DOD291: Is Punching Each Other Therapy?

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

0:00:28 Tom: Welcome to Dear Old Dads, the podcast that's playing magic again with his son. Yes, I hijacked it just to tell you guys that Finn and I are playing magic again and I am very excited. I'm Tom Curry. I am joined as always by Thomas Smith and Eli Bosnick. Hello, gentlemen.

0:00:35 Eli: Oh! Back to Magic? I'm excited that you're playing Magic because that means I have good gifts for your family again. There was a rough year where I was like, ah, fuck, I hope you like these board games. These are new ones. I liked them.

0:00:42 Thomas: That's awesome. Sure.

0:00:48 Tom: Let me tell you a quick reigniting the magic spark story here real quick. I want to be clear. We have not actually played any magic, but that's because we both both decided that the game had gotten ridiculously expensive.

0:01:05 Thomas: Yeah. Well, and it's just insane. Every fucking card is a dictionary's worth of text now. It's like, fuck.

0:01:11 Tom: The game has gotten unbelievably expensive. They come out with a new set every 30 seconds, and, like, all the good cards are $50, $100, $200. You want to build, like a deck to even, like go to the local game store to play, you're dropping $300 or $400 just to, like not lose, right? And, you know, that's not even to win.

0:01:29 Tom: That's not Even like a competitive good deck. That's just something that you're not embarrassed like turn four with, right. But, but, but here's the thing. We're just proxying all the cards we're just with it fuck it fuck it fuck yeah that's

0:01:25 Thomas: It's insane. Yeah, there you go. Yeah! That's inevitably, this is why you start doing cube. This is why you start doin' cube. Inevitably, that's the evolution of every Magic player is like, I

0:01:39 Eli: Yeah, baby! I was, like, oh my god, I'm about to tell Tom about proxying. Yep, mm -hmm.

0:01:49 Thomas: Can't keep up with all this fucking shit so cube is when you take all the best cards throughout history and you draft them and you can use proxies for like the the good ones it's the best

0:01:57 Eli: Proxying is great because it's a really good way for me to get people into pirating. Because I know a lot of people who I'm like I steal everything you should steal it too and they're like I don't want to do that it feels wrong and then proxying is a gateway drug where they're wait a second I didn't take anything away from magic the gathering I just didn't buy their overpriced piece of shit they forced me to and then you are on a torrent server oh

0:02:25 Tom: Yeah yep it look we got a printer we got to fucking die cast cutter to make sure the cards look good we bought the right card stock like and he has been oh yeah oh yeah and like he is in heaven like my

0:02:33 Thomas: What oh wow you're really getting into it okay nice yeah

0:02:41 Tom: House looks like a fucking weird fucking wizards of the coast counterfeiting operation like it looks insane right now

0:02:45 Eli: Yeah oh look you need a box of 25 gloss paper and some card sleeves and you fucking cannot tell the difference yeah

0:02:54 Thomas: Yeah the sleeves really make it yeah that's awesome well and okay you already know this I was gonna say you can go on etsy and people do like really cool cool proxies for you that are like, they're like cool art or they're, yeah, it's awesome. You can look into that.

0:02:55 Tom: Yeah yeah like I just found I just looked there's whole communities of people that do this I just look down like okay

0:03:07 Eli: Oh yeah those are for sure those are good and there's a program that just lets you put in the

0:03:12 Tom: Well yeah that's what I was gonna yeah this is great you go into this program this architect program and then you export from or you build your deck and then you export from this into this other program he hits print it fucking prints them all out he cuts them all into pieces we throw them in sleeves boom we're done like we can actually go to the store and we can play and we can enjoy the game again without having to spend infinity dollars. We don't, no, just go to the game store

0:03:27 Thomas: That's awesome, ooh, well, you're not supposed to play with that. Wait, are you playing in Wizard and Sanctioned Events with that? Oh, gotcha, yeah.

0:03:31 Eli: Deck yes yeah

0:03:39 Tom: Down the street. You know, like what we discovered is you can't even go to The Game Store and play unless you spend three, four, $500 every time a set comes out or you just get fucking owned. You get owned. So like we are running a counterfeiting operation here in

0:03:39 Eli: 100

0:03:49 Thomas: Yeah it's insane. Yeah you can also get into more eternal formats by the way, the ones that don't change as much and then you, it'd be like a one -time expense and then can play with deck for longer, but it still sucks.

0:03:54 Tom: The Curry household. Thomas, Thomas, Thomas, I'm just following his lead, man. I spend I just want to be very clear no no I got you I will tell you that like he's like oh dad make a deck make a duck I just had claude make a few decks for me no it's so much but chat gpt like a year ago was trash at

0:04:06 Thomas: Oh yeah, for sure. No, I'm just giving I'm giving more ideas if he gets bored of that. Yeah.

0:04:15 Thomas: Oh, is it still bad at it? Didn't you say it sucked? Oh, yeah.

0:04:21 Eli: Funnest yeah no it's bad

0:04:21 Tom: It it couldn't even keep the colors right claude is like yeah here's a great deck and I'm like awesome thanks and I just literally copy and paste it from a text file into this architect program and then he takes it and puts it into this printer program and and then print it, and then I have that deck. It takes fucking minutes. It takes minutes. I just come up with a concept or a theme, and I'm like, hey, would this be a thing? And Claude is like, you're the smartest person ever.

0:04:46 Tom: I love you. And it fucking builds it for me. It's awesome.

0:04:47 Eli: Oh and then it builds up for you it's great yeah and if it's fake or doesn't turn out there's no fucking stay that's the other thing is people are like what if it gets it wrong and it's like everyone gets everything wrong have you met a person have you asked for help Help anywhere in your whole life ever.

0:04:55 Tom: Yeah, don't give a shit. Yeah, I know. I don't care. Like, the amount of I don'T care. He wants me to go with him on a Saturday to the game store. He's all excited that, like, I will go with them to this game store, and I am like, yeah, man, but I got to have a deck to play. I don't care how bad I lose I never would have cared how bad I lost like I would have brought fucking some old pre -con decks and been like yeah here I am an old fucker you know I don' t care yeah I don´t give a shit but like now I can go with something like fun and kind of original and I´ll still lose I´m bad at the game I´l still lose but I´d get to go with him and we get to play again

0:05:25 Thomas: Goblins.

