Timcast IRL - Timcast IRL #292 - Woke Takeover Of Company FAILS, Founders Fight Back And WIN w/ Grace And Curtis

Episode Date: May 22, 2021

Tim, Ian, and Lydia host co-founders of a nonprofit organization and married team Grace and Curtis to discuss their recent experience with fighting critical theory in their own organization, defining ...the terms that lay the groundwork for engaging these ideas, the meaningless of postmodernism, an Antifa friend who told Tim she WANTED to 'burn everything down', how wokeness emulates a prion brain disease, and how to make the left play by their own rules. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 In a viral video, you can see Russian soldiers preparing for some kind of conflict. A super chiseled, shaven head Russian man sits him from his bed, muscular. Then there's another picture of him. He's like in a bomber jet and he's got like a hood over his head. And then he jumps out and he's got like a bolt action rifle or whatever because it looks like he's got an AK-47. Anyway, the point is, this is an ad for the Russian army, apparently, and it makes the Russians look like pretty badass.
Starting point is 00:00:26 And this viral video then juxtaposes it with the American army ad, which is a young woman talking about going to LGBT pride events in support of her two moms. This is getting slammed by conservatives, and I don't think the Democrats really care that much of the woke care that much until it became a culture war issue but ted cruz said that the democrats and the woke media are trying to make our military into pansies so across the u.s we've seen the expansion of critical race theory in many companies during the trump era there was a strong effort to push back donald trump at the very at the 11th hour signed his executive orders to ban critical race theory in government government trainings and then any company that contracts with the government but joe budden has reversed this so there's a lot of optimism but there's also a lot of pessimism today we've got some people here who have actually dealt with the expansion of critical race theory among uh with
Starting point is 00:01:18 from those in their own organization and how they pushed back and actually wrote about how they were able to resist this. So we're going to talk a lot about critical race theory today, where we're currently at, optimism, pessimism. Of course, we have the military. We also have the woman who wrote the 1619 Project, outraged because she was denied tenure, even though apparently it isn't something she should have actually gotten. And they're claiming now in mainstream press that it's cancel culture because she wrote
Starting point is 00:01:43 fake history and nobody's buying it. I'm just going to throw it to you guys to introduce yourselves because I know that there's – I'll just throw it to you. Go ahead. You can start, Grace. Thanks for having us. I'm Grace.
Starting point is 00:01:57 And Curtis. Aloha. I'm Curtis. There we go. Good to be with you guys. So just – you want to give like a really brief introduction of – Yeah, sure. So just you want to give like a really brief introduction of. Yeah. Sure.
Starting point is 00:02:05 So we're co-founders of a nonprofit organization doing trainings with lay care providers working with trauma survivors all over the world. So pretty high trauma context like refugee camps and human trafficking aftercare and foster kids and that kind of thing. Right on. So we're training people who do not have a clinical background in how to better support the people they serve. So you wrote an article for the American Mind? Yep. About this push for critical race theory, I suppose?
Starting point is 00:02:38 Yeah. All right. Well, then we'll get into it, I suppose. Did you want to add anything to that, Curtis? I'm just here so that I don't get fined. Okay. Good answer. All right.
Starting point is 00:02:51 So I think, you know, for this show, we're going to be going through, like, the whole story from the beginning. So it's probably better we save a little bit of it. So Ian has set up his static orb. Yes, I'm ready now, the static orb. Oh, nice. Thank you, Tim. I'm loving it. Got a little shea butter on my hands, moisturized, ready to rock and roll.
Starting point is 00:03:08 I love it. This is going to be a great show. I'm really excited, and I am here in the corner pushing the buttons for it, as always. But don't forget, go to TimCast.com, become a member. We have a huge library of awesome members-only content. When you sign up to be a member, you're really helping us grow the business because we are talking with a bunch of other producers about new shows. So Timcast.com is going to have a ton of content. So that membership is going to go a long way. But we are very close to opening up every Friday
Starting point is 00:03:35 night as a semi-public event, which means sign up. Those that give at least $25 a month will see the announcement. And we're doing 10 first-come, first-served tickets for those that give at least $25 a month will see the announcement. And we're doing 10 first-come, first-served tickets for those that are big fans and you're able to catch the article. And then we're doing 10 auction tickets, so it's like to the highest bidder. And we're trying to find a way to balance getting as much opportunity to everybody who don't have the time or who don't have the resources. It's not easy. It's not perfect. But sign up because that will be coming soon.
Starting point is 00:04:05 We just got to get through a lot of the business work to make it you know on the level you can't just invite a bunch of people to a building you know there's there's laws and stuff but uh definitely do it and don't forget to like and subscribe to this channel like like this video subscribe and share the show with your friends because we're going to get serious right now let's jump in to our story so this is the article, The American Mind. You can hold your ground against critical theory. And there's this image of a bunch of very angry people with pitchforks and baseball bats, shovels. One guy's got an axe.
Starting point is 00:04:39 I've seen angry mobs depicted in movies, but this guy's got an axe and he's wearing some kind of ballistic helmet. That's a pretty serious graphic they got there. But I don't think what you guys were going through involved people with axes chasing you. Not literally, no. No, not literally. But I guess the gist of your story is that you run an organization and wokeness, critical race, started to emerge and you guys fought back. So why don't you just tell me from the beginning what happened? Yeah. So I actually joined Twitter almost a year ago because we were dealing with
Starting point is 00:05:13 what we could tell were some sort of ideological strains of thought happening within the organization. And with those strains of thought, some very specific, strongly worded requests around how the organization should proceed. So what does your organization do? Right. So we're doing the trainings for people who work with survivors of trauma. So we're training lay people, so people who do not have clinical training, in how to better serve the people that they are helping. Cool. So what happened with these ideologies?
Starting point is 00:05:45 So, yeah, so it's connected to, you know, psychology, counseling, and those fields are influenced now in part by critical theory, which is an academic theory. And while most people, I mean, I think the language is kind of a hard part about this because, you know, when you use the word like woke, it's really loaded, and it's becoming kind of a pejorative and people will resist that. And, you know, like, OK, you're just using woke to say like anything I don't like that's coming from the left.
Starting point is 00:06:13 It's just sort of this vague word that catches everything and you don't even really know what it means. So let's so if you don't mind, how about I just I'll pull up critical theory as Wikipedia defines it. Not the perfect definition, but for those that we want to avoid, you know, loaded phrases. Yeah. They say critical theory is a Marxist approach to social philosophy that focuses on reflective assessment and critique of society and culture in order to reveal and challenge power structures with origins in sociology and literary criticism, it argues that social problems are influenced and created more by societal structures and cultural assumptions than by individual and psychological factors.
Starting point is 00:06:50 Maintaining that ideology is the principal obstacle to human liberation, critical theory was established as a school of thought primarily by the Frankfurt School theoreticians, Herbert Marcuse,
Starting point is 00:07:04 Theodore Adorno, Walter Benjamin, Eric Fromm, and Max Horkheimer. Horkheimer described a theory as critical insofar as it seeks to liberate human beings from the circumstances that enslave them. Yes. So this is what... Marxist liberation from systems of power and oppression orchestrated by humans on behalf of other humans, or humans collectivizing in order to liberate themselves from hegemonic oppression so yeah definitely marxian in nature the thing is though and where it gets hard is even though people are very influenced by the ideas of critical theory
Starting point is 00:07:35 and we're seeing this all over our country at this point you know in schools and the military and medicine um a lot of people who have embraced the ideas of critical theory don't, wouldn't call it that. They don't know. They wouldn't say, oh, I'm a critical theorist. I believe in critical theory. So while they're, while they have accepted many of the tenets and they're using the jargon like, oh, there are systems of power and oppression and we need to, you know, we need to examine these power structures and make sure that we're not complicit in perpetrating abuses or perpetrating oppression. So we're all familiar with that language at this point. If you were to, you know, ask the average person, like, oh, like, where would you say your ideas are coming from? They might say something just like social justice.
Starting point is 00:08:11 It's social justice. I'm doing social justice. And so it's like, that's great. I'm for that, you know, but they're not maybe aware of the actual roots of this thing and how it, the aims of it, you know? And so they end up aligning themselves with a theory that is fundamentally i mean this is why i think it's so important to speak out about it is it's dehumanizing um definitely so and we felt that and so i mean in terms of that image being somewhat um sensational with all the pitchforks and whatnot it still is and other people many other people because when i when i i posted this story on Twitter and it ended up being spread abroad. So let's start.
Starting point is 00:08:48 I'll start from the argument. I'll give you a left argument, I suppose, a critical theorist argument. So you run this organization, and you start noticing this ideology. The first question you'll probably get is, well, what's wrong with someone speaking up and trying to have racial justice within your company? Are you against that? No, not at all. In fact, I share those same values, and I think we might differ in strategy. And then what happens is when you say, I differ in strategy, they say, it sounds like maybe you're unwilling to investigate your white
Starting point is 00:09:18 privilege or your whiteness or how you're complicit in the system. It sounds like you're not really ready to talk. So it quickly shifts from the idea to you. What was the first thing that happened that you noticed? Right. So actually the first time the rubber really met the road, we were like, okay, wait a minute. So first of all, Curtis runs the staff. I'm technically a volunteer for the organization and have been on the board, the governing board.
Starting point is 00:09:41 I couldn't help but notice that Curtis is a white male. You are correct. He's also straight. He's also cisgendered. Oh, no. Are you a Christian? He's a Christian. I'm going to pass out.
Starting point is 00:09:54 What's the five things? It's a trifecta. Oh, man. That's like way more. But jokingly, but I do bring it up because I'm sure that with him running the staff, that was immediately a point that people brought up. So, again, I shouldn't interrupt, but what did you notice? No, it's an important point.
Starting point is 00:10:11 Well, I mean, he might be able to speak to this more because he was beginning to feel like I don't even have the right to, or it's hard for me to contradict my own staff in certain ways based on how they're presenting these things to me, as though these are non-negotiables. Well, so what were they presenting? Like, what happened? Yeah. I mean, so I would say that the first time that I felt like I ever kind of even hit the pause button, because first of all, I hired all these people. I love these people. They're not people that are carrying pitchforks. Exactly. I mean, when you try to have these conversations, of course, you're, you're being, you're trying to get people's attention. So I'm glad that, that we are attentive to this conversation now. And so all these people, I hired them, they did great work in so many ways for so many years. Um, we, I'm proud of what we
Starting point is 00:10:59 accomplished together and I love and care about them. And it was an honor to partner together as well as support them in all the ways that I was able to. And the first time that I ever felt the need to push pause on and really kind of analyze their approach to providing the mental health resources that our organization's mission offers was when affirmative care came up. And when we were trying to talk through our guidelines of really being welcoming, inclusive and a space that, of course, the shared value of everybody being able to have access to what we had to offer and to feel comfortable and and be able to receive from that time in that educational space. So that is where things began to surface was around the strategy of how to welcome and include people. Right, and specifically around gender identity and the use of gender pronouns.
Starting point is 00:11:59 So it was an issue of speech and compelled speech because at first— Was this you guys introducing a policy or was this something brought to you like wanting a new policy? No. So the way the organization is structured is we're a training organization. So we have trainers who are contract employees who are all over the world. They're scattered different places and they lead trainings for us. And then we have a central team at headquarters that oversees the training program. So those training program staff that began, you know, wanting to introduce into the curriculum this idea of we should be actually
Starting point is 00:12:31 teaching the people at our trainings about gender identity. And a good way to model that is to actually more than invite at first. And they eventually realized their first approach was not the best. But their first approach was everyone needs to share a pronoun whether you know what that you know whether that's your thing or whatever like we're gonna we're gonna have the whole circle share their gender pronouns i mean there were comical moments because like we we train everybody in the world and even the people who come to where we are locally and are trained with us are coming from all over the world so there there are many languages, languages that don't have pronouns. Oh, that's a good or like non-gendered ones.
Starting point is 00:13:08 Like these trainings that were happening locally were done in English. So anyone who was there was an English speaker. But yes, we did. We train in other languages as well. And in context where, yeah, absolutely. This category of gender identity would just be completely foreign and inappropriate to bring up. But this in the local trainings, you know, we'd have moments where, you know, a woman from Uganda was there at the training and it gets to her and she's just like,
Starting point is 00:13:30 I don't know what you're talking about. You know, like, I don't know. So it's like, how is this inclusive? Like you're making her feel like she's no idea what's going on this, you know? And so they, they back peddled from that, but it was still their deeply held conviction that if you don't bring that category of gender identity into the space, as they would say it, the people who that category is important to their identity will feel erased, essentially. It's a very egocentric worldview. Right. Like, my experience trumps yours. Yes. Right. worldview right like my my experience trumps yours yes right um and the the fact also that
Starting point is 00:14:09 even though some of our training staff were licensed clinical mental health professionals these training spaces are not clinical spaces so there was that thing too of like well wait a minute like how can we be doing care like this is a this is a clinical model of care affirmative care like we shouldn't even be touching it at all. We're training. We're an educational space. No one is signing confidentiality waivers to be here. No one is receiving therapeutic care from you. And so that just kind of that is what ripped off the the lid to all of this, because I just was like, I don't know what they're talking about. I don't know why this is such a big deal to them.
Starting point is 00:14:42 I don't get it at all. I need to start doing some reading. And this was probably like three years ago.'s been a it was yeah yeah and that i really started i i using some of the jargon that i heard from them on a regular basis i just started reading so intersectionality you know is a big word that i heard them use and um that was kind of where i started and then that that launched me into this world of critical theory. This is why I say woke and I don't say critical theory. Critical theory is one aspect of what we're seeing. But then you have intersectionality.
Starting point is 00:15:14 Then you have fourth-wave feminism and all these different ideas. And so I understand that woke might be loaded because you've got a culture war going on. But it's more of an umbrella term for a variety of authoritarian ideology right it's it's very it's it's uh it's it's a moral framework that believes in their own superiority much like many fundamentalist religions it's unassailable you can't examine it you can't challenge it right so so that to me was what raised the red flags was like hey i'm i'm totally happy for you to disagree with me like that's why we
Starting point is 00:15:45 hired the diverse people you know we wanted the strength that comes from different perspectives but when you tell me i must accept your conception of reality and i can't even ask questions because asking questions alone reveals that i'm i'm revealing like my resistance to even being a good person or something by asking questions like oh i don't want to investigate my cis heteronormative you know whatever um i was like you know that to me is like cultish language you know where it's like this this doctrine must be accepted and to ask is proof first of all first of all that the injustice is happening that you're questioning you know what is ibram x can he's always saying the heartbeat of racism is denial yep So it's this... Proving that he himself is one of the most abhorrent racists on the planet.
