Trash Taste Podcast - Do We Still Share The Same Brain Cell? | Trash Taste #299

Episode Date: March 13, 2026

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Ready? Yes, sir? Yeah. I'm sorry. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Did you have some else to be today? Oh, okay.

I didn't get a great night's sleep. Me neither, buddy. I locked in. Who asked? Locked in your sleep? Six and. Shut of fuck up. Oh, I'm good.

Hey, welcome back to another episode of the Trash Tastes podcast. I'm your host of today, Joey. Join with me as always are the boys, Connor and Gant. And today, or Gant's just waking up, apparently. Oh, no. I just, uh... Which is crazy because he was the one that just worked up from the app. I work up for a little nap.

Yeah. Uh, I only got four hours of sleep tonight. You only got four hours of sleep last night? Last night. I'll come. I was up late streaming. Oh my God. You deserve it then.

You deserve it. And then I had meetings at like eight. So I had to get there. Right. It was a bit of a track. Fair enough. But today we're not talking about sleep. We are doing an episode of Trash Tase that we've done in the past,

or rather we did it like three years ago on Trash Tase Arndes. AfterDark, I believe. No. Stop fucking touching the slime. It's what? I've read a turn on the slime. Give me a slime. Please.

What do you... I just want to pay me for it? Just give it to him. It's mine. Let it touch it for five seconds. Five seconds. You can have it for a little bit. Ooh.

Anyway, we're doing something that we did on AfterDark. I think it was like three or something ago, according to our producers, I don't remember doing this out. No, no, we've done it on this. Did we do it on this? Was that the different one, right? Oh, I'm so dumb. Yeah, I know.

I touched the slime. You went dumb. The slime of my IQ depletion. God damn. But it's, I think we're just going to call it like, do we have the same brain cell or not? So essentially, we are going to be given a bunch of prompts, a bunch of questions. That I'm catered towards trashduff. That we have to.

Can you fucking love the fucking? God damn it. We're recording. Jesus Christ. But we're gonna be given a bunch of prompts. It's always when I'm hosting. We're gonna be given a bunch of prompts

that we either have to agree or be neutral or disagree with. So I think we have five levels. It's either strongly agree, agree, neutral, disagree or strongly disagree. Are the slams in this also made in China? Yeah. Or just this one?

Just all of them. Oh, okay. They're all Chinese, actually. The Chinese slimes. The Chinese slime. They're making the slime, yeah, srives, if you want. So we're gonna get to give a big in a

You make a statement. Make a statement. I got, I woke myself up from a nightmare today. And I said, like, agree. That's a, that's a. No, that's a fact. I, I say agree. Okay.

I, I have never done this before. Are you trying to tell something, God? Yeah. I fucking screamed myself. You actually? I've never done that. What was the nightmare? Huh?

What was the nightmare? You don't get to, I had a fucking Lefcroftian nightmare. Like some cosmic horror shit? I literally some Cosmic Horror. Is this, this is like, this is not rubbing off properly. Oh, for fuck's sake. Anyway, describe your love crafting Cosmic Horror. I felt like God was watching me and fucking with me.

I felt like I was in like the Truman Show, but I couldn't prove it. I was like that fucking doaks meme in my own, my own dream. And then I looked at, I was like, I can remember, I was looking at the night sky. And it was like that fucking scene. from, what's the, what's the fucking sci-fi show? Oh, yeah, really narrowing down there, dude. It's the sci-fi and vener show. Huh?

Star Trek? No, basically the stars just fucking started moving. And, and... Yeah, they tend to do that. No, no. You don't understand. They were moving right in front of my face. God was fucking with me.

And I shout out, the stars are moving. It's like that shitty Netflix thing. I was going to say the three China problem. The three body bones. He was literally there. The three China wrong. Because it's set in China. And I shout out.

And I shout out, the stars are moving. They're moving the stars. And the next thing I know, Sidney's just looking at me dead ass, being like, are you a gay guy? Okay, God. Yeah. Why the plot twist was that Gant wasn't even asleep.

He was just out in his balcony. He was like, the stars are moving. Do you get the dream, the piss dream when you need to piss in real life? And your dream is trying to tell you like, hey. Yeah. Hey, you got a piss. Hey, you got to piss. Because, like, suddenly your dream that is like about something totally different,

you have weirdly in this dream, the rock hard urge to piss in this dream. Oh, yeah. Like, this is weird. I was, yeah, I don't know if I'd use that exact phrasing, but yeah, I get what you mean. You know, it feels, you can feel the, the rock hardness being emanated to the peak length. It was worse when you have that dream. Because I remember so many times, I piss in the dream. I didn't piss myself.

That feels crazy that you can piss in the dream and not do it in real life. Oh, yeah. Every time I piss in the dream, I'm pissing myself in real life. It's, it's, that happens. It's awful because I piss in the dream and I'm like, Why do I still need to piss? I'm pissing so much. And I realize how like I'm playing with fire.

Like my mind is like playing with fire. It's like, yo, you need the lighting the lighter in the gas station. Yeah. What's going on? What are we doing today? Anyway, yeah, that has nothing to do with what we're doing today. We're going to be given a bunch of prompts. We're going to see if we're all on the same brain cell of whether we agree or a neutral

disagree on something. And then if we disagree on each other's fucking, I'm just going If we disagree or we have different conclusions to a statement then we're going to talk about it. I have a feeling

it's not going to go as plan just based on the first five minutes of this fucking episode. When China 1 caused those issues we were fine. When China 2 came in goddamn China 2.

We have three Chinas. Don't even talk about the third China. Anyway, yeah, So we got a bunch of prompts. We're going to talk about it, I guess. What, do we want to talk about the three China problem? No, no. No, we should not.

We should save that. Yeah, we'll save that for another one. We'll save the three China problem. All right. Where are the prompts? Are they in trashbox skin? Oh, okay. Word.

We're going to bring back trashbox in here. There you go. You don't even know. You don't even know. You didn't even know. I didn't even know. I just rocked up. All right.

All right. Statements. Um. Um. Sick. I don't care about that. It's not about China. I got three Chinas in me.

One of them is Chinese and the other one's Chinese. Language ability changes how people treat you more than nationality. Wait, say that again? Language ability changes how people treat you more than nationality. What does that mean? So, like, let's say you... Like, let's say you're in, uh, if you're in China. If you're in China, if you're in China, damn it, God, you'll be it too.

Okay, I'll be in China. I'm imagining. Uh, and you speak Chinese. Yeah. As a white person. Uh-huh. I don't know where I'm going with this, actually. Let me reread it. So it's saying that, like, you would be treated, I suppose.

Does anyone know this problem to speak? Like, your ability to. converse in Chinese would have more of an impact than perhaps maybe your race. Let's just pick another one. I get it, but I understand that it's been asked so badly. Okay. I think that was the two China problem. That was the two China problem.

I spoke Chinese and I was Chinese. What's the bigger problem? Speaking Chinese? Or being Chinese. Success makes people more cautious rather than creativity, mainly aimed at the the YouTube creator space. Oh, that's a good question. Oh, success makes people more cautious than what?

Being creative. This is like a 30-minute long discussion. Ooh. Um, what does that mean? So, you know, sometimes, you know, often being creative, or like, following your creative urges,

often has a lot of, I suppose, quote, quite risk with it. Uh-huh. Because you might be trying out new things constantly, you know, but oftentimes, I guess the point of saying that creators will get complacent and will stick to

formulas or reoccurring things. They'll stick to what they know best or what works for their current trajectory rather than... And this is saying that success as an attribute being successful makes you more complacent or less likely to take race. Okay.

Brugan speak English. I can speak Chinese too. I can speak Chinese. I'm not one I have the Chinese street. I'm only one of you to explain that again in Chinese, actually. So I, do you read the question in Chinese? You read it, Chinese? Well, God is Chinese.

Gone is Chinese. He's the Chinese sleeper agent. Shit. My great granddad was actually Chinese. It's a word. Mine, too. We're all Chinese, deep down. All right.

All right. Do we have our answers? Yeah. Here we go. And three, two, one. I said agree. I said agree. I said disagree.

I know you would disagree because you just took one of the biggest fucking risks of all time as a longstanding creator, which is funneling hundreds of thousands of dollars into a passion project. Yeah, I mean, I'll let you guys go first. Yeah, I mean, I've, you know, certainly found myself in those times when, I've perhaps considered doing an idea where I was like, well, wait, actually, it's a bit risky. It might not work out. I'll stick to the stuff I know.

But, you know, this is such a multi-faceted thing to talk about because... What is your definition of success? To start for starters. Well, I mean, for me, maybe being able to love off it and being able to hire other people, I'd say that's definitely for a creator, certainly. I mean, that your creative endeavors can not only fund your life, but multiple other people.

people maybe. But then that's also then for me personally, that's when I started feeling a lot more pressure to deliver was like, okay, I've got X amount of people who rely on me to do my job. And suddenly now it becomes a lot scarier if I start taking these big swings. But at the same time, it's not like I haven't taken risks, but there are times definitely where I find myself maybe being more complacent with certain aspects of the creativity, especially creativity in general, that I'll be a bit more like, I'll stick to something. I know that roughly will work and I'll retool it or I'll try something like this. But Not all the time, that's why I wasn't strongly agree.

It was an agree because I definitely have done it. And I know, I mean, look, you can go on YouTube and look at a lot of creators and you can very much tell that they are living in a time loop. Yeah, they're using like the formula that has worked out for them. And I think that's why they're like, oh, I could or I want to maybe like go, you know, branch out more into like a completely different field, for example, of like content or even just like something that's not content in the case of like a YouTuber. But then, you know, there's a part of you that's like, yeah, as Connor said, like, if you've got employees or you've got like a family or you've got like, you know, some other person other than yourself to take care of or that is relying on this success, quote unquote, then, yeah, obviously it's going to be a lot harder to be like, I'm just going to start a painting now, you know, or like doing something completely different in terms of content. It might work out, but not a lot of people are willing to take that risk. Yeah. Why did you say disagree? You aren't someone, though, in general, gone, I would say that can do something you're not passionate about. I feel like you can't force yourself.

I can force myself. I guess also my definition of success is, I guess, I don't know, my definition of success. I wouldn't say is different, but I never forget what my original definition of success was, which is to make sure that I'm comfortable, to be able to make sure my parents are, like, comfortable. and that's basically it. But you can also, I would say you're successful as a YouTuber, that you are hungry to be a writer or director, a screen screen.

You know what I mean? There's different aspects. It's more like I'm constantly pushing to challenge myself. If I'm doing like completely the same thing, then I just feel like, I don't know, I just get bored. How many anime of the year videos have you made? Well, here's the thing. Even like I'm my anime of the year videos,

I've made over 10. But the style of it over that 10 years, so it's like changed a lot. And my writing for each anime of the year videos has like slowly changed. If you look at my anime of the year video five years ago and the one I just released, it's like the writing style is like totally fucking different.

