DOD209: My Kids Stopped Talking To Me for NO Reason

Transcript

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

0:00:02 Clip: I'm the cool dad, that's my thing I know now what I can offer you that no one else can Complete and under-dependent I'm a man, I'm sensitive I need to feel loved, I need part of being a father that I enjoy

0:00:29 Tom: Welcome to Dear Old Dads, the podcast that's not returning your calls. I'm Tom Curry. I am joined, as always, by Thomas Smith and Eli Bosnick. Hello, gentlemen.

0:00:39 Eli: Hellooooooooooooo! Heh heh heh heh.

0:00:41 Tom: We're going full Heath on this podcast. We are not returning anybody's calls.

0:00:41 Thomas: How's it going? Yeah. But we do read your emails.

0:00:48 Tom: We do. We do, in fact, read your emails.

0:00:48 Eli: Me too. Me too, we'll read them out loud.

0:00:51 Thomas: Sometimes. I don't know. No.

0:00:51 Eli: Not on this episode, which is a real interesting and to what Tom said. You'd think that we were about to introduce an email from our listeners,

0:01:02 Thomas: We read them. I'm just saying. Yeah, we read them

0:01:04 Tom: I'm not convinced Heath doesn't read emails and texts. I just think he doesn't respond or care.

0:01:07 Thomas: Oh, I think he reads. Yeah. I think you reads the text that says, Hey, I really need to hear from you. I don't know where you are you live? I think it reads it and gets a little smiles ago. That's nice. You know?

0:01:10 Eli: But yeah, he just doesn't care.

0:01:19 Tom: Oh, I feel loved.

0:01:19 Eli: What I think is he looks down at the notification and he reads the first four words, and if they're not trapped under A, he's like okay I'll get to it when I get to it and here's the thing all right life's not a race at the end when we get to the pearly gates god's not going to be like well eli you answered 100 texts and heath only answered seven right he's just has an objectively better life for that reason

0:01:45 Thomas: Yep. Yep. A hundred percent. What?

0:01:46 Tom: Yeah. Heath is doing all the things that I'm like, people should do this.

0:01:49 Eli: People should do that yeah

0:01:50 Tom: He's like, yeah, I fucking do it. And you're just like, how's it working out, Heath? And he's like I'm very happy. I'm, like, oh, shit. Yeah.

0:01:53 Eli: It's great it's green got a wife by the time you hear this podcast listener he'll be married married with a step kid yeah

0:02:02 Thomas: The fuck?

0:02:00 Tom: Jesus, that's right. Yeah. You didn't get your invite? I didn't either. We're not invited. We're, like. We're. Not. Invited.

0:02:05 Thomas: Jesus Christ. Is that already now?

0:02:09 Eli: That is already now now

0:02:10 Thomas: What day is it? Where am I? Yeah. But, and it's a waste on Heath. Cause like I have a ton of notifications and texts and emails, but they're all fucking horseshit crap. Like I wish

0:02:21 Tom: Okay. That hurts my feelings a little.

0:02:21 Thomas: I had like, Heath probably has a bunch, you don't email me. Heath probably has like a bunch of like, you know, Cool people like maybe his friend Thomas. He's like, hey, man, I would love to talk to you. And if I had that, I would answer those texts. So Heath is still a monster. I just make that very clear.

0:02:41 Tom: Thomas is just like fucking like ads and fucking nonsense

0:02:43 Thomas: God, yeah, it's all fucking work stuff that I'm not don't need to read because it's stupid. Or I don't want to. You know, it is all nothing. It sucks.

0:02:51 Tom: Do you guys delete your emails I'm curious I I just want to ask this question

0:02:54 Eli: I'm an inbox zero person

0:02:55 Thomas: He is an Inbox Zero guy.

0:02:56 Eli: There are very few things where I'm like I should enforce my life on other people and everyone should be polyamorous and your inbox should have no emails in it if there isn't time for emails

0:03:07 Tom: I have never deleted an email from either my business or personal account and I don't mean like I don't delete many emails what I mean when I say that is I've never deleted any email and I don't ever want

0:03:19 Thomas: Yeah. I think that is a good way to do it.

0:03:19 Eli: Now that's insane I'm gonna

0:03:21 Tom: I just got a notification from my work that says that I've filled up our maximum allotted because I've been here 13 years and I've I've never deleted an email and I'm not going to. And so it's like, hey, you've got 70 gigs of space chewed up in your email box. You're going to have to do something about that. And so I literally called our IT director so that I could auto archive without deleting any of my emails into a separate space, like a separate partition space that he made for me because I am not going get rid of. I told him like, I'm unwilling to get rid OF any email. I will never get rid Of one, not ever.

0:03:29 Thomas: Oh, my God. Jeez.

0:03:54 Tom: And I'll tell you what, that sounds crazy. I'll tell you what, man, I got sued once by an ex -employee and I was able to go back through all of my emails and document every single conversation that we had. No problem. I was like, oh, OK, no problem.

0:03:55 Eli: Die yes okay counterpoint tom thomas was also sued and whatever your email policy is his is the opposite well I tell you every friday I load every email onto a hard drive and then I throw it in the river and then I go oh water why must you be wet like so there's the proof that thomas was not taken down by his email practices I'm afraid it counts it counters

0:04:32 Tom: Well. Well, there are plenty of emails that I have that say, let me call you on that because that's a policy I have.

0:04:38 Eli: Yours I'm

0:04:40 Thomas: See, that's where you're smarter than me. I really everything about me was the worst possible quality for getting sued in this way because I just but anyway, we won't get into that. I will say, Eli, do you need to delete them? Because I'm harsh. I might be like a mix between you two because I don't know. I don' t know. I just use that. But for the red unread distinction.