Starting point is 00:16:27 I mean that literally. By his own worldview, the man himself is one of the most unrepentant racists. And that's a really important point is you have to hold them to the standards that they're holding to you. And then when you hold them to those standards, that's when you start to realize like, wait a minute, this isn't actually about a good faith dialogue because I just applied your standard to you, but now it's asymmetrical. Exactly. So we'll put a pin in that.
Starting point is 00:16:52 And then for the people who watch this show and know me, they've probably heard this, but just for you guys who haven't heard it, my first experience with critical race theory intersectionality during Occupy was if I agreed with them they would they would recognize my mixed heritage if i disagree with them they would accuse me of being a wealthy white male clearly none of that was true but it was just if you disagree with us you're a white man and then i'm like well my mom is actually and i'm from the south side i'm poor and they're like oh i'm so sorry oh you know on... Even though none of your ideas changed.
Starting point is 00:17:25 It's just like now they've reframed. They, I was told explicitly that I, you know, needed to reconsider my opinions as a white man. And then when I explained, actually I'm a high school dropout from the South Side of Chicago and I'm from a mixed race family. Then all of a sudden these white liberals went,
Starting point is 00:17:37 oh, oh, now I see what you're saying. Like legit. All of a sudden now I was like, oh, I'm like the most disrespectful and insane thing i ever experienced i was like what do you what is this like do you have an actual argument it's reductive and that's the dehumanizing part is it's reductive for the person who's on the receiving end of that you know to literally be told you cannot speak on this topic because you are xyz like you just don't even get a seat at the table but then it's i think it's dehumanizing
Starting point is 00:18:03 for the person who is holding the view. And so equally equally like I'm concerned about the people who are being treated this way and, you know, having their their lives ruined because they're being canceled or whatever. They're going to lose their job. They're going to be smeared in, you know, in all the newspapers and their and their reputation is in shambles at the end of it um and i'm concerned for them but i'm also concerned for the people who have bought into it because it's it's really a dangerous way to look at other human beings so after you start noticing this this is critical gender theory stuff popping up yeah you you mentioned that they realized it wasn't working so they changed their tactic or whatever well just like so so walk us through what's what's the next thing that happens well actually i really appreciate how you defined terms for us at the beginning and read
Starting point is 00:18:47 that definition of critical theory. That's super helpful. And that's kind of the next tack we took was like, okay, it seems like we're talking two different languages. We're saying, no, we're doing justice. That's why we started this organization. It's about justice. It's about disparities in mental health care that most of the world that needs mental health care doesn't have the resources they need. That's why this organization exists. And you're telling us that we're not doing justice. So I think we need to define some terms, you know, so we really started there. I can't remember which the first one was that I did, but I just started cranking out organizational position papers that essentially defined terms. And we, at that point, we had entered into, like,
Starting point is 00:19:26 a formal series of, I don't know a better word for it than struggle sessions. It was these all org meetings with the board chair present, sometimes a third party mediator present, trying to just even figure out, like, what is needed? Where is the harm? You know, because there was all these accusations of this organization is causing harm. There is but it was always in that kind of passive voice you know like it wasn't ever like you harmed me when you said this it was always there is harm there is harm um and so we were like okay first thing we need to define is psychological safety what does it mean because that that term is being thrown around you know like psychological safety has been violated um i can't even trust you know i can't have a conversation with you with your ideas or whatever, the things you've said.
Starting point is 00:20:08 And it's like, OK, fine, let's look up what psychological safety actually is and define it. And we defined it based on The Coddling of the American Mind. I don't know if you're familiar with that book. Is that Jonathan Haidt? Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukinoff. And so they really go into like the psychology behind what's sort of happening on university campuses right now and now has, you know, like overflowed into the whole culture. And so I use a lot of the material from that book.
Starting point is 00:20:35 And then Amy Edmondson is a professor at Harvard business school who coined the term psychological safety. And I used a lot of her research and then I use some trauma informed models of psychological safety, which is, you of her research and then I used some trauma-informed models of psychological safety which is you know we do trauma work so um very much all in alignment with each other so you've got this like business school perspective you've got these guys who wrote this book about the phenomenon in college campuses and you've got um these trauma-informed groups that basically teach about how to be safe when you're working with trauma survivors it's like a whole other level of safety. Right.
Starting point is 00:21:09 And essentially what we saw is while these people were trying, or they were trying to be helpful to people who have been hurt, you know, it's like, yes, there's racism. Yes. There is,
Starting point is 00:21:16 you know, discrimination against people with different identities. Totally agree. But what you're doing when you say like you, like you said, this, if you don't speak, you know, this thing into the space, this person is going to be erased. It's like you're essentially saying that person has no agency.
Starting point is 00:21:31 They're the biggest wimp on the planet. That if people don't validate them at every moment and affirm them and clap for them and do whatever they say, they're going to fall apart and dissolve. Have you seen the DSA meetings, the viral videos? No. So this is the Democratic socialists of america these are a series of viral videos where it i i wasn't there i can't tell you what the whole several hours looked like but in a span of a few minutes every time someone spoke they offended someone and so oh this is an old video i've seen this a couple years point of personal privilege and the one guy says guys please the chattering is giving me anxiety right someone goes don't say guys and then exactly sorry yeah so that's an
Starting point is 00:22:09 extreme version of what i mean right the yeah but it's what happens when you take all of those people and put them in the same room together well yes it's what yeah exactly when when your sense of self is dependent on others validating you and other others accommodating, I think narcissism is a great word for it. Entitlement is another great word for it. And it's counterintuitive because it's like, yeah, if a person's been hurt a lot, there is a sense of like we need to take care and we don't want to make them feel unsafe. But also it's like counterintuitive in that this person probably actually needs to be pushed out of their comfort zone. So you're having these company struggle sessions.
Starting point is 00:22:47 I mean, it doesn't sound to me like these people actually wanted to help anyone. It sounded like they just wanted to have power and bully. I wouldn't characterize them that way. They're definitely geared towards helping people. But again, it's the strategies versus values. Like they really, because I think, I mean, you have to applaud them for living in integrity with the moral framework that they've adopted. Like they truly believe like this is how social justice is done. And so they're carrying it out according to that, that conception of reality, that Marxian framework that you just read about, where it says this constant like so somebody is in power and the person who's marginalized or disenfranchised.
Starting point is 00:23:24 They have no say in the conversation. So all the norms are just established by discourse. There's nothing, nothing actually objective. See, that's, that's the real shift is it's not these, these, these social categories of race and biological sex and gender identity and all these things. Those are really weapons towards what is actually under assault which is objective truth which is why this whole moral panic you know that took place over the last whatever period of time are um i i kind of think of it as an epistemological panic it's like it really it really disoriented people in terms of how they know how they can know whether something is helpful and true and just.
Starting point is 00:24:06 And then their methods of getting to how they know what they know also were under assault because science itself is under assault as a way to know. If you understand their view that it's all about power dynamics, the ideology, the underlying moral framework held by critical theorists and the expanding umbrella is there is no truth but power. That's that's a core function of their belief. It's it was one of the core tenets of fascists. Right. So they're not ultra nationalists, but they hold that authoritarian worldview, which is why it may be true that there are individuals who think they're helping by doing it. Yes. But certainly it is.
Starting point is 00:24:42 These are organizations and these are corporations that are exploiting it for wealth. radically transform our system of government and consolidate power. And then, like I said, there are like the foot soldiers who are just doing what they're supposed to do within their moral framework, who really think that they're helping people. They really see this as like, oh my goodness, it's the critical consciousness, right? That's the word that's used that that's where the word woke comes from is that your consciousness has finally been awakened to the reality of power and oppression, these structures of power and oppression that are everywhere, and you just didn't see them before. So there,'s like their mandate now i mean it's this conversion language right it's like i was blind but now i see and so it's like it so i see this thing now and these these poor white straight cishet whatever people they don't see how they're oppressing and so if i if i
Starting point is 00:25:40 care about the people who are being oppressed i have to help them understand how they're part of the oppression just like when i hear from christians say, I don't want you to go to hell, so I have to tell you and teach you. Exactly. It's like, if that's my moral framework, I don't love you if I'm like, I think you're going to hell, but I don't care. Good luck. Some issues I'm having with it is, as you said, Ibram X. Kennedy said that denying racism or kennedy kennedy candy candy candy uh that one of the 10 aspects of racism is denying racism but questioning
Starting point is 00:26:11 something is not denying something that's very important to understand and also questioning critical theory for people to have an issue with that seems counterintuitive because the whole point of critical theory is to question power structures. It is. So it itself should be questioned. That's why I don't say, you know, I hear, you'll hear from people like Christopher Ruffo, it's critical race theory. Well, that completely excludes critical gender theory. And that just excludes everything which is underneath the umbrella of critical theory in general.
Starting point is 00:26:40 He's focusing specifically on critical race theory. Right. That's his mission. So, yes, but the terms are really sloppy. Like, you'll hear people refer broadly to critical race theory when they mean critical theory. And that's part of the problem. But it's like, I think that's just the nature of when a social philosophy
Starting point is 00:26:58 or a critical theory makes it into the mainstream, and it really just becomes more about the phraseology more than the phraseology the more than the philosophy so people know the jargon and they know what you're supposed to do and what you're supposed to support and what you're not supposed to support they don't know the philosophy behind it i think it's another big mistake because i've seen that i'm seeing the it's it is a it is a huge failure of the anti-woke to embrace critical theory as their target because now what we see are the the woke left saying, OK, name a critical
Starting point is 00:27:25 theorist and give me the idea that you have a problem with. And then what happens is they pull up specific quotes from like Ben Shapiro, where he'll read one quote and say, well, actually, I agree with that one. The issue is that critical theory isn't as a whole the real problem we're experiencing. What we're experiencing is the fascistic ideology. There is no truth but power, which in many ways is rooted in critical theorists and Frankfurt School, et cetera. But it's well beyond any particular identity group,
Starting point is 00:27:53 race or gender. It is just a group of people who will claim harm in any way and exploit the system in any way. And right now they've found an attack vector. We as a society don't like racism. We don't like bigotry. We don't like discrimination. They attack that by saying you're being racist. When you try and then ask them what that means, they'll give you a different definition each time because it's not critical race theory. It is just an authoritarian, authoritarian, fascistic tactic towards gaining power.
Starting point is 00:28:26 Yeah, and it's incoherent, and it's a double standard, but they are acting according to the theory, which says everything is socially constructed. So you can continue to reinterpret. It's reinterpretations of reinterpretations of reinterpretations because there's nothing ultimately real. It's postmodernism. It's postmodern philosophy put into a management theory
Starting point is 00:28:48 for how to keep people in line. It seems to me like it's what happens when you have no moral framework. I suppose there is one. There is no truth but power. I think one of the things I've often talked about is the difference between the two factions in the culture war. There's a lot of different definitions you'll get. People will say libertarian versus authoritarian,
Starting point is 00:29:06 globalist versus nationalist, left versus right, whatever. I think one core separation may be Judeo-Christian moral framework versus absence of moral framework, just power dynamics. And so the example I give is Bill Maher, for instance, often talks about how you don't need religion to be moral. However, he believes in many classically liberal principles which are founded in Judeo-Christian moral framework. For instance, the example I often give,
Starting point is 00:29:30 ad nauseum to the audience who knows this already, is the Fifth Amendment, a right to a speedy trial, innocent until proven guilty, the right to remain silent. The core of innocent until proven guilty is Blackstone's formulation, which was inspired by the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, literally out of the Bible. So you take away these moral frameworks. Bill Maher, who was raised in a Judeo-Christian society, who understood these things, but without the religion, doesn't understand how that framework changes, how that, you know, forms society and what that means in terms of justice. you now have an entirely new, purely secular
Starting point is 00:30:06 religion, or whatever you want to call it, non-theistic religion, with no core moral framework other than the writings of critical theory and a bunch of other, I mean, there's other non-critical theorists who are included in their citations often. And the ideas they have is just get power by any means necessary, period. Yeah. And I think that's a great point, talking about the framework that's being replaced. Because I've also heard as, you know, everyone's trying to figure out what do we do about this woke movement? What do we do?
Starting point is 00:30:36 Is just sort of like just get rid of it. And I'm like, that's not enough. You need a positive moral vision to replace the moral vision that has become embraced by many people because i i do agree that it has religious connotations it's a way of of understanding yourself in relationship to the world and then acting out of what you believe in a morally integrated way and that that's the definition of religion and so it's like okay so you can just say let's just get rid of, of all these, you know,
Starting point is 00:31:05 critical social justice people and the woke movement. And that'll be good. It's like, no, because there's clearly like a hunger here for something. Power, power. Yes.
Starting point is 00:31:14 But belonging and having, having a moral purpose that you can attach to clear aims. So like that kind of teleological argument that is like, there's something that we're aiming for, that society is aiming for, that each human being is made for. And so all of that is providing people with meaning. And you see like very religious kind of activity coming out of this, you know, ritual and confession and conversion kind of. I mean, so it's like you can't just replace that with nothing so let's let's we'll go back to uh your company so you're having these struggle sessions you decided to define
Starting point is 00:31:49 these definitions uh what happened next do you want to share anything i'm enjoying someone's conversation a breakthrough flew through the window the happy philosopher over there um did you well i can step in just to say again that i want to again dialogue i appreciate being here with you guys because having rich dialogue where there's no victim villain narratives where you're honestly seeking the truth because we're on the same team the human team um i'd love to just point out in as we describe this just again that i love these people they're intelligent they are caring they're living consistently with their convictions. And that's exactly how I want people to live. And so the process for us went from when we started and we had to push pause and say, hey,
Starting point is 00:32:33 okay, you know, in terms of gender pronouns, like, can't we find a way in which everybody can not have to violate their conscience and be able to be here together. And the guidelines and the way in which we handle that would allow everybody to show up and learn and take advantage of that. So in terms of when we did hit pause and then entering into those sessions, I mean, we were trying to define terms. We were trying to not just miss each other, same words, different dictionary, defining words. And then also we started to define the process, and we look for tools. So one tool that's great, which actually we haven't had a chance to properly embrace you guys in the Aloha spirit and give you some swag from our organization,
Starting point is 00:33:16 but I tucked a book in there that was really helpful for us. Our board chair, who actually does professional conflict mediation, he suggested a book called Crucial Conversations. And so defining what is dialogue, how do we actually have conversations together where you can be communicating the same definitions of terms and you can hear each other. And actually, it's kind of fun because they use the term that what you're doing in good dialogue is that you are filling the pool of the common understanding. You want a deep pool of being informed. So you're trying to make it a place where some people aren't just being a fire hydrant and just like overrunning the conversation.
