Something You Should Know - How to Get People to Say Yes to You & Have We Become Overly Cautious?

Episode Date: October 7, 2019

“Never cry at work!” has been some long standing advice for employees. So if you DO cry at work, what will people think of you? This episode begins with how people perceive their colleagues when they see them crying on the job. http://time.com/4513209/cry-crying-at-work-tears/ It would sure be nice of people said yes to you whenever you ask for something. Unfortunately they don’t. So how do you become more persuasive so more people say yes to you more of the time? Brian Ahearn specializes in applying the science of influence and persuasion in everyday life and he is author of the book, Influence PEOPLE: Powerful Everyday Opportunities to Persuade that are Lasting and Ethical (https://amzn.to/2oH9xlu). Brian joins me to discuss the principles of influence that get people to do what you ask.  Ever drink straight from the milk carton? C’mon, of course you do! And if you get caught people will tell you that it is just plain gross. But how gross is it? Listen as we explore the science of drinking from the carton and what that does for the next person who drinks from that carton and what it also does to the milk. http://spoonuniversity.com/lifestyle/we-debunked-the-5-second-rule-double-dippingand-other-food-myths/ We have a lot more rules than we used to. Kids today are taught to be far more cautious than in earlier generations. And while it is good to be careful, there are some unintended consequences to living in a world where there are so many rules and so many thing you are forbidden from doing. Tracey Brown has researched our overly cautious society and found some very surprising things which are in her book Playing By The Rules: How Our Obsession with Safety is Putting Us At Risk (https://amzn.to/2nUUSTJ). Tracey joins me to reveal that the world today is not as dangerous as people think and how all these rules are harming our children and our way of life.  This Week’s Sponsors -Noom. Sign up for your trial today at www.Noom.com/something -Airbnb. To learn more about being an Airbnb host visit www.Airbnb.com/host -Babbel. Get 6months for the price of 3 when you use the promo code SYSK at www.Babbel.com  -Zapier. Try Zapier for free for 14 days. Go to www.Zapier.com/SYSK -Les Mills. For 21-day free access to their app go to www.TryLesMills.com/Something. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As a listener to Something You Should Know, I can only assume that you are someone who likes to learn about new and interesting things and bring more knowledge to work for you in your everyday life. I mean, that's kind of what Something You Should Know was all about. And so I want to invite you to listen to another podcast called TED Talks Daily. Now, you know about TED Talks, right? Many of the guests on Something You Should Know have done TED Talks. Well, you see, TED Talks Daily is a podcast that brings you a new TED Talk every weekday in less than 15 minutes. Join host Elise Hu.

She goes beyond the headlines so you can hear about the big ideas shaping our future. Learn about things like sustainable fashion, embracing your entrepreneurial spirit, the future of robotics, and so much more. Like I said, if you like this podcast, Something You Should Know, I'm pretty sure you're going to like TED Talks Daily. And you get TED Talks Daily wherever you get your podcasts. Today on Something You Should Know, we begin by looking at what people think of other people who cry at work. Then, what's the best way to influence people so they say yes to your request? People who get really good at influence understand, you know what, it's probably in my best interest to actually be the giver, to take that first step. Because if I do something that genuinely helps you, Michael, you probably feel

like, wow, that was pretty nice. I'd like to help Brian if I can. Also, if you ever drink milk straight from the carton, you should know what that does to the milk. And we live in a very cautious world, and that's not all good for our kids. You know that childhood no longer seems this fun place to be, and that raising a family is all about risk assessment and safety measures rather than actually exploring the world and learning how to cope with those risks and find the opportunities. All this today on Something You Should Know. People who listen to Something You Should Know are curious about the world,

looking to hear new ideas and perspectives. So I want to tell you about a podcast that is full of new ideas and perspectives, and one I've started listening to called Intelligence Squared. It's the podcast where great minds meet. Listen in for some great talks on science, tech, politics, creativity, wellness, and a lot more. A couple of recent examples, Mustafa Suleiman, the CEO of Microsoft AI, discussing the future of technology. That's pretty cool. And writer, podcaster, and filmmaker John Ronson discussing the rise of conspiracies and culture wars.

Intelligence Squared is the kind of podcast that gets you thinking a little more openly about the important conversations going on today. Being curious, you're probably just the type of person Intelligence Squared is meant for. Check out Intelligence Squared wherever you get your podcasts. Something you should know. Fascinating intel. The world's top experts. And practical advice you can use in your life. Today, Something You Should Know with Mike Carruthers. Hi, and welcome to Something You Should Know. I want to start today talking about crying. What do you think when you see someone crying? When a baby cries, it gets your sympathy, and usually when a baby cries, it gets what it wants.

