly, but one of three relationships began at work. Men have been told, any expression of romantic interest in work could get you a trip to HR and potentially out of the company,

that any man potentially who expresses sexual interest or romantic interest to a stranger is a creep. And none of those are true. None of those are true. And if you talk to most couples, what you find who have been together 20 or 30 years, is that at the beginning of the relationship, one of them, usually the man, was more interested than the other. And it took a certain amount of elegant persistence to convince that person and that they should go out with them and then demonstrate excellence, demonstrate kindness, demonstrate generosity.

And I worry that young men aren't getting an opportunity to participate in what is the most rewarding thing in life in my view, and that's develop a family and kids, because they're not being taught how to endure rejection or how to approach people in a random environment while making the other person feel safe. Yeah, I think women also could do with being taught that the old world, they maybe taught to learn from their mothers and older sisters, from thes and the noughties about, you know, treat him like you don't like him and like you're not interested and why men love bitches. You know, there was this entire genre of books that came about that was create additional mate value in yourself by extending the chase and making him work

a little bit harder. But in a post-Me Too World, anything close to a no by most men, apart from the predatory ones, which it's not going to stop in any case, anything that Virgis on a no is a fuck no get away from me. Anything shy of an absolute yes and complete openness and receptiveness to a guy is that. And I do wonder whether I don't know. There's like a reticence that both guys and girls have got now of reaching out to people and it's so 100% It's so averse to the way that again I was a club promoter the only way that we filled the events for 15 years was by being the person that would continue to send annoying DMs over and over again until someone actually decided to come out so my threshold for messaging someone is so much lower than it is for pretty much anyone else. And you hit the nail on the head with that thing with the Chelsea owner, no one on the planet is upset and not going to reply to a cool, cute video of a 13 year old boy celebrating that his favorite sports

team, just one. Like that's like that's a universallyobjectionable content to send to someone. Yeah, and even at this age, I'm worried that like, oh, I don't want to be perceived as harassing, someone is more important than me, but it's, I do get in my podcast, Office Hours, I have had an increasing number of women dial in an ask for dating advice. And the dating advice I give them is, look, you shouldn't lower your standards, but try a second coffee to see if, in fact, this person does start to slowly meet your standards. Because women naturally have a much finer filter. And unless, you know, there's this data. A lot of times people weren't interested

in the other person at first, and then they got to know them. They found out they were kind. They found out they were funny. They found out there's something about their smell that they liked. They got, you know, they became attached to them. They love spending time with them.

And the problem in an online dating format is it's sort of like, you know, I make a snap decision and it's over. And that's it. They're off. They're, you know, that's it. It's over. So what I tell men is create more initial opportunities. And for women, my advice is like, if there's nothing there and you really just know you're not into this person fine. But if you walk in and say, it's got to be someone at least six feet who makes at least six figures just recognize that's point six percent of the population and That you may you may not find the same volume of potential mates

You may be fishing in a pool. It's not a pool. It's it's a tiny puddle and see what see if there's other ways You know if other things develop, give a second coffee a chance. But it's, I think it's really disappointing because I think not only are men struggling, and without women or lonely, but they do a much better job of maintaining relationships without a romantic relationship. They're just better at maintaining life and love and professional success. When a young man doesn't have the prospect of a romantic and sexual relationship,

he doesn't shower. He doesn't work as hard as he should. He doesn't save money for a house. He drinks too much. He gets high too much. And I'm making huge generalizations here, but the data bears this out. This stuff is so important.

And so we need more thirdspaces, parks, recreation links, more educational opportunities, more church, I dare say, more religious institutions, more parks, you know, the barbershop, more random opportunities, more nonprofits. I'd like to see national service, compulsory national service for everyone that gives people a chance to fall in love. I'm an investor in a bunch of Israeli companies. I can't get over how many co-founders and husbands and wives met in the military because they had an opportunity to demonstrate excellence to each other in the pursuit of something bigger than each of them. Yeah, and the co-ed spaces where people can be competent and they can show that they have a degree of excellence. Yeah. And the co-ed spaces where people can be competent. And they can show that they have a degree of excellence and ambition. Like competence is sexy, right? It doesn't

matter whether you're a guy or a girl and what you're looking for. Someone that is competent at doing a thing. Wow, that's cool. That's hot. Well, this is the, this is what we don't talk about. It doesn't get a lot of academic institutions. There is a preponderance of people on the faculty who are married to one another. And typically, often times, it was a professor and his or her PhD student, or they knew each other and they were on the faculty together.

There's a lot of inter-office romance. Why? Because if you're the premier thought leader in gap to accounting, you may not be great in a bar setting. But your opportunity to demonstrate excellence to people who find this stuff interesting makes you attractive. You're a Chad's to someone who lives on Excel. There you go, and an Excel chat. And 99% of these relationships were consensual and really positive things, even when they didn't work out. So I'm all about, and this is probably setting

myself up for disaster. And my company's I have always allocated a lot of money for social stuff. I want them to meet each other. I want them to be friends. And something I celebrate is when they get married. I've had, I've been to six weddings of people who've met at my companies. And what I tell the senior level men and the senior level women is if you're above a certain seniority in the company, your fly is up and locked. The power asymmetry here is just too great.