0:05:37 Eli: And can I say, there's no better examination of masculinity than the game store. Because there are two kinds of men at the game story. Let me explain right now. The first kind of man is just a completely normal gentleman who happens to enjoy Magic the Gathering. You're like, hey man, what are you doing? He's like, well, I work in finance. My daughter is into having a son let me show you this picture here oh it looks like my uh my bomb went off you're going down and then there's someone who like lowers his fedora over his face and is like saipan unfortunately have you discovered the world's greatest magic the gathering player and you will never recover and you're just like wow have you seen all the cartoons they're about you are you not aware like the amount of people that I meet at just magic the gatherings not board game conventions luckily although they one or two sneaks in but the amount of people who I meet at a magic gathering tournament or a magic the gathering event who just are the stereotype of a thing where I want to go but surely you consume media where they say don't be this all

0:06:47 Eli: The media says don't be this yep

0:06:46 Tom: Okay I hate I hate to do it but like that's not a stereotype the one game store in town has a sign up that like people with bad hygiene will be asked

0:06:57 Eli: Every single every single magic the gathering event or thing that I have been at has had to have some kind of if you smell so bad other people are getting sick we're gonna ask you to leave sign and it's hand drawn in a hurry it's never printed yeah may

0:06:58 Tom: To leave I'm not even kidding yeah yeah that was done in a moment of extremist for sure like but I am excited so I wanted to jump in and tell you guys that

0:07:23 Thomas: That's so interesting that is an examination of

0:07:26 Eli: I give you some commander advice tom because there's two kinds of commander groups right much like there are two kinds and magic the gathering players there are two kinds of commander groups there's I'm just here to have a good time groups which is the group you should play with and then there's the I have tweaked the meta group which you should go to jail you should set them on fire you should pour antifreeze

0:07:40 Tom: 100 yeah oh

0:07:47 Thomas: Masculinity especially if you're playing commander why the you're commander is already the group of people who doesn't give a shit that's fucking

0:07:53 Eli: They should you'd think but there's nothing worse than sitting down in a commander group and being like yeah I'm running something fun and silly and they're like I'm writing ithgor the malnorthment and you're like oh Okay, well, I look forward to you winning and not getting to do anything.

0:07:55 Tom: We're playing commander yeah yeah well it's funny because like finn was all excited he's like we can proxy anything he and I both agree like I don't have any interest in like proxying the most powerful stuff because that's not just not even interesting to

0:08:11 Eli: Doing a nonogram on my phone while you talk. It's nothing.

0:08:22 Tom: Me like I want to do fun shit and if it doesn't work I'll like that didn't work like I don't care throw them in the garbage as far as I'm concerned it's literally seven dollars worth of card stock it doesn't

0:08:32 Eli: But gentlemen, do you know the only thing worse than the smell of exactly 50 % of Magic the Gathering players? Why? It's the auto -ads, the B .O. of your podcasting experience. But you can make all that go away over at patreon .com forward slash dear old dads. Where? For a commercial free version of every single show. You get it for a dollar. You get a dollar, you give us a dollar we give you a dollar over at Patreon .com Parenting story at the end. Bonus episode. Rip into it.

0:08:45 Thomas: Boring

0:09:09 Ad: [Ad break 1 — ad music]

0:09:10 Thomas: You know we need to make it a crime to smell I'm sorry I just realized we went we we did a a family trip to a museum. Uh, we went and saw a Monet exhibit. Lydia really wanted to see the Monet exhibit and we're like, let's go take everybody. And at a certain point, uh, looking around, I couldn't do it anymore. Cause I was like, Oh, somehow I got in the same area as someone who has the worst BO in the world. And now I don't get to have a museum, I guess you just have the museum. Dude.

0:09:14 Tom: Matter oh that happened to hayley and I at the top of the hancock building we were at the Top of the Hancock building they have this thing in chicago where the you can go to the window and then the windows like lean out they like they angle out and you can like look out at the city we're like oh let's go do that it's like a classic chicago tourist

0:09:50 Thomas: Can really imagine killing yourself. It's great.

0:09:52 Tom: Thing yeah we get some call to void shit like for sure yeah so no we were we We were up there and you're trapped and you were in line and there was a group of people in front of us and the stench wafting off of them was eye -watering.

0:10:05 Thomas: We need to make it acceptable in our society to be like smell everybody stop like there's

0:10:14 Eli: Yes! Hunt him down! Hunt them down!

0:10:14 Thomas: An alarm where everybody stop somebody smell everybody and we need a we need a neutral nose come and smell everybody because it's hard to place because like it's so bad that like it had the radius of it is really I did the thing where I was like I think it's that person so I weighed you know and then I went in again I was Like oh mate might not have been that per fuck and then I just left I was like I'm not I guess I don't see the rest of the paintings oh first thing your dad's done that I agree with yeah it

0:10:37 Tom: I told you my dad fired a guy for being stinky, right? I think I told that story.

0:10:42 Eli: It was good. No, it was Tom. And he was a child.

0:10:45 Tom: I've never been stinky. I'm like a crazy two or three showers a day person. I am pathological about not being stinky. Am I your dad? Eli, am I your Dad?

0:10:53 Eli: My dad was like, well, that's him.

0:10:57 Thomas: Was actually hold on

0:10:57 Tom: Like, we have, like, a lot in common.

0:10:59 Eli: You're a little, you're my dad if he succeeded. At a lot of things it's just my it's just all the financial like because all the financial things that someone stepped in and was like hey Tom don't do that my dad did it's Justin it's a lot more just all those financial bad times that's

0:11:12 Thomas: But Tom can't do sports so there's that your dad is a legend on the the football field of course

0:11:19 Tom: That's true. That's truth. That's your dad doesn't just drop shit all the time.

