The Blindboy Podcast - Brandos Dartboard

Episode Date: February 27, 2018

Platos Cave, Cargo Cults and meditation. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

God bless you charming Joshua's. They call me the Kansas City crybaby. Cars rumble overhead as I slurp purple drank from George Clooney's crazy juice box. I cuddle in puddles with Lindsay Lohan's no good uncle, ripping up his sweaty dashboard. The neighbours are telling his partner what part of his body he put through the letterbox. Let me see the New Jersey lingerie.

Let me see it over the internet, because I'm unsure of my purchase. That was a poem for some of my American listeners you'll notice throughout that poem I used several instances of American references and some American vernacular as well because

I'm proud to announce that we have over 25,000 listeners in the northern continent of America, including Canada. Yes, I just did that, Canada. I included you with the yanks, because I'm a thick paddy cunt. How are you getting on? And welcome to a new week. How has that week been?

Has it been fortuitous? Has it been lucky? Has it been fortuitous? Has it been lucky? Has it been serendipitous? Has it brought you good fortune? Going to the President of the United States, I'm going to give loads of, I'm going to give all the teachers loads of guns.

That's the plan, that's what I'll do to keep it safe. I'll get up, go to all the teachers, give them a lot of guns. Real expensive ones as well, ones that'll cost a fortune real expensive guns I want all the teachers in all the US schools holding big massive expensive guns and I'll pay

for them, because I'm loaded it's going to cost an awful fortune doesn't matter that was a paraphrase of President of the United States Donald Trump not a direct quote well it could have been, I don't know

Donald Trump as your drunk limerick aunt Donnie, Donnie, Donnie wants to arm the teachers fair play to him Donny, Donny, Donny wants to arm the teachers. Fair play to him. I'd like to take you on a little a guided journey. A guided meditation, if you will. I want you to imagine a very large

cave about the size of a the inside of a centre big cave and in this cave are three men Paddy Irishman

Paddy Scotsman and Paddy Englishman and these three men are kneeling on the ground in this cave and in front of them is a wall but the three men they're chained they're kneeling down but their necks are chained behind them so they can't move they can't look left or

right all they can do is look straight ahead at the wall in front of them and they've been this way since birth right now I know that sounds cruel but it's not because they don't know any different literally since birth they've been chained kneeling down

looking straight ahead at a wall and they don't know anything else. They can't look left or right. All they can see is what's in front of them. So anyway, on this wall, kind of like if you're in a cinema, are these projections, right? Shadows.

Because behind the three boys, Paddy Irishman, Paddy Englishman and Paddy Scotsman behind them is a torch and in front of this torch like people and animals walk past it and their shadows get projected on the wall

in front of the three lads so all they see are shadows of people and animals and cars but because they've grown up knowing nothing other than the wall in front of them they assume that these shadows of people and animals and cars and things they assume these things to be real they experience them as only two dimensional shadows

and they start to give these things names and they become their world and it's all they know these shadows in front of them two dimensional and each other's voices but they don't know

3D space essentially they just know 2D because they can't look left and right they can't look down, just straight ahead and it's ok because they know no better so then one day Paddy Irishman

manages to break free from the chains and he steps up and he turns around and he sees up in the corner of the cave a little a little slit of light and he runs towards it runs all the way up

pushes aside the big stone block that's covering the entrance like Christ emerging from the tomb and he exits the cave and all of a sudden he's in the real world outside the cave and the sun is shining and it fucking blinds him he can't see.

Because it's so bright. All he's ever seen. Are these shadows on the wall. But then his eyes adjust. And for the first time in his life. He sees real human beings. And he sees real animals. In three dimensional space.

And his brain can't really fucking handle it. But eventually. He gets around to it. And he's's like fuck me this real world is absolutely gorgeous this is amazing I can smell different things I can communicate with people I can move around freely this is absolutely incredible

I was wasting my time downstairs in the cave with these shadows in front of me what a fool I was so after Paddy Irishman starts to enjoy the real world In the cave. With these shadows in front of me. What a fool I was. So after Paddy Irishman starts to enjoy the real world. He feels bad. For Paddy Englishman and Paddy Scotsman downstairs. In the cave.

So he goes back down to them. He goes to the entrance of the cave. Opens up that block and runs back down. And he sees the two lads. Paddy Scotsman and Paddy Englishman he looks at the backs of their heads and they're still there just staring at the shadows on the wall talking to the shadows

giving them names nothing has changed so Paddy Irishman walks in front of him and the boys start freaking out. They can't recognise him. Because all they know are 2D shadows. So they can hear his voice. And they're like where the fuck have you been?

