Judging Overweight People?

Stefan Molyneux

This lecture examines societal perceptions of obesity, focusing on moral judgments and individual choice. The speaker discusses the complexities of criticizing overweight individuals, particularly those with medical conditions, and how exceptions complicate accountability and dialogue. Using a predator-prey analogy, the talk illustrates the destabilizing effect of uncertainty in moral reasoning. Emphasizing the need for clarity, the lecture argues that critiques should center on those capable of making health-related choices, concluding with a call to recognize the assumptions underlying moral criticism to foster meaningful discourse on personal agency and societal expectations.  GET MY NEW BOOK 'PEACEFUL PARENTING', THE INTERACTIVE PEACEFUL PARENTING AI, AND AUDIOBOOK!  https://peacefulparenting.com/  Join the PREMIUM philosophy community on the web for free!  Also get the Truth About the French Revolution, multiple interactive multi-lingual philosophy AIs trained on thousands of hours of my material, as well as targeted AIs for Real-Time Relationships, BitCoin, Peaceful Parenting, and Call-Ins. Don't miss the private livestreams, premium call in shows, the 22 Part History of Philosophers series and much more!  See you soon!  https://freedomain.locals.com/support/promo/UPB2022

Transcript

00:00Good morning everybody. Great question from Facebook. Somebody says, very

00:04unoriginal question, if an obese person, e.g. with Hashimoto's, has to exercise

00:09seven times more for seven hours a day, as chat GPT says, compared to one hour of

00:13exercise for a happier person, is it permissible to criticize such fat people?

00:17I don't know, but it seemed that the key question would be what proportion of fat

00:22people would have to exercise impractically so much? Does Gini

00:26coefficient genetically determine such impracticalities that determine a

00:29statics in the happiness of most relationships? So this is, it's a great,

00:33you know, it's not an unoriginal question, it's actually a very deep question, and it

00:38is kind of central to what is going on in life and society as a whole these days.

00:44So the general pattern goes something like this. Propose a rule, and then

00:49somebody, generally, attempts, I'm not saying you, but in general, people try to

00:53paralyze you with an exception. It is a way of making sure, or trying to make

00:58sure, that people don't have certainty. So disarming your opponent in any moral

01:06conflict is really essential. I mean, in conflicts as a whole, if you could

01:10disarm your opponent, I mean, if you're facing an enemy, and you can deny them

01:15access to weapons and ammunition, well, you pretty much win the war, right? So

01:21getting people to be disarmed, disarming people, is foundational to conflicts.

01:28Like dishonest conflict, right? Honest conflict, you have your reason, and you

01:32have your evidence, and you have your debates, and so on. So bad people want to

01:36disarm good people. Now, bad people are certain without any particular reason.

01:43They're just certain. They're operating at a fairly animal-like certainty, right?

01:48There's no compassion, there's no empathy, there's no reason. They're just, I mean,

01:53the technical word is sort of entitled. They just believe that they should have

01:57all of these great things, regardless of what other people want. They're selfish,

02:01and they want what they want, and they're certain about all of that. And they

02:06don't want you to be certain that you shouldn't give them what they want. They

02:12don't want that at all, right? Let's take an analogy from nature, and it's more

02:16than an analogy, this is actually how predation works. So if a lion is hunting

02:21a zebra, the lion wants the zebra to not know that the lion is there, right? That's

02:29why the lion has camouflage, that's why the lion creeps up and tries to

02:34stay downwind of the zebra, like, hey, there's nothing here, just some rustling

02:40in the thick grass, right, in the tall grass. Now, when the lion gets close

02:44enough that the zebra can't help but notice that there might be something amiss,

02:49right, maybe there's an odd scent, maybe the rustling in the tall grass is

02:54looking a bit suspicious, but the lion does not want the zebra to be certain

02:58that there's a lion before he gets in striking distance. The lion wants the

03:02zebra to be full of doubt. Oh, I don't want to just run away for no reason,

03:08because that's gonna cost me energy, and I might trip, but I also don't want to

03:11stick around. Uncertainty, right? So predation is all about making your

03:18victim uncertain, right? I mean, you have a balance between predator and prey,

03:24right? So if there was some prey species that had no way of knowing when a

03:30predator was coming, then the predator would just eat them, right, and they would

03:36go extinct, right? So there has to be some sort of balance, right? So uncertainty is

03:42the mark of a prey species, and the predator wishes to infect the prey with

03:48uncertainty, right? So you'll see this a lot in movies where uncertainty leads to