Starting point is 00:34:00 And then other people are like shut off and not contributing to it you want everybody to relax and be able to contribute so that you've got a deep shared pool of meaning for you then to make informed decisions around so so that's where we were trying to go to was just yeah we basically said we need to do it we need to do this the communication hasn't been healthy because there are these narratives forming that like we're these oppressive people or somebody is oppressing and causing harm and there hasn't ever actually been a concrete accusation of harm. So that's not psychologically safe because the person who's being accused is like, oh, how do I rectify it? I don't know what I did.
Starting point is 00:34:32 And there's nothing concrete. You know, you're not telling me what I did. So how can I apologize about that? Yeah, right. Besides everybody being laden with the sense of like, I'm sorry, you're feeling hurt. And I don't even know what I did. Like, so that's something in terms of defining psychological safety and where not only the same definition of the term, but also processes where I love it that, you know, just having a term like a crucial conversation where emotions run high, where there's high
Starting point is 00:34:59 stakes, it means something is very helpful for us to just say, hey, we want that to become the norm in our culture, like at the organization, that when there is something that matters, you're not going to hide that and have sideline conversations with other people. If it's, you know, related to somebody, then they get to take part in that conversation. And then it also set up a process, a framework by which you knew that if somebody approached you and said that I need to have a crucial conversation, there's, you know, that I think in to what was happening was there was a lot of conflict that was never brought to the surface. And then that wasn't able to be dealt with in a healthy way. So those sessions were about us trying to adopt tools that will allow us to have this conversation properly. And we did continue to dialogue things. You know, people didn't leave immediately. We got a chance to actually hear from everybody and fill that shared pool. And then what I think brings us back to this conversation about critical theory
Starting point is 00:36:17 and whatever we want to call what's going on right now, that is that people started to leave the dialogue. And that was the question in terms of it if it wasn't, you wore them out, they couldn't handle it. They weren't gaining ground and they're like, I'm out of here to some degree. But, but it was, I mean, yeah, the experience that I had that was just, you know, disappointing was that I've in sticking to principles, I, until you can point out something that we actually concretely can change. Then to me,
Starting point is 00:36:48 we haven't done the work together. And there were, so they never said, here's what I want you to do. No, they did. Yeah. No,
Starting point is 00:36:59 there were, there were a lot of different points where, you know, open letters were written for instance, with demands in them. What were some of the demands? Just all the stuff that you're hearing at all the companies like we need to we need to be more aware of diversity maybe we need some outside training we need to be aware of other perspectives we need to um we need you know certain kinds of
Starting point is 00:37:18 diversity on the governing board this that and the other and so it's like all of these things are great like we we can you know none of this is something we're opposed to but it's the manner in which you're approaching us is completely unprofessional and inappropriate that you would you would go and like write this letter and then like present it at a board meeting like kind of guerrilla warfare style or something it's just like this is not but so this is this is why i i i think you know it's clearly bad faith in my opinion from what I'm hearing especially. And it was an attempt to subvert and steal power. And so the tactics they use are meant to maximize damage to you while minimizing risk to themselves.
Starting point is 00:37:55 The general idea is they can cause you more harm by publicly just slapping you in the face without warning, putting you on the spot where you're forced to say, oh, we're okay, we'll do it. Whereas if they go to you in private or with an email, then you can easily push back with minimum risk to yourself. So they are presenting you an open letter at a meeting. Yeah. Common tactics, showing up with a protest. I don't know if you guys experience any like hard protests, but it's one of the things they'll do because then these corporations are on the spot right now. Will you say yes or no? Do it or don't. And the corporations panic and say, okay, you win. Yeah, exactly.
Starting point is 00:38:31 Because who wants to be the target of the next big thing in the media? But you resisted. You didn't give in to the demands? Yeah, I mean, we had the advantages of being the co-founders of the organization and so having some authority instead of just maybe an employee who's seeing all of this happening and like, I don't want to be part of this, but if I speak up, I'll lose my job.
Starting point is 00:38:51 And also just being, you know, a scrappier grassroots nonprofit organization, we're not in the spotlight necessarily of, you know, we have a lot of work that we're doing around the world, but I just think that we, it was worth it to us to really like lean into that conversation and try to understand the ideas and be really principled about our our push back to those ideas and we while it was really draining organizationally like we we spent a lot of time on that process that could have been going towards the work that we're organized to do
Starting point is 00:39:22 um it was it was worth it to be able to, in a principled way, say, we're not going to do these things and here's why. That's another, that's essentially the tactic. They know that, you know, for a lot of companies, they might say, how much money is it going to cost to do all these trainings and keep having these meetings? Oh, is it going to cost 100 grand? How much is it going to cost to just give them what they want? 10, 20?
Starting point is 00:39:43 Just do it. Just hire somebody. Just hire the diversity person, whatever. Right. And it going to cost to just give them what they want? $10,000, $20,000? Just do it. Just hire somebody. Just hire the diversity person, whatever. And then we're done with this, right? But that's a mistake. Short-sighted. Because then you're never done with it. And the long-term effect is that now you live under it.
Starting point is 00:39:53 Yes, yeah. The appeasing strategy doesn't work. And for me, it's, again, I love these people. And over a number of years, I don't think, even in talking with them when we started to identify some of the language and we've asked them explicitly, do you, like it seems like you might be adhering to some of these philosophies. Is that the case? Um, they denied that. I don't, and I honestly think it was the truth that they, they weren't aware of it. There's something that they weren't taught.
Starting point is 00:40:17 It was something that formally, yeah. And it's just something that was influencing their thinking. So my hope too, wasn't just to try to, you know, hey, I think that my intuitive sense of this is correct and let's get there as soon as possible. It's like if you want to treat people well and, you know, be the change you want to see in the world, I want to have conversations where you can actually look at the ideas and at the end of the day, the best ideas will be the ones that influence your policies as an organization.
Starting point is 00:40:41 So it wasn't just to try to hold out and make it annoying because, you know, outlast them. It was really, my hope was that people would come to see that, okay, we can have diversity, but we need to unify around what makes sense for the context of our organization. And then also, again, following the logic of, you know, in terms of that one specific topic, can't there be a way in which somebody doesn't have to compromise their conscience and everybody can be in an educational space together? Interesting, because, you know, it feels like a Chinese finger trap, right? That most people's instinct would be to try and pull their fingers out as hard as possible. And you guys seem to have like leaned in and really made them explain themselves.
Starting point is 00:41:24 And it got to a point where they just couldn't effectively do it. You know, they talk about harm, but people are probably sitting around saying, I'm so sorry. Tell us about your harm. And then they can't. I met with every single one of them individually for as much time as they wanted to take because I genuinely cared. I don't want to harm people. And I, you know, and yeah, I'm sure that they had an experience. That's the thing in trauma, too, that like it's not necessarily about the experience, about the meaning that you make of it, that it has an impact on you. So it's even if it's something where it's like, OK, there's no policy or anything that I can necessarily fix or adjust. I still just wanted to hear them out because they it was the experience they had is real and I care about them. But yes, we did have, you know, the way that things went where we stuck to the ideas.
Starting point is 00:42:09 And then over time, too, more came up. So, you know, when George Floyd happened and that was another big blow up moment of people wanting to hashtag certain things and to advocate and to do things that were just out of the scope of what we considered within our mission. We don't make meaning about individuals trauma and we don't make meaning about societal trauma at large. Um, we show up and say, Hey, we've got rigorously built tools to help people get through things, but we're not going to make meaning about what you're getting through. That's just out of our lane. We're not therapists. Yeah. And so anyways, there was some more, you know, just kind of dissatisfaction around that we weren't being more proactive about that in terms of either advocating using our social media or in terms of doing that work internally as an organization. And so that was part of the story was was that it at that point, then people started to and I think this is kind of, you know, moving us forward in the conversation.
Starting point is 00:43:11 At a certain point, people were not interested in staying in the dialogue. They weren't interested in looking at the best research that we could find around how to actually, you know, evaluate our policies. And it got to a point where people decided to step away. And what was unfortunate, and I think is also reflective of the cultural moment we're in is that too often it switches from the ideas that you have being bad to you being bad and and you know and I everybody's an individual and um people when those that did leave the organization all left in their own you know way and experience but we were called some names and and it wasn't our ideas that were ultimately, you know, the most italicized comments. So it sounds like, though, you're just on the other side of the culture war now. You could you could choose to agree with the woke people who are constantly pressuring you, but it, it sounds like you rejected it. And
Starting point is 00:44:05 now you're having a conversation with those who are rejecting, you know, critical theory and, and the wokeness and all that. Yeah. I, I mean, in thinking about why that Twitter thread that I posted ended up, you know, going as widely as it did and, and bringing a bunch of attention to me, it was that it was just, I mean, I was sad, honestly, it was like, this should not be rare, you know, but I sad, honestly, it was like, this should not be rare, you know, but I understand why it is because the pressure is so great. And people don't want to see their, their organization, you know, sued, ruined, whatever their reputation ruined. And so like you said, they'll appease, you know, like, okay, yeah, let's do the training.
Starting point is 00:44:39 It's no big deal. Let's just do the training. But what they don't realize and like what to his point about, um, may the best idea when sure let's engage in dialogue let's talk about your idea let's talk about my idea and may the best idea win that that is gone because there is no um there's no more of this idea of of antithesis right which is how philosophy was done forever like from aquinas up until hegel was like hey i have an idea i like this idea then the next i come along is like no i have an idea this is this is how we understand knowledge this is how we have a unified field of knowledge and he bumps that up against the last guy's idea and they're like okay this idea wins and on and on and on until hegel where hegel says no no we we this rationalistic philosophy project has failed like
Starting point is 00:45:21 we are never going to find unified field of knowledge so now the best way forward is to take your thesis your antithesis and combine them into a synthesis but what he did in that is he didn't just change he didn't just go from that dude's philosophy to this dude's philosophy he changed the whole rules of the game of philosophy which was he established a whole new kind of epistemology basically saying well there isn't really an objective field of knowledge that we can ever find so let's just do the best that we can to move things forward. So it wasn't like, you know, where you have an idea and I have an idea, one of us is closer to the truth. You know, we're going to, we're going to try to align with truth, not just like move the ratchet forward, you know? And he, so he changed that understanding of epistemology. He also changed the methodology
Starting point is 00:46:03 by which we arrive at the right solutions so it's no longer like we're going to try our best to align ourselves with what's objectively real i had a conversation a long time ago someone during the occupy wall street era who is a far left antifa ultra woke very intelligent totally educated in philosophy who completely agreed with me on everything with one core difference. She told me it's fun to watch the world burn. So while there are probably the grunts, the peons, the foot soldiers of, you know,
Starting point is 00:46:37 critical theory who just abide by the tenets that they've been, you know, that have been espoused, it seems like there is some truth in the idea of being woke, of truly understanding the nature of humans and the philosophy of there is no truth but power. Because it seems like, well, they're actually in a sense correct. Of course, there's objective truth, but they know that people will absolutely give up any notion of truth for comforting lies and or personal benefit.
Starting point is 00:47:05 And that's what they exploit in which case i have this conversation with an individual and we talk about general philosophy morals nihilism solipsism etc and what a person can know and what a person can do and why we do it and we both we ultimately come to this conclusion that in the end we're just kind of being hopeful that what we're doing is the right thing because we only know so much, right? What is what is saying truism is knowing that you know nothing. And so my response was, in which case, I'll seek to do the most good. I want people to feel better, to flourish, to live long, healthy lives, to be happy with their families, to be protected, safe, life, liberty, pursuit of happiness. And that means sometimes there's harsh realities like personal responsibility.
Starting point is 00:47:47 You have to work hard and it might not be easy. And she said, no, I just want to watch it all get screwed up and burn. It's fun. There's no point. If there's no point, there's no end. And everyone just chooses what they want to believe anyway. Then let's have some fun with it. And this person is extremely active today in far left politics. Yeah. Writing books and holding rallies.
Starting point is 00:48:06 And I know when I see this person, their true intent is I want people to smash and burn because at least life isn't boring them. Well, again, she's acting in integrity with what she has decided is the moral framework of the universe. So it's like after Hegel and one of my favorite philosophers francis schaefer calls hegel the line of despair so it's like at hegel philosophy changed and people gave up the project of understanding truth objectively and it changed to kind of coping with this reality that the universe is absurd and that there is no meaning attached to our morality there's no meaning attached to our language there's no meaning attached to anything we do really sad so yeah it's very sad i mean it ends in nihilism and despair it has to because once you remove meaning you remove hope it's like what's the point because like one of the john paul start for instance like not too long after hegel was like this is where
Starting point is 00:48:58 the this is where the trajectory naturally goes right he his whole thing was we can't really ever know what's what's true what's real and if we experience something true and real we wouldn't even be able to communicate it to someone else or even to ourselves therefore the only way to like authenticate your existence is by an action of the will but it's still completely disconnected from meaning and so um francis schaefer in this book that i was reading recently was used the example of you're driving down the street in the rain and you see somebody standing with an umbrella you stop and you pick them up and you give them a ride and you go on and that was an act of the will that that authenticated your
Starting point is 00:49:33 existence but an equal act of the will that would authenticate your existence is you're driving in the rain you see somebody with an umbrella you run them over equally authenticating so who cares you know it's just like and you're like okay that's, that's where we've arrived is like that. There's nothing, we can't attach meaning to morality. We can't touch meaning to our words. Um, then yeah, why not? Like, so how, how do you like say I should do these things, you know, cause those are kind of shoulds, right? I should, I want to be good. I want to help. I want to, you know, I have a unique moral framework built based around
Starting point is 00:50:06 entropy, negative entropy and creation and protection. So I wonder, you know, a lot of people believe that a society can't function without a religion. Obviously, many people who are Christian or Jewish
Starting point is 00:50:18 believe that the United States needs to maintain this Judeo-Christian moral framework. I agree with them to a great extent. But we've seen a society based heavily in the moral foundations of religion. And if we went back 100 years, we'd not be happy with that. There was a period where it weakened to a point where we had a lot more liberty than we'd ever had in the past. I mean, I brought this up recently.