0:11:21 Eli: True that's truth that's true he was he's gonna be in the next we always get a little email when they're like you're the respondent there's some fucking NFL something coming out I think it's football manager NFL something something that's coming out and my dad's in it, which I'm always excited. Yeah. So dad's in whenever the NFL thing includes college and goes back far enough. Dad's in the game.

0:11:36 Thomas: Wait what

0:11:46 Tom: Yeah, that's so cool. Yeah.

0:11:47 Eli: Yeah. And for a while he was just in like what he was in like NFL 98 or whatever the fuck it was.

0:11:46 Thomas: Whoa that's awesome well actually so that's funny because they stopped making the college game for a while it's really fun I used to play with my brother it's been like 10 years or more actually but they stopped making it I think because they were arguing over rights maybe and so maybe that's why you didn't hear for a While but then I think they started making them again nice that's so fucking cool dude

0:12:08 Eli: Yeah, exactly. Which is why dad's back in there and his stats are on there and all that kind of stuff. He's, he's dead now. So when you Google him, it's just, Hey, that that guy fucking died but it used to be his like number one google result was people being like hey this guy they're wrong about how many interceptions he has because he had so many fucking interceptions at ecu and people were just like uh this statistic is wrong and I jumped on and I was like no I'm his kid his statistic isn't wrong look here's the like plaque they gave him and people were like fake and I was like all right cool this was pre -ai and I was still like okay cool well I tried to help fuck me

0:12:28 Thomas: Oh okay I'm googling

0:12:46 Tom: All right. So I found this crazy article from Vice, and I'm just going to read. I didn't watch the fucking multi -part video series because I don't want to but I want to read just the and here's the thing like I subscribe to Vice I have a subscription for not because I read Vice all that often but because it's good

0:13:03 Eli: He just wanted to support

0:13:09 Thomas: This yeah vice went to shit man yeah

0:13:11 Tom: Like you know it's good to hunt stories down for citation needed so I've got subscriptions to all kinds of crazy bullshit but like I get this email from Vice and I'm just going to read to you guys the opening paragraphs the opening salvo if you will and then we've got to talk about some of what's in here. Spartan Bare Knuckle Fight Club, it's not even in a car wash, is the UK's only licensed eight foot by eight foot bare knuckle pit fighting syndicate. A kind of rolling mobile punch up that draws baying crowds across the north of England. Spartan bouts are short, bloody and brutal and often end in knockouts. This is the part. Yet beneath the violence, The club aims to be a lifeline in difficult times. It was initially set up to try to decrease levels of knife crime, allowing disputes to be settled before they escalate, with one condition. You shake hands, and the argument is left in the pit. However, over seven years, Spartan's scope has grown wider, and it's become a form of community and therapy for men battling ill mental health and addiction, as well as the lure of crime. No.

0:13:32 Thomas: Yeah fucking cowards

0:14:21 Tom: That's my response to that. Absolutely not. Do I think that a bunch of mentally ill men are beating each other bloody with their bare fists? Absolutely.

0:14:21 Eli: Gavin

0:14:31 Tom: Do I Think That Violence Equals Therapy? What the actual no is that? No, no. But what I want to talk about with you guys is like, that is an enduring myth. Here's the question that I wanted to pose to you guys. Why the fuck have we decided that for men, violence is therapeutic? Like you've seen the rage rooms and like that feels very hyper masculine. There are a lot of times in places where it's like axe throwing. We've got this idea that like violent catharsis is actually catharsus. And by the way, it's just not. It's just there's literally all the research says the opposite.

0:14:31 Eli: Of course yeah

0:15:05 Thomas: Yeah well I don't know see here's why we're here tom all the most balanced people people mr rogers barack obama you know that they have a history of beating the living shit out of men day in day out you don't know this but they actually are cage fight uh mr roger's he killed a man in the cage it was it was uh they say it was an accident I'm not sure but see that's why we have this trope is because it's so provably to be true you know it's just so

0:15:34 Eli: What's so funny is like venting right which is what that's supposed to be punch a pillow fight you know yell scream all that stuff is like one of the best studied phenomenons in psychiatry short of like hitting your kids and being touched by a priest we're really sure venting's not good at you and every generation of men is like guys I have a new version of venting it's called the watch smash you go into a room you dive into a swimming pool full of valuable watches and then you eat as many as you can before you get to the surface and it makes me feel so good it's so much better for you than hitting your kids the other thing is like think about the societal tropes that we would not allow that we allow for men on a regular basis right the the notion that like men need a certain dose of violence right because we can't just get therapy when we were talking about this before we started the show tom said something that was very funny he said that's not therapy therapy is therapy,

0:16:37 Thomas: Yeah,

0:16:37 Eli: Right? But how many fucking news articles have we read that it's like blank is the new therapy that you would never do as a stereotype about a different gender or race, right. You wouldn't be like, Oh man, those Jews, they just need to count pennies. Sometimes, you know, there's a new Jewish form of therapy called penny diving and we just drop them into, yes. Oh man. Nothing makes them feel better

0:16:53 Thomas: You play Monopoly and they get to own everything.

0:17:03 Eli: Than dropping your Jewish friends into a bucket of pennies oh man of

0:17:09 Tom: Like these guys are gonna show up the shtick here is and I watched a little bit of the videos these are like genuinely like not well men they are not okay these guys aren't okay they're like fucking ptsd and criminal histories and like they were gonna knife each other like from the opening of that they're maybe the way to solve this is by you know obviously stabbing someone to death and instead they're like well what about if we just either both both give and receive traumatic brain injuries imagine going to the doctor and the doctor's like hey you don't seem well I mean you seem like you're suffering right I feel like you haven't been knocked unconscious

0:17:23 Thomas: Oh, what? Yeah. Hit your head with this hammer, but not that hard. Oh, wait, they're doing that, dude. The look looks maxing.

