Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 468 | America’s Narcissism Problem & How to Fix It | Guest: Matt Walsh

Episode Date: August 10, 2021

Today we're talking to the Daily Wire's Matt Walsh, host of "The Matt Walsh Show," about pretty much everything wrong with America right now. And a lot of it has to do with how narcissistic and selfish so many people have become. Right before the show, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced his resignation. That's awesome, but what's less awesome is the Left still won't acknowledge all of the deaths that occurred in nursing homes during the pandemic on his watch. Then we discuss some of the instances in which the Left automatically labels someone "racist" when anything happens, then never backs down when proven wrong. Plus, Simone Biles' recent pro-choice statements and the most important topic of all: How harshly should we punish cyclists who take up the road? --- Today's Sponsors: Good Ranchers safely delivers American craft beef and better-than-organic chicken, right to your door! Go to GoodRanchers.com/ALLIE to get $20 off & free express shipping. Fundrise has a team of real estate professionals who carefully vet and manage all their real estate projects. See for yourself how 150k investors have built a better portfolio with private real estate. Go to Fundrise.com/RELATABLE. Red Pill Book Club delivers a book to your doorstep every month that addresses the challenges we face as mothers in this culture. This is a simple way to integrate this fight into your everyday life. Go to RedPillBook.Club/ALLIE to join the book club & receive 25% off your first month. --- Buy Allie's book, You're Not Enough (& That's Okay): Escaping the Toxic Culture of Self-Love: https://alliebethstuckey.com/book Relatable merchandise: https://shop.blazemedia.com/collections/allie-stuckey

Hey, this is Steve Day. If you're listening to Allie, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity, and reality itself. On the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested against first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality. We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort.

We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over hype and clarity over chaos. If you're looking for commentary grounded in conviction and unwilling to lie to you about where we are or where we're headed, you can watch this D-Day show right here on Blaze TV or listen wherever you get podcasts. I hope you'll join us. Hey guys. Welcome to Relatable. Hope everyone is having a wonderful day. Today I'm talking to Matt Walsh. And I am still like I just filmed the interview. So I film the interview and then I come back and I do the introduction. And I'm still like trying not to laugh because the end of the interview. just really made me laugh. And I know you guys are going to enjoy it. We talk about all kinds of things. We talk about Governor Cuomo resigning, which happened. I am shooketh. I am shocked by that. I am shocked. And so now Walsh and I are going to talk about that. We are going to talk about Simone Biles, his take on that. Also, her saying on Instagram that she is pro-choice.

we are going to talk about this trend of falsely accusing people of racism based on like these decontextualized clips and how terrible and toxic it is for society. We talk about some more philosophical, theological things as well. We talk about this kid James Younger who unfortunately his mom is pressuring him to be a girl. She was awarded full custody. So we're going to talk about a whole variety of things. And then the last subject is the one that made me laugh that I'm sure. that you guys are going to enjoy. So lots to cover, lots of thoughts from Matt Walsh. And without further ado,

here he is. Matt, thank you so much for joining us. There's a few things I want to talk to you about today. But since this just happened, as we're recording this, Andrew Cuomo resigning, I just want to get your reaction to that. I saw you talking about it a few days ago on Twitter, but what's your reaction now that it's actually happened? Well, I guess the lesson for Andrew Cuomo is that you can kill thousands of elderly people and that'll be okay. But if you make uncomfortable comments to women, that's a bridge too far. I mean, that is the lesson here because if it wasn't for the sexual harassment scandal, that little detail about the mass slaughter that went on in New York, that would not have brought him down. He survived that.

In fact, he thrived through that. And it's this, this is what takes him down. So I don't know exactly how to feel about that. him. I don't like Andrew Cuomo, obviously like any other conservative. I don't like him. And I especially don't like him because of what he did in New York through COVID. But I don't know how this reflects on our culture that this is what brings a politician down and not the other thing. I know a lot of conservatives would say, well, who cares? He's going down one way or another. And so I can understand that. I'm also worried about, because I'm always looking at the,

I'm always finding the dark cloud within the silver lining. That's my gig. So here's another dark cloud, which is who comes after him? Are we? sure that whoever replaces him. I don't know anything about the lieutenant governor, but is she going to be better than Andrew Cuomo in any way? I'm not sure. I guess what I may as to be seen. Well, I think that's what I was wondering. What's happened over the past few days that he decided that he was going to resign? There's got to be something going on behind the scenes because like what's the upside for him. Like you said, he survived and thrived through what I think

was the biggest scandal of the past year and a half for him. And now he crumbles because a few people. These are bad accusations. I'm not saying that they're not, but because a few people accuse him of sexual harassment. Now he is stepping down really quickly. I mean, it just makes me think that there's something going on there, that there were reasons why people didn't want him to be in power. I don't know. It's kind of conspiratorial. It just seems a little fishy to me, don't you think? Yeah, I'd say so. There's also the question of why, why did everyone on the left turn on him, the media, his fellow Democrats. turned on him quickly. I don't think we've ever, I'm not going to say ever, but it's not often that we see something like this, a rise and fall, this dramatic within a year, because it's within one year. I mean, a year ago, or at least a year and a half ago, he was being hailed as the hero of the pandemic. He was beloved, at least by people on the left. The media certainly loved him.

He got an Emmy. He got a multi-million dollar book deal. And then he's at the sort of his political heights, and then he crashes down, and they all turn on him. That's not, the media doesn't often do that. I mean, usually they're going to either ignore something like this or they'll circle their wagons around their guy. The Democrats generally do that. They don't often turn on their own like this, which does, which does get my own conspiratorial intent up a little bit. And it might be something as simple as they started to see him as a threat for 2024. And they don't think he should be the guy. They want maybe Camila to be the person. And maybe that's, maybe that's what he did wrong ultimately to earn this. I don't know.