So it's, even if it's not like out there front and center, I'm constantly trying to push myself to, do new things in a new style and constantly trying to like, I don't know, develop myself as a person. And I think that reflects in my approach to content creation as well. Yeah. Where we're at the point, at least I feel, we're at the point where we are comfortable

in terms of like being able to be comfortable in our position, in our lives. And I see that comfortability as, okay, that means I can use whatever X. resources I have to do something exciting and do something new. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I mostly said agree because that's the general consensus that I see amongst the entirety of the content. I'm also lazy sometimes. Sometimes I rinse and repeat. Yeah, of course. And there's nothing wrong with that, obviously. If it works, then it works. And if, you know, as long as you're not like beating a dead horse over like a certain type of content, then yeah, obviously I think it's fine. I mean, I think all three of us individually have a long-running series or a long-running style of

that we've repeated over the years, you know, which works for our content, obviously. We also all changed up our content at least a couple of times. Yeah, exactly. And done some big things. But it's a hard thing to talk about. I think if you're not in it, it sounds facetious and it doesn't really like make a lot of sense, I think. Whenever I heard YouTube talk about it, before I was YouTube, I was like, you're so fucking. Just like, shut the fuck on.

Go on fucking make dumbass videos. Go on make food fight, okay? Yeah, yeah. sure. Yeah, I think it completely depends on what that person's definition of success is or, you know, where they seek the validation for their contentment or their happiness or, you know, however they might pursue, you know, just comfortability or anything like that. Because, you know, at least for me personally, like, I've always lived with that philosophy, like, you know, that's that whole thing of like success in the case with like content creation, you know, obviously naturally it's going to come with like more revenue. you more money. But, you know, it's that whole idea of like, yeah, money can't buy you happiness. But like, in my opinion, it can't buy your happiness, but it can buy you the freedom to pursue that happiness, if that makes sense. You know, it's this whole idea of, it's like how you use your success and how you define that success that changes the trajectory

of like, do you want to pursue creativity because that's what you view a success, like the, I guess, you know, because like some content creators view success as constantly just getting the numbers, whether that be doing the exact same thing for more. multiple years, you know, with little to no change. But then there are some creators out there that I know that are very content with being like the opposite side of the spectrum where they're just like, no, I'd rather not do the same shit that I did the previous year. I'd rather actually, you know, better myself and in my creativity and do something completely different, even though it may not immediately reap the benefits of the views or the money or however maybe, right? But

you're more content with that because you don't get bored. You're constantly pushing yourself to be better and that to some people might be considered success. So it's like, I don't know, it's a bit open-ended. Do you think Mr. Beast is happy? Look into his eyes, gone. I mean, I think like as, as obviously all of us have gone through this life cycle of YouTube and ups and downs, I think one thing that I think generally I've always seen to be a trait that is just never healthy is just like hunger for like numbers that never ends. Yes. Like if you're just ravenous for growth and you can't see past that

and that is the only thing you can ever see or care to strive for, I feel like it just always leads to consequences that you didn't anticipate. And also you end up fucking up along the way because you start making, you know, you start justifying maybe actions that you might not have done before. But suddenly now, you know, there's numbers involved and then it becomes a lot easier. Also, everyone falls off eventually. So, you know, if you're constantly pursuing for like more of you. I'm not saying you can't be number one forever.

No, exactly. And you have to be content with that. Nah, not me, though. What? That's that Chinese dog is that Chinese. You're that Chinese dog, you know? The resilience. All right, let's see what's next.

Okay. We've gotten more honest about... China didn't fall off. They just had to clear. We're not going to stop fucking saying China and Chinese. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why is it funny to say Chinese? No, no. It's so stupid. It's a country.

It's so funny, though. It's so stupid. I hate myself. We've gotten more honest about what we don't care about as we've gotten older. We've gotten more honest about what we don't care about. Yeah. That's okay as well. We don't need to have a massive discussion for everything as well. I'll say this won't be a quick one. Yeah, this will be a quick one, I think.

Oh, my pen is ass. Is that a new pan? Yes, please. The best smelling one. Aw. He's going to decipher them. He's going to pick one by one. Actually, you can have this anemic pen.

This didn't feel good to write with. Oh, great. There's no black pens. Okay. I'll pick out the best one. Here's the shittest one. All right. All right, here we go.

Ready? Three, two, one. Strong disagree. I said neutral. Agree? Wow. Oh, wow. Okay.

Wait. Why did you say strongly disagree? You know, well, first of all, I don't care if I say my thoughts on something, because I'm more honest. But I think, like I mentioned, I've said this a lot, but like, I feel that I've come to appreciate that media can mean a lot to a lot of different people. And I try to at least give everything a fair shake. And I try my best to see the positive and everything. But that being said, something is do fucking suck. And if it does suck, I don't mind saying it.

But I feel like I am more considerate, considerably more so than I was. I would just be like, that's ass. I'd watch five minutes on TikTok, dog shit. Yeah. And now I'm like, okay. Yeah. I say neutral because, yes, I have gotten more honest with the things that I dislike. But at the same time, I've gotten even more honest about the things that I like.

And I'm more honest. I'm more, yeah, I'm more willing to like be open about the things that I like because, you know, saying like, oh, I don't like this thing. it doesn't usually lead to any kind of, I don't know, positive direction in any way. Like, whereas saying something that I like and I want to share something that I like because I'm genuinely passionate about it and I want other people to like give it a fair shake. And if they don't like it, then that's cool. But, you know, I have fun talking about the things that I like, I think, more than the things

that I dislike, which I will say is like a big 180 for me because when I first started making, you know, YouTube videos, like I was very much talking about a lot of the things I dislike. You know? Well, I mean, talking about things you dislike, always does better than things you like. Exactly. Exactly. Whenever people that, they would do like top 10 games of the year, top 10 worst games the year, always the worst games have like three times the views. Exactly, exactly. But I think I've just gotten to that point in my life now where I'm just like, okay, you don't like this thing. Cool. That's it. All right, sweet. Whereas if I much rather listen to someone go on on a 30 minute, you know, rampage about like what they fucking love and what they're passionate about versus 30. minutes of them talking about something that they hate. I mean, I also find that from a critique perspective, and when making videos about it and trying to make it entertaining, it's a lot harder of a challenge to present something you like, talk about it in a fun way and an engaging way,

and convince people that it's good. Whereas, you know, dunking on something is... Shit, you just described my entire fucking career. I was like, is it hard? Yeah, it is hard. It is hard. That's why you're good at it, God. Yeah, that's why you're good at it. You're the go to it.

And, you know, dunking on something is, you know, it's easy. It's easy to find something bad. But the bad part is when you think about it and you get deep, you're like, I'm just dunking on someone else's failures. Yes. Nobody sets out to make a bad thing. And it's so easy to see something that's just so fucking awful and shit on it. But then when you see like a Ubisoft game, you're like, I don't feel bad.

This is like pure corporate greed. But at the same time, it's like, There's probably like a good chunk of people on that team that really tried their best, but it ultimately doesn't matter because ex-person was evolved and did, you know, but that aspect of it I'm trying to get more aware of and trying to appreciate it that when I do fucking shit on something, like I'm laser-focused on why that is and not to just do broad strokes of like, and it's bad. And it's like, that doesn't help anyone. I just feel it's harder to like, I don't know, sell your personality by shitting on something

terrible all the time as opposed to just talking about something that you like. Like, again, it's like if there are two people in front of me and one of them only talks about the things that they like and are interested in and another person only talks about the things that they dislike all the time, I'm going to want to talk to the guy who likes the things and wants to talk about the things that he likes, you know? That's just life, bro. That is life. But that's why, like, I think it's fine to be, uh, that's why I said unusual though,

because it's like, I think it's fine to be honest about the things that you dislike because, you know, you should be true to yourself. but I think you should also be honest about the things that you like equally. Yeah. And yeah, I think that I mean, we all put different answers, but I essentially agree with what you guys said. Different perspective, bro. Yeah.

I mean, it's just, it's more so that I am more confident in what my tastes are and what I'm going to like and dislike. And I'm always open to give stuff like a shot. But I also know, like, how my brain is wide in a certain. certain way to know what my interests are. You can't like everything. I'm not going to like the high school romance. No. Yeah. No, no. Exactly. Yeah.

And sometimes I think people conflate talking about the stuff that you do like and focusing on that. Sometimes in modern day and is they conflate that with being afraid to tell the truth or to tell like, you know, negatively, talk negatively about that. And I think it's the way I see it is that there is so much in terms of like entertainment and media, there is so much stuff to choose from nowadays, right? There's so much things coming out no matter what medium you're in.

Why does anyone have time to fucking sit down and watch 12 episodes of something they don't like? Yeah. It can't like, for me, I've gotten a lot more comfortable in just saying, this isn't for me.

This doesn't mean it's like inherently a bad piece of like media or anything. It just isn't for me. And there's a lot of things like that. But a lot of people misinterpret that, Like saying something is not for you. Immediately people would be like, that means it's the most terrible thing according to you.

And it's like, no, that's not what I said. Yeah. You know? Me with JJK. Yeah. The internet and we realize I have no enemies. I have no enemies, man. Shut the fuck.

Except China. China. I'm kidding. Oh my God. Jesus Christ. That's the three China problem. Yeah. That's the second China in the equation.

Where's the third China? We don't talk about the third China. Oh, okay. Is it? Yeah, thanks, Kahn. Oh, no, it's actually a good one. There you go. Being honest is a bad thing if it hurts people.

Okay, this is stupid. Okay. Nobody thinks being lying to someone is good. But I think they'll be happy. Yeah, yeah. Okay. A bad ending can completely change my opinion on an otherwise great series. Hmm.

That can be a movie anime, whatever it might be. A bad ending. will change the opinion. Um, hmm. Hmm. Jeez. Okay. Ready?

Yeah. Three, two, one. Disagree. Neutral. I said agree. Wow. So Joe said agree. Got said neutral.

I said disagree. Okay. Yeah. I mean, Game of Thrones. Okay. I know this has to be brought up because it is universally regarded as a fucking awful ending, right? Yeah.

And I can't think of a TV show that has. a public sentiment as agreed upon that it's a bad ending. But I still really enjoyed Game of Thrones. And I had a good time watching it, and it did not at all sour my feelings on Game of Thrones. I still think about it very positively. And I had a good time. And as someone who...

As someone who has the hottest take on the Game of Thrones. Not hottest, most dog shit. Let's not pretend. Incorrect. Let's not fall a hot take. Your hot take is valid. Yeah. Well, as you said, you know, you have no enemies, so I'm going to...

