Stefan Molyneux
  • 4 months ago
Sunday Morning Live 4 August 2024

In this podcast episode, we delve into philosophical discussions with a focus on financial independence and integrity. The conversation covers personal finance, skepticism towards economic assessments, and the implications of accepting large donations. We explore reflections on mortality, legacy, and material possessions, emphasizing the importance of upholding autonomy and ethics. The dialogue extends to societal expectations, psychological aspects of collecting behavior, and societal issues like debt and family structures. This dynamic and introspective episode blends economic analyses, philosophical musings, and practical advice, inviting listeners to contemplate human interactions, personal values, and societal influences.

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Transcript
00:00Yes, good morning everybody.
00:03It is the 4th of August 2024 and we are doing our philosophy.
00:09I have topics.
00:10I appreciate your tips to start.
00:13You can also go to freedomain.com slash donate to help out the show.
00:18I appreciate that enormously and let's dig straight in.
00:24We are going to do our first hour open season, second hour don't only, yes, I know there
00:34are questions about the UK riots and so on and we can get into all of that, but we'll
00:38do that second hour.
00:40All right, so let's get to your questions.
00:45I have a good topic as well.
00:48And let's get into it.
00:51Steph, if Taylor Swift decided to donate $10 million to Freedomain, how would you use
01:00the money?
01:03That is a very fine question.
01:05That is a fine question for which I will give you a simple answer.
01:10You may or may not believe my answer, but I actually have passed this test already.
01:15I would not take the money.
01:18I would not take the money.
01:22I would not take the money.
01:27Now let me ask you guys why I would not take the money.
01:34Why would I not take the money?
01:39I must know what your thoughts are as to why I would not take the money.
01:44Did you see the job reports?
01:46Why would I consume propaganda voluntarily?
01:49Steph, you've inspired me to open up my own consulting business instead of taking the
01:53deputy COO job in the accounting industry.
01:56Wow, congratulations.
01:58That is very exciting.
01:59Fantastic.
02:00Good for you.
02:01You are about to embark on the entrepreneurial life, which is wonderful.
02:08Wonderful.
02:09Because she would expect you to change the show?
02:17Because it's not in Bitcoin.
02:19Because she's trying to buy you, right?
02:23Nothing is free, especially your soul.
02:29So we get, not talking about you guys, but people as a whole get greedy because they
02:34look at the visible benefits and they fail to process the hidden costs, right?
02:40So I've studied enough economics, both at the undergraduate, postgraduate, and just
02:45on my own research level to know that if somebody's offering you $10 million, what they're trying
02:52to do is to get you to adjust your spending to the point where you can't live without
02:58that money.
02:59So let's say somebody gave me $10 million, free and clear, for the show.
03:05Well, I mean, I suppose I could build a big studio, I could hire more researchers, professional
03:10camera people, I could go do more documentaries, and what I would do is I would increase, what
03:18they call in the business world, my burn rate.
03:20I would increase my burn rate and I'd probably end up spending, I don't know, maybe $100,000-$200,000
03:26a month because I would, I guess, invest that money and get some proceeds and use it as
03:32seed capital for building stuff and so on.
03:35So I would build all of that and I would increase my burn rate.
03:40Now increasing one's burn rate is a fantastic way, thank you Tony, is a great way to stay
03:46enslaved, as a whole.
03:49Now there's some businesses you need to increase your burn rate, I get all of that and there's
03:52no hate about capital spending, but what is essential about what I do is I got three
03:59chords and the truth, right?
04:01I got a hat, a camera, a microphone, and the truth.
04:04And I'm not sure how having a whole bunch more stuff around me would benefit philosophy.
04:11I mean, I've actually considered this over the years, I have a pretty bare bones studio,
04:17I mean, I pour a lot of effort into audio and video quality, but as far as like how
04:22would philosophy be better served if I had a bigger backdrop?
04:26I'm not sure.
04:28Now if I had the bigger backdrop, right, I'd have to set it up, I'd have to maintain it,
04:32I'd have to light it properly, I'd have to dust it, you know, whatever I would happen
04:37to do.
04:38But I'm not sure how that would actually improve philosophy, improve communication.
04:44I kind of like the bare bones thing.
04:47You know, when it comes to songs, I generally prefer the live acoustic versions to the heavily
04:52fill specter wall of sound over processed studio stuff.
04:59So I would increase my burn rate.
05:02And then what would happen is, after I increased my burn rate, then I would need to replenish
05:09the ten million dollars, right?
05:12So, you know, if I upped my spend to 200k a month, which is not that unusual in, you
05:18know, top tier all tech spaces, so I'm burning through a lot of money, right?
05:24I'm burning through 2.4 million a year, which means in four years, you know, obviously this
05:31is all other variables being equal, if I up my spend to 200k a month, right, then I'm
05:38burning through 2.4 mil a year, and that 10 mil is gone in four years.
05:43And then what I need to do is I need to get more money.
05:50And then to get more money, I'm either going to collapse back down, which is probably going
05:54to feel bad.
05:55And then you, of course, you know, you care about the people you work with, and you want
05:57to make sure their paychecks continue and so on.
06:01And so, and even if I kept my spend to 100k a month, that's still 1.2, right?
06:05Which just means the money's gone in eight or nine years.
06:07Again, if you invest other things and so on, right, you can sketch that out, but then
06:14what would happen is, and also, of course, if I got, if I took 10 million from someone,
06:20then donations would drop off, right?
06:22Because people would say, well, I don't need to donate because you got 10 million, right?
06:27So there would be a high, which is like all drugs, right?
06:32And money is one of the most potent drugs around, money, sugar and screens.
06:37So I would up my spend, and then I would find myself running low on money, and then
06:44I would have to start making compromises in order to get more money, right?
06:47So it's kind of like drug dealers will sometimes give you a free sample, right?
06:52And then you get hooked, right?
06:58So my fundamental question with regards to income, outcome, I'm sorry, income and spending
07:03and donations and all of that is what best and most serves philosophy?