But that's not so true for adults, especially when it comes to crying at work. In a series of three experiments, researchers asked about a thousand people what their impressions were of a person in a photograph. In one photo, the person had visible tears on their cheek, making it obvious that they'd been crying. In the other photo, the tears were digitally taken away. People perceived the tearful person as sadder, warmer, but also less competent than the very same person when the tears had been edited out. People looking at the photo said they were more likely to approach a tearful person and offer help than the person without the tears,

but they were less likely to want to work with a tearful person on a bigger project. And that is something you should know. Wouldn't life be so much easier if people would only say yes to you and to me? And sometimes people say yes, but sometimes people say no. And a lot of what determines whether you get a yes or a no is you and what you say and how you say it. Brian Ahern is chief influence officer at an organization called Influence People. He's also an international keynote speaker, trainer, and he specializes in applying the science of influence and persuasion in everyday situations. Brian is also author of the book, Influence People,

Powerful Everyday Opportunities to Persuade that are Lasting and Ethical. Hey, Brian, welcome. Thank you for having me on, Michael. I'm excited to be here. So what is influence? Because I think so many people think when you're trying to influence people, you're trying to trick them, you're trying to persuade them to do something they wouldn't otherwise do. It has kind of that salesy tinge to it. So what's your take?

Where do you come in at this? When it comes to influence, every day, all day long, we are trying to move people to action. And there is a science to how to do that. And specifically when it comes to persuasion, I like the definition that Aristotle put forth thousands of years ago. He said it was the art of getting somebody to do something that they wouldn't ordinarily do if you didn't ask. And so it's about changing people's behavior, and it's really contingent on how you ask. Which I think is a problem, because people don't always think about that. They don't give a lot of thought to the how,

they just give thought to, you know, I've got to ask for that. But how you ask makes a big difference. That's right. And the problem is, most people have never studied this at all. And the ability to influence is a skill like most other things in life. And if you study the process, you work at it, you can get much, much more effective. But it's also like breathing, right? Most people don't think much about breathing because they've done it their whole life. And if you study meditation, if you do sports, you realize there's a lot to breathing and getting better at breathing will make you better at your activities. Studying the influence process and diligently applying it like any skill can help you get significantly better at getting people to say yes to you.

So let's get into that influence process. What are the some of the ABCs of that? What do I need to understand to be a better influencer? There's lots of different psychological principles. And so we can touch on as many as you want. But I'll start with one, which is just the principle of liking. And we all intuitively know that we like people who like us. And so the better job we can do at not just getting somebody to like us, but really coming to like other people, that will make it much easier for them to say yes. So it's not about me getting you to like me, Michael. I really should be focusing on how can I come to like you? And I should connect on what

we have in common, pay you genuine compliments, things like that, that will convince me, you know what? You're a pretty good guy. And when you sense that, you become far more open to whatever I may ask of you. And it becomes a win for both of us because the more I like you, I would never take advantage of you. And you know that, and we have a better working relationship. Great. So keep going. What are some of the other principles? Okay. Well, another principle is reciprocity. And everybody innately understands this too, the sense of obligation we feel internally to give back to somebody who has first given to us. I mean, most of our parents taught us this when we were children. Someone does something nice, they bend down and say, what do you say?

And then we'd say, thank you. And the conditioning began. We learned that we're supposed to give back to people who first give to us. So people who get really good at influence understand, you know what, it's probably in my best interest to actually be the giver, to take that first step. Because if I do something that genuinely helps you, Michael, you probably feel like, wow, that was pretty nice. I'd like to help Brian if I can. And by living a life where I look to give to other people, I multiply my resources of people who will want to help me when that time comes. But that's one of those things, reciprocity. I've heard salespeople talk about that, that that can be trickery.

Let's give them. In fact, I remember once being in New York City years ago and some religious person came up and put a flower in my lapel and then asked me for money. Reciprocity. When I didn't give them enough money, they took the flower back. I've had the very same experience when I was in Austin, Texas, where somebody offered a flower, but I actually said no to it, because I understood what was going on. It wasn't truly a free gift. He was going to then start hounding. But ultimately, somebody within our group said, oh, thank you, and took the flower. And then he followed us for a block or two, trying to get us to give him money. That's not the kind of reciprocity that we're talking about. That is what we could term

give to get. I'm only giving, so I will get something. I believe the right way that we do this is we look to genuinely help people because in our heart, we believe it's the right way to live life. But we also are very comfortable then when we need help from somebody to look at the people that we're connected to and say, who has the right skill? Who might have the time to be able to help me with this issue that I need help with? And that's where when you've lived the life of a giver, people want to give in return. But other than that, you're right. It is purely than a technique to get you to do something. And we're getting pretty good at sniffing that out. And we tend to not want to associate with people like that. Yeah. You usually can sniff that out pretty easily. You know when you're getting manipulated with this, oh, look, a free gift, and now here's what I want from you. But it still works. It must work,

or people wouldn't do it. It does. Manipulation, I hate to say it, but manipulation does work. Everybody listening to this can probably think of a time or two where they were manipulated into doing something, and then they think, boy, if I knew then what I know now, I never would have made that decision. So sometimes people who do the manipulation get what they want in the short term, but usually in the long run, they don't end up getting what they really want and need in life. And it might be an overused example, but think of used car salespeople who will say or do anything to get you to buy because they know if you leave the lot, you'll probably get the high pressure from

somebody else and buy there. But those are never the people that we want to go back and do business with. And they're never the people we want to refer people to. So what do they do? They hop from job to job to job because they're always trying to stay ahead of that. Okay, let's move on. Another one. Another principle that is really powerful to stay ahead of that. Okay, let's move on. Another one. Another principle that is really powerful is the principle of authority, that we recognize we will be more swayed by somebody who's considered an expert as opposed to somebody who we don't know anything about their background. And the interesting thing about this, Mike, is that two people can say the very same thing, and the person who's known to be an expert might be believed all day long, and the person who has no background or experience won't be believed. And yet what they say in both cases might be every bit as true.

