Spanking Debate: Community Feedback! Twitter/X Space

Stefan Molyneux

In this episode, philosopher Stefan Molyneux reflects on his debate with Malcolm about peaceful parenting and its broader societal implications. Joined by James, they analyze emotional reactions and contradictions in parenting philosophies, emphasizing trauma's cyclical nature. Stefan critiques "straw man" arguments and advocates for kindness over aggression, urging listeners to reconsider the impact of their beliefs on relationships and society.  SUBSCRIBE TO ME ON X! https://x.com/StefanMolyneux  Follow me on Youtube! https://www.youtube.com/@freedomain1  GET MY NEW BOOK 'PEACEFUL PARENTING', THE INTERACTIVE PEACEFUL PARENTING AI, AND THE FULL AUDIOBOOK! https://peacefulparenting.com/  Join the PREMIUM philosophy community on the web for free!  Subscribers get 12 HOURS on the "Truth About the French Revolution," multiple interactive multi-lingual philosophy AIs trained on thousands of hours of my material - as well as AIs for Real-Time Relationships, Bitcoin, Peaceful Parenting, and Call-In Shows!  You also receive private livestreams, HUNDREDS of exclusive premium shows, early release podcasts, the 22 Part History of Philosophers series and much more!  See you soon! https://freedomain.locals.com/support/promo/UPB2025

Transcript

00:00yeah i guess it makes sense put the mic on sorry about that yes uh i am just doing a little bit of

00:05a post debate review analysis uh on i hypocrite channel i debated with malcolm about peaceful

00:14parenting and spanking and i suppose it turned into anarcho-capitalism so if you could um let

00:22me know what you think strengths and weaknesses mostly the weaknesses would be the most helpful

00:26to get a hold of i would love to hear what it is that you have to say and james i was going to say

00:36if you wanted to jump up front here and let me know what you think can you chime in and uh yeah

00:45i'd love to sort of hear what what you have to uh what do you have to say yeah it was an interesting

00:50debate it never quite goes the way that you think it's going to go as a whole there we go all right

00:55james from the outside what were your thoughts hey so um yeah i thought that was uh was really

01:02interesting and um i'm not sure if i have too much in the way of weaknesses but uh man you you've really

01:10got him hysterical at one point it was just i mean not like you got him but like he he he got really

01:18unhinged at one point that was just like well i mean that's around uh the family stuff right yeah

01:24yeah yeah yeah well i mean that's that's where all the um that's where the whole thing like

01:29this uh not well i thought was really good was it you know not judging sorry forgiving his parents but

01:36not forgiving his kids and you know he just couldn't keep his composure which was yeah like you said all

01:42around family stuff yeah yeah and of course the idea is that if you accept violence within the family

01:48you can't conceive of not needing violence in society as a whole and i think that one certainly

01:53seemed to like it's really fascinating to see the theories at least for me sort of manifest in that

02:00way yeah yeah yeah so so uh that that's exactly what you would expect from that and so see it sort of

02:09come to life in that kind of way that well you want to use violence in the home and look at that

02:14you then need also violence in the um in society as a whole and you can't even conceive of how you

02:21can't conceive of how your individual family could run in the absence of coercion and you can't imagine

02:30how society could run in the absence of coercion and yeah just seeing how that sort of plays out

02:36is pretty interesting i didn't understand some of his uh like there was a lot of um a lot of

02:42straw manning yeah and that's it's fascinating to see that happen in real time because normally

02:49there's you know in twitter and all of that there's you sort of time delayed and all of that but you

02:54know it seems like or you appear to be or like you could see this this straw manning just kicking in

02:59yeah right away and this lack of listening is so it makes debate virtually impossible when people just

03:06can make up whatever they want from uh from what you're saying and how can you uh how could you

03:16respond to that i don't know other than pointing out that it's happening yeah yeah i'm not sure i mean

03:22i guess if there was any i don't know how to say other than you mentioning that and um

03:27if there's a weakness maybe finding a way to address that but again i don't have any particular

03:33suggestions like um and the other you said like to point it out because how do you get someone to

03:39respond to you when they're not responding to you i'm not really sure yeah i mean i certainly didn't

03:45say that he seems like a pretty good dad i'm uh there was a and so he was interviewed by the guardian i

03:52i guess you know some of this stuff he was interviewed by the guardian and his two-year-old

03:56son was in the restaurant where he's being interviewed and his son was i think rocking on

04:00a chair or something and he turned and smacked his son across the face and say loud enough that it

04:07could be heard on the recording it's like well recorders are pretty sensitive so i don't know how much

04:11that means but is it is it dangerous uh you know is it necessarily wise to bring your children

04:18to an interview with a reporter yeah well um i mean i put that into the research uh as well and um

04:27i mean i saw like i saw the stuff about his upbringing and just sort of this really really brutal kind of

04:34like you know basically imprisoned by the state essentially um and uh anyway in the course of that

04:42article uh i did have a thought i didn't put this into the research itself but i had the thought

04:46later it's like yeah i mean the reporter in writing the story was kind of like a a fainting violet about

04:52it you know so it seems i guess it's illegal in pennsylvania or something like that but it's like i

04:57don't think she would have said the same thing if it was like a brown muslim that did it you know

05:01seriously oh no no yeah of course i get that yeah that that makes sense and uh did you were you

05:06following any of the comments because i was just in there i think it was in stream yard so i didn't get

05:10to see any of the comments that were uh kicking around but it's of course nice to see a lot of

05:15people from new hampshire they're not not too shocking or or too surprising yeah but the

05:21new hampshire comments were funny uh so there was there's a good number of people who uh like like

05:26like in a lot of these things there's people that aren't going to be convinced yeah so but i didn't

05:30track to see if anyone became convinced in the through the course of the bit because i didn't really

05:35you know there's a lot of comments going past um but you know there were people that are definitely

05:40like you know well libertarian boomer which you've seen before i'm sure you know it's like

05:46you know it's like they're they're they're not interested in the nap or anything like that um

05:50and some people were saying we got really off track when talking about the free society stuff but

05:55and i was trying to remember track back how that got into that part of the conversation

05:58um and i think was it you you had said something about this sort of this cycle aren't you tired of the

06:04cycle but was there something before that years because he's like well you know at the beginning of

06:08societies uh that they they're harsher than their kids and it's like yeah and then later in their