I thought about that too. I was thinking about that a few months ago when it was heating up about what he did with the nursing homes. And then there was also kind of the beginning of talks of recall of Gavin Newsome, which is obviously going to happen. And it made me think, okay, were these 2024 contenders at the Democratic Party didn't want to get in the way of Kamala? Now, I don't know how true that is because Kamala is so unpopular. I'm like, surely they're not going to try to get her to run against Ron DeSantis. But I mean, who the heck knows? So I was thinking about that conspiracy too. But I do hate that this kind of gives Democrats a way to say, look, we hold our people accountable. This is what we do, whereas the Republicans don't care about integrity and their leaders

at all. We really care about integrity. I've seen people kind of have that reaction and it just makes me roll my eyes. What do you think about that? Yeah. Yeah, well, that's, I mean, that's one thing on the left is that, first of all, they're always on offense. I think the right can learn something from that. Nothing that happens can ever prove them wrong or ever give them a reason to apologize or to say, oh, we got that one wrong, because these are the people that were hailing him as a hero identifying themselves as quomosexuals. And rather than saying, oh, we got an egg on our face on that one, that's embarrassing. They're saying, oh, no, this proves how great we are. It's kind of like with the, you know, the Olympic weightlifter, the guy who, well, you know about that Olympic weightlifter.

Yeah, exactly. And he flunks out of the. Olympics and in the left, rather than saying, well, this was embarrassing, they say, oh, this, this proves our case. He didn't, he didn't, or rather, she, they would say, she didn't succeed. So that proves that there's no problem here. The right is making a big deal out of nothing. So they're always doing that and they do that in this case. But, but of course, I don't buy it at all. They're very selective about who they decide to hold accountable. Yeah. And I guess the question, why was, why did Andrew Cuomo draw the short sticks as far as that goes? I get, maybe we'll never know exactly.

Hey, this is Steve Day. If you're listening to Allie, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity, and reality itself. On the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested against first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality. We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort. We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over hype and clarity over chaos. If you're looking for commentary grounded in conviction and unwilling to lie to you about where we are or where we're headed, you can watch this D-Day show right here on Blaze TV or listen wherever you get podcasts.

I hope you'll join us. Speaking of holding accountable, I want to talk about a couple stories that have been circulating over the past couple weeks. There is, as you've seen, a mob that likes to, quote, hold people accountable when they think that someone is being credibly accused of racism. So like, you know, the viral videos will come out without any context, without any proof whatsoever. The person is deemed some kind of white supremacist in their life is ruined. That happens to this woman named Amy Cooper. And I'm sure you've seen maybe over the past couple of days she did an interview with Barry Weiss where basically she gives some other details. And there are other people that corroborate the details that she gave that shows that, okay, maybe she wasn't like completely unjustified in calling the police on this guy who seemed to be maybe implicitly threatening.

her dog. I'm sure most people remember this story. And then there was this poor grandfather at the Rockies game. I think it was last night who was saying Dinger, which is the name of the mascot, who was then accused of saying the inward and it was investigated, you know, by the MLB and the Rockies. And they basically accused him of this thing that he did not do and never apologize for it. I want to hear your take on this, like this trend of accusing people of racism when we just don't have any details and ruining their lives and no one saying sorry for it after. I think part of the key here is that the outrage mob, they only care about getting the scalp. They don't actually care.

Each person they go after, this is why they're so ruthless about it. And it's also why, by the way, the apologies never work. You know, you start groveling and apologizing. You shouldn't do that, number one, because you should have more dignity and self-respect. But also, it's not going to work. It won't matter because it's not really about you. it's almost like it's nothing personal. They're destroying your life because of what you represent to them,

which is, you know, if it's a racial thing, then you're a representative of whiteness. And especially a grandfather at the game with his, with his grandkids, with his family, that's a representative of he's an older guy. He's white. He's male. So he's a representative of all those things.

And those are all bad, they say. And so it doesn't matter if he actually said it or not. Because what they would say and what they have been saying after it comes out that of course he didn't. say the N-word. And that's the other, a quick aside here. Let's just have some kind of accurate understanding of human nature and what sorts of things people will actually do and not do. What are the chances that some guys sitting in the front row of a baseball game would just, knowing he's on camera, just starts shouting the N-word at the top of his, of the top of his

lungs for no reason. What is he saying? I'm going to destroy my life right now at this baseball game, just for the sake of it. Of course he wasn't saying that. But after that, out and you see some people in the outrage mob, their response is, well, he could have been saying it and people do say these things. And so this is a problem. And whether or not he specifically actually said it doesn't matter because this is still a systemic problem and so on and so forth. And so they can continue, you know, throwing their stones. Well, when you watch the video, and I'll back up a little bit just in case some people didn't even know about this story, you watched this video of this grandfather, like you said, sitting there with, I guess,

his wife and his grandkids trying to get the attention of the mascot to come over and take a picture, which I guess the name is Dinger. Someone caught it on camera. They showed it on social media. People thought that it was the N-word. But if you look at the context at all, like, look at the people that are standing around him. No one is paying attention to what he's saying. Do you think if this guy was really yelling the inward at a black player, everyone would just be sitting there and being like, oh, yeah, you know, that's perfectly fine. No, people would obviously be freaking out about that. There would have been some ruckus that was raised as he was, as he was yelling that. But, I mean, there are a lot of people, unfortunately, especially on the

left, who really do think there are just like flagrant white supremacists walking around who do that kind of thing. They think that kind of thing is very common. And the statements that were put out by both the MLB and the Colorado Rockies basically say that. Like it was like, you know, justice and equality are just elusive in this day and age. And this is just indicative of where we are. It seems like these people live in a completely different reality than the rest of us, and it colors their judgment a lot. Yeah, they do. I mean, this is, they really do believe. Now, I think when we say they, we have to stipulate a little bit because the people in positions of power and influence in our culture, the race hustlers that are perpetuating a lot of this stuff,

I don't think they actually buy it, but many of the average people on social media and elsewhere, that's what they believe about the country that they're living in. And they've been told this from a young age. I mean, kids now with critical race theory in schools and everything, they're being indoctrinated into this belief system from a very young age. And they really do think that they live in a country where, you know, because as you point out, no, he's shouting this. Nobody even reacts to it. And, of course, you and I as rational people, we know that, number one, he's not going to start shouting that word. even if he was the most flagrant racist in the world, he's not going to do that right then and there in that context

and just jump on a grenade and destroy his life for the sake of it, but also no one else is reacting like they would. But I think people who are delusional look at that and they say, well, you know, this is so common that the other people there were probably also racist and it was the most normal thing in the world for them to be. They're probably at their barbecues at their houses and just shouting the N-word recreationally. It's just what they do.