07:12Would a bigger studio, better production values, more research, you know, obviously doing politics
07:21would, if I went straight back into politics with 10 million dollars, then I would have
07:26a big impact, but would that, did we just lose our color back here?
07:32Yes, we did.
07:33All right.
07:34That's a little too bland for me.
07:35Hang on.
07:41I didn't fart, but something happened, right?
07:44So it would just be, and I've seen this before in business, right?
07:47I've seen this before a million times in business.
07:49So when I first started making some coin in the business world, I did not increase my
07:55spending.
07:57Of course not.
07:59And the people I knew who made some money and increased their spending to match their
08:06income ended up kind of enslaved.
08:12And I never really liked that as an idea.
08:14The whole point I think of an income is to try and buy you some liberty or some choice
08:19or some freedom so that you can make decisions that are not economically productive in the
08:24short run that bring greater either wealth or happiness or something down the road.
08:29But if you go from, you know, 2000 to $5,000 a month and then you immediately up your spend
08:35to match, then you're still kind of broke.
08:39And I've never really liked that idea.
08:40And I used to, you know, I have a bunch of people who work for me who I helped make some
08:46good money and I would just give them the same speech, right?
08:48I mean, I mean, enjoy the money.
08:50I'm not saying you've got to live in poverty, enjoy the money.
08:53But the temptation to up your spend to match your income is very tempting.
08:59It's very tempting and it arises out of a kind of insecurity and a desire to flash and
09:04show your resources, which, you know, again, I'm not saying that's the worst strategy if
09:07you want to meet a girl or whatever, but it's not ideal.
09:13So the 10 million, and I obviously haven't had offers for 10 million, but I've had offers
09:18in the past and I just, I mean, I do mull it over carefully and it's a very nice thing
09:23to receive those offers, but it doesn't tempt me in particular.
09:30It doesn't tempt me in particular.
09:34The background looks good.
09:35You don't look like you're videoing from inside an egg.
09:38Like, yeah, yeah.
09:39My older setup was, yeah.
09:41I mostly just listen rather than watch your show.
09:43Absolutely.
09:44Yeah.
09:45I understand that.
09:46I mean, most people do, right?
09:48Missed a couple of shows.
09:49Glad to be here this Sunday morning.
09:51All right.
09:55I appreciate that.
09:59I love the people who say no sound without checking with anyone else.
10:03I know the sound is good.
10:06All right.
10:09Yeah, job reports, particularly the U.S., job reports are just propaganda.
10:20They just keep revising them.
10:21Job reports are just political jacantery, right?
10:24I mean, I really don't believe any of it.
10:26So the problem is, I mean, there's so many problems with job reports.
10:30One of the most foundational ones is they count, often they will count two part-time
10:36jobs as equivalent to one.
10:38They don't necessarily say, well, jobs were lost during the pandemic.
10:41We're just gaining them back.
10:42They say job pluses because people are just idiots and don't know these things and they're
10:47basically easy to think about.
10:50And also, of course, they don't count anti-productive employment as a drag on the economy.
10:59So if the government goes and hires 10,000 people, they say the economy is 10,000 paychecks
11:05better, which it's not.
11:06I mean, not only is that money being taken from productive people, but those government
11:11employees are often acting to interfere with the free flow of goods and services in the
11:15free market.
11:16I tune in for the hat.
11:26That's totally fair.
11:27You know, you can never get, Tom Cruise has these like perfect platonic hat placements
11:33in his movies.
11:34It's like laser, Bioshock, Big Daddy helmet work.
11:37It's fantastic.
11:38All right.
11:39It makes sense.
11:42The philosophy is pretty good, but that hat, that's right.
11:48The only thing I can think of is film discussion with people in person.
11:50Yeah, for sure.
11:51That would be interesting.
11:54But politics has turned to quite aggressive and sometimes violent.
12:00So I'm not going to disrespect philosophy by saying that I can reason in a state of
12:10coercion.
12:12Steph, can you please touch on how to break the people-pleasing cycle?
12:17Your insight is powerful.
12:18You are like the oracle on the top of the mountain.
12:20We crave your wisdom.
12:24She craves my wisdom to the tune of $5.
12:31Very interesting.
12:34Government spending being included in GDP?
12:35Yeah, of course.
12:37So what I would say is that you would have to take out debt from jobs created, right?
12:48All right, let's see here.
12:55I will get your question, though.
13:01Just from my perspective, no questions, just love the live shows.
13:05Just from my perspective, and this is because, I mean, I've been working for tips, I mean,
13:12outside of sort of my business career, I've been working for tips most of my life.
13:16And if you're broke, that's totally fine.
13:19Honestly, I have no issue.
13:22If you're broke, that's totally fine with me.
13:24I've certainly been broke in my life and like really broke and I understand it and I sympathize.
13:30But generally, it's a good thing to say.
13:32And it's funny because if someone said to, like when I was a waiter, if someone said
13:37to me, it was great service, I'm so sorry, I just, I didn't realize how expensive the
13:41appetizer was, I can't tip.
13:42I'd be like, hey, that's no problem, right?
13:47So, all right.
13:49So we will get to that question.
13:53Thank you, I appreciate that.
13:54So somebody says, what if someone donated a million dollars anonymously?
13:57I get the being tempted to spend more, but with this scenario, compromise your principles
14:01by accepting it.
14:02But you can also stay silent about the donation amount.
14:06Well, all right.
14:10So let's say that somebody donated a million dollars anonymously.
14:17What would the challenge be for that?
14:22What would the challenge be if somebody donated a million dollars anonymously in remembering
14:28nothing is free?
14:29If you remember nothing is free.
14:32Steph, this is great, I recently got a raise and I was already thinking I want to buy with
14:37the new cash.
14:38Right.
14:39Hey, have a celebratory dinner, buy a knick-knack, buy a claw, whatever you want, you know.