Starting point is 00:50:43 Constitutional care of the Second Amendment is expanding across the country only the past 10 years. In the 80s, we had a Second Amendment, but you had less gun rights. Free speech as we know it didn't actually get solidified I think until like 1961 because we had that ruling, was it Brandenburg v. Ohio or whatever, which finally gave us true free speech as we know it,
Starting point is 00:51:00 and there are still restrictions on our speech. So it's interesting to me when I think about this that there are many people that they say red-pilled. And red-pilled is very much the other side of being woke. It means essentially the same thing. But if you look at the average woke person and the average red-pilled person, they actually aren't awakened to much of anything.
Starting point is 00:51:20 They're just aligned with a political tribe. As you move up higher in the hierarchy, I suppose, you'll find more and more enlightenment. My personal view of the politics right now from the high profile political actors is that on both sides, you have a lot of high profile dumb people who don't really know what they're talking about, don't know anything about existence philosophy, or they can't self-reflect, they probably don't meditate. But then I think there's a lot of people who actually are truly awakened to something. So not necessarily woke or red-pilled, but conscious of philosophy. I do, however, think those that find themselves on the anti-woke side when understanding philosophy are good. And generally speaking, those on the woke side
Starting point is 00:52:00 are generally bad. And the reason for this is that when I started, we had a really great discussion about religion, several times actually. We always do these bonus segments, they go for a really long time, we talk about philosophy and religion. I was talking about my moral foundations and why I choose to do the things that I do. And it stemmed very simply in
Starting point is 00:52:20 what life does. And what life does is organize free energy into more complex systems. The universe as we think we know it today, assuming we're correct, we're probably wrong, and it'll probably change in the future, is that we are looking at the blip just after the Big Bang. And the true state of the universe is the heat death of the universe, where there's just absolutely nothing. Every electron evenly spaced so far away that they can never interact ever again. We're in this period where entropy rules the day and the universe is slowly dying out and spreading out. And so in the
Starting point is 00:52:49 meantime, there is some unique organization that is not a singularity that creates some kind of interesting things. Free energy organizes itself into molecules, elements, eventually single-celled life forms. Well, actually first self-replicating proteins, then single-celled life forms. Well, actually, first, self-replicating proteins, then single-celled life forms, then multicellular life forms. Then multicellular life forms grow to a point where they start interacting with each other, creating ecosystems. The one thing that we can truly see life do is organize, create, or I shouldn't say create in the physical sense. They're not making things. They're organizing and giving structure to things. The woke are the opposite. They're deconstructivists. They want to take ideas and rip them apart. They want to smash windows. They want to go
Starting point is 00:53:30 into organizations and break them apart. I want to build things and make them better, get rid of the parts that are vestigial or broken, and slowly improve upon society to the point where maybe we'll have a Star Trek-like future where we're in a spaceship and we can travel the stars and have replicators and people are much more happy and continue the process of organizing the universe, as it were. Woke tends to be a disorganizational and chaotic force. That is a force of entropy. Of course, a law of the universe and the dominant one, which is a bit – it is a bit – oh, now YouTube's going to claim my sword. It is a bit depressing, but when I look at that conversation I had with that woke activist who understood much of these ideas, they chose to be chaos and destruction.
Starting point is 00:54:13 I chose to be creation and order. I view creation and order as good for very simple reasons. Like I mentioned, we see life do this, but also who wants to die? Some people do for some reason, like their body is breaking down. The organization of their form no longer functions and they're in pain or they're suffering or something is wrong. But most people and almost all life, one of the core aspects of life is the desire and the will to fight to live. So when I see a chaotic, destructive force breaking things, I see that as inherently bad because it defies the function of what life does. Right.
Starting point is 00:54:47 Not necessarily a – not at all, I think, a Christian framework in any capacity, but certainly much more in alignment with the structure of order, creation, and protection. Sometimes you need destruction because too much creation can lead to cancer, too many cells producing. So you need cells to apoptosis and destroy themselves sometimes you need like neutral not not creation or destruction but a balance where the cell is just in in not stagnation but in in synthesis or in so there is like a neutral aspect to to reality i think that we're we're missing and i think it's by design too you could you could theoretically argue that the critical theorists, the woke, are actually an extremely harsh version of order where I recognize sometimes destruction is necessary if it serves the greater creation. Unfortunately, it is, as we believe it now, in order for there to be negative entropy, there has to be greater entropy created along the way. However, if you look at the woke and you look at authoritarianism, eventually they are so rigid, it's like creating a giant tower that goes up in
Starting point is 00:55:50 a straight vertical line. It collapses. So in the short term, you may say if the woke had their way, they would create a rigid power structure, which is very orderly. Those who take the power are in charge and they can control systems that way. the communists in in the soviet union had structure in order but it was so rigid and it was so straight up that eventually you knock out one one you know one blocking the whole thing falls down so you need a robust structure ultimately i view woke left communist socialist etc in the long term as a destructive path it's like watching someone build a bridge to nowhere where eventually just just crumbles and falls to the ground, and it's destruction.
Starting point is 00:56:27 And they're actively fighting against us who are trying to build, improve, and... So they're creating a system that's susceptible to destruction because it's brittle from its extension. But it does destroy. As a result, a falling bridge will destroy that which it lands upon. Sure. They also are actively stripping organizations and structures to build their broken system,
Starting point is 00:56:49 which is why I view it more like an... What's the right way to put it? There are people who are taking resources and building something nonsensical that will eventually destroy the system. Parasitic? Whatever. Call it what you want. I think that Jordan Peterson has definitely spoken to this because he talks about the
Starting point is 00:57:10 negative ramifications of having too much order and the negative ramifications of having too much chaos. So when you get to the level of authoritarianism, you have too much order. But when you get to the level of postmodernism, when you can't even agree on the definition of the word that you're using to discuss these ideas, that is too much chaos. So as far as I'm concerned, what fire? Yeah, it's fire. Oh, how's that?
Starting point is 00:57:33 It's fire. It's consuming resources and converting them. So not parasitic. It's like burning. Okay. But yeah, so like these ideas are so disorganized and unstructured. This is the negative manifestation of chaos and the negative manifestation of order, both wrapped into this nice little package of wokeness, this critical theory. And I'm not sure what their end goal is here, but it's just...
Starting point is 00:57:57 Hear me out about this theory. Let me know what you think. I think that religion and God worked for a long time, but now it's to the point where it doesn't make sense to a lot of people. It's hard to measure. We can't really measure it. So people are looking for a unifying theory. I think collective consciousness is real,
Starting point is 00:58:13 but we don't have the tools to measure it yet by design because we're still in the age of combustion. So these people that have kept us on copper and oil have inadvertently disallowed us to measure like femtosecond vibrations of plasma fields. So we can't see our magnetic fields interacting. We don't have the tools to measure it yet. How do you know about that?
Starting point is 00:58:32 Well, if you study like... Some research. Yeah, you can study vibrations of surface plasma, and you can see light interacting with plasma, and that seems like consciousness. No one's stopping you. Yeah, but it's not mainstream and that's a problem because it could have been in the 30s when tesla was working on it but the
Starting point is 00:58:49 the oil companies and the copper they wanted to suppress that this is that you're blaming someone else for what you should be doing i think the it the in the the unexpected result is this uprising of a new religion because we've suppressed what is actually real. I disagree. I don't know what's actually real other than what we think we know as humans. I love this story about what humans used to think the brain was made of based on the current science at the time, like steam pressure. Now we believe brains are more like computers because we've invented computers. Maybe we're getting closer. Maybe we're not. Maybe eventually we'll think it's magnetic plasma or something. But we're seeing the rise of a religion because they were raised without that religion.
Starting point is 00:59:29 They were raised without that moral framework, and they're actively being converted. I look at, you know, I think maybe a really good way to explain it is a prion disease, or prion, however you pronounce it. Are you familiar with what that is? Prion, yeah. Yeah, prion disease. So basically we have a structure of self-replicating proteins that is our system. And woke are malformed proteins that when they come into contact with healthy proteins,
Starting point is 00:59:52 malform them. These proteins can't work in the body and eventually lead to the body's death and destruction. So I think, what was it? Mad cow disease? Was that a brain disease? Eventually, your brain stops working and then you die because the proteins aren't connecting anymore properly. So malfunction.
Starting point is 01:00:08 Let's get to that. What is malfunctioning? Because that's something in terms of getting back to Hegel and just, is there objective truth or not? And for people to be making objective truth statements, that it's contradictory for you to say there's no such thing as absolutes, but that in and of itself is an absolute statement. So I think that, again, we find ourselves, you know, I like the movie As a Surfer, 180 Degrees South,
Starting point is 01:00:33 where the Patagonia founders that are into surfing and climbing and all that, they at one point in the movie say that, you know, you want to be progressive? Well, at some point, if you're going in the wrong way, it's progressive to turn around and go 180 degrees the other direction. And I think in terms of our ability as a civilization, I like how Oz Guinness calls, we're living in a cut flower society where we're enjoying so much of the fruits of Western civilization. And a lot of ideas that come from Athens that come from Greece, people for thousands of years have been developing ways to reason, you know, empiricism, the scientific method.
Starting point is 01:01:06 So we see a lot of yard signs in Seattle that say science is real. Okay, what is science and what is real science? How do we actually do that? And in our case, you know, in terms of applying to all these issues, just trying to think clearly and think well about, in our case, how do you do mental health work? But even these bigger questions of what's true. I liked I heard what you were talking about, Heather, something about where like, I don't know if it was a proton or electron that was orbiting a vacuum.
Starting point is 01:01:36 Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it was trapped in a circuit with no nucleus, and it exhibited the chemical properties of what it normally would with a single electron in orbit. And when they injected more electrons into it, it exhibited the chemical properties of the appropriate atom with no nucleus. Yeah, so that's, I mean, that's, it seems like that's kind of what's going on right now
Starting point is 01:01:56 is that, as Grace was saying earlier, that, you know, you can't just remove this particular project without being clear on what you're going to put in its place. And I would just hope that we can just take a deep breath and look at some of the skills that our brothers and sisters have developed over a long period of time in terms of just doing dialogue better, doing science better, because that's something we've seen. The American Psychological Association and others are out of their lane. They're dealing with things that are philosophical, ontological, that are not empirical, and that's messing things up. And we just need some honesty
Starting point is 01:02:30 and some carefulness around the way that we approach things. And I'd love to continue conversations around things like what really is at the root of these questions of what is true. But I think that fundamentally, we all share the values of wanting to love people. And in our case, we've just seen in a particular way in which loving people depends on truth. Right. And that matters. Yeah. A lot of what we see with the woke is comforting lies.
Starting point is 01:03:02 They'll tell you something that will make you feel good, but will destroy everything. And maybe it's a lack of, I guess, foresight, a lack of perspective or vision or understanding. I'll give you a really simple and physical example, real world example. Someone posted on Facebook earlier about gun control. No one's going to take away your guns, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, here's a list of the guns of mine that are already being banned. Like they're already banned in most places. And then they just come out with memes.
Starting point is 01:03:33 Like their knowledge is based on memes. They think they're helping, but they're angry. There's no conversation. I can tell you outright. M1A banned Maryland. Why? Well, they already took my gun away. You can't have it here in Maryland.
Starting point is 01:03:46 There are people who genuinely believe false things and because of that want to build in the wrong direction, which would ultimately cause pain and suffering to a lot of people. But when you're arrogant and you just, I guess, egotistical, maybe a lack of true philosophical understanding,
Starting point is 01:04:02 you're willing to burn down the entire system for the sake of claiming you're right. It's a problem humans have, I suppose. I think a lot of critical theorists disagree with the scientific method, have issues with it, and something about that that's interesting. They call it the scientific method,
Starting point is 01:04:16 but it's just one aspect of science. You could call it the floorball method. You could call it dark method or whatever. It's a method of measuring something over and over and over again to make sure that it continues to happen. And then you can say, okay, fine, that is real. And if it doesn't happen over and over again, then you say it's not real. But a problem with reality is sometimes things happen and they don't happen over and over again because they're happening for reasons we don't understand or can't measure. And so the scientific
Starting point is 01:04:41 method is flawed. And it's saying people are taking issue with that they just don't have another type of science yet to explain why someone might be born with male genitalia but feel like their gender is female but it's flawed in the sense that we're imperfect but the fact that you recognize it's flawed and science recognize its limitations means it serves its purpose humility yeah it's epistemic humility it's not arrogance it's not you may not challenge like please keep challenging it's quite simple it's um uh what's what's the saying those who are uh who are smart are so full of doubt you know and the ignorant are so sure of themselves and that if something like that who wrote that was that i don't know. But that's the issue,
Starting point is 01:05:25 is that I can simply say when it comes to issues of universal health care versus private health care, well, I don't know. I don't have the answers. I'd love to look over the data and figure out a plan
Starting point is 01:05:33 to move forward. But then you end up with zealots who say the answer is clearly one, done. If you don't want it, you're bad and I will fight you. So that was Bertrand Russell. He said the whole problem
Starting point is 01:05:42 with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves and wiser people so full of doubts 100% like the wiser you get the more you're like oh I'm probably not right call me on this yeah the people uh I look at this way you've got five doors in front of you four of them lead to sweet sweet sweet freedom. One of them leads to a lion cage. Well, I feel the door, give a little knock. Then I'm finally on door number four. I hear a roar. I'm like, okay, that's not the, or I'm sorry, it should be four of them lead to lion's cages and one to freedom. And so I just like bang, bang, bang. And then I hear the roar, bang, bang, bang, hear a roar.