So of course they're not going to react to it. It's completely diluted. But that is the version of the world that they live in. It's just a, and it's sad in some ways. Yeah, I feel the worst for the targets of the outrage mob. But I also do in some ways feel a little sorry for some of the people in that mob. They live such a miserable and fear-driven life that this is the kind of world they think they live in. There was another video that went viral.

I don't know if you saw it the other day where from one angle, it looked like this police officer who had pulled over these two guys. I think both of them were black. It looked like from the perspective of the driver that was taking the video that the police officer had put, like, had planted a bag of drugs in the car and everyone was freaking out. Rex Chapman, which is, he's one of the biggest peddlers of misinformation on Twitter. He said, you know, this is systemic racism. It turns out you see from the body cam from the police officer that that's not what happened at all. He had found to like the top of a baggie in the pocket of another guy that they were, you know, checking out and he just kind of put it down to do whatever he was doing.

But, I mean, this guy, he was probably doxed. And he could have gotten in trouble. He could have gotten threatened. His life could have been ruined if this grandfather had been identified. Amy Cooper's life was certainly ruined by all of this. And those that perpetuate the narrative, whether or not it's true, they really don't care. They really don't care.

Like, where do you think that callousness comes from? Because they're not losing a wink of sleep at night, the people that piled on this grandfather or any of these other people now that they have been proven wrong. It just doesn't seem like they have compassion towards the people they falsely accused at all. Not at all, but you see the real power of when you can be callous and cruel and you can be part of the pitchfork mob, and you can go and randomly tear people to shreds and throw stones at them, but also feel morally justified in doing it.

Feel like you're, you know, this is part of some greater good where you're given moral license. That's when it becomes very dangerous. And so I think everyone in the mob, that's how they feel. They feel like they think, they believe, they've told themselves, convince themselves at least, that they're struggling against some greater evil.

So it goes back to for them, the actual details of this case don't matter that much, especially when it comes to police officers. So they see that, and it doesn't matter, did he actually plant the drugs? Who cares as far as they're concerned? This kind of thing happens, they would say. They would say it happens all the time. And so this is our way of calling attention to it. And this police officer, if he didn't plant drugs that time, he probably has done it before, and he's definitely a racist. And that's all we need to know. They're not going to apply any common sense. Because you have to, in order to not fall victim to that, I think you have to have some kind of moral bearing.

And also you have to have common sense. You have to understand the way the world works. And that's often enough for me. Anytime we see these, you know, very often when we see these kinds of out-of-context police videos and usually there's a shooting or something. And you hear the claim, oh, a cop just walked up and shot someone dead. And before I even look at the video, I always say, well, I'm. I'm almost certain that didn't happen before I even see the video because that's not the way the world works usually. It could have happened. I'll watch it, but probably not. But for them, you know, their prior assumption is that this stuff happens all the time.

And so that's probably what happened here. Yeah. And just to note, just for people listening on the Amy Cooper thing, I don't know exactly. All I'm saying about the Amy Cooper thing is not that she was necessarily in the right because if people remember she was the lady at the dog park, she had her dog off the leash. this bird watcher told her, you know, I'm going to call your dog over here. You're not going to like what I'm about to do. She threatened to call 911. The thing that she said that I thought was pretty egregious was, well, I'm going to call the cops and tell them an African American man is approaching me. That does seem kind of threatening. But the point I'm making is that there were other apparently complicated details that don't make this so cut and dry. And I just don't think, like in the age of everyone, especially on the left talking constantly about nuance and the importance

of nuance. Like there's no nuance to be had whatsoever when it comes to accusing some people on social media of racism. And it's really sad. Like this one USA Today writer, he said that the grandfather, it's a blue checkmark. The grandfather should be put in jail because of what he said. I mean, that's crazy. Yeah. And that goes, another part of this, there's nuanced, context and everything like we've been talking about, also a sense of proportionality. So when you're talking about the situation with a dog walker, that, yeah, there's more to the story, there's more context, all that's important. And of course, all of that is lost in the shuffle because in this day and age, everything is simplified. And once you're cast as the villain, that's it. Context does not

matter. In fact, we've been told that explicitly that context makes no difference. Well, in certain circumstances. Like if you riot and burn down a building as part of a BLM protest, then we have to see all kinds of context and understand within the greater. Yeah, so on so forth. But also, But even putting all that aside, there's also the matter of proportionality. I mean, let's just say that the woman in the case you're talking about was totally in the wrong and she was as wrong as everyone assumed. Does that mean that she needs to be, that the entire country needs to condemn her? This needs to be an international story. We need all of the media.

She needs to be in the headlines. Everyone needs to talk about it and think about it. They took her dog away. They took her dog away. That's crazy. It's like I would relate it to. another case kind of similar to that of the woman who the media calls Soho Karen. I don't even remember her real name, but she got into an altercation with a black teenager in

the, in California, in the lobby of a hotel. And she thought that the kid had taken her phone. And she was confronting him. And she was totally crazy. And he didn't take the phone. And she was out of bounds. And she was completely in the wrong. And this becomes, you know, now the family is like suing the hotel over it. And it becomes this whole thing. And there's rallies and press conferences and everyone's talking about it. And it's just like, yeah, she's in the wrong, but this is a crazy eccentric woman. Why does everyone in the country need to know about this? Why is this now a matter of urgent national importance? And I think that's kind of lost in the shuffle also. And I mean, people's lives are ruined over this. There is another, I mean,

this has happened a lot over the past year because unfortunately these people are like rewarded and patted on the back for taking these kinds of videos. But there was this one woman that was accused of cutting this guy off and he followed her to her apartment, like filmed her license plate number, filmed her address. It was, of course, it was a white woman who had apparently allegedly like cut him off or something. And so she's effectively doxed because of a normal negative interaction that people have on a daily basis. Like, why are we seeking this kind of, like you said, disproportionate, retribute?

on people, especially along racial lines. I guess it's because of what you said. Like, it's rewarded on social media. People go viral. People will do anything for just, I don't know, that, like, dopamine hit of, you know, getting a lot of retweets. But I don't know. What do you think that we can do to rectify this kind of thing?