But they can't see him. Because their brains don't know how to deal with. You know 3D Paddy Irishman. And then he starts telling them. Fuck me lads. I left this. This is a cave left this is a cave this is a cave that you're in there's a whole world

going on behind you and to your sides there's a whole world out there and there's real animals and everything you know they're walking around and it's really bright but the lads couldn't understand what he was saying to him because they've no

frame of reference all they know is fucking because they've no frame of reference all they know is fucking shadows they've no frame of reference whatsoever and he's trying to explain to them the incredibly complex theories such as 3D moving objects and the sun and smells and the lads just can't grasp it

because all they know are shadows on a wall so eventually they entertain him for a while and then they start to get fucking mad angry furious at Paddy Irishman coming down to them

telling them about this world outside calling him a fucking idiot calling him a fool saying that he's mad then they want to kill him they want him dead so he leaves now you're probably wondering

where the fuck am I going with this what's he doing what's blind by that I know it sounds like I'm a after smoking a lot of hash and I'm in the middle of a whitener

but that scenario there that I just spoke about that's not my my scenario that is a scenario that's 2500 years old

and it's known as Plato's Allegory of the Cave and it's known as Plato's allegory of the cave and it's kind of a thought experiment that the philosopher Plato came up with and what it's about it's it's about kind of human perception and knowledge and enlightenment. Some people say what it's about is Plato's teacher was Socrates. And Socrates was sentenced to death because his teachings were so disruptive to society and the political system of his time and it's

kind of the theory that when a human reaches a level of knowledge or enlightenment that if that level of knowledge or enlightenment is so far ahead that when they come back and try and explain it

to humans like if it's too far beyond what society is capable of understanding that the person bringing that information to society will most likely meet some type of violent end because it's too much of a shift,

in kind of, ideology and perception, you know, and that's why, Paddy Scotsman, and Paddy Englishman, like wanted to kill Paddy Irishman, and all he was trying to do,

was say to them, lads, you've been staring at sock puppets your whole life you know the shapes on the wall they're not real I know you would think they're real but they're not real I've seen actual things I've seen actual animals and people I've seen them

but I can only use words to describe them and the boys can't understand it so they want to describe him, and the boys can't understand it, so they want to kill him, and, I don't know what got me talking about that, it was maybe, some relation to last week's theme, of the podcast was about,

the theories of Carl Rogers, and the real and ideal self, and, the shadows on the wall are the ideal, they're not the real, they're like the ideal, ideal they're not the real, they're like the ideal but they're like the the shadows on the walls of Plato's cave are projections that are projected by society and culture

onto our minds as real, but they're just, they're not, they're ideal it's like advertising, advertising is the shadow on the wall nowadays you know. The idea that buying a bar of soap is going to make you a better version of yourself, and we believe it. They are the shadows on Plato's cave. On his wall. But some would argue that if Plato's cave was a real thing, right, if that was an actual thing, if you had three

human beings from birth who knew nothing other than shadows on a wall and then all of a sudden you confront them with 3D reality, that what the the leap of perception would be so great that the two boys would actually die of shock and that's a theory that futurists have regarding accelerating change in technology right some futurists futurists are i think they're people who study the future not futurists as in the actual art movement the italian art movement they were fascists but futurists as in people who theorize about the future but technology has it's in a state of accelerating change right if you look at

the technology from we'll say the time of Christ 2000 years ago to 1000 years later we'll say the Normans technology hadn't changed that much there was better metal forging

but people were still kind of living in shitty enough huts and going around on horses but you compare we'll say the year 1000 to the year 2000 and the level of technological change there is fucking nuts

so if you got a person from the time of Christ and you then gave them a time machine and they arrived at the norman invasion 1066 that person would certainly go into a state of future shock but they'd be able to adjust to it you know but if you took the person from the norman invasion and brought them to the year 2000 they would die of shock it would be too much for them they would die of shock cars televisions but with the theory of accelerating change if you got someone from the 1920s

and brought them to now right and we're only talking 100 years now if you got someone from the 1920s and brought them to 2018 we'll say 1918 someone from 1918 and brought them to 2018 and showed them things like smartphones or virtual reality they would most likely die of shock and only 100 years has passed so that is accelerating change and