I have an enemy when you said that. I had one enemy. I'm not going to limit test that right now. I really hate the, you know, this argument take when it's... This is going to make me sound even worse. I think Game of Thrones is the wrong example to give for this argument. Okay. Because as someone who had the take on Game of Thrones that they did, I can...

What was it, God? Remind the views of your take was in case... I liked the latter half of Game of Thrones. More than the first half you said. Yeah, because of my monkey brain. I've not seen a single episode. As a critic, I know like the first half is better. And that doesn't include season eight.

These season eight is absolutely dog shit. Okay, okay. Now we're adding caveats. Okay, go ahead. Yeah. The reason I think is a bad example is because the fall of Game of Thrones wasn't just the ending. The writing was on the wall. way before the ending.

Yeah, it was like to say that a bad ending ruins a show and using Game Thrones an example, well, you know, that isn't just the ending. That is the entire lead-up to the ending. I think that makes my point even more for disagree. Because I was like, I watched half of a mid-season show and I still enjoyed it because the first half was so fun. But were you watching that because it was an obligation

because you'd already gotten so much of it or already. No, I was genuinely excited for every week. Like I, even if I knew it was falling in quality, I was like, don't you bring that down. tiny slime. Even though I knew it was falling in quality, I think I was so invested in the world and the characters that any amount of garbage

would have been honestly welcome because I was just so into it. Right, right. It's why The Hobbit is kind of palatable. And I was, I just like the world of, I don't really like the movie, but I like the world. Right, right. I'm invested.

Right. And like, the more I think about it, the more I'm just like, all of these bad endings that are, I guess, famous, how many examples are there where the writing wasn't on the wall to the lead up to the ending, you know, because it's, I'm trying to, what, can you, can you search up like worse endings in anime? Um, because I'm trying to remember, the Evangelion.

See, I don't think, I don't think, nobody took the bait on. No, nobody took the bait. No, I wanted to try. Yeah. Princess Tutu, death note. I see, death note is such a cop out of an answer. Yeah. And again, I think it was like they, it was the entire, like, after,

L died. Yeah. Because I think another thing is that it heavily relies... I was berserk on there. It's not a... Because the original... The original anime ended run like a cliffhanger. Okay, Dead Man I was going to say, yeah.

Tengue is probably on here as well. Yeah. No Game No Life had a bad ending. Promise Neverland. That just had a bad season two. Yeah. These are shows that just didn't end. Wonder...

Okay, promise like that I would agree with. Well, yeah, but Wonderig fell off after like episode three. Okay, pull down. I mean, Akamai, school days. That's the only good thing about it. Hard disagree. This is like a rage bait list. This is genuinely like useless.

Okay, so I am going to, because we have these like anime series up, right? Like, for example, I for one, like when I think of, Gura Lagan is crazy, by the way. That's a crazy take. That's crazy. Gintama, it was also fine.

Arrace. Yeah, okay, I agree to agree with. Gagliam number two. Play more, I guess. Play more manga ending. is fine. It's an anime. It's the anime only. Like, go for a joke. No, no, no. Okay. So the reason why I said agree, right, is because I forgot who said it, but I very much agree with this kind of perspective on it, right? Like, it's this whole idea of like, if you're watching,

say, a gymnast, do like a gym routine, right? They do like, they do the run-up. They do the flips. They do the spirals. And then if they land flat on their face at the end of it all, you're not going to be like, yeah, but that backflip was sick. You're going to be like, well, fuck, they just fucked up. The entire thing is ruined. I'm not that harsh of a critic. I'm like, well, yeah, but that's the problem. It's like, you know, you personally may not feel that way, but a lot of people do. Like a lot of people

say the reason why, for example, a lot of people hated the fuck out of Dead Man Wonderland was not because the entire series was shit. If anything, the majority of the series was actually decent, in my opinion, but the ending was just fucking horrible. And so most people, or same with like erased, not every episode of

erased was horrendous. There were a lot of like some, especially midway through the season of a race? Like, there was some really great emotional episodes, but it's just the ending was so on the wall that people were like, eh, whatever, you know, whole thing. Now when you talk about a race, everyone's like, yeah, but the ending was shit. That's usually the first piece of criticism that you ever hear

about any of these kinds of shows. And I think, so I think like, yeah, the ending of the show isn't everything, but it is the one, in my opinion, pivotal moment where it should tie everything up that you experienced up until that point. and if they don't tie it up or if it's not at a satisfactory point that made it so that that whole journey was worth it then in the end of it you're going to remember

only the worst part about it conversely speaking it's the reason why a lot of people rate code gear so highly right yeah the entire show was amazing but the whole thing was nicely wrapped up and neatly packaged in an amazing ending and that's what most people remember about code gear's right

yeah that's my argument so that's why I said a great It's not a strongly agree because it's not everything, obviously. But in the case with like anime or long-running TV series, it's a pretty big, unavoidable part. Yeah. And I think I've just seen more and more when an anime has ended. People, it's just fucking, it just has become popular to just like dog pal on this ending. Right.

And the more I experience it, the rarer it gets that I actually agree that there is a bad ending to something. I think most recently was My Hero Academia. got cloned on to no end. And I'm like, this is a fine ending. It's not the greatest ending, but it does everything it needs to do. Attack on Titan as well. Another ending where people are like, this ruined the entire fucking show for me. And I'm like, what? Yeah. I think there's also an aspect of people that are just sad it's over. Yes. And they lash out. Yeah. Is they young? And they don't know where to put that energy in. Yeah. They say the ending's bad. And I think that my opinion over time has changed about the ending just because I

I was thinking about it because I was like, if the ending is the paramount thing to kind of like determine my overall opinion on a show, then surely that means if a show hasn't ended, if a series hasn't ended, then I can't be able to judge it. And then I think of examples like berserk where I'm like, no, even if berserk had a dog shit ending, you know, hypothetically, we would never know. We would never know, you know, hypothetically. but even if it did, I was like, it wouldn't have ruined what it did for me. Because I don't think the gymnast analogy is totally correct, because I think some of these are more akin to a marathon than one, like, very quick sequence, you know? Yeah, yeah.

It's an entire marathon. And maybe there are parts where it runs a bit slower, runs a bit faster, maybe they trip up at the end. But, you know, they were on that fucking world record run for a lot of it. And you've got to respect that. That's fair. That's fair. Yeah. Yeah.

All right. Damn. All right. Dash deep. All right. Das deep. Who's going to pick the next one? Go on.

Go ahead. Social media algorithms decide what we care about more than we think. No. Sorry. I should I write it down. What was the prompt against? Social media algorithms. Do social media algorithms decide what we care about more than we think?

Hmm. All right. Three, two, one. I put stonk disagree. I put disagree. I would agree. I know you did. I don't know about you,

Gant. I don't let these fucking clankers decide what I want to like. That's good for you, Joe. That's good for you. So I guess I'll try. I have free will. I was very quick to voice my thoughts.

Go on. I mean, you feed the info in, right, that it gets. So it knows what you're looking for and it knows what you're engaging with. And so if you spend 0.3 seconds longer looking at this one video of this,

one thing or you looked at this post from this one person who was searching this account. It's like you are putting the data in that is allowing it to make decisions for you. Yes, it can suggest things. But ultimately, it's your engagement with it that decides what you will be then fed to you. So in some senses, I do think, yeah, it is kind of deciding because it can show you a bunch of things. And it's up to you what you engage with. But ultimately, it's your choice to either watch that video for longer or leave that comment or look at this thing that is, giving the computer all the information that it needs to then know more about you and perhaps

know you even better than yourself and then feed you something that you don't know you're going to lie. But again, I think it's all from information that you've been willingly handing over. Yeah, but like... But it sounds more dystopian and cool if we say it's all the computer stuff. I'm just a bot, man. I'm a bot. I'm a hundred. I'm that guy. The only thing that I think it does very well without, like, an say as a user is that, like, being a consumer is, like, you are pushed to buy, buy, buy, buy. Like, that is the one thing that it constantly does is ads, ads. So, like, in terms of, like, the actual content creators you're watching or whatever it is or whoever you're, you're normally going to be fed stuff that you're kind of aligned with and your humor is or whatever.

whatever it is you're looking for, you know. But in terms of sometimes I do feel like a trend that gets popular, for example, is perpetuated because the thing can be sold. Like I think I do, I have this weird theory that I feel like any kind of hobby that has like a ton of like buying aspects to it where either like TikTok shop can sell you things or YouTube shop can say it gets pushed more because there's more money changing hands with the platform. So I feel like we are constantly being fed hobbies that are more materialistic or require more purchases or more expensive purchases than before, that we would just kind of get a range of things. I do think in one aspect that's you, in another aspect, we are being pushed towards hobbies

that are often about buying things like trading cards. Like I think that's so much algorithm involved in pushing trading cards, trading cards, trading cards, buy trading cards. You need to buy these things. you buy the things to be a part of this hobby. Like that kind of stuff, I think, is being pushed on us. Okay. Make a great argument, but I'm going to make a count. I'm going to make accounts. I'm not. I'm not. I'm not. I wasn't even going to argue against this.

And then I was like, hold up. Because all I was going to talk about actually initially was, yeah, I've watched way too many movies because of one fucking short that got recommended to me. But. Yeah, but Lodry did this to me or not. He was like, let's watch Training Day. I was like, why? He's like, I saw like two TikToks. It was fire. I was like, what is wrong with? with you. I guess it's the modern day trailer. That's what it is now. You know what I mean?

It's the TikTok sleuth trailer. Do you know what I watched the other day? Uh, Dr. Strange Love. Okay. I would not have gone out my way to watch Dr. Strange Love. Not a TikTok, a YouTube short. Okay. Oh, I'm sorry. Oh, the pinkies out. Which I'll talk about another time because a fantastic fucking movie. But I think to counter the argument that you made, yes, you do have free will, and yes, you do enact that free will. The problem with algorithms is that sometimes you can unwittingly or unwillingly fall into a rabbit hole by accident. Oh, for sure, for sure. And you, by that metric, you are sometimes exposed to stuff that you might not even want to be exposed to, but you know.

sometimes what algorithms are awful at is stopping you from going too deep, going too deep or like, you know, there are some, there are some, definitely some, like, genres in the algorithm world where it's like morbid curiosity. Yeah. And you go down a rabbit hole, you would never have gone down before, if not for like morbid curiosity. And that, I think, is like a dangerous game sometimes. Yeah, like the true crime stuff.

Certainly, you watch some videos. You know, like that this video seems interesting. And then the video is like weirdly super graphic and like shows images that they probably shouldn't be showing on YouTube and stuff like this. You're like, I feel like I'm, yeah, like you said, I'm being pushed. But I think it's also frustrating because the aspect of it all being user generated and users tend to create things that they are either one is trendy for whatever reason or two is monetarily beneficial.