The opportunity for abuse is just too great. It's awesome to be a senior level executive in a company, it means money, it means status. You have other opportunities off campus. So if something happens here, you're just at fault. Let's just say that right here. But other than that, the company policy is the following. Use your common sense.

So when I was running my nightlife business, one of the, the way that it was structured was a couple of owners at the top, a couple of senior managers above us, block of maybe about 10 to 15 junior managers, and then a ton of guest listers below them. So each manager had a team of around about 30 people, something like that. And each of these people, it was their job to bring people to the nightclub, got a event going on on Thursday or Friday or whatever, and they made a commission, and then the managers made a commission on the commission

and so on and so forth. You're kind of like a sales, typical sales set up, right? But as you were talking about that power asymmetry, damn, we're talking about 18, usually 18 to 20 year olds, sometimes like 18 to 22 year olds, and it's young guys who are living away from home for the first time ever. They're the ones that choose who gets to dance and hostess at the nightclub. They're the ones that choose who gets the preference on shifts.

They're the ones who gets to choose who goes into VIP and all the rest of it. So there's power there, even though everyone was 18, 19, 20, there was a power differential. And me and my business partner find the boys if we found out that they'd had sex with one of our staff. And it was 10 pounds for the first time it happened. 20 pounds for the second time it happened. 40 pounds, 80 pounds and then 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100. We find them and we told them, we were like,

look, if you do this, you are putting both your own money and the company at risk. There is a risk that's associated with this. There are five other events companies with just as many hot girls who love partying just as much as you guys do, go and decimate them from the inside, go and cause all manner of strife because without a doubt, there was a 50% chance that if the manager, one of the managers had sex

with one of the staff that worked for us within a couple of months, they'd leave. Well, that was an amazing member of staff. That was a really great guest list or that was a really great hostess or she worked really well on the till or did whatever. And she's gone now because you've broken her heart. Or the manager, he loses his head because she's now talking to one of the other managers and then it causes internal strife between the guys. So we disincentivized it financially and the boys just accepted it as part of the course.

So yeah, I think... I'm just shocked that 20 pounds would be... It would actually make someone think twice about having sex. You'd be surprised when you're in the northeast of the UK 20 pounds goes an awful long way. Yeah, yeah. What I tell, what I've always said, and I mean, it sounds like basic training, but I think the first thing you tell, especially a man in a corporate setting, especially a young man, is that instinctively,

men will mistake kindness for sexual interest and women will mistake sexual interest for kindness. And just be cognizant of the fact that because a woman is nice to you, does not mean she has any romantic or sexual interest in you. And in a corporate setting, you need to be very careful because correctly or incorrectly, if there's a problem,

that most likely HR and the powers of B and society and Twitter are going to find the man culpable. And, and that's probably right because the man is usually the person who initiates and men get it wrong more often than women. They just get it wrong. So, I'm a, but once you're cognizant of this power dynamic, once you are, if you tread lightly and you ask someone out to coffee, which isn't that threatening, yeah, okay, use your judgment, you're all grown-ups, you're all grown-ups. I go to a gym in Austin that is super cool and all of the guys and

girls that go there and like crazy shape and the machines are fantastic and the culture and the atmosphere is amazing. And they put a real out a few months ago and it was advice for a guy. The sort of guy approaches the camera and is like, I'm going to show you how you should approach girls in the gym and then it turns around. The camera turns around and there's a group of six girls all studying online looking very haughty, and they go, just don't flick their hair and walk off. And I was like, am I fucking high here?

Like what is this? This is the exact opposite of what we need, like just don't, like just don't approach like girls in the gym. Hang in a second, if you go to the gym, especially a gym like that one, which is very specialized and it's selected for a very specific type of person, how many other places are there where you're going to find someone who has that particular niche obsession with fitness?

And the gym, to me, seems like the perfect place to approach people. Yeah, it's... Some of two minds about this. I think that I think some women get approached so much and just want to go to a gym where they just want to work out that I think they can send signals by just putting on headphones, right? What I would tell my boys is, if you're on a treadmill next to somebody and you want

to try and strike up a conversation, do it, and you might find, you might sense right away that they're just not interested. They're there to work out. They're not looking to meet anybody. And guess what? You're both going to be fine. And what you don't want to do is sit around and stare at somebody and make them uncomfortable. I think that's even worse. So pick up on visual cues, and if you, on the way out, you know, run into them and start a conversation with them, great. And then you'll hopefully be able to figure out pretty quickly if they're, if they return your interest. But don't, you know, like this is, this is what it means to be an adult.