Starting point is 01:06:19 Finally, I bang on one, I hear nothing. I look down, I look under the crack of the door, I see some light and I'm like, I think that one's door to freedom. I don't know for sure, but let's take a peek. I open it. I see sunlight. I say, all right, it's my best guess. Makes sense. I gathered evidence, and I moved quickly. And then I bring the people behind me with me to freedom.
Starting point is 01:06:34 But too many people are like, I don't care. Door number one. You know, my politician said door number one is the right door. And they open it, and the lion jumps out. Then they claim, it's your fault. See, the system is broken. There's lions in this room well you you let the lion in so i think what we're getting to though is so rationalism has clearly failed you know like we can't we can't just with our brains and which are with our senses completely comprehend reality
Starting point is 01:07:00 and then i i think empiricism also has its limits right because empiricism can only still observe what exists in the natural realm and then we have all this other knowledge that is true that is a part of us like the transcendent like why do we love what is beautiful why do we want what is good why do we seek the truth and all like science doesn't talk about that so these are like the ultimate things that everyone is answering and everyone has arrived at even if it's just sort of an agnostic i don't know no one knows like that is still the framework out of which you're operating and so what i see happening also with this critical social justice movement is that they've actually
Starting point is 01:07:39 arrived at a transcendent version of science they They're saying that the, you know, the classic, you know, textbook definition of science didn't, isn't good because there's all these other knowledges, and they use that word knowledges, plural, that we need to be observing. We need, we need to be carefully, you know, listening to because those views have been pushed out to the margin. And in a way, I'm like, I think you're right. And it's not, it's not that people's individual kind of standpoint epistemology is is gonna get us to all the answers you know that that's that's a fallacious way of thinking but there is the sense in which
Starting point is 01:08:14 we need something that also transcends the empirical like rationalism and enough is not enough empiricism is not enough there's more knowledge that is so true to reality and to our understanding of ourself in reality that science doesn't touch. This is why I say I don't think that the left, the woke, are acting in any sense of good faith. I was watching a documentary about air conditioning
Starting point is 01:08:36 and they said that, or I think it was about skyscrapers, we couldn't build above like eight stories because the accumulation of heat as it rose made the upper floors unbearable until we invented window unit air conditioners. Then we put them in the windows and we could filter the heat out of the building and keep the building cool. Then we could start building higher and higher and higher. And then they mentioned that there were actually ancient tribes that already understood the principle of pulling heat from the bottom and pushing it out the sides
Starting point is 01:09:04 so that the upper levels of their structures could be warmer or they could remove the heat from the building to keep their huts cooler. And these tribes learn how to do it by watching ants. There are ant hills in, I think it's in Africa somewhere, where they grow these big towers that pull heat out of the ant colony and then funnel them out in different directions. Understanding that principle by watching nature, these ancient tribes were able to build and utilize it to keep their houses cool. And we, as Eurocentric settlers in the United States, didn't understand that technology. So now we're actually building skyscrapers that follow more of these principles because it's very, very energy effective and allows us to build without needing
Starting point is 01:09:44 massive amounts of air conditioning. You still got to pump water and air up and stuff like that. So I see that and I say, that's true. It's very obvious that if we paid more attention to other cultures' developments, that's why the actual diversity in the true sense is good. This is diversity of worldview. That's not what we're getting from the diversity, inclusivity, and equity crowd. They're looking for homogeneity.
Starting point is 01:10:06 They want everyone to conform to one way of thinking, which is anti-objective. No, no, we're looking for objective truth. We have blind spots. We find better technology. People often look at, like, how did they move these big stones to build these pyramids? Like, they couldn't have done it without a machine. And then some guy is like, actually, you can use some wood. There's a really amazing video
Starting point is 01:10:26 where this guy moved like a two ton slab by hammering wood under it, digging a hole and then teetering it back and forth until it flipped. And he's like, and you just got to keep doing it.
Starting point is 01:10:36 And you can move using its own weight and counterbalance. And he was like, so you don't need gigantic machines to do it. There's also another video with like, how did the,
Starting point is 01:10:44 how did they split these rocks so perfectly? And then a guy just like takes an axe and he hits it along the edge and then the rock just splits. It's like there are techniques that we might not know about. Or how about, didn't in like ancient Greece or Rome have like cement that could dry underwater? Yeah. And we're still like, man, how did they do that?
Starting point is 01:11:02 But we understand that. So what happens is they exploit that. To the layman, they hear this idea. Did you know that these ancient tribes already knew how to do this? Man, if only the white man paid attention. And from that, they go, yeah, why don't we do that? Exploit that problem that is plainly visible and then give them a solution. And they believe it.
Starting point is 01:11:24 Well, it's because white people are racist and they disregard the true discoveries of other cultures. Wow. And now they believe it. Now you've indoctrinated and you begin converting that protein into a malformed protein where they no longer believe science is real. But I tell you this, if people live in a broken world where there's no truth, they're extremely easy to control.
Starting point is 01:11:42 And that's probably the end goal, in my opinion. Right. A group of subservient individuals who will give you what you want, and you can exploit them. No, that's why I think of it as management theory. It's really pretty crass. You know, it's not it, you know, whereas most frameworks by which we would have a conception of reality are about establishing sort of a meta narrative, right? Like, okay, who are you? What is the world? How do you relate to the world? How do you relate to other people? Um,
Starting point is 01:12:10 this one is really just about managing people. It's about, it's about managing people into categories by which we can easily identify each other and about having people mistrust whether they can really know or how they know. Yeah. So that the, the,
Starting point is 01:12:23 the knowledge is really coming from a Gnostic place. It's reserved to a few on any given topic. It's amazing. I was thinking the metaphor of if you're playing a video game and you have a multitude of characters to choose from. You have an archer, you have a rogue, you have a warrior, and you get to pick your party of four people. These critical theorists will pick four archers because
Starting point is 01:12:46 that's what they want. They want people that believe the same thing and act the same way. But then they'll get skins just like cosmetic skins of difference. They'll have one archer will look like a woman. One archer will look like a black guy. One archer will look like a white guy. But the problem is it's not real diversity.
Starting point is 01:13:02 They look different, but it's four archers. You look different, but it's four archers. You need different people with different worldviews. And that's a very different type of diversity. Dude, ranged DPS. You're seriously going to go on a raid with nothing but ranged DPS? You've got to have a tank and a healer to start. And then you can talk about which ranged DPS you're going for.
Starting point is 01:13:20 Who cares what they look like? Wear whatever skin you want to wear. Yeah, I mean, most want like the legit armor set but you know end game characters end up looking really funky because the best armors don't usually go together though i think you know a lot of games started making that better like okay fine the tier three end game armor is going to be better so look if you want to go on a raid and you want to have like a mage you know he's a little squishy but he's got some good range dps and then you want to get a hunter because he gotge, you know, he's a little squishy, but he's got some good range DPS. And then you want to get a hunter because he's got the pet. You know, you can't just go in with five tanks.
Starting point is 01:13:49 Although I've seen videos of people trying to do it, and it's hilarious. It is. And that's like critical theory, man. You need a healer. No, exactly. They're claiming it's diversity because it's like, well, we've got a rogue who's specced for stealth. We've got a rogue who's specced for combat. It's like, no, no, no.
Starting point is 01:14:03 Well, it's cosmetic. This rogue has a black skin. This rogue is a female. This rogue has white, yellow hair. And they consider that diversity, but you can't win with four rogues. That's a really good idea for a video we should make where we go on a World of Warcraft dungeon
Starting point is 01:14:16 and we just have, like, a white rogue, a black rogue, a lady rogue, an elf rogue, you know, whatever. And we're like, we've got five different races of rogue. We're going to go in and beat the boss. A truly diverse party of rogues. You get crushed. I mean, if you're really strong, you can do it.
Starting point is 01:14:31 Maybe. But it's not optimal. That's the point, is you need true diversity. It doesn't matter what skin. They can all be skinned to look like a black woman. But if you have a warrior, a rogue, a wizard, you're going to have a much more balanced party. And the cosmetics is irrelevant.
Starting point is 01:14:46 But to these people, it's not necessarily. That's the problem. I wonder if people watching all in their entirety completely understood all those references. No way. God, I hope so. They were all like, I have no idea. Oh, Lord. Yeah, I'm a little lost. Yeah. So in
Starting point is 01:15:01 most RPG, MMO games, I'm mostly referring to world of warcraft you have a team of five people and they're a tank is a reference to a character that can take a lot of damage they don't give a lot of damage a healer that one's obvious and then dps means damage per second so you have people who can fire arrows or magic spells And then you have rogues in Warcraft who are up close slicing and dicing and stuff. If you want to win, almost every single normal run will be we need a diverse team. Right. We need these different kinds of characters.
Starting point is 01:15:36 Diverse in capacity. In function. In function, yep. Instead, Ian makes a really good point that would be hilarious to watch. Like five priests trying to you know win a dungeon and it's like well like peace priests can do damage if they're spec shadow but you're not gonna have it like it's not gonna work all that well like the it's interesting games are designed this way to require diversity of player function interesting yeah the real world
Starting point is 01:16:02 the real world is similar like Like art imitates life. It's true. Well, remember Nicole Hannah-Jones talking about how you can be politically black and you can be politically white even though you're actually black. It's kind of superficial. Well, no, that's in critical theory. All identities are politicized. Your identity is only your political identity, which is why they could
Starting point is 01:16:25 treat you one way with thinking of you as a white man and one way thinking you as a mixed man. I do have to counter that point, though, Ian. Ah, yes.
Starting point is 01:16:33 World of Warcraft has racial abilities. Tell me more. Oh, you're right. Different races have different abilities. So Void Elf, they can teleport.
Starting point is 01:16:41 So you can have five rogues of different races with different abilities. You're still not going to win. That's meta diversity. Yeah, you're still not going to win. I mean, you can have five rogues of different races with different abilities you're still not gonna win that's meta diversity yeah you're still not gonna win i mean you can you can try but i think if you had a team of five paladins though you could because they're healers tanks and dps i feel excluded from this hegemonic discourse i feel discriminated against for sure you haven't played a lot of warcraft no or just role-playing my brother did my brother did quite a bit dungeons
Starting point is 01:17:04 and dragons and all that stuff so that would be like what country are you from but where were your ancestors from like depending on where your ancestors were from would be a racial ability but where you're from is like what class you were I'm done with this metaphor it's funny I can't contribute anything yeah I got nothing well so I guess uh man just what's the final final leg of the story? You guys got a bunch of, you know, anti-woke, anti-SAW fat dudes in fedoras with katanas to, like, storm into the building.
Starting point is 01:17:35 And the big fat feminists were chased out or what? No, we were. We love all those people. We were just. Yeah, we wanted to continue having the conversation as long as conversation was possible. And there came a point at which each of the people who left,
Starting point is 01:17:54 left on moral grounds, saying that they wouldn't want to be a part of an organization that is white supremacist, for instance. So, yeah, it was just sort of like, okay, that's, you know, you're living according to your moral beliefs and we disagree with you you have these deeply held commitments convictions whatever you want to call it and um yeah i think it you know i i just think it took
Starting point is 01:18:17 you guys longer than it would take me you know like i but i get it and um if it were me and i was running an organization and someone you put an open letter i'd be like bro the door's right there yeah like no beef like you don't i got no obligation you got an obligation okay well here's here's where it's tricky because employers know that employees who are oriented towards this ideology will turn that into an attack on the organization if there's any sense of I was wrongfully terminated or I was shoved out because of my beliefs, you know, so honestly, I think the principled approach that we took is the only approach if you don't want your organization, if you don't want to.
Starting point is 01:18:57 I disagree. A Pyrrhic victory, for instance, there's like, OK, you won, but like now you're in litigation. okay you won but like now you're in litigation if if uh if if i'm an employee say that they wanted everyone to name their gender pronouns i would pull them aside and say i cannot allow you to be homophobic or transphobic and force people to out themselves that's kind of what we said you need yeah you can't and if you do that again then i'm gonna have to ask you to leave for you know discrimination no and we did it with research we, look, here's what the actual research says. I put together a 14-page paper on gender identity,
Starting point is 01:19:31 and it was all the research cited throughout the paper, like actual peer-reviewed, controlled, real research. And it was basically like, hey, this is actually not best practice this this is this can be damaging to people in dysphoric conditions to be asked to name their gender identity into a space full of strangers by the way and so what was really disheartening though is because this has more of a religious nature to it that this person is like that's all good these are probably a bunch of studies written by white guys. Anyway, they don't understand. I'm the one with a critical consciousness,
Starting point is 01:20:07 and I'm an ally for these people. It's my job to make sure they're not harmed, and I can see you have no interest in understanding things from their perspective. Therefore, you are transphobic. I still have my deeply held convictions, and I'm going to act on those. And so at that point, you're like,
Starting point is 01:20:21 we're really at an impasse, you know? But that's what this is what happens when you when you erode the foundations of how do we arrive at what is true normally we've had our scientific method right it's like i'm showing you all the studies i'm showing you what they say this is the best research we have to date and like that is irrelevant this is the the pitfall of true liberalism yep when we say you can't discriminate on the basis of race, gender, national origin, religion, okay, now define discriminate. So I was,
Starting point is 01:20:49 I mentioned this in a segment a couple days ago about Coca-Cola doing these woke trainings. And I was like, they want to have these trainings where they start talking about whiteness. All right? If I were there, I would immediately file a complaint saying they were trying to have a white supremacist meeting. How do you define white supremacists?
Starting point is 01:21:06 Well, it doesn't matter. So my argument would be to make minority individuals go into a room to be taught about white people is discriminatory because they don't have meetings about black people or Asian people, only white people. So I told them that, you know, it's racist. I would I would say absolutely no to that. If they said we want to do pronouns, I would say this is harassment of the LGBTQ employees who don't want to out themselves. And if you bring it up again, you're gone. People don't do this. Only the woke do this.