If we're going to keep talking about it, which just brings these kinds of things more attention, maybe that's counterproductive. How do we push back on that? Yeah, I mean, I wrestle with that. also, especially when my complaint about some of these stories is that we shouldn't be talking about them, but now I'm talking about it by even saying we shouldn't talk about it. So what do you do about that? But the only other option, as far as we're concerned, is to say nothing and just leave this

person to be torn apart by the pack of hyenas on social media. And I don't think that's the right thing. So we're kind of forced to speak up as far as a solution. I don't know that there is any quick switch we can flip on any of our cultural problems, but certainly has to begin at least with decent normal people, being decent normal people and speaking up when it's when it's time to speak up. I think that has to be the first step also. And we also know one of the reasons why these kinds of stories get the attention that they do

is because we've decided as a society that racism is not only systemic and it's everywhere, but it's also the worst thing, period. There's nothing worse. There's nothing worse a person can be other than racist. Even like a child rapist or a murderer is not as bad as a racist. And we've decided that as well as deciding that it's everywhere. And so then all these issues become issues of national importance. And like you point out, these kind of normal, if contentious, human interactions are seen now through this racial lens.

And that just confuses everything. And we see this at the, you know, there was a Michelle Obama recently was, you know, I think on her podcast telling this story about that she's still harbors a grudge over back when she was first lady and she kind of went under cover incognito to an ice cream shop and she was waiting in line and somebody cut in front of her and she's still traumatized by it to this day because she decided that it was racist there was a white woman cut in front of a black woman and this was all racism and it's part of this whole tapestry of racism and so on and so forth and then you listen to you think what i've gotten cut in front of in line many times and i'm a white male it's just it's something that happens in the world and but when you

have this framework is every single thing even if it's the most normal thing in the world is seen through that lens and it becomes a big bigger deal. Yeah, I think it's just this inflated self-importance that it's not just from our talks about race and racism that have been so prevalent over the past, especially a year and a half, but really just like the elevation of people's individual identities to the point where it's the most important thing about you and therefore everything that happens to you is because of your identity, especially the negative things that happen to you. So this person treated me like this because I'm a woman or because I'm gay or because I'm this skin color,

whatever. And it's just, I think it's a consequence of narcissism that people assume that everyone's thinking about them when the reality is, is that no one's really thinking about us. Like, we're thinking about ourselves. But very few people actually have other people out to get them simply because most people are thinking about themselves and not other people. I just think it has to do a lot with this kind of you are so special culture that we've created a lot longer than the past five years, I would say, over the past

few decades, don't you think? Yeah, I think you're exactly right, first of all, that that's a really important thing for people to learn because it makes them more well-adjusted and mature and less selfish people, but it's also kind of liberating, I think, to realize that very few people actually are thinking about you

in the world or care that much about you. Most people, most everyone that's ever existed on earth and exists on earth now doesn't know about you, doesn't know you and never will. And the people that do, most of them don't care that much and aren't thinking about you. The circle of people who really care and think about you is pretty small. Even them, even those people, are mostly thinking about themselves because we are egocentric people by nature. So that's an important thing to learn. But as you point out, in this culture now, it's all about the identity. And I think it goes even deeper than that because it's not even that the most important thing is your

own individual identity. It's actually, the most important thing is how you feel. about your identity. So it's your feeling of it is the self's feeling about itself. That is the most important thing. There's a book, a really great book called The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self by Carl Truman. Yep, I've read it. And he talks about a philosopher called Philip Reef, who kind of separates the ages of man, the ages of humanity into these. There's a political man and there was, you know, a religious man. And he says we're now living in the era of psychological man. And the most important thing in the era of, of psychological man is your own psychological state and how you feel about yourself. And it is,

and that means that it is everyone else's job to affirm your own feelings about yourself. And then from that starting point, we see a lot of the craziness all around us. I think in this age of, in this age of self-love, which is ironic and self-help and self-empowerment and self-self, we're told that that is the most important thing for you to achieve. If you love yourself, then all of these good things will finally manifest. But at the same time, we've seen such a rise in anxiety, such a rise in depression, such a rise in all these mental health issues. So, like, how can it be that if we're told that the real problem in the world is that people

don't love themselves enough? And if we all just loved ourselves more, then we would, I don't know, live out John Lennon's imagine or something like that. But that's obviously not the case. Like, we're told to focus on ourselves more. And we're more miserable. Like, we're more divided. We're more offended.

we're more sensitive, we're more fearful than we've ever been. I think social media and technology also play a role in that. Like, when are people going to realize that, okay, maybe the solutions that we're putting on people are actually making it worse. And if we just went back not to self-loathing, but to a state of kind of self-forgetfulness and a willingness towards self-sacrifice and inconvenience, all of these things that we're told, like, we shouldn't embrace nowadays. maybe, maybe society would be a little bit better and even more cohesive. What do you think?

Yeah, I mean, I couldn't agree more. And part of the problem here is not only there's the intense focus on self-love, which is a huge part of the problem. And I agree with you that it's not that we're supposed to hate ourselves. That's not good either. But more just stop thinking about yourself so much. Maybe try to think about something else. Find something like find a hobby. I mean, find something else to think about. Read a book that has nothing to do with any of that. Just find other things to put your focus around. But then the other part of this issue is that we see love as nothing but an emotion. And so, um, so if we're focused on self-love, what does that mean? It means that we're just sitting around on our couches, trying to make ourselves feel a certain

way about ourselves. And it's just this, it's, you just start circling the drain. And, uh, and nothing ever comes from it. If you start to see that love is an act, St. Thomas Aquinas said to love is to will the good of the other, then, yeah, in that sense, it makes sense to love yourself and that you want what is good, what is actually good for you, which may not be always what you want. So you're trying to live a healthy and well-ordered life. But also, this love is inherently an outward-facing thing. It projects out. And so you're trying to will the good of everybody around you, the people closest to you. And if you just make that your goal, you try to live a good life and help people around

you to live a good life and to bring goodness into your life and into your orbit, I think that's the key rather than sitting around worrying about your feelings. Yeah. I think the problem is the redefinition of love that we have allowed like kind of postmodern progressives to do, to take on. And that is love, like you said, that people think it's just a feeling, but they also say it's complete and total affirmation. So whatever someone says that they want or whatever they want to do, we are just supposed to affirm it. And that's what it means to be loving.