And hopefully you have good role models, and there's some trial and error here. And that is you, you've said this, the difference between a creep, a story, a story that's a romantic comedy that's told 40 years later as in this great soft lighting and someone is a creep is the perceived attractiveness of the person who initiates the contact. And the problem is the person and you said this, who initiates the contact, doesn't know how you're going to attract if you're going to perceive them. And what I do respect, and I've seen this with women when I'm out with my young friends and they approach someone and she's clearly not interested, most women are kind. Most women

will be thoughtful and polite and they have to develop their own skills around how to wave off interests that they're not interested in in a polite and dignified way because most women I find are kind. And also when I've been out with guys and a woman, I have seen more of this recently, women now approach menopause. I never, that never happened to me when I was younger or maybe it was just me, but I've been without a couple of my younger buddies who work and women will actually come up and start talking. I've never seen that before. I think it's wonderful. And I just think as a guy, just in terms of karma, you are always down to hang out, be nice, buy drinks to any woman who comes up to you, because my

brother for the universe, you want to encourage that type of behavior. You want to encourage it. It's not enough with 100%. 100%. But the skills show me a guy who's good in a random situation at a party or is good meeting strangers, either strange man, he's in sexually, or strange women, he's sexually interested in. I'm going to tell you guys can probably make more money than he deserves because that ability to open, that ability to initiate a relationship is kind of, that's half the battle in a corporate setting. What else would be on your syllabus for teaching young men what they should focus on in life and prioritize?

Well, you did this early, but I think fitness, just from mental health, getting used to working out early. My dad was in the Royal Navy and he started me working out when I was like, I don't know, 13, and he was sort of stuck with me. Like I didn't do it a lot till I was 17 or 18, but it just sort of was ingrained in me. I think having a plan, even if that plan changes, always just sort of having a plan.

I always be able to say, if someone asks you, what are you thinking you're going to do the next five or 10 years, you don't have stick to it, but I'm planning to go to college, and then I'm going to get a degree. You know, when I was 17, I thought I was going to be a pediatrician, and chemistry disabuses me of that notion. But I always have sort of a plan that you can articulate to somebody. I would say, try and, and this

is something I didn't want to do, be more in touch with your emotions, and that is be more honest with people. Tell them when you're upset, reach out to people, ask for help, when a woman upsets you, or a friend upsets you, you know, it bum me out that you didn't call me back, or you were not nice to me in front of the other guys and I don't understand why I mean There's a certain amount of that pecking order and socialization you need to endure growing up But I wasn't in touch with my emotions. I didn't tell my mom I loved her until I was much older and I wish I'd said that more often I wish that I had told women and romantic partners when my feelings were heard or how it truly

Felt about them. I was one of those guys that would was never wanted to appear weak or vulnerable full women and romantic partners when my feelings were heard or how it truly felt about them. I was one of those guys that was never wanted to appear weak or vulnerable, so I would never share my emotions. And I think that screwed up a lot of relationships or diminished them. So it would be much more in touch with your emotions, be much more willing to express your emotions. Why? What's on the other side? What's the positive on the other side of doing that? Well, there's opportunities to have friendships and relationships. Sometimes people are waiting for you to say, I'm really bummed out that maybe you don't want to be my friend or that you don't like me as much as I like you. And only that, there's so

few people who are willing to say that at a young age. It demonstrates confidence. And not only that, there's so few people who are willing to say that at a young age, it demonstrates confidence. And I think people find that really attractive. I mean, and if they don't, that's the wrong kind of person. Also, you go into this, this kind of funhouse of your emotions and a reality where you don't know what's important to you. You start convincing yourself you don't care, you don't mind, and you never really get informed.

My attitude is when a movie really moves you, ask yourself, why am I inspired by this? Because that will help inform what interests you. When something really upsets you, really lean into the upset and ask, why is it upsetting me so much? And otherwise you're just sort of walking around with blinders on you. You don't know really what's important to you. You don't know who you want to spend time with. So to not lean into your emotions and register them when you give up a lot because you're

going to find out later in life. Oh, yeah. No, I liked you too or no, I would have been friends with you or yeah, we weren't sharing hiring you, but you didn't follow up. You weren't persistent. Whatever it might be, right? You should have applied a second time. You should have applied to university the second time. Whatever it might have been, right?

And also, you just miss on the opportunity to feel closer to people and have some sense of what's important to you, what inspires you, what makes you sad. Where, you know, I don't think I ever told someone until I was willing to my 30s. It's something they did upset me I had this notion that I'm me big strong man. I don't get upset at things, you know everything deflects off of me. I don't care Yeah, I'm a I've started working with a therapist over the last few months here in Austin who worked with a friend that's way more way more fucked up Than I'll ever be so I figured look if she can see through his bullshit

She can definitely deal with mine. And there's layers to this. You realize, you know, just even talking about your emotions or being prepared to say them isn't quite the same as actually feeling them, feeling them fully, you know, having your emotions and your mind rest where your feet are. And there's layers and layers to this that I've realized, especially maybe people that listen to podcasts like mine or yours, who are interested in psychology and human nature and can rationalize or explain away what they're feeling. Oh, that's the negativity bias, or that's the aballine paradox. So that's, you know, I understand that this is because of my,

it's the bystander effect or some other bullshit, right? Like they've got some mental model that allows them to explain what's going on inside of her. Yeah, James Clea talks about something similar and whatever whatever. And I realized that for a good chunk of people way more than might like to admit it, that's a protection mechanism.