0:04:59 Tom: That's what I do.

0:04:59 Thomas: So if everything's red, that's inbox zero if stuff is unread that's not inbox zero why does that matter what does it matter yeah exactly and then what happens is I keep up with it for a little bit until it gets to a number that's slightly too big and then I never keep up With it again and it swells to hundreds and hundreds until I kill myself

0:05:02 Tom: Same.

0:05:04 Eli: Gonna throw up on my own dick and die

0:05:06 Tom: Yeah, that's it. Anything unread is work I still have to do. Yeah.

0:05:20 Thomas: And then life is over and it doesn't matter that's my policy

0:05:23 Eli: The notifications badge has destroyed the american spirit you want to know why we don't make railroads anymore it's because these fucking cucks out there don't see a little red number five and so they're like I'm done with my no your email your email is done when there is no email in your inbox it goes to the outbox you don't you don'T ever need to look at it again if you solve it if you fix it or you organize it

0:05:26 Thomas: Yeah that can't be there what why what if you need to look at something you got sent You never need to look at, what are you talking about? What if the email, okay, here's the email. Here's the, yeah, well, that's, again, that's kind of the same thing, Eli. That's kindof the same things.

0:05:51 Tom: No. No, that is crazy.

0:05:56 Eli: No because that goes out of your inbox into its own separate folder. No. No, because it's literally not a folder with my inbox. It's its own separate folder.

0:06:00 Thomas: That's still your inbox. Like it's a folder within your inbox if you go to the folder labeled all mail, it's in there. No, all mail is everything. Do you use Gmail? What, what?

0:06:01 Tom: That is crazy that is still part of your inbox. Box I

0:06:09 Eli: No. No. It goes out of there and into the special folder I have. Cleveland Live Show. MOTM 2025. PAX Unplugged 2025. QED 2025.

0:06:19 Thomas: No, that' fair.

0:06:20 Eli: PerformCare. They're just different folders. And it's all there. And then when I...

0:06:15 Tom: Got no no

0:06:22 Thomas: Okay, well that's fine. As long as you're not just deleting shit that you need. That's the part I didn't get. It no I get it that's a good approach I mean I still think you can just do it the way tom and I do which is market is red and then it's basically it's the same thing yeah

0:06:31 Tom: Yeah like I got an email from Eli the other day hey pay our CPA so I was just like that's a cool thing to do I'll just leave that unread until I pay and that's how I paid him I literally I left it unread and it bothers me to see so I'm like fuck I gotta do that and then as soon as like we got that I pay him no

0:06:47 Thomas: But tom until you get to too many on red and danny that you're fucked that's me anyway I try I used to inflation though you know

0:06:51 Tom: I keep that number like under six or seven like I try to keep that number like low because it does make me itchy it makes makes me

0:06:58 Eli: I get it.

0:07:00 Thomas: Man what the fuck were we talking

0:07:02 Tom: Crazy is there anything worse than an email box eli that's full of okay

0:07:06 Eli: Why it's the auto -ends. And the spam email of your podcasting experience. But you can get a fantastic ad blocker in the form of patreon.com forward slash dear old dads where for as little as a buck a show, you can get rid of those ants. You can get commercial free extended edition of every single show. Last week, I talked about Max's preschool graduation, but you'll only find out about it if you give us your money over at patreon.com forward slash dear old dads. Wipe into it.

0:07:45 Ad: [Ad break 1 — ad music]

0:07:46 Tom: All right so we're going to talk today about an article that thomas put in our show notes here this is from a sendai I've never heard of it

0:07:50 Thomas: About huh oh yeah baby I don't know what it is it was tweeted by michael I don' t have lydia here to give me his last name the guy from the podcast he listened to and I listened to tom the michael yes it was tweeted by michael hobbs for for I don't know why I don'T KNOW WHY but I saw like one word of it and I was like this yes I need to read whatever the fuck this is and it just resonated with me so hard because I see this in people all the time and I hate it it's like I hate this quality so much but anyway that's where I found

0:08:04 Tom: Michael hobbs michael joe rogan

0:08:05 Eli: That joe

0:08:24 Tom: Just a brief summary it's called down the rabbit hole the The World of Estranged Parents Forums. So this is a really fascinating read. You know, obviously there are forums for fucking everybody. And there are forms for children who have chosen or been estranged from their parents. And then there are forum for parents who are estranged from their children that do not want to be estranged from their child. And they noted in the article or in this blog, whatever it is, they noted that there's a commonality in the estranged parents forum That I think is really interesting.

0:08:54 Thomas: It yeah so you could also rename those as the worst people in the world and probably some of the better people in the world would be those two.

0:09:03 Tom: Yeah, right. Yeah. And so and so like in the parents forum where the parents are saying, hey, you know, my kids cut off contact and I really miss my grandkids. My kids don't let me see him. And, you Know, all this stuff. There is a near pathological lack of personal introspection and accountability where they don't seem to acknowledge to the point of not even properly summarizing conversations that are had. Like, purposely just, like, under -summarizing, cutting off, like Any kind of, you know, explanation value Yeah, no,

0:09:11 Eli: Rogan

0:09:21 Thomas: Oh God. Yes. Yep. It's the missing, missing reasons. Yeah.

0:09:38 Eli: Have you guys seen clips of or heard any of I can't listen to a full episode of the conversation

0:09:45 Tom: I'm not familiar with it

0:09:46 Eli: This fucking rules it's a brother and a sister mostly the brother but the sister joins in too they're doing a podcast their parents are trumpers their dad is the chief trumper and they do a podcast where they just try to talk to their parents and it is this article living breathing every single week it's nuts the conversation there's this fucking incredible moment where he's like hey dad you're about to end the conversation he's like what are you talking about and he's like you do this thing right before you you end a conversation on your terms where you say like well we'll see what happens or something like that because you don't want to like continue talking about this point so like I want you to know something he's He's like, I don't do that. And he's like okay, that's what you do. I just want you to know that you do that and then literally the next words out of the dad's mouth are well I guess we'll see what happens and he's just, he's not, he's, like, you, you did it.