And I saw this once where my wife, who's a really good golfer, I had shared with her a story about golf that I gave in a training presentation. Weeks later, she's reading a book and she says, listen to what Corey Pavin says. And for the listeners who don't know who Corey Pavin was, he won the US Open in the early 90s and he finished in the top five in all the major golf championships. And she read the short paragraph and I said, I told you that. She said, no, you didn't. I said, yes, I did. And she, for the life of her, could not remember that I said that. And I finally go, oh, I guess if Corey Pavin says it, it's true. But when I say it, it's not. But the reality was she believed him because he was a great golfer and I'm her husband.

I've even experienced that myself. When I first got into podcasting, I learned a lot. I studied a lot. I learned about it. I knew a lot about it, but I didn't really have the street cred that anybody would care about my opinion. But this podcast has done very well. The audience is quite large. And now I'm an expert because I have a very successful podcast. I don't know that I know a whole lot more than I did before, but because of what this podcast has done, I'm now an expert. Absolutely. And people live their life based on perceptions. And the perception is now that you are an expert. And again, you're admitting you may not know a whole lot more than you did before, but that's not what matters. It's how people view

you. And our challenge, if we want to influence others, is can we get them to see what our expertise is? Yeah. Well, that's so important, what you just said about it. It isn't the reality necessarily. It's what people perceive. It's what people see and what sense about you that, that ultimately decides whether they will or they won't. Absolutely. Okay. Keep going. Well, we've got another principle called principle of consistency, and this one is really powerful, especially, well, really with everybody, but especially powerful in sales people feel this internal psychological pressure to live up to what they say and they also get this external social pressure because if I tell you that I will do something I feel kind of bad if I don't follow

through I think that's pretty natural for most people. And when I put it out there in the public space, well, then I'll also feel a little bit bad if I don't follow up what I said I would do because you'll look down on me. So we've got this internal and external pressure that really compels people to keep their word. And I would just challenge anybody listening to this, think of a time where you gave your word that you would be somewhere for somebody or you would do something with them and you had to back out. The real question then is, how did you feel? And every time I ask people this, Michael, they say, terrible, awful, guilty. Well, nobody wants to feel that way, right? So what do we do? We work really, really hard

to follow up and do what we said we would do. It's a powerful psychological principle to get people to ultimately take action. We're talking about how to get people to say yes. And my guest is Brian Ahern. He is author of the book Influence People, Powerful Everyday Opportunities to Persuade that are lasting and ethical. Silver Lining, a fantasy adventure series about a spirited young girl named Isla who time travels to the mythical land of Camelot. Look for The Search for the Silver Lining on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts. Since I host a podcast, it's pretty common for me to be asked to recommend a podcast. And I tell people, if you like something you should know, you're going to like The Jordan Harbinger Show. Every episode is a conversation with a fascinating guest. Of course, a lot of podcasts are conversations with guests, but Jordan does it better than most.

Recently, he had a fascinating conversation with a British woman who was recruited and radicalized by ISIS and went to prison for three years. She now works to raise awareness on this issue. It's a great conversation. And he spoke with Dr. Sarah Hill about how taking birth control not only prevents pregnancy, it can influence a woman's partner preferences, career choices, and overall behavior due to the hormonal changes it causes. Apple named The Jordan Harbinger Show one of the best podcasts a few years back, and in a nutshell,

the show is aimed at making you a better, more informed, critical thinker. Check out The Jordan Harbinger Show. There's so much for you in this podcast. The Jordan Harbinger Show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. So, Brian,

I understand what you said about how people feel terrible when they have to let other people down and not do what they said they were going to do. But I also know plenty of people who are very flaky, who say they're going to do something and don't do it, and it doesn't seem to bother them at all. There's always going to be people who don't do what we might think they would do according to the psychology. It's not a magic wand. It will not get all the people to do all the things you want all the time. But if your listeners can move 20, 30, 40% more, get twice as many, four times as many people to do something because they just adjust how they communicate,

that's a huge win. So you're right. There will always be somebody who gives you their word and doesn't follow through. But I think what ends up happening with people like that too is we, if we can avoid it, we avoid association with them because we don't like when, for example, if we're all out and everybody buys a round of beers and it gets to that last person and then they choose not to, nobody likes that person. Nobody likes the person who says they'll do one thing and then doesn't follow through and do it. So you start to get a little social shunning there. So talk about scarcity. is another one that's incredibly powerful because as human beings, when we know something's rare or it's going away, that we may lose an opportunity, there's just something like in our

gut that makes us want to take action. And I'm sure your listeners can relate to this. Sale ends Sunday. There've been many times, I'm sure, when people listening to this podcast got off the couch and got to the store just in case there was a good deal, and then they end up buying something. Or maybe they saw an advertisement that said, while supplies last, now they get to the store sooner, just in case they sell out. In the absence of that understanding in either case, they might not have ever gone to the store. So it's very powerful because it taps into this part of human evolution that says, if I lose out on something, that could be really, really bad for me. And therefore,