Starting point is 01:21:37 So long as only the woke are exploiting that system, it will go in their direction. But like I said, it's a problem of liberalism in that we created the civil rights act to protect people from there there is just a it is a sieve it is it is just holes to leak through because no matter what you do you are discriminating period and they know that and they exploit that yeah and we one quick add on to that too, is just that in terms of the spirit of what you want to actually see happen there, we ended up into a place where it's like, we don't want to just play games and use the same rules that you have and apply them back to you to try to, you know, in some case show you that we can't live this way. But, you know, in
Starting point is 01:22:20 terms of the space where you want to be inclusive, the whole point is we have these tools that are meant for everybody to be able to benefit from. And how can we make people feel like they can come and be a part of that? So there are solutions. And that was the effort is how can we be informed and get to a place where we don't just play a game back and forth with a use of language, but to actually make progress in the world. There are solutions. And for us in that one particular case, it's like, why don't we just put the power in the hands of that individual and just say, you know, we're going to go around. And as part of our guidelines that include all the normal stuff of just, you know, being respectful and everything you'd want to do in civil conversation. These people in sharing at the beginning to get to know each other, why don't you just invite them to share how you'd like to be referred to in the space?
Starting point is 01:23:09 Because that doesn't make anybody say a pronoun. And then that if somebody is still not satisfying is what we learned. You're not satisfying. What the goal was, again, was to bring that gender identity category explicitly into the space as a way of reflecting back to those people that they're seen. So it still wouldn't satisfy it. Yeah. So what you guys found was that there is not a compromise there. There's nothing you can do to make it so that you are happy and feel that you're serving your own moral standard and that they're happy and you're giving them what they're looking for.
Starting point is 01:23:44 There's just no common ground. And I think they make it that way on purpose. I think that's the reason they keep their definition so loose and easy and they change it on you in the middle of an argument. And you were talking about this before the show, the concept of making them play by their own rules. Holding them to their own standards. Exactly. Hold them to their own rules, hold them to their own standards. And I think that's the only way to fight back against this. This is in the rules for radicals. This is in the book that they follow, whether they know it or not. harm them so you want them to reveal that's insane there you go how dare you bring that into my my office we protect our lgbt employees and their right to privacy well seriously that's that's what i did i see it it's like a kind of linguistic credentialism they have where they have this whole jargon that they use and that they employ against people and most people just feel like overwhelmed
Starting point is 01:24:40 by it like i don't know what i'm even being of. I don't know what all these heteronormativity phrases are. What are you talking about? Um, but I did, I did learn enough to know that when I was told I wasn't allowed to speak on a certain topic because I'm straight, I said, well, wait a minute. How do you know I'm straight just because I'm married to a man, you know, it's like within your own, within your own framework, you know, like I could be any, I could be any sexual identity, any gender identity right now. Based on their own framework, you could be a dog. I'm not exaggerating. So this is in a Freedom Tunes cartoon. Are you guys familiar with Freedom Tunes?
Starting point is 01:25:17 Seamus. How's it going, buddy? He made one where he's talking about gender, and he said the arguments about critical gender theory is that men and women are on a spectrum you know it's a it's a there's a gender spectrum for instance some men um are infertile so reproduction or the production of sperm doesn't make them a man some men might lose their privates in an accident they're still men and he said right like what differentiates a dog from a person a person walks on two legs okay well some dogs walk on two legs does differentiates a dog from a person? A person walks on two legs. Okay, well, some dogs walk on two legs.
Starting point is 01:25:46 Does that mean a dog could be a person? Well, but humans use toilets. And he said, yeah, well, dogs don't, and some humans in California also don't. So the issue is, it's true. So the issue is they deconstruct concepts to make excuse for why certain ideas exist. That logic right there shows they'll exploit anything to claim it was a violation and they'll use it to gain power right but again you can use that against them you know if you're just deconstructing my you know gender anything any
Starting point is 01:26:18 societal norm i can deconstruct your theory i can deconstruct your deconstruction if everything is a social construct why does this stand? I just say, like, discussions of race are banned at this company. It's because we don't want any harassment. So all discussions of race, gender, national origin, religion, you can't do it. Don't talk about it. Have a nice day. That's nice that you're in control.
Starting point is 01:26:40 How do we talk about discrimination? Well, you can talk to your boss. But if you want to go and harass... Are you saying you want to harass employees? Because if you want to harass our employees, I'm sorry, that's harm. And people here don't feel safe around you. That's the game.
Starting point is 01:26:56 And I suppose the problem is, that's what they want. They pull you down into the fray so that you're playing by their rules. They've won. Their rules... They walk away laughing, saying, thank you for adopting my rules. Thank you for adopting my worldview and my way of life. the fray so that you're using you're playing by their rules they've won their rules they walk away laughing saying thank you for adopting my rules thank you for adopting my my world view and my way of life it's exactly what we wanted in the first place oh intolerance so the alligator wants you yes to come underwater and fight it with and so you're thinking all right i'll drag
Starting point is 01:27:19 you underwater and he's like that's all they ever wanted but who i mean that's the thing though is there are people that are that self-aware that are doing that but just again not trying to have the victim villain mindset and we're trying to speak to people we love and care about and you know in a way that can point it out and uh have a good dialogue to where you can be um i love the concept of the noble adversary and how in philosophy it's so helpful to have somebody that might be completely on the other side of an issue. But as long as truth is on the throne, then you both can be very helpful to one another. And I love that question. It's just how can truth contradict you?
Starting point is 01:27:58 And is truth on the throne in your life? What if they don't believe in truth? Well, then you don't have to listen to anything they say they can say nothing objectively that could what happens when they're the dominant political party and they control the house the senate the presidency and they're passing laws based on this stuff that's a problem yep so that the issue i see is that there are many people who think that these people want to have a dialogue, that these people are trying to improve things. I don't think fire is evil.
Starting point is 01:28:32 I think the person who set the fire is, the person who's watching it and laughing and seeing it destroy the building. But you don't argue with fire. It's just spreading and destroying. You put the fire out immediately. And there are some circumstances where you can use fire to prevent the spread of fire, controlled burn in a field, for instance. You've got to be careful.
Starting point is 01:28:50 You've got to do it right. Typically, we just spray water on things, though, which means if you want to maintain your principles, you can't, in the end, in my opinion, use the rules for radicals, I suppose, because then you're just spreading fire along with it. So I suppose, though, controlled burn could work. In the end, though, perhaps there's a surgical approach to using a controlled burn in certain settings where it must be done. And then overall, we need to keep spraying water on the fire.
Starting point is 01:29:13 Fire also can keep you alive in the right circumstances, like a controlled bonfire. You can cook. It can keep you warm. But that's like critical race theory has some value or critical theory in that it questions power structures. And we were born into an imperialist power structure. It's worth questioning. But when it gets out of control and then it loses its own tolerance and can't – it has problems with upending itself when it sees its own flaws, that's the wildfire that's dangerous.
Starting point is 01:29:41 And that's what – and you can see – I mean, I would say you guys are dealing with that. Yeah. Well, how about – Critical theory that you can't critique. Right? Let would see who you guys are doing with that. Yeah, well, how about critical theory that you can't critique? Right? Let's go to Super Chats. Oh, yeah.
Starting point is 01:29:48 We chill in this Friday night, everybody. So make sure you go to TimCast.com, sign up to become a member. We got a bunch of really cool stuff coming. We actually are building
Starting point is 01:29:56 this auction system, which means it's not just about auctioning off weekly tickets to the space to come hang out for our Friday night events, but we're actually going to be able to
Starting point is 01:30:04 have signed t-shirts and other weird stuff. Yeah. T-shirts, mugs, pillows. The original Our Pillow. We should auction that off. See how much we can get. So the original Our Pillow is a burlap sack full of styrofoam packing peanuts. In fact, I will get it now.
Starting point is 01:30:20 Yeah, it's the communist version of My Pillow. Have you guys ever used a My Pillow? We have given one to my dad. So, you've ever used it? It's got a bunch of basically like memory foam bits inside. He really likes it. Yeah, so we decided, you know what?
Starting point is 01:30:37 We'll cut the corners. We'll get a burlap sack. We'll throw a pack of peanuts. We should wash this thing. Okay, maybe. No, no one's been using it. It's just a burlap sack fantastic but we'll auction that off for sure and then these these silly trinkets will help fund more work and
Starting point is 01:30:51 we're hiring some journalists so let's take some super chats my friends you must give a little tap to that like button it really does help out let's read what we got here ib drago says 1984 is now and red dawn isn't far behind. Just saying. Yikes. Joey Meldaman says, hey, Tim, since Google is censoring search results, I recommend using Brave browser. It's powered by the BAT cryptocurrency, is safe, secure, and pays you in bat for viewing ads. Win-win. We use Brave. We do, yes.
Starting point is 01:31:19 And whenever we pull up articles, you can see the little Brave icon. We almost exclusively use Brave. Sometimes we need other browsers for pulling something up. We use Brave for everything because Brave is awesome and the BAT token is great. All right, let's see. Euphoric
Starting point is 01:31:36 Break says, I've been keto eight years now. I turn 50 next week and I am on no pharmaceutical drugs, just eat real food. Hey, there you go. A super chat based on our sponsor of the day. Check out the link in the description below. Josh L. says, hey y'all, how come people talk in chat in a way they never
Starting point is 01:31:52 would to another person in real life? I consistently see people say crap that I know they'd never say to another person face to face. It's really interesting, isn't it? Who was it that made that quote? Mike Tyson made the quote that being online has made people comfortable with saying things that would get them consequences in the real life.
Starting point is 01:32:11 Yeah. Punch in the face. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I wasn't going to say that. We don't say that here. Is that real?
Starting point is 01:32:15 Was that debunked? I think that's real. Yeah. I saw it the other day. I was like, yep, it's true. You see this guy,
Starting point is 01:32:21 key Mark is trying to get me. Whoa, but you're not going to get me, but I'm going to read your super chat anyway. I love it. Where's Bucko? Can you let him know Michael Malice's amazing new book, The Anarchist Handbook, is now for sale on Amazon for $19? He will love it.
Starting point is 01:32:33 Bucko would love that. Bucko went feral. Yeah, he did. So we started letting him go outside. And then he killed a rabbit and was just carrying the body of the rabbit around, like very proud that he killed it. That's pretty proud of him. And then we saw him chewing on it, and I was like, oh, that's to be expected.
Starting point is 01:32:51 And then after the show a couple nights ago, I went downstairs, and he was eating it on the floor in the kitchen. It has since been buried. He severed its head and was chewing on its spine. We should have seen it. It was brutal. It was brutal. It was like the most metal thing Bucko has ever done. He also eats mealworms.
Starting point is 01:33:10 He was super excited. Oh, we got a new chicken. Yeah. Dorothy. Good stuff, Dorothy. She's a, what is it, a Bard Rock? Plymouth Bard Rock. Oh, you highlighted her on Instagram.
Starting point is 01:33:19 No. That wasn't Dorothy? No, that's Margaret. I didn't know you got a new chicken. Yeah, so somebody not too far away said that the chicken was an escape artist and that they couldn't keep it because it was going to get out and get eaten. And I was like, well, we've got this fortified coop, and she's currently laying eggs.
Starting point is 01:33:35 And it was funny because I was like, I wonder what's going to happen because our chickens have never been around another chicken before. We put her in, and you know what the chickens did? Literally nothing. Like, no reaction at all. It'll be interesting to see once they start all laying eggs is when they really develop their pecking order. Oh, really? That's what we found with our chickens.
Starting point is 01:33:52 Well, Dorothy is already laying, so we bought her. She might be the queen. She's the queen? Yeah. Queen Dorothy? Yep. Dorothy. We're pretending like she's related to Vanessa.
Starting point is 01:34:00 Big old girl. Yeah, they are related. Whoa, is this true? Red State Bound says Space Force Lieutenant Colonel Matthew Lohmeyer removed after Facebook post announcing Marxism. Oh, look this up. Interesting. David Palmer says, any charities you guys trust? I'm looking to donate but want my money
Starting point is 01:34:15 spent well. Well, one thing you can definitely do if you want to contribute. Not all charities are tax deductible, which means you may as well contribute to something that is going to do great work like going to timcast.com and becoming a member. I'm kidding.
Starting point is 01:34:29 But definitely do that too. Any charities you guys recommend? Find me on Twitter. Yes. They have a good one. So yours? Yeah, absolutely. DoobieMcNasty says,
Starting point is 01:34:41 the only pronoun we all need to share is human. What is your pronoun? Human pronoun human human i am human uh tex avery says as a trans person i have to disagree with gender pronoun woke nonsense people have a right to talk about you however they want there you go it's true it's going against the grain yeah daddy day 71 says tim wanted to provide some clarity for your 4 p.m video you can become a commissioned officer without having a college degree i know many who have become
Starting point is 01:35:11 limited duty officers or chief warrant officers interesting the median says israel will not fall even if they take down their wall and if russia iran egypt and turkey all attacked israel together israel has been around longer than the U.S. and will be here after. Favorite water-based mammal? Oh. That was a segue. Yeah. Anybody? What you got? I got one. Platypus.
Starting point is 01:35:36 I mean, come on. What is it? Is that a water-based mammal? It is. That's a mammal that lays eggs. Yeah, but is it underwater? Well, it's amphibious. Yeah. Mine is hippos? Well, it's amphibious. Yeah. Mine is hippos. Water-based mammals.
Starting point is 01:35:49 That's courtesy. Hippos are awesome. Yeah, dolphins too, though, because they protect surfers from sharks. Oh, there you go. I don't think I have one. No? I could just say a random animal, I guess. Capybara?