06:13societies they neglect their kids which makes the kids neurotic and like aren't you tired of this

06:17cycle that no civilization could last more than 250 years before it collapses because of violations of

06:23the non-aggression principle how about something else you know oh yeah yeah you know what and and

06:28actually um because i was because i started seeing the comments and started people sort of doing that

06:32little sort of sniping you know not sniping stuff like oh this is off tracks like but no

06:37you know that it's not not at all because uh malcolm is making his justifications for

06:45hitting his kids on this basis yeah sorry yeah he's from my novel right i mean obviously but

06:51slightly slightly more fey glasses but yeah he's he's roman from my novel which is well the world is

06:56tough so you gotta you gotta you gotta be rough on your kids and it's like well no the world is rough

07:02because you're rough on your kids right it's this end of cycle right and this idea that you know

07:07well i you know this is a lot of growing criminality in the world so i gotta teach my kids how to fight

07:12it's like go tell that to daniel penny right uh that's no that's not that's not going to be a

07:18thing that they're going to be able to do they're just trying to avoid that kind of stuff because

07:21there's no good outcome from that kind of stuff because the state is generally siding with the

07:26criminals so yeah yeah so i found that i mean listen good for him for having a bunch of kids

07:32and again he seems like a a good dad in in many ways but right oof this thing with the parents is

07:38i mean i can't i can't conceive of hating the woman i had a bunch of kids with so much that i'd rather my

07:46kid go to government child jail then do better and yeah because he's like well but you know they

07:57grew up in the 60s and 70s like hello so did i it's not not a right so this determinism is really

08:04interesting that his parents aren't to blame because everything's deterministic but his kids need to be

08:10punished for bad behavior or wrong behavior or whatever i i couldn't quite figure out what it was a

08:16real slippery gassy kind of goofy thing that was going on right at the center there because

08:21like why was he just hitting his kids because they were doing stuff that was dangerous or was he hitting

08:26his kids because they were doing stuff that was wrong or like i couldn't quite figure it out well

08:32because it's not moral instruction is he just training it like you train a dog sorry no no that's

08:36that's that's totally fine uh the um when i look when i was looking through this you know sort of

08:41digging oh by the way and did you get a chance to look through the research and was that uh good stuff

08:45oh it was great yeah thank you very appreciate us good good um so i didn't see why i mean other

08:54than you know the obvious sort of obvious thoughts like emotional sort of drivers for this you know

08:57forgiving his parents and then inflicting on his kids um i don't know what was between him and his

09:03wife that said well we should start hitting our kids because they gave an example of having been

09:09been on a safari and watching how tigers were sort of lions uh lions was a lion's lion's tiger yeah

09:16these big cats essentially um giving immediate quote-unquote feedback and he makes this evolutionary

09:21case yeah which is it's not because i understand from our perspective like well i mean you're making

09:29you see you're telling these kids to make different choices so that's all about free will but everything's

09:33deterministic but there's a kind of deterministic through line if you're like well this is the

09:39evolutionary path right so it it's not it obviously there's a contradiction in there because it's like

09:47well you gotta you gotta hit your kids because otherwise you know they're just gonna well no

09:50that's not quite it um but it's like it's like there's this you know this this is how things should

09:56be but this is how we got here but you may sorry hang on i i you lost me here what do you mean things

10:01what should be i get the evolutionary thing but what's the should be oh um i don't know if i i

10:08don't know if i can make the case for it i think that's what he's trying to say which is like we are

10:14no actually you know i don't know you know i'll take i'll take i'll take a uh i'll just say i'll just

10:20confess ignorance now because i don't know enough about what he talks about the sort of things he talks

10:25about to say what he is trying to do except for to find a way to bring his like create create a

10:33culture that his kids will pass on um but yeah just just sort of like this is the way things have

10:38been but not like like there's a big old leap to should be and i don't know how to bridge that so

10:45yeah and what's the should be do you think that he was working with

10:48oh let me see let me see um well i mean from what he said in the debate uh he said this at least

10:56once uh i think more than once about people should be afraid of his kids yeah um and i i don't i don't

11:06know that i've read this anywhere so this is i don't think he said this in debate but a kind of like

11:10we should return to a more direct and essentially brutal kind of parenting but that's not necessarily

11:18prescriptive of like where we want to go that's sort of like his you know it's okay it's a kind

11:23of naturalistic fallacy right which is and and i understand that because of course you know the

11:27the the communists say that we can somehow reinvent human beings so that they don't care about profit

11:33and we'll work as hard no matter whether they get benefit or not and we say well that's not natural

11:37and so his argument i think goes something like well we were raised with being cuffed around and

11:43hit and and and bopped as he as he calls it and so yeah we we can't drift too far from

11:50from our origin and and i i get so it's a naturalistic fallacy which is to say this is how

11:55we evolved right and therefore dot dot dot right and so that's why i said okay so then if it's

12:01naturalistic then you know genghis khan or rapists they're spreading their genes he says no no it's

12:05more about culture and i should have of course have replied that genghis khan is still on the

12:09mongolian currency so he's still quite a strong effect on their culture but i that that point

12:14escaped me at the time but that's what i was trying to understand is that is it is it genetic

12:20because it's like well no because if you if you die out then you know it doesn't matter which of

12:25course we can certainly agree with but uh is it genetic is it is it cultural he seemed to lean more

12:31towards the cultural side of things but there's no moral content to the culture that you're spreading

12:36right which is why i said well with the aztecs the thousands and thousands of years and he's like

12:40well yeah but then they fell to to the conquistadors or whatever it's like but yeah but still thousands

12:45and thousands of years they were sacrificing children and that helped them because you know

12:48once you're into the the circumcision thing circumcision is good if it helps replicate your culture

12:53uh it's it's very it's nietzschean it's it's nietzschean and darwinian it's darwinian but more along

12:59the lines of whatever brutality helps perpetuate your culture is good because if you

13:05can't perpetuate perpetuate your culture you die out or something like that if that makes sense

13:10is it fair to it is fair to say it's like dark triad like montrealian maybe uh it is it is an

13:17amoral kind of whatever wins and that's why i say it's sort of nietzschean it's like the will of power

13:24right so if something if something is beneficial to your standard then it's the good uh we think of of

13:33good as moral but it's good for so if it's good for the culture to circumcise and of course you