I should probably try to take advantage of that opportunity. Now, the downside is because some people who are unethical understand this, they will create a false sense of scarcity to try to get us to act. And I think one of the most prevalent examples is, and you've probably had somebody who tried to sell you something for your home, like siding or roofing or gutters or something like that, who might have said, Michael, if you sign today, you can save 15%. But if I have to come back, I can't give you that deal. Well, there's nothing scarce about that. They're just trying to manipulate you into signing today as opposed to having to come back. But you know,

if it's a big decision, you want to take your time on that decision. So that to me is manipulation. Yeah. Well, I've always been suspicious when people say, you know, this price, it's only good for, you know, the next 12 hours, 24 hours. My guess is that if it's good for 24 hours, it's probably good for a lot longer, typically. And the last principle is the principle of unity that we haven't talked about yet. Well, unity is a relatively newer concept that was promoted by Dr. Robert Cialdini in his book, Pre-Suasion. He originally came out with six principles, which are highlighted in his book, Influence Science and Practice. But in Pre-Suasion, he introduced a principle called unity. And that principle speaks to the fact that

we are more willing to say yes to people who are of us, where we have this shared identity. And the best example I can give you on this one is my father served in the United States Marine Corps during the Vietnam conflict. And while he probably wished he never had to go there and do that, when he was asked at a dinner party, what's the greatest experience of your life? He said, being a Marine, leading men in combat. And I've noticed this, Michael, over my whole life, that when my father meets another Marine, particularly one who's been in combat, I would swear he's closer to them than me, his own flesh and blood, because they share an identity

and a common experience that very few people can understand. And that is unity. My father would do something for a Marine that he might not do for anybody else in the world except for maybe family. And there are lots of examples of this. Religion, where you go to worship, if you do that, what do you do with people there? You stand together, you sit together, kneel together, pray together, worship together. You become, they call it the body. So it's no longer about me and you. It's about we. And when we can find that deep unity, that shared identity with people, it's far easier for them to say yes if we have to ask them to do something. So what is the secret sauce in this? Because, you know, many of these principles that you've outlined, you know, frankly, we've heard before, reciprocity, those things. People have heard them before.

But still, there are some people who are much more persuasive than others, even though they know the same thing. So what is that? What is that secret that makes somebody more persuasive than others? I think the biggest thing is probably the relationship aspect of it. Because in the absence of knowing anything else, when you meet somebody, there can almost be this instant, I like that person. And then if you, it's, you know, we've used terms like charisma and charm and things like that. But if you break it down, there are things that make people charismatic, charming, likable. A great example of this was

Bill Clinton. No matter what side of the aisle you were on in terms of your politics, it's pretty undeniable that Bill Clinton had a way of connecting with people that was different than most other politicians. You know, his ability to look people in the eye, his ability to say, I feel your pain. I've read from multiple people who met him that here he was, President of the United States, and he was focused on me. It wasn't all about him. It was about me. And that feeling of importance when you're in front of somebody like the President just drew people to him. So there are things that we can learn from that, that we try to emotionally connect

with people. We look them in the eye. If we can have appropriate physical touch, that we focus on them and not us and our agenda. All of these things can build rapport instantly and people are going to be more likely to say yes to people that they like and feel connected to. If you and I know each other and you like me and I call to ask for a favor, you're far more likely to listen to me. If I say, hey, Michael, I've got something I need here and I really would appreciate your advice or your help.

If I've already built some foundation there through the principle of reciprocity that I genuinely was giving and trying to help you, that we've connected on liking, maybe we went deeper into unity, you will be far more likely to listen to me. And that may supersede any expertise that I have, any scarcity that's there. It might just be, I know Brian, I like Brian, so therefore I want to help him. It's really not that complicated when you break it down the way you just did, because, you know, people are people.

They tend to operate with the same manual. But unfortunately, a lot of people, when they are growing up, they may not have learned these things. I mean, there are a lot of people who compliment me because if someone asks me something, I might say, yes, please, or no, thank you. I've had a lot of people say, wow, it's really nice to interact with people who have manners. And I'll jokingly say my mom raised me well, but that signifies to me that that is not as common as it might have been when you and I were growing up. So not everybody is raised to understand these things. I mean, there's so much self-promotion in our society today. All we have to do is watch a college football game or an NFL game to see it's always far more about the individual than it is the team.