Starting point is 01:35:58 Walrus. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I mean, I guess capybara. They're not water-based, but they love water. They're awesome. I think that they're the friendliest animal right they are yeah yeah like all the other
Starting point is 01:36:07 animals just like hang out with them yeah and and nobody wants to like eat them for some reason it's weird they're so friendly like the predators are like nah you're cool
Starting point is 01:36:14 dude what is it about them what's the trait there's they're super chill yeah there's videos of them like sitting in hot springs and their eyes are like half closed like the
Starting point is 01:36:22 stoners of nature I love them nobody wants to eat them I guess they're so cute maybe they taste bad they got a bunch of lice that's what i heard oh really that's gross not actually kind of gross lucas parada says great guests question for them did they approach the issue from a spiritual perspective i feel these ideologies can't be brought into the light without a spiritual approach? That's a great question. Well, our staff was of diverse religious and spiritual backgrounds, so that was something to take into account. Yeah, and I would say that also it was the idea of personal versus professional came to light in terms of just how oftentimes that the organized worldviews are quickly called out,
Starting point is 01:37:08 but people are not aware of just the fact that we all have a worldview and that, again, people are out of their lane when you're trying to do science or have empirical conversations around these types of things. We all need to just be honest about that fact. That is something that we laid early on with the groundwork was we all operate on faith at some level, especially about the ultimate things. Yeah, true. Kylan Riley says, Tim, why do you still bother using
Starting point is 01:37:34 NewsGuard? They gave CNN an objectivity rating of 8 out of 10. They gave The Daily Wire a 3 out of 10. That would be like giving Ian a sanity rating of 8 out of 10 and you a 3 out of 10. Oh, rude. I'm a wizard. It's hard to be sane when ian a sanity rating of eight out of ten and you a three out of ten rude i'm a wizard because it is a wizard it's a bias check so when people are like tim's fake news i'd be like all my sources are certified by news guard and they gave cnn an eight out of ten and daily wire three out of ten so if you don't trust them i don't know who i'm supposed to trust
Starting point is 01:38:01 it was funny there was like some fake report that claimed me and like it included me in a list of people spreading election misinformation. And I was like, what did I say about the election? Like, seriously, tell me. All of the articles I use on everything are certified by NewsGuard, period. So that's really a tech on NewsGuard. And if NewsGuard doesn't take issue with it, you know, whatever. So they're Microsoft funded, I guess. And I think they're they're microsoft funded i guess and uh i think they're super biased they give media
Starting point is 01:38:26 matters like a 90 out of 10 like a like 90 out of 100 like an organization that literally just puts out fake news and conspiracies yeah oh yeah they're credible sure drew richmond says tim crucial conversations is a great book gnc's approach to their employees is cc in action i used it myself when I did mediation between truant teens and parents. It helped me in my life, too. Ian, you would love it. There you go.
Starting point is 01:38:53 I got a copy for each of you. Oh, cool. Awesome. Thank you, guys. Joe Novarotti says, Tim, can you shout out Rimfire Apparel on Facebook? We're a family-owned, Second Amendment apparel startup out of New Jersey. Shout out to Rimfire Apparel. Facebook we're a family owned second amendment apparel startup out of New Jersey shout out to
Starting point is 01:39:06 Rimfire Apparel very cool thank you for the super chat Mountain Man Chuck says any thoughts on Alexander Dugan fourth political theory shout out to
Starting point is 01:39:17 Jack Murphy interviewing Michael Millerman and Dugan himself any thoughts oh cool I saw Mike Millerman tweeting about Dugan recently
Starting point is 01:39:24 but I'm not well informed. I don't know anything about it, no. I don't really know that name. Sleepless in Phoenix says, Long time viewer and big fan, Tim. Can you give a friend's link a shout out? It is, help Tony Burns compete in Formula Drift on GoFundMe.
Starting point is 01:39:43 The A in fan is actually meant to be a U. GoFundMe. The A in fanned is actually meant to be a U. GoFandMe? Censorship is getting crazy. It won't even let me put the word fund in Super Chat, but you literally put fund in the Super Chat afterwards, so maybe you can't say GoFundMe, I guess.
Starting point is 01:39:59 Clay Moore says, Didn't they say great leaders don't seek power? It is thrust upon thee. Or at least they used to. Yeah, that was how it was supposed to be, I guess. Whose quote is that? I don't know. That's a Shakespeare quote.
Starting point is 01:40:14 Is it? Yeah, I think so. Sounds right. It's very wise. Some great leaders have power thrust. Oh my. Devin Stark says, Tim, prians are formed by eating brains.
Starting point is 01:40:22 The proteins are correct for the original brain, but malformed for the one eating them. I proteins are correct for the original brain but malformed for the one eating them. I wonder what that makes this all a reference to. I think it's related to Jefferson's tyranny over the mind of man.
Starting point is 01:40:35 Oh, yeah? Right? Just this whole philosophical movement is to control people's thoughts or like freedom to have thoughts, you know?
Starting point is 01:40:44 It really is sort of management. I mean, if you're managing people's speech or like freedom to have thoughts. You know, it really is sort of management. I mean, if you're managing people's speech and what they can read, you're kind of saying you shouldn't think certain things either. Definitely. This Shakespeare quote was that some are born great,
Starting point is 01:40:54 some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them. Yeah, you found it. Not that great leaders don't seek power. I don't know. I don't know where that comes from. I don't know. I mean, you know, Donald Trump,
Starting point is 01:41:04 the greatest leader of all time sought power what is power i'm kidding by the way is power just authority i mean i don't it's not just authority that's the question that i think is really important what's the difference between power and authority huh i think all legitimate power comes from authority power uh power grants authority in a certain sense but disagree what do you mean i think that i mean there can be illegitimate power right like somebody just wielding brute force over another person and then there's authority which gives a person the due right to have power in a situation you know think about a parent and a child i don don't think authority is due, right? Well, how do you define authority?
Starting point is 01:41:47 Hierarchical command structure. Okay, so I'm not defining authority that way. I'm defining... Like you're saying, like you're defining authority as like the authority on a subject, like the expert. Yeah, the authority or the actual author of a thing, the actual creator of a thing. The root word. Yes. Interesting.
Starting point is 01:42:04 So that, you know, is where our founding documents come from, for instance. Yeah. That our rights are rooted in the authority of a creator. Yeah. And that, that creator is due the power that we're,
Starting point is 01:42:15 you know, so like recognizing a soldier would be given a gun. That would be authority. But the person who took the gun would be not authority but they would they would also have power so the power derived from right illegitimate authority or yeah other means right so you can be a person who has legitimate authority and therefore your power is legitimate or you can be a person who has no authority and then therefore any power you have is illegitimate interesting yeah i. I think it's a kind of
Starting point is 01:42:45 a component of this whole conversation because I do think that critical theory since it's built on assertions has no legitimate authority and therefore all the power that it wields is illegitimate which is why there's so much intimidation involved because there's nothing there. There's actually nothing there. Hollow. Yeah. Don Jet
Starting point is 01:43:02 says woke baby children's book my wife stumbled upon. ish if you guys can find it you should read it it's short and worth it for its insanity i'm pretty sure it's by ibram kendi i think it is woke baby yeah that sounds right that guy's out of his mind a woke baby but but he asked like i think someone like ibram x k, he's just like a legit con artist. You know what I mean? Like, that's my opinion on what he is. It's sad. Saying something like the root of, what does it say, the root of racism is in
Starting point is 01:43:31 denialism or whatever? The heartbeat of racism is denial. Right, right, right. Like, the dude's clearly like conning people. You know, in my opinion. Oh, what were you going to say? I was just going to say it's very similar to Robin DiAngelo's whole argument is if you deny that you have white fragility, it's proof that it's the same exact Kafka trap.
Starting point is 01:43:49 Did he put X in his name because of Malcolm X? Probably. That's like clown makeup. Pretty much, yeah. I don't know if that's true. I know it's not his birth name. Why did Malcolm X have an X in his name? I don't know.
Starting point is 01:44:02 Because it's his name? Possibly just his middle initial or the 10th person. King Cringe says, Acting with integrity within their moral framework seems like a capitulation to abhorrent behavior. This can be applied to witch hunts, lynch mobs, and genocide. Every zealot believes their actions are for some greater good. Yep.
Starting point is 01:44:20 That's a good point. But would you rather people believe things and not act on them? I mean... That's what you get on the right. There's a good point but would you rather people believe things and not act on them i mean did you get on the right there's there's a line i remember when i was little i was in school and i was walking down the hallway and there's a big banner it said stand up for what you believe in and then i asked some i asked my teacher i was like what if someone believes in like you know beating someone based on like their race or their like who they love and they're like well i mean i was like should someone in the class stand up if they like hate a person like based on their race or something great question yeah there was a really great point that was brought up on tucker carlson's show when he was talking about cancel culture someone said um they're talking about free speech and they were like tucker you don't
Starting point is 01:44:58 believe in free speech either if someone came on your show and something racist you'd remove them from your show and he's like yes i would he's like exactly so why are you mad that social media companies and of course the argument is bunk because the the issue isn't necessarily that you know youtube facebook or whatever are banning people for being racist it's that they're banning people who are literally often on one side of political political spectrum for highly dubious reasons right but it's true though uh tucker carlson would absolutely boot someone from his program for saying racist things. Well, it's a it's a great point. What you asked your teacher is, should the people who believe in atrocious things stand up for those things? Yes. And that's why everyone should be examining what their underlying presuppositions are about reality and be honest about what those are, because everyone is making assumptions about what's real, what's true, what's right. And you should act on them.
Starting point is 01:45:46 But if you haven't ever examined what those are, it could be something that, you know, is not sound, is not in alignment with truth. Are you familiar with the paradox of intolerance? Who's that guy that they're always citing who wrote that? I don't remember. So the left loves this meme where it's like, should we tolerate intolerance? And it's like, no, because if you do, eventually the intolerant take over. And I'm like, that's a really great reason why we shouldn't tolerate you. So
Starting point is 01:46:10 we shouldn't tolerate authoritarianism in any aspect, be it fascism, Nazism, communism, socialism, whatever. Bye-bye. Y'all can go. Now, what does it mean to tolerate fascism? Well, I don't care if you have the ideas and you speak them, but if you are politically organizing, then I think
Starting point is 01:46:26 we absolutely should not tolerate this woke insurgency because they're authoritarians. Malcolm X, the X stood, was a response to reject slavery. That's why I put X there. Ibram X. Kendi, his middle name is Zolani. X-O-L-A-N-I.
Starting point is 01:46:41 That actually is his initial. Julie Simone says, sounds like Dunning-Kruger effect, a type of cognitive bias where people believe they are smarter and more capable than they are. Basically, low ability people don't possess the skills to recognize their own incompetence. Check it out. I'm very familiar. And you know, my favorite thing growing up was when people would say, when dumb people would also use Dunning-Kruger, they would say, well, you're an example of Dunning-Kruger.
Starting point is 01:47:04 And I'm like, bro, I'm the one who's saying I'm not entirely sure. You're the one who's overly confident. I got no problem saying, I don't know, man. I'm trying my best. The other funny thing was I remember, you know, I had these arguments about religion and stuff when I was younger. I would often hear, like, you need to have an open mind. And I would be like, now, hold on just a minute,
Starting point is 01:47:20 because that statement itself is paradoxical. You're disagreeing with my view, claiming I'm the one with a closed closed mind why can't i just assert the same thing of you and say you don't have an open mind it's a pointless statement yep damon bowers says you should try to get richard andrew grove on he is a very knowledgeable person on this he has been covering this information on philosophical corruption of reality and the origins of it very interesting look him up i've never heard that name. Tyler Fulkerson says, big fan since Occupy. Want to say how much the Air Force has changed a lot since 2016.
Starting point is 01:47:55 Extremism training was the last straw for me getting out in August. It's a bummer, man. Oh, boy. Here we go. Excelion says, just run all druids, Tim. He's right. Druids are pretty bad. Bro, druids can be tanks, healers, and DPS. That's busted. That's busted. In a good way. Yeah. That's busted. Druids, Tim. He's right. Druids are pretty bad. Bro, druids can be tanks, healers, and DPS. That's busted.
Starting point is 01:48:06 Bad in a good way. Yeah. That's busted. Druids, legit. Man. Druids for life. Yep. They get stealth.
Starting point is 01:48:14 They get, you know, stronger armor. They get resto. And now they got moonkin form. They got owl-like. They get travel form. Man. They're so good. Druids are the best.
Starting point is 01:48:23 In Warcraft. I just don't like playing Druids, though. Okay. Yeet says, oh, I forgot to say, this is from my Ethereum classic, Winnings. I like how you refer to it as Winnings. Here we go. John Lee says, hey, Tim, in WoW, you can run a full team of Druids and clear raids. Me and my brother used to run this.
Starting point is 01:48:39 I know. I know. And theoretically, you could probably do Paladins, too, but not nearly as good as Druids. Oh, yeah. Not in D&D, though. Druids aren't that tough in D&D. Really? Yeah, they're more like priests.
Starting point is 01:48:52 Shane Kerwood says, totally with you guys on the RPG metaphor. I understood every word, and it's a brilliant example. Okay, good. I effing love this show. You guys are the absolute best. See, I knew there were going to be people who heard us using that, and they're going to be laughing the whole time. Although all the people talking about druids
Starting point is 01:49:08 were like, actually. Oh gosh. You got us there, but they were right. Interfade. Moonfire. Druid for life. Alright. YouTube just jumped on us. They always do this. We get a bunch of super chats all at once and then the thing goes...
Starting point is 01:49:23 James Orenthal Nguyen. Is that how you pronounce it? We get a bunch of super chats all at once, and then the thing goes... James Orenthal Nguyen, is that how you pronounce it? Leroy Jenkins, stop Asian hate in 2021. Silence is not violence. If you're still reading, please consider pre-ordering Michael Knowles' new book, Speechless, Controlling Words, Controlling Minds. They're everywhere. The smartest thing I've ever seen in any marketing campaign is making a meme where people go to other people's channels to get them to promote michael knowles's book i should start doing that with like we don't have any like strong merch i guess our pillow
Starting point is 01:49:56 you'll sleep better on our pillow yeah make sure to buy our pillow yes good communist pillow jack besoic's been doing. William Carlos says, please, this is my third attempt. So, hi, I wrote a free book about exactly these topics, specifically about fallacies, biases, and axioms. I am William Carlos on Minds. Love the show.
Starting point is 01:50:16 Very cool. There you go. Great. Lone Wolf says, man, I love Ian. No insinuations there, just honest, brother. You bring such a great element to the table for example the uncommon thoughts and angles of viewpoint that's right the wolf is
Starting point is 01:50:30 my spirit animal it is it is funny to like imagine someone playing warcraft and like have five rogues and just have one who's black one's who's white one is a woman we need some diversity here yeah right we can't we can't beat this dungeon we need diversity so so what do we need for this dungeon well we need a black rogue we need a white dungeon? We need a black rogue, we need a white rogue, a female rogue, a black female rogue, and an elf. It's like, that's diversity enough for me. I had a vision that I was being attacked by
Starting point is 01:50:55 an eagle or some sort of hawk and a wolf dove out of the veil and it spun around and protected me from the bird. Speaking of the wolf being my spirit animal. Spirit animal. Tofu Poncho says, good job, Bucko. Tear it up.