13:40can say well the jews you know five thousand years or whatever right six thousand years and they're

13:45circumcising so you say ah and this is why he wanted to i think bring the jewish question in

13:49right which is that he says look uh they they circumcised their kids their cultures lasted a long

13:53time and so it only matters in the long run if your culture survives and flourishes and whatever you

14:02have to do to your kids to have it survive and flourish it's really the only thing that matters

14:06because if you go below your replacement rates and you just get taken over then your standards don't

14:12matter which of course is quite a strong argument in that this is roman's argument right which is that

14:17you can be as nice as you want but nature is cruel and you're just setting yourself up for failure

14:21and so it i mean it's an argument from practicality that that makes sense from a long-term standpoint that

14:30uh if if you have a brutal tribe and you have a tribe that's super nice to its children and the

14:35brutal tribe because it breeds a lot of sociopaths takes over your tribe then your niceness just gets

14:40weeded out and what was the point yeah yeah which again is roman's argument from uh from my novel

14:47the future so uh i i get all of that but that's my wheelhouse is not what may be memetically

14:55survivable over thousands of years based upon violations of the non-aggression principle right

15:00that is not my a wheelhouse it's sort of like a a doctor and you say oh yes well you know in some

15:07sort of horrible eugenics argument which i would completely disagree with you say oh you know but you

15:11you're intervening too much and you're letting the weak die off right and the doctor says look i'm not

15:16i'm not an agent of darwinian evolution i'm a doctor i'm supposed to keep people healthy

15:20that's my job and i am a moralist so i have to deal with good and evil right and wrong virtuous

15:28non-virtuous i can't deal with or i won't deal with evolutionary meme warfare or culture survival

15:39because then there's no such thing as morality and this is what it was interesting because i couldn't

15:44get him to you know he said well i have my morality but i can't convince anyone of my morality

15:50which is sort of odd because if he can't convince anyone then his morality fails by definition

15:56because it dies with him right it dies with him and well he can't convince his kids either which

16:01yeah if he can't convince his kids yeah so um that's why he's got a hit on i mean it is again i i enjoyed

16:08the debate i thought it was it was fun and i thought it was rambunctious which was enjoyable

16:13and you know it's been a while since i've done the sort of ancap 101 stuff so i thought that was

16:19interesting and uh it's and he says no no i've studied all of this stuff and i'm like really

16:26because you're asking the most basic questions you can't say that you studied japanese and then ask what

16:31the word for house is like it doesn't really make much sense so i wasn't sure that that was the most

16:36upfront uh thing but you know my and i've thought about this you know like should i just throw my

16:42lot in and try and work to maintain and uh whatever but for me it's like you know if if our society

16:49can't become good i mean does it really deserve to to last you know if if if virtue is is abandoned by

16:59the society for the sake of convenience i mean i can make my case for the virtuous stuff but if you

17:04know if he's right and and you know this you know the society that is isn't going to make it uh i'm

17:10not going to you know beat up my kid for the thing of maybe that helps society down the road because i

17:17don't believe it would and you know if we don't make it in this cycle of history at least the ideas

17:23and the arguments are there for the next cycle of history which is of course a very long view of

17:27things but i just i cannot get to the place where i'm like well let's just start doing evil for the

17:32sake of genetics and and culture or whatever it is because then yeah and then we're no different

17:38from the aztecs and what's the point of any of this been and um you you brought in the slavery analogy

17:44um which is like basically you tie it you look at look at what malthus was going on about and he was

17:49talking about like not being able to feed people in the age of slavery just when i mean i was after

17:54he was in the mid-19s right so that was after our agriculture revolution started but it just started

17:59was starting to pick up right yeah it certainly was not certainly it was nowhere near the productivity

18:05that we have now right right but i i'm trying to remember did did um did did uh malcolm himself

18:14even have a response to the you meant mentioning slavery like as a moral sort of approach or like

18:20like no i don't think he seemed to dodge that one although i tell you i thought they had me

18:26by the short and curlies at one moment uh which was when i said you know how peaceful it was growing

18:30up in london ah but they were beating their kids right and okay i was like you know what that is a

18:37really hang on a sec i know it's not right but i don't know how and you just what you have to do is

18:42just wait for that you just have to wait like if you're squeezing an orange and suddenly something

18:47comes out the top i just have to let the question squeeze me until my brain panics and picks up

18:52something helpful because it's not the kind of thing that i can sort of reason through in the moment

18:56but you know my my i wouldn't say my faith but my belief in the value and validity of the

19:00non-aggression principle is so strong and so validated over so many decades that i'm like

19:06okay i know it's got to do with the violations of the non-aggression principle and it's true that

19:09things were pretty brutal in families back then oh yes that's right because they were beating people

19:14it leads to faith in the government faith in the government leads to the disruption of society

19:18and the decay of the family ah there we go so like yeah so i was i thought that i thought

19:23i thought i was like the um the guy in pulp fiction is samuel l jackson just

19:28gets shot all around but doesn't actually hit him like hey did i i gotta have a hole in me somewhere

19:34here what's going on you were not kidding about him being like him being a roman essentially being

19:39roman yeah yeah which is funny because i always thought that you know i mean my image of roman is

19:45like this really gruff tough guy and uh this guy looks like a stiff breeze would blow him

19:51off a mountainside uh but you know obviously um a good debater and kind of knows what he's doing and

19:59and very passionate about things and and all of that and you know the fact that he's got a bunch of kids

20:04is is great yeah and you know the fact that he wrestles with the sun is great and of course i do

20:09wonder and i'll never know directly if i have grandkids maybe but what it's going to be like and

20:15it uh mike cernovich talks about this quite a bit that that uh having kids is like i said

20:20completely different animal so to speak right they're just wild like my daughter would not climb bookcases

20:25but clamber monkeys right boys uh will will do that kind of stuff and

20:33uh maybe i'll find out with grandkids but it is also a big question i'll never know it's like well

20:38what if i'd had a son or a boy and a girl or you know i would like five myself but that wasn't in

20:43the cards but yeah it's uh interesting to imagine again i know mike cernovich is talking about like

20:48it's just wild how different the boys are from the girls and i certainly believe that and i accept that

20:54for sure but so yeah he seems like a pretty good guy but i guess at some point the amorality