So some of these things, while they may have seemed like common sense, are not as common as they used to be. But the good news is for people who will latch on to it and do it the right way, the way science says, you will be far more persuasive than people who aren't doing that. Well, this is one of the good things about podcasting. You've covered several really strong principles in terms of getting people to say yes, and so people can go back and listen to them again if they need to. Brian Ahern has been my guest. He is the chief influence officer at Influence People. He is an international

keynote speaker, and he is author of the book, Influence People, Powerful Everyday Opportunities to Persuade that are Lasting and Ethical. Thank you, Brian. Thanks for coming on. Well, thank you. I really appreciate being on the show. Hey, everyone. Join me, Megan Rinks. And me, Melissa Demonts, for Don't Blame Me, But Am I Wrong? Each week, we deliver four fun-filled shows. In Don't Blame Me, we tackle our listeners' dilemmas with hilariously honest advice. Then we have But Am I Wrong?, which is for the listeners that didn't take our advice.

Plus, we share our hot takes on current events. Then tune in to see you next Tuesday for our Lister poll results from But Am I Wrong? And finally, wrap up your week with Fisting Friday, where we catch up and talk all things pop culture. Listen to Don't Blame Me, But Am I Wrong on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. Do you love Disney? Then you are going to love our hit podcast, Disney Countdown. I'm Megan, the Magical Millennial. And I'm the Dapper Danielle. On every episode of our fun and family-friendly show, we count down our top 10 lists of all things Disney. There is nothing we don't cover. We are famous for rabbit holes, Disney themed games, and fun facts you didn't

know you needed, but you definitely need in your life. So if you're looking for a healthy dose of Disney magic, check out Disney Countdown wherever you get your podcasts. Rules are rules, and we have a lot of rules. Just try getting on an airplane. You have a lot of rules you have to follow to get on that plane. And at some point you might ask the question, are all these rules really making us safer? Are you safer because nobody can bring liquids on an airplane? Are all those warning labels on a stepladder really preventing people from falling off the stepladder? Tracy Brown is somebody who decided to investigate all this.

Tracy is co-author of a book called Playing by the Rules, How Our Obsession with Safety is Putting Us at Risk. Hi Tracy. So all these rules that have been created were probably created with the best of intentions. I suspect the phrase is often used in creating these rules, out of an abundance of caution, we're now going to do this. But do all these rules really help? In fact, far from it.

We found that some of these safety and security rules are actually making us more at risk of other things. So that's a really interesting discovery. It just seems that when something has got a safety or a security label on it, people stop asking questions. They stop asking, is this actually doing anything to make us safer? So let's talk about some specific rules that I think a lot of people find arbitrary, and we have to look no farther than the airport. Okay, so one of the things is obviously all those things that TSA don't allow us to take when farther than the airport. Okay, so one of the things is obviously all those things

that TSA don't allow us to take when we board an airplane. And we assume that there must be some reasonable possibility that someone could, for example, use those outsized shampoo bottles, fill them up with stuff and make a bomb in the airplane bathroom. We assume someone somewhere must have actually been able to achieve this. And similarly, with all the other sort of stuff that they say we can't take on board, there seems to be some sort of background to it. We were very surprised to find that it's near impossible to make a bomb in the airplane bathroom with the kind of stuff that people are worrying about. On the other hand, you can go straight through airport security, buy yourself a bottle of overproof whiskey, you can carry a

lighter on board. It seems rather strange that you're allowed to do that because it suits the duty free, but you're not allowed to take anything more than three ounces with your shampoo. So there must have been something, there must have been some basis for somebody saying, okay, no more than three ounces of liquid on an airplane. Something must have happened. Well, a lot of this starts with something. There was an attempt to create a bomb on a plane, but it wasn't a likely successful attempt.

So what happened was that it took i think 30 attempts and four weeks of the top government scientists trying to use what these would-be terrorists had been hoping to use to create a bomb and it took many many hours so obviously most planes will have landed by the time you've been in there in the bathroom with your eyes keeping it all at 10 degrees because if it goes any higher than that, you would inhale the fumes and die. Keeping it all really 10 degrees, you'd be in there three hours, four hours, hopefully no one knocking on the bathroom door wondering what on earth you're up to. And then you'd have to have another few hours to dry it out into some sort of a powder.

So, yeah, there is a tenuous link. The thing is, of course, people feel, we sort of live in this age where people feel something must be done. And that's not just about possible public outrages, terrorism incidents, gun sprees. It's also about people feeling that something must be done in relation to child protection. If there are any of these very unusual, really highly unusual circumstances where children are abducted and killed. It's very, very rare. But again, there's this feeling that something must be done. We must have some new measure put in place

that will mean that won't ever happen again or can't happen. And it becomes almost a kind of talisman. You know, the fact that it isn't really ever likely to work doesn't really come into the question. So the response to that might be that, well, but if it saves one child, if in an abundance of caution we're doing this because you just don't know, as you said, you know, it's unlikely you could make a bomb,