03:56mistakes, right? You jump to conclusions, right? There was a show in the 70s, I

04:01think it was, called Three's Company, with John Ritter, Joyce DeWitt, and Suzanne

04:05Summers. I'm not proud I know that, but I do. And in it, it was always a

04:11misunderstanding, right? People jumped to conclusions, and they were wrong. So

04:16this was part of the general infection, and you get this all the time. You jump

04:21to conclusions in movies, you jump to conclusions, and you're wrong. So, you know,

04:28the psychopaths and the sociopaths and the sort of sinister dark triad of

04:32personality traits are certain, but they wish to inflict uncertainty on their

04:37prey, right? This is why abusers push boundaries, I mean, really effective

04:42abusers, which is to say really nasty people, tend to push boundaries a little

04:46bit at a time. And that's because they don't want there to be enough of an

04:50issue that you actually rebel right away, right? They'll just take your rights a

04:56little bit, a little bit, a little bit. Not enough for you, so that if you get upset

05:00and you get angry and you fight, then you look silly or ridiculous or you're

05:07easy to portray as crazy and unhinged and paranoid and all of that, right? So

05:12the infliction of uncertainty is essential for the predator-prey

05:19relationship. The infliction of uncertainty absolutely benefits the

05:23predator at the expense of the prey. In other words, the price that you pay for

05:28uncertainty is often the destruction either of your freedoms, your life, or in

05:34general the factors that make life worthwhile, which is the exercise of the

05:38free choice in pursuit of moral goals. So uncertainty, you'll see this all the time,

05:44right? You propose a general rule and then someone is gonna say, well, what

05:50about this? And what about that? And what about the other? And that stuff will

05:56destroy you. I mean mentally, whatever, let's just talk mentally for the moment,

06:00right? That stuff will destroy you. In other words, think of it this way, if a

06:04lion, and you know, obviously human beings are one species, I'm just using this as

06:08an analogy, right? But a lion, if he could disguise himself as a zebra and

06:14was working for the lions, the pride of lions, then what

06:21that disguised lion would do if his fellow lions were creeping up is he

06:27would attempt to calm the fears of the zebras. He would say, there's nothing

06:32there, you're just being paranoid, the lions are a long way away, I saw them

06:36miles away just this morning, they already ate three buffalo, they're not

06:40hungry, you know, you guys don't have anything to worry about. The scent that

06:44you're smelling of lion is just some old lion poop and you know, it's funny how

06:49the wind can carve the tall grasses to make it look like they're lions, but you

06:54guys just gotta, you know, trust me, there's nothing going on, don't, you

06:58know, relax and enjoy your day. This is one of the few days where you can really

07:01enjoy being a zebra, enjoy the food, enjoy the grass, enjoy the Sun, and

07:09relax, right? That's what he would do. He would tell the zebras not to trust their

07:15instincts and he would attempt to dispel their unease or their certainty.

07:22If he was philosophically minded, then what he would do is he would say, I mean,

07:27what is a lion anyway, you know, what are grasses, what is a zebra, right? And he

07:31would attempt to distract the prey with abstract questions that would get them

07:38ending up in a lion's belly, right? I.e. play to listen or Neuromino rounds out a

07:45cant or Nirvana for the Buddhists and so on, like abstract questions that destroy

07:51instincts and eliminate certainty. I mean, the lions don't sit there and say, well,

07:57what is a zebra and what is a lion? The lions are hungry and they just want to

08:01expend as little effort as possible in their pursuit of zebras. So what this

08:10means is that if you feel like the most important thing you can do is not to

08:17shore up people's certainty but to create exceptions for every gender rule,

08:23then you are working for the lions. You are delivering your fellow citizens into

08:30a predator's jaws. And it is an instinct and I understand that instinct. And I

08:37remember many years ago, many, many years ago, I was training to be a security guard

08:43and the situation came up that, you know, if there's some guy who wants to go see

08:50his girlfriend, you dial up, the girlfriend says, don't let him in, you

08:52can't let him in, right? And then I was like, well, what if you let him in? And

08:55then she calls down and changes her mind. But it was just this exceptions, right?

08:59Create exceptions, create complications, give people abstract nonsense like

09:04trolley problems and hanging off the flagpole problems and, you know, the

09:08ethics of emergencies, right? If you want to get zebras eaten by lions, you get the

09:15zebras to start debating the existence of dragons or unicorns. And that way

09:19they're very much distracted when the lions come and they get better eaten,

09:24right? If a philosopher or thinker is not giving you practical certainty and

09:30practical plans on how to promote virtue and diminish the power of evil, well,

09:36that person is working for the lions, sorry to say, working for the lions. They

09:42are camouflaged, so to speak, right? So the reason I'm saying all of this is, of

09:46course, when you say, well, you know, we can have negative opinions of fat

09:53people, but what about people with incredibly rare disorders where it's

09:59very tough for them to lose weight? But of course, none of that means anything.