14:44I'm not saying, you know, you're going to get Howard Hughes shuffling around with long
14:47fingernails and your feet in Kleenex boxes, but I am saying that don't just up your spend
14:53to match your income because then you're just as broke as you were before.
14:59So, what would that be?
15:04No, no, I mean, somebody donated a million dollars anonymously, I mean, I would still
15:08declare it, it would still be right with income and all of that, right?
15:18So the problem with taking a million dollars anonymously would be that somebody could at
15:27any time step forward and say, I donated the money, I would like a meeting.
15:35Now of course you could say no to that meeting, that would seem a bit churlish, to put it
15:39in a little rude, so you could say no to that meeting, but, and then somebody would say,
15:45hey, I did donate a million dollars to you, can I get a meeting?
15:48And then they may have an agenda, so it just might happen down the road.
15:53It just might happen down the road.
15:58Generosity that is large and concentrated often comes with strings attached, which is
16:03why I kind of like the decentralized aspect of donations, right?
16:08That people donate a small amount of money, but there's a lot of people who donate a small
16:12amount of money and that's decentralized.
16:15So nobody ends up with any particular control over my agenda, if that makes sense.
16:24So it would be tough to maintain independence.
16:29And what would the money do for me?
16:32Because here's a funny thing, you know, obviously I've been thinking a lot about death lately
16:35and I just went to a funeral this last weekend and, you know, my daughter likes to go to
16:44these occasional Renaissance festivals and I enjoy them too.
16:48So you know, you buy things, right?
16:50So what do we get?
16:51We got this little, we got this little, I guess it's, is it reversed?
16:56Yeah, that's reversed, right?
16:57It's a little coaster there that says, what doesn't kill you gives you XP.
17:01That's kind of true, right?
17:05But when I buy stuff now, in the past I just, oh, this is kind of cool.
17:08And again, I'm not a big knickknack buyer because I moved 18 times in my 20s, so I'm
17:13not a big knickknack buyer.
17:15But now I'm just like, okay, well, if I buy this little cool little thing, it's going
17:18to sit on a shelf.
17:19I'm going to look at it every once in a while.
17:21And then when I die, then what?
17:27What happens, right?
17:31What happens then?
17:32I was talking to a friend of mine some time ago and he was, he's a guy who buys, in his
17:38past life, he bought distressed properties and he bought one property and he went in
17:44and there was just wall to wall, this unbelievably incredible epoch, decade, genre spanning vinyl
17:53record collection.
17:59Vinyl record collection.
18:03And the guy died in the house.
18:12The headphones were dusty, the turntables were dusty.
18:15You couldn't possibly listen to all of these records.
18:22And the guy obviously had spent decades of his life and hundreds of thousands of dollars
18:27gathering together this record collection, which was worth, I don't know, theoretically
18:34sort of X amount of dollars.
18:36But the problem is, of course, you're trying to sell the individual records and ship them
18:40out in a safe way is really time consuming.
18:44And so what happened to this record collection that this guy spent his life gathering and
18:49putting together?
18:50And I'm sure occasionally listening to bits and bobs here and there, although because
18:54it was a collection, maybe he didn't want to take them out of the wrapper, they're sealed
18:58and you got to have them in mint condition like the comic book things, right?
19:02Or I guess first edition books.
19:03I actually had a first edition of the Fountainhead many years ago and I left it at a gym rather
19:09foolishly.
19:11But what happened to this record collection?
19:17Got tossed out.
19:18I mean, my friend is a very good entrepreneur and he was interested back in the day of like,
19:23can I monetize this?
19:25You know, that the house, there were no relatives, no, right?
19:29So what happened?
19:30Well, this guy spent probably tens of thousands of hours, hundreds of thousands of dollars
19:37and built the shelves and kept everything lovingly and carefully and didn't touch anything
19:41and kept it and it just got all thrown out.
19:44That's life, man.
19:45Think of all the people who die who are single.
19:52I mean, often single, right?
19:53Or people, couples who die even, right?
19:55Hey, I took this video of fireworks on vacation in 2007.
20:05Nobody cares.
20:07Your computer gets reformatted or tossed out.
20:11And if you've ever seen, there's a video I remember, it was quite powerful.
20:15It was a cleaning woman coming into this old woman's house, pictures on the wall, photo
20:20albums, books, notes, letters stored in a trunk that nobody cares about and they just
20:24get thrown out, lost like tears in the rain.
20:35You're going to gather a whole bunch of stuff over the course of your life and it's mostly
20:41going to get thrown out when you're dead.
20:51So you'll want to buy stuff.
20:55You'll want to buy stuff.
20:56And again, I mean, I have a nice microphone, two nice microphones here, I got a good camera,
21:02a nice, a good computer here because I was really getting tired of computers stalling
21:07when I was live streaming.
21:11Collections.
21:16Collectors generally are driven by a rabid and hollow incompleteness in their life.
21:22So this guy who died with all the records, and I've told Ted this story before that another
21:26friend of mine had an uncle who went all around the world collecting butterflies from
21:32every country, every continent, collected butterflies.
21:36And the uncle died and willed the butterfly, he was a single guy, no kids, willed all the
21:40butterflies and this guy had the butterflies in his basement and he was trying to find
21:44a museum to offload them to.
21:47Nobody really wanted them.
21:49You know, they were getting kind of moldy in his basement because, you know, it wasn't
21:52exactly a climate-controlled environment and it was just all rotting apart.
21:58Ah, yes, but you see, he had pleasure in collecting the butterflies, yeah, maybe, sure.
22:11But would he have had the same pleasure in collecting his butterflies if he'd known they
22:16were going to get moldy and tossed out after his death?
22:19Hundreds and thousands of butterflies, all lovingly preserved and pinned and boxed and
22:24he put millions of dollars into this, I assume, travel and storage and all taxidermy and so
22:30on, right?
22:32Now, I mean, it's a little different for me, I mean, if I end up being as well-recognized
22:39as justice would require over time, and it may take quite some time, but I think people
22:45will be, I mean, even when I was very young, when I was writing my novels and so on, I'd
22:49keep stuff because I'm like, people are going to want to know the history of this, right?