Their ability to rationalize and explain a way what's happening inside of their minds gives them an excuse to not have to feel their feelings fully. I thought to you this last weekend, did you see what happened with Caleb Williams, the quarterback for USC? No. So this kid is probably going to, I think he's probably going to be the high-smotrophy winner and is probably going to go number one in the draft.

He's playing against Washington and he blows it and they're going to go number one in the draft. And he's playing against Washington, and he blows it, and they're going to lose. The guy breaks down and begins sobbing, and immediately runs over to the stands and jumps up and embraces his mother, and his mother puts this notebook over his helmet so that the crowd can't see him crying. And his father comes over and consoles him. And I thought, Oh my God, this kid doesn't even realize he has moved

masculinity so far forward. And the ability to give into that sort of emotion and do it publicly, you know, so much of this fucked up sense of what it means to be a man is around bearing your emotions. And when you look at suicide rates and how they're now, they used to be three to one, male to female and it's approaching four to one. One of the key components of that is men do never learn how to express their struggling.

And because they're taught from a very early age that real men don't express that sort of upset. So when you see this guy, he's probably the premier quarterback in college football, this really like big, handsome, ridiculously strong guy in front of national TV, jump up into his mother's arms. I mean, it sends such a good signal to young men

that it's okay to be emotional, it's okay to be disappointed. I also think that's such a gift to, I mean, you're not a parent yet. You really as a parent, all you really want, you want two things, you want your kids to be happy and successful, but you also want to comfort them.

Any chance you would get as also want to comfort them. Any chance you would get as a parent to comfort your child, it's just so rewarding. It's like, okay, I have purpose. And I remember seeing that literally the whole nation saw that moment, and I thought that kid unknowingly just moved masculinity forward and just reduced the likelihood or increased the likelihood that a young man is going to have an easier time expressing to a family member, a non-family member, I am really upset. And that is key to solving.

That is key to getting out of a really, really dark place. And I thought, oh my God, it's such a moving moment. So anyways, Google Caleb Williams, and you'll see the video, it's really, it's very raw, it's very, very moving. And I was just, I thought it was, oh God, I think this kid doesn't realize what a positive role model he is. I love that story, that's awesome.

A lot of people on the internet, especially guys, will talk about, not showing vulnerability in front of a female partner because it's going to lower her perception of you. You know, the absolutely arb women out there who will see vulnerability as a weakness. Now, I think if your female partner is unable to see you show bare your emotions without thinking that you're less of a man, I think that's a sufficient red flag in the relationship to be good that you're getting out of it in any case.

But when I talked about this a little bit recently, guys took it one step further and when I said, okay, so let's say that you have a concern about showing emotions to your partner, what about showing emotions to your friends? And there were a whole bunch of people in the comments that were like, no, no, no, no, no, like even doing that, even doing that is too far.

And you go, oh, okay, this is just your way of rationalizing and coping with not wanting to show your feelings. This isn't to do with, you can say it's because of the outcome, the negative outcome that you're going to get in some relationship and she's gonna leave you for Chad, who's actually a stoic giga, like giga turbo, like Andrew Tate, but no, it's not. It's just that you don't wanna feel your feelings.

Now, I had Chris Bumstead on the show who just won his fifth Mr. Olympia Classic Physique title this weekend. And I think he, if he doesn't cry on stage, he's kind of welling up as a fifth time that he wins the hottest man on the planet award, like the most jacked Greek god man on the planet award. And he told me the story about when he broke down and cried in his girlfriend's arms six weeks before one of his Olympia

competitions. And he told me that because that's actually what happened and that's how he felt. And you're talking about the most hyper masculine, looking, lifting heavy weights, sweating, doing the full thing. Like he's the, he's the sigma male meme. And yet for him, he was fine to do it. So yeah, I think a lot of what the modern culture of masculinity is doing is kind of repurposing the male denial of emotions

into some more rationalized approach of, oh yeah, but you don't, your friends to see you weak because then they're gonna, they're gonna move on and find a different friend. Oh yeah, you don't, your girlfriend or your wife to see you weak as she's gonna leave you and sleep with the guy next door. It's like, all right, well,

so you just never go into failure emotions at all. That doesn't seem very adaptive. That doesn't seem like a very good solution. So I think a lot about this because from the age of 29 to 44, I didn't cry. I forgot how to cry. Like if someone said, in the next week, you got to, you got to cry once or if you cry once, you're going to get a million dollars, I would have to have, I would have to learn to do it again. I forgot how to I didn't cry my mother died and in crime. I got divorced Didn't cry with my businesses failed just forgot how to cry and now I probably well up and downright cry once to twice a week And it's a real gift to me and I have noticed though

