Katie Herzog and Jesse Singal || Uncancellable

the podcast. Herzog's writing has appeared in an array of publications, and she is a former staff writer the Seattle Alt Weekly. The Stranger. Single is a contributing writer at New York Magazine, where he previously edited Science of Us, a behavioral science vertical. He also has a newsletter where he writes about behavioral science, media, and other stuff. The other stuff part being a lot of other stuff. His book about half baked viral psychology,

The Quick Fix, is coming out in about a year. Together, Herzog and Single co host The Blocked and Reported podcast. So great to chat with you today, guys. Thanks for having us. Thank you so much. Do we have anything to discuss? How's the weather where you are? Yeah, the weather is beautiful actually, so please don't hate me, but you're making a lot more money than I am. So I don't know about that. Discuss the above ground pool

I have planned with our Patreon earnings. Yeah, yeah, I was wondering what like the next big you know, like goal stretch goal is like, if you hit ten thousand a month, you guys will donate half the proceeds to the Psychology podcast. Is that it? Yeah? That was that

was under discussion, of course, naturally. I think right now the only plan is that Jesse's going to make pizza for every single one of our listeners if we hit him ten thousand dollars a month can be gluden free some of Golden Frien absolutely, Scott, that is that is blasphemy gluten free pizza. Come on, well, it's gonna some Patreon subscribers, Jesse, but you'll get the Celiac people loving you, okay,

trust me, and that would include me. Okay. So look, I want to actually start off and I ask you guys where you first met each other, because I it occurred to the other day. I was like, was I witnessing the origin story? Remember We went to the bar after that Heaterdox Academy conference, and you guys were just so intensely talking to each other, and I was, I was like, and I kept looking over to talk to you too, and you two worked so intense that I was just like, I'm just gonna let you two be.

Is that is that one of the first times you too talk to each other in person? I think, right? But Katie, didn't you originally reach out to me because

we were writing a story on the same subject. Well, so I reached out to you while I was working on a piece about de Transition because I read your work and part of the story that I thought that I was working on had a section about sort of backlash to talking about the transition stories, which didn't ultimately make it in the piece, and I don't think it needed to be in the piece, but it was sort of my way of like hedging against against criticism was

to add, like, all these stories about people who had written about trans issues in a way that sort of got them, got them dog piled for whatever reason. And so I reached out to you, Ali Draeger, a few other people, but I had been reading Jesse's work for a while, and then so we corresponded over the course of several months. And then yeah, the first time we met in person was in New York. We met right before the Heterodox conference. We had food and beer or something.

But you saw us right at like one of our early conversations, right on a legendary historical moment that I wouldn't So you too are quickly making waves. Now can you maybe just both of you just go one? We want you to introduce yourself. I did a bio, but if you could just introduce, how would you like to be viewed as all that Katie goes first because she's she's smarter than me. I'm actually not smarter than Jesse, but I'm funnier than Jesse, which is worth more. It

turns out, so I am. I guess I think of myself as a media critic. Primarily, as you mentioned in the bio, I was a staff writer at The Stranger Seattles All Weekly until recently. I was laid off in uh in the COVID the wave of COVID laid off layoffs, and so now I'm doing some freelancing. I've written a couple of pieces for The Guardian in the Atlantic since

the layoff. But mostly what I am is a podcast co host that is now the most important part of my identity now that people are actually giving us money to do this. But my interests are are fairly aligned with Jesse's and probably with yours in some respects. I'm interested in psychology and human behavior, particularly why humans sometimes

do such crazy things. Yeah. Yeah, before this, I I wrote a lot about climate change, and but I find that parsoning a human human consciousness is more interesting to me now. Cool, Jesse, How do you know? What are some things that are core to your identity these days? Man, that's a good question. I have a one foot a little bit in academia because when I was twenty seven ish, I left a sort of permanent freelancer job at the

Boston Globe, where I'd been doing opinion writing. I went to public policy school and I learned more about psychology, economic statistics, and it really turned me away from just straightforward this is right, this is wrong opinion writing. I got. I got much more interested in why people believe what they do. Led me to a lot of thinkers like Danny Kahneman, John Height, just just this whole universe of a different way of looking at things where it's less.

You know, you don't believe in gay marriage, so I think you're bad, And more like, why did you come to some, you know, such different conclusions about morality as I did? And I think there's a way to do that where you don't lose sight of your own beliefs, but you just understand how complicated the human brain is. Yeah, for sure. And that's my introduction to you as you're writing on the replication crisis. I believe it in New York Magazine. I thought it was really well done, Jesse.

So that's that's where I first encountered you. Now, why do you decide to start this podcast together? Blocked and reported? Why do you decide to start it together? You want to take that? Yeah, you know, it's such a weird time and COVID makes the last I mean when we started in March? Right? Yeah? Wait? Did we? I think we started? I don't know. Time has seventy evening, but it might have even been April. It might have been April.