0:17:50 Tom: I feel Like you've been conscious too much they let me go ahead and solve that with a vast blow to the

0:17:52 Eli: Course

0:17:58 Thomas: I have a question because this could be a slightly different thing if it's men who are about to kill each other and they're like, all right, alternative you to take it to the car wash essentially and do like a boxing match instead. I don't know if that's good or bad. I have no agnostic on it. Is that what they're dealing with? Because you said they were going to knife each other. I wasn't because I would maybe be slightly different. It was like all right these people are trying to kill each other but if you do like a boxing match then maybe that actually like works or something or is it just yeah yeah

0:18:26 Tom: Head yeah I don't I don' t buy the premise though like here's the thing if I'm like I am gonna kill that human being I am going to kill that person and somebody and somebody says hey I actually am here to intervene first of all there are interventions that would work better than like let's put you in an eight foot by eight foot ring yeah no no right all right sure then the the second part of that sentence is like but the agreement is they shake hands and walk away and the beef is settled right the beef has quashed I don't buy that for a second not for first day

0:18:41 Thomas: Oh no I'm just asking which it is was that that or what okay good yeah oh

0:18:57 Eli: Not if you punch you punched me in the face and I'm supposed to be like but that was the punching time the punching team is over now

0:19:07 Thomas: Man okay but hockey does work that way is the only thing it's a different context but hockey doesn't actually completely work that much no I didn't get to fight dude if I'd gotten to fight that guy totally solved completely solved

0:19:12 Eli: That's not what I heard mr fighty mcfight over here losing getting thrown into the penalty box

0:19:14 Tom: Man yeah there's that like idea that like oh like when men have a you know problem with each other they you know they might fight each other but then they're gonna shake hands and then everybody's no like that's not how it works the person who lost is still mad now they're mad and humiliated that doesn't solve the

0:19:37 Eli: I don't know maybe if I had won a fight in my whole life ever I've never won a fighting I I got my ass kicked a bunch of times, so I'm obviously still mad at them. I feel like if I won a fight, I would want to be their... Let me say this. Ooh. I think I'd want to beat the best friend of the person who I beat up, so that when we were hanging out, I'd get to be like, Oh, yeah, this is my friend Craig. I kicked his ass once. No big deal. Craig learned his lesson. He was paralyzed before we fought. And that's why it went so well. Neck down.

0:19:48 Thomas: Probably oh yeah there you

0:20:00 Tom: Beef I think if it's like I think it's a minor beef between like people maybe there maybe maybe but if you're thinking I think I'm actually gonna stab that person right like I I I'm probably gonna take a knife and shiv the fuck out of that person and And it's like, well, then you lost the fight. Are you still mad? Like, yeah, I'm still mad. I was so mad I was going to kill him, and then he beat me up.

0:20:37 Tom: Why would I be less mad about it?

0:20:30 Thomas: Go yeah look I'm not making an argument I'm not making an argument for this but I will say in the context in which this this does work if ever I think what's funny that people don't understand about it is fighting or wrestling or anything like that is the most physically exhausting thing in the history of the world if you try to wrestle just get in a wrestling match you would die in a minute it's the most exhausting thing and I actually think that's what's happened if this ever works is like you physically get exhausted the point of like uh okay uh yeah we're cool man we're just we're We're cool. Yeah. Like it actually takes that energy out of you because you're going to die.

0:21:14 Eli: You just want the fighting to be over. Here's the other downside. I don't know about you guys, but a tremendous amount of my self -worth is based around the completely untrue notion. Like I said, I've lost every fight I've ever been in. It's based around the completely undue notion that I think I could beat up everybody I know in a fight because I am deeply, deep down convinced and nothing you say or do will convince me otherwise wise that if the fucking doom music started I could beat up everyone we know everyone does regardless of yes tom everyone's like he doesn't mean tom yeah I'm in my head I'm like no no no once I got a rarin tom wouldn't be able to stop this train tom would hold me at arm length genuinely afraid for my safety until I fell asleep and shat myself but in my heart you can you you imagine what it would be like to try to live the rest of your life knowing that that had been proven false oh I'm just supposed to walk around knowing absolutely not I'm not doing it I already am so disappointed in so many things why would I take away the last of my delusion oh hey man now that I'm all done beating you up I also brought a survey that all of your exes took on a lie eye detector test about how the sex was just fine um there you go they were telling the purest form of truth while they gave

0:22:46 Eli: These answers um now you have these yeah

0:22:42 Tom: And that I think is embedded, like that idea that like violence is some kind of like male. I don't know. Like it's a it's it's well, we can all dip into as men. And that's like how we're that's how we'RE going to solve this. Just a little good old fashioned fistfight. And it's like, I don'T feel like grownups fistfight like regular grownups. I'm just saying, like regular actual adults, you don't fist fight as an adult.

0:23:14 Tom: I literally don't know a single actual grown ass man who is like, yeah, I'm a grown ass man. Yes. No.

0:23:18 Thomas: Because you die like it's not sustainable. You can't.

0:23:21 Eli: Also tell me you've never seen the results of a fist fight without telling me you've never seen a result until you're there a month later talking to someone about their broken tooth and you're like I think fighting I thought I thought it would just be that day, but you're still very hurt from the fight you were in.

0:23:39 Tom: Right. This is the mental health equivalent of just committing slow motion suicide. That's all it is. I don't understand why articles are written like, Yeah,

0:23:48 Thomas: It's like if you're suicidal they're like okay you can jump from like a four -story building you You know, you won't, that'll solve it. You know? Oh, man. Right.

0:23:55 Eli: No, just cut your, a little bit of your wrist. Cut the first, you know how you got like six veins? Cut two of them and then that'll probably, that's the new therapy.

0:24:11 Ad: [Ad break 2 — ad music]

0:24:12 Tom: This is not what men need, right? Like, this is not the messaging that men need. The messaging men need is Andrew Tate's in prison. That's the message men need.

