Red Scare - Mentally Challengeders

Episode Date: May 28, 2024

The ladies review Challengers. 

["All The Things You Said"] Back. Hello. Anna. Hey. Anna, are you there? Hello. Hello. Hey. Can you hear me? Is anyone out there?

Our last episode was our 400th, by the way. Really? I realized. That's so insane. And we still, yeah, we still start off the show stuttering. So how many hours is that? Oh yeah, we still start off the show stuttering and stuff. So how many hours is that? Because let's say we average like an hour and a half

per episode if you factor in the early episodes which were really short. Yeah, 90 minutes times nine. So that's 36,000 minutes of audio. How to divide that by 60. So 600 hours. Wow. Is that correct? Is that, that sounds about right.

Yeah. That's fucking crazy. Man, we've been yapping for 600 hours. When will these bitches shut the fuck up? Oh my God. We've spent 600 hours of our lives collectively yammering into a microphone. Yeah, when we could have been hitting a ball with a racket. So I have to be honest with you.

I suggested sort of vaguely that we should touch on the Iranian president dying in a helicopter crash and mentioned some Serbian minister getting stabbed but I like didn't. Slovakian prime minister was shot I think or I think shot but survived, survived like critical condition. Yeah, but I have nothing to say about either of those events. I mean, it's pretty crazy, but I can't provide any meaningful analysis of the situation.

My only meaningful analysis is that these things tend to come in threes, so who will be next? You heard it, yeah. Armenian curse, the Armenian curse has been issued. We just have to pray that it's not. But when you killed Anthony Bourdain. I do. So I don't wanna be the one to kill Donald Trump

because. Don't even say it, Anna. It's not gonna be DT. I love that man to death. And he's gonna be in the Bronx tomorrow. I know, I did not register for for his even though he emails me and texts me all day long. I know. Dasha what are you wearing? Yeah I got that one. I was like it did when it comes through because you just see the top of it. I mean it's from like an unknown number. I was like oh my god what? And then I was like oh it's Donald Trump again. You're like the son of Sam. I'm wearing it. Do you think he's speaking to you personally?

Well he does say like Dasha I love you. You're like sexting with Trump. I'm wearing it. You think he's speaking to you personally? Well, he does say like, Dasha, I love you. You're like sexting with Trump. I know, I'm responding. Yeah, I won't be at his rally. That's me knocking on wood. Okay, curse has been lifted. That's good. Yeah, I would never go in a helicopter. And I'm not even like, even close to being

ahead of state. Not even a little bit. Like if I had any kind of power. I mean, Kobe Bryant. I mean, yeah, I mean, the list goes on. Did you know Kobe Bryant was Catholic? No, I didn't know that. And him and his daughter took communion before going getting on that helicopter so they're we're probably in a state of grace. That's great. That's good to know. The pope went on 60 minutes also. Okay. Which I also didn't watch. What do you say? I saw some people like chimping, because he said he thinks every person is basically good in their heart, which is true.

I mean, that people can, you know, live in deeply sinful ways that are like corrosive to their humanity, but like, that he basically does not believe in like total depravity. The way that like a Calvinist does is shouldn't be a surprise to people because he's not he's a he's the Pope. But okay, don't the Calvinists only believe in total depravity for the personally convenient reason that they get to be morally superior and act like they're the saved ones?

If you wanna be cynical about it. Yeah, I mean, I'm sure they have like theological justifications that are compelling maybe, but that's one of the issues, yeah, with Protestantism is that it's like, yeah, it's this kind of, because they think they're justified by their faith alone, they have this, yeah, moral high ground that they have to occupy.

But a lot of Protestants are genuinely very good, I think also. Yeah, I'm sure. I think it's probably nice to be a good person and then also think that, yeah. But it's nice. I think that should be like everyone's default state to go through life, acting as if most people are good at heart, not because they are, but because if you believe the opposite, that makes for a very cynical and paranoid vision of life in the world. And when many people feel that way, then you have like a game theory problem where everyone kind of reaches suboptimal equilibrium. You should be merciful and forgiving of others

because you want God to be merciful. For your own sake, not theirs, yeah. Because you understand that the mercy that you'll be shown at your final judgment will be in proportion to how merciful you were towards others. So if you're an unforgiving and grudge holding piece of shit. Then.