21:01i think is going to be a problem for the kids because they're going to say why right and he's

21:07going to say well you can do like logically he's going to have to say you can do what you want

21:14if it maintains and spreads the culture if it enhances the spread of the culture that is

21:22a very tricky standard to give to kids because it's pretty subjective right i mean you can say just

21:29about anything that you could do that would be kind of wrong you can say oh no but it it spreads

21:35the it spreads the culture don't worry dad it's going to spread the culture and that's not a pretty

21:40good standard to have for kids and you know a point that i didn't get to which i guess i can discharge

21:48here although i think i'll go over the research that i did uh maybe on a show uh maybe tomorrow but

21:55what i wanted to get to was adults can't adults can't agree on morality how how dare we inflict it

22:02on two-year-olds you know like one of the reasons that i worked so hard on upb was like i want to

22:09become a dad and wanting to become a dad means i'm going to have to explain morality to my kids

22:14and so upb was like i can't explain like if you can get a phd in ethics and still not know very clearly

22:24what virtue is right then how on earth is it possible for us to say oh yeah we should totally

22:32inflict this on kids yeah yeah kids kids have got to know what right and wrong is to the point where

22:36we'll hit them when you give an adult a trolley problem and they just get a thousand yard stare

22:41right you know like we're oh yes but uh you know what if somebody's starving and they want the loaf

22:48of bread and and and and what if uh what if someone's wife is dying and copyrights and right that there's

22:53medicine and do they steal like adults can't even figure out what right and wrong is what's the balance

22:59between compassion and property right like we can't figure out what the hell morality is and then we sit

23:06there and hit kids for not doing the right thing it's like then it's the uh the line from hamlet you

23:12know if every man is treated after his just desserts there's none that will escape the whipping or

23:16something like that so you know i was going to point out that uh you know i was kind of hypocritical

23:22in a show the other day when i was you know crabbing at some guy for being passive aggressive about the

23:28collecting thing when i called collecting kind of fake it gay and it's like yeah okay that's uh or gay and

23:33retarded or something something that was that was kind of a goofy off-the-cuff comment and he's like

23:37man i had to say yeah you know what you're right i'm sorry that was that's fair play so even i i was

23:41not even either i was being kind of hypocritical at that point taking offense when i've been giving

23:45offense as if i hadn't been giving offense so do i get hit now because even after all of this time

23:51studying philosophy i can still do something goofy and hypocritical well no right so and the free

23:57speech thing i thought was interesting as well the free speech thing was very interesting because

24:02uh he's like well making people feel bad is worse than hitting them so honesty that results in

24:11people's feelings being hurt is worse than hitting them verbal violence is bad or worse than physical

24:18violence and then he had the nerve to call me sounding like a progressive like bro

24:23anyway right uh all right does anybody else have thoughts again happy to get your feedback if

24:31there's anything i can do a better or different did you think that the level of decent humor but

24:37also being quite assertive and all of that i think i did ask you to calm his tits once when he was just

24:42sort of yelling at the top half at the top of his lungs about things you absolutely did yeah i was just

24:48like bro come on you you you're supposed you're supposed to be you're supposed to be a spartan

24:53tough guy and you're getting like upset about an argument like where's this where's this uh

24:57incredible spark-like uh certainty and and rigor and strength and like you from your tough childhood

25:05right why are you getting all hysterical it seemed like to me over an argument and all of that and

25:12that did seem but like you know if somebody's gonna say you know my tough childhood made me tough

25:18and we gotta be tough uh like like like the founders of rome and it's like your argument is

25:24making me hysterical it doesn't seem to quite track as far as uh as far as i can see and uh yeah i i don't

25:32know if people notice that in terms of like if you're gonna say that adversity makes you tough

25:37then you should be able to handle an argument without kind of half losing your your shit right

25:43but anyway uh that's neither neither here nor there and also i i it seems it's it's like a debating

25:49style and maybe i do it too i don't know right it's hard to see from the outside but this bit just like

25:54your little utopia you know that kind of stuff just these these little digs you know like i well i have

26:00to deal with human children it's like yeah yeah okay we're dealing with human beings i think that's

26:04understood like just that kind of stuff uh that is uh it's almost it feels like it's more now even

26:10than it used to be but this sort of uh bitchy passive aggressive stuff uh is you know because i

26:16you know i said hey man you've got the best of intentions you're a good dad i'm not including you

26:20in the abuse your children i never said your children are traumatized i'm sort of trying to be

26:24positive and that's sort of stuff that i really do believe but just this these little digs this is

26:30constantly flowing in it's it's really tough because you know puts you at least for me kind

26:35of puts me in a difficult situation because i either keep pointing them out which looks petty

26:38or i let them roll by in which case i look weak but speaking of passive aggression i'm just kidding

26:44uh jared if you want to unmute what's on your mind can you hear me all right yeah yeah okay awesome

26:51i don't have too too much to add just my praise i thought it was an awesome debate uh you

26:56you uh you can i can really tell that you're not trying to you're trying to find new arguments

27:02uh new ways to approach these these problems and not just that but a new but uh different

27:07approaches to the debate themselves uh this was to me a mix of like fun warm uh serious with these

27:15topics as well but you got the points across uh you were playful at times you were you know stern

27:21authoritative at times i'm magnificent man just is i've said it before it's great to see you

27:26your craft and you just you're awesome at it and i really really appreciate it was a great great

27:30debate um i i love all around the place like whenever he was uh getting hysterical you're like

27:36oh wonderful oftentimes you could laugh and joke with him and the uh oh something that didn't get

27:44brought up yet if i know when the moderator stepped in to bring up some points which i it didn't

27:51bother me it was interesting to see i'm glad to see you answer those questions for the audience

27:56for the world um so yeah that's generally what i got is just praise for the debate i think it's

28:03awesome oh yes so i'm up here in new hampshire got the there's uh the lpnh libertarians up here

28:09and um of the they know that i'm very much like freedom main like libertarians i'm like that's a

28:17coin toss what kind of libertarian um but they know me they know i'm in the freedom world and i had

28:23uh of your content the things you do this is one of those moments where people were scheduling

28:28uh like watch parties to do that i didn't go to it but i saw that that they were organizing that

28:34you know to have conversations and debates around it and then people that i know in the sphere like

28:40the person who was uh doing the new hampshire messages was messaging me and we were joking about

