AS249: Tom and Cecil, Part 2

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:29 Thomas: Hello and welcome to Atheistically Speaking, this is episode 249 and I'm your host Thomas Smith. Alright, we're just gonna get right back to part 2 with Tom and Cecil. And I'm sure this time it'll be much more clean, no dirty, bad jokes or anything like that. I'm-I'm sure they finally- they're on the straight and narrow, we'll find out.

0:00:54 Thomas: Let me ask you this question. One of the big narratives during when it was actually closer between Bernie and Hillary, because now it's a pretty much a foregone conclusion, but one of the the big narratives was, well, sure, Bernie is my dreamer candidate and he's got a lot of big dreams and all that, but that'll never happen. So Hillary is the practical kind of gonna get things done candidate. I would say just to quickly give you my opinion, you can react to it. I never really found that as being that great of an argument because I think no matter what happens, if the the Republican Congress is still Republican, which by all accounts is probably going to be, it's probably still going to Be dominated by Republicans. I don't think either of them are getting anything done. I mean, Obama couldn't get anything done and Republicans hate Hillary just as

[0:01:44] much, if not more than Obama. How is she getting anything done? My whole thing was, was that I would support Bernie because of the principles, you know, because of the principles, because he stands for certain things. He might get money out of politics. He Might have a chance of doing it, but I think either one of them is going to be deadlocked. Did you guys

[0:02:02] Buy into that narrative at all? What did you think about that? You mean, are you talking about like voting for who you think is going to eventually be president or who you think you want to be president? Is that the difference? No, but this was, how many debates did we see this? I guess there weren't that many Democratic debates. But the last two, I think, between Bernie and Hillary, all the analysis and a lot of the questions were, you'd love

[0:02:28] to vote for Bernie, but he's a dreamer. So you vote for Hillary because she's - It's an idealist versus a realist.

0:02:34 Thomas: Is that what you're saying? Yeah. And a lot OF people were citing that as a reason for voting for Hillary. And I didn't really buy

[0:02:40] it. Yeah, I don't buy it either. And I think the reason why... We actually got into a conversation with a listener on this. I never vote for anybody I don't want to be president, right? So in the president, I mean, I don't, I mean, if I'm voting gubernatorial, I'm not voting for someone to be president.

But at the same time, if it's a presidential election, I'm voting for the person who I think is the most, the one who I want to see be president, the one who I think is the most qualified person to be president. Now, I don't know that that person's going to win, but that doesn't mean that I don't want them to be president. So I would never, ever consider, based on whether it's idealism versus realism or whether it's a viable candidate

[0:03:20] versus an unviable candidate. I don't ever consider that. What I do is I walk in and I say, what's the issues? And there's a great website. And actually, Gary Johnson was on the Joe Rogan podcast and mentioned this website called isidewith .com, I think it is, or something like that. And basically, it has maybe 20 total questions. And the questions range from how do you feel about abortion? What do you think about Muslims being given immigration status into this country, et cetera, I said, all these different talking points that everybody seems to be talking about in this election cycle. And they don't just have yes or no answers. You can go into more depth. You can actually click and there's an actual more

[0:04:00] Choices. So it's not just yes or no. It's yes, I think they should allow refugees, Muslim refugees in this country, not just 10 000 should be 50 000 or whatever, you know, like there's... There's nuance, there's more nuanced answers. When I did this, I side with, I sided with Bernie Sanders at 97, I sided with the Green Party at 96, which is Jill something Stein, maybe your name is, your name is, and then I sided with Hillary at 96, I sided with Gary Johnson like 55, and Trump at like, like 32%. And so you get a chance to see sort of what the spectrum of where you stand is. And Bernie was

[0:04:40] my guy. Bernie was my guy the whole election cycle. And I thought, you know what? I'm just going to go with Bernie every chance I get. So idealist, realist, it doesn't matter to me. I think that's a goofy concept in a primary. The primary is what decides whether somebody is a realistic candidate. Candidate, right? No, that is the point. Oh, let me clarify, because I think I did also see a lot of realistic candidate kind of stuff. That wasn't my, my question was specifically about, uh, the

[0:05:09] Practicality of Bernie's agenda, not, not his realistic, uh, chances. Sure, sure, of winning. Oh, whether or not his agenda, I think that's a terrible way to, I mean, you, you gotta give a guy a chance. I'm going crazy. You didn't, you guys didn't hear this. Because this was all the talk for like a month of the, of the primary was Bernie is the dream. Sure. We

[0:05:27] All kind of want those ideas, but he won't be able to get any of them done. I think that's when we were, we were laughing at Ted Cruz dropping out of the race. I think that's when that was happening. So I think, well, you guys played the uh uh I always blank on a stupid name. What's his name? You know, Mormon talk show guy, oh

[0:05:46] Glenn Beck? You guys played him, right? Oh, yeah. Yes. So much the times where he said, like, the country, country, but the country, no, but the country. Oh my god, it was the funniest thing. That's because, just so you know, Carly Fiorina is the biggest patriot in the United States. Oh yeah, biggest. Yeah, no, it's you. No, it's you. She went to Glenn Beck and drowned in North Korean right in front, but the country, but the country, but the country. God, that did not happen.

0:06:18 Thomas: So I guess you guys were We were too busy laughing at how funny that was We were too busy. And I can't blame you. I can't blame you for that. But okay, well, it sounds like you're probably on the same, maybe more or less on the same page with me on this. And that, do you, well, let me just quickly rephrase the question one more time. Do you see, imagine in your mind, okay, Bernie wins versus Hillary wins, the whole presidential election, not the primary, whole presidential

[0:06:43] Election. We got President Bernie versus President Hillary. I hope it gets something done fast. Do you see, how do you see either one of them being able to work with the Republican Congress?