That's what it means to love your neighbor. But if love actually means, as you said, to want the best for other people, then that's going to mean, for example, that I am not going to affirm someone's delusion or, you know, especially a young person's delusion about being the opposite gender. That's not wanting what's best. for them or if you look at like the normalization of obesity as something that is healthy. It's not loving for me to affirm that.

I can be kind about it. I can be gentle and generous about it. But affirming those kinds of delusions is actually not loving at all if you see loving as something that is to really help someone, not just to make them feel good about themselves all the time. I think that's actually enabling not love. Yeah, I think that this is the great grotesque. sort of morbid irony that we're told the loving thing is to abandon someone in a situation

where they're clearly miserable and leading a really horrible life. I mean, it's like, it's like they're telling us, you see someone on a deserted island starving to death and dying of thirst. Well, it's where they want to be. Obviously, leaving there, they seem to be having a good time. They're laying on the beach. It seem to be relaxing. No, they're dying there. And so the best thing you can do is rescue them from it. And it's the same way kind of psychological. A lot of people, you bring up the gender example, the number one prime example, there are other ones related to it, like body positivity and someone who's morbidly obese, we have to affirm them in that. But there's no happiness in that. There's no happiness in self-destruction.

There's no happiness in the rejection of your own true nature. And that's why there are many things when it comes to the transgender issue, many facts where it's supposed to simply not bring. up, starting with basic facts about human biology. Another one is the insanely high suicide rate. We're talking 40% for suicide attempts in the transgender community. And that does not go down very much after the gender affirming, quote unquote, procedures, as they call it now. Even in the most progressive countries, by the way, people say, oh, well, it has to do with America not accepting these people or whatever. But even in Sweden, some of the most accepting families and communities, the most tolerant and progressive countries,

we still see a suicide rate among transgender people that is much higher than the general population. Yeah, and even if that weren't the case, I mean, even in this country, we are very affirming of transgenderism. So that, that objection doesn't make any sense. But even if we weren't, it's still 40 percent. That's a cataclysmic, catastrophic, unthinkable rate of suicide attempt. Something is going on here and it is not just that people are bullied because Look, you can find many examples through history of groups of people who have been actually persecuted in horrific, horrendous ways. We can start with slaves here in the United States, Jews in the Holocaust.

We think of persecution that is certainly far beyond anything that a transgender person in modern America in 2021 will ever experience. And yet you do not find 40% suicide rates or anything close to that. In fact, sometimes you find the opposite. You find that groups of people who are really persecuted, the suicide rates can sometimes go down because they're sort of rallying around each other. And they've got this outward villain that they're struggling against. And they can have that effect. But whether it does or not, you certainly don't find 40% suicide rates. This is something new and unique. And it requires an explanation that goes beyond the normal things that we hear from the culture. And we're not loving this group of

people by not being willing to dig into those things. I'm sure you saw the 60-minute special that interviewed several detransitioners, young people, some of the minors when they transitioned, who got, you know, life-altering surgery because their parents, their psychologists, their doctors didn't give them any pushback when they said, yeah, you know, I'm kind of troubled and I want to become a different gender. I want to get a double mastectomy or whatever. So they did these things only to realize that, okay, I had other mental health and environmental issues that were going on, then that no one even bothered to ask them about. So wasn't really the loving thing to do to allow that 15-year-old girl without parental consent

to get a double mastectomy because she said she was a boy? That actually seems like that seems like hate to me. That's the worst. In fact, it's even worse than hate because as they say, you know, indifference is far worse than hate. And I would agree with that. I think it's, so it is indifference. I don't really care about your long-term well-being.

That's what a lot of these therapists and these surgeons who do these procedures. I don't know, the girl comes in and wants to double misectomy. Does the surgeon hate that girl personally? Probably not. The surgeon just doesn't really care about that girl's well-being and would rather take the money and run. And so it's something even, yeah, it's something even worse than hate that we're doing. And meanwhile, you talk about not even asking them basic questions. And that's true.

There's really basic questions that people, especially kids struggling with these, gender confusions are not asked. Here's one, and I'm always harping on this for a reason, but when you hear, let's say, a boy says, oh, I think I'm a girl, or I'm a girl, or I want to be a girl. Well, what do you mean by that? What is a girl to you? What do you mean when you say that? What exactly do you want to be? Or what is it, what do you think you are? Tell me a little bit about this word girl that you're using. Yeah. That question, it blows my mind that no one ever. thinks to ask that because if you did and you were at to ask a young boy who says i'm a girl you would ask him that either he would have no answer at all because for him he's just babbling nonsensically

as kids do or if he has any kind of coherent answer he's going to say something like um i like the color pink i like my sister's doll house it's fun i like to play with it um i like to play with the little toy kitchen set you know that he's going to say stuff like that there are things that he associates with girlhood that he enjoys and thinks are fun. That's it. And so your response is, oh, well, go ahead and go ahead and play with the dollhouse. That's fine. But you're a boy. You're still a boy, but you can go ahead and play with the kitchen set. You can play with the dollhouse. That's, it really is as simple as that oftentimes, I think. Yeah. And there, I mean, obviously, you know, there's a whole industry kind of pushing this kind of confusion on kids, which is so

contradictory simultaneously saying, you know, boys can wear dresses, do anything they want to do. but if a boy wants to wear a dress, that means he's actually a girl. And there was, you know, people were getting upset, understandably about, I don't know, one of the Muppets who is a boy, like calling himself a princess and putting on a dress. And of course, people on the left were saying, why are conservatives mad about this? Boys can wear dresses. And I, no, no, they call him princess and they call him they. They won't even use he pronoun.