Starting point is 01:51:11 Hold on. Bucko killed a baby rabbit. We were like, oh, big man. You got a baby. And then he comes up the next day with a baby mouse. And we're like, is that the best you can do, bro? Killing babies? I'm just getting started. No, it? Killing babies. That's sad.
Starting point is 01:51:25 Yeah. He's all young, just getting started. No, it's like he's all proud of himself. He walks up like, look what I did. And we're like, dude, really? Okay, okay. You want us to be impressed by you killing a baby rabbit? He starts eating it. He's being trained by the neighbor's cat.
Starting point is 01:51:38 He is. It's very cute. Also a hunter. He is. I have to defend Bucko because he thinks that Tim is very bad at being a cat. And he needs really small little meals to make him full and fill his tummy, so he's bringing Tim these little meals. He's not bringing them to me.
Starting point is 01:51:49 Where is he bringing them? He just, like, drops them on the porch. He brought them to the – him and Herman, the other cat, brought them to the green room entrance, which is, like, the lower floor. Yeah, it's for you. I wasn't down there. That's where you come in. It was, like, Andreas and, you know.
Starting point is 01:52:03 It's, like, this is for anyone who's here. You're welcome. You're bad. I i think he was i don't think he so a lot of people say that cats will bring you down animals because they're trying to like hey you're bad at hunting here let me show you like here's how here's what you do no no he was parading it around proud of himself it was the first thing he had ever killed like he was an indoor cat and we got him a little we got him armor you know he has a vest with a little bow on it he brought to one door, and then the next day he brought it to the other door. Yeah, he was showing us. He was very proud of himself.
Starting point is 01:52:30 And the other cat, who's an outside cat, who lives outside and hunts all the time. I watched him one time playing with a mouse and swatting it. It was brutal. He was teaching Bucko how to do all this stuff. It's funny. He follows him around and watches. So cute. Yeah, it's great.
Starting point is 01:52:43 Is this keeping poop off the skate ramps? Well well he's never allowed anywhere near the skate ramps okay but the cat doesn't poop they didn't you know no i'm killing the the culprits oh well the problem is we have birds in the garage because but we cleared out the roof we're doing like cleanup and remodeling so now the problem is there are these tiny little bugs and every night they reproduce about a million of them i'm not even exaggerating like no joke like a million and so every morning in the garage no joke the ground is blanketed with like you'll see dots all over the ground and you it's like it was really funny so i pointed out and i can't remember what i was talking about they're like uh just they thought it was dust
Starting point is 01:53:21 and so i took the uh the leaf blower and i started blowing the floor and clearing it and then you have a big clump a huge clump of dead bugs of like flies of some sort yeah so i'm wondering if like the chickens can eat them because then what we'll do is we'll just it's free meal you know i don't know what they're eating to be like to make more bugs they're certainly eating something the other bugs i guess would do the other night i opened the door after the show And then all of a sudden No joke About a thousand tiny bugs
Starting point is 01:53:48 Flew in my face Whoa And so I pulled the door closed And I'm like They're everywhere I started flying around And then I looked out I turned the light on
Starting point is 01:53:55 And it's just It was a cloud It was like a horror movie I wonder if those are locusts No Is that the beginning of the locusts Absolutely not No these are tiny little flies
Starting point is 01:54:03 Or cicadas rather So what we're going to do is... Oh, they got through my screen and my window. Oh, snap. I have to keep my windows closed because they're smaller than the screen holes. They're tiny. Gross. And so what we're going to do is we're going to get like 10 bug zappers and we're going
Starting point is 01:54:17 to create just like a fortress. So we had a bug zapper last year and Ian, you got mad because it was just going like... It felt inhumane like it was I just let it roll it sounded like a permanent high-powered taser going off non-stop and then he was like why are we just killing the bugs for the sake of killing them and I'm
Starting point is 01:54:34 like we're trying to get the bugs off the porch but it was like it's like you know normal bug zapper ever every few seconds you're like this one was like and when you could see the arcs and we were like what is going on I thought it was
Starting point is 01:54:47 a fire hazard from Star Wars yeah exactly killing bugs no more unlimited bugs unlimited bugs alright what is this
Starting point is 01:54:58 GG Player says want to clarify my chat from the other night when I went to Parnell's website and it said I could not find the IP that was only when I
Starting point is 01:55:06 used your link. Oh. It was the correct link. I double checked it. Brian says, Tim and Ian, I'm running for Congress and I want your ideas to make policies and give the people back the power and wealth. You know what? I got it. If I ever run for office, it'll be to abolish
Starting point is 01:55:21 everything. Solve it. That's one way to go i'll be like we're gonna start over very nuanced i want to get rid of everything and then we'll just you know one thing you could do is at a local level create an app that lets you allocate your local tax funds i love that yeah like a with sliding bars so like you'll slide up two percent and everything else like drop down 0.1 and it's like tinder so you'll see like 2% and everything else will drop down 0.1%. And it's like Tinder. So you'll see, I want to build a fountain on Main Street. And so you'll swipe right if you want to add it to your list of things that you want to apply tax money to.
Starting point is 01:55:53 And then you can put your tax dollars towards... Ian, that is the most right-wing thing I've ever heard you say. I love it. Yeah, libertarian all the way. Yes. That's awesome. It's an interesting position where it's like, you should still be forced to pay taxes, but you get to choose where they go. It's like, okay, well, then you're not paying taxes because you're going to be like, no roads, no water, no fire department, no cops.
Starting point is 01:56:12 Some of them will be grayed out at like five. So the police, you'll have to pay at least like 6%. Fire department will be at 4%. So there's minimums for some. Oh, interesting. I love it. I think it's great. Professor Enigma
Starting point is 01:56:26 says, I believe the future of gaming will be currency in-game as an altcoin. People can invest in the coin and increase the value of items in-game. For a long time, in World of Warcraft, gold had real world value. And there were, I can't remember what we were talking about. We were talking about maybe like
Starting point is 01:56:41 Cuba or Venezuela. World of Warcraft gold in their online accounts, they would keep because it actually had value to Americans. Venezuela. Yeah, Venezuela. So they would actually rather hold World of Warcraft gold because it was less risky than the Venezuelan currency. Wow.
Starting point is 01:56:57 Crazy. Yep. No name says, am I God? I'm sorry, but you're not. Oh sorry i think you are bad news what if what if no name is oh you're a finger it's like god's just like sitting back in his chair his eyes half closed watching the show and he's like oh my god and we're like no and he goes i could see it the real mr pink says yo tim love the show and what you're doing you are truly on the front lines of the culture war.
Starting point is 01:57:26 Sent you a pitch for my punch in jury concept and even made a harumph character for you. Keep an eye out. Keep kicking butt. Thank you. I will. Wicked Felina says, The end of your quest,
Starting point is 01:57:40 shining light into shadows, reveal the wizard. Who is wizard? Ian will always be the wizard. Then who is wisdom? Yoda is wisdom. Who is Yoda? Yoda is wizard? Ian will always be the wizard. Then who is wisdom? Yoda is wisdom. Who is Yoda? Yoda is Tim. Tim will always be Yoda. Okay.
Starting point is 01:57:52 Logical. I caught all of that. GG Player says true power is competence according to Jordan Peterson. Yeah. I think it's related to authority. You know. Competence gives you the right to speak into Peterson. Yeah. I think it's related to authority. Competence gives you the right to speak into something. Yeah. It's this like, you know, whenever the communists get power,
Starting point is 01:58:16 they're like, we're going to take the farm away from the farmer and give it to the farmhands, and then the farm collapses. It's like maybe you needed that person to know what they were doing. Is authority derived from power, or is power derived from authority? True power, in my understanding, comes from authority. Huh. And where does authority come from, do you think? Well, competence was one good, but, you know, maybe wisdom is another one. Right.
Starting point is 01:58:39 Okay. Sounds good. Virtue, character. Jerome Morrow says, based on a previous Super Chat, zombies don't eat brains because they're zombies. People become zombies because they eat brains and get the wrong prions. Oh. No, I think you just die when that happens.
Starting point is 01:58:55 What is it called? Encephalopathy? Crits felt Jacob disease. Oh, is that what it is? The shakes? Yeah, the shakes. Remember in Book of Eli? It's like when you buy, you gotta hold your hands. Oh, no, my hands are shaking. Look. Wait, okay are shaking look wait okay there they go oh my god no what's the
Starting point is 01:59:07 story dude book of eli is an awesome movie you should watch it oh awesome no like a post it's a post-apocalyptic and like he goes to the store and they're like show me your hands and he like has to hold his hands up because when the cannibals are shaking wow yeah so they're like they want to know if you're a cannibal or not. That was Book of Eli, right? Yeah, it was Book of Eli. That movie's awesome. Great movie. Inzel Washington. Yeah, dude. That movie's so cool.
Starting point is 01:59:28 Super twist. He's badass. C.S. Bowden says, the little bugs are most likely gnats. But they're so tiny. We have gnats. They're everywhere. You know what we should do for the vlog? We should make the world's biggest bug zapper.
Starting point is 01:59:43 That'd be cool. Like a Tesla tower. Yeah, it would basically be a giant Tesla coil. We build a Tesla coil in the parking lot. For the bugs. And like, it just wipes, like we should say, it's raining bugs. Because they're all flying towards it.
Starting point is 01:59:55 And then the chickens are having a field day. The moths would burst into flames, right? Probably, yeah. That could be a fire. Wow. That'd be awesome. That would be pretty cool. I feel weird about coming out to nature
Starting point is 02:00:09 and then slaughtering all the animals of nature. It could be an attraction. They're trespassing, Ian. That's true. They are trespassing. That's true. And there's a sign up. Charge people to come see it.
Starting point is 02:00:17 Yes. That would be fun. We could do it on a Friday. Everybody stand back. We're turning on the coil. Maybe a Michael Knowles book signing there? Yeah, yeah. Yes.
Starting point is 02:00:24 We have to.g puppy says quote power emanates from the barrel of a gun mao se tong yeah technically correct authoritarianism nick spicer says hey tim love the show curious if you think the world is heading towards the world in harrison beron. Forced equality and dystopic government rule. Well, that one was obviously very silly, like people having earpieces that scream in their ears so they can't think properly or wearing ugly masks or something.
Starting point is 02:00:54 I mean, in a certain sense, I think we're already there. Where it's like, Ian was saying, you get a company and they're like, we need someone who knows how to backflip. Have you considered hiring a Mexican person? It's like, what does that have to do with the backflip what backflip it's like we need to hire people who can that's where we're at i feel like um purely through like need necessity that it won't get to that place of harrison bergeron because i think we'll die
Starting point is 02:01:19 off as a species if we let ourselves hamstring or kneecap ourselves as a species. So I think it's just going to be like this. Evolution doesn't happen because we want it to. It happens because it has to happen. So does that make sense? Did I clarify that? Or was that too... Here's what I think we should do. I think maybe all of us productive
Starting point is 02:01:41 individuals should just one at a time start leaving without a word and, you know, go to a specific area where we can be separate from these countries that support people and extract value from those who are the hard workers. You know what we can do? We can leave like a calling card after we're gone. Maybe like some kind of question. Something that people would struggle to understand. Like maybe like calling out someone's name or something just having them question it like who is one juan uh galto who is how do you say how do you say who in spanish
Starting point is 02:02:16 yes uh ein rando for those that aren't familiar S. Juan Galto. Is that how you say it? Yes. Aynrando, for those who aren't familiar. Got it. Rainforest says, third time's a charm. It is the sixth, not the fifth, that guarantees a speedy trail. Thank you, sir, for the correction. The Fifth Amendment is what?
Starting point is 02:02:40 The right to remain silent? Mm-hmm. And the fifth is more than that, though. Yeah. I don't remember. Whatever. Constitution's great. All right if you haven't already smash that like button you can follow this show on instagram and facebook at timcast irl go on facebook and share hit that smash that share button on these clips we're putting up clips from the show which are very different from the clips on youtube and they're usually like making specific points so they're really fun and it
Starting point is 02:03:04 helps grow the show. We want to obviously leverage Facebook to get more people to go to timcast.com and become members. We have two vlogs this weekend because I recently went and got the SIG M400 that Steven Crowder had sent me.
Starting point is 02:03:17 So tomorrow's video is me going to get it. That'll be up around 9 a.m. at Cast Castle. So go to youtube.com slash Cast Castle. And then Sunday is when we used it and also when we brought out the Barrett M82 and fired a 50 BMG at a
Starting point is 02:03:32 steel target rated for 308 which was a whole lot of fun you don't want to miss it so go to youtube.com slash Cast Castle check out the vlog you'll love it subscribe did you guys want to shout out your social media or anything you can find me on twitter at grace is for you just everything's spelled out easy enough curtis ian how about you curtis you can find me cooking dinner for her while she's responding to twitter
Starting point is 02:03:57 you're becoming more healthy you You are engaged with society. Thank you. Have a wonderful evening and find peace within you. It's there. Oh, I like this. I like this Ian wisdom before we leave. I just looked up the Fifth Amendment. There's a lot in there. Due process.
Starting point is 02:04:18 You can't try somebody twice and private property. And I just wanted to say, if you don't want to get into a fight with an alligator in water, what you need to do when you start a conversation, not shoot it. That would be violence, is to pin down your definitions before you even get started, just like Tim did tonight with our definition of critical theory. Anyway, I'm Sour Patch Lids on Twitter. You can follow me and join me in my journey to have more followers and Sour Patch Kids. Smash that like button on your way out. We do the show Monday through Friday live at 8 p.m. So we're not going to be necessarily back tomorrow, but with the new show we are, normally
Starting point is 02:04:47 it's like we'll see you on Monday. No, now we'll see you tomorrow at youtube.com slash castcastle, 9am and then Sunday, and we are getting closer and closer to making the vlog go daily. How crazy are we? Just more and more shows. We're nuts. The Paranormal Podcast is
Starting point is 02:05:03 not far behind, but the biggest challenge we face is just, you know, you can only hire so many people so fast. You can't just be like, okay, everybody's hired and then you just have
Starting point is 02:05:11 no idea what's going on. So we're going as fast as we can, but we're getting there. So thanks for being members at TimCast.com and we will see you all next time.
Starting point is 02:05:18 Bye, guys.

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