0:24:22 Thomas: Oh, God. Oh, that cured so many illnesses that I have to see those fuckers. I don't know if you guys read the piece, the fucking amazing, deep reported piece out of, it was New Yorker, I want to say. You got to read it if you have it. I mean, it's obviously it's a tough read, but that was, I think, what led to this, which is so sad. What an indictment. Some amazing female journalist had to go to the trouble to write. This is one where if you go to listen to it, it is two hours of listening. And that is how I measure things because I don't read. But this I actually did read. That is how good it was because the voice was automated and I can't do automated voices. So it's a two hour long read of an article of this woman who went into absolute, just the most in -depth thing and ended up interviewing the Tates or I think Andrew, maybe both of them. And that was horrifying, like obviously a disgusting experience, but just detailed all this fucking awful crimes they've done. And then coincidentally, after that comes out, like a couple of weeks later, I think it was now there's finally consequences. It's just like, is that how our fucking society works? Yeah no you're right I I heard it oh my god so dumb that shouldn't be how anything works yeah

0:25:30 Tom: Is 100% how our society works, Thomas, yes. Yep, yep, yep. That is 1 ,000 % how our society looks.

0:25:32 Eli: I mean, that is. That's how it worked starting in 2018. Yeah.

0:25:40 Tom: Andrew Tates, 59 counts. 38 new counts. 59 total counts, and they're in extradited. Do you think he's actually going to get extraditated? And then, what do you think this is going to do to his popularity among young men yeah

0:25:51 Thomas: My gosh I think so it's only good I know there's people oh they'll still no it's only good I think people will no longer feel as comfortable and it's everything's a matter of degree I know you can think of some dedicated fan who will still like him and there's going to to be some, but everything's a matter of degree. And nobody in normal society, which is still 80 % of society, nobody wants to be like, oh, you know, my favorite guy is the rapist who also had child porn on his computer. You know, like nobody does that. Yeah.

0:26:24 Eli: Well, they'll vote for him for president. That's a bad example.

0:26:26 Thomas: Yeah, no, exactly. Well with Trump, they always had plausible deniability. And then once he was president, they just never were going to listen to him having done anything wrong. And you know like, I don't think Andrew Tate will will be anywhere. It's like when they banned Milo from fucking whatever he was gone. There was no, there was no more Milo.

0:26:41 Tom: Yeah it's gone

0:26:44 Eli: That's what I was going to say is it's the economy of attention, right? And when you're in jail, you can't make videos anymore. And your fans, your stupid fucking fans, they don't care anymore.

0:26:54 Thomas: They don't care about you.

0:26:55 Eli: They just stop caring and they leave you alone. And also all your rights go away. Like that's the crazy thing that people forget is when you are in jail you don't have any rights anymore, right. Like and even the ones that you are technically supposed to have you really don't fucking have. And so all the like free speech, the ability to, I don't know, job, business, blah, blah. All that shit that we like take for granted that already sucks when you're not in jail we literally had to write a law into our law about slaves to be like except for people in jail those people are obviously still the definition of slavery still

0:27:24 Thomas: Yeah because they were still in slavery. Now I will say like it's important to realize it's not going to be in the US. They're going to be the UK. So do they?

0:27:33 Eli: Really bad Can I say better than us still awful they're cooler definitely cooler but this is not fucking

0:27:34 Thomas: Okay, good. I'm just making sure. I was I was like, are they cooler or no? No, not cooler. Okay.

0:27:42 Eli: Sweden where you're in a one -bedroom apartment and like twice a week fritz comes by to give you the therapy that makes

0:27:45 Thomas: And he got arrested in that fucking outfit. Oh, it couldn't have been better.

0:27:53 Eli: Him it's the best yeah

0:27:53 Thomas: It couldn't Have been better, guys. Oh, oh, no,

0:27:53 Tom: Oh we've got to talk about the outfit the outfit is great and I want to be clear I don't give a shit what anybody wears I don'T CARE AT ALL I don't CARE but it matters here because this guy is wearing like essentially capri pants no socks a pair of loafers an orange like silk blouse close opened at the like three buttons down it is a very effeminate outfit

0:28:00 Thomas: Of course not. It is very weird. Look, there is something to be talked about in terms of the extreme misogyny, like kind of trending toward hating women so much that you turn gay or something. There's a weird thing there. I don't know what it is, but these people, these asshole men will talk about women in a way that's like, hey, man, maybe you're gay. Like, that's fine. Just be gay.

0:28:37 Tom: Just be gay man it's fine doesn't matter wear your capri pants with style and pizzazz it only matters because this guy is the he is the architect of all this toxic not all of it but like an enormous amount of influencer culture toxic masculinity stuff and so like to watch him get get arrested, and then have the internet blow up making fun of his masculinity? You just couldn't ask for anything better. You could not ask for nothing better.

0:29:03 Thomas: Did you see the greatest social media post about this in the world, which was someone named Julia Comedy that said, I'm one diarrhea lettuce away from fitting into my slutty little Andrew Tate capris.

0:29:15 Tom: You could ask for everything better.

0:29:16 Thomas: And that's someone, the one that got shared was actually the response, which is, isn't it crazy that a week ago, none of these words had ever been said together? Together god so good uh you see something like that you're like is the internet almost worth no it's not worth it but like there's still some upside the worst things happen and then you get like the best comedy ever and you're Like wow how did someone even think of that so good

0:29:30 Eli: Care no yeah can I say instagram is the one social media that I do occasionally indulge in except for tiktok which I have a new rule for taktik guys are you ready only on planes

0:29:44 Thomas: Yeah only on planes right wasn't that what it was yeah

0:29:47 Eli: I load it up on a plane I delete it on my way off the plane and everyone in my life is like hey man you sent me 27 tiktoks while you were on that flight and I'm like yeah sorry I didn't want to watch minions I just sent TikToks

0:29:47 Tom: It's a good rule.

0:29:58 Thomas: So funny well

0:30:03 Tom: Again. I was actually surprised when Andrew Tate lost that MMA fight so, so badly. So, so ,so, so embarrassingly badly. Badly he

0:30:12 Thomas: Which was interesting because he he apparently was a real fighter, like an actual fighter, but I guess he's old.

0:30:19 Tom: Was but I think he was never a particularly great fighter like he would never we never made it to the big leagues I don't think he ever made it to like ufc or anything

0:30:26 Eli: No the thing that I love about andrew tate is that whenever you would criticize andrew tay in the before times someone would be like andrew take your kick your ass but then you would have to to remind them that he was so bad at ass kicking that obviously lots of professional ass kickers were like yeah I would love to fucking fight andrew tay but he wasn't good enough the law wouldn't allow them to there were lots of real fight grown -ups who are normal people who don't like rapists that were like I'll punch that rapist and then the the fucking fighting referees were We're like, no, man, you'll explode. You can't punch him.