0:06:55 Thomas: I mean, do you see one making a big difference where the other wouldn't? Because that's the question. And in my mind, I think, I don't, I mean either of them is going to have a hell of a time with the Republican Congress. So why not vote for the guy, you know, for the Bernie that I think has the best ideals and not worry about the

[0:07:14] Practical argument? Argument? I think Bernie could be a very practical president. I really truly believe he could be a very practical president. He's not going to be president. I know, I just want you to know. It would take him until the midterm, though. It would take him till the midterm election. He would flip the house and he would flip the senate, and I think he would have the ability to do it.

And I think so, because he stands up and he talks to people in a very, and if he had more time and he had more air time, which you would have virtually unlimited as president, and he got in front of people, I think I think his message resonates. I think that his message does not resonate with a huge portion of the general populace right now, because they're just not open to it. They're not listening to it. But once you become president, you have a much larger soapbox.

[0:07:54] Your soapbox is much, much, much more important. I think he would take two years. He would accomplish virtually nothing. But I think he would stand up there, and he would be Bernie. And who is Bernie Sanders when he talks? He's a guy who's just angry. He says exactly what he means. He means exactly what he says, you know, and and he's, I think he could electrify, I really do, I think he could electrify a significant number of people.

I think he could flip the house and the senate in the midterm, and then I think he'd actually get some shit done. I think he is a real progressive, and I think that, you know, when you ask people on the street and you take the politics out of it, you ask people about progressive ideas and whether or not they're pro or

[0:08:34] Against those, those ideas, more often than not, people poll more progressive than they vote. And I think if he had an opportunity to have that larger soapbox, I think he could do some damage in a good way. It reminds me of how when they polled Obamacare versus, the health care act or what was it? The same thing, but one with Obama's name and one

[0:08:57] With not. Yeah, well, you just say the stuff that it's about, right? People are like, yeah, it all sounds like a great idea. And it's like, yeah, it's, Obama couldn't, like, I fucking hate that. Yeah, I changed my mind. Yeah, takes his backsies. Yeah, well, yeah, it sounds like we're, oh, go ahead, go ahead. I was just gonna say, um, uh, I feel like, I feel like that's an easy prediction that I was never gonna, you never, that's why I made it

[0:09:22] Because Bernie's not gonna be president and he's gonna be super president, fuck you, he's gonna be super, he's gonna be dead in like three years. Okay, that's number one. He'll never live to the, he's not even gonna make it to the midterms regardless. It makes me feel sad, but, uh, but yeah, I think like him, I think, I think, you know, there's a possibility that that could happen. I'm, what I wonder what, because now, now it's Hillary Trump, and I wonder what that is going to entail. You know, like I said earlier, are the Republicans going to block Trump out if he makes it? They're certainly going to block out Hillary because they fucking hate her. So I don't know what they're, I don't know what she's

[0:10:02] And that was my point behind this question, is there was always this presupposition that she would somehow compromise better, and it's like, man, do they hate her. They fucking cannot stand her. Yeah, they've hated her forever. Yeah, they've, they have hated Hillary Clinton for 20 years. Yeah, that's, that's, and you know, here she is rearing her ugly head again. I mean, hey, it's not, that's not nice, I didn't mean it that way. Why do you you think she is so disliked? I think the easy liberal answer that I don't fully buy has been sexism. I I think a lot of Hillary supporters will just say, yep, sexism, That's why all you Bernie bros are voting

[0:10:38] For Bernie. That's not true. I think that's a little too, there may be an element of it, especially with Republicans. I could see there Being an element of it. But I don't, I don't think that fully explains why she's so disliked. Do you guys have

[0:10:50] Any theories on that? I gotta be honest, when I'm not excited about her as a president, like I, I'm not excited that, that she's going to be the nominee, and I'm not excited that that's who I'll probably wind up voting for in the, in the primaries, or not in the primaries, in the general. I'm not excited that she's going to be that person. Um, and it's because of politics as usual. I mean, I'm kind of on the, on that Bernie or bust idea.

I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna bust, but I am on that, man, I really wish that there was some sort of outside candidate I could vote for to really send a message to the people who are in power to be like, look, we need to pay attention to a lot of other things other than just campaigns.

[0:11:30] And I really feel like, you know, Bernie was one of those people who's, you know, he's not taking money from corporations, or at least, you know, not a lot of money from corporations. And he's really trying to make sure that he pays attention to where his donations are coming from.

A lot of them, a majority, vast majority of them are from just small donations, just little donations from people, and so I feel like, you know, he feels like Tom said, he just feels like an angry real person, whereas I don't know what I'm getting with Hillary, I don't know. You know, I mean, I kind of know who she is, but at the same time, I feel like I feel like I don't know that I'm getting a genuine, angry old Jew, like I am

[0:12:10] with Bernie, you know? I do think a big chunk of it is sexism. I do. Am I sexist for saying that, you think? No, I don't think you're sexist. Well, I mean, that's not why you're sexist. No, I mean, I'm sexist for other reasons, then? Yeah, you're sexist for all the reasons. I'm okay with those. You know, I had a conversation today. Show me your tits. Oh, God, put them away. Put them away. Put them away. I can't get the shirt back over them.

I had a conversation today with a woman that I work with, you know, bright, intelligent, educated woman that I work with who said that she didn't think that that America should have a female president because when she goes on her period, this is a this is a bright woman that I work with, that when she's on her period, she worries that she will not be able to be

[0:12:50] and I'm summarizing for her, but she worries that she won't be able to be objective. I think that there's still so much rampant sexism. Some of it is very overt. She's gone through menopause by now, right? Hillary? Or I don't know, I mean, I didn't ask her, I'm not, I'm not all up in that's a lady status, right?