10:05That's all pure, distracting, convoluted, certainty eradicating nonsense. So if

10:12someone doesn't exercise, we could call that person kind of lazy, right? And then

10:17what you do is you take the category of exercise to mean people who don't move,

10:23right? People who don't move much, right? They don't get on a treadmill or ride a

10:28bike or run or play tennis or whatever, right? So people who don't move, but

10:33that's not the category. People who don't exercise is in the category, of course, of

10:41people who can exercise, right? So if you've got a brother-in-law who sits on

10:46the couch all day and gets overweight, you might say to him, you know, that's bad.

10:50You should exercise because he's physically capable of doing it. However,

10:54you don't go to your grandmother's grave three years after she died and say,

10:58Granny, I just mean to nag you because for three years you haven't gone for a

11:03walk. Like this is really because she's dead, right? So she can't exercise.

11:08Similarly, if you have a relative who's in a coma, then you do not blame that

11:14person for failing to exercise. Why? Well, of course, because they'd be in a

11:21coma, right? So if we say to people, it's bad to be fat, this is not all people,

11:30right? This is not all people. This is a fundamental error that people make. And I

11:35actually think I'm not saying that you're corrupt, but it serves corruption,

11:38right? Until you're aware of it, right? You're just an innocent pawn to some

11:41degree. So if we say it's bad to be fat, we are including in that people who have

11:51the reasonable capacity to lose weight, right? Which is most people. We are not

11:56including in that people who have a medical condition that precludes them from

12:01losing weight or has them gain weight, right? It's sort of like saying, well,

12:07free speech is important, but what about people who are mute? They can't speak.

12:12Exercise is important. Well, what about people who were just recovering from

12:16surgery? They shouldn't exercise. Exercise then is bad for them in certain

12:20situations, right? So in every general statement is implicit, or at least used

12:27to be implicit before, I don't know, education fell apart and people stopped

12:30bothering to think. But in every general statement, there is an implicit statement

12:37to whom this applies, right? To whom this applies. So if there's a 20-year-old person

12:45who was born and raised in Japanese, Japanese-speaking parents, but they're very

12:50bad at speaking Japanese and they can barely string any words together, we would

12:54say that this is probably indication of a significant cognitive deficit or problem

12:58or brain injury or something like that, right? However, if this person recently

13:03arrived from Australia and was just starting to learn Japanese and didn't grow

13:08up with Japanese, then clearly we would not say your ability to only speak a couple

13:13of words of Japanese indicates a brain problem. Of course not. I mean, the brain

13:17problem is simply that they're from Australia. It's nothing to do with Japanese.

13:20That's just endemic to the continent. Just kidding, of course. So when we say a

13:27failure to speak a language is indicative of a brain problem, we're talking about

13:35to whom it applies, right? So implicit, and this is understood, right? By reasonably

13:44intelligent people with a good degree of self-knowledge, the understanding that

13:49implicit in a general statement is to whom it applies. That's implicit, right? And

13:56it is not an intelligent thing to create situations where things do not apply and

14:05say you are somehow repudiating the general rule. So in general, we might have

14:10negative opinions about people who are fat. I mean, in particular, because we are

14:16forced to pay for their healthcare and they consume a lot more resources than they

14:22should, which is bad for the environment and so on, right? And, you know, general

14:26human care and compassion. So we would say we could have negative opinions about

14:32people who are fat. Now, of course, we are talking about people who can choose to

14:39not be fat. Of course, like that's implicit. And the reason why that's implicit is

14:44there has to be a certain efficiency in our communication, right? There has to be a

14:49certain efficiency in our communication. If we have to put every caveat in all the

14:53time, communication becomes impossible. And partly what has been done with this

14:57put in every caveat is to make communication boring and impossible. That's kind of

15:02part of the woke culture stuff where they're trying to make clear and simple

15:08communication so difficult. And there's so much blowback for clear and simple

15:13communication. You have to put in so many caveats that you can't communicate

15:16effectively. It's a way of paralyzing and harming people's ability to communicate,

15:22right? So if I say, of course, right, that we can have negative judgments of obese

15:32people with, you know, some sympathy and compassion. A negative judgment doesn't

15:35mean, oh, they're horrible and hateful. It just means that it's not ideal to be fat.