0:10:03 Thomas: No, man. Really?

0:10:11 Tom: It's called the conversation, okay

0:10:45 Thomas: Oh,

0:10:46 Eli: He's, he, he is, like I can't, I can, I'm busy. He's , like, tell me what you're about to do right now. It's fucking, it's, it, it it's beautiful. It's beautiful, it' s what you want all those people to say. That's what this article reminded me of.

0:10:56 Thomas: Wow. Any other better podcasts that people should be listening to that aren't ours, Eli or Joe Rogan? Wow.

0:11:01 Eli: Yeah, exactly, yeah, no, um, yeah, Joe Rogan, listen to that. See my buddy Oz Perlman on there talking shit about the telepathy tapes.

0:11:08 Tom: I am somebody estranged, purposefully estranged from one of my parents I don't want to say I'm pro -estrangement What I am is, like I understand that there are sometimes really good reasons reasons really powerful personal and and safe good reasons to just be like yeah that person is not part of my life anymore right that person is not Part of My

0:11:26 Thomas: I just realized, Tom, you're doing the exact I'm not pro abortion. I just think sometimes there's good reasons. And I'm realizing, like, I'm pro abortion, like I'm just going to go ahead and say I'm Pro abortion. And Tom is like Bill Clinton.

0:11:32 Tom: Life it's hedging and hedging and hedding

0:11:41 Thomas: Look, it should be safe, available and rare. Rare it should know what was this thing was something something rare or whatever that was the the clintonian like abortion thing tom was like estrangement should be available but rare and I'm like no fucking estranged yesterday everybody is strange it's hard I think they should hand out third trimester estrangements that's what I'm saying

0:11:55 Tom: I don't believe that at all you don't belief that the thing is like I do think that if you were to if you were go find my mom and ask her why we are estranged I think she would be be very confused. I don't think she understands why we're estranged.

0:12:02 Thomas: Mandatory god do you think she would be exactly one of these people

0:12:15 Tom: Yeah, I do. I think she would not fully understand why we were estranged, yeah.

0:12:19 Thomas: Oh it's the best please read one of them so people know what we're talking about in your best estranged parent voice. You have to fake confusion. You really got to fake confusion hard.

0:12:24 Tom: I was abandoned by my daughter six years ago this June. I received a text message that said, the keys are under the mat. I've moved out. Don't come looking for me. I never want to see you again. You've ruined my life. I got home, and I found my husband standing in her empty room. She had a prepared speech that she emailed to me. She didn't even say mom or dad anywhere in it. It was just me or my husband's first name. She stopped communicating with me about a year after but each time I asked why I got the prepared speech or some slung together four -letter words I didn't appreciate and all my husband said was well she's 18 I was expecting this well I wasn't I love that idea like every time we ask why she tells us why right they're

0:13:05 Thomas: I love it so much. All I get is these reasons. It's weird, but I don't know what they are. I can't tell you what they Are. God, it's the best. Oh, it' the best Oh,

0:13:15 Tom: Just like I can't figure it out there because Because

0:13:17 Thomas: I just get this prepared speech. Yeah, what's in the speech?

0:13:20 Tom: Something about how I never listen, it's just more bullshit about how I never listened. I don't know. I couldn't hear it. Let me read a couple more because I think they're illustrative.

0:13:22 Thomas: Yeah. Oh god please I love these these are like there's opium to me I fucking love it I've oh give me

0:13:37 Tom: Sometimes when I've tried, all I've had back is pages and pages of abuse. It kills me and my husband when we have to read what a despicable person I am, how I'm evil and twisted and negative and a thousand other things. I sent an email to the middle son asking what we had ever done after all these years, and no one has ever spelled it out. And the reply last night was unbelievable. The things he said were cruel, vindictive, and completely untrue. He remembers things in a totally distorted way, and he believes 100 % that this stuff is true, no matter how much we want to try to tell him that he has it wrong.

0:13:43 Thomas: More in caps

0:14:14 Tom: Clearly you have reasons.

0:14:16 Thomas: So good it's so fucking good yeah

0:14:17 Tom: Like, clearly there are reasons.

0:14:17 Thomas: All I get is multiple novels like worth a fucking in a compendium of reasons, but I don't know why. Nobody will tell me.

0:14:24 Tom: Nobody ever explains it.

0:14:25 Eli: Now tell me in a way that I will like.

0:14:25 Thomas: God, I love it. Yeah.

0:14:28 Eli: Tell me why you're not talking to me anymore. Because I don't think that's nice. Do a nice version of why you are ending our relationship.

0:14:38 Tom: Yeah, right. Right. Like there's never going to be a scenario where you get a message from your kid that says, I don't want to ever see you again. And you read it and you're like, yeah, that tracks. I get that. I did all the right things. I did it all the way. Yeah. You know what? I did. All the right things. And my kid doesn't ever want to talk to me again. Like, of course you're going to read it and be like, Yeah, it fucking sucks to read that. Like of course it sucks to that. It's outlining the reasons you suck that's what that is by definition you fucking idiots it is

0:15:04 Thomas: It's so funny. God it's so funny. And it's so funny because this article or it's, it's some sort of psychology paper or something, but whatever it is, it describes the opposite, which is the estranged kids forum where they're the opposite people. Like, and I just don't know. I just wonder why this is. Are we just getting a gerrymandered collection of people or is there some generational difference or is it just, I don't know what, but the kids are all intensely introspective. They don't want to be estranged. They're always like, all right, I've tried a lot of times and I've got here, let me know where I went wrong. And it describes how the kids in those forms are talking. And It's just like, okay, here's what you should do. Talk to them this way. And then what did they say? And then they're actually like scrutinizing each other. And it's like real people and the parents what I love the most about this estranged parents forum is what is the value of that to each other what isthe value would you find any value any of the two of you in going to a place and being like yeah I had a fight the other day and my friend he was mad at me for nothing and then they were like oh my god that's so hard what would you was Is that valuable to you? You don't tell them any of the details. They're just like on your side for no reason. It has nothing to do with anything. What is the value of that? It's so weird to me.