Like, you know what, Hillary gets a hot flash and then she like lights up fucking North Korea, but, but I, that's that is a that is a reasonably common, horrifyingly obtuse way of thinking. Um, and and it's, wait, women do get periods, though? No, that, that's true, I just wanted to, I just want to point that, they don't all, what, some of them do, they stop, the really old ones, yeah.

[0:13:30] It's just dust comes, I was, I was, Thomas, I was shot, dust, no, that is pretty shocking that a woman is like, punk, and like confetti comes out when you get to a certain age, yeah, it's done, it's not, everybody at Thomas's show has turned this off, like, I'm, I know, it's amazing, when I'm the straight man for a minute, like when I'm actually, you're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, yeah, Cecil, come on, come on, man, Cecil, Jesus, I can't go anywhere on this show, here, here, I want to talk about, I want to talk about fucking, like, at this point I want to talk about a 60-year-old menstruation,

[0:14:11] and you won't even go there, I'm trying, this is my most serious fucking, go there, 60-year-old menstruation, you're right, I won't fucking go there.

0:14:21 Thomas: Well, but but Tom was actually making a very depressing observation about a real conversation

[0:14:27] in which a woman told him, sure that you wouldn't, is that anecdotal?

It is anecdotal, but yeah, but you weren't talking to an alien, I mean, you're talking to a representative, exactly, exactly, yeah, and and I don't know how representative that is, but but she may have been a lizard person, that's entirely pop, but then she would vote Hillary because Hillary is like the queen of the lizard people or whatever, she definitely is, but I I do think sexism is a huge, huge part of it, I think people are, are not, I think America is is a rampantly sexist nation in a lot of huge ways, some of them are overt, many of them are less overt, unfortunately, um, because it's easier to combat when it's over, that's why I say unfortunately, um, but I I also think that Hillary is just a terribly

[0:15:08] awkward person to watch speak, when I watch Hillary speak, I'm never, ever galvanized, you know, I'm gonna vote for, but I'm never like, yes, like I am with Bernie, or I am with Elizabeth Warren, or I am, right, Barack Obama, Barack Obama, great speaker, yeah, Bernie, great speaker, Elizabeth, time to confess my unpopular opinion. Time to confess my unpopular opinion I hate how Obama does

[0:15:31] his speeches, it takes an hour to get through anything, you're racist, he gives us, I had no idea, you know, this whole time I'm on a fucking Skype call with this guy and he's all fucking, did you hear what he's saying, embedded in there is that he's on black people time, Jesus Christ, fuck, he gives his speeches, he takes an hour to, he pauses, his pauses, or I just want to die, look, as as a reasonably intelligent, as a reasonable racist, black speeches matter.

[0:16:07] Oh, man, he's the, I can't think of another politician that I've had that big of a problem with how long he takes it, just, it's just because he takes a long time to read the teleprompter, that's the problem, he's got, there are you could make whole sentences in between some of his pauses between words sometimes. And it's just like, dude, I know what you're already gonna say? I already know what the end of the sentence is. I don't want to wait five minutes to hear something that I already he's

[0:16:32] always buffering, Jesus Christ, I'm surprised you could, I'm surprised you could hear this speech through your clan hood, racist, he's always buffering, I like that, do you have an antenna on top of the burning cross, yeah, during, yeah, every speech he says a word and then a little circle comes up that's like, like loading, yeah, like loading, yeah, there's a thought bubble over his head, just empty, yeah, I think he's, I think he's a great speaker, I think, I think, I think, I think he has a good speech writer. I mean, I don't, well, let me clarify. It probably works, but I I, I don't know. Who who cares about speeches anyway? Am I am I the only one who just

[0:17:11] really doesn't care about, I feel like, I feel like somebody's got to, uh, grab me in the sense that I want to, like when I watched Bernie speak, and it's not, it doesn't have to be a speech. I watched him shoot down reporter after reporter when they caught him after his rallies. And they would say, what do you think about Hillary Clinton?

And he would look at him and and say, I'm not going to get in this with you, I like Hillary Clinton, leave me the fuck alone, basically is what he would say, it was awesome, you could tell, when people speak to the media you can tell, and I and it's not just speeches, Tom, it's it's the way Hillary just interacts with other people, I'm just awkward as fuck man, she's just, yeah, it feels, it feels always like she's

[0:17:52] managing a perception rather than, yeah, you know, and again, is this intensely subjective, subjective, absolutely it is, but I don't believe her in the same way that I believe Bernie, in the same way I frankly believed Barack Obama, and that's, that is a fucking completely subjective, anecdotal experience that I have with Hillary, I'm gonna vote for Hillary, but when I see her, it's like, man, I just, I'm, she doesn't get me there, you know, it all feels really calculated, and I'll say this, I I don't think it's a sexism thing.

0:18:25 Thomas: For me because I think there's nobody in the world more calculated than Ted Cruz. I mean, he's a lizard person who's trying to pretend he's a human. It has to be calculated. Everything he says is calculated.

[0:18:38] It's not, I don't think it's a sexism thing. I mean, who knows? I could be unaware. I'm not saying everybody who dislikes Hillary is sexist. It's not sexist for me. I think she's caliente, man. I think she really, the number one impression I have gotten this entire time is just insincerity, especially when she started adopting things that Bernie was saying and the way she would argue against, that one gun control bill that he just, he said we shouldn't punish manufacturers for just making guns. And she kept going after him saying, oh, he just wants a gun in every, a chicken, every pot and a gun on every table. And the,

[0:19:17] chicken wielding a gun in every pot. The way she spun that, I mean, just everything, it was just so insincere to me, and that's kind of how I feel. She strikes me as somebody trying to win an election, rather than trying to convey a set of ideas, right?