I often wonder too as well like the human like physically biologically the humans that were around in the time of Christ like we're the exact same now like we haven't actually changed biologically not even the time of Christ

earlier we're biologically modern I think for like 30,000 40,000 years so I sometimes wonder, what the fuck do our brains think

when we're messing around with technology? Like, we still have a caveman brain. Here's a hot take, but like, your smartphone, right? You spend your day on your smartphone, like, essentially just tapping on a piece of glass, right? Tapping, tapping, tapping on a piece of glass all day long. I do it myself. Hours on end, tapping

on a piece of glass. Does the caveman part of my brain think I'm trapped inside a prison and a glass wall and I'm just tapping on the glass wall trying to get out? That's Banksy level of hot take right there now that's one of those terrible internet art pieces that critique how our critiquing social media and how it's a bad thing

but there are elements of that with our with our brains you know that don't understand society as such even a theme I speak about a lot anxiety you know anxiety attacks do you ever get so

do you ever get so scared right or you get a big fright and you either want to fart or shit yourself yeah should we even have the phrase you know you're shitting it you're so scared you're shitting it like that's a really weird physical response to being frightened Should we even have the phrase, you know, you're shitting it, you're so scared you're shitting it. Like that's a really weird physical response to being frightened.

But that is, there's a part of your brain called the amygdala. It's a tiny little part of your brain and some people call it the lizard brain, right? Because if you go back millions and millions and millions of years in our evolution, when our earliest ancestors, which were essentially like little lizards that climbed out of the ocean. Now this is before the dinosaurs. And we came from these little lizards that climbed out of the ocean. Excuse me. But these little lizards, millions and millions and millions and millions of years ago they had very simple brains

that mainly contained an amygdala and an amygdala which is in your brain tiny part of your brain it's kind of it's quite binary and these little lizards

their tiny lizard brain used to know it would tell him when it wanted to eat when it wanted to run away and when it wanted to have sex but three things but we still have this little amygdala in our brain now as as complex human beings so when this little lizardions and millions of years ago. Got attacked by a bigger lizard. Because it's body weight was so light. If it needed to run away. It would actually shit itself.

Because that would reduce. You know. A substantial amount of body weight. And it could run away faster. So you and me today. Still experience the sensation. of needing to shit ourselves if we get a fright because of the primitive amygdala in our head

that can dictate and trigger our emotions and if you get a panic attack inside the fucking library or shopping centre shitting your pants isn't going to do much for you you know it's certainly not going to reduce your weight so much

that you need to run away and it puts into perspective how irrational things like anxiety can be you know the fight or flight response that's what an anxiety attack is you get a

a pang of fear and then your amygdala triggers we'll say the adrenal gland tells it to release adrenaline all over your body your heart starts thumping your breathing becomes shallow your digestion stops

and you're told to you know either fight or run away but the source of fear and you're told to either fight or run away, but the source of fear is not a large animal coming to attack you, but it is a threat to your sense of self, your self-esteem, your identity. That's what can trigger anxiety now. But regarding the future shock theory theory because that's something that

I don't know keeps me awake thinking about if you got Padraig Pearce and James Connolly and brought him here now and gave him a Facebook account would they die of shock

and I often wonder is that true, would that happen how do you test that how do you test would somebody die of shock if you showed them advanced technology because there's no way to do it because you'd need a time machine

but then this got me thinking got me thinking about World War II. The Pacific theatre of World War II. So if we go back to the early 1940s, right? And I've spoken before about when the Americans entered World War II, it was because of it was as a response to the attacks on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese

so the majority of the American conflict in World War II took place on the Pacific Theater against the Japanese by sea and by air so the area we're talking about is you know the Pacific Ocean by sea and by air so the area we're talking about is

you know the Pacific Ocean the one to the left of America the one between America and Japan and above Australia, around there so in the Pacific Ocean there's lots and lots, loads

of little islands, tiny islands. Unfortunately, these little islands are now disappearing because of global warming. But there was loads and loads and loads of these little islands. So the Americans and the Japanese made use of these islands, right? made use of these islands right they would land planes on them or they would have little bases on these tiny islands in the Pacific theatre of World War II

but living on these islands are people and they're known as in general Melanesians would be the collective term for the vast peoples and cultures of the islands of the Pacific okay

Papua New Guinea Fiji and many many smaller islands in between very small islands so the thing is with the cultures on these islands for a vast

for a few reasons they were not very technologically advanced, right? A lot of the small populations on these small islands had essentially Stone Age technology. The reasons for this are mainly they didn't have access they didn't have access to certain facets of the environment that allow for technological development one of them was they didn't have beasts of burden on their land

they didn't have cattle or cows which you could use to farm land and plant things like rice or wheat and to till the soil so they had to do it by hand for whatever things they were growing they also relied on a kind of a hunter gatherer

lifestyle as well their main source of carbohydrates that they had it was like a type of tuber like it would look like a potato a type of tuber, like, it would look like a potato,