28:46that back and forth and uh yeah sorry about what uh he had to like try to promoting uh i think they

28:54call it like peaceful breeders here in new hampshire or something like that it's a bit too hidden for

29:00my phrasing but i like the principle right right yeah i was i had a good joke i completely forgot to

29:08use it something about you can't claim spanking a self-defense from the initiation of the use of force

29:13against children unless you can't stepping on legos and hurting your feet to be the initiation

29:18of the use of force on the part of your children uh so that was the only other thing that i kind of

29:22forgot to get across and yeah the amount of research i did just in case we were going to go into studies

29:26and all of that but yeah sort of what i said look if there's a peaceful alternative wouldn't that be

29:32better and he couldn't couldn't answer that and that's why i went through all of this stuff like i did

29:37quite a bit of the latest research like 90 percent improvement 90 plus percent improvement

29:42in these behaviors without spanking and better way better than spanking so so that's interesting

29:48right because that's the big question is okay if you can do it peacefully and it's it works according

29:54to the latest studies why wouldn't you because you're roman and you've got to uh you've got to

30:01keep that that keep that going on you know like this guy like you mentioned earlier like he was uh

30:08the the stereotypical like you nailed it like you know we say like

30:12um as a non-npc i can simulate an npc and so not to put this guy down he's thought about his stuff

30:17thought about these things a lot but uh for these particular things that i think people are

30:23ultimately wrong about they fall into just kind of like an npc automation whatever trauma response

30:28whatever it is and um like you you nailed roman with this guy and vice versa well i think if i

30:36would have put on my cheap psychologizing hat which is probably nonsense but the sort of sort of

30:41rolling around in my head that i might just discharge and see if they're of any value

30:44it's that this guy can't have moral principles because that would condemn his parents

30:48so he has to say what's valuable is the continuity of the line because that's what his parents did by

30:55having so many kids so whatever my parents did is the good and if my parents hit me i have to hit

31:02uh if my parents yelled at me or whatever right and so because his parents had so many kids then

31:09he's defined the expansion and continuation of the line as the key good thing because that's what his

31:15parents did and i can't imagine at 13 being handed over to the state by two parents because

31:22like like how can you how can you deal with that how can you process that your parents would be

31:28so selfish and destructive that they would rather hand you over to the state than stop abusing each

31:34other verbally through lawyers in in some sort of horrible divorce like they're both saying each

31:39other are unfit parents and then i like i'm sure that uh you know i he said these are public records i

31:45haven't read them but i'm sure that it wasn't just the judge who said that's it i'm taking the kids and

31:50putting them in kid jail right i think it was like look if you guys can't come to a resolution

31:55if you keep slinging all this mud at each other then the net net is going to be your kids going to

32:02go into a juvenile facility now it seemed like foster i wasn't sure if it was because like kid jail

32:09because of uh because he was acting out in some manner or something like that but i i assumed that

32:16the judge said to his parents you have to work to resolve this or i'm putting your kid in this

32:22system this this pretty awful system and the parents would not would not back down and they

32:29were told i'm sure they were told by the judge you gotta stop attacking each other in this ferocious

32:35way because i can't give the kid to either of you because parental alienation is going to happen for

32:39sure and so if you can't come to a resolution your kids go into kid jail and they were like yep okay

32:45off he goes like that's wild to me i i i can't even express you know the contempt that i would have for

32:52that kind of perspective because you know parents do have to put their egos aside and do what is

32:57best for their kids and this is like wow that is really really digging into hating on each other to

33:03the point where your kid at the age of 13 gets naked from the family structure and dumped in some

33:08government system it's like wow and and to not criticize that at all to not i mean he could not

33:15take the moral judgment that to me is a a real shattering of bond and you can't get the principles

33:20if uh and and it also says to me that the parents still can't handle criticism because i think that's

33:25why people i mean people don't want to criticize others if it's going to result in some absolute

33:34disaster now he could say look uh the what i've learned from my parents is you don't criticize

33:40people it's like but he was criticizing me a lot so you know some of it was just sort of pulled out

33:47of thin air right and that's fine it's like i'm not made of glass i don't mind the criticism that's

33:52fine but it's just kind of funny where me advocating for peaceful parenting is someone that he's going to

33:58call like bad and you know wrong or whatever but his parents who put him in kid jail at 13 are great

34:04like i i i don't know how people uh hold those opposing thoughts in their head sorry for the

34:11this guy is interesting in in an aspect of um he's he's very unabashed very direct and sometimes i'm

34:20like oh this could be really interesting because he seems like he possibly was maybe really curious

34:24about moral positions and things like that but no this he has thought about this a lot it means very

34:30much i mean you're kind of very honest and directed about it like will to power nietzschean

34:35whatever like you know evolutionary it justifies the means in terms of like you know what your

34:41bad word morality doesn't matter if your species is gone you know kind of thing yeah i i'm i'm of

34:47the side that uh i believe peaceful parenting philosophy principles all of these things produce a far more

34:54robust uh individual in society you know family share all that stuff like i think this is the

35:00better evolutionary path um but i once you've you've given away to well if i can see my line

35:09dying then anything's on the table like it's like like what where's the boundary of that what's the

35:14line to that and and like we've seen this so many times with people that if they don't have some

35:18kind of principle to go by and i i can't accept that as a principle that like if i perceive enough

35:25threat anything's on the table you know or is that and if in if

35:30like you're i can't see anything different between that and like that's the root of a leftist

35:36like whatever gets me the power what whatever you know gets whatever gets me the end and then at

35:42same time i i personally i just categorize that with evil i can't see a difference when i look at it

35:47you know broadly enough so sorry yeah a bit of a bit of a ramble rant there but this guy is

35:55interesting in that in that way like he's a very modern to me like wilder power nietzschean uh like

36:02he could say he says he's moral but i don't see any moral principle like as soon as he perceives

36:08enough threat the principles can go out the window you know well and the leftists of course

36:14ally themselves with those who done demonstrable wrong and against those who are arguing for something

36:20better right and so and and so he's like like his his parents like i'm not saying they're stone evil

36:27ivy i don't know but but this is not great parenting to be so dysfunctional in your divorce and so

36:32hostile and full of hatred to each other that the government takes your children from both of you

36:37uh that's that's not good that's that's pretty bad but now he can forgive but but heaven forbid i talk