So it feels like it, the most. money is always the one, the fucking the flow. It's like, it's like I might not give a fuck about Pokemon cards, but if people keep fucking making them, because everyone's trying to make a quick buck off them for whatever reason, I'm just being exposed to more stuff like that. But I, actually, I agree. So it's a higher likelihood to go down

that rabbit hole. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, but I agree. I think like, you know, people getting, kind of, going and learning about, like, extremist beliefs. Yeah. I think that's like a prime example of, you know, I think we all know a person in our life that probably wouldn't have gone, would never have done that normally, had there not been a literal, like,

multi-trillion dollar system in place that pushes them towards this. Yeah. You know, and I think there's definitely an argument that's like, hey, you should be able to have some self-control here and some self-awareness. But unfortunately, we clearly live in a world, but that's not the case. And I think getting annoyed at the individual for a systematic problem is unhelpful and it's not going to change anything. Yeah.

So I do think there's, yeah, there's some right there. Yeah, yeah. Obviously, it's not every single individual. Like, some individuals are aware enough of themselves to be like, oh, okay, I am being fed this stuff. But maybe I should rethink. Yeah, but obviously like that's not everyone. And it's like...

Unfortunately. Yes, you do have free will, but yes, we are also very monkey brain. And our programming is sometimes just flawed in our brain. That doesn't lead to what is healthiest for us mentally all the times. But I think YouTube, it's peaked and it's going down now. You reckon? Yeah, because I, dude, every single science informational video now that isn't like from, I would say like the 10 channels that you probably all know is literally AI voiceover or like

AI script writing. And it's like it's genuinely impossible to find a channel that is new, that is good. Or like even the kind of trend of like I don't mind hiring like a narrator or whatever, but it does feel like we lose a little bit of like what made YouTube so special a little bit. And I just feel like it's getting harder and harder to find newer channels that are making really interesting and creative things. Because YouTube, if you, you know, you watch like a Veritacium video or whatever, like, oh, my son, it's kind of cool, isn't it?

And the next 10 videos we like, here's the top 10 Nobel Prize winners that did this. You're like, that sounds interesting. Top 10 Nobel Prize you didn't expect. I don't know what these videos are. I'd never watch this video like this. But then you start watching it, and you're like, fuck me. It's an AI voiceover, and it's like AI generated things. It's like, we are

so fucked. Because it knows how it's like a thumbnail that's as good as the other thumbnails. We're so fucked. I saw an article the other day that analysts speculate, and this is like a pretty wide, you know, guess, but, you know, based on a bunch of bases, that they reckon that modern day YouTube in 2026, 20% is now AI content. I mean, which I does not surprise me, but it does upset. I find myself using YouTube less and less and less and less and just leaving Twitch on the background, because at least I'm listening to like a friend or someone else I know. Right, right. Because, and I think that's why streamers are getting more popular every single year, because it's the only fucking thing we have left that we're like, that's an actual,

well, at least, you know, mostly, that's an actual person. At least that you're aware. You know, and it's, it's, it's kind of frustrating because you're like kind of watching YouTube. Maybe they're getting more views. They probably are. But you're watching the, like, the thing just kind of crumble and become decrepit in real time. You're like, wow, a lot of people are uploading shit. And YouTube has no system in place right now

to help you as a viewer get the content you want. It is just force feeding you garbage. No, if anything, they're like double-tripling down on like, yes, make more AI content. And they keep pushing the like AI dub videos from other countries. And it's like nobody has ever clicked on one of these videos

and thought, wow, this AI dub sounds so good. It's ridiculous, but it keeps pushing it. Yeah. Stop recommending me this shit. Yeah. Yeah, Guardian reckons more than 20% of videos shown to new YouTube users are AI slops. It's so bad, man. I mean, I think YouTube, if they don't figure this out soon, it's going to

absolutely ruin the platform. Oh, 100%. It's getting bad already. And I think, I hope to God, that there's someone at the company who's ringing the alarm bells because right now it's just, you're just watching YouTube was, and I still believe this, was like the only S-tier social media platform. I think it used like for a good 10 years up until maybe like, I don't know this year. The 2010, zero. Yeah. 2015 and 2025. It was the platform that I think, I would like, you know, I'd watch Netflix a little bit. I'd watch, you know, Twitch a little bit. But I would spend hours on YouTube every day

because I could always get bangers. Yeah. A genuine bangers. Totally. And it's frustrating watching this happen because you're like, this sucks. And we've also put so much fucking ourselves on this platform. And watching it just go to shit is so fucking frustrating.

Yeah. It is really tragic. But it's okay because they'll sell more AI chips. Yeah. What lovely future awaits for this platform? Ugh. Yep. Preach.

Sorry, I'm carried away. All right. Who's next? Yeah, go ahead. Japan is only romanticized by those who don't live here daily. All right. Three, two, one. Neutral.

No more neutrals from now on. What? You just, you wrote down neutral. This is my first neutral. I don't like how it made me feel. See, because I read this, right? I read this. Japan is only romanticized by those who don't live here daily. Yeah, but it also is also.

gets, I think, equally as shit on daily as well. Well, so, okay, first of all. Also, people who live here can romanticize it too. Let's talk about the timeline. First of all, Japan had his history being glazed. Yes. Because the culture is just really cool. Yeah.

Okay? It's different. COVID hits. Peak Japan glazing era, okay? And then what that caused was then a wave of people who are like, I am fucking sick of hearing about how good Japan is. So that people now it's like more trendy to find things that are the dark side of Japan. Yes.

So I feel like Japan's a bit of a downturn right now and popularity wise, at least in social media with younger people. Because I think everyone's sick of hearing about how good it is. Yeah, totally. But here's the thing. It's pretty fucking good. That's why we live here. That's why I like being here. Like, I won't lie.

Totally. It's, it's the thing, right? I think that everyone is sick of their YouTube videos. It's like, you won't believe this thing. thing and they show you the most mid thing ever. And it's like, what you won't believe is that I get to walk everywhere. I get to have an affordable meal all the time. Everyone's really nice,

polite. I can leave my laptop anywhere. I can, I feel safe at all times. I do not have to worry about being stolen from, robbed or anything. And that's like the truth. Like, that's the core necessities that you need as a human being in your day by day. And I think Japan gets the

certain things completely right. Is there a lot of problems of Japan? Of course there is. Yes. Every country has its problems. Japan has some major problems in a lot of aspects, especially as being foreigners. We experience a lot of shit. I still take it. Yeah.

I went to the bank yesterday. I was about to discover slurs that didn't exist yet. I was so angry. They made me go back because I didn't have my previous expired Zyrio cards. Oh, damn. That wasn't on the website. And then, you know, some rules that came out of nowhere, absolute bullshit.

And they were being unhelpful as ever. Yeah, there's a lot of frustration. But I think that, yeah, it's not. Yeah, I will say, I will also say that from what I have been seeing, yes, there are a lot of people who don't live here, maybe have never even come to this country before that romanticize the shit out of it based on what they see on things like social media or YouTube or whatever it might be, right? Because obviously it's very easy and we did have a history of people glazing the shit out of even the tiniest things in Japan, even though, let's be real, like 80 to 90% of it also exist in other countries. But at the same time, I feel all the people who are on the opposite end of that spectrum who don't live here, who probably have never visited here, who are just like, actually, do you know that the suicide rate in Japan is also the highest in the world? Blah, blah, blah, blah. And like, you know, suicidal. So it's great. I'm not having to that. Yeah. But also, I feel like regardless of if you are like dick riding Japan or just like have a hate bono for Japan, I feel most of the time those people on both ends of the extreme spectrum are just as misinformed about the country.

as each other. It's frustrating because people think, you know, people love to quote statistics in every, every country where they want to visit. You know, they'll find some metrics that they don't like. And it's like, unfortunately, a statistic doesn't tell you how it is to just be there every time. Exactly.

Like no GDP or no mortality rate or any of the stuff can accurately describe the feeling of living there or being there for a long time. Obviously, we're very biased in our, because we've lived here. Yes. And we still live here for a very long time. But we choose that. We chose that.

Yeah. And there's not a day that goes by that I regret that decision. You think I'm very grateful to be here. I think every reaction has a counter reaction. Yeah. And I think just social media has obviously exasperated the Japan glazing. Yeah. But no, like as fucking annoying as it is, no amount of Japan is living in 2030.

Here is a vending machine. No amount of like those kinds of annoying videos can just replace waking up and being in a country that just works and we can afford and has good meals. That's that's that's it. You want to know what people fantasize about? That's pretty much it. Yeah. Just just living a comfortable life. Just having a good quality of living.

That's pretty much it. Like that's that I don't give it, you know, vending machines are nice and everything. I don't give a shit about vending machines or this, like, all this shit. Nobody moves to Japan for the vending machines. Yes. I care that the streets are nice. I can walk to my favorite places. It's like way more affordable than a lot of other countries.

Yep. And also, I actually feel like a lot of my taxpayer money is being used to make the country function. You know? Yeah. And that's pretty much it. That's it. I mean, obviously, we've been very lucky to do our job and do this, absolutely. But I think, you know, whatever your job is, you're day by day.

You still have to go through the same shit. I have to go to the bank. I have to go to the ward office and do all this shit. You know, like, but living in Japan is great. It's very safe. Yeah. The benefits definitely outweigh the negatives for most people who live here. And that's the reason why we leave here.

You know, and I think for a lot of people who might want to consider living here, it might not be a place to make a career. you know, it's kind of a tough place to earn a lot of money. You'll save a retirement fund. And there's all like valid complaints. And sometimes, you know, especially as far as you don't feel like you're welcome. That happens. But, you know, it's a lot of the times a lot of things can come down from effort and, you know, how much work you want to put into socializing with people, you know, knowing how to break

the ice, get a little bit more confident. All these things go a really long way in Japan. And yeah, I think the only truth to this in Japan overglazed is just the people glazing absolutely nothing, which a lot of the time there's glaze shit that is like, yeah, just so boring or so like whatever. Yeah, for sure. But then it's like a, everyone is trying to grab

the next trend from Japan and trying to find it. Yeah. And I think that you'll see at least online, the creators that seem to have found a knack for it, are the ones who have found a really great way of presenting Japan in a more true sense, my personal thing. Totally. People have done really well, you know,

can showcase the good parts of it. present the bad, present the good, and allow you to make your own decision. Yeah, 100%. There you go. All right. I think Connor, I think I skipped Connor, didn't know? Yeah.

All right, go for a corner. Where did you come from? Where did you go? What? Why is you in Conton, I joke? I just remember there was the fucking horror movie I watched. And then it's this, Jim, Jim, Jim McAvoy. What's his name?