What I like, what I think what people respond to, the people that respond to Bernie, I think are responding because Bernie appears to be conveying a real set of ideas and solutions, and even if you don't like his solutions. He's like, these are problems. I'm super mad all the time about them. And here's my solutions, which I'm also strangely mad about. And I love that. I love his fury. I love his anger. I love his rage. He backs it up

[0:19:57] with his life. That's what I was getting at in the beginning, yeah, yeah, he he's not a guy who talks about, uh, the, you know, all these rich people, and then you find out, oh, he's worth 10 billion dollars. You know, he'S not one of those people who's worth millions of dollars. He's worth less

[0:20:12] than a million dollars, yeah, which as I said is bad even for a non-politician, like just a regular dude should be worth a million dollars by the time you're 68 or 9 or whatever he is. 77 How old is he? He's

[0:20:24] a billion, he's a billion years old, he's 76, I think, when Carl Sagan wrote billions and billions, he was talking about, you know, that's the other thing too, I feel like Bernie is the other side of Donald Trump, and Donald Trump really does do the same thing. Like, Donald Trump has in his backyard a wall made out of Mexican skulls. And I think he's going to do the same thing again.

And so, again, we can look at Donald Trump as a guy who is sort of, you know, he's going to be somebody who follows through on his word and makes a giant wall. Well, which word, though? Like I said, he's on both sides of everything. He's going to make an awesome wall, and someone's going to pull it all over. It's going to be great. It's going to be the best wall. It's going to be pretty much the best wall. It's going to be the best wall, best wall, it's gonna have the best walls, we

[0:21:05] have the best skulls, the best taco salads.

0:21:09 Thomas: So that that actually transitions a little bit into at least uh one more issue that

[0:21:15] I want to make sure I got your view on. So you guys, I think, heard the James Lindsey Eli debates. Yes. Uh, and I know Tom was gonna pretend he didn't, but I think he did. Yeah, no, I stayed awake for some of that, some of it. Yeah, well, one of, one thing I I argued with James about, I think it might have been on Twitter. I guess it wasn't during the debate because I pretty much just let them talk the whole time. Did he block you yet, or no? No, he doesn't block. That's why I like James. That's what I like about James. He doesn't block people. He does try to just argue his point the whole time, which I respect, but one thing I argued with him about is he thinks that the

[0:21:52] regressive left and And the, you know, the PC, the two PC left is what has caused a portion of Trump's support, and I, have I take huge issue with that.

[0:22:04] I don't know. Have you heard that? I have heard that. I have heard people say that. Sure. Well, let's talk about it. I don't know how you feel about it. Definitely, you know, let me know how you feel. I guess I'll start us out because I was in the middle of saying it, but he thinks that at least like a third of Trump's support is due to this PC backlash. And I just, I can't imagine a person, how many potential people could there be who fit this bill, where it's like, well, I'm an otherwise rational person. I would have voted

[0:22:38] I would have voted.

[0:22:42] Because you're going to finish that sentence with, I'm going to vote for Trump and there's... there's no way to finish that sentence. That's what I'm trying to say. Yeah, you're right. There's no way to finish that sentence. There's no way. I have another wise, rational person who would vote for a reasonable candidate, except I'm just so mad that people are policing language, and therefore I have to vote for Hitler. I have to vote for a guy. Some random person at a random college was deplatformed. I'm super mad about it. I'm voting for Trump. Let's build a wall. Yeah. I don't know. And even if that were the response, I just,

[0:23:22] could you blame PC culture for that? Could you say, hey, you should have known someone was going to get so mad at your PC stuff that they were going to vote for someone who literally talks about Mexicans as rapists and wants to ban Muslims. So, that's just totally an illogical thing for me. I I think you've

[0:23:45] tipped your hand that maybe you agree it's asinine. I'm sorry, that's asinine, a third of his support comes from the, the super mad bros, the left. Yeah, no, absolutely, nobody cares about these issues except for a niche portion of our tiny community. That's what we like, we're embedded in this community and we think that the whole rest of the world really totes super cares. But guess what? If you fucking walk out on the street and ask a whole bunch of people about these issues, most of them don't even know what you're fucking talking about. Do they? Have, is their PC culture in general that people will say that they are generally opposed to? Sure. But if

[0:24:25] you ask them how important is that in your day-to-day life, how much does that affect your, your voting status, it doesn't affect people's voting status very much. Look at the demographics of the people that are voting for, for Trump. These are people from the rust belt who were former blue collar workers who didn't experience any of the economic lift of the last six years. That's, that, that is the demographic that is by and large sweeping Trump upward, mostly white, mostly uneducated people, right? It's uneducated white males. It's not the, the liberal educated left who's like, I'm super mad about what's going on at Yale. Like, that's fucking ridiculous. Yeah, a third of his support of his support. That sounds a little heavy, bro. That's all I'm saying. Sounds

[0:25:05] a little heavy. I am right there with you, Tom. I feel like, you know, we are embroiled. There's a lot of educators that are involved in the atheist movement and things like that. And there's a thing that's going on in the atheist movement that everybody's paying attention to. You know, we got a tweet from some jackass a couple of, maybe a month ago, that was super pissed off that somebody wrote a paper about feminine glaciology or something.

And they sent us a message and they said, oh, you guys are milquetoast going after fucking mega preachers or whatever when you should be covering this. And my first thought was, you have no idea what our show is about if you think we're going to cover an academic paper. Like, I'm never

[0:25:45] covering an academic paper on our show ever, ever, ever. But then the very idea that you're super mad that somebody is talking about... And, you know, when you think about the world at large, right, the world at large doesn't care that there's a feminine glaciology paper. You ask somebody about what they care about in the next election and whether or not a feminine glaciology paper comes out, they would give no fucks. Zero fucks would be given. And they'd be like, how much taxes am I going to pay? If I brought that up to my dad, if I was like, dad, what do you think about this feminine glaciology paper? My dad would hit me. I would encourage it. I know, I think this

[0:26:25] is good. I think we can disagree a little bit. Oh, did I cut you off? Sorry, I was gonna say, like, the idea though is like, like the average person who's not in academia, who is on the periphery of these issues, and that's a majority of Americans, do not care a bit about whether or not something like this happens.