0:16:28 Tom: Super fucking weird and I will also say it's real real common it's really common I see these these are like emotional confirmation bias spaces where like you go in and like it's like oh I have this set of emotions I'm mad about this this part of the world I'm bad about these people in it and you look and it's yeah all right these are just people that want to say I also have the same feelings about being mad I also have been aggrieved by the same group I also have been done wrong by my kids or done wrong by I mean you see it in like men's groups all the time you see the same kind of talking in men's rooms when they talk about like the way that like women have done done them wrong and you're like

0:16:32 Thomas: Yeah, I guess. Oh, good point. Yeah, they're exes in divorce court or whatever.

0:17:07 Eli: Oh yeah, definitely. It's a big one.

0:17:09 Tom: Yeah I think this is like a common sort of psychologically I think that's right I think it's pretty common I think it's still pretty fucking troubling right yeah

0:17:14 Thomas: Yeah, it's worthless. Absolutely worthless.

0:17:17 Eli: It's the modern digital version of the dive bar. Like I remember, have you ever been in a bar and a guy's like tries to make conversation with you and you're like oh god here we go and then he tells a story where he is so obviously the villain that you're like and so was your punishment to come here and tell strangers this story right and so they said once you shit on the bus you're not allowed on the bed anymore and you know you're just like yeah man I agree yeah

0:17:45 Thomas: Well, to me, it is. And this happens in more than just the estranged parent thing, as you're kind of highlighting. Just in my life and maybe this is why I have so few friends just when I hear the part of the story people get to where you can see in their face that they know they're wrong in this instance and you're like so wait what did they say when this happened and you see them do that split second I don't they didn't even say anything they I don'T know what this and then instantly I'm not interested in any of this like if you're not you're NOT giving me the story why would I like give you support for whatever thing you're about I'm happy to give people support if they actually you know tell me what's going on but like for all I know you fucking suck and did a bad thing why would I want to give you sport for being a shitty person you know what I mean like I don't understand it I do not understand the part where you're going to a forum we're giving people no details other than well this person was mean to me for reasons that

0:18:41 Tom: For reasons.

0:18:41 Thomas: Don't exist and then you're getting a bunch of other people being like oh they're the worst it's like what is that you might as well talk to chat GPT and just have just have a robot do it what is that there's no point

0:18:53 Eli: I think it is especially when it comes to like the older generation generation and neglectful parents or parents who have sort of been separated from their children through their own behaviors. I think there is a generational, like, because I'm very interested in like the function social media serves for different generations, like how they use it. And I think one of the uses that that generation has found for social media, the internet, forums, et cetera, Is when everyone in their life tells them they are wrong, they turn to those open forums to say, well, I got 100 likes on that post. Right. Right.

0:19:31 Thomas: Anti -vaxxers all that everything all of that

0:19:34 Tom: Yeah, that's 1000 % the problem of having too big of an ocean to fish in. If you have an entire ocean to fish and at some point, you're going to collect a whole bunch of incel like incels are a great example of the same cultural problem. Like the whole incel idea would not be able to take root if you weren't able to fish into biggest possible pond for other incels but because you are it's real easy for a thousand of these people to all be together in some digital space if it was just one person who woke up and went to work and was like hey I got some crazy ideas everybody would be like get the fuck out of here jim that's nuts these ideas they don't flourish in person because they die everybody's like that's fucking crazy man And the same is true of like, if one of my kids stops talking to me forever, I'm going to know why I'm not going to be confused. Right.

0:20:29 Tom: I will know. But like you fucking know. Right? Like you just you

0:20:27 Thomas: I'm gonna die

0:20:30 Eli: They all know. They all now.

0:20:33 Thomas: Trying yeah they all

0:20:33 Tom: Fucking get it right. They all know what they're trying to do is to purposely lie to themselves through the conditioning and lens of other people enough that those lies become a different kind of reality. They're trying to create a new world yeah the internet and the ability to build community is wonderful the problem is you can build any fucking community you want

0:20:39 Thomas: Know yeah which I hate so much yeah

0:20:55 Eli: Right. It doesn't select for positive communities only.

0:20:58 Thomas: I also I think this is a real person thing too like a real life thing too I think people do this all the time in conversation when they get to talk to like a you know a stranger and tell them their stupid version of a story in order to get because people always prioritize relating to the human in front of them more than like they care about the details of any of that shit so those people can get that interaction in real life too but it's just on a bigger scale I guess online

0:20:58 Tom: Positive communities right yeah well the difference is if I go online I'm seeking out a place where everybody else has the same story if I'm going someplace in real life and somebody starts telling me this story and I don't have the same history I'm gonna ask the questions that make sense if I am having the same story, I'm going to avoid the questions I also don't want to ask.

0:21:41 Tom: So there is a pretty big difference in terms of like how echoey that echo chamber is. It's not as echoey in person, even if other people are generally eyes to eyes sympathetic. If somebody is like, hey, man, my fucking kids, my adult kid, they don't talk to me anymore. Oh, shit, that's so sucks. What happened? Why? Well, you know, they wrote me this letter. Holy shit. What the fuck's in that letter? Let me see that letter.