James McAvoy. James McAvoy. Jim McAvoy. Jim McAvoy. Jamacklevo. I love that Jamaica boy Scott Ash and this horror movie remake

he makes this kid dance and it's a really intimidating scene and the music comes on and it's fucking caught an idea he's like do it again and then he said Where did you come from? Where did you go? He's like, stop. Do it again. As a man I find it hard to talk about my feelings

Maybe changing feelings to mental health repeat that again, sorry? Sorry, I agree with as a man. As a Chinese man. During my very Chinese time in my life. I'm doing very Chinese. As a Chinese man, strongly agree. As a man, I find it hard to talk about my mental feelings.

Maybe changing feelings to mental health. I don't know what that means. The second part throws me off. Maybe my feelings in the wind. My feeling. Is it just me personally, or is it? Yeah, you personally? Okay.

Maybe you want to speak for your fellow men? Yeah. We could. I guess. Yeah, we could. Let's speak for... We've banned neutral. Yep.

Yeah. Three, two, one. I put a agree. Strongly disagree. I would disagree. I... You talk about your feelings, this shit? I do talk about my feelings.

But you know what the fucking worst part is? I'm just not eloquent. So when I think about the words to use, I'm like, bah, we're sad. They're like, why. I'm like,

I don't know. I just am. It's so frustrating. Sometimes I am so envious when I, women are able to fucking boom, pinpoint. Yeah.

The exact second that started happening. And the, the fucking, they can, like, pin it right back to the age it all started. And I'm like,

bad day. 12th of February 2022 I fucking this is just a me thing personally I'm just so bad when I try to talk about

this stuff that I wish I want to talk about it but I really struggle to understand the words to find to talk about it right

because I don't I it's like the word cloud and it's like it's like when it's like apple and juice and I'm like oh

I can't it's like sad and then this weird ball this feeling and I'm like well it's right

goes with it. I don't know how to... Let me break up the thesaurus. What's another word for sad? It's not even the ability to understand the word or the emotion. I can't grasp the emotion or the feeling or sometimes where it stems thrown. I think this is like a trained

thing as a guy for me where everything was taught like, bury it, bury it. Yeah. And then it's... And now I've gotten so good at doing it. I do want to, I do try to talk about it more and I do try to recognize it, but I really struggle to sometimes allow myself to really sit with it, think about it, and kind of figure out where that

uncomfortableness is coming from, or where it's... No, I totally get that. And obviously, you know, I think that's an issue that a lot of men struggle with because, you know, just naturally we don't... And haven't been given the space to talk about our feelings as openly as say, like, you know, women have or other genders have. But I think, societally speaking now, it's way easier than ever before because it's a lot more accepted from most, especially in the West, for a lot of people to just be like, I don't care what gender you are, man. Like, if you want to talk about your feelings, we can talk about your feelings. Like, you know, there have been more,

I don't want to use the word safe space, but like, you know, there are, you know, variances of that now that are a lot more accepted in this generation specifically, compared to like, say, you know, back in our parents' days or even before them, you know, like, you know. I hate therapy talk, though. What do you mean? What do you mean? Everyone, like, talks like a therapist. Oh, even if they're not a therapist. Yeah, like people do this a lot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, Garn, I understand you're hurt, and I really appreciate that,

and I'm so helpful and so glad that you felt vulnerable enough to share that with me. Let's talk about your childhood. You know, people are kind of like, they talk like, almost like like chatchy we teach to some example. Like everything is like, you know, I don't know. I'm talking to a mate. I just want to talk to me like a human. Yeah, don't, don't, you're not a therapist. Don't talk to me like one.

I don't need that. Do people talk to you like that? No, but sometimes you talk to some people, admittedly, I do think this is more. of a younger person thing. And I'll be like, yeah, I'm not, if I tell someone, like, yeah, I'm just not feeling it today. I'm not feeling great. They'd be like, do you want to talk about it? I'm like, no.

Sometimes I do not want to talk about it. Sometimes I, because I know tomorrow, it'll be gone. Yeah. Let me just, and as a man, sometimes you need those days, you just like, just you in your fucking room and you're just like, this is me time. Yeah. Yeah. This is, this is, your own shit out.

I don't say a word. I put on some lofi or something. I don't know, some random background music. and I just lock in on some kind of game or whatever, and I'm like, this is me time. Meditation, bro. It is not talking. It is not, I don't,

not everything is solved by talking. Sometimes I just need to just. Yeah, yeah, alone time, right? Yeah. But yeah, sometimes,

I don't know, maybe because I'm, maybe because I'm young and hip gone. I have these, uh, this. Word. This is like what I'm doing, man.

This fucking 20 year old, I swear. No, I won't lie. I think it's mostly from Americans, but I've had this. Ah, right.

The therapy talk. I get that. British people will be like, the fuck you mean you said, have a pint. Yeah, shut the fuck up. Let's go to the palm.

Yeah, Ozzy's going to be like that too, for sure. They'll be like, you're feelings. What are you gay? No, I just was a bit,

I was happy. I'm sorry. Okay. Oh, it's, it's, I mean, a lot of the times

it was just, you know, it's not just talking about your feelings. It's being that person on the other side that is on the receiving, in sometimes as well, because sometimes you're not a therapist, you're right, but sometimes people are just like, how the fuck do I, you know, acts or react or respond without, I don't

want to offend the other person. Yeah, without coming off cold. Yeah, I don't know how to, like, properly, like, handle this. I've struggled with that, with that a lot, to be fair. You just say, like, bam. That's crazy. That's what you do. You're fucked in the conversation.

like, bam. Yeah. And they're like, that's crazy. That's it, that's it. Anyway, I don't even know. Actually, sometimes, sometimes you just need that. Sometimes you're just like, that was fucked, man. That's because like, sometimes you are in a situation where there is no other response.

Yeah. But some people hate that, though. No, because I think it's so much worse when you try to like logically work through everything or you try to explain everything. And it's like, or the worst point is where people try to offer a solution to everything. It's like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. I don't want a solution. Yeah. I just,

I just wanted to just have you be like, yeah. Yeah. That's it. That's what I wanted. Yeah. It's like, just, you know, validate that. Yeah, that does fucking suck. Yeah.

Your words have been heard. Yeah. You're like, fuck, man. That fucking sucks. I do say fuck, man. Fuck, man. Maybe that's a British thing. Or the, or the deep sigh.

Like, I audibly have to make the little trumpet, too, just to people know, I'm like, damn. Man. But sometimes as men, you've got to know when someone just doesn't want to talk about their emotion. Yeah, that's true. Ready to. Sometimes, you know, you're just like, sherman, you want to talk about it more? And they're like, nah.

And you're like, I got you, bro. Understandable. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes you just want to keep playing the video game. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Yeah.

Let's just watch something. I think men have their own way of meditating and self-reflecting that maybe women might see as, is like... Well, I think sometimes people just, they always, when someone's kind of consoling in them, they're expecting this like goodwill hunting breakthrough moment. Yeah. Where they'll like break down and cry.

We're like, you're like, yeah, most of the time that doesn't happen. Yeah. It normally takes, you know, many, many, uh, conversations to kind of work through these things. And nothing is a breakthrough.

It's going to fucking hit you, uh, but when you're by yourself, like taking a shit or maybe you're taking a shower, or maybe you're like, all both. All both. At the same time.

Anyway. I don't know if this is a 30s thing or getting older thing. Actually, I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna make a statement. Okay, go on. I feel Chinese. Strongly disagree. How do you write strongly green Chinese?

You write it in Chinese. All right, all right. Here's my statement. Okay. As I've got an order, I've found it infinitely easier to cry. Found it easier to cry the older you've gotten. Yeah. Okay.

Okay. Ready? Three, two, one. Agree. I want to bring this up because I was like, sometimes. We all said agree, by the way. Yeah. Okay, we all said agree because sometimes this never used to happen, right?

But, you know, there will be times when a really emotional thing happens and you don't get the emotions you think you do. And then you're watching some fucking random TikTok and it's like, it's like a cute fucking puppy or something. The dog was so happy. And then you're just like, what? Why am I crying right now? Yeah. It's so fucking weird. Yeah, I had this thing.

And I don't even know where it came from, but like when I was younger, there was this weird part of my brain that told me I know, like say for example, you're watching like a movie or something right. Or you're listening to a very emotional piece of music or whatever it might be. Yeah. But whatever it is that you're watching, it makes you like, you know, feel emotional. And I don't know why. When I was younger, there was this part of my brain that was like, I know you want to cry right now. I know you want to shed tears right now. But maybe you shouldn't. Maybe you should try and hold. hold that shit back. And there was like no rhyme or reason to it, but there was just this wall in my brain that told me you shouldn't cry right now, even though the emotions that you're feeling are very valid. But the older I've gotten now, my brain's just like, go on then. You know, it's just like, yeah, it's a right. Why would you blueboard yourself? I don't know. Again, this is a part of my brain that I've never been able to figure out. And I guess I grew out of it without ever figuring it out. But yeah, like I remember, you know, there was, would be a lot of like, say, emotional anime that I would watch where if I was, were to watch it

today for the first time, I definitely would like shed a tear or cry or anything. But there were, but back then, I don't know what it was. It was just like, maybe I felt weak for crying over something like that or maybe I was like undermining my own emotions or something. I don't know what it was. It was like when I was in my teens. But now, yeah, I, if I, you know, watch like a really emotional, like I watched the whale for the first time the other day. Yeah. That shit made me cry. Like I was fucking, you know, tears down my cheeks. I'm crying. But I feel like if I'd watched that movie back in my teens, I would have tried everything I could to not shed a tear. And I don't know why. And I don't know if it's just a me thing or not or if it's just like a young guy thing. Yeah. You got what I'm saying? I don't know either because...

Is it just a me thing? What? Like, it was it just like a past me thing? No, I think every guy gets it. Yeah, right? I think every guy goes to. that. Yeah. Imagee. Yeah. No, because, yeah, I mean, I can sometimes, like, just get emotional over, like, the most randomest fucking things now, which I never, like, which never happened before.

Yeah. Like, I almost shed a tear at a fucking speed running meme because they played, because they played you say run. And it's just, I caught myself. What was the meme? It was, uh, um, it was, I think it was like a fucking Minecraft speed run meme. It was something like that. It was really crying.

I mean, I did. I do. Because he's fucking you say run. I did. The power of you say Ron. Is probably the closest like blue note we call it. What's it? Yeah.

If there's a brown note makes you shit. Blue note, yeah. You say run is the blue note of our generation. I think so. There's something about it that makes me cry whenever I'd hear it. Yeah. It made me tear up. I don't know why, man.

That song is fucked. I don't know. Evil. Yeah. Generational song. Evil. All right. Next one. Sorry, I got us.