but unlikely is not 100%, so this just makes sure that, you know, it's unlikely you could make a bomb, but unlikely is not 100%. So this just makes sure that you know what I'm saying. So what's your response to that? Sure. I mean, we need to be very careful here because what happens is when you stop looking at what are the unintended consequences of introducing rules, you stop looking at the lives it might ruin. So I'm quite serious about this. It's not a rhetorical point. If you have rules that stop families from taking more than two children,

or in some cases even two children under the age of eight, swimming in a public pool because of fear that this would increase the risk of a child not being supervised and therefore drowning, and there are no under-8s drowning in public pools as a result of parents having twins or two young children and taking them both swimming. They just are not the incidents to deal with. But, you know, there's a theoretical possibility it saves one life. But there's also a pretty convincing possibility that families not going swimming and getting children used to, particularly getting them used to cold

water and cold water shock at a young age, are not producing teenagers who can cope with falling into rivers and lakes. And that is a real thing that happens because teenagers do die from falling into rivers and lakes. So, you know, these things are trade-offs, you know. So when we introduce something in the name of safety, sometimes we're introducing things which actually put us at risk of other things. So a good example of that is also quite a well-known one that after 9-11 and continued for many years after 9-11, because of all the restrictions that were put in place, among other things,

people took to the roads. Well, the roads are a much more unsafe place to travel. And as a result, you saw a direct correlation in the spike in road incidents and deaths. There are some things, though, that become safety issues that become part of our culture, and that nobody questions anymore, and that people think, well, thank God for that. I'm thinking of seatbelts. I mean, what, 50 years ago, cars didn't even have seatbelts. And when they did, they only had lap belts and hardly anybody used them. But now everybody uses seatbelts. And I think most people agree it's a good thing. And Mike, you're absolutely right to point out seatbelts. The interesting thing about

the seatbelts argument is that it was won by hard evidence. So people analyzed what was causing the severity and fatalities in car accidents, and as a result of that, there were experiments introducing seatbelts. The results of those experiments showed that people were much less damaged by the collisions that did happen, and the seatbelt argument got one that way. It got one with evidence. It's very different from the kind of things that you're talking about. And, you know, you raise a really important point here.

I kind of hear behind your question the concern that it's not just a question of whether stuff makes us safe, but it's also the other stuff that might be damaging. You know, that childhood no longer seems this fun place to be, and that raising a family is all about, you know, risk assessment and safety measures, rather than actually exploring the world and learning how to cope with those risks and find the opportunities. There is certainly a perception, and perhaps the media plays a role in this by seeing all the horrible things on the news that happen and all, there is this perception that the world is a more dangerous place than it used to be, that a few generations ago life was simpler, more innocent, more trusting. Is the world becoming more dangerous? It's going the opposite way. And this is why it's so frustrating and one of the reasons why I felt such an urge to write this book because I really do want citizens to stand up and start asking questions because we have got this fantastic legacy of safety.

As you said, children now are belted up in the back of the car. We don't have playgrounds with this really hard concrete that people smash their heads on. There are some really good measures. There are just so many things, you know, that our children are less likely to be involved in wars, less likely to be harmed on the streets, so many things that they have better options for

than we ever had and the previous generations did. And yet we live in such anxious times. Why can't we not claim that legacy? It seems that we need to kind of relax a bit and start asking some questions about what risks really are. I know you have some good stories and examples of how all this concern and worry over potential dangers has played out. For example, one mom who allowed her son at age of 10 to walk a few blocks to soccer practice, only to find that someone called 911. And now most of us would be really intimidated by that because a cop showed up at soccer practice and ranted at her and raged at her.

But her reaction was fantastic. She wasn't intimidated. She went home and she phoned the chief of police in her town and said, where's your evidence that our town is really so dangerous that I can't let my 10-year-old walk just 20 minutes ahead of me to soccer practice? And he had to admit there was none. And in fact, that actually led to her running a big campaign to get kids playing outside more and get parents to admit there was none and in fact that actually led to her running a big campaign to get kids playing outside more and get parents to be more aware of what the risks are of abduction and kids off the street and that kind of thing and in fact she actually created she

noticed that there were many roads many streets where there were no sidewalks because so few kids were playing outside that in fact a very dangerous thing had happened was that nobody bothered to build a sidewalk on some streets. What you said earlier is so true it seems that when something bad happens to someone that somehow that results in a law a rule that now must apply to everyone, even though there's little evidence that this is ever going to happen again, that it's ever going to happen to anybody other than the person it happened to. But I guess it's that feeling of if something bad happens, we have to do something. We must do something because that's what good people do.

And sometimes it's kind of ridiculous. That's the crucial question. We really do need as citizens to get our politicians and our rule makers to ask the question, is there a pattern? Is there a pattern? We need to make them aware that we as citizens expect them to take a pause for breath and ask that question. Never mind that the newspaper headlines are screaming. They really need on our behalf to ask that question, and they won't do it unless we ask that too. Is there a pattern? And if there is a pattern and we might do something to stop it,

then are we sure that the thing we're proposing to do will actually influence that pattern? You know, one of the things we do just have to accept is that there are some things that don't have a pattern, like those random events of very unusual child abduction and murder, and we just cannot predict them. Any measure that people could dream up and tell you, this is a great way to spot the person who's going to do it,

this is a great way to spot the situation where it's likely to happen, they're just not telling the truth. All of the evidence that we can find, and there have been some fantastic studies, show that this is pretty much a random event and there's no predictability. And, you know, things happen. There's no way to guarantee.