22:55But yeah, these women, here's 5,000 pictures of my cat, it's just going to get thrown out.
23:05So yeah, people want to complete their collections when they have a wildly incomplete life.
23:12And collections are mostly busy work, right?
23:17They're mostly busy work, and it gives you a sense of purpose that's useless, and it
23:22gives you a sense of completion that's actually hollowing out your life.
23:27Like my friend who used to go to records, there used to be these, I don't think they're
23:31really around anymore, but there used to be these giant warehouses where you'd get these
23:37record shows and you'd be able to go and find bootlegs and live versions and this, that
23:42and the other.
23:44And he just had this whole wall full of collections of movies and CDs, DVDs and live this and
23:50live that, and it's like, eh.
23:57Not in the case of books.
24:01I'm not sure what you mean, Tom.
24:09I hardly care.
24:10I look at all these old photos and I rarely look at them, yeah, yeah.
24:16All the stuff you collect will be junked when you die.
24:23All the stuff you collect will be junked when you die.
24:25Shouldn't that give you a sense of what you should hold on to and what you should let
24:30go?
24:32Records made their way to Japan, but definitely still around.
24:34Oh yeah, no, I know.
24:35There's a vinyl fetish group that as they age, this vinyl has better, it's a warmer
24:42sound than that.
24:47Music nerds drive me crazy.
24:49And listen, I have a fair knowledge of music and a fair knowledge of genres, but the audiophiles
24:56and it's got to sound like this, and this high is perfect, and I remember a friend of
24:59mine got so excited when CDs came out because he said, you pause the CD, it restarts exactly
25:06where you stopped it, not like tape, which slows down and then speeds up again.
25:10What the heck does that?
25:11Oh, I know why.
25:12I know why that's, sorry, I keep losing the background.
25:16So when I had the studio built, it was actually a friend of mine's wife who built the studio,
25:20she put in fans, but they were a little bit loud for my prior setup, and I've tried them
25:26now, and because we've got this audio cleanup thing, you don't hear the fans anymore, but
25:30I think the fans are blowing the backdrop, here, let me try one more time.
25:40Well that's why.
25:41I really like family photos, seeing the old pictures from my ancestors' time brings a
25:44smile to my face.
25:45Absolutely, there's nothing wrong with that.
25:49We just have to leave that, I'll have to figure that one out at some point, but yeah, family
25:53photos, yeah, I have nothing wrong with people, it's great taking photos, I get that.
25:58You know, here's your great-uncle so-and-so, but you understand that all the stories behind
26:02the photos will go, unless you sort of write them on the back, which, you know, you can't
26:06really do digitally very easily, right?
26:07I guess you could make the file name that or whatever, right?
26:12Yeah, I actually have a whole bunch of different gels for the color back here.
26:20I can make it.
26:22Yeah, there is a little breeze there.
26:26Where the heck's that coming from?
26:28Oh, well, it's been a while, it's been a while, since I've used the fan, but it's good, because
26:36if I'm bellowing away, I keep the door closed, and if I've got the door closed, I let a little
26:40bit of air circulation.
26:42Alright, let's get to other questions.
26:49So, my aunt, who never married, had a huge collection of books.
26:53We tried to give them away when she died, but nobody wanted them.
26:56Yeah, yeah.
26:58Yeah, I remember a friend of mine, who was a real estate agent, once sold a couple's
27:07house, they were both professors of English literature, and their house was strangely
27:13free of books.
27:14And what they said was, they said, we are going to buy a few books for our courses,
27:18but they made a pact at the beginning of their marriage saying, we are not going to become
27:23insane book people, right?
27:26It's in the University of Toronto or something like that.
27:28They have a whole library where they can't use the top couple of floors, because the
27:31architect forgot to take into account the weight of the books.
27:36Just about every odd collection I've seen, I've gone, oh, that's neat, might look into
27:40it a bit, but I'll forget about it in a week, yeah.
27:45Yes.
27:49All right.
27:53So in general, are completionists avoiding life or important things, or is it a type
27:57of OCD?
27:59So OCD is a way, in my obviously completely amateur nonsense view, I have no ability to
28:05talk about this in any professional context, but in my amateur idiot view, OCD is a way
28:12of deflecting anxiety about the larger issues in your life and transferring them to smaller
28:18inconsequential issues, so you don't trigger actual change.
28:25Because most people have big giant messes right in the center of their lives.
28:30And OCD for me is a way of saying, well, what matters is how the pictures line on the wall
28:35or how many times I've washed my hands today and so on.
28:38And it's a way of repurposing or channeling your anxiety about larger issues into smaller
28:43inconsequential issues, which is why you go to these rituals and feel better, but it doesn't
28:48solve any of the bigger issues in your life.
28:55Somebody says, I know a young Hispanic woman with a strong preference for white men.
28:58She wonders why even attractive white men rarely if ever attempt a cold approach, whereas
29:01non-white men do this to her on a regular basis.
29:05Yeah.
29:07Yeah.
29:10Yes, it's very, very sad.
29:12It's very, very sad.
29:16I, because I'm generally very friendly in public, I'm always chatting with people.
29:22I just love to chat with people, trade a couple of jokes, ask them, you know, if I see somebody
29:26with a, like in their own caste, hey, what happened?
29:28You know, like, I mean, I'm just curious and I love to learn about people's lives and I'm
29:32very interested in that.
29:33So for me, the cold approach with women when I was younger, and I've always been doing
29:37this.
29:38So the cold approach for women when I was younger was pretty easy.
29:40I know what you're reading.
29:41Oh, but it's just because I'm doing this with everyone.
29:43It's not like squeezed like some laser into focusing on a woman.
29:46Right.
29:47So I just do this with everyone as a whole.
29:50And so you just get used to chatting with people.