0:21:41 Thomas: Yeah fair yeah what'd you do did you abuse them or yeah what exactly is in the letter where is it do you have

0:22:06 Tom: You would naturally inquire to it. But I think what happens in these spaces is people don't ask. They say, oh, my God, the same thing happened to me. They reinforce. They don't asked. It's different. It is a different space. Right.

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0:22:25 Eli: So it wasn't in the article, but it was on the forum that the article refers to that I thought was really interesting. It was like one of the top pinned posts on that forum that I thought was fascinating and I think is worth discussing is like a lot of people separate from parents because those parents facilitated or perpetrated physical or sexual abuse. And when you try to talk to them about that abuse, it's a shut subject. Right. Right. So what often happens, and that's why I wanted to refer to this link, is a lot of the time people will say, I don't know the reason why. But when someone starts to talk about the physical or especially the sexual abuse, the parent will be like, we're not talking about that. That's not a conversation that's happening. And so when the kid just goes, OK, goodbye, in their head, they never got a reason because there should be a reason other than the bad thing they've decided they're not going to talk About.

0:23:21 Thomas: That's a cool trick I wish I could do that yeah let's not talk about the time I horribly wronged you that's not so that doesn't count that's free home base you can't touch me on that that's nothing yeah yeah yeah yep

0:23:57 Tom: Of maturity. Your kid's been living in this bad soup for a long time. They don't know it's bad soup. They have no idea. Then they mature into a space where they can see you, right? They fucking see you. And they're just like, wait a minute. I don't have to feel like this. I have other choices. I Have other options. I've other ways and means of identifying who's good and bad for me.

0:24:20 Thomas: Not to go all eli for a moment but a lot of these people are philosophical zombies and they don't realize that when they've been interacting with their own children on their own terms, that was them kind of cheating at the game of human interaction. When you raise something to be your little, like, yes man, you know, because you haven't given this kid, they haven't grown up enough to know what's really going on, and you're the kind of person that's not introspective enough to Know That's What You've Done, then when they mature enough to maybe not be that yes man anymore, then you're very confused and you don't know what the fuck's happening.

0:24:55 Tom: Well, and you know, like I think too, most of our introspection involves lying to ourselves to some degree, right? We cannot be objective arbiters of our own experiences. It's just not possible. There are a lot of people who are just bad at the process of honest introspection and being like, hey, I've hurt people in my life. That sucks. Yeah, that really sucks. And I should take ownership.

0:25:12 Thomas: Yeah, they don't even try. I go the other way I make up lies against myself I'm I'm my worst I'm like the fucking justice system I'm a prosecutor who's indicting myself with like you know how they can indict a ham sandwich I'm that ham sandwich that's me

0:25:20 Tom: I do want to say, though, I want to shift a little bit, that I am a little little bit like maybe nervous is too strong, but sort of aware that there seems to be in a lot of online spaces, there seemsと be a sort of like real quick reaction toward estrangement that you see. Like when people are like, hey, I had this experience, you know, with this family member or that family member. And like, admittedly, not cash money experiences, right?

0:25:56 Eli: Right?

0:25:56 Tom: In almost every case. And there is like a flood of commentary that I see that immediately jumps to fuck that go no contact. That is a form of terrible abuse that cannot be overcome. That person is toxic. Go no contact, and I do think that like that level of sort of, I don't know, reaction or reactivity that moves you from family to no family, that should be a high bar to cross, right? Right? I think it's a bar that we should cross when we need to cross it. I am pro estrangement when it's the right call, but I am also really aware. Yeah. Safe, effective, and rare. I mean, I do feel that way. I wouldn't want my kids to have, you know, if I look at it from the parents perspective, I wouldn'T want mykids to be like, Hey, you Know, I had a big fight with my dad and he was being a huge jerk about this. And, you KNOW, we had a fundamental disagreement on a value. You. And so I'm just leaving.

0:26:23 Eli: Yeah. He's not just a supporter. He is also a member. Yeah.

0:26:30 Thomas: Safe effective and rare safe effective in rare that was it no I'm pro estrangement are you kidding me I want my kids to be on a hair trigger for estrangements I want them because if I've done anything wrong to those kids first off it's not not going to happen. I will know the reasons. I'll do everything I can to make up for it. But if I can't, guess what? Fuck me. What am I going to blame now? If only you hadn't seen that internet comment, you wouldn't have estranged to me. That just doesn't exist. That's not real. If they estranged from me, then either I'm incredibly unlucky and someone suffered a mental breakdown, or what's 99 % more likely is I've somehow done something wrong. And my goal is to just try to not do that. I'm going to do everything that I can, be the best to my kids I I can and if I mess up enough that they don't want to talk to me well that's on me

0:27:34 Eli: They don't necessarily have to be wrong. They can also just be young and they can be unempathetic and they could be confused and silly. And the problem is, and we talk about this all the time, right? One of the problems of the internet is that it loads a bunch of people up with psychobabble ammunition, very serious terminology for not very serious problems. I mean, I don't know about you guys, but in the last 10 years, the amount of people who describe their ex, who was, and I need to emphasize this because I know it for a case to be true, not an abuser as an aboser, because the internet has just started referring to anyone you have broken up with as an Abuser has throuple quadrupled 10 billion times, right? Everybody has to talk about their toxic ex. Everybody has to start calling each other abusers. And it's, it's the term gaslighting, right. If you disagree with someone on the internet right now, Now, they just say, I won't let you gaslight me every single time. People have lost the sense of what that word means. Now, look, is awareness of gaslighting, is awareness of abusers amazing and good? Yes. And should abusers and gaslighted be called out? Absolutely. But there are also going to be doofusaurus rexes who aren't experiencing those things, who are weaponizing that language,

0:28:57 Eli: You know? And the problem is, I think a lot of young people are getting, and I just see this everywhere, in every term where it's sort of hyperbole thrives, a lot of young People get swept up in that sort of internet speak and don't realize quite what they're doing, saying, or embracing when they do it.