but you have to dig it out of the ground, and there's one specific island too, and their source of carbohydrate, is this type of, potato you dig out of the ground, that's poisonous, and you have to wash it, so because of, lack of be subordinate,

and a lack of, proper farming, and things like that, they weren't very technologically advanced and they remained like that for a long long time so these tribes of people living on the islands who had had no contact with the outside world by the way none okay they hadn't even had contact with populations living in islands you know a few thousand miles away very very isolated communities

so all of a sudden during the Pacific theatre of World War II they had their first contact with American soldiers and Japanese soldiers out of fucking nowhere ok

they had their recorded history and then out of fucking nowhere okay they had their recorded history and then out of fucking nowhere planes and cars and people with machines arrive on their islands and what you essentially have there is it's like a stone age people being confronted with modern technology and that right there is your future shock right but the people in these cultures the Melanesians they didn't drop dead of shock

now it was highly highly stressful for them highly stressful because there was a war going on as well and they had this peaceful life on these little fucking islands and there's planes flying overhead blowing the shit out of each other.

I mean, for us, it would be like an alien invasion. It'd be like aliens having a war in the air. Be Independence Day. You know, big giant spaceships fucking hovering over all the major cities. That's what it would have been like for the Melanesian people of these islands in the Pacific. But one thing that was specific to some of the cultures of these islands

is they have a system of hierarchy which is known in anthropology as the big man system okay so in we'll say papa new guinea for instance hierarchy usually true true it was usually true males but but the hierarchy and status in your community. It wasn't about how hard you were, how great a fighter you were, how warlord-ism. Or it wasn't like how much property you had. Do you know? Because these are small islands, small communities. So property wasn't necessarily a massive commodity. So it was influence the person with the highest status in their community was somebody who could we say fairly redistribute goods

like if a hunting party went out or if they got climbed up a tree and got a lot of honey the the man who could distribute that in in the most fairest fashion and be reciprocal and the person who could tell the best stories any type of thing that could be bartered or that could increase your influence and how much people like you almost like a very political like a politician a parish pump politician this is known as the big man structure and the big men were the ones with the most influence and sway over people and the ones with things to trade and if you weren't a person who could do this you you were seen as what's known as a rubbish man so there was big men who could influence and trade and have goods and then there was the rubbish men and these were the men who

couldn't so what started to emerge and this is it's an anthropological theory about it when the american soldiers landed on the island and the Japanese soldiers landed, the soldiers themselves, they obviously wanted to be nice to the native people because they were setting up fucking, you know, they had a war to fight and they were setting up bases. So what they would do is they would give the fucking natives, like, cans of coke and chocolate bars

and radios and all sorts of stuff that they had. They would give the communities these things. So what this did psychologically is within the big man culture that already existed within the Melanesian people, when the Americans and Japanese came with their trade of these technologically advanced items it made the entire community of natives feel like

rubbish men it made them feel diminished and inferior within their culture so anyway World War II ended right

and all of a sudden out of nowhere the Japanese disappeared and the Americans disappeared okay and the people left on the island, they didn't have much communication going on

with the Japanese and with the Americans because one small little island could have, they could speak their own language and there was no way of translating. So the war ended and just everyone disappeared. But the lads were still left, the communities were still left on the islands

going what the fuck happened where did they go like I said it's like if aliens landed and they fucked off again for no reason and then what started to happen after they left every so often because of international trade routes

that established in the Pacific after World War II when the waters became safe every so often maybe once every five years something would wash up on the shore of we'll say Papua New Guinea

or one of the smaller islands like a crate full of clothes or a few tins of coke would wash up on the shore. And what started to emerge is that the Melanesian people believed that the Japanese and the American soldiers were actually gods, that they were gods from the heavens and that the cargo that used to wash up on the shore were gifts from the gods. So then something really fucking nuts starts to happen. The native people started to develop religious rituals and religious beliefs whereby they worshipped

American culture as a godly culture, right? And they started to create, they started to replicate the behaviour of the American soldiers when they had been on the island, okay, so the Americans would have had like temporary runways where planes would land, and they would have had like aircraft control towers and things like that, so around the 1950s and 60s, the Melanesian people started to make their own runways out of like bamboo meaningless runways just a runway out of bamboo and a bamboo air traffic control tower and they'd make stereo headphones out of bits of wood and visually recreate the rituals of air traffic control bringing planes in so they they started to behave like u.s military using their meager kind of scraps that they made as a religious ritual in the hope that by aping the

american soldiers who were trying to bring planes onto the island that if they do this as a religious ritual it will result in more and more cans of coke washing up on the shore these gifts from the gods and this phenomenon is known as cargo cult they're called cargo cults and they're now religions there's one in particular called the john Frum Cargo Cult and it's the biggest and most important one. There's an island called Tanna, a tiny island, and it's in a place called the Venatu Archipelago. And this particular cargo cult,

they're awaiting the second coming of an American soldier who they believe is a divine being and he's going to come back. They're still doing it. He's going to come back and bring them TVs and Coca-Cola

and fridges and they perform these rituals. With their fake fucking. Their fake runways. And their fake. Aircraft control towers. And they perform these rituals. As their religion.