I have registered different responses from different parties. I Cry on my podcast if I get if I start talking if I got a question from a listener I have noticed though, I have registered different responses from different parties. I cry on my podcast. If I get a question from a listener and I start talking about it and I get upset, I will get emotional. I find that people really respond well because it helps them put them in touch with their emotions. That yeah, I was really upset when I had to put my dog down. I get tremendous positive support from strangers

whenever I'm emotional. Amongst my friends, we all, especially at this age, when one of us isn't doing well and shares, I mean, men are just so good at sharing like just how fucking awesome they are all the time. Oh yeah, I just made a million dollars on this trade. I'm selling my company, and we put up this Instagram facade, this Instagram meets Arnold Schwarzenegger meets, you know, David Beckham facade to each other or meets Carl Lyck on whatever the... And

then when you really get behind it and you find out, well, I'm really struggling. You know, I'm my dad's sick and I just had my business is not doing well and I'm worried about money or I have a friend whose child just had a real mental health breakdown and What I find though is when especially as men get older they are really I find really supportive and receptive to one of them As I think women are incredibly receptive to each others Emot emotions and vulnerabilities. Across your parents, your parents want to come for you. It's a feature not a bug for them.

They want to come for you. I've had mixed reactions from my romantic partners. And that is, and maybe I've chosen the wrong women, I don't know. But oftentimes I feel like when I have express vulnerability and emotion and weakness, that they don't like it and are less attracted to me, that they feel like I'm not going to be as viable or as robust a protector and provider when I am depressed and down. And that if I talk about it, there's some lip service to how are you doing. But at the end of the day, they don't have, at least in this might be my flaw, they don't have a lot of patience for weak men. And I sense this is weakness.

Yeah, I wonder how much of that is a selection effect for the kind of women that you're going for, the kind of place that you visit yourself in. Let me give you one of my spiciest new ideas. I've got this idea of surplus mate value, which is when you have a relationship in which there is a disparity in mate value between the man and the woman, you can basically look at that disparity, kind of like a bank account that you can withdraw from. So for one of a better word, the man can mistreat the woman, like you're not replied to text or come home late or you know, like break promises or do whatever. And the girl will stick about because there is this disparity.

Now a girl that's healthy with a good sense of self-esteem may not do that regardless of how much disparity and mate value there is. But as a good example, at Chris Bumstead, this dude, his wife's like a 10. She's a fitness model and super smart and like was a doctor and stuff as well, but he's like number one in the world. It's impossible to be like as have as high mate value as he does. So one of the things that actually came out of the comments was, well, of course, Chris Bumstead can grind his girlfriend's arms. Look at who he is. It's like the hottest thing on the planet. Like, of course, he can do that. Brad Pitt, of course, he can grind his girlfriend's arms.

He's Brad Pitt. So this idea of surplus mate value, I think, is interesting. But another one is if you are going after girls and women who are looking for that hard call, protector provider, and you then start to crack that facade a little bit or crack the veneer, yeah, maybe they are gonna respond to that in a in a slightly interesting way. I just it's what I've seen. I look at, you know, my dad, I just like, the moment my dad lost his job and he kind of deserved this because he was never really engaged or shut up for his marriages. But I generally found, choosing my words carefully because this sounds really judgmental. I generally found, and maybe it was my dad's been married in divorce four times, but the moment my dad stopped being a great provider, the women were out.

And I think it's because, like you said, they were getting so little on every other dimension that if he wasn't at least going to be at a minimum, a bare minimum, be a good provider, like when he got fired and when he was 52 52 and couldn't get another job within six months, she was gone. And and quite frankly, he kind of had a coming because what you're basically saying is he got to bring something to the table, right? And but it's still I think we have a tendency to sort of what's the term bag of ants to assume that all men are naturally you have a predisposition to it being the bad guy and all women are these incredibly high character good people. And the reality is, and I think there's statistics to show this on a balanced scorecard that

there's mostly, most women are really good people, most men are really good people. But it's not like, it's not like women aren't, you know, don't have their own needs and have a scorecard out in terms of when they exit a relationship. And unfortunately society has stigmatized mental health at the point that there's so little of it still. I think it's been destigmatized across every demographic except straight men. I think if straight men express a certain level of mental health vulnerability, they're not going to be CEO of this company. I mean, I just, I've seen it. I've been on boards. A male CEO who takes a break and if he were to say, I'm struggling with my mental health.