And the fact is, is that if we're going to get into these fights about whether or not there's PC culture, and that's all this feminine glaciology paper is about, is whether or not this is a PC culture and all this. I don't even know anything about it. I don't care about it. That's the thing is, fucking don't send me email about it because I don't fucking care. I do not fucking care about it. But the thing is, like, I'm one of those people. I'm one of

[0:27:05] the majority of people in the United States. Like, I don't give a shit. Who cares? I don't care what an academic wrote because I'm never going to read it.

But the idea here is that this is a fringe group, a tiny group, and we need to, we need to pay attention to what people are really voting on, and what they're really voting on is that they are xenophobic, that they don't want people that are coming into this country taking jobs and taking money away, because that's what they're thinking, they're going to take jobs away from me, and they don't want people being in this country taking the money away from them. Like Tom said, they were not brought up at the last six years and they feel like they've been left out and they are looking for someone to help them in some way.

0:27:46 Thomas: Yeah, I think if I were to try to push back on a couple of things. First off, this isn't really disagreeing with you because you said you didn't care about the paper. I don't. I think that paper was actually overblown

[0:27:59] and misinterpreted. Actually, if you Snopes it, it wasn't really how people made it out to be. I don't know. Again, Again, I never know what the fuck to call anybody, but the anti

[0:28:12] -regressive left. The people who don't like social justice. Sure. The anti -regressive left, quote unquote, whatever.

0:28:18 Thomas: I don't fucking know. They went nuts on that paper. It turns out if you actually read it and you look at the guy who wrote it, his interview, it's like, oh, that actually was kind of reasonable. It was, I, don't

[0:28:30] remember word for word. Go look it up. Make your own decision. Make your own decision about it. Just for people, just so that I address it, it's not as, as people made it out. Also, do not send me email about it because I will put you on a fucking spam filter. Do not send me email about the other thing. One paper, yeah, like, it's what I would push back a bit on, is I, I do think there is a huge narrative. Uh, I, I think you guys interpreted it as maybe James was thinking a lot of people are in tune with these campus censorship issues and all that. And you're saying you don't think the average person is in tune with that or really cares. But I think to give James

[0:29:07] a little bit more credit, I think he's referring to there is actually a pretty wider anti-PC narrative within the Republican Party. I think those people are racist. I think that there's a lot of racist outlets there. I'm getting to that. I do agree. But if you'll remember, if you'll recall, and this is actually another reason I ultimately disagree with James, every candidate, back when there were maybe like five Republicans left, all five of them talked about being anti -PC. Trump is not some special anti- PC monster that was created. That's the Republican Party. So Trump, we're not responsible, liberals who are too PC, that is, are not responsible for Trump specifically because Ted Cruz said the same thing. I mean, there there are. And to agree with

[0:29:57] you, Cecil, I think that that is a little bit of a code for, I don't want to acknowledge that trans people exist. Sure. I don't want, you know, I think one of the major things you've got to consider too, is that isn't that just the very, the very essence of the conservative party to be anti PC? Isn't that their very essence? Like, it doesn't matter whether it's Trump or whether it was Cruz or whether it was Rubio or whether it was Fiorina, they were all going to be anti-PC because PC is a progressive ideal and they're always going to be anti whatever is progressive. They're going to try to conserve what is here, and what, what

[0:30:37] they think is here, what they think is the status quo. And the status quo right now is, uh, is basically subjugating gays and transgender people, and what, what they want to conserve is that. And I think that's the case. So it doesn't matter whether it's Trump or anybody else. Vast swaths of uneducated white males are not voting on this subject. This is not the thing that brings them to the polls. It's just not. It's not a third of his support. It's just not.

0:31:06 Thomas: Well, not only that, in order for this to be some failing of the PC, if you want to call it that, community, community, these would have to be voters who would have otherwise gone the other way, would have otherwise gone the other way. They would have otherwise voted for Hillary or something, except there's too much PC culture going on, so we've lost them to Trump. I mean, I just can't imagine there would be that many people. There There could be a couple, but seriously,

[0:31:32] I mean, a third of his support. So I guess we ultimately come down on the same side of that one. But yeah, thanks for sharing your thoughts on that. Matt, I wasn't sure. I was pretty sure you were going to agree with me, but yeah. I don't see it. Nobody cares. Nobody cares that much. They care about their wallet. They care about their wallet. Yeah, that's the big thing for sure. Okay, once again, I think to slightly disagree, I think there are people who really care about it. They're called Republicans. They were going to vote Republican no matter what. And you kind of said that, but yeah but just to clarify the concept, I I don't think we were losing any voters because of this, is what I'm trying they're

[0:32:09] not yeah you're You're not getting some Ivy League professor flipping his vote because.

[0:32:14] Because he doesn't know the right word to call someone who's trans. Because he can't slap a black student.

[0:32:22] Yeah. All right. You're going to get mailed for that one. Oh, no.

0:32:26 Thomas: We've come to the end of my prepared questions.