They also have an American flag. That they worship. And they do this. Hoping that. John Frum. Whoever the fuck John Frum was, they think maybe that there was a guy called, an American soldier called John,

who was particularly nice, and he used to give chocolate and coke away, and they think it's John Frum America, and that's where they got the name. And they believe that he's going to come back as the form of a god, and give them televisions. And one day a year these tribes people they have they celebrate john from day and all the tribal elders they put on blue navy jeans like american jeans that are like 40 years old that were either left behind or washed up on shore and they wear these American jeans and they paint the word

USA on their chest and they perform like military drills holding bits of sticks instead of guns and they have an American flag that flies on a bamboo pole and this is their religious ritual

John Frum is going to come from the skies on his flying bird and give him cans of coke and that is their religion ritual. John Frum is going to come from the skies and his flying bird and give him cans of coke and that is their religion. And that is still going on. And there's a few, there's another cargo cult called the Tom Navy cargo cult

and they worship a US naval officer. And the most maddest one of all, the most insane one, there is a cargo cult in Micronesia and they worship Prince Philip the Queen's husband they actually worship him and they believe that he's a pale skinned

mountain spirit and they eagerly await when he is going to return to their island and bring them chocolate or whatever and the cargo cults for me to me it goes back it's Plato's cave that's what it is that goes back to Plato's cave essentially those cargo cult lads they're the ones that are.

They're staring at the kind of. The wall. And seeing the shadows. And then one day. One of them breaks free and comes back. And explains the world outside. And shows it to him. And that's what the Americans and the Japanese planes were.

That was the. The outside world. And they didn't. Try and kill the Americans. Or try and kill the Japanese. And they also didn't die of future shock. They worshipped. The Yanks and the Japanese.

And Prince fucking Philip. As gods. And that's my hot take. That's my hot take that's my hot take that the cargo cult is Plato's allegory of the cave that was some fucking rant lads wasn't it

huh fucking hell hot take but uh no I'm over I'm in, I'm in London, I'm in fucking London, and I'm working 12 hour days, if not longer, on a TV thing I'm doing, right, I'm staying in Saha, the West End, the beautiful Saha, and, yeah, I had to pull that out of my hole there I just had to fucking 40 minutes of straight talking about whatever trying to get into a state of flow and allow my unconscious to delve within whatever the fuck was stored into the back of my head and see what it took me so it took me to

Plato's Cave and Cargo Cults there you go the place that I'm staying in what I had to do was I have a mattress it's a small little bedroom thingy

I have a mattress up and I threw my jackets all over the place to diminish any potential echo in the room so that I can still give you the

podcast hug that you're accustomed to that warm intimate sound and I'm quite happy with it I think it sounds okay I brought my microphone over with me

you know so there you go last week I brought my microphone over with me, you know. So there you go. Last week, actually, do you know what? No, do you know what we do now? We'll have our ocarina pause. So every week, halfway through the podcast, a digital advert is inserted by Acast.

Some people hear it, some people don't for those who hear the advert fuck you, for those who don't hear the advert you get a beautiful a beautiful bit of playing of the ocarina and I brought the ocarina with me to London so the ocarina is a Spanish clay whistle

god help any new fucking listeners Jesus Christ, if someone said to you tune into the blind boy podcast and this is the one it starts off on sure fuck me go back to the start will ye go back to the start and listen

this episode is madness I'm under that hot London pressure ok here's the ocarina On April 5th You must be very careful Margaret It's the girl Witness the birth Bad things will start to happen

Evil things Of evil It's all for you No no don't The first omen I believe The girl is to be the mother Mother of what? is the most terrifying

six six six it's the mark of the devil hey movie of the year it's not real it's not real it's not real who said that the first omen only in theaters april 5th rock city you're the best fans in the league bar none tickets are on sale now for fan Appreciation Night on Saturday April 13th when the Toronto Rock hosts the Rochester Nighthawks at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton at 7.30pm. You can also lock in your playoff pack right now to guarantee the same seats for

every postseason game and you'll only pay as we play. Come along for the ride and punch your ticket to Rock City at torontorock.com actually you know what else i'll do what for the day that's in it i'll get some English money in my hands and I'll move it around my hands and you can hear

the lovely, the heavy English money English pounds have a different candor to them than the euro they're a much heavier currency listen to that that's three English pounds with the Queen's head on top. Oh, I'm taking the Queen's shilling. I like English money. It's very heavy.