15:40Of course, that refers to people who can choose to be slender. We're not talking

15:46about people who are kidnapped and force-fed at gunpoint. We're not talking about people

15:50who are in a coma. We're not talking about people who have various disorders, right?

15:55We're talking about people who can choose to be fat. So the category of judgment is

16:02those you can judge negatively, those who choose badly, right? You can judge negatively

16:07those who choose badly, right? You understand that, right? But implicit in the judging

16:13someone negatively is that they have the capacity to judge differently. And that, of course,

16:20is implicit in the fact that there's judgment involved, right? So if you say to someone,

16:25you shouldn't judge overweight people negatively because there are a few overweight people who

16:30have a genetic or some other medical disorder that makes it very hard for them to lose weight

16:36and easy for them to gain weight, we would say, well, yes. So the fact that you are

16:41criticizing my judgment means that you want me to judge differently, which means that you

16:45accept that I am in a state of choice when it comes to my judgment. I mean, to take a silly

16:50and extreme example, if somebody said, I judged fat people negatively, but it turned out that he

16:56had a gun to his back that you couldn't see and was being forced to say that, then we would not

17:01criticize that person for saying it because they would not be in a position of choice, right?

17:06So when you criticize someone for having a negative judgment, you are saying you can choose

17:11differently. You are in a state of choice and you should choose better. So the fact that you

17:15criticize people for having negative judgments means that you accept that they are in a situation

17:21of choice and can choose better. So you accept that if they weren't in a situation of choice,

17:26in other words, if you knew that they had a gun to their back and were being forced to say

17:30something, you wouldn't judge them negatively. You would judge the person who had the gun to their

17:33back negatively and rightly so. So you can't say to people, I'm only going to judge you because

17:38you're in a state of choice. I'm not going to judge you negatively because you're in a state

17:42of choice and then say, you can't judge people negatively because some people are not in a state

17:48of choice. It's a contradiction, a performative contradiction. I want to reiterate this because

17:54it's really important. If I say I have a negative judgment to fat people, but I have a gun to my

17:58back and I'm being forced to say it, you wouldn't judge me negatively, right? You'd have sympathy

18:01for me being in a situation of force, right? Being compelled, right? But when you criticize

18:08me for saying I have a negative opinion of fat people, you're saying, Steph, you have a choice

18:13and you can choose better and you can choose differently and you should and here's the feedback.

18:17But that's exactly what I'm doing with the fat people in this theoretical, right? I'm saying to

18:22the fat people, you have a choice and you can choose better and you probably should, right?

18:27So I'm talking about the people in a state of choice, just as if you're criticizing me for

18:31having negative opinions about fat people, you're putting me in a state of choice and you're saying,

18:35Steph, you're in a state of choice, you should choose better and you probably should, right?

18:40You should choose better. So if you're judging me by putting me in a state of choice and saying,

18:45Steph, you're in a state of choice, you should choose better, then you can't criticize and if

18:50I were to say, well, no, you can't judge me because some people have guns to their back

18:53and are forced to say things, then you would say, but that's not you, right? So when you say

18:59I criticize someone's statement and they should choose better, you're putting them in a state of

19:04free will and free choice and therefore you can't put in the category of what they're criticizing,

19:12people with no free will and no choice. Sorry, I'm trying to explain this as best I can.

19:17Maybe this would be easier with a diagram. If Bob criticizes Sally for being overweight,

19:23clearly Bob is saying Sally has a choice and can choose better. If you criticize Bob for

19:26criticizing Sally, clearly you're saying Bob is in a state of free choice and should choose better.

19:32So you can't apply a category of you're in a state of free choice and choose better

19:37and then eliminate Bob's category of Sally's in a state of free choice and should choose better.

19:43You're saying that you can't take into account the fact that Bob might have a gun to his back,

19:47but then you start to introduce situations of no choice to overweight people such as this,

19:54what was it, Hashimoto's? Some ailment where people have a tough time exercising and losing

19:59weight. So implicit in the criticism of people saying stuff is that they're in a state of free

20:05choice and can choose better and should and therefore you can't introduce into that which

20:10they're criticizing people not in a state of free choice who can't choose better. It is simply a way

20:15of attempting to make those who make generalized statements implicit in those generalized

20:20statements being that people are in a state of free choice and choose better. If you criticize

20:25all of that, then you are in a terrible contradiction and it is obviously I'm not

20:32saying this is conscious to this person who sent this message, but technically it's ridiculously

20:37hypocritical to criticize someone for saying I have a negative opinion of obese people and then

20:45saying well what about those people who can't choose? I mean why don't you apply that category

20:49to people? Maybe he's got a compulsion, maybe he's got Tourette's, maybe he's got a tick, maybe he

20:54doesn't mean it, right? In which case you can't criticize anyone for having negative opinions of

20:58fat people. You can't criticize anyone because they might not be in a state of freedom. So you can't

21:02criticize fat people because they might not be in a state of freedom, but you can't criticize those

21:05who criticize fat people because they might not be in a state of freedom. Do you see what I mean?