I mean, a piano could fall on your head tomorrow. It's just things happen. They just do. Things happen, but also good things happen as well. Good things happen as a result of us going out into the world and experiencing it, especially when we're talking about allowing our kids some freedom to engage with it. And I think one of the problems is that we don't count what it is that children are losing when they're wrapped up and kept at home.

It does seem that there's a lot of momentum for this in other words the more new rules and new laws about safety that we pass then the more laws and rules about safety that we pass it's as if the government or whoever is making the rules assumes that people are so stupid that they couldn't possibly figure out the danger here. So we need to pass a rule to point it out. We looked into the question of the politics of it all. And one of the things we noticed was that the closer you are to an election, the more likely it is that you're going to get this kind of knee-jerk response. In fact, we tracked various political leaders who were initially very calm in response to a serious public incident. And we showed how actually, as the closer it got to

their re-election, that changed. And I think what that tells you is that this is not a given. You know, what they're trying to do, of course, is to get favor from particular groups by responding. But if we make it clear that we as citizens do not expect our politicians and our rulemakers to react at the drop of a hat, the latest thing, then I think we're going to get a different response from them. At the moment, the pressures all seem to be going one way. And I'm not talking about go off to university and make yourself into a statistician and start taking issue with all this. I'm saying that if all of us, once in a while,

instead of shrugging our shoulders at something that doesn't make sense, ask the question, then these things would stop becoming sort of a free pass. If you say safety or security, or it's for your own security, it stops being a free pass. It becomes a slightly more difficult and uncomfortable thing for people to do, and they will have to justify themselves. It just takes all of us doing that once in a while

to really change how I think the pressure that there is coming the other way to say no, stop and think. But isn't the comeback to that, which is hard to argue, well, don't you want our kids to be safe? Well, sure, but that doesn't mean what you're suggesting will. Yes, but, you know, it couldn't hurt and it might help. Well, the other danger is that when everything is about safety, then we start losing sight of the real important stuff, you know, because I'll give you an example. Pregnant women are absolutely bombarded with information now about what is safe for their unborn baby. And, you know, it's about everything. They can't go to the pool because they might

inhale the chemicals, never mind whether or not they're getting any benefits from swimming. You know, all sorts of things to do with putting plastics in their microwave and what they should eat, what they shouldn't eat, and cheese and all sorts of different things that they're warned about. Now, there are some really important bits of information to get across to pregnant women. And that is that folic acid does hugely improve the outcomes of their pregnancy and how to spot early signs of preeclampsia, which is a condition that is not good for either mother or baby. Now, those are two really important messages. But if they become two messages among 300, how are we sure that people are going to hear them?

So it's not a case that just stacking up these messages and talking about safety on everything really helps us. It means we lose the ability to alert people to things that really do need to be taken notice of. Do you think it might be just too late for this? I mean, is it too late to stop the momentum of this? I think it's hard. I agree it's hard, and I think in some areas it's particularly difficult. In kids' sports, I think it's really difficult to do now. But I do think that there are so many great examples in our book

of people who ask the question and stop something in its tracks. you know they've had to really work hard to get that question heard so in the case of taking children swimming um the the hero of that story she took she just took it further and further she went to the pool she went to the local authorities that govern the pool she went to the um the professional body that informs uh she went to the insurers, everywhere. She was great and really pushed it through. But there are other stories where people just asked a simple question and put the, I guess, put the sense of accountability

back on the person proposing the rule. Because you know how that feels like. If someone says to you, well, it's for safety, you feel like that puts you under the spotlight. Well, who am I to say it's not? But if you say, where's the evidence? I just want to see the evidence. That puts the onus back on them to come up with it.

And I think we can do a lot to push that back and to stop feeling so intimidated and start listening. We all have this inner voice telling us that some of this stuff just really does not make sense. Well, what we were talking about earlier about the seatbelts, I mean, there's real evidence that seatbelts do protect people, prevent injuries, save lives. So that's a good thing. There are other things that are just maybe more coming to light recently, like head injuries in football. And so now people have to question, well, do I want my kid to play football? And, you know, these are legitimate questions. Go ahead. There are some things where in life we might choose to take certain risks.