36:44about a stateless society right like that's that's bad and wrong and you know i'm wrong and right so

36:50he can oppose me but he can't oppose his parents and that to me is that that's the kind of inversal

36:56of moral values that i find i find pretty wild yeah did you notice how uh just before he got

37:03ostensibly offended and and you called him out on on this and then you know he called you out

37:08later on where he's getting ostensibly offended where he framed you as uh causing his

37:14trauma or something along those lines sorry i don't think the exact detail sorry jared you're

37:19kind of fading in and out oh sorry can you hear me better now yeah go ahead so he uh he seemed

37:25offended or was kind of calling you out on um framing it as he was causing trauma to his kids and

37:32of course you corrected him but as soon as you described how like how you would never punish your

37:39daughter that he got like the most pearl clutchiest face on like oh oh that's i wouldn't

37:44i i don't think that's a good you know well no he said people and that's that's a sad argument

37:49there's a lot there's few people who would think that's a good idea it's like and and like face and

37:55body language he got pro clutchy like you're just getting like been out of shape about the impression

38:00that he might that steph might say that uh you know hitting is causing your kids trauma which you

38:05didn't say you know uh there well it's certainly it's designed to be unpleasant for the child

38:11so it's negative but i i wouldn't say that the children are traumatized uh you know i mean it's

38:17not not ideal but um so what was the other the other thought um that no punish yeah don't punish

38:26yeah i mean that was sort of my point it's like if it's my job to to work on keeping my daughter safe

38:31and if there's a problem i first have to look in the mirror oh yeah the other thing was that

38:36it's it's it's interesting how i kept saying here's all the ways i had i thought it was a

38:41pretty good argument of course tell me if if you think it's not but it's a pretty good case to say

38:47that we don't deal with fistfights usually as adults we have to deal with things like disappointment

38:53and rejection and hostility and and physical pain and illness and so on right and so when i was

39:00saying look hitting my child is inflicting a negative consequence that they're not going to

39:06have to deal with as adults people got around at least not not in my neighborhood don't go around

39:10punching each other so letting her experience negative consequences like physical pain and

39:17disapproval and and so on uh and rejection uh these this is preparing her for adulthood because those

39:23are the kind of things we need to deal with as adults which i thought was a pretty good argument

39:27but he kept flipping back to and this is the not listening stuff that drives me kind of batty

39:33you know like you've heard this a million times on my show where i somebody i ask someone a question

39:37they go on a tangent and i say well what was the question i just asked you and they have no idea

39:41like it's very very bizarre uh because i i tried to i listen kind of half obsessively and i make lots

39:46of notes and so on but he kept saying well you know your children have to learn how to experience

39:51negative consequences and i'm like yes i just said that's like i gave all of the examples of the

39:57negative consequences you know that that and it's like yeah but but but but still they have to be

40:02able to experience negative consequences that's just kind of a broken record thing which i think

40:06actually obviously not to psychoanalyze the guy i don't know him and again i'm very glad to have

40:10had the debate seems like a pretty good dad in most regards but that's just a trauma response where you

40:14just you cannot get out of the groove yeah well the only negative consequences that your kids need

40:21negative consequences the only ones that you can really uh have your kids experience is is hitting

40:29them because disapproving of them is worse and it's like what but but people are going to disapprove of

40:36them over the course of their life so how if you don't give them disapproval but you only give them

40:40hitting and then they grow up in a situation where they're not being hit but being disapproved of you're

40:44not preparing them for adulthood right that makes sense you know we i i i absolutely think that is

40:50this is a good argument uh to to expand on that it's like and to like to come across his point of

40:57like this evolutionary thing uh what kind of society and interactions uh what kind of uh peers are you

41:05raising your kids to accept and and expect if it's people that knock each other around when they

41:12you know have problems or or to to expect like that's the way they may have to solve their

41:16problems that kind of stuff what groups in society are you training your kids to

41:23tolerate yeah you pretty much expect you know well i mean you know your kids need to learn how to deal

41:29with being hit and it's like and then i want to move them to rural pennsylvania it's like i don't know

41:33much about rural pennsylvania but i don't think it's a knockdown slug out slug fest of a society i'm sure

41:40it's pretty rural and people look out for each other and it's the same way that they do in new

41:44hampshire i mean well let me ask you this jared when was the last time you got into a full-on fist

41:48fight oh full-on fist fight oh man that would have been i i could nothing comes to mind beyond like

41:57my first job where this one guy had a problem with me and uh and basically just kind of got it got

42:05in my face i didn't back down and we got the blows yeah and how long ago was that i was 19 i'm 42

42:13right and it's how how many how many fist fights would you say you've got into in the course of your

42:20life oh man uh public school i mean i don't even say oh as an adult kid it doesn't really matter yeah

42:25i can only think of that one okay so one right uh have you ever been rejected or disappointed

42:32oh uh yes right a little bit more than once right uh quick question uh for those of you who don't

42:41know um jared is a has a fetish a calling an obsession around handiwork uh question as a handyman

42:51have you ever injured yourself uh yes i never maimed but you did say injured not maimed not maimed good

43:00good well you know goals yep as he would say goals um yeah but okay so roughly would you say

43:08how many times have you hit your thumb with the hammer or stuff like that well i could i could

43:14even hazard a guess hundreds probably over the decades right yeah like hit knocked my head on

43:19something uh you know got a little bit too close i i take the safety stuff off of my tools because they

43:25they get in the way and so uh yeah yeah yeah this has happened well and we're not even talking about

43:32the even worse injuries which is when i when i put the echo on the karaoke machine but that's perhaps

43:37a topic for another time but so so yeah so you have to deal with rejection with disappointment with

43:44uh sometimes loneliness and and physical pain from injuries and things like so to me letting your kids

43:51experience those things in a sort of you know relatively controlled uh format and so on is

43:56preparing them for adulthood i'm not sure that hitting them is so uh and you want your kids to

44:02grow up with reasoning skills not with obedience to pain skills and look again i'm not saying that

44:07malcolm that's all he's doing i'm sure he reasons with his kids and he says by the age of six it is uh

44:14uh it's largely done with and so on so i think he's saying that reasoning is better and he didn't

44:20also didn't address the fact that i did have and you know it's kind of funny all the coincidences in