English coins are very heavy. To the point that I have a conspiracy theory that the Bank of England directly funds the belt industry because all English people over here have got very strong belts because their pants, if you've got too much English money in your pockets your pants fall around your ankles. That's how you can tell if an Irish comedian such as myself ignores the entertainment industry in Ireland and goes over to England to take the Queen's shilling as soon as you get back to Ireland your pants fall around

your ankles because your pockets are so full of that delicious Protestant money that black Maggie Thatcher's black Protestant milk sucking it out of her nipples this podcast does not have a sponsor it is supported by the generosity of the listeners

via a Patreon page if you enjoy the podcast and you want to support it I won't say keep it going do you know why? because this podcast is going to go indefinitely even if I upset people and only have 10 listeners but if you are a listener and you enjoy it and you'd like to buy me the equivalent of a pint once a month for uh for five hours of content

a month if you think that i'm deserving of. A cup of coffee or a pint. Approximately 4 euro or 5 euro. Then you are more than welcome. To contribute to the Patreon page. Which is. Patreon.com Forward slash. The Blind Boy Podcast.

So if you're feeling generous and sound. Please do. And as always. If you don't have the money. Or if you simply don't want to give me any money that's fine absolutely fine you can continue to listen for free there's no pressure however if you don't want to part with money and want to give some type of gesture um subscribe to the podcast on iTunes I invite everybody

please leave a review and rate the podcast, rate the podcast every week if you could, the reason I'm always asking for subscriptions and ratings is I'm trying to bag an international sponsor for the podcast if I can because the Irish sponsors

they're just not interested the Irish advertisers are they're behind the times podcasts give them future shock do you know they're living in the stone age but I want that hot international sponsor and things like

high ratings and lots of reviews are what you bring international sponsors and go hey look at me I'm a hot boy. Oil me up. So please leave a review or recommend it to a friend or all that carry on. Also last week, I recommended an album, a musical album every week. And I think last week is going to be the last one that i i

recommend at least for a while i don't know i might bring it back the reason being last week i recommended that you listen to an album called crime of the century by super tramp and i said i'm not sure if i've recommended this before i don't I have. And it turns out I fucking did. So I recommended the same album twice. In the podcast. And that to me lets me know. That I'm after losing the run of myself. And I need to drop the album segment. So there you go.

If you want to hear new music. I do have. I have. Some playlists on Spotify. that i curated there's three playlists there's one playlist of uh west west coast g-funk music another playlist called objectively class tunes which contains many many songs across many genres that are objectively class and there's also a post disco playlist and you'll find them if you go onto spotify and find the rubber bandits page and go into playlists so there's some music for you but i'm

going to chill out on the albums for a while because i'm embarrassed that i recommended super tramp twice holy moly so i'll answer a few questions that you send me on Patreon and Twitter there's one question I wanted to answer actually and I saw it on Twitter during the week and I can't remember who asked it but a girl

asked she'd like me to I'm paraphrasing blind by i'd love to hear you talk about repeal the eighth and then that got a couple of likes because i haven't mentioned repeal the eighth now for our non-irish listeners in ireland uh abortion is illegal because there's a thing called the eighth amendment in our constitution which forbids abortion and this may we are having a referendum to try and change this in the constitution so that access to abortion can be made free safe and legal but however 10 ir Irish women a day travel to London for abortions.

And there's also a lot of abortion pills being brought into the country. So abortions are happening, a lot of them. But they're not happening in a way that keeps women safe. And women are entitled to be safe and entitled to have a choice over their own bodies. So yes, repeal the fucking 8 please. safe and entitled to have a choice over their own bodies so yes repeal the fucking eight please if you have uh if you're trying to organize repeal the eighth in your town or village or whatever and you want me to retweet your event just at me rubber bandits Twitter, and I will retweet that for you, because I want to try and support that, and,

to the lads who are listening, if you are in support of Repeal the AIDS, which I think you should be, don't waste your time on Twitter arguing, or Twitter or Facebook or social media, arguing with, the kind of hardline pro-life people because their minds

are made up if you want to use your energy appropriately speak to your uncles and aunts and speak to the lads, speak to your friends who don't have an opinion on it because it doesn't affect them get them to use their vote so that's my two cents on it