0:31:04 Thomas: Well, yeah, he was a good kickboxer. I guess maybe that's what it is. He was a good Kickboxer, but not, uh, he never could do the, well, he had one.

0:31:07 Tom: He was yeah

0:31:07 Eli: He was a good kickboxer, yes. He can't do any other shit.

0:31:12 Tom: Yeah but like he lost that

0:31:14 Eli: I was a Good Magician.

0:31:14 Tom: Fight and it was a stand -up only yeah

0:31:15 Thomas: Also he's older. Yeah. It's like, well you don't realize once you go 10 years of not doing it, like you're not going to fucking be able to do it anymore.

0:31:21 Eli: That's why I'm not a Good Magician anymore.

0:31:22 Tom: But I really thought I was like is this going to be the thing that like takes his reputation down that like makes it like completely erodes because it's it's a uh it's It's a fall of mythology. Right. His whole thing was built on this idea, this mythology of this sort of like hyper masculine guy. So then to be defeated in the ring, which like wouldn't matter to anybody saying, right, be like, oh, yeah, well, I mean, that's how fights work. Sometimes you lose them and like nobody would care. Right, but it has to matter for these guys because they've built this mythology around this guy. And he still maintained a fair amount of influence and exerted a fair among a control. And I was honestly surprised by that because I would have thought that that would be humiliating. And I do think that that idea that like the thing that's going to take down the masculinity fucking goobers out there is humiliation because it's the one thing that they can't possibly spin. Right. Right. It's the thing that they can't get out of. They can't wiggle through. They can't rewrite. They camp by a Bugatti about if you just humiliate them like utterly and completely like, you know, arresting them on fifty nine counts of rape and child pornography, et cetera. Now he's nobody. Right. Like now he's Nobody. I thought the fight would have done it, but I hope

0:32:34 Tom: That this does it. Do you think that there's a blueprint around humiliation that works for the other toxic masculinity influencers?

0:32:34 Thomas: More

0:32:42 Eli: So I don't think it's humiliation. I think it'S exposure. And I think the Milo example, and there are other examples as well, but, like, when you stop getting attention, because the economy of the right wing is just an economy of attention, attention it's the only thing they can guarantee from both sides their fans will pay attention to them and we will pay intention to them because we hate them but once they run out of attention I think humiliation can actually be a good thing for some of them right like Ben Shapiro has never been more pot Ben Shapira was relatively marginal and then his wife told him a wet vagina was a disease and he sort of like he got a bunch of mainstream attention he had never gotten before And we all were like, well, that was obviously bad. He's so embarrassed. But the way the right works is they get a couple of people every time attention happens to them, right?

0:33:10 Tom: Influencers do

0:33:33 Eli: They suck a couple people into their sphere. It's the lack of attention, right, which is what's going to happen when they're in jail. They just won't be able to create content. They won't be able to be the focus of anything. It's why they're, in jail right now, being like, I'm drinking poison water. It's because they're desperately trying to cling to attention for the last seconds that they can. The minute that attention dries up all their power goes away

0:33:56 Thomas: I will say I think that's true I also think and you have to put yourselves outside of our brains for a moment for this I think for a lot of impressionable men they had a plausible deniability because they would joke about it and they would say like oh but I don't really mean you know like they would make little efforts to talk as though they weren't literally doing what they were doing, which is being rapists and abusive and physically. Now there's there's zero like short of, again, a few diehards. It's much different for boys to see them on their YouTubes with their fucking cars and their whatever talking horribly about women. But it's also like, oh, that could possibly just be how they treat women in a non -criminal but horrible way versus, oh oh, wait, they were actually just rapists. Okay, never mind. And as much as for you and I, I don't think that's been any different. Like that's how they've been the whole time. But I do think for a lot of people in our society, there's actually a significant difference between those two things. Sort of like how when people, like it's not exactly the same, but how when women answer a questionnaire about have they been raped, they'll say no. But then when it says, have they Been things that are rape, but not with that word, Waymore will say yes. In a similar -ish way, I think abusive men, there's a difference between like, well, no, the legal system literally declared you a piece of shit versus they can talk in a way that's like, loosely speaking, maybe you could interpret it in a non -criminal way.

0:35:24 Tom: You think that there's a way to use this to take them take other influencers down

0:35:30 Thomas: Oh, if we had a functioning legal system. Yeah.

0:35:33 Tom: Yeah, but like what about the ones I guess like I guess is there a lesson we can learn some of these guys aren't breaking the law right like some of these guys aren't breaking the law, but is humiliation of these guys a tool does that not work

0:35:45 Eli: No, I don't think it matters

0:35:46 Thomas: I don't. I don't think so. Yeah, I don't think so.

0:35:47 Tom: Because I'm kind of coming around, I don't think it works either. I think of Donald Trump

0:35:49 Eli: Yeah, no one's more humiliated than Donald Trump, just every minute yeah and it doesn't matter because they're just they live in their own reality with algorithms that reinforce it right like the answer is, and it's a bummer, the answer is you vote for a bunch of really young politicians who are sane. And then those politicians spend the next 40 years building the political capital that allows them to make laws around algorithms that support white supremacy. And then instantly pirate radio style, it's gone, right?

0:35:52 Thomas: All the time.

0:35:53 Tom: Should be right should be

0:36:12 Thomas: Yeah yeah yeah. Rebuilding the system yeah. Yeah god. Hmm.

0:36:26 Eli: Like the example, whenever anyone talks to me about this, I talk about Nazi radio because most people don't know this. In the early days of pirate radio, just a tremendous amount of it was Nazis, right? Just being Nazis, right? It wasn't just libertarian.

0:36:36 Thomas: Nah. Wait, it's not just libertarians who care about...