0:29:16 Thomas: Don't have any way of judging the prevalence of this do you how do you judge like where the dial is on this you know I'm globally like as a well I guess as a society our country whatever

0:29:26 Eli: That's a great question. Yeah.

0:29:26 Tom: I don't have any way of doing it objectively that's for sure. I do think that there's a visibility to it that maybe makes it seem more.

0:29:34 Thomas: That's the thing and I'm not even saying you're wrong it's just I've grown really weary of this because it's all of our fucking centrist commentariat now is well I saw someone be mean I saw a leftist be mean on on the internet. This has got to stop. And it's just like, I'm just sorry. I'm a little wary of this mode of reasoning. It's like, can we get an objective measure? If there's an objective measure for something, if there's some fucking National Institute of Estrangement, it's like hey, it turns out estrangement's up 400%. First off, that's only one variable. You have to also know like where were we in terms of what it should have been? Like how many people should have been estranged and weren't 10 years ago because people are putting up with abuse? Or Or, by the way, there are lots of places, religious culture, conservatism, where you're encouraged to not ever leave your abuser. And you're, you know, like, estrangement, I don't know what the right number should be. But it seems to me that it's kind of a dependent variable based on another variable, which is how shitty is everyone?

0:30:01 Tom: Yeah

0:30:32 Eli: Right.

0:30:32 Thomas: You know, how much should you be estranged? I don'T know the answers to those questions. And I just, I'm just a little weary of the reasoning by way of seeing the comments that are scary. You know?

0:30:42 Tom: I don't disagree that it is very difficult to make any kind of an objective statement and that there is a problem of like nobody is looking at the real internet right nobody is look at anything that's representative of anything wherever you are you are not in a representative space right because there's no such thing as a representative space every space you're in is a curated algorithmically non -identical space so whatever you're looking at whoever you are you've never seen anything at all representative of what's really out there I'm fucking very aware of that. Nonetheless, I do have a general worry, right? Because the worry I have is if we get this wrong, it's a fraud issue. If you get it wrong in the one direction, we are allowing and encouraging relationships with shitty, abusive people that objectively hurt our lives. That's no good. Like I am not a fan of that and I don't want anyone to do that. Don't do that, don't do that. But if we get it in the other direction, it becomes more isolated. If we get wrong in the other direction we don't have family yeah

0:31:16 Thomas: Yeah. Hmm. Yeah. Well, we've talked about conflict is not abuse, right?

0:31:47 Eli: I think we've mentioned it. Yeah. But it's a Great Book. Yeah. It's a good book. It's great book. Book it's incredible book yeah

0:31:48 Tom: But we should talk more about it because that's a big deal

0:31:52 Thomas: Yeah. Oh, I think I read it because of you, Eli.

0:31:55 Eli: The book on tape is awful but other than that it's

0:31:57 Thomas: Oh yeah. Okay. I think we did have this conversation cause I don't read. So I did the audible version. And what's funny is this was a few years ago before I really paid any, like that much attention to like the Israel conflict. And it was before obviously October's and before all that. And so halfway through the book, she just starts talking about that and how that's a model of the conflict is not abuse thing. And then I was like, I don't know what the fuck this is. And now in the year of our Lord 2025, I'm like, oh, okay, you also nailed that. Cool. Yeah, that makes sense. Hmm.

0:32:10 Eli: Great yeah exactly yeah yeah no she absolutely nails it it's such a smart book and it's it's so funny because talking about that book with people who have read it is so telling as to how someone uses or values information because if you talk to someone about thatbook who's read it and the first thing they tell you about is why everyone that they've ever accused is actually evil you're you're like, oh, okay, we found it. There it is. And I'll admit my own biases, right? Because obviously, and look, this is a situation that I think nobody else is fucking in.

0:32:58 Eli: So talk about your unsympathetic takes. But because we have curated an extremely leftist space and we have done it on purpose and we love that, we don't apologize for that. We are super duper happy to have curated that space. It means that we tolerate and deal with on a regular basis the silliest opinions of the left because if there are silly opinions from the right we block and ban those people right we jump in we don't block and band someone who says you want to kill all the snakes that person doesn't see social consequences but if you came into any of our facebook groups or into our inboxes right and said like you know trans women are ruining the sports we'd be like fuck you right you don't get a perch to hold on to with your silliness if your sillliness comes comes from the right, but if you say they want to kill all the snakes in the world, our community will allow you to say that. Now, I think it's because you want to Kill All the Snakes in the World guy isn't as harmful as a transphobe. I don't think they're making snake survival laws to keep kids out of classrooms, right? I am very happy with where we've settled, but in my day -to -day existence and in my, like, last five years especially, when I think about the things that that have been threats to like my mental health, my safety, my livelihood, right? They have all come from the left. So I think it's a really good point to make, Thomas, that like, I think that the objective measure from the National Institute of getting rid of your fucking shitty dad means that probably not enough people get rid of their shitty dads rather than people are over

0:34:29 Eli: Getting rid of their shitty dads. But I think my bias comes because of what I see. And keep in mind, like, I am a person who has uninstalled Facebook from every advice, gotten rid of Instagram from every device, blocked myself from the patreon comments I can't even read patreon comments anymore so the interactions that I have are literally when my co-workers have to come to me and say hey man someone on the facebook group said you want to kill all the snakes did you kill a snake on a live stream I

0:34:46 Thomas: Dang. You need to hire someone to just read you random good comments to give you a sense of at least proportion, don't you think? You got to get a good mix of that.