I don't talk about it much on this because I reserve Twitter for that and even on Twitter I don't talk about it much, I prefer rather me talking about repealing the 8th I rather retweet and platform fucking like the abortion rights

campaign and things like that because at the same time I am conscious of the fact that it is a it's a female issue not necessarily a female issue it's an issue for people with reproductive organs

I don't have them so I'd rather platform the voices of people who have those reproductive organs than me roaring it and shouting about it and to be honest that position is that's only something I've very recently learned like the past year you know through listening Anita asks hello blind boy can you talk a little about the root causes for mental disorders such as depression, anxiety

ADD, bipolar etc do you believe it's genetic or is there a correlation between stressed out parents and the environment set up for a developing baby that creates these dysfunctions in our kids later life where do you feel these mental disorders lie well Anita, I'm certainly

not a fucking expert at all i would have more than an armchair knowledge of psychotherapy and psychology because it's something i'm very interested in but i'm certainly not an expert and there is no black and white yes or no answer to that question and the human mind is something that people are still really learning about a lot i'll tell you what i am cautious of i'm cautious of people who say that mental health issues are purely genetic or you know what i mean i'm cautious of that i'm also cautious of people who say that mental health issues are purely environmental. It's more than likely a complex mix of the two. Speaking for myself and my own voice,

my mental health issues were most certainly environmental and did not have, I believe, a genetic kind of... I didn't have a genetic predisposition to anxiety or depression. I can tell you, I definitely, I can trace in my childhood how I learned anxiety as a response to stress. So I believe that a lot of my issues with anxiety and depression, they were learned from my childhood. Many myriad things came into it and in my treatment i chose not to use medication that's just me personally okay i am not saying that that's going to work for anyone else here's the thing with mental health the mental health issues are as unique and complex as the people it affects so there's

never a black and white answer for me personally i was prescribed xanax at the start of my panic attacks and me personally i was just like no i don't think i don't think i'm ready to go down the that route for me so i used cognitive behavioral therapy and meditation and that worked for me so I used cognitive behavioural therapy and meditation and that worked for me but if you are taking antidepressants or you're taking anti-anxiety medication it's your business

that works for you that works for you and don't allow people to shame you around it but there is no black and white answer to that question mental health is incredibly complex and we're still only finding shit out and effective mental health treatment as well the ideal situation it's always multidisciplinary you'd have a psychotherapist a psychiatrist clinical psychologist all these

different disciplines to try and tackle the issue you know and each one of them they all come from different you know a psychotherapist is interested in talking and probing the mind the psychiatrist is more interested in looking at it from a medical perspective that is the opinion of a man from limerick who wears a plastic bag in his head and is not an expert personal opinion shenade asks you end the podcast with a god bless do you believe in god what's your concept of god when i say god bless it's more of a cultural thing it's it's an ironic cultural thing we you know it's god bless is an irish saying it's an irish thing god bless so when i say god bless it's i'm kind of taking the piss but i don't really have an opinion on on on

god do you know what i mean like i'm certainly not hardcore atheist for i'm like there is definitely no god or what the fuck is god um If I had to take a stance on it. I'd take the Buddha's stance. And the Buddha was asked once. Is there a God? And Buddha said. If you're worrying about whether or not there is a God. Then you're not living in the present moment.

So. My kind of belief is that things like heaven and hell and God, these are things that happen right now. So, if I'm living my life in the present moment and experiencing news and mindfulness, you know, if my life has meaning, if I'm doing things I like and my mental health is good then i am living in heaven and if i choose the opposite route where i'm going down the road of anxiety and depression then i'm living in hell so things like god and heaven and hell for me they happen in this reality and it's about the present moment so i try my best to live in heaven as much as possible through my daily mental health regime and I don't really think a lot about abstract concepts like God because you can go down many fucking routes

I mean I often look at animals and I wonder do animals have a concept of God because humans are the only animals that actively create things we we cannot fathom pointlessness and meaninglessness we can't do it because we are creatures of meaning if you look around at the the built environment around you if you live in a city literally everything has kind of has been put there deliberately for a reason buildings, roads, even trees that humans planted and nature is less like that

nature is more chaotic and I often wonder the likes of Yortley Ahern the otter I doubt he thinks about God he would be quite comfortable living in the the chaos of the universe I don't know, here I am again projecting fucking

metaphysics onto an otter should just leave him alone this is another podcast this fucking this discussion is for another fucking podcast I'm concerned with the here and now being mindful living in the present moment that's what I'm about Owen

asks on your point about solemnity and yet another fucking massacre in an American school would the victims be better remembered by the aftermath being graphically displayed? Show the reality of what a bunch of people getting shot in cold blood looks like. Perhaps encountering that visceral horror

would finally crack the impenetrable. Our thoughts are with you but the second amendment is sacred bullshit. Again I'm always choosing these fucking questions. That. Could occupy a podcast by themselves. Oh and what you've kind of done there. Is positioned the.