So obviously it's a way to try to confuse kids about gender, but also pushing really weird gender stereotypes. If your son comes up to you and says, hey, like, I had fun playing dress up with my sister today, that doesn't, you don't say, as you said, okay, well, that probably means you're a girl. Like, what do you want your new, what do you want your new name to be? I mean, it's completely nonsensical. And the fact that they're even professing Christians that go along with this madness. I mean, it's really, really sad. And that's the one of the men, there are so many contradictions when it comes to this subject. It's hard to even sift through all of them. That's one of the biggest ones that you just touched on that for so many years, for decades,

the goal of the left and a feminist in particular has been to break down gender constructs, what they consider artificial gender constructs, to break down traditional notions of masculinity and femininity. And what I always understood that to mean, and what it did mean originally was that, hey, if you're a girl, you can do whatever you want, and you don't have to conform to any expectations. Or if you're a boy, same thing. But now they say, oh, if you're a boy who wants to wear a dress, that means you're a girl. So before it was, if boys should be able to wear dresses, now it's, now we're back to boys can't wear dresses, because if they do, that actually means they're a girl. Yeah. So they've completely, and I know some feminists have realized

this, and that's where you get the so-called turf's trans-exclusionary radical feminist, even though there's nothing radical really about their position at all. They're just sticking with what feminists have always said. You're right. Whereas all the other ones have abandoned ship, exactly. Speaking of this subject, I don't know if you saw the latest in the James Younger case, the little now eight-year-old boy who has been, you know, going through a custody battle between his mom and dad.

The mom has insisted he's, you know, he's a twin. And the mom has insisted that this little boy thinks that he's a girl dresses him up. like a girl, calls him Luna, and I'm just saying this for the people listening. I know you know this. And the dad is like, no, you know, he's a boy. He wants to dress like a boy. And I think the dad even gives him the option of dressing like a girl when he's with him, but has tried really hard to get full custody while the judge granted full custody now to the mom, who has been trying very hard to do hormone therapy and all that kind of stuff on this eight-year-old boy in Texas for a really long time.

And man, if this is not an instance of true injustice, I don't know what it is. What's your reaction to all that? Yeah, first of all, I think you're right that the father is actually more tolerance of this stuff than even than I would be. Because if my son said he wants to dress as a girl, I'm just going to say, no, you're not doing that. Sorry, not happening.

So this is, but this is a father who is, I don't know anything else about him. I don't know him personally. Yeah. I don't know anything else about the mother. I don't know her personally. I don't need to because all I know is that the father recognizes that his son is a boy and should live as a boy and shouldn't have this madness foist on him and imposed on him. And the mother wants to turn her son into a girl, turn her son into a daughter.

And that's all we need to know to know that that child should not be with that mother. And in a sane society, this would be an easy case. This wouldn't be something that goes through the courts for years and years and then ends up how it does now. This would be really simple. Like during the divorce, the custody hearing, all the father would need to say is, hey, judge, my ex-wife is trying to turn my son into a girl and telling him he's a girl. And the judge would say, okay, well, he's going over with you then. Yeah. That's a sane society, but we don't live in that kind of society.

And there are a lot of lessons we can learn from this. It's a terrible case. I think one thing though is for for younger people single people who are not married yet this is kind of a this is kind of a red flag thing and and so when you're especially you know as a man you're maybe dating a woman and you think it's getting serious I would ask them about something like this I would I would say to them hey by the way do you think that there's any chance that a young boy could ever transition into a girl or should ever be transitioned into a girl. And if you hear anything other than hell no, run the other way.

Yeah. Because this is the nightmare scenario that you have to worry about now where your spouse decides to impose this on your kid. And when it happens, you know the entire system will be on their side. This is not a warning against getting married. I'm all about marriage and kids. I'm just saying this is one of those things you should probably be screening for in the dating process.

Yeah, that's true. I mean, obviously you hope that someone who shares the same basic worldview and theological views as you would agree with you on the subject. But unfortunately, you might not know that. I've never even thought about that that's, hey, that's probably a good question to ask someone or a good thing to know before you get married. So if you're engaged or if you're dating, probably just good to know that because you never know people's perspectives on that. And that would change your life and your kids' lives forever. That's crazy. One thing that you, I saw you talking about and that I talked about too on Instagram was Simone Biles. I think you were talking about her saying that she's pro-choice, right? Yeah. Yeah. So I want to hear you talk about that. But there's something that we disagree on when it comes to Simone Biles that I want to talk about first, since I know we agree on the abortion thing. You're very harsh against Simone Biles for saying that she is not going to compete due to mental health.

Can you explain, again, your position on that? Well, first of all, I would never, I'm never harsh on anyone, so I don't know why you would accuse me of that. That's true. That's true. You're very sweet. Thank you. I'm very gentle, I think. Yeah, I think, listen, if, first of all, if she had just not shown up at the Olympics and said, I don't want to do it, no problem. If she had shown up at the Olympics and then quit in the middle, as she did, and apologized after and said, hey, you know, I just, I was getting in my own head and I couldn't do it. And I'm sorry, I shouldn't quit, but I did. and I appreciate my team for picking up the slack. They shouldn't have had to, but they did. And then if everybody else had kind of responded to that in a normal way by sort of shaking our head and say, oh, that's really too bad, you know.

And that would be it. We move on. I probably never would have even talked about the issue because I don't care about the Olympics or gymnastics that much. But it's when what we do in our culture now, when we turn vice into virtue and we take this moment of cowardice, which is what it was. And now I'm being told that I have to celebrate it, that it's actually courageous. Not to be tolerant of it, not to be empathetic towards her, but to celebrate it as an act of courage, that is where I draw the line and say, I can't do that. And Simone Biles was leaning into that and embracing her role now as a courageous mental health advocate, never apologized to her team for putting them on a spot like that in such a way.

And not to mention depriving someone else of that spot that she ended up bailing out of. you know that that for me is where was where I had to draw the line and so that's where I stood on that. Yeah, and I agree with you and I really went back and forth on it because on the one hand, I felt the same things that you did

in bailing on your team. That seemed like a big deal to me that you could be more contrite about. At least she could have said, you know, it's crazy. She said that she had the twisties, which I'm not a gymnast, so I don't know really what that is. But apparently, you know, you lose your spot in the air and you don't really know how to land.