0:35:06 Eli: Think I need the this too shall pass guy that king david had I just need him to tell me and that's my therapist that's what it

0:35:19 Ad: [Ad break 3 — ad music]

0:35:20 Thomas: I I want to apologize. The intensity of my distaste for this is not based on anything you guys are saying. It's based on the anti -woke stuff that I do all the time, which is the fucking people who make a zillion dollars writing for Atlantic who are talentless fucking hacks who just go on and write the same article about how they saw a Twitter. Oh, I would love

0:35:36 Tom: You said you liked my article yeah

0:35:40 Thomas: An article that you wrote for the Atlantic. No, but they just write the same shit about the Facebook book comment, they saw the Twitter comment and that became our whole politics, you know, is overreacting to that. So I have a bit of a sore spot for that. But I do want to say it's not that I'm unconcerned about this. I just wish I knew the balance. But to be fair, when I think about the conflict is not abuse book, which I know, and Eli, I think you nailed it. I think there is some stuff in there that I don't agree with, but like, it's very, very interesting to read. I do worry that we are, I think tilting the balance more toward not estrangement. Cause I don't know about if that's happening more. And I also think it should have been happening more, but when it comes to just day-to-day interactions and our kind of our politics, I do worry that we are leaning too much toward a never fucking talk to that person again at a hair trigger. And I do worried that that balance is tilting that way. I don'T know that it is, but I do think in general, the world would be better if we were all a little better at trying to resolve uncomfortable conflict. And I'm not talking about, cause everyone will go to the, Oh, so you're saying mine, abuser. I need to go say hi to them and have breakfast. No, shut the fuck up. I'm not saying any of that. But there's a bunch, a whole bunch of marginal interactions that I think are what you're talking about, Tom, where it's like this person, maybe, you know, maybe someone did mess up somewhere. People make mistakes. Maybe someone or maybe you made the mistake and you thought someone messed up and actually you're wrong. You're not going to find out unless you are able to deal with conflict in a more mature way and have an attempt to have a conversation. And by the way, if you try to have that conversation once, twice, and it still sucks and you confirm they suck, then go ahead by all means. Do the estrangement. It's like, unless you're dealing with literally an abuse, like an actual abuser, whatever, that's a different story. I'm talking about someone you had a conflict with where you feel like they've wronged you or something like that.

0:37:27 Thomas: There's just no downside, but people do it to protect their egos. Like this article makes clear. It really is just ego protection. It is protecting their feelings. They need to exist in this little space where there's no possibility they ever did anything wrong. And it's just bullshit. It's just fake.

0:37:41 Tom: Well the thing is like in online advice related spaces what I guess I see and I'm on a bunch of them in part to content farm for this show, right? So I joined a whole bunch of stuff because like

0:37:53 Eli: Hey that sucks man don't do

0:37:53 Tom: I want a content farm for the show. Yeah, it's the worst, bro. It's terrible. When I look around and I see in these spaces, there is a rush against nuance. There is a Rush against context. There Is a Rush against building bridges. There IS a Rush to say like every solution is fucking nuclear. Every solution is a binary. You know, that's not how people work. It doesn't teach people good lessons on how to like have relationships that can have things in them go wrong and then they can also be patched up and then we can also grow together from those things if conflict is always nuclear or always feels like it has this threat of becoming nuclear that's a fucking problem too and I do feel a sense and again this could be bullshit so like maybe I'm just wrong but like I do feel this sense from these spaces that I go look in online which again are not representative but like there's so many people who are so quick to say throw that whole person away and you're like wait a minute that's not cash money but this doesn't seem like something where we can't overcome this and like I also want to acknowledge like as a parent I have made mistakes Mistakes. I've made mistakes that I think I would like an opportunity to apologize for, right? And not have the entirety of that relationship be thrown away because I was human and made a mistake, right, or I prioritized wrong and made a mistake.

0:39:24 Thomas: But here's the other thing, Tom, if you got the list of grievances from your kid, you would fucking read it and you would actually deal with it. That's why this isn't when it comes to this specific thing. I just don't think this is a problem because nobody I don't Think any of these kids are estranging themselves for no no fucking reason. I think the vast majority of it is they have very good reasons. And maybe some of them are wrong. I don't know. And the parents that we hear from are just in fucking denial about it.

0:39:31 Tom: Oh, 100%. Dude, 100%, yeah. Yeah. Yes.

0:39:50 Eli: That yeah right the

0:39:51 Tom: Dude, 1 ,000%. 1 ,00%.

0:39:51 Thomas: And Maybe there's a bunch we don't hear from where they actually do try to deal with it. I don't Know, you know,

0:39:55 Eli: Notion that any of us on this podcast that our kid would be like hey it really hurt me when you did x and we would do anything but dig x out of our skulls with a kitchen knife right if max was like hey really hurt me when and I'd be like well good news daddy's gonna set himself on fire, and you can tell me when I get put out. Right, obviously. So I think for us, you know, that's a very,

0:40:02 Thomas: Kill ourselves. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah I'm just realizing though that may and I doubt this is what's happening with these people, but I'm Just realizing I do have to deal deal with Phoebe telling me that I'm the worst and I murdered her every day because she when she gets upset she goes to that hyperbole about how I'm The Worst Dad and I'm whatever so I do I just just as you said that I had this thought of like oh maybe could that be how this happens where they they tune no where parents tune it out and so they they don't take their kids concerns seriously maybe because maybe they tune too much of it out when they're little maybe for good reasons maybe maybe not. And then they don't ever make that switch in their brain where they're like, oh, wait, they're old enough to where if fucking seven year old Phoebe says you're the worst and you're the worst dad and I wish you'd never been born and all this stuff. It's like, all right, she's having a fit that she does it

0:40:42 Eli: She's going to cancel you online. That's right. Just wait until she starts tweeting.