No, no, you're right. Oh, that was good. Yeah, no, that was good. Okay. The popularity of a show, game, or movie determines how much I'll enjoy it. That is the dumbest wording. I've heard of my love. You can't agree with that.

No. Yeah, Joey? No. Yeah, Joey? Absolutely not. That would make Jay actively dislike it was popular. That's not entirely true. Really?

Yeah. Really? I can't help the general public a shit taste. Oh. Fighting words. Yeah, I said. It was easier to enjoy show slash games back in the day as there was less social media hype slash spoilers going around.

Ooh, that's an interesting. A.e. hype has ruined enjoyment. Oh, hold on. Think about it. Let me think. Let me say it again. It was easier to enjoy. shows all games back in the day as there was less social media hype and spoilers going around.

Okay. Okay. Okay. Three, two, one. I said agree. Disagree. Oh, you disagree. Yeah. Why do you disagree? Yeah, you start because you're the solo.

Yeah. I want to hear you guys is reasoning first. I want to you. You always get to counter us, bitch. You go first. I want to count of you this time. Let me counter you. Um, um, So I think, you know, hype has always been a thing in our community. I think social media and popularity has just exacerbated it. I don't know if it's any more harder or easier to enjoy things.

But what I do know is that there we are living in a golden age of just great things. And I, you know, I'm going to repeat what I said before. it's so much easier to find things that you do like in this day and age because of social media, because you are more likely to get a tailored recommendation towards your taste, rather than having to watch what everyone else is watching all of the time. I know a lot of people who get recommendations just from a random, maybe film clip or random TikTok of someone talking about this one really niche thing that they would never have discovered, if not for social media.

hype and spoilers ruin maybe the more popular things? Yeah, I would say yeah, but I would say that social media has made it easier to discover other things that you will enjoy and you will like. Okay. Fair enough. See, because I have always lived with, well, not necessarily lived with, but like I've always had this kind of philosophy where like I would much rather get a recommendation from someone that I know and trust as opposed to some randos on the internet. Like, I've never, I've never gone onto social media to look for something. Like, if I want to look for a new movie or a new anime, a game, whatever it might be, 99 times out of 100, I will take a recommendation from someone I know over what social media is telling me to like.

Because, you know, I just don't trust social media. Like, basically, like, I would much rather have a tailored recommendation from someone who knows me, who knows my personality, who does. knows the things that I like and who I know the personality of because that creates more of an intimate, I guess, connection in that sense of enjoying media together. And, you know, I'll go on social media to see the things that are popular. And, you know, sure, you know, some of the popular things I have also enjoyed. But I've never liked the idea of just because it's popular, it should be something that I should also be a part of as well. Because frankly, I don't really give a fuck. And I

just want to like the things that I actually like regardless of if it's popular or not. So that's why I said, agree. I think there was, how do I say this? I think there was less of an emphasis back in the day of your social standing, to some extent, being tied to the media you liked or enjoyed, whereas now I feel like, hype and your enjoyment of something popular is almost like commoditful. find. Like if you, if you're like the most hype for JJK season three, you're like, oh, I'm doing by the matter. I've fucking watched all of it. I was fucking and you're tweeting nonstop,

but everything that comes out, you're making reaction fucking things. You're like, I can't believe this happened this week. It's like everything is commodified with how much you like or are fan of the current popular thing. And I think it ends up making this weird loop sometimes of like whatever is the big thing for whatever reason. People are always fighting to prove. that they are the most hyped for it, the most excited, um, for some reason.

It's like a competition in a weird way. Yeah. Whereas I, you know, obviously people have always, you know, tried to like fake or not fake or, uh,

exaggerate how much they like stuff. It's never, you know, it's not, it's not, you know, it's not a new thing. Mm-hmm.

But I just think it's like hyperchargeded it to a point where, um, you know, people are so willing to try and say they're a fan more so than they, normally would be or would say and I don't think that ruins the enjoyment by any means

it just means that I find online reactions generally unhelpful in terms of finding new media and I think it's made the discourse around it less useful and like Joey said I would always ask you for anime recommendations yeah totally because you know me personally and I know you have great taste and you know what I like as opposed to some random people on the internet that will just say what they like or what they are hyped for or what they are facing as a piece of media that they hype

are excited for it. Yeah, it also like in a weird way creates this strange social pressure to try to belong to the larger crowd in a sense, right? People have always wanted belonging. Yeah, of course. But I think, I think like rather than following the larger crowd because it's larger, I think it's much more healthier and I think much more deep rooted to have a smaller yet more intimate connection to maybe a smaller group of people that actually understand you and know you

as opposed to just following the larger crowd because it's larger and louder. Like if you want to follow the larger crowd, like if you know, if you want to like the biggest anime or the biggest movie or whatever it might be currently on social media and you want to be part of that conversation and you want to belong to that group, then I don't think there's anything wrong with that, especially if you genuinely just enjoy that piece of media. But I think seeing all of the hype and going around on social media and thinking to yourself, oh, I need to be a part of that. Otherwise, I'm going to feel left out is like,

it's kind of an unhealthy way of thinking about it, in my opinion. And it also makes you, like, devoid of your own personality in a sense. It's like, why are you afraid to just not necessarily, you know, agree with the larger crowd because what? You feel like you're not belonging into that crowd? Like, who cares? If you don't like it, then you don't like it, you know? Yeah.

They don't have any right to, like, disavow the things that you like just because you don't agree with the larger crowd, you know? Yeah. And I mean, I would feel like enjoyment can be is exasperated by just staying off Twitter. Yeah.

I feel like a lot of, a lot of the more toxic discussions and stuff, a lot of them come from Twitter. They, they, unfortunately, unfortunately, they do. And I feel like, remove that one aspect.

And there's still like toxicity there because on TikTok there is TikTok it can spread very very easily as well on YouTube shorts as well but I feel like

it is more manageable I would say where on Twitter it's all about all engagement baits all of the time who can get the most engagement

it's not about truth yeah exactly and yeah I mean like I said it's changed my view on how I view

like popular topics because there is specifically for anime at least there is no one unified community anymore it's it's gotten so like segmented that tribalism people not being a part of their little their show and rooting for it totally yeah yeah yeah exactly yeah um and i get that but like it also at the same time now has just created this like extreme us versus them mentality which i think completely you know defeats the purpose it reminds me a lot of, weirdly, whenever it gets recommended to me,

the whole live subreddit, they rank the earnings of each, like how many super chats the talent get. And I've always found that so bizarre. Yeah. But then when they're like, when their person's getting a lot of superchats, like, dude, my guy, my guy's crushing.

And it's like, it's literally how post clubs work. Yeah. What do you mean? Like, and I, I just, that aspect of like that kind of, it like support, like, I support the thing from this angle is so odd to me. Yeah. It doesn't, I don't get it.

Yeah, there's this really weird trend in the anime community that has been like cropping up. And it's this trend of just being like, yo, my anime, this episode got rated this much on IMD. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I swear. Easiest engagement bait of my life. Yeah. I swear, like, nobody fucking gave a shit about this.

like five years ago. You know, nobody was just like watching airing anime and being like, yo, your episode got ranked this much. My episode got ranked this much. Yeah. This week. And it's just exasperated,

this kind of like tribalism between being fans of like certain shows. It's almost like if you are a fan of a certain show, then there are certain accounts on certain social media websites where they're like, all right, it is now my personality. to cheer for this like I do a fucking sports fan.

Yeah, it's ridiculous. Yeah, legit. Whereas I think at least, you know, sports fans who will say the other person is a coward of scoundrel and a man who doesn't deserve to exist, they'll at least have a more fun discourse often. And also, it makes sense with sport because it's a competition.

There is a winning team and a losing team. So clearly that competition is more natural, but like, I don't know. I just don't understand people who are like, yeah, we hate fucking Dragon Ball fans. out here. We only ride and die for the Jutsu Kaisen. I'm like, dog, you're still an anime watcher. Like, what the fuck's the difference? I guess like the Jusikaisen daughter, Chainsaw Man, when the, my hierogadamia people

were fighting each other, uh, judicayson fans on Twitter. Yeah. Yeah. Remember that was happening. It's so bizarre. It's like the, they, at least, I don't know, there's some weird kind of, uh, these little, like a flashpoints that happen with these anime community things. Very odd. Yeah. It's weird. All right. This one's an interesting one. Go on. Being too old for something is a real thing. Being too old for something is a real thing.

That's real, though. Don't look at me like that. Okay. I have... All right. One easy way of proving this argument is true. Go on. Dating teenagers. You're on.

I arrest my kids. Your honor. You can date a teenager when you're a teenager. I'm going to assume this means hobbies. Unless dating teenagers is your hobby.

Am I right? Leo DiCaprio? Leo DiCaprio is like to disagree. Actually, Connor. Was that your Decaprio impression? I actually,

I was like, Oh, God. Being too old for something is a real thing. Hmm. I mean. I'm just trying to think of examples now. Yeah, I'm trying to think of examples as well. Um.

You seem so sure in yourself. Yeah, I think so. Okay. All right. Three, two, one. Disagree. I agree. Agree. I knew I'd be the...

Agree. All right, go on then. Huh? Go on then. What's your argument for this? Other than dating teenagers. That was a great argument. Yeah, that was a great argument. It's hard to deny.

That is hard to deny. But for everything else, why would you say agree? Um... Why is this fucking mic deteriorating on me? Yeah, I know. It's crumbling. It's only that one, too. Dude, this is fucking shit.

To the audio list says, this mic, fucking foam has been crumbling on me. And every time I sit here, I look down and I'm fucking culling. It's ridiculous. Just my dragon roar, Chris says. The Mike Dandruff. I don't know. I've reached that point in life where I'm like, there are some things where I'm like, Am I too old for this now?

What's the first thing you thought of? I don't know what this came to mind. Anime? Would you say you could be too old to like anime? I wouldn't say, I feel like... Because that is an argument that gets thrown around a lot on social media. Well, okay. Yeah. You know, I mean, obviously it's the people outside of the anime community that are like grown ass man liking Japanese cartoons.

Pokemon cards. Oh yeah. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. That's an asset. That's an investment. That is an investment. That is. That's smart finance. Yeah, I kind of want to play devil's advocate, honestly, because I feel like in this day and age, we're like, everyone's just like a very accepting of people's hobbies and whatever. And I look around and, you know, I see Adam. else taking, you know, in our generation, at least, you know, we have definitely kept a hold of like our hobbies. And it's almost kind of like, man, what, what are the children meant to do, man? Where are the kids spaces anymore? There is no kids. Are you talking about the death and deterioration of kids friendly spaces in general in our world? More great, bleak. And online, there's no club penguin. I think, if anything, I think the argument is the opposite. I think you can very much

easily be too young for something. Well, so here's the thing, and Gantz, it can't try it with something. You can never be too, you know, being, you can, so many things you're too young to do. Yes. But now as adults, we have kind of, we've kind of yoint the kids' hobbies from them. They don't have any hobbies anymore.