44:25my life right so yes i have only one child but i did have i spent years working with 25 to

44:3215 to 25 to 30 kids uh age 5 to 10 uh for for you know eight nine hours a day sometimes

44:40and never needed to use force and never had any particular issues and and so on and but but but

44:46they had to you know i remember telling them the story of the silmarillion i mean obviously i made

44:50up about 50 of it because nobody knows what the hell that story is about but i'd have them sort of you

44:55know stay close as we went through the park so they could hear the story you know just things like

44:59that and try to keep it entertaining for the older and not too incomprehensible for the younger

45:02so if you're interesting and if they like you and you have something of value to offer them they're not

45:08going to go run into the lake like it's just not it'd be like you know you're on a great date and

45:12you're like hey i gotta run into traffic it's like and you're right you might i might to get away from

45:18a bad date maybe not a good date yeah but yeah there wasn't much response to that if that makes

45:23sense i i definitely noticed that uh where you brought that up and there was just yeah it was it

45:28was deadpan um but at some point he got to be where he was broken record uh constant kind of like

45:34interrupting hysteria like it just kind of repeating the same points you had already addressed

45:38and so it was wow but i also think you know to his credit i think i think he did a very good job

45:44in many ways uh because uh you know that he was vague when when needed right so he clearly wasn't

45:51a principled guy right so his was all arguments from effect and arguments from anxiety well the world's

45:57getting dangerous you got to hit your kids kind of stuff like that i'm sort of simplifying a little

46:01bit or if hitting your kids or even you know sawing off their their foreskin helps transmit

46:08culture then it's good right because if it doesn't transmit culture who cares so he's you know an

46:14amoral argument from effect guy and wouldn't engage to my memory and again and it's a little chaotic

46:21when you're sort of making notes and listening and talking but he wouldn't engage in how the

46:28violations of the non-aggression principle are leading to the circumstances that he views as

46:32negative right so the father absence and and so on right and so uh he didn't want to deal with that

46:39because my argument is you know violence in the home leads to violence in society if you have to have

46:43violence to run the home of course you have to have violence around society and so i think the

46:49violence or whatever i'm not sure it was violence i don't know much about his childhood other than the

46:53few of the highlight highlight bad parts but if there was that kind of aggression in his household

46:58then he's not going to be able to grapple with it at a social level uh because he has to justify it

47:04in his parents therefore he can't identify or condemn it at a social or political level and it was really

47:10to me it was really fascinating to see that theory come so vividly to life yeah yeah james i saw you

47:16unmuted did you want to uh yeah so um james stop interrupting no i'm just kidding yeah yeah no oh gosh

47:23what was it now um oh yeah yeah he had uh he he was put into the kid jail when he was 13 and he also

47:31mentioned on the in the course of the debate that he plans on you know putting his kids i sound like

47:38put them in the woods to fend for themselves for a couple of months so very much like you know if i'm

47:45i'm not remembering correctly correct me but uh yeah he not only not forgiven or sorry it's not

47:51only he's forgiven his parents he's sort of like approved of it in in some level you see now i don't

47:56necessarily i don't think that that's abusive as a whole i mean i'm certainly happy to hear the case

48:02well but no maybe not okay maybe not abusive but it was a bit like i mean wouldn't you have loved

48:09to try that i mean obviously you know you wouldn't just be dumped there and picked up again a month or

48:14two later but i mean wouldn't that be kind of cool to give that a shot as a kid you know obviously

48:19you know 14 or whatever right like uh to to have a shot at you know planning let's say a week in the

48:26woods or something like that i mean i remember when i was 15 my friends and i went hiking for a week in

48:34algonquin park and it was a complete disaster of a trip so we had a guy who was so macho he refused to

48:40he refused to use water purification tablets was kind of half drinking out of moose tracks

48:45and then very predictably got quite ill it was a complete disaster of a trip but we all made it

48:50right so i don't know i mean maybe a couple of months might be a little bit long but i mean i i do

48:56think that some of the uh over protection of of kids i mean to me it would have been pretty pretty

49:02exciting to plan that and give that a shot maybe not for months but at least try a week or

49:06i would have been down for that absolutely yeah yeah i think that would have been kind of

49:10interesting but but i know that james needs his hair gel and you know i'm i'm really not sure at

49:17the age of 14 or 13 because i've never been much of an outdoorsy guy but at the same time could have

49:23been fun i don't know uh well it would just be an interesting challenge right i mean yeah yeah it

49:28would be i mean uh charles murray has his like you know you become an adult and just go fly to some

49:34foreign country with a couple hundred bucks in your pocket and see what you can make work

49:37and uh i think that's you know he says that's a that's a big plus and uh you know he's keen on

49:44that and again i mean i know that's older but i don't know i think i sort of think of the

49:49huckleberry finn stuff and the tom sawyer stuff from mark twain and obviously again a bit young and a

49:55bit chaotic but i think that kids can have adventures uh a little sooner especially now with cell phones

50:01and all you just dump in the woods and pick them up in a month but i think it would be interesting to

50:05have that kind of challenge and again i was sort of 15 tried to do a week in algonquin with friends

50:11and we lasted a couple of days but i was fine i was fine but uh um i think i think it was i think it

50:20was the couple of months thing that kind of was like oh but yeah i mean that may be a little long

50:24yeah but you know what i mean as as like hey you know i mean and and obviously uh oh maybe not

50:31obviously i was gonna say obviously if they're down if the kids are down with it i mean maybe

50:34you sort of nudge them it's like hey you know give it a shot you know see what you can do you

50:38know well i think you'd also step them up to it right you'd say try a day try a couple of days

50:42try a week you know yeah i wouldn't just say uh i'll come pick you up at three months good luck

50:47with the wolves right i think you'd need you need i and you know i i'm sure he was talking about

50:51maybe stepping up uh in some way but i i think the kids are just a lot more a lot more competent

50:58and resourceful and because of course you remember you know kids used to start working with machinery

51:02and and so on and dangerous stuff sort of five six seven eight years old and and the chimney sweeps

51:08and you know and and they went and explored and and all of that so i think i think the kids can

51:14generally do uh have a lot more adventures than parents think of these days but with with the rise

51:21of sort of the somewhat neurotic uh mom thing it's like oh uh okay play video games because

51:28at least i know where you are at least i know that you're safe and it's like yeah but it's not the best