0:36:42 Eli: Very sadly, it wasn't just... Yeah, to me, it was just Nazis being Nazis. Not to end up. And then there was the Something Something Communications Act, which made it hate speech even if you were on pirate radio. And instantly, all of these super libertarian free radio organizations just made all the Nazis disappear overnight to the extent that most people do not know about it like

0:36:42 Tom: Tomato tomato right

0:36:42 Thomas: No way. I thought they just liked freedom. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:37:09 Eli: Literally, you're like, but they no they played the sex pistols and you're like, no, it's a bunch of Nazis that's how we're going to feel about social media in Again, if we vote correctly and we will have to explain right right -wing social media the way people from the 1950s have to explain pro -segregation lists.

0:37:19 Thomas: I couldn't agree more. I agree with everything except the idea that that's actually going to happen, but I do agree if it were to happen. Yeah.

0:37:36 Eli: Oh, I didn't say it was going to happen. I said that was the path.

0:37:39 Tom: That's that. Yeah, that's the how.

0:37:39 Eli: I don't fucking... I could diet and exercise too.

0:37:39 Thomas: If it were to happen... I fully agree that we need to ban the internet or we need to drastically change how algorithm or not allow algorithms, not allow any of that stuff. What if you just passed a law and, you know, you'd have to assume the Supreme Court let it happen. But what if you passed a lot that said no algorithmic content? Imagine if the content was just like, all right, you can have YouTube, you have Facebook, all TikTok. It's just people you follow.

0:38:06 Thomas: That's all it is. You only get to see the people you decide to follow. It might not sound like much, but to anyone who was around back when that's what the Internet was, it was completely different completely different, yeah.

0:38:23 Ad: [Ad break 3 — ad music]

0:38:25 Tom: I would argue that you cannot have anything approaching an objective view of the world if you allow yourself to engage with algorithms. You just can't.

0:38:33 Thomas: I was ready to like yes and this is when tom is going to be tom and I'm going to yes and so hard algorithmic content in this way is not compatible with a free society I actually don't think it

0:38:38 Tom: Yeah. A thousand percent. I love this conversation right now. I have been having this for 10 years.

0:38:44 Thomas: Yeah, no, I... it's couldn't be. I don't agree with Tom on much but god

0:38:48 Eli: He's pulling Post-its down from the wall next to him. Wait, I got stuff on this. Guys, you didn't tell me. You didn't tell me we were doing this week. Electricity is bad. No, that's for later. They're not ready for that one yet, but your kids are going to love it.

0:38:52 Tom: Yeah? Yeah. Well, let me yes and that real quick. Specifically for this show, I joined a bunch of parenting subreddits, and there was a guy on one of the dad and he was saying hey is anybody else really tired of all these like reels and other videos that pop up in the feed about how bad husbands are and a bunch of the dads were like yeah that's not in my feed that's

0:39:25 Thomas: That's actually not mine either yeah

0:39:26 Tom: Not in my feed, and like this guy was like convinced though that his feed and everybody is to some degree that his feed is emblematic of what people think or what people are saying and it's not it's just an algorithm that's showing it to you so much that you think it's what everybody else is also looking at it's not you're wrong about that every time you think that you're wronk about that but his vision his idea of the world had become become distorted by this algorithm to the point where he was like man this is fucking exhausting and I hate it and I have a problem with it and like I do want to say also the best comment on it was hey dude if the shoe doesn't fit don't wear it which

0:40:08 Thomas: Nice! How have I never heard that? I need to remember that. Yeah. Shit.

0:40:09 Tom: I thought that was fucking great, and I love that. It's mine now. That is mine. I love that phrase now forever but like it's so important to recognize that like algorithms are always distorting reality they can never definitionally they cannot reflect

0:40:25 Thomas: This is why—and hear me out—this is why all I do on every social media is go after women with large breasts. That's all I do. I look at big tit content and that's all they send me. That is all. They don't try to get me with racism anymore. They are just like, oh, here is a big boob thing. You will probably like that. Yep, sure do.

0:40:44 Eli: T-Dog, I love this. Love this direction.

0:40:45 Tom: Reality, yeah.

0:40:46 Eli: I just want to do a quick note. I would love for you to say that again, but I'm going to give you a note. I would like the words go after to not be included. I think the words you meant were follow

0:40:56 Thomas: Well, what is funny is the words I actually mean is my eyes linger long enough for the computer to know I liked it and that's literally all it is literally all this yeah yeah yeah I

0:40:58 Eli: Or click like. Love that. Love that! Just clarifying for the folks at home, when we say they go after big-titted women. We mean support them.

0:41:10 Tom: I Disavow this comment.

0:41:11 Eli: We mean heart their pictures.

0:41:13 Tom: Let's start a new

0:41:15 Thomas: Click on the post I this is actually I'm not even joking it's also beneficial for me of course but I love it. My whole algorithm is just that now I don't give a shit because I don't want to see anything. All your political racist

0:41:24 Eli: No, it's great. I have a thirst trap Instagram where I just follow thirst traps. And occasionally that tries to, because it's connected to everything, right? Everything's connected. Everything's related to everything. And so occasionally that algorithm will be like, hey, this is the same guy. You should feed him something. And I become a Victorian woman. I'm like, how dare this young woman wear a bathing suit in public?

0:41:34 Thomas: Bullshit, mm-hmm, yep, yep. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Oh, I thought

0:41:52 Tom: Show

0:41:52 Thomas: You're going to say I do that, but for the political content, like, no, how? Please go back to the large breasts. You can't. How dare you show me racism?

0:41:57 Eli: Oh, no, they don't. They don't ever bother. They don't ever bother. Now, once they know you're there for the boobs, they actually leave you alone with the racism because they have a thing to sell you.

0:42:08 Thomas: Yes, that's what I'm saying. Like legitimately, it's just nonstop. So in my algorithm, everyone has an OnlyFans, like my

0:42:09 Tom: That they don't care what it is yeah yeah there's no preference

0:42:18 Eli: Yeah, everybody

0:42:18 Thomas: Skewed view of the world, like, to the equivalent of Tom's friend: everyone has OnlyFans. I walk around thinking like gosh I guess everyone has one like probably they have one probably they don't have one that there's no way that's true I don't think I can hope it's true but I don't think it's true.