Sober. Then. Sober. Yeah. If you're an Al-Anon, no, I don't know. I mean, I just told you how I went to see the Glenn V. Dersh debate, and I really liked when Glenn took the podium to give his opening remarks that he said that he's not gonna try to like psychoanalyze Dersh

or figure out what's in his heart, like morally or spiritually, that he's just gonna proceed with the kind of circumstantial argument, which he did and he won. We love. Yeah. Bravo. He didn't like try to put in Dersh. Yeah.

He didn't use enhanced interrogation techniques. So I think like you should go through life like basically believing to the best of your ability that most people are good or can be good and treating them by their deeds and their actions. Yeah, yeah. That's sound. I don't know what else. Sorry that else gobbledygook. I don't know what else the Pope said. It's too hard to watch. You have to get like Paramount Plus. I can't.

Yeah. And my project. I have to like a weird one. Yeah. I was like, what? How is it so hard to watch 60 minutes? I know. Should there be an app? It is an app, right? No, well Paramount Plus, but there should just be a 60 minutes.com like that you can go on. Cause I would love to watch 60 minutes. Wait, you've just come up with a great new business model of turning individual franchises into apps

versus like the networks or outlets that broadcast them. Yeah, we could have been increasing our, I'll pay. I'll pay for whatever. I'm still paying for boingo wireless. I haven't used it in 20 years. I don't even wanna know what I'm still paying for. I know, you really don't. I'm like doubled up on random subscriptions

to magazines that I don't even read. And sometimes I'll like sign up for stuff with like our Red Scare account and then forget and then sign up for the New York Times again to read some paywalled article because I'm too stupid. Just making a bunch of shell emails every time you lose your log into the New York Times. Yeah, so since we don't know about Iran or Slovakia, which we should a little. Yeah. We're going to talk about challengers.

We can touch on the microplastics. Oh yeah. Though, smoking gun, like they didn't tell us anything we didn't know already. It's like the Twitter files. It's also like the study, you know, it's like the, they tested how many, not even that many balls. I think it was like 47 canine,

no, whatever, 47 canines and 23 humans. And the humans were dead. Yeah. The study was based on autopsies of men ranging from 16 to 88. And then the canines were all recently neutered. Yeah, that's where they got the most of the balls. Yeah, so not dead.

Yeah, but all of them had microplastic. But that's not that many, like, that's not that big of a sample size. Right. Though I am like dogs, you know, they just love to chew on plastic. Yeah, they're literally eat plastic. That's like a big part of a dog's life is like eating plastic. So like, I'm not that worried about the dog. Their balls aren't even filled with microplastics. They're filled with macroplastics, but they chewed up and turned into microplastics themselves. So that's not a problem.

But I guess the study did find that in dogs specifically, there is a correlation between microplastics and lower sperm count. Well, because the balls are so full of plastic, they can't fit anymore sperm in there. That all said, all tracks. But like how significant is it? How much lower of a sperm count

and how significant is it? That lower of a sperm count and how significant is it that's a good question the hill article that you sent me to specify any of the number we need to know about the loads mm-hmm are they thick and creamy or they watery like what is it a rope of come I'm gonna have to conduct my own studies. You're gonna become a dog girl. I meant to humans. I don't fuck dogs as I've sat on this podcast many times. As I've been saying for 400 episodes of this show.

Yeah, that's the article. Yeah. But there was a, I didn't understand why the microplastics discourse was veering its ugly head, no pun intended, yet again. Yeah, I looked it up. It was like that meme that was like, maybe microplastics aren't such a bad thing.

And it was like a picture of George Costanza and a picture of Timothee Chalamet, like 30-year-olds in 1990 versus 30-year-olds in 2024. Yeah. But I do, I would believe that there is probably some correlation between like microplastics and neoteny. You think? I mean, people looked older back in the day

because of hairstyles and lifestyles. It's a multi-factor thing. There's so many factors. Yeah. I don't think it's the microplastics making people more neotenous. I think it could hypothetically maybe perhaps play a part, but there need to be more studies, just kidding.

No new studies. No new studies. We can just observe, yeah. I mean, there's clearly something going on yeah I wouldn't chalk it all up to microplastics no something's going on definitely something's going on there's all sorts of other like horrible chemicals that we're coming into contact with at all but is it not during the day good not just aesthetically but isn't doesn't it correlate also like just aesthetically but isn't doesn't it correlate also like positively to repeat would say right that that means you're like forever young yeah that a youthful appearance is like a sign of health

i don't know that's a good question i would assume so yeah there's a reason that like a an an aged and haggard appearance has been not so popular. For vile throughout time. And like the cause of like witch hunts and cross burning. Though I guess during the Salem witch trials, they did burn all those hot young things alive because all the old crones in the community were jealous. Exactly. That hotter, younger women were getting more attention.