That does sound pretty terrifying. I don't know what that's like. But she didn't really give that explanation publicly, which made it weird. She basically just said sometimes you're not having fun. I was like, okay, well, that seems like kind of an odd reason to bail on your team. But at the same time, what I kept telling myself was, all right, but I know that she's not a weak person and she's never exemplified, at least in her professional career, any kind of selfishness and self and narcissism that we know of anyway. she seems like she is in general a team player and we know that she's not mentally weak. Like we know that she's not a weak person because she wouldn't have gotten to where she is

if that were the case. And so if someone who has been a champion for as long as she has says that she's having a hard time that she doesn't think that she can compete, then I do believe in maybe giving her the benefit of the doubt that, all right, like she just doesn't have a history of being weak and of being selfish. And so maybe it really is serious. Like maybe she really did have a serious problem. Although I do see your point that she didn't seem very like humble and sad about it.

Yeah, I think your interpretation is is charitable. I mean, I respect being charitable, even if I rarely am. But in this case, I just think because of how there's how the media reacted to it, which I think necessitated a response from people like us. And then also Simone Bile, she just didn't approach it from that angle. And I would also say, yeah, she's obviously a tough competitor most of the time. She's an extremely talented gymnast, way better than I am, which is not hard to do. She has handled a lot of pressure clearly.

But I would also say when you've been at the top of your game and you've been really, really good for a long time, and you're always the best and all of that. There's pressure that comes with that, of course. And there's a certain amount of courage that's required to kind of keep at it. But when you start to fail, you know, and when you're not, and when you're really struggling, and when you're not at the top anymore, because she was, let's not forget, she was struggling in these Olympics by her own standard. That calls on like a different kind of courage to know that, okay, I could actually go out there and I could maybe fail doing this.

I've never failed before at this, but I might fail now. And to go and do it anyway, that calls on a different kind of courage. And I think this is the first time in her recent athletic career, where that kind of courage was required, where there was actually a chance that she might fail. And she wasn't willing to do that. She wasn't willing to potentially fail in front of the entire world, and she pulled out. That's how I kind of read it. Yeah. Maybe that's the case.

I guess I have a hard time criticizing people in that position because I've never been in that. I've never been in that position. And I could never do, even if I was an athlete like that, I could probably never do what she does. And she's been super successful. So I did kind of give her the BOD. But then I was looking through her Instagram stories last night. And I saw that someone asked her about abortion. And I was like, okay, maybe she's not mentally where I thought that she was because, I mean, she gave crazy

explanations of why she is pro-choice, which is adoption is expensive, which is funny. I can get into that, which is true, but you don't pay to put your child up for adoption. The foster care system is broken, which is true. She was a product of foster care, and basically she just said, your body, your choice. You had something to say about that, so I want to hear your take on it before I talk more about it. Yeah, well, this is coming. There's something all the more disturbing and troubling about it coming from someone who as she says, was a product of the foster care system and thrived and succeeded, much to her credit,

in spite of beginning life with those kinds of struggles. Yet she's turning around now and saying it might be better that a child not exist at all be killed than go through what she did, knowing that it's perfectly possible to experience that and to still thrive and live a happy life as she is living. you know, that to me is a, it kind of goes back to a disregard and indifference for other people's lives that I think shows a certain selfishness that was also on display of the Olympics, I think. So this can, in some ways, kind of I felt like confirmed my priors a little bit about her, my instincts on on this kind of selfishness that's on display here. And as you point out, the arguments also, we should note, are just not true. First of all, the expense with adoption is not when you're putting the kid up for adoption. But even more importantly, yes, there are a lot of kids in the foster care system, and it's a very sad and terrible thing. And there are kids that are in that system for years and have hard time finding a family that will take them.

It's a very sad and terrible thing. But that is not the case for babies. I mean, there is a, there is a line miles long of couples that are waiting to adopt babies. The reason why the older kids end up there for so long is that most couples want babies because they feel like they can really, you know, bond with a child if they get the child at a young age. So if there's an unquote unwanted pregnancy and a woman is deciding between abortion and adoption and she chooses life and she chooses adoption and puts the child up for adoption as soon as the child is born, that child will be adopted. Maybe not like tomorrow, but there will be a family adopting that child. So the idea that they're just going to linger from infancy. Yeah, they don't go right into the foster care system. Like you said, I mean, it's very likely that you will be able to find a couple who will pay for. For all of your medical expenses, by the way, if you were someone who is going to give your infant up for adoption.

I'm not saying that that is true in every case, but there are so many willing parents who want to adopt that they will give an arm and a leg just to make sure that you are comfortable throughout your pregnancy. And so I don't even think that she had thought through her position on that. And like you said, like she's a product of foster care and she makes a huge contribution to the world. Like, why doesn't she think that of other babies that are born to drug-abusing mothers as she was? Yeah, it shows a vision of life that is really, really dark, and she's not the only one. I mean, this is the pro-abortion vision of the world where there are some lives that there's no point in even having those lives. There's no point in existing, especially if you're going to potentially experience suffering and deprivation early. on, and I don't minimize that at all, by the way. I mean, there are kids, let's, let's confront

and acknowledge the reality that babies who are, quote unquote, unwanted pregnancies, as much as I hate the term, but using their term, unwanted pregnancies, many of those babies, if they're born, there's a good chance that a certain portion of them will suffer in their lives. They'll have very difficult lives early on especially, and they might suffer tremendously. And that's a terrible thing. But is it for us to say that it's just better off if they died, that there's nothing at the other, there's no light at the other end of that tunnel, there's nothing greater and better out there for them?

What a way to look at the world, and that's not how I look at it. And even if you do look at the world that way, it's not for you to decide that for someone else. Right. And you can always try to apply the arguments that they have about babies in the womb to people outside the womb.