So Katie and I have had similar experiences where we run up against this thing where in liberal and lefty journalism, and we're both firmly on the left by any conceivable metric.

Certain subjects are very difficult to talk about. And when I say this people people caricature that position as though what I'm advocating is like phrenology or race science, when really I think like what's going on now is a good example where there's a lot of complexity to the protest going on to the question of how to reform police, and I think a lot of people feel like they can't talk about this stuff openly. They can't weigh costs and benefits, what policies we should pursue, how race and

class intersect. So that's the classic kind of single hurt some issue where we have I think, traditionally gotten themselves out in trouble, gotten sorry, gotten ourselves in trouble on Twitter for maybe speaking about it a bit a bit too freely. Do you think that's fair to say, Katie?

I do. Yeah. I think that Jesse and I tend to both be motivated by by data and by empirical evidence and things that can be tested in a little bit less by emotion, and that probably makes us like less fun to hang out with than most people and a little bit too like like, oh, let me explain

to you how the world works using numbers. But it's not it's not necessarily the sort of I think dominant dominant personality trade them on much of the media right now, and it puts us at odds with a lot of other people, and there seems to be a desire for that conversation. The response from the pod to this podcast

so far has been like sort of overwhelming. We're getting a lot of messages from people who say things like, thank you for making me feel less crazy, and so I feel like, you know, that's kind of the goal for me at least, is to besides make enough money to get them around pool, to make people feel as crazy because I feel crazy right now. Yeah, I think I really I completely echo that goal of making people not feel crazy. I also think we want to carve out a space where, like I don't think Katie or

I want to give up our identities as progressives. And a lot of the people who get caught up in some of the craziness right now sort of change their political identity entirely because they feel so unwelcome, especially online. And I think that's unfortunate, because you know the question of whose meanor on Twitter is the left meaner? Is the right meaner? That shouldn't determine your politics. Your politics should should come from core aspects of your identity and

your values. Says you're in your opinion, So why do you think it's let's really zoom in on why your podcast is taken off by storm. You're at what now five thousand a month on patroon eight hundred scott. Okay, sorry that was very snooty. I should be clear Katie and I had no idea this was going to happen, and we're sort of in shock about it. But yes, we're eight hundred and thirteen as I look at this

less than a month in. If we were in normal fields like tech or something, this would be like, this would be petties. But as a journalist, this is like the equivalent of JK. Rowling's money. Oh, come on. And as a scientist then it's, you know, let's be realistic. As an academic, I really want to zoom in though, like, what do you think is the people that are signing up, what are they craving? What is the underlying basic human

need that you're fulfilling? From a Maslowian perspective, see, I like actual which which part on the pyramid of the higher needs. I think for shelter for shelter, Yeah, we are shelter at this point, your shelter. And then what's the storm that they're trying to come away from? The social media? Social media Katie should run with this, this this is good, we're shelter's right now. We've talked about this a lot on the podcast, and I keep coming back

to this one phrase, the pressure to conform. I think people are really experiencing that with then, and especially because of the pandemic, and we're seeing people less in person unless you got to protest. So so much of our communication now is filtered through social media and online, and there's not a lot of room for nuance and debate

talking about difficult issues, as Jesse you mentioned. And I think that what we're providing for people is just a way to listen to people talk about these things that isn't driven by ideology, that isn't strident. I hope that we're not I'm okay with us being no at all's, but I hope that we're not the sort of people who I don't know, I'm sure others to conform to

their opinion. So I think that's what it is. I think people feel like genuinely nuts right now, and they don't know how to talk to their friends about it because they're scared if they do they'll get excommunicated, and so they listen to our podcast instead. And we should say, like, this isn't some idle concern. Like just today, a twenty eight year old data science guy at Cibus Analytics, which

is a big data and polling firm in DC. All he did was tweet that there's some political science from this African American studies professor at Princeton suggesting that violent protesting and rioting leads to a political backlash. That's a very important finding. He got fired, fired capital f fired

just for tweeting that. I think this is an outlying case, but when people send us messages, this is increasingly the sort of thing they're concerned about that if I tweet the wrong thing or say the wrong thing, there's going to be disproportionate consequences. Yeah, I hear you, and Katie, you said something that really stuck out at me on Twitter the other day, and we'll be going through a lot more of your tweets in a second but one that you said that really stuck out of me is

you're like, I've never felt more free in my entire life. Look, that really hit home for me as well. What do you view as freedom? Then? For me, it really comes down to not having bosses so right now, I mean if I were trying to make it as a freelancer right now, a freelance writer, or if I were trying to get a staff job, I would be really constrained in what I can say. And this is not like my views are very normative. I'm sort of a like