[0:32:30] So I'm wondering if there's anything else you guys want to shoot the shit on or if we should call it a day here. You know, we just want to invite people over. If you like Thomas, and again, Thomas, you can cut this out if this doesn't materialize, but if you like Thomas as a person who does podcasts, we are going to have Thomas on for an entire episode, episode 300, which is coming up in a couple weeks, and you should check that out. Oh, man. All right. There, I'm committing now. I'm gonna do it. Because you know why? Because I don't want to edit. I was, I was not going to come on your show. You're so fucking lazy, dude. It comes with the name. Oh. Yeah no, that is, that is the the biggest honor. I, I, I've said it before. I will say it as many times

[0:33:14] As I need to, which is infinite. Thank you guys so much for all your life's my favorite podcast. I know, right? I just want to say thank you for giving me the opportunity. By the way, I love Eli, and my mascara is running because every cock is in my mouth, every time I say his name I fucking taste his dick in my mouth. Oh, man. You've kind of ruined it, but I was going to thank you guys. Oh, I missed that one. No, he's got a Jew fro. Down. Cut that out. Cut that out. Don't make me look like a racist. Look, if I had to cut out everything that made you look racist, I wouldn't have the show. You interrupted what I really mean sincerely. Thank you guys for the invitation. I'm going to take you up on that. I love your show. I can't believe you guys were the first people to invite me on their show way back when, I was doing Thomas and

[0:34:07] The Bible. That's right. It's made a huge difference. When was that? That was like a... I mean, you had just started the Bible and you finished it. When did you finish? When did you finish the Bible again, Thomas? We're just curious when that, did that happen in October of this year? Yeah, in the future, I think. We're racing at this point. Yeah. Look, I, oh yeah, that's right, because you guys have to finish your lizard book. Are you gonna finish your lizard book?

You gotta read part of the lizard, if you're gonna be on our show for 300, you have to read part of the lizard book. Okay. It's great. You're gonna love it. If I only have to read part, I can do it. I can't read the whole fucking thing. No, you have to read up to the, the place that we're at. Yeah, otherwise it won't make sense.

[0:34:51] Can't take that shit out of context, man. That's awesome. Oh, that's awesome. Okay, well, uh, if there's, if there's nothing else, um, thank you guys. Nothing here. Um, thanks. For coming on, it's always fun. I love having you guys. I'm excited thanks to be back on cog diss It's been, I just

[0:35:10] Can't remember the, the last time I was on. So I'm very excited. It's going to be great. People can look forward to that. All right. That's Tom and Cecil.

0:35:16 Thomas: That's Cognitive Dissonance. You already know that. Thanks for joining me. See you next time.

0:35:31 Thomas: Alright, well, I've got a little time left over. I guess I'm going to try to cover some of the comments, or at least, I don't know, do some more commentary on ableist language. First, I want to address a comment just in general on the show. Someone said they were, it was kind of interesting, they said, I'm not really doing atheist podcasts anymore, I just, I am doing social justice, which is, well I want say a couple things about that. It might be the case that this is a new listener, I don't know, I'm not sure, but the story of my show, the goal, the reason that my show exists has always been the main reason, it's not 100% of course, but the main is I want to talk about things that atheists disagree on.

Just now, I mean, as much as me and Cogdis and Tom and Cecil, you know, we are great friends, podcasting friends, you you know, who probably agree on just about everything, we always find something to disagree on. That's what's interesting to me. What's interesting to me is the areas where the atheist community has a disagreement. So what does that tell you? Well, most of the disagreement, probably none of it will be about whether God exists because that's already covered. I mean, we're all atheists. We're pretty

0:36:52 Thomas: Much on board that God doesn't exist. We can argue about it. I do, on occasion, I do like to have Christians on. In order to debate them, because I, in general, I find disagreement interesting. So debating Christians, fine. That's something I like to do. I have one scheduled actually for a couple weeks from now, I think, so that'll be coming up again. But it just turns out that social justice is the, gosh, it's gotta be the biggest disagreement we have. However, I will say that, well, A, I had the two Sean Carroll episodes plus the one that that was commentary about Sean Carroll, which is as atheist-y as you get.

It was all about science. And two, I didn't Expect the Anya episodes to be social justice. I had no idea that's what it was going to be about. Her book, honestly, it was a little bit misleading because the byline of the book was A Skeptic's Journey Through Medicine and Being Disabled. Having to go through... I thought it was going to, based on the description, you can go check it out on Amazon, look at the description, description, tell me what you think we would, we're going to talk about based on that.

I thought it was going to be like, oh, there are a lot of people trying to use alternative medicine and I applied skepticism, and this is, you know, I thought there's going to me more of those stories. Turned out to not really be so, it was a little misleading. I didn't really mean it to be a social

0:38:12 Thomas: Justice thing. However, when she called me out on ableist language and we had a debate, I found that to be, be incredibly fascinating. And it has generated a ton of comments. So I think people are interested. So that's my response. I mean, I don't know what it means to be an atheism podcast, really, like if there's some rules to that. I think that person had in mind some other podcasts that they want me to be like, maybe Scathing Atheists and others. And I'm not really trying to be like any podcast. I'm trying to be like this podcast because I know you guys, almost every podcast listener listens to several, and I don't want to just give you the same thing.

If I just sat here and did the news, if I covered, you know, what the conservatives have done that's done this week in the news, I mean, I would be just like other podcasts and I would probably not even do as good a job. So why would you want me to do that? So now to the response on the show. I think I just want to, in general, rather than reading comments because there are a million and there are some common themes, I'm going to try to deal with some common things. I still think people don't understand the difference between the word gay as a slur and these words like crazy or dumb or idiot or that sort of thing. There is so much confusion on this issue,

0:39:32 Thomas: There really is, so I'm just going to try to restate it and see if maybe I can get people to understand what I'm thinking, and then it's up to you if you agree or not, I guess. So here's the argument that was made a million times. A million times, you don't call things gay, right? You don't say, that's so gay, or you would agree that that's wrong, and I say, yes, I do agree that's right. Ah, so, therefore, ipso facto, saying that's crazy is also wrong. It's the same thing. This is more or less exactly the argument Anya and others have leveled.