29:53But I don't know if it's just white men and so on, but a lot of men have just been brow
29:58beaten into this story that you see that because something like this, women are just
30:05out there to have fun.
30:07They're out there with their girlfriends.
30:09They're not looking to get hit on.
30:11They're not looking for some creepy guy to come and eye them.
30:14They're not looking for any of this.
30:15They're just looking to be out in the world and please leave them alone.
30:19And they're not, they don't want to be bothered.
30:21They don't want to manage guys.
30:22They don't want to deal with guys.
30:24They're just out there enjoying the sun, feeding some ducks, walking around, having a coffee,
30:29reading a book.
30:30Stop bugging women.
30:31Right.
30:32This is what this whole, I mean, it's a complete psyop.
30:35Right.
30:36It's just a way to reduce the birth rate.
30:37That's all that.
30:38Right.
30:39So, oh, this is the wisdom of the 10th commandment.
30:41Don't buy stuff just to impress or outdo your neighbor.
30:43Yeah.
30:44I have dabbled in Excel spreadsheets for comic checklists.
30:56Right.
30:57Right.
30:58Part two, I told her that the cold approach isn't typical for us as we usually need to
31:04build a rapport with a woman before approaching her for a relationship slash dating.
31:08Do you have any further input?
31:09Or is it just an R versus K selection dynamic?
31:11No, it's propaganda.
31:14It's propaganda.
31:20The propaganda is, and I think it is probably directed a little bit more at white males.
31:25Like, you know, whenever you see the propaganda about a man who's inappropriate, you know,
31:30there's that famous meme of the black guy stopping the white guy from approaching a woman.
31:35Hey, man, she's just out there.
31:37She just wants to get some groceries.
31:39Leave her be.
31:40Don't interfere.
31:41Don't interrupt.
31:42Don't intrude.
31:43Don't blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
31:45Right.
31:46And of course, you know, women want love in many ways, even more than men and so on.
31:51So and of course, it is a form of flexing for women to say, ah, every time I go out,
31:58that's like so many men, they're like bothering me and they're like constantly in my face
32:04and they're asking for my number and they're following me around and they're trying to
32:07strike up conversation.
32:08And it's so boring because it's just so intrusive.
32:11And I just want to go out there and feel up some mangoes and go home and have a salad.
32:15But I just can't do it because these men are just on me like flies on flypaper and I can't
32:19go anywhere.
32:20I can't do anything.
32:21Right.
32:22You know how that kind of is.
32:23It's just a flex.
32:24Right.
32:25It's just a flex.
32:26I'm so attractive.
32:27Vibe.
32:28Right.
32:29But of course, the problem is then, in general, only sociopaths approach women.
32:35Right.
32:36Because they don't read the social cues.
32:37They don't care about what's considered right or wrong.
32:40They don't follow politeness and so on.
32:42So by saying to men, don't approach us.
32:47Don't approach us.
32:48Even if I'm not wearing a ring.
32:50Right.
32:51Even if I'm kind of dressed up.
32:52Don't approach us.
32:53Don't talk to us.
32:54It's like, okay.
32:55So then the men who actually respect boundaries and are trying to follow social norms won't
32:58talk to you.
32:59Therefore, the only men that will talk to you are sociopaths who don't read social cues
33:03and follow their own pleasures regardless of any kind of convention.
33:06In which case, you're going to get your heart shredded like a toaster in a bathtub.
33:11Does that translate to detailed artistic work?
33:13Not sure if that's OCD or different.
33:15I guess it could be both.
33:21I mean, this is one of the questions I've always had.
33:23Is the 13-year Odyssey of Atlas Shrugged with two years Wright and John Galt speech, was
33:27that OCD?
33:28Yeah, probably.
33:29And I think, I mean, it completely burned out Ayn Rand.
33:32And did it change the world?
33:34Nope.
33:35Nope, nope, nope.
33:38So, detail and depth and precision, I mean, obviously it's very important when you're
33:44building motors and airplanes and buses and trucks and computers that you need to get
33:49the detail.
33:50It needs to be perfect.
33:51Artistic stuff, though, a lot of it is, I mean, I could probably use a bit more editing
33:55in some of my work and a bit more rewrites in some of my work.
33:58But I don't feel that's the difference between people reading and not reading.
34:04And I hate rewriting as a whole.
34:11It should have changed the world.
34:14You know, you can't change the world when the government controls education.
34:19Or you can, but you can only change it for the worst.
34:28I thought it was R versus K.
34:30I had this problem as well.
34:31Yeah.
34:34You know, you've seen that meme of the guy and the girl, how women shoot their shot and
34:40they're just standing there, just standing there, just standing there, and then she leaves
34:43and says, well, his loss.
34:49If people don't reciprocate, it's normal to feel negative emotions after being so thoughtful
34:53and helpful.
34:54I think the resentment would go away when we express how we feel when the resentment
34:57comes and don't continue once people reveal if they will reciprocate or not.
35:01Yeah.
35:02We are very well primed.
35:03And they've been studies where people can't solve abstract math problems, but you put
35:08it in a social fairness situation, they get the answer like that.
35:11So we're very good at knowing where there is reciprocation.
35:16It's a very deep gut sense thing, right?
35:20I love Seth's Valley Girl accent.
35:22I don't know what accent that is.
35:23Something to do with finance and the guy who's 6'4".
35:28All right.
35:29Let's see here.
35:32What if having their heart shredded is what women actually want?
35:39Or is this just a sign of them being trashy and low quality due to them being abused as
35:43children?
35:47Women don't want their hearts shredded.
35:49What are you talking about?
35:50I mean, even masochists want to not be masochists, right?
35:53I mean, because if you said to someone, you can get healthy, romantic and sexual pleasure
35:59from positive interactions and being loved and cared for, people would say, well, yeah,
36:04I'd rather have that.
36:08No, they don't want that.
36:11My husband told me about one girl who told him in the pub, pretty me, who told him how
36:15everyone was always hitting on her and it was so tiresome.