0:41:07 Thomas: Five times a day. And it's like I always just patiently. Yeah, I just patiently sit there and say, oh. That's not very nice. And then she eventually like immediately is like, I didn't mean it, I'm sorry, you know, like right away.

0:41:07 Eli: Yeah. All right. You just can't, yeah, fit that in your brain. Yeah, exactly.

0:41:18 Thomas: But like maybe there's people who don't make that switch. If, you know, if even 10-year-old Phoebe does that, it's going to be a bit different thing. If 12-year-old Phoebe does that is going to be a different thing might still be bullshit. But am I not? I don't know. Wait, what's that?

0:41:29 Eli: I was at a convention over the weekend, and there was a kid there who very clearly had PDA. I know Phoebe does not have PDA, but it matters for the story. It's basically the fight or flight response activates very quickly when they are told what to do.

0:41:43 Thomas: Oh, never heard of that.

0:41:43 Eli: And so like everything, even the like most minor of criticisms or like directions, it just absolutely sets them off. And this girl was like eight, maybe nine years old. And she was just screaming, I'm going to kill myself at her mom. Her mom was getting her from the outside area into the hotel. And this kid is screaming and throwing everything. Her mom has like a bag and she's just taking things from the bag and throwing it and screw I'm gonna kill myself I'm going to kill myself and as someone who has dealt with someone who has dealt with meltdowns and knows how embarrassing that is I, like, cleaned up all the stuff and, like, put it back into this lady's bag and so when she came out I just sort of handed it to her and she was like thanks and I was like hey you're doing a make because the mom did so good the mom was fucking awesome you ever watch a parent just absolutely nail it on a tantrum and you're like hey I know you're embarrassed right now but you fucking

0:41:56 Thomas: Jesus. Maybe Phoebe does have this. Oh, nice. Oh.

0:42:37 Eli: Rule and so I was like hey you did a great job

0:42:38 Tom: That's an awesome thing to do.

0:42:38 Eli: She was like thanks yeah and so she she just fucking but I thought I know Phoebe is not the same and I know I don't want to compare the two

0:42:39 Thomas: Wow. Yeah. I don't know, man. Maybe she is. I don't. She gets it's pretty intense.

0:42:47 Eli: This kid was just wiling

0:42:49 Tom: What does PDA stand for?

0:42:50 Thomas: Public display of affection.

0:42:50 Eli: Out oh I don't public displays of affection pathological demand avoidance

0:42:56 Tom: Gotcha, gotcha.

0:42:57 Thomas: Oh, interesting. I gotta look that up.

0:42:59 Tom: So I also do think it's worth noting too that sometimes because we're talking about this as if the parents are just always the ones that are wrong but I happen to know somebody who's cut their parents off and they're wrong like their parents are really nice people they've worked hard they've given them lots of stuff they were there for them they were normal parents they made some mistakes but they did most of the things generally right right yeah

0:43:21 Thomas: It's like they didn't buy him the drugs the one time. And so he's cut them off or whatever.

0:43:25 Tom: So I also think it's worth noting because there may be parents out there listening to this show who are in a spot where they're like, hey, but I actually don't really know why I've become estranged. Sometimes people become assholes. That's just a true fact, right? Like sometimes people just become assholes and that sucks. And sometimes like people will leave you and maybe that's your kids and they'll leave you for reasons you don't understand and they're not explicable. And that sucks too. So I think that there's like when it comes to the estrangement thing I think that that's also worth noting is like it's it like these are generally adult children and those people can fuck up they can make mistakes they can do the wrong thing they can be turned by other people they can have they can just be assholes and that's possible as well so when I read this part of me was like yeah I know somebody though that I can see them on the forum being like yeah I don't really fucking know what happened here I did all the right things and I still got thrown to the curb right

0:44:21 Thomas: But okay. I want to make very clear in this article, it's talking about all the examples are where the parent has specifically made reference to what is obviously the reasons, like the email, all of the examples, the email the tirade, the whatever, the letter, they always make reference to it and never say what's in it, and I think if there's a real case like you're talking about, maybe there's the demand letter, and then that parent can be like, yeah, here's what it is they're like, you broke my bong, whatever the stupid thing is, and they could actually deal with it, maybe the parent would be correct, maybe, but there's no instance of this being correct, there's no instance of the parents receiving a letter or a, like multiple times and making reference to it and saying, yeah, that for no reason, no reason unless it literally was an invisible letter that they like to just nothing written on it. That's never correct.

0:45:14 Eli: Blank piece of paper.

0:45:15 Tom: There's just an owl here it's not even carrying anything it's just

0:45:17 Eli: Max, if you're listening and you ever want to cut daddy off and do a fun little goof, first of all, be careful because I'll kill myself in a second. But second of all just send me a blank letter and be like the reasons are in here. Because I'll spend a week with your mom putting different kinds of lemon on there to see if it's a fun goof. But again I will end it at a

0:45:32 Thomas: Milk or whatever. Very quickly. Yeah.

0:45:38 Eli: Moment's notice. I'm just living in the happening. All right, gentlemen before we go I got an email the other day that promised to teach me how to read maps backward, but it turns out it was just spam.

0:45:39 Clip: Dear old dad

0:45:57 Tom: A spam I was waiting for that

0:46:00 Thomas: What day is it? Where am I?

0:46:49 Eli: I'm gonna throw up on my own dick and die.

0:46:52 Thomas: I think they should hand out third trimester estrangements.

0:46:55 Tom: And I'll tell you what that sounds crazy

0:46:59 Thomas: I want my kids to be on a hair trigger for estrangement.