Horse riding is a really dangerous sport. Football's a dangerous sport. Skiing is dangerous. You know, there are some things relative to other things. And there are some things where we choose to take certain risks. And so long as we know what they are, we can make those choices. And, you know, we can make decisions about how much we want to allow rules to influence those. The problem we have with so many of these things is that they're not being introduced in respect to the evidence. And at least in the, as you say, in those

discussions about football, there is a conversation about the evidence. Most of the time, we don't even see a conversation. Somebody just thinks, you know what, this is a really good idea to put up a notice. One of the other issues I'm finding in kids sports is that people are being appointed to have these roles like, you know protection officer in in a maybe a junior soccer league and what happens is they then need to find something to do so they start sending emails and they start looking for training courses for the coaches and these you know guys who are volunteers who suddenly it becomes not so fun anymore because they've got to go on all these courses and they've got to have all these checks and so on. And, you know, people start saying, you know what, you know, I've got a busy day job. I'm going to leave this. And that's what happens.

You kind of formalize it by appointing people into these roles where their job is to, you know, to come up with something that shows that they are taking these fears seriously. Yeah. And what you were talking about before of, you know, we do things that are risky. Skiing is risky. Jumping out of airplanes is risky. We choose to do them. And letting our kid walk ahead to soccer practice a couple of blocks is nobody else's business. You'd think it was nobody else's business. And this is, I mean, this is worrying over the last week while I've been

talking to people around America about these issues. One of the things that's come up is this thing of people phoning 911 when they see a child left in a car seat while mom pops into the drug store or something. And that this is now something that people are making their business. So I think there's a lot of urgency in us starting to get people to take a bit more of a measured response to risk and safety. And one of the ways we can encourage them to do that is to think about whether or not there's anything to back up all these anxieties. I wonder what this all does to kids. I mean, you talked earlier about there isn't as much freedom in childhood and that ability to learn what the dangers are, because that's already been programmed into the system, that you don't go anywhere near those dangers.

And what does it do to kids? One of the things I've noticed a lot is that we've lost our sense of how we learn to negotiate risks. So we forget that we did it through experience. You can't be instructed in this stuff. You actually have to go out. You have to experience everything from rejection. You have to experience going to the store and the storekeeper giving you the wrong change and how you cope with an adult in that situation. You have to experience misjudging, stepping out into the street and only just having to jump back onto the sidewalk.

And, you know, you have to experience those things in order to get a measure of them. So it's kind of worrying that we've got a generation of kids who, in a practical way, are not engaging with the world enough. But also, emotionally, what's it doing to them? You know, when you get a rejection letter, teachers were talking to us about this when we wrote the book. When you get a rejection letter from your first application for an apprenticeship or for going to college, how do you weigh that if you're not used to understanding that one bad incident does not, you know, make your whole of the rest of your life? You've kind of just haven't got that resilience unless you've been able to understand things in that context a bit better.

So I think our ability to understand risk and opportunities is really at risk here. Well, I think this is an important conversation because, you know, so often when we hear something about rules or laws or things that's for safety's sake or it's for the children or it might save one life, that we just accept that and that there are two sides to this and that conversation is worth hearing and worth having. Tracy Brown has been my guest. The name of her book is Playing by the Rules, How Our Obsession with Safety is Putting Us at Risk.

And you'll find a link to her book in the show notes for this episode. Thank you, Tracy. Okay, who hasn't taken a drink straight from the milk carton in the refrigerator? And while it may be convenient to do it at the time, it's actually pretty gross how many germs it spreads. And it can actually make your milk spoil faster. In a study, there were eight times the number of bacteria in the carton of milk that had been drank from directly compared to the carton where the milk had been poured into

cups. And this was only 10 days after first drinking from the carton. Now, that bacteria won't necessarily make you sick, but if you do have a cold or the flu, you could give it to somebody else who drinks that milk. What that bacteria will do, however, is cause the milk to deteriorate faster and go bad. So resist that straight from the carton swig and tell other people in the house to do the same. And that is something you should know. Follow us on Twitter. We're there, at SomethingYSK. I'm Mike Carruthers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know. Welcome to the small town of

Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper. In this new thriller, religion and crime collide when a gruesome murder rocks the isolated Montana community. Everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug-addicted teenager, but local deputy Ruth Vogel isn't

convinced. She suspects connections to a powerful religious group. Enter federal agent V.B. Loro, who has been investigating a local church for possible criminal activity. The pair form an unlikely partnership to catch the killer, unearthing secrets that leave Ruth torn between her duty to the law, her religious convictions,

and her very own family. But something more sinister than murder is afoot, and someone is watching Ruth. Chinook. Starring Kelly Marie Tran and Sanaa Lathan. Listen to Chinook wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, this is Rob Benedict. And I am Richard Spate.

We were both on a little show you might know called Supernatural. It had a pretty good run, 15 seasons, 327 episodes. And though we have seen, of course, every episode many times, we figured, hey, now that we're wrapped, let's watch it all again. And we can't do that alone. So we're inviting the cast and crew that made the show along for the ride. We've got writers, producers, composers, directors, and we'll of course have some actors on as well,

including some certain guys that played some certain pretty iconic brothers. It was kind of a little bit of a left field choice in the best way possible. The note from Kripke was, he's great, we love him, but we're looking for like a really intelligent Duchovny type. With 15 seasons to explore, it's going to be the road trip of several lifetimes. So please join us and subscribe to Supernatural then and now.