Like if you think that a life in foster care and a life that, you know, is filled with abuse is bad, which obviously I do, I think is, is terrible. And you think that that's a justification for killing someone in the womb, then why don't you also think that's a justification for killing someone outside the womb? Like, what's it to you? What's your standard? Why is it only that defenseless babies are okay being killed because they might have a hard life, but not babies outside of the womb to be killed because they have a hard life. So, but unfortunately, I just think that most pro choicers,

and this is what I found. I'm sure you have two, have never thought about it. They've never really thought about their position beyond my body, my choice, and this is what, you know, gets me a pat on the back. Yeah, they really haven't. It's like many other viewpoints, we go back to the gender thing. You can't really hold that position and think about it very long or very deeply and still have that same position at the end of that process of thinking because you run into so many problems and some really fundamental ones with abortion, like, okay, you think it's okay to kill babies in the womb, which means that you don't think babies in the womb have any moral rights, which I assume means that you don't think they have any moral worth, any real worth,

which is why they can be killed and discarded and thrown into a dumpster outback. So if that means that they don't have any worth, then that means that human worth is not inherent. There's nothing inherent in us that gives us that worth. And so then that means that the rest of us don't have inherent worth. Worth is, I guess, earned by degree and by how much you contribute to society, but As you point out, well, then why don't we, you know, that that logic can be applied and has been applied in other societies. Exactly. Outside of the womb, I don't see how you get around that.

And also, by the way, if we don't have inherent worth, then what is all this stuff about human rights? What do you even mean by that? What are our rights exactly? Where do those come from? Who cares about your rights? Well, if you're not even a being that possesses inherent worth. So these are all questions that I think they just don't really think about much. And I think, well, I think that's exactly why they're okay with giving up,

for, you know, temporary comfort and safety because they do think that rights are something that the government came up with and gives people based on, you know, a bunch of arbitrary standards. And I would say that's why a conservative can't be pro-choice because of the reasons that you just listed. I know libertarians can, you know, they say whatever they want to say about, you know, bodily autonomy and all that stuff. But conservatism is based on this idea that we have inherent rights from a power that is bigger than that. in the government and therefore they can't be arbitrarily taken away by the government. And that is where we get this understanding of human rights.

And if it doesn't start at conception, then any time after that, it's just totally arbitrary. And if you give into that argument, then like you said, you don't even believe in an inherent right. And why are you a conservative? Why do you believe in the Constitution? It's just completely incongruent to me. Yeah, I wish people would do this inventory. And for those of us who think at all, it's sort of, it's kind of mind-boggling to think that there are others who haven't asked themselves some of these really basic questions, but apparently they haven't. And so here's a, here's one question. I think everyone should ask themselves if they haven't. It's, do I believe that life has any real objective value? Do I actually believe that? and then once you get the answer to that question, because you're going to be a yes or no on that,

and if it's anything other than yes, then it's a no. And that's going to set you, you know, those are two, that's a path parting in the woods there. And your answer on that was going to take you in one direction or another. And when you start following that path, you may be surprised about some of the answers you come up with, depending on what your first answer is. Because if your answer to that is no,

then, you know, there may be a way to cobble together some kind of nihilistic philosophy based on that, but you're going to have to give up a lot of the positions that you currently hold because those things aren't going to matter anymore because life doesn't matter. So I think everyone should kind of do that. But if you answer yes, I think most people instinctively would answer yes, then you know, you start following that along. And you might be also surprised by some of the positions you end up forming. Yep. Yep. I think once people realize that any of their defenses that they have for abortion, could be logically then applied to people outside the womb and no one would say, oh, yeah,

I believe that we should, you know, kill people in foster care or homeless people or people who have hard lives. And then if you just, you know, trace that back and ask yourself, well, then why do I believe that it's okay for someone with a potentially hard life just because they're defenseless, just because they're in the womb? That seems like a very arbitrary standard for life and death. last thing I want to talk to you about, very important. And this is something that you talk about a lot. I don't know, maybe it's your biggest issue. Maybe this is like your hill that you will die on. And that is cyclists who decide that they are going to, that they are going to bicycle, I don't know, two, three, four people abreast. You have very, very big opinions on that. Can you explain them to us?

Yeah, it's one of the many hills that I will die on. But it's, certainly an important one, and I think a very important issue. Look, I have a very basic point of view on this when it comes to cyclists. The road is not a place for recreation. If you want recreation, if you want to exercise or anything, we got gyms for that, you got bike paths in the woods, we got sidewalks, we got tracks, we got so many things for treadmills. I mean, the good news is is that there are so many places you can go for recreational activity and for exercise. I'm not going to go out to the road and pop down the ground and start busting out some pushups. If I want to do that, I'm going to go inside to do that, because the road is not for that. It's not for recreation. It's not

for exercise. The road is for getting from point A to point B, and it is made literally for cars. That's why we pave it. It's like literally we make the roads for cars to be on. Yeah. And not for you on your toy. And a bicycle for most people is really just a toy. That's fine. Again, we all, we all have recreation. It's just not a place for it. So get the hell off the road. That's it. Well, they can't ride on sidewalks, though, because sidewalks are for walking. And also, like, it's annoying of with, as a mom with two kids, I can't, like, just get off the sidewalk when there's a bike coming my way on the sidewalk. It really bothers me when they're a cyclist on the sidewalk, too, because what am I supposed to do?

And so, I mean, what's the solution? They kind of have to go on the road sometimes, don't they? I think the solution in those scenarios is just don't. I guess you're going to have to, I guess you just can't bike it. all. I'm sorry. Like find something else to do with your time. There are there's you might have to actually get you might have to put your bike in an actual vehicle like a civilized person and drive to some place where there's specifically set up for you on your bike. But yeah, I agree. I mean, I am saying get off the road, but I also think get off the sidewalk. So I realize that I'm kind of

limiting your options. Um, I guess the main point is you're just, you're like imposing yourself on the rest of us and no one else wants you around. And, um, that should also make you, I would feel self-conscious being, like biking on the road knowing that I got this whole line of cars behind me. Right. I had thought about that. I've thought about that. And like, how does that not bother you to even know that? And I think it's because all cyclists are sociopaths and are psychotics.

That's my final. That is one of your classic charitable assessments. And I think that's how we have to end. So thank you. So much for giving us your takes on so many things today. I really appreciate it. I know everyone else does too. So thank you.

Thanks a lot. Appreciate it. Hey, this is Steve Day. If you're listening to Allie, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity, and reality itself.

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