Yeah, we've kind of stolen them. Yeah, well, like, the kids problem. Like, okay. Fucking d' ass. Get a fucking hobby kid. Who cares if the adults like it? Like, I was, I was thinking about this. I'm gonna bring this to the context of anime.

Sure. Which is why I like, I said agree. I didn't say strongly agree, but I said like, okay. Because that would look weird, go. Yeah, yeah. Don't look weird. Look, when you keep talking about playgrounds, I felt that really weird,

that you keep using them. Like, even in the context of anime, you're like, do you guys feel like there is going to be an age where you're too old? I already feel like I'm too old for this in some way, where I'm like, should I really be relating to stories about teenage romance? and handholding and high school kind of like romance stuff. But this is the best thing about anime, Gant.

Not all anime is like that. But that's the thing. So you don't have to be into that kind of anime. But that's the thing. Okay, okay, wait. That's why I was going to lead into this argument. So I have seen the evolution of what I'm going to call like the Shonen action evolution.

I almost feel like Shonen, modern Shonan, I see a lot of like modern Shonan action. Some of the ones that get most popular are the ones that are like, it's getting bloodier, it's getting weirder, is getting more like sexualized. Sure. You look at, you know, JJK and JJK and Chainsaw Man and even like Dandadan, you know. And I remember feeling like my here, I remember finishing my hair academia. And I remember thinking, man, if I was like, you know, 10, 20 years younger, I feel like I would have really fucking loved my hair academia so much. more than I do now. As an adult, as like, you know, mid-30s, I was like, I still really,

really fucking appreciate it. But it's like as little too like cheesy, maybe a little too cliche for me right now. Uh, the show to make some the same way they used to a hundred years. Still makes it. Still makes it. Still makes it like, still makes it like they used it. But just because it doesn't appeal to me as much now, does that mean that stories and series like this should stop existing, you know. But, you know, as it is, as the anime community has grown older and the fandom is, you know, getting older, more shows are going to be targeted towards maybe more hypercharged, kind of like mature with maturer themes, you know? And I, and I just think, do I need to like every anime? Does every anime need to appeal for me? Or can I, can I be okay in

saying, you know, maybe I'm just too old for this genre now or now. Maybe this genre should not be for me. Maybe it should be targeted towards someone who is a younger demographic. Yeah, I mean, I get what you're saying, but I think at the end of the day, it's like if you say, for example, you know, someone is in their mid-40s, mid-50s, for example, right? Like a much older generation to us who will look at your, I don't know, your high school romance shows. And from their personal experiences seek some kind of enjoyment or some kind of connection, regardless of whatever that emotion may be, right, to the point where, you know, they'll watch it and be like, you know, as of me right now in my current moment in my life, there is almost nothing I can

personally relate to to these like high school characters, but maybe, you know, there might be some anime fans who will watch that and be like, well, I might not relate to the high school romance aspect, but there might be some character traits to a certain character that may be slightly reflective on their current life, or maybe their past that they have grown out for example. Like, I feel like if you look hard enough that you can, and as long as the character is like well written and, you know, constructed in a way where you can connect to it in some way. I think regardless of your age, you can, on a personal level, find some kind of connection to it that maybe will make you go, maybe I'm not that old for it. You know, I think it's all

a personal thing because at the end of the day, being too old for something now is like just a social construct. It's just people being like, oh, you shouldn't be watching this because traditionally, like, you know, people saying that about anime in Japan back in like the 90s where it's like, oh, only kids watch that or, you know, if you're a grown-ass man now, you shouldn't be watching cartoons. I mean, people still fucking say that shit all the time. But like, it's been proven time and time and again through generations that there is always going to be something in that medium that is going to pertain to that person on a personal level that I don't think anybody else has the right to judge. If you want to connect to it on a personal level, then that's how you connect to it. And if you feel like that that is right for you, then I think you can't be too old for it, personally speaking. Okay, then question. Question.

Go on. Question. Do you ever going to, do you think you're ever going to feel too old? Uh-huh. Or hentai? Well, it depends if my kids are in the house or not. That's the thing, right? That's the thing.

I don't think, I don't think, I think, okay. I feel like the 60 to 80-year-old men in Japan are the pervious fucking horniest dudes I've ever seen in my life. The fuck knows. I might be that in my 60s. I don't know. Do you want to be that? Not necessarily.

Like now. Like now. Would you want to be 60 years old? Maybe with kids. Maybe not. You know, who knows? You still want to be jacking it to hentai. I don't know.

If they're still making the good shit. Man, if Masterpiece Season 8 comes out during that time. Mastery Season 4 comes out. Manxpery years old, I'll be happy if I can joke it at all. If I get it, if I get it's anti or real porn, like, if my dick can still stand at age 60, I'll be like, fuck, yeah. I still got it. Yeah. I mean, I still got it.

The question will be, do I have the patience when I'm 60 to go through these websites to try and find something? Yes. Because that's the battle. I'm already losing it. Yeah, the question is... I'm like, fuck it, I'll jerk to the wall. I can't be bothered to go through this. Well, my tastes still be the same in, you know, with that amount of time passing.

Who knows? But that, I think that's independent of if you're too old enough to enjoy something, you know? Because, like, you could be, you know, you could be of a much younger age where, like, the thing that you're into is clearly targeted to your demographic currently. But if you don't feel any kind of personal connection to it,

then it's like, you know, you're not too old for it or anything. It's just you're not into it. That's all it is. I think taste and being too old for something is a completely different argument. Yeah, I mean, too old, I mean, taste and too old for something is, yeah, rightly so. It was a lot more toxic back in the day where it was just like, oh, this thing is like, you know, anime is like, that's animation, that's cartoons, that's more kids. For sure. But yeah, I mean, there is, I don't think it's some, I don't even think sometimes it's about age.

It's maybe sometimes it's about fucking, like, life. you where you're on life right like you know if I have a if I have a kid I'm not going to be watching high school DXD on like the fucking main big screen man of course I know I feel like there is a social

expectation and I agree with that that's in my private quarters yeah yeah yeah my kid needs to discover that on their own are we talking about gooding on the family TV what's going on here boys no no no 100% I don't think about like McDonald's kids' toys, if we're still chill with that.

Look, if you give me a McDonald's kids' toys. Look, if you give you a McDonald's kid's toy right now, I'm playing with that shit. I'm not. Really? Depends how fun the toy is. Why would they play with it? Why not? You're fucking fiddling with basically the equivalent to right now.

This is not how dare you must. It's the same fucking thing. This is a perfectly nice feeling ball. All right. Then let's let's let's let's pivot. Let's pivot the arguments. You bastard. apologize about Peter's slime. Do you think there should be some like things that adults

shouldn't touch? That should. Okay, actually, I can give you one. Some God. This answer might seem crazy. Children, actually. That's one thing adults should. Yeah. Yeah. You know, it needs to be said because there are, unfortunately, some adults who don't understand that. Okay. You scientifically cook that up to choose the worst word of all time. Yes, shockingly got it? The answer is yes. There are some.

Me. You've seen entry form. Oh my God. Alright, let me... You want to rephrase that? Let me rephrase that. Do you feel like there should be some spaces that should be reserved

only for a certain... That's a much better way. That's a lot better. Yeah, of course. We had to like club pregnant and shit. Yeah. That shit was hype. Absolutely.

We had like literal kids' websites that we didn't realize we just thought they were cool. Yeah, exactly. Because it came out during a time where we were the public. demographic for that thing. So naturally, yeah, like when fucking club penguin came out, we were all like ages, you know, three to ten probably when it was at the peak of that. Yeah, and every kid was on club penguin at the time because it was literally built for kids

that age group, you know, and that generation that was on the early days of the internet. So yeah, obviously, it'd be a bit fucking weird if, you know, your uncle Dave, who was like in his 40s was just like, I fucking love club penguin because, you know, it's probably not there for the right reasons. Let's be real. The mini games are pretty fun. The video games were fun, but, you know. The dojo is kind of sick, Jerry. I mean, for sure.

Like, you know, I'm not denying that. Well, when they, when they rebooted it, they didn't have a problem. Yeah, right? So obviously, yes, there are spaces where it is clearly made for that demographic. And if you are too old for, you know, outside of that demographic who is trying to join in on that, then, yeah, societally, people are going to look at you in a pretty weird way, even though there may be a possibility. where that adult just genuinely enjoys playing club penguin, for instance, right?

But, unfortunately, that's not what happened for the most part. Then tell me what... Then tell me what space there is left, then? There is no space. There is no space left. So, I guess that was like... That was like my main kind of, like, argument that there should be... I feel like there should be a space, and I feel like...

I feel like we have gotten to accepting of, like, you know, every space for everyone. You can't be too old for something. I was like, oh, you know, maybe, maybe, maybe there should be some things. Yes. That's, I can't stop like I. I'm trying not to say the exact same wording. Fuck you guys. I just think.

I just think there are certain things that adults shouldn't touch. Is that such a crazy thing to say in 2026? I agree. I got on me. Jesus Christ. Oh, God. Oh, there you go.

I don't know how we can top that. Real, real shocking argument. You brought up in the, that's going to be on the Transstage Awards. Yeah, for sure. Oh,

that's a making, well, we know where the most replayed moment of this episode is going to be. Ooh. What do you got? Okay. Consistency is better than originality when it comes to creating content.

Consistency is better than originality when it comes to creating content. Oh, man, that's hard. Consistency is better than originality when it comes to creating content. All right. All right, here we go. Three, two, one.

Stonk agree. Stonk agree. I just said agree. Stonk agree. Yeah, we all agree. We all agree. I thought I thought there was a chance. You might do disagree to be contrarian?

Nah. That's one thing about YouTube and social media in general consistency. I know more people who get away with doing slop content because they can post a lot more frequently than

some of the highest quality creative content I've ever seen who fall off because they barely post. Yeah, for sure. You sacrifice a lot when you, even though it is slop, you do these daily things where you spend a lot of time doing it. You know, it takes a lot of earth energy to do that. And you have to put a lot of most of your life on the back burner for it. That being said, I do think that as a creative, holding yourself to a schedule or being

disciplined and consistently having to make something, regardless of it's original or not, because what the fact does that mean really in this context? But your baseline quality that you can achieve will always improve the more you're doing it. And so maybe if you could take time off, you can make. a masterpiece, but you learn so much by having to hold yourself to the ability to constantly make something. And also have to be original in doing that. You have to make something. You have to find ideas. Like forcing yourself to cut up with ideas is not easy. Yes. But it's a skill that you can learn. Yeah. And I think especially on sites like YouTube where like if by content we're

talking about like, you know, making videos or whatever, um, originality just isn't really a thing that's rewarded as much anymore. Like, you know, maybe in the earlier days of YouTube where, like, it was still a brand new platform and people didn't know what the fuck they even wanted to watch, it was a lot easier to be original and be rewarded for it, whereas nowadays, I feel consistency is much more rewarded regardless of the quality, quote-unquote, of the content, if you will, right? Because if you say, for example, you look at, say, like, the arts, like traditional art, for example, then, yeah, it might be the opposite where, like, originality is probably going to be in the longer run, rewarded more than the consistency.