Exactly. It's halos all this time. So I don't know. I don't think we're getting- Well, also George Costanza and Timothy Shatlyk, it's like, I mean, you know, we could, there's- Sample sizes too. Once again, sample sizes are not, these studies are no good. I know, I know.

These memes. Memes are the new studies. Basically, there was a study also I saw about how more people are smoking weed now than drinking alcohol. Daily consumption of cannabis has surpassed alcohol for the first time. Well, I guess that's what happens when you make it legal. consumption of cannabis has surpassed alcohol for the first time. Well, I guess that's what happens when you make it legal.

Well, it's still illegal. I learned in this, I think it was in like, Washington Times or something in like 26 states. Okay. So it's about, you know, and I think it's become more permissible and like normalized across the board. That's for sure. But also the amount of THC that like people That's for sure. But also the amount of THC that like people were consuming in like the 70s and 80s was like five milligrams and now because the you know with the pens and the distillation and like the uh the dank not the the nugs are too dank and so now

people are consuming at the Trump rally BT dubs. Well I'm not going to the Trump. No vapes at the Trump rally, BT dubs. Well, I'm not going to the Trump rally. No, I know, I'm just saying, can't bring those, that's on the list of prohibited items. Interesting. Don't be vaping up in there. Yeah, I mean, I also feel like smoking cigarettes probably. Keeps you young.

No, yields the opposite of nyatiny, it ages you prematurely so they say so they say but yeah you can point to lots of like anecdotal evidence of like french people yeah though they don't exactly look young even though they look good yeah so maybe point stands who fucking knows maybe it's the whole the weed. Maybe the weeds keeping you young because it's making you stupid. Yeah, and making your sperm count extra low. Extra low, nice smooth brain.

And so you don't have all these tumultuous thoughts. I mean, I guess it definitely feels like people are growing up slower or not even growing up at all. But again, this seems also partly like a social versus environmental thing. Yeah. We're also more exposed to people than ever before in a curated way that they, you know.

Yeah, which produces like a kind of artificial effect that people are younger because you're dealing with like the cream of the crop, like 1% of influencers have access to. Or even normal people who still are like, you know, yeah, that's true. Also that like, anti aging technologies have become more democratic and cheaper and so on. I think it's possibly, yeah, we're social scientists. I know. Look at us. I think it's possibly we're social scientists. I know look at us. I

Do you think like it is like when I was fighting with those right wing guys like a week ago because they were accusing me of Promoting trunary. Yeah, we were ousted from the dissonant, right? Like life comes at you fast I didn't even really write membership revoked. Yeah, I was like, what the fuck? I didn't even know I was in the dissonant, right? But OK, go off. I didn't realize. Oh, damn. Oh, I just thought we were like their token libtards that they kept around because we were girls. And not doctors. Yeah. came really out of left field.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But what? Who gives a shit? But my thing there was like, okay, we're all becoming more spiritually trans. If you live your life in the memeplex, you are effectively spiritually trans. So I almost wanted to be like well you have no business Opining on the lifestyle choices of others if you yourself live in denial of reality

Like yeah, if your online life has overtaken your real life I know that those things are increasingly entangled and one is no less real than the other for more and more people No, I would disagree and I would say actually if you are anonymous online, right, exactly. Then it is completely divorced from your personal identity and you can present in any kind of way. And many, many people do. No, I know.

And look, I'm sympathetic to the argument of the Anons that the reason that they're anonymous is not only because they have families and livelihoods to protect, which is a very small minority of them, but also because not being anonymous opens you up to potential future prosecution. To people knowing that you're Jewish. Yeah, so true.

That you're a Nazi if you're so Jewish. I get all that. I'm not an enemy of the Anons, exactly. No, no, no. But yeah, when your whole identity is basically a fake one, you are literally equivalent to a trans person. Yeah.

Well, yeah. And they would say much like a trans person. Well yeah, and they would say much like a trans person would that like because of their anonymity they're able to be more real because of the oppressive structures of our society. So yeah, live your life. So but in