That guy's not going to be CEO. And maybe that's not going to be an a- Go ahead. It's going to be an a-l equivalent of being early 30s engaged and as yet childless as a woman when you're going for the job interview and the boss is like, I mean, she's going to be- She's going to be for 18 months and then she's going to be full of children. Yeah, we're going to lose her. Yeah, there's, I mean, everyone has to deal,

you're right, everyone has to deal with their stereotypes in the workplace and how it sets them back. But again, it just results in, I don't know, results in bad behaviors that makes it, I mean, there's definitely something around, all right, and I don't know if we should be teaching at schools, but we're getting to the point now where, you know, mental health is becoming such a big issue for men as it relates to suicide. I mean, what we're finding is essentially

is that, well, men are physically stronger. Women are emotionally and mentally stronger. I mean, that's, if you were to distill it down. And so I think, I don't want to call it additional focus, but at least more focus on men's mental health is so critical to a healthy society. There's this really moving ad on mental health in the UK where it's two guys, two friends, they look like under 50 or 60s. And it shows them a different football matches. And one guy is really enthusiastic and happy all the time. And the other guy says, much more sedate and kind of calm and a little kind of, I don't

know, just sort of melancholy. And then it shows up and it says, you know, mental health or struggles aren't always what they appear to be. And then it shows a game where the guy, one guy shows up and puts his friends cap down in a seat and it's clear, you know, his friends gone. And it was the guy who was really effusive and happy. And the whole point is, unless you're willing to open up

about what's really going on with you, and unless you invite your friends to open up about what's really going on with them, you just don't know. And they might be the guy rooting and it seems really happy You just don't know. And they might be the guy rooting and it seems really happy. You don't know. And so I don't know the approach. I don't know the mechanisms, but this every year, the ratio of people committing suicide

goes up for men. It's now going to four to one. I got this from Rob Henderson's blog among 15 to 24 year olds, 80% of the suicides are male. A boy who is sexually molested and a girl who is sexually molested. Later in life, and by the way, they're both equally heinous crimes.

No one is a lesser crime against humanity. The boys 10 times more likely to kill himself later in life. And again, that's not in any way to say one crime is less hideous than the other, but we're just finding out. And we never thought this. Boys are just emotionally and mentally weaker. I heard you say a really interesting take, which was the overcompensation and the kind of extreme aversion that every single person has to pedophilia to an older man spending time with a younger boy that isn't his son or some member of his family has Created a massive death of role models of men that will take young boys under their wing You know even now for me as a guy who's got an audience of you know many of whom are in their teenage years and stuff like that

Even if I was to think about like Fucking even sending a message to somebody like that, there's something in me that I triggered almost like an allergic response that I'm so averse to that dynamic has been given such a very particular type of brand, which is older men, younger boys, should not be interacting really unless you're the caregiver, because so many of the stories that reach the press are about people that have taken advantage

of young boys in that way, has left an awful lot of potentially super valuable caring, nurturing relationships, just left by the wayside. When I heard you say that, I thought it was a very interesting idea. I think this is a huge problem because we know we can diagnose when the single point of failure for when men come off the rails and that is they lose a male role model. And I was talking to Rick Wilson, the political strategist of the Lincoln Project. And he got a motion. I was on his podcast, the enemies list. And he talked about his father

was in a terrible car accident and was in a coma for two years. And his father's business partners, neighbors, all these men stepped in, taught him how to fly, took him to games, and he said it kind of to save me, kind of kept me on track. And so when you're dealing with a society where we have the second most single parent family homes, and we say single parent family homes, we mean a household led by a mother, you know the same data, the girls have the same outcomes, college depression, you know, same income, boys have dramatically worse outcomes when they lose a male or a model. So the question is, all right, we could fill that void with other men that aren't necessarily biologically related to the boy, but here's the problem. People suspect any man that wants to be involved in a younger man's life.

I mean, the Catholic church and Michael Jackson have fucked it up for all of us. When I was on Bill Maher, I said, if we, if we want better men, we need to be better men. We need to get involved. We need to seek out and find boys and young men who are struggling and need some help because they're everywhere. They're literally everywhere. Your nanny's kid. My nanny's kid is sticking at home, doesn't want to do, doesn't know where they should join. The Navy is gambling on crypto. Like, needs a small amount of advice, right? They're everywhere. My friend's son, who will not listen to his father

and is making bad decisions, but will listen to his father's friends, you've pointed this out, right? The father's friends, the family's friends can have more impact than the actual parents, because you have a healthy gag reflex to what your parents say. Yeah, your dad sucks, but Scott, Scott's cool. He plays a car. Yeah, that's right. He has a podcast. He lets his play on PS4 until three in the morning. He's a podcast. And the same is true of my friends. My, my sons, my sons are now having a

healthy gag reflex. Everything I say, but they find a lot of my friends really interesting, and my friends will say the exact same thing and they'll listen and nod their head. To get involved in a young man's life is so rewarding. There's this wonderful movie, I think it's Wes Anderson, and actually I want to Tom Cruise's best films called Magnolia. And the guy, there's a bartender in it, and he says, I have love to give.