But people don't look at YouTube videos in the same way that we view traditional oil paintings, right? Like, it's a completely different style of art. So I think the system, I think the people who consume it and the system itself rewards consistency now over originality. And as Connor said, like, it's like, what does original even mean anymore? Like how it's pretty hard to be original on YouTube. Well, fully original on YouTube. I think you're always inspired by. media or whatever it is that has happened in your life

totally everyone is inspired by everyone so I think originality is such a a trap to find yourself in desire to have to be so original I agree I agree when you know we're all we're all original human beings just follow your own voice the most original thing you can be is yourself

yeah MSD damn yep I as it went though damn give me that take it all right what do we have All right, here we go.

Social media has made people worse friends. That's worse friends, huh? Musukashi. Musukashi, yeah. You can't write neutral, right? No neutral. That definitely would have been my answer. What's neutral about this show?

Depends on what kind of people you associate with. If you have friends who are not on social media, then no, obviously. has made people worse friends. Okay. Okay. Ready? Three, two, one. Disagree.

Can't put... Agree. I put stonk disagree. Stonk disagree. Yeah. All right, well... Please present your argument. Okay, go on.

I think in this day and age, because we all have the luxury of being able to almost keep up with each other by not having to see anyone. And also, you can become almost one-sided to keep up with each other. Even your friends that aren't,

like, because obviously we're content creators, but like just friends that I'm just checking in what they're doing. Like, I definitely parisocially keep up with all my friends from what they're posting. And I'll be like,

oh, when I see them, I'll be like, oh, I saw you did the thing. And in my weird brain, it does scratch a little bit of that. I hung out with the merch. however, and I think it's allowed you to take on more friends, like a capacity for more friends. However, I think this is maybe a recent phenomenon.

I think it's kind of made a lot of people push back because a lot of people don't like being on it anymore. And so I found personally in my life that I've had a lot of friends that I feel like make more of an effort now, especially because we're getting older as well, that they realize that like, look, this interacting through social media is not an interaction.

It's not a real experience. Let's hang out. Let's do some more stuff. So I feel like in some aspect, it's made a smaller group of my friends stronger, and I feel like I am generally weaker friends with a lot of people. Maybe this is just the true life balance of being how many friends you can juggle, like realistically.

How many close friends can you actually have the day old question of how many best friends can you have? Yeah, right. Well, I think you presented a great argument for my case. Trap card, actually. You've stressed. This is why he wants to go second. I'll give it you. Yeah, I mean, everything you said just said in terms of just your grown personal, like, experience.

And I also know that we're YouTubers. So that's a big caveat. Yeah, for sure, for sure. But, you know, sometimes I feel like, unless you have. have that kind of like realization of just like, oh, okay, how do I form a proper connection, not through social media? Some people can be sometimes overly reliance on that kind of like social media. Yeah.

Social media engagement and social media conversation without going out their efforts, going out the way to build a proper connection with someone, which does take a bit more efforts than kind of like commenting on your Instagram post or, you know, sometimes talking to each other. No, I completely agree with that. And that's why, like, if I had the choice, I would have put neutral because I think, and the only reason I put disagree is because I think, yeah, as Connor said, like, maybe it's the age talking or maybe it's the fact that people are slowly starting to come onto the idea of maybe social media isn't, like, the best way to, like, deal with friendships or keep up with friends or anything like that. And I think more and more

people, maybe, you know, millennials, our generation, are slowly starting to understand. understand the importance of in-person friendships over social media friendships. You know, like you could have a thousand people you follow on Instagram, but at the end of the day, are you friends with a thousand of those people? Probably not. You know, you're probably only friends with like a fraction of those people. And the way that you treat those small fraction of people is completely different to the rest of the, you know, thousands of people that you might be following, right? So I think it's getting to that idea now where this whole idea of social media

bad in all aspects I think it's slowly starting to seep into the fact that people are realizing that the worst, yeah, I think people as well are getting too comfortable on social media about the things that they say or the things that they do because they view it as like

a reflection of themselves one to one and so people are starting to be like, I was kind of cool with you when we were hanging out in person but like you're posting that kind of shit or you're saying this kind of shit online is a very different person like how can I trust you?

You know, like, how do I try and form a friendship with someone who acts like this in person, but acts completely different online, for example? I mean, I don't hang out with those people like that, but there have been examples of people like that. And I just think it gives like a false sense of, I don't know, connection in a weird way. I don't know. Maybe it's because I'm just not really on social media as much anymore. And I just, yeah, as Connor said, like, I value in-person friendships a lot more now.

It gives you slam dunk. Yeah. I mean, do you retort? I mean, both of you guys have, I mean, kind of just said, yeah, I make real friends by not going on social media, which is the entire point. But, you know, what I was, you know, kind of like, I'm going to build on you guys this one. I'm going to dunk it down because I feel like, I'll dunk on you. I don't, I dunked on you for that kid thing. So I think it's right.

Yeah, rightly so. Someone had to. I laughed very hard. But yeah, I mean, I feel like it's never been easier to make friends with social media and finding friends, maintaining friendships, and kind of like building meaningful connections. I think that is where the real challenge lies to a lot of people, where a lot of people are finding people and finding people with like common interest. but that kind of like skill of building a proper, like, deep bond with each other is maybe what, you know, maybe a lot of what people are lacking. And maybe what people think the friendship through social media provides, but it doesn't

provide that kind of like deep, meaningful friendship all the time. Yeah. I think social media friendships should be used as kind of a stepping stone to kind of, I wouldn't say like gauge if a friendship is, you know, solid or authentic, if you will. But like, you know, I think it's, I think it is a good way, you know, because obviously, you know, I have, I have a lot of friends that I'm still in contact with on social media through Instagram who, you know, most of them live in like Australia or like overseas, not in Japan, basically. And social media is the only way really I can like keep up to date with what they're doing. Yeah. But like, for example,

like very recently, I randomly got a message on Instagram. Instagram from like a friend of mine who I've known since I was in like the fifth or sixth grade. And the last time I saw them was in the fifth or sixth grade who just randomly messaged me and was like, hey, I'm in Japan. Do you want to hang out? And I saw him for the first time in 20 years. And like, in my head, it was like, oh yeah, of course I'm still friends with him because we've been following each other, you know, social media and stuff like that and keep up to day, you know, maybe occasionally commenting on each other's stories or posts or whatever. But it wasn't until I met up with them again in person 20 years later that made me solidified.

oh yeah, this guy is still the same guy that I was friends with all the way back then and the friendship is still solid and is still real. But it's really hard to determine that if social media is all you're going off of. Yeah. All right. Then question to you guys.

Yeah. Like we have like a pretty good like friendship group like here, right? But it takes time to build that kind of like friendship circle Like, do you think, let's say, you know, we're not, but let's say hypothetically,

you choose to move to a different country next month. Okay. Let's say China, for example. That's just hypothetically. I'm already Chinese. Yeah, hypothetically. What is your strategy for making friends in that? Like, let's say you have to start from zero.

In China? Yeah, in China. In China. What are you laughing, Joe? What are you going to do in China? How are you going to make friends? Yeah, yeah. Since, you know, smoke cigarettes.

Yeah, that will work. Yeah, that will work. What is your strats? He's going to the mahjong parlor. He's going to learn Chinese mahjong rules. Yeah. He's going to start smoking. He's going to be a friend every 50-year-old man.

Yeah. I'd be like, hello my fellow Chinese. You want to play some mahjong together? Instant friends. I also smoke cigarettes. Yeah. It's tough, isn't it? It's tough to make new friends.

Yeah, of course. The only you get, it's going to be harder as well. But people have to do it all the time. No, for sure. Like, yeah, it is tough to make friends. Yeah. You know, it is tough if you don't, you know, we were lucky enough to have a community where we all shared like a common interest.

Yeah, drawn to each other. No, everyone has that. Yeah, not everyone has that privilege. No, of course. And, you know, I think sometimes if I were dropped in a different place, could I make, like, a new friendship group? I think I probably could, but God damn, does that sound daunting? That's how, oh yeah.

Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. It would take a long time and it would be fucking tough as well. And it's always, and you know, the time commitment that you put into it may not necessarily work out either. Yeah. Yeah. There's that fear as well that makes most people not even bother taking that first step, right? Yeah.

Yeah. So, yeah, no, it's definitely hard. But I think, I guess it also depends like how desperately you want to feel some new connection with some new people, right? Like, you know, maybe some people will move to a new country. and just be complacent with the fact that, you know, I'm okay with just having maybe like a couple of new people that I meet along the way. But for the most part, my core friend group is across the ocean or in a different country. But there might be some people who desperately want that local connection, that in-person connection.

You're always going to have friends that are near you. Of course. Yeah. Yeah. Those should always be the people you can call on. Yeah, 100%. And that's a scary thing about moving. So you're new friends. Exactly.

New friends. and having to put yourself out there once again. Yeah, exactly. Which is why, you know, I've always said to people, it's like, if you want to move to any country, if you want to move to Japan, if you can, you know, try and like visit a couple of times, obviously to familiarize yourself with the country, but also if you can, try and find, like, one local friend, you know,

that, like, lives in that country or someone that you know or someone you can trust because it makes that first step into making that new friendship group in that country so much easier. I mean, that, you know, that was the case with me. Like, you know, I had childhood friends who lived here who introduced me to a bunch of people and now I have some great friends. But if I didn't have that, like, yeah, fuck, it would have been hard. Yeah. You know, and I probably wouldn't have been as bothered maybe as, you know, some other people who want to just like start from scratch and, you know, find a new fresh pair of friends.

But like, you know, sometimes people want that. Sometimes people drive for that. And that's the whole reason why they moved a new country. True. Yeah. Amen. Amen to that. That's the three China problem.

That's the three China problems. So bottom line, bottom line, if I moved to China, start smoking cigarettes, go to the Mahjong parlor. That's how I'm making my friends. I said a very Chinese timing bottle. It was a very...

I don't know why. I kept saying China this episode. Something happened to me in that nap. I think I dreamed of being Chinese. The sleep region alone. I don't know what happened, guys. I'm tired turned. But anyways,

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