0:42:33 Tom: Yeah, it was funny too because in that same thread when I was reading through some of the comments on it I was thinking about bringing it up for the show as a topic anyway but like some of The Other Dads were like wife sees a lot of this stuff and she sends it to me and so that's how I see it and he's it's actually really interesting to read through because he was sort of understanding like hey the algorithm isn't true maybe this isn't ubiquitous like it is kind of coming to this realization and a bunch of the dads are like oh yeah just send your wife a whole bunch of like puppy pictures or cat videos and just reset her algorithm to just sort of boot that stuff out of there

0:43:04 Thomas: I don't want to hear it, yeah.

0:43:06 Eli: Send her a bunch of big breasted women. That's what you got to do. Yep.

0:43:08 Tom: And I thought it was great I was like yeah like the other thing is like you could just boot that stuff out, right? Because the systems are stupid. They don't actually preference one thing over the other. They just preference your engagement. That's it.

0:43:21 Thomas: Well they might but yeah

0:43:22 Tom: Well, they actually preference outrage, and that's very well studied. Right.

0:43:26 Thomas: Yeah, and if rich people are manipulating them who knows but yes, point taken.

0:43:30 Tom: Yeah. But I thought that was really funny that all these dudes were like, oh, yeah, no problem, man. I got you. Here, just send her a bunch of cute animal videos or whatever. Send her 20 of those things a day for a week. It'll kick the rest of the shit out of the feed. I thought it was great.

0:43:44 Eli: Know what? We'll never defeat anything in my wife's algorithm anymore. And keep in mind, my wife loves an algorithm. Nothing will defeat the, will you stay for one minute so a single mother can escape an abusive, like that.

0:43:58 Thomas: What?

0:44:00 Tom: I don't even know what these are

0:44:00 Eli: My wife is just, you don't know this?

0:44:00 Thomas: What is? Yeah, I don't know what this is no yeah yeah what is

0:44:03 Tom: No because your algorithm isn't true yeah right yeah that's exactly the point so good what is

0:44:07 Eli: Yeah. Yeah. Oh, it's a thing people do to get engagement: they'll be like, hey, keep watching this video. I am trying to escape an abusive relationship. I'm trying to, and so the money you give, I'm like secreting away so I can escape my abusive relationship. It's every two. I've never seen one and it's every two video yeah because we don't fucking care can you help me escape my nope not yep

0:44:23 Tom: It oh my god

0:44:22 Thomas: It oh god I've never seen one either. Yeah, how crazy is that how fucking crazy is that? To take a step back, think of any other time in our lives like imagine as kids when you talked about the four tv shows that existed imagine if someone was like yeah no I just watched the one where it's um a woman pretending to be abused by a man and you're like what I'm just watching ducktales what where did you get that and they just had a whole different media like that is insane the idea that like that we spend so much of our lives on these things and I truly have never heard of what you're talking about and that's probably someone's whole fucking life

0:44:49 Tom: What yeah It is. Yeah And, like, I don't want to—I know it's the end of the show. I don't wanna go too far, but, like, it is a real problem that we don't all share the same cultural touchstones and the same reality anymore, and, like, the fact that we don't makes us easier and more fragmented? It makes it easier to manipulate us because it fragments us. It destroys cohesion, education, and social culture and all of those things. And none of that's an accident. It's all part of the intended purpose. And it's been part of the intended purpose since they fucking invented it.

0:45:35 Thomas: Well, I might disagree slightly, and I think it's just been for them to make money, and it's an unfortunate consequence of that, but sure—we get tomato, tomato, yeah.

0:45:44 Tom: But I think this is part of how they realized because they've studied it. I mean, there's articles written that like they know that this is what's happening. You know, like they're sitting in boardrooms like, hey, this is dangerous. And like, yeah, but we're going to do it anyway, because by doing this, we actually have more control over people's lives. It makes them more We're liable to click and stay here and continue. So the vicious cycle builds upon itself.

0:46:05 Tom: The fragmentation is part of what earns them the money. And none of that's conspiratorial.

0:46:08 Thomas: But how do we get here I guess in the end we just need to appreciate it is such a good thing that the fucking not our justice system apparently well I guess they didn't commit the crimes here maybe so who knows but somebody's justice system decided to fucking do something about these fucks I was messaging lydia like an insane person I was so happy because genuinely look everyone cares about this already but as an additional thing having a daughter and that there are people who are listening to these people like I'm not saying that's what it takes to have empathy about it I'm Not but as An additional like reason that I was So fucking over the moon about this was like if my daughter ever ever has Has anyone in her life at all espousing these things? I'm going to have to go to jail.

0:46:53 Thomas: I won't get to live in free society anymore, you know? Yeah, but I will still want to kill them. You will have been like, oh, I did the crime for you. And I'd be like, no, I also am doing it too. I'll spell check your murder.

0:46:53 Eli: I'll kill him for you, Thomas. If you want you see you got it you get you do important podcasts you could spell chat here's can we say a good thing because here's the thing you're too empathetic if you plan the murder and I do it I feel like that's be like I'm gonna hit him with my car while yelling my first and last name to a cop and you'll be like no man you gotta do it this way this is a better way to do it but I'm too busy you're also gonna be too busy I'll do it yeah you'll I'll do it, and you'll

0:47:14 Tom: Well, that's good to call.

0:47:22 Thomas: And then you do it because I'll forget something. Yeah, oh my god uh this is we

0:47:27 Tom: I should have written it down somewhere.

0:47:27 Eli: Be like, I meant to murder that guy, but I had to push a button and murder him. We got a great plan All right, gentlemen, before we go: what's a ghost's favorite kind of sex? A booty call I

0:47:32 Thomas: Found it. That's it, yeah.

0:47:33 Clip: DEAR OLD DADS

0:47:47 Thomas: Hit your head with this hammer but not that hard

0:48:38 Eli: Could diet and exercise too. Ew.

0:48:41 Tom: I love this conversation right now.