36:17So he didn't hit on her.
36:18He has no idea.
36:19She was trying to tell him how desirable she was and probably flirting with him.
36:22Apparently, she was quite cold afterwards.
36:24No, good for him, though.
36:25Don't, I mean, I just, I really, really hate people who just can't tell the truth.
36:29Like, just, hey, I'm interested in you.
36:31Let's, let's go on a date or whatever, right?
36:35All right.
36:36I heard something about Rome's birthrate dropping off towards the end of the empire.
36:39I haven't verified that yet, but if that's true, what was happening that they basically
36:43gave up?
36:44Too hedonistic, perhaps, blows my mind if the similarity to the modern West is accurate.
36:49Well, I mean, I've got a whole presentation called The Truth About the Fall of Rome.
36:53You should check that out.
36:55Yeah, the birthrate did drop off towards the end of the empire.
36:57Sure.
36:58Sure.
37:00A debt is birth control.
37:06A debt is birth control.
37:10Because with debt, the government just hands out money to women, particularly single mothers,
37:14so they don't need men.
37:15So men don't have to work as hard to get women because the women don't really need the men
37:20and divorce becomes more dangerous.
37:23Because women can just take men to the cleaners because they have an option called government
37:26money.
37:27So when men don't want to get married or are frightened of getting married or don't particularly
37:32focus on having families, then men turn to hedonism.
37:36Why not?
37:37Why not play video games and have porn if you can't get married and have children?
37:42I mean, you've got to do something with your life.
37:44And so when men take their productive energies out of the economy and do the non-frivolous
37:49hedonistic activities because they don't have to fund a wife and kids or rather they're
37:53funding it involuntarily through taxation and debt, then the productivity within the
37:59economy collapses and the relationships between men and women collapse and women then end
38:07up in a situation where they end up endlessly flirting and dating rather than settling down
38:13and having children.
38:15Dating becomes a drug.
38:16It's not a gateway drug to marriage.
38:18It just becomes.
38:19This is why I saw this.
38:22It's a kind of funny meme.
38:24Oh, it's an interaction.
38:25Some guy in a dating app.
38:27And the woman, he's like, hi.
38:30And she says, hi.
38:31And then she says, so why should I be spending my time with you?
38:34You'll have to sell yourself on me.
38:37And he's like, oh, please don't even bother trying to play hard to get.
38:40You're 38 years old.
38:42What's with the horny nonsense, right?
38:49Most women I interact with seem to want kindness.
38:52Is it creepy to ask her out when she is at work?
39:01Didn't they invite barbarians in?
39:04No, not exactly.
39:06Tax policy and debt policy.
39:08So very, very briefly, what happened towards the end of Rome was taxes increased, but they
39:17could, they only had the manpower to collect taxes in the city.
39:19So all the young men moved out of the cities and got works on farms in the country.
39:23And so you couldn't really collect taxes.
39:25And you also couldn't conscript because it's one thing to conscript in a city.
39:29It's another thing to conscript men who were scattered throughout the countryside
39:32where the guy can go missing and nobody will ever find him, the conscript guy.
39:37So what happened was as their manpower went down, they had to hire mercenaries.
39:44Right.
39:45And so because they had to hire mercenaries, they had to raise taxes on the cities,
39:49which drove more young men out of the cities.
39:51And then they had to pay more because they could draft fewer men.
39:55So their costs of enforcing the empire's boundaries were going up and their tax base
40:01was shrinking.
40:02And then eventually the barbarians weren't getting paid and they came and sacked Rome
40:06because they weren't getting paid.
40:07So they didn't invite them in.
40:09It was just.
40:11We never escape the cycle of gruesome disaster currently playing out in the West,
40:19of course.
40:20We never escaped the cycle as long as we have in the state.
40:28The beauty of having children is that everything else pretty much falls away.
40:31Yeah.
40:33Love of pets, collections of stuff, even politics just seem unimportant
40:36when your two-year-old is counted to 20 in Spanish, English and Chinese.
40:39Good for you.
40:40Yeah.
40:41This morning I was going to do, I bought my notes, right?
40:44I was going to do some Q and A's.
40:46My daughter got up a little early and so she came down and she said,
40:49would you like to sit with the ducks?
40:51Which is where we get towels and we sit with the ducks and we chat and pet the ducks.
40:54And of course I love doing philosophy, but it's like, yes,
40:57I would absolutely love to come and sit with the ducks.
40:59It just simplifies your life a whole lot.
41:01Right.
41:10All right.
41:14Let's get to your,
41:18let's get to your question about people pleasing.
41:23I wish there was a search function on the chat, but there is not.
41:28But that's because it's not my code.
41:31All right.
41:32Did I write this down?
41:34Did I?
41:36Yes, I did.
41:37Oh, glorious.
41:38Magnificent.
41:39All right.
41:41This is for Pauline.
41:42This is for Rosanna, sweet girl of mine.
41:46Steph, can you please, please, please, please,
41:49me touch on how to break the people pleasing cycle.
41:53Your insight is powerful.
41:54Okay.
41:55I appreciate that.
41:56So the people pleasing cycle.
41:58So unfortunately it's in the language.
42:03The problem with that is in the language.
42:11You're not people pleasing.
42:14It's fear based manipulation.
42:17It's not people pleasing.
42:18You're not trying to please people.
42:20Right.
42:21Like if there's a lion, I think is going to charge at me
42:25and I throw a piece of meat to one side.
42:27Am I lion pleasing?
42:29Nope.
42:30I'm hoping the lion will be appeased by the meat
42:32and not attack me.
42:34So it's not people pleasing.
42:37I mean, who wouldn't want to please the people they love in their life?
42:41I mean, I'm trying to please you, the audience.
42:43I'm trying to please philosophy.
42:45I'm, you know, hopefully going to enjoy things myself as well.
42:49But, you know, if you've got people in your life you care about,
42:51you want to please them.
42:52Of course you do.
42:53I mean, I want to please you by going higher and higher.