I just don't know where to put it. And I think there are so many men. Men your age, did feel fraternal love, would really feel like they could help a young man or a boy in his life. When I, I stayed in touch, I made really good friends with my stockbroker. When I was 13, my mom's boyfriend who stayed involved in my life after they broke up, gave me 200 bucks. I marched into Westwood Village.

I went into Dean Witter and I met this broker, this 30-something-year-old broker named SiSero. And we bought six, he gave me a lesson in the markets. We bought 16 shares of Columbia Pictures. And every day for two years, no joke. In Emerson, Jr., I'd go to the phone booth. I put in two dimes and I'd call Si, and he'd spend 10 minutes on the phone talking about my stock that day. Close encounters of the third kind is a hit so the stock was up

a dollar. Kasey shadow with a bomb. It's down and he gave me a lesson in the markets and he was really nice and like a good man. My camp counselor taught me how to program. He stayed in touch with me and taught me how to program I had all these random men in my life None of them ever in any way did anything inappropriate also We categorize a we stereotype gay men who may want to get involved in a young man's life pedophilia does not over index amongst gay men anymore than it does amongst straight men. Granted, should a mother or parents be thoughtful about who's

getting involved in their son's life? Yes. But the vast majority of men, the vast majority of men who want to get involved in a young man's life do it for the right reasons. And it's hugely important. And when I was on Bill Marr, I said We need to get involved in men's lives and Bill Marr immediately said what you just said No way if I got involved in a 15 year old boy's life they'd start saying I was a pervert and That is therein lies the problem. There is so much fraternal and paternal love out there for men who would like to find a young man or a boy to help out. It's hugely rewarding for them. It's profoundly meaningful for the boy.

And people are afraid of it and look at it and it's got to stop. It's got to stop. The majority there are so many good men out there that have love to give, but just on a word to put it. many good men out there that have love to give, but just on a word to put it. Before we got started, you were telling me about some lesion or limb that you had lopped off because you're raging and parts of you break. I've been thinking about this for a while. We talk a good bit between us about the plight of young men and then finding their place in the world and all of the rest of it. But there's an interesting period of life at least that I'm in at the moment,

which is starting to realize that I've probably passed the peak of how fit that I'm going to be, how physically attractive that I'm going to be. Now, I can compliment that with status and wisdom and grace and confidence and poison, all of the rest of the stuff. But this is such a weird thing to talk about, aging gracefully as a man, not just in the way that you look, but in the way that you think about yourself, you know, not having the same level of energy that you may be used to and all the rest of it and

With diet and training and things you can extend it but when you get to whatever 35 40 It is a You sort of hit this top of a hill and then you start to roll down the other side You're like well, it's like the story of the first time that your son beats you up basketball You realize that you've kind of passed the crown on a little bit What do you say to young, to guys who are in the 30s and 40s and realizing that age is no longer just a number, but actually a thermodynamic of their life? Yeah, we feel your pain set three and a half billion women. I mean, what you just described, a women feel this worse than men. And because reality

is, how old are you Chris? 35. Okay, so this is the bottom line. In terms of the romantic or sexual marketplace, your currency is going to continue to go up because you're going to get wealthier over the next 10 years. And unfortunately, unfortunately, women are disproportionately valued on their physical appearance in terms of sexual currency and men unfortunately are unfortunately are disproportionately valued on their economic strength and influence and yours is going to increase. So you know in Sex and the City they called it the Power Flip and that is your currency in the marketplace is probably going to increase over the next 15 years. In terms of your own physicality, I mean, you work out a ton. I mean, you're probably not going

to feel it. I felt it at 47 when I really felt the slow down. Like, I just couldn't, I was used to be able to row, you know, 2,000 meters and whatever was 7.5 minutes. And no matter how hard I train, I just couldn't any longer. You know, there's just certain things that just start to go away and your body starts to starts to break down. And then what's weird is the perception of I used to be the youngest person in every room. I'd walked in. I was I got I had a lot of success early. One to kid. Yeah, I was always the youngest person in the room. I'm, oh, that's the young guy. That's, he's the, he's a young entrepreneur. And then one day I walked in and I was the oldest.