My counterargument was, no, that's not the same thing, because the slur of saying that's gay, and by the way, it's important to keep track of what we're talking about. We're talking when someone uses that's gay to say that sucks, essentially, like, ah, that's awful, that's terrible. It's that synonym. So, ah man, that gay. That's something that people where I grew up said all the time. I actually used to say it as a kid. And then I met a gay person in college and accidentally said it once and saw the reaction and said, oh my god, that is the stupidest thing. I cannot believe that I said that and never said it again, except for, of course, like

0:40:53 Thomas: This, but I never said it in seriousness again. So I will at least point out that, I mean, I'm being honest with how I feel because when I said that, when I say that's so gay when I was, you know, 18, and a gay friend of mine heard me and gave me a little bit of a look, wasn't even, required almost nothing, I don't even think he said anything actually, he just gave me kind of a kind of look, and instantly I knew, oh that is completely wrong. Contrast that, and this doesn't prove anything, I am not saying this proves anything. Thing. But contrast that with when I said, oh, that's crazy in front of Anya. It's just not the same thing in my mind.

So, that gives you an indication that I am capable of, if I'm wrong about something like this, I'm fully capable of accepting responsibility, saying, oh my gosh, I can't believe I did that, which is exactly what I did back when I was 18, you know, 100 years ago, when it came to the phrase, that is gay. So I'm completely capable of change on this. I promise you I am. I just do not think it's the same thing. So now I'll deal with the argument of why. When someone says, that's gay, in the way of that sucks, the only way the sentence even is intelligible is if they've created a meaning in their mind where they are associating the word gay,

0:42:13 Thomas: Which means relating to homosexuality in this case, and they're associating that with something negative. They are making the one-to-one direct connection of gay people are bad. It's just like my weird example I brought up. If someone says like, oh man, that was Mexican, you know, because they hate Mexican people, they're taking a one-to-one relationship in their mind. It's easy. It's right there. It's easier to grasp. They don't like Mexicans. They don't like gays, whatever the case may be. They're taking that dislike or that hatred, whatever it is. And they are using that word directly to say, this is that thing which I don't like.

This is negative. When it comes to that's crazy, no such thing is taking place. When I say the movie Inception was crazy, when I say, wow, what happened there was crazy. Or even, by the way, I'm crazy about you. You know, I am crazy about cognitive dissonance. No such thing as taking place, there's no association in my mind of crazy is bad, And by the way, even if there were an association of the word crazy is bad, you would still need another association to say that people who suffer from certain illnesses are crazy.

0:43:34 Thomas: So there's two steps there that you would need, which are in no way guaranteed to have happened. So it is not the same thing. This doesn't prove that it's okay, but it does prove that the example of saying you wouldn't say that's okay. Therefore, don't say that's crazy. That example does not work because they are not the same thing. Now, here's the first misconception I need to clear up.

A lot of people didn't understand this when I said it the first time, and I got a ton of comments, including, I think, from Anya. It might have been in her comments. I can't remember, but it was in a lot of peoples that said, well, hold on, they said. You could say that's so gay and just not even know because you just learned it, you know, So you don't even know that it refers to homosexuals. You could just learn that the phrase that's gay means that sucks. This is a red herring, because you can do this with any word. Any, any word has that possibility. This still doesn't clear up the difference that I already stated, where Where you can say something is crazy, you can know what you mean and the people around you can know what they mean. They all know exactly what you mean. It is not a case of not knowing, it's a case of another meaning. There's another meaning we all know, it is common, it is wild or unpredictable. Wow, that roller coaster is crazy. Wild or unpredictable, thrilling,

0:44:54 Thomas: Weird, something, whatever it is, whatever the synonym is that you're using, that's understood. Did. It's not that we all didn't learn what crazy means. We know what it means in the way that we're using it. In the case of not knowing that gay refers to homosexual, I mean, that's just a red herring. You can use words and not know what they mean all the time. It doesn't mean that gay and crazy are the same thing.

Somehow people thought that objection meant what I was saying was wrong. I don't really know where that disconnect happened. So if you still feel that way, feel free to try to explain it, but I don't know, maybe this will educate you on where our disagreement might be. I'm not sure. If you want to come back at me with that, feel to. Thing that bugged me about this, I can't remember where this took place, some level, layer of Facebook somewhere, I don't know if it was on, I think it was someone else's post about my episode, and then Anya posted, I responded, and she gave me the stereotypical, this is the biggest cliche in the world, oh, not everyone's experience is like yours. You're falling for that trap of thinking everyone means the same thing you mean and that everyone's experiences like yours. This frustrated me to no end. I said as much right back to her. I said it has nothing to do with that. I fully understand people's experience is not my own. We simply

0:46:15 Thomas: Have a disagreement about what's reasonable in terms of offense. I think there's a meme in among social justice that I don't think is the right way to go there's it there's a meme that whenever someone says they are harmed, they are by default correct and you cannot challenge them. I do not think this is the right way go about it. People need to be able to reasonably understand why something would harm someone. Although it really is true, I mean, if I just say a a random word, like milk, and then someone says, oh, do not, you cannot say that word. Well, why?

It harms me. Well I don't, but I don't, that doesn't make sense. No, no, I've been harmed, so you cannot question it. That doesn't work. I understand, I'm not, and I'm not saying that's what social justice is doing. Not, not at all. I'm not saying, that there are plenty of things where we need to be sensitive to what we're saying, but it's because we can reasonably understand why it would cause someone some pain to hear these things. It causes people pain to here. If I go up to someone with a disability and say, you're retarded, that is very hurtful. I would never advocate that. I

0:47:36 Thomas: Would never ever advocate calling someone with with a mental illness crazy. Look at that crazy person. I would never advocate that. But it's because I can reasonably understand why that would be hurtful. So So as a heuristic, saying whenever someone claims they are caused harm, you have to believe them and adjust your behavior accordingly, I'm sorry I don't accept that. It has to be reasonable. Here's another reason why. There's an example from years ago. You may be able to still Google it, but it's years old. Could be six, seven years old, there was a toy or it might have been a card.