42:55Apparently, apparently.
42:58So it's not people pleasing.
43:00It's fear based manipulation.
43:03So you fear attack and so you appease.
43:10It's the appeasement to preempt attack.
43:13It's people appeasing.
43:16Yes, but the important thing is it's a way to...
43:20It's not people pleasing.
43:21It's fear based manipulation.
43:24And the problem with fear based manipulation
43:26is it doesn't get the bad people out of your life.
43:33It's a tactic to get predators off your back.
43:36Well, not really, though.
43:39I mean, it's very momentary, right?
43:41So let's say I have to walk in the Serengeti
43:46every day for some reason,
43:48and I keep bringing meat with me
43:50so that I can appease the lions that might want to eat me.
43:57And so every time a lion shows up, I throw some meat.
44:00Oh, look, I've appeased the lions.
44:02What's the secondary effect?
44:04Lions seek me out.
44:07It doesn't get them off your back.
44:08It keeps them in your orbit.
44:11Because if you appease, bow down for,
44:13and provide resources to people because they threaten you,
44:17they will come back and continue to threaten you
44:20because they get resources.
44:24Right?
44:25If you give the bully money every day,
44:29the bully doesn't stop bullying you.
44:32So it is a very short-term strategy
44:35to deal with aggressive people,
44:37which guarantees that more and more aggressive people
44:40are going to be in your life or stay in your life.
44:43Thank you, David.
44:46But it doesn't work.
44:48Now, it's a perfectly acceptable strategy as children.
44:55It's a perfectly acceptable strategy as children.
45:00Because you can't get, if you have abusive parents,
45:03you can't get the predators out of your life.
45:05Right? You can't.
45:06You can't get the predators out of your life.
45:10Because they're your parents and your teachers
45:12or the kids you're locked up with at school.
45:15Closest thing to prison most people ever experience.
45:23So it's a perfectly valid strategy when you're a kid
45:27because you can't get the predators out of your life.
45:29The problem is when you continue in it as an adult,
45:33then you then are voluntarily choosing to reward predation.
45:39Right? You're voluntarily choosing to reward predation.
45:43And that means the predators will stick around.
45:47You are the oasis to which they return to get their drink.
45:53Yeah, boarding school is prison. Yeah, very much so.
45:57So you're not pleasing people.
46:06As an adult, you are managing your own anxiety regarding predation
46:13by appeasing people and buying them off.
46:16So how do we train ourselves out of that behavior?
46:24You know the answer to that.
46:27You know the answer to that. Come on, how do you stop doing this?
46:44Let's go back to the African analogy.
46:47How do you stop getting half ambushed and stalked and preyed upon by lions?
46:54Do you keep throwing the meat? Nope.
46:56That's just going to get more and more like, hey, free meat.
46:59All you have to do is growl.
47:02By stop doing it? No, that's not training yourself out of it.
47:05Deal with the anxiety? Eh, that's tautology.
47:08How do you stop the anxiety? You deal with it.
47:10What does that mean?
47:13Choose to not continue enabling evil people. That's not enough.
47:17Because if the lions are all gathered around because you keep throwing the meat,
47:21you've got ten lions around you like, I'm not throwing you any more meat.
47:24Well, then what happens? Your arse is grass.
47:27You know, your next view is your eyeball staring out the arse of a lion
47:30as it poops you on the...
47:35...welskun.
47:40Yeah, you stop walking the paths with lions.
47:46You stop walking the paths with lions.
47:49You stop engaging with people
47:52who frighten you.
47:55I mean, your fear is there for a reason.
47:59Staff, you know, I've got to tell you, man,
48:01every time I stick my hand in that fire, I get burned.
48:03How do I deal with that?
48:06How do I deal with the pain?
48:08How do I deal with the horror and the burn and the smell?
48:11How do you shoot the lion who attacks you?
48:15Well, you still have nine other lions, right?
48:22So, that's not great.
48:24But, obviously, you're not talking about violence in your personal life,
48:27but, no, that doesn't work.
48:29That doesn't work.
48:31I, as a person who's not naturally aggressive,
48:37will take on ten aggressive people and win.
48:41It's like, no, you won't. No, you won't.
48:43No, you won't.
48:44Because you have a conscience,
48:46which means there's a limit to how much your aggression is going to escalate,
48:49and you're dealing with people who don't have a conscience
48:51and who are willing to do whatever it takes.
48:55And the people who are willing to do whatever it takes
48:58will generally win against the people who have a conscience limiter.
49:06I do it with nice people, too, though, Steph.
49:12So? What are you talking about?
49:16I'm terrified of lions. I feed them.
49:19I also feed kittens. It's like, so?
49:22I don't know what that means.
49:25I'm not saying don't feed kittens.
49:28I'm saying don't be around where the lions are.
49:36But the problem is that even if you manage to get all of these people out of your life,
49:40they can still use the power of the state to extract reasons for you from you via taxation.
49:47Well, aren't you an anvil around my balls?
49:54Ah, dear, oh, dear, oh, dear, my friend.
49:57What an absolutely craptastic response.
50:01You know, I'm very vulnerable to abusers in my life,
50:04but taxation?
50:10So there's no escape, you see.
50:12There's no don't try, you can't win.
50:14Here's a solution that could really help people,
50:17but there is law and taxation, so.
50:21Yeah, OK.
50:23OK, you just keep focusing on the taxation and we'll just be happy in our marriages
50:27and have great friendships and relationships,
50:29and you just keep getting depressed by taxation.
50:32OK.
50:35Hi, Steph, I have cut out all abusive people in my life,
50:37but like you said in a recent call, removing abusive habits is another thing.
50:40For example, treating people like abusers.
50:42What are your biggest pieces of advice to remove abusive habits?
50:45I don't know what you mean.
50:46Treating people like abusers?
50:49Cut out all abusive people in my life.
50:55Yeah, that sounds like a call, and I don't know what you mean.
51:00Yeah, I don't know what you mean.