And I felt like I was never the same age. But in terms of physically, a guy like you, and this is why you really want to establish really strong. I mean, you really, I just, I, I, I, I, I, I guess back to that advice for young men, you gotta establish physical fitness habits and nutrition habits and sleep hygiene because if you aren't and every guy that's 35 should be able to walk into any room and know if she got real, they could kill and eat everybody or out and run them. One of the other because if you don't have it by the time you're 35 or 40, if you're not strong or fast or agile

by the time you're 35 or 40, oh my God, by the time you're 50, you're just gonna be a fucking hot mess. And you're not only gonna, you may live as long, but the call your life from 50 to 80 are just gonna be substantially worse. So I don't buy, you're gonna be fine until you're 50. What happens at 50 is you get these kind of

constant reminders that life is finite and you can't stop time. And that's kind of devastating. And also, or scary, I should say, not devastating. And also, supposedly because for 98% of our time on this planet, we didn't live much past 35 or scary, I should say, not devastating. And also, supposedly because for 98% of our time on this planet, we didn't live much past 35 or 40, our brain can't literally can't process how we look. So when I see myself in the mirror,

it's devastatingly strange to me. It's like, it's horrifying. The uncanny valley of yourself. Yeah, you're like, okay, what is that alien being that should have died 15 years ago from a bone cut hunting a mammoth or something, but it's aging as I'm fascinated by it. It does, uh, as, you know, the physical part of it is hard,

um, but those habits you said in your 20s and 30s, good or bad will carry or not into your 40s and 50s, but there's just no getting around it. Men have it so much better than women because when a woman hits her 40s and 50s, but there's just no getting around it. Men have it so much better than women, because when a woman hits her 40s and 50s, it just gets, we can maintain our romantic or sexual currency. It is much harder for a woman. Society, I find that society in terms of the marketplace for mating is really hard on young men.

Like guys in their 20s, it's just hard to get arrested because the women, the most attractive women in their 20s, generally speaking, are usually dating up age wise. They want men that are more emotionally and economically viable. So a guy in his 20s just has a really hard time wants to be in a relationship. I remember thinking in my 20s I'd be such a great boyfriend and I just couldn't get arrested. Just couldn't get arrested And then I think the world becomes Increasingly fair to them in their 30s and then disproportionately Advantage to them in their 40s and the exact opposite is true of women

Well, this is why the the discolors online is dominated by people in their 20s, right? And that means that at the moment, the mating market is very much well-betied young men, men are falling behind, twice as many men are single than women. This is how many men that haven't had sex and can't get a swipe on Tinder and so on and so forth. But I think you're right. I think that the scales are run about balancing your 30s and then they pivot back in your 40s. And there's a, you know, in my, in all guys, more juvenile moments, there is a very bitter kind of satisfaction that the women who maybe

denied you when you were 22 are potentially going to be chasing after you when you're 42 and it's a incredibly immature mindset, but it's definitely one that I see on the internet. For all of the struggles of young men are having in mating as younger men, the fear is that they never developed those skills and they end up alone their whole lives and And that lack of a romantic relationship leads to economic insecurity, depression, and they're just unviable mates the rest of their lives. They never dig out of that hole. But Ivo has said New York is the bobsled of a capitalist society and it kind of indicates where the whole world is going. And the reality is New York is optimized for two types of people.

For 40-something successful men, and 20-something attractive women. And it's a fucking Disneyland for both those groups, and for everybody else, it's a soul-crushing experience. Be a nice guy who's got his act together in your 20s or 30s, a good person, but you're not making bank, you can't get arrested.

Be an interesting woman, attractive, single, in her late 30s or early 40s in New York. That's not a good place to be either. And I feel like the world is becoming more like New York and less than less. And what we need is more places and opportunities for men and women to really get to know each other and spend time with each other, such that they can again

sort of fall in love instead of this kind of like swipe left or swipe right society or this consumptive culture but yeah you're Chris Ida you're gonna be you're gonna be just fine. I appreciate that as my non-pidophilic elderly advisor here. Thanks for that. Thanks for that. I'll get a T-shirt that says that. That could be your epigraph. One of my friends, Alex Hormozzi, has a masculinity and six words, do no harm, take no shit.

And I think that that's a nice summary. Dude, I appreciate the hell out of you. Thank you for all of the support and continuing to chill my memes on CNN or wherever else it is that you go, Bill Ma. What's next? You've got two bucks next year, one book at least next year. I got a book coming out of financial literacy called the Audra of Wealth. I'm starting to think about writing a book on masculinity, although everyone I'm run into is writing a book on masculinity, or trying

to redefine it. And you know, just doing the same thing. Got my podcast, got my, you know, I got my sons for another five years. So I'm trying to lean into that a bunch. We just went to the Brentford man. Was it Brentford? Yeah, Brent, I'm sorry, Brentford West Ham game on Saturday. We're going to Arsenal, Sevilla tomorrow night.

So I'm just really enjoying the shit out of that. Yeah, you being completely anglicized from York. Totally. I'm just really enjoying the shit out of that. You see you being completely anglicized from your totally. I'm drinking tea right now. Look at this. I'm drinking tea. It's pretty milky. That's kind of that would be that would be considered a builder's brew in certain areas of the UK. But you are down south. So I'll give you that. I'm a rangers. I'm a Texas Rangers fan. they won the World Series. So we've swapped nationalities in terms of our sporting desires. Scott Galloway, ladies and gentlemen, Scott, I appreciate you. I can't wait to have you back on to talk about financial literacy and whatever the hell else

you write next. Thanks, Chris. Congrats on your success. Offends, get offends