21:09That none of it makes any sense. The moment you criticize someone you're saying you're in a state

21:12of freedom and you can choose better and that's assumed. And so when people criticize fat people

21:16they say you're in a state of freedom you can choose better and that's assumed. So in general

21:21if you find yourself tempted to destroy people's certainty by saying well there's an exception,

21:28there's an exception, what about these people, what about that? You're taking this like...

21:31No. It's understood and perfectly clear, it's understood and perfectly clear that when you

21:37criticize either an individual or a group that you are criticizing those members of that group

21:44who are in a state of choice and can choose better. That's implicit, that's understood

21:50in the very act of criticizing someone. That is what you are assuming. So the category of criticism

21:59to a group is not all fat people, right? It is all people who are overweight, who are in a state

22:08of choice and can do better. What is a choice? Well you need to do better. That man has more

22:15hats than I have hairs. Oh maybe that's not the right analogy but... So you sort of follow what

22:21I'm saying, right? And it is a way of just stalling the conversation and it's the way

22:26of making yourself sound quote reasonable. Well I'm reminding you that not all overweight people

22:32have the choice to lose weight. It's like but I'm not talking about that. Clearly I'm talking about

22:38the overweight people who are in a state of freedom and can choose to lose weight. Being

22:43underweight can be dangerous to your health and so if people have access to more food and they

22:49remain underweight they should probably choose better for their health, right? But if they're

22:54in North Korea and they're starving you would not criticize them for being underweight if they're at

22:58a concentration camp, right? Then you would not criticize them for being overweight because

23:04they're not in a state of choice, right? So if somebody says to you, if you say it's not great

23:09to be overweight, say well what about the people who can't? They just can't lose weight. It's like

23:15why would I... Are you assuming that I have a choice in what I'm debating, in what I'm arguing?

23:21I have a choice, right? You're trying to change my mind which means I'm in a state of freedom

23:25and choice. So you're assuming that about me. I'm assuming that about fat people. Surely you

23:29understand that. It's not complicated. I'm talking about those who are in a state of choice, right?

23:35Those who are in a state of choice and can choose better. They have the options, right? I would not

23:40criticize someone's diet if they were lost on a lifeboat with only salt crackers, right? I would

23:45not criticize their diet because they have no choice. I mean I guess maybe they could try and

23:50catch some fish with some crackers as bait or something like that but they certainly can't

23:54choose to eat a steak, right? So just remember that's really really important. The category of

24:01criticism implicitly assumes those people who are in a state of choice and can choose better.

24:09That is by definition. So bringing up people who are not in a state of choice is completely

24:15pointless. I mean it is like if somebody is a big fan of the carnivore diet, you got to eat,

24:20I don't know, red meat or something like that, right? You say, well what about people who live

24:27on a tiny island with no animals and only fish? So well then they got to eat their fish. Like

24:34of course you're talking about people who have the choice to eat red meat. What about somebody

24:38who is lost on a desert island and can only eat coconuts and fish? Well then they can't eat red

24:45meat, right? Unless a cow washes up or something, right? So bringing up these exceptions is

24:51fundamentally misunderstanding the categorization of criticism. The categorization of criticism is

24:56always those who can do better, right? So if somebody curses somebody else and they're in a

25:03state of choice and freedom, we might criticize that for being rude and obnoxious, right? However

25:08if somebody has a neurological disorder like Tourette syndrome, we would have some sympathy

25:12for that person because they're not in a state of choice. It is an involuntary tick, sort of like

25:17epilepsy in someone you wouldn't have. You wouldn't have a criticism of somebody who's not in a state

25:22of choice, right? So that's really important. Implicit criticism is that the person is in a

25:28state of choice. Bringing up people who aren't in a state of choice is as useless as tits on a ball.

25:33So anyway, thanks a mil. Freedomain.com to help out the show. We'd really, really appreciate it.

25:37Have yourself a wonderful day. I'll talk to you soon. Bye.

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