51:03How do you stop treating people as abusers when they're not abusers?
51:07First of all, how do you know that they're not abusers?
51:09Second of all, if you've got the people out of your life who are abusive,
51:13but you haven't morally condemned them in your heart,
51:16the behavior is just going to replicate.
51:18Moral condemnation is your defense line against the intrusive thoughts, right?
51:23What is your best advice to stop treating virtuous people like abusers?
51:27Well, it means that the abusers are still running your mind,
51:30which means you haven't drawn that fiery moral moat between you and the abusers.
51:41Good morning, and welcome.
51:45No, I know what he's talking about.
51:47He's talking about the people who, when I'm talking with them in call-in shows,
51:52they treat me with outrageous levels of manipulation and deference
51:55because they're treating me as they would treat their abusive parents, right?
51:59Or whoever else might have been abusive in their life.
52:01So how do you stop doing that?
52:03Well, it's one thing to get the people out of your physical life.
52:06It's another thing to get them out of your head.
52:08And the way that you get them out of your head is you unreservedly condemn them as evil.
52:15Evil, monstrous, you're a hero for surviving.
52:18They are unredeemable, unrecoverable, committed to evil,
52:21committed to destruction, committed to harm, and so on, right?
52:28You've drawn that fiery moral moat between you and the bad guys.
52:32No hesitation, no issues, no, well, but they had bad childhoods,
52:36like I was reading the other day about the number of German women
52:40who were brutally gang-raped by the Russian soldiers.
52:46And again, it's World War II, there's a lot of propaganda,
52:50but my mother was 8, 7, or 8 years old at the end of World War II,
52:57and they said that the soldiers were raping the women from 8 to 80.
53:0210,000 of them were killed, hundreds of thousands of them were raped multiple times,
53:06and it was just brutal, right?
53:09And I assume it was somewhat payback for what the German soldiers did in Russia
53:13in the Operation Barbarossa, right?
53:15It was a 42 invasion of Russia.
53:18And, of course, that was my mother's childhood,
53:21and was she assaulted in this kind of way by soldiers?
53:25I would not doubt it at all.
53:28I don't have proof.
53:29I would not doubt it at all.
53:33She did talk about having to flirt with a Russian tank commander
53:36so he wouldn't destroy the village, and I don't know what she means by flirt,
53:39but who knows, right?
53:42But there are no origin stories that excuse evil doing.
53:52Otherwise, we can't have moral standards.
54:05Yeah, the taxation argument.
54:07Yeah, yeah, there's taxation. I get all of that.
54:09It's still pretty much the best time to be alive.
54:11We're having this conversation, aren't we?
54:14And to me, the taxation argument is like,
54:18well, I mean, what's the point of working out?
54:20It's not going to make you immortal.
54:21You're going to die anyway.
54:24Quality of life is important, and self-respect is important,
54:27and your body keeps you alive.
54:29How about you repair with some movement and exercise and decent food?
54:40All right, we're almost at our hour.
54:42If you want to get in, if you're not a donor,
54:44and you want to get in any other questions or comments,
54:48I'm certainly happy to hear them,
54:50but we're going to switch to donor only in a couple of minutes,
54:52and we can spice it up as much as you like.
54:54I will do my best to answer this, your questions,
54:58and we will get to that in a second,
55:01but I'm certainly happy to hear your comments now.
55:04Don't forget your donations at freedomain.com
55:06slash donate.
55:14It's funny, Trump talks about the U.S. government
55:16getting involved in Bitcoin and Bitcoin crashes.
55:19Probably coincidental.
55:21All right.
55:37He says paying taxes is still a form of appeasement.
55:44It's appeasement when you don't have to,
55:48but you go to jail if you don't pay taxes,
55:50so it's not appeasement.
55:56Somebody says,
55:57Oh, I had a friend who was a German female teenager
55:59at the end of World War II.
56:00I didn't get to say goodbye to her when she passed,
56:02but my God, what an amazing person.
56:04You can easily turn suffering into virtue.
56:11Ability to walk to the washroom is something to be welcomed.
56:14Maybe that is an answer to why exercise.
56:17I mean, honestly,
56:19you exercise out of deep gratitude
56:21to the amazing machinery that keeps you alive.
56:23I mean, you tell me anything that works
56:25for 80 or 90 years
56:27without you having to open it up and repair.
56:29It's incredible.
56:31It's incredible.
56:33And the body is the foundation on...
56:40It's the foundation in which all your thoughts rest
56:42is the functionality of the body.
56:44And if you take the body for granted,
56:46then it will get back at you.
56:48And it's a lack of gratitude.
56:50I'm fundamentally incredibly grateful for my body
56:52for keeping me alive and being functional
56:54and being healthy and all of that.
56:58When I receive a gift, I like to reciprocate.
57:00And receiving the gift of life from my body
57:02makes me want to reciprocate
57:04because I'm not selfish that way.
57:06I may be selfish in other ways,
57:08but I'm not selfish that way.
57:15Good.
57:17Okay, so we will go to supporters
57:19in a minute.
57:21And then the next part
57:23will just be for donors only.
57:25You're not a donor only yet
57:27in 50 seconds or so, give or take.
57:29I'll tell you when it is.
57:31And if you have questions, great.
57:33I'll tell you a sentence.
57:35This is what I'm going to deal with at some point.
57:37Somebody wrote,
57:39Thanks for answering my question
57:41and apologies for upsetting you,
57:44my question was based on
57:46genuine curiosity and I don't find your answer
57:48particularly satisfying because you basically
57:50just insulted me and completely ignored
57:52the core of my argument.
58:00So, that's a really
58:02meaty and deep interaction
58:04which I really appreciate.
58:06I know you opened the floor for anything.
58:08If you don't have any burning questions regarding
58:10politics, that's totally fine.
58:12But private in 10 seconds.
58:14Alright, I'll stop this and start it again. Hang tight.
58:18FreedomAid.com slash donate to help out the show.