There's a philosopher called Michel Foucault. And. Foucault. Had an interesting argument about western society now i don't want to give too much of this away because i think foucault himself deserves his own podcast episode but foucault argued that crime and punishment in industrial western society is more barbarous now than it was we say a thousand years ago right a thousand years ago you had public beheadings and executions very public bloody punishment that everyone could see and smell and be a part of and foucault argued that that could actually become more just

when brutality is platformed and visible and that the sanitization leads to greater brutality and evil is far more evil so that's kind of what you're arguing from you're coming at that from a Foucault point of view because Foucault would say yeah, show us all the blood

we need to connect fully connect in a human way with the scale of what's happening. Otherwise it is sanitized. The other way to go at it too is from the philosopher Jean Baudrillard. And his big thing was hyper-realism. He would argue that the school shootings are being presented to us as a hyper real simulacra that because they happen in the media that they are not presented to us as real they're presented to us as copies of copies of copies and therefore we do not fully emotionally

connect with them and because of that we won't do anything about it so to probe your question yeah you're looking at a mixture of Foucault and fucking Baudrillard and I can't answer it em I don't know I mean fuck it did looking at the ISIS videos

do anything maybe it did I don't know that's a big big question for another podcast you can't okay one last question Jamie Carty asks any chance you could give us a run down on your meditation process would love to get

into it but I'm not really sure what I'm at there's one answer to that and in order to do this I'm going to have to essentially do free advertising for a product. There's an app that you can get called Headspace, okay? And it's free, but if you get into it,

I think it's like seven quid a month. But if you use it, it's well worth it, right? So Headspace is a meditation app. There's no spirituality to it. It's just very straightforward, mindful meditation, there's no beliefs to it, you stick your headphones in, you do it 10 minutes a day, twice a day, and I would, I would give it a go, give Headspace a go, Headspace is fucking amazing, and I used Headspace quite a lot myself when I started off meditating years ago I first ever mind from this book I bought was a little book called the calm technique

and it was recommended to me by a counselor and if you can get your hands on the calm technique by Paul Wilson as well it's just a tiny little book that's very good it has a basic counting meditation I might at some point over the summer when i have more time do a few guided meditations myself on this podcast maybe i'll go down to yorty's couch um down by plassy river and record them there because that's where i used to meditate now when i meditate because i've been doing it so long I'm able to meditate while I'm running and meditation essentially all it is

is having the skill to focus your mind on something repetitive such as counting counting is the easiest meditation then when you get more advanced you can meditate on specific emotions or parts of your body so

download Headspace and give it a crack i mentioned earlier that i'm looking for a sponsor for the podcast and like my ideal international sponsor would be headspace because if i do get a sponsor i'd actually like to be advertising something that i myself use and think would be a benefit to my listeners and headspace is that thing so download Headspace for yourself, give it a crack and the one piece of advice I'd give you going into

meditation don't, try to lower your expectations, okay lower your expectations don't have too much judgement around yourself whether you get it right or wrong it might take you a while to get into it just go with the flow that's what meditation is about it's

about relaxing letting go and truly accepting meditation is acceptance it's not about fighting things it's not about changing things it's about accepting but the the app itself. The meditations on it. They explain that far better than I can. So yeah. Download Headspace. We've reached an hour now in the podcast. And I usually go for an hour 15. An hour 20. But I'm just up the walls this week lads.

And I'm going to be busy next week as well. So I'll give you a nice concise hour. And as always. Go in peace. And look after yourselves. Be compassionate to yourself. Try and be compassionate to someone else. And have a good week.

Chill out. You'll be grand. Don't focus too much on. Worrying about something that has focus too much on worrying about something that has already happened or worrying about something that might happen enjoy what's happening right now okay

and be mindful in whatever you do even if it's scraping dog shit off your shoe yort also leave a review of the podcast yart also leave a review of the podcast subscribe to the podcast recommend it to a friend if you like

and donate a few quid to the Patreon if that's how you're feeling I'd like it if you did that thank you yart Thank you. Yacht. rock city you're the best fans in the league bar none tickets are on sale now for fan appreciation night on saturday april 13th when the toronto rock hosts the rochester nighthawks at first ontario center in hamilton at 7.30pm.

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