51:31kind of safety yeah yeah not you know what that's that's fair i i take that uh i take that entirely

51:37you know i don't want to be unfair to him in that particular way i mean i hear what you're saying

51:43in the couple of months seems a bit surprising and i'm i'm sure that uh some of that was hyperbole but

51:48i kind of get where he's coming from in that uh you know that this thing on online where people say

51:53is it true that in like the 80s you just roamed around the neighborhood all day and it's like yeah

51:58that's that's what we did i mean i did when i wasn't working uh there was not much to do at home

52:03there were no there's no internet no video games nothing really on tv oh you just you roamed you just

52:09roamed and you know we had no money and we had you know the bikes are seven colors and we just bike

52:14around and we'd go garbage picking and we'd go you know scrounge together a bottle of dented beans and

52:19go cook it in the woods and you know we just just do stuff and try and find a way to make it work

52:25and that's i think that's largely incomprehensible and it's also partly just because the video games

52:29have become so absorbing for people that it is uh uh it's tough to compete like the mere outdoors just

52:36can't compete but yeah i think it would be pretty wild to try and make it in the woods

52:40as in your sort of mid-teens all right we have somebody who wants to jump in sorry go ahead

52:46compared to i only one other thing um which is it was interesting he's talking about i mean he's

52:51he's talking about like getting his kids to sort of carry forward the culture but it wasn't the

52:57culture that his parents created was it or was it i don't know because i don't think that he wants

53:05his kids to go to government jail right so his son is sick so in seven years he doesn't want his kid

53:11going to government jail so i i think what he's saying is i'm a better person because of my

53:17hardships therefore the hardships are good right which is i'm sort of saying like if you end up in

53:22a wheelchair you get significant amounts of upper body strength but that's not the best way to get

53:27it and you can get good things out of bad things that doesn't make the bad things good

53:30otherwise we would just you know beat the hell out of everyone and and assume that then and of

53:35course some people get broken by by these negative experiences and obviously he's pretty robust and

53:41that's good i'm sorry compared to if you wanted to unmute happy to hear your your thoughts oh i i think

53:47you did great uh i just wish you you mentioned new hampshire a little bit more well that wasn't really

53:55up to me but uh we did it at the end yeah i really appreciated the part it wasn't a very large part of

54:03the debate but i really appreciated the part where you had started talking about um within the different

54:13ages for the different capacities that uh kids will have on average during those ages how you can

54:19approach problem solving um if a kid is losing their temper in a situation or if they are going

54:30after a dangerous object right yeah so that was you mean when i was sort of i was reading off some of the

54:36research about how you can handle these situations without hitting yes and i thought that was that was

54:43great that was practical that was meaningful i hope that there i don't know that there were but i hope that

54:49there were listeners out there who um heard you talk about those different things and are able to take

54:57that back with them as alternatives they have to i don't know hitting their kids to get compliance or

55:07something yeah and it really does work i mean it works very well statistically as a whole to to take

55:15those approaches so yeah it really does it does work out very well and uh so yeah but he didn't it's

55:23interesting right because he didn't really seem to be super keen on that sort of information because that i

55:34think would that that that goes into the criticism of his own parents i think yeah that's well and this is

55:42something you've definitely talked about uh many times and written about um about uh the i don't know

55:53the awkwardness the difficulty of confronting if my parents could have done better why did they not

56:01or asking them like if they had because sometimes it's like oh i didn't know any better it's like

56:07well why didn't you know any better and so it's like uh uh like confronting that is is is difficult

56:14and i don't mean that uh um that your suggestions uh were there to like put parents in the audience

56:24on the back foot of like oh well these are somewhat obvious or things that you could have done or

56:32now that i've told you these things if you don't do that that's like additional you know there's

56:38additional there where it's like if they are confronted by their kids in in the future and

56:44they ask them well why did you hit me if you knew specifically these ideas of exactly how you could

56:53have done better and did you try them uh that it just um it definitely i don't maybe solidifies

57:02moral culpability there where they can't hide hmm yeah yeah if you don't know if you've never

57:08studied it you can't be held quite as much responsible for it and this is something that

57:13uh i i think this is true i i i never know of course because it's got to do with reporters

57:18but i was sort of struck uh that this is what the reporter wrote about malcolm in 2024 again whether

57:27it's true or not who knows right but she wrote in the car on the way to the restaurant malcolm

57:32tells me how much he doesn't like babies and he says quote objectively they are trying and they're

57:37aggravating they're gross this little bomb that goes off crying in this big explosion of poo and

57:42mucus every 30 40 minutes and it doesn't have a personality really but once the kid enters the

57:48goof patrol as we call it i love them to death they're amazing they're so happy they're so full of life

57:52and i don't know about that i mean it doesn't sound like there's a lot of pair bonding going on

57:58you can't obviously pair bond with the baby if you really dislike the baby and consider it gross

58:03and i wonder if maybe the lack of pair bonding that might come out of the child getting really

58:11positive the baby getting really positive responses from you when they're babies if that leads to more

58:17disobedience later on like if you have this kind of revulsion about babies what does that mean in

58:22terms of how much they're going to want to listen to you later on and that's you know maybe that's a

58:26bit of a stretch but i i wouldn't i wouldn't be surprised at all if that had some some relationship

58:32in the same way that his forgiveness of his parents and his aggression towards his children are related

58:40i mean if he if he's justifying his parents aggression towards him or a difference towards him or lack

58:45of concern or care for his motives then of course he's going to end up reproducing that like what we

58:49justify we reproduce whatever we excuse we repeat all right any other thoughts people questions issues

58:56challenges problems really do appreciate the feedback and thank you to those who helped me refine the

59:00arguments gosh was that today earlier today i think it was uh but yeah i know i was it yesterday

59:07anyway uh i it was it was some some point but i really do appreciate people's help uh and if there's

59:13anything that crosses your mind you can always email support at freedomand.com and don't forget

59:18to support the show freedomand.com slash donate and shop.freedomand.com pick up your merch and

59:25peaceful parenting book.com to get your copy it's running out of time if you want to get it for

59:29christmas so i hope you will check that out and uh thanks to james again for all the great research

59:34thanks for the feedback lots of love from my pmi friends i'll talk to you soon bye

59:38you

59:49you

59:51you

59:53you

59:55you

59:59you

00:01you

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