No, I think it was a card, it was some sort of greeting card for a graduation or something like that, where these people were saying some congratulatory things. And in among it, they were talking about science and different things, and it's hard to explain. But the line that was said in the card was, oh, and those black holes, they're so ominous. Those black holes are so ominous. You can Google that and you might even come up with it. Just googled that and it indeed did come up and it is indeed from 6-15-2010. So, coming on six years ago, I guess. Or no, it is, yeah, right about six years. So,

0:48:56 Thomas: Yeah. There was some card, again, I think it was for graduation or something like that. Said, and you black holes, you're so ominous. It was some sardonic thing. You can check the results if you want. The NAACP threw a fit over this because they thought it was saying that black, they thought he was saying black hoes. And furthermore, they thought saying ominous was some sort of insult. I'm not making this up. This was incredibly frustrating to see. Especially if you're someone who like I am, you know, I'm pretty liberal and I'm in favor of getting rid of racism wherever we can, to see probably the dumbest reaction I've ever seen to something, and to the point where I believe this was taken off the shelves, this card was actually taken off of the shelves because a group, I think a part of the NAACP thought it was talking about black hoes.

And it thought it was, it thought somehow calling them ominous, first of all, like that made sense, which it didn't, and secondly, it though it was some sort of insult, rather than just realize, no, it's saying black holes, it, black, black holes. You know, you know science? It's that thing. And I'm not making this example up, I strongly encourage you to Google it. It. That's a case where the appropriate response

0:50:17 Thomas: Is, oh no, no, no, you're mistaken. That, that is, that, that's a load of crap. What you're saying is complete crap. You, you are, you are feeling hurt, but it's wrong. You are wrong to feel hurt in this case. I hope this should be uncontroversial. I really hope that it should be uncontroversial that if, if someone decides that the phrase black holes are so ominous is somehow saying something bad about black people, I would I would hope it's uncontroversial to be able to tell that person, no, you're just mistaken. Don't worry about it. Check your, you know, maybe ask someone next time or be more careful in the future because that's, you know, ludicrous. No one had any intent to harm anyone with that obviously not black people related thing.

The only reason I bring this up is because it is not, it can't be a rule that whenever someone says they're harmed, they're right. It just, it's not going to work. It's not a good way to go about business. I mean, if you want to say that whenever someone is harmed by something, you need to listen to them, then sure, you should listen to them. We should listen, we should be receptive to that, we should be willing to change our behavior, we should be, you know, whatever it is, but there has to be a reasonable explanation. We have to be able to handle it in our minds and relate and say, oh, I see, I do, I understand.

0:51:37 Thomas: Well, having said all that, I'm somehow already out of time. So, that addresses, I think, some of the misconceptions. The one last thing I would say is I got a lot of comments that said, like, hey, you wouldn't call someone retarded, right? Yeah, so don't use the word crazy. Total non sequitur, total non sequitur. None of this was ever about calling people these things. This was never me saying, yeah, I should call people crazy. I should call people who are, you know, are missing a limb. I be like, you're so lame. That's not it at all. It's using the other meanings of the words which are well understood, crazy, which is unpredictable.

You know, that was unpredictable. That was wild. That was Crazy. Oh, the other thing I'll say is people are under the impression that saying someone is dumb or that was stupid or that was idiotic, that there's somewhat how a way better and more descriptive way. And then when I saw people posting suggestions, almost every single one was just a vague insult. It was just like, oh, douche muffin, douce donut, oh, dummy, like it was just stupid insults. That's not more descriptive, by the way. That's less descriptive. Then you've just said, oh, I'm a four-year-old and I'm insulting someone. Calling someone dumb or saying what they're saying is stupid or ignorant or whatever the case may be is

0:52:57 Thomas: More descriptive than just calling them a douche donut or whatever. I saw just a a bunch of examples of just insults, and that's not more descriptive, just so people know. All right, I could say a lot more about that. There's tons of debate. I could be wrong. Let me say this. I would say that I'm not a fan of the term lame. I actually am kind of questioning that one. I think that one may be different because the definition is pretty clear. Like, like lame means lamed, you know, and we do, that one almost, you can almost say that one is like the word gay. Crazy, I don't think is. Stupid, I do not think is, not even close. But the word lame, I will say I am worried about that one. I may be wrong about that. I will tell you what, I'll throw, people who disagree with me, I'LL THROW YOU A BONE. I will try to not use that word. I will check my vocabulary there and I will do my best to use another word because I'm not sure about that one.

That one I can see a pretty good argument for, actually. So there you go. I mean, I'm fully willing to change my mind and to say what I'm wrong. And I think I could be wrong about that. It's hard. I'm not 100%. I'm going to think about it more, but I will

0:54:18 Thomas: Try to avoid using it because since I'm not sure, you know, why not avoid using it because I can. But otherwise, crazy, I'm never going to, I mean, I say things are crazy all the time. I mean it's just something, it's so ingrained, the meaning is so not that I'm trying to insult someone who suffers from a mental disability. It's just not even close to me and same with stupid. Stupid is even further away because there's just no connection. I don't, anyway, all right, I've gone on too long. Thanks for listening. That was an incredibly contentious episode, like I said, and I appreciate the debate. I look forward to hearing more from people and we'll see what people say. Maybe I'll change my mind on more words, but for now I think lame is the one that that I do get. I'm gonna do my best to not say that. All right, thank you for listening. See you next time.