a regular like Maltos liberal. I'm a registered Democrat. I don't think I believe anything you know, outside the Overton window at all. But when you work at a media job, at a staff need a job, particularly right now, there's an attitude that everybody who doesn't conform to the same narrative is wrong and if you're wrong, you were bad, and if you were bad, you were evil. And there's a real cost to that because people feel afraid to say what they want to say, you know, and people

are getting fired. There was that analyst that Jesse mentioned. There's been lots of cases of this, particularly people in academia, which you know, you would think they would be more protected and in media. Now that Jesse and I have this, are creating this business where we're not My ability to say what I want isn't constrained by the fear that my coworkers besides Jesse are going to get mad at me. I just don't have to worry about it. I mean, so much of my sort of internal like brain space

and stress. But what I had a job at the Stranger was trying to figure out what I could say and what I could say in a way that wasn't going to get me either like a talking to or my boss wasn't. I didn't want other people to sort of have to, you know, pay for like my sense, so my bosses would get emails. I didn't want that to happen. And I just don't have to worry about

that anymore. You know, I'm sure that there's something I could say that would probably make our Patreon followers leave, or Jesse could or maybe when Jesse create rights his wrap for his the replication Crisis, which is one of our straticals. I think you should both start taking pictures of what you're doing with people's money. God Instagram different pictures of like, look, we're on a jet. That that might be the thing that would that would make everybody

stop giving us their money. But unfortunately, I don't think a six thousand dollars a month will get us there yet. So that's what I mean by free. I don't like right now, especially in the media, if you say the wrong thing, if you believe the wrong thing, if you say that you don't think Woody Allen's book should have been pulped by his publisher or whatever, there's a real danger to that. And I don't have to worry about that anymore. Yeah, I can see why you would, you

would feel free. But this is also like I'm in a very unique position because one of the one of the reasons we're in this unique position is because Jesse and I do have this sort of freedom in some ways and other people don't, and so we can say the things that they can't say. Yeah, yes I am. I'm saying we have we have a you know, independent podcast wealth privilege. So that's what I mean. It's not I also like, haven't left my house in like three months,

so that's a it's a weird sort of freedom. So but at the same time that freedom is being restricted for everybody around us. We have to do found ability to support ourselves by saying what we want. Yeah, and so it sounds like this dynamic that you describe the stranger is going on at the New York Times right now, right, Yeah, I think it's going on everywhere absolutely. And what and what I what pisces me off about this is there's a subset of journalists who will go on Twitter and

loudly claim a that it's not happening. Be anyone who claims it's happening has a suspect political agenda and is just you know, wants to be a Ben Shapiro fan or a far right person. The reason, Okay, Katie and I both get tons of emails from people in journalism and academia, that's safe to say, right Katie, Oh yeah, and they send us those emails because they know we're going to be sympathetic. Why would you send an email about your workplace situation to someone you think might you know,

screencap that and make fun of you on Twitter. So I think people who are sure this stuff isn't going on should should consider there might be a reason you're not hearing from the people affected by it. That makes a lot of sense. Yeah, it hadn't really that. It

hadn't even really occurred to me. So what happened is at the New York Times for your listeners who don't know, So, the New York Times publish and op ed by Senator Tom Cott, and that essentially argued for sending the national troops into the US cities and states to quell the

civic unrest or civil unrest. And then there was a huge amount of pushback from the staff and then Barry Wise, who's the staffer there, basically wrote a series of tweets saying that there's a civil war inside the New York Times.

And the response to that was a bunch of her colleagues saying that this doesn't exist and it hadn't even occurred to me until Jesse and I had this conversation that people, some people in the New York Times probably weren't like, they weren't lit, They really didn't are like, aren't even aware that this thing exists because the only mess is that they're getting is the one they already believe.

It's just we're all surrounded by confirmation bias, which is it's just sort of remarkable to me, Like you guys, you guys, don't you really don't even realize it's very strange. Well, what do you guys do to try to get outside of your own bubble on your podcast? I think it's been easier as I've developed. So I think the average, say, reader of my articles and and my chunk of our fans, like the chunk of our fans who came in via me versus be a Kadi, is definitely left of center.

They're sort of like Obama liberals. But there's also been a subset of sort of genuinely centrist and right of center people. I would imagine the percentage of our listeners who are Trump fans is very, very small, but it's slightly I've interacted with a slightly wider array of people than I would have, say, when I worked at New York Magazine in twenty sixteen. Just hearing their voices and hearing their critiques of liberal ideas and left the ideas I think is important, just as sort of like to

exercise your intellectual muscles and your skepticism muscle. So for me, that's been a big part of it. And also just I'm curious if Katie feels the same way. But there's a subset of issues where in the course of being a reporter, I've learned a great deal about them, and then I've seen how they're covered in other more ideologically conformist outlets, and that has shown me that I need to be skeptical because I see stuff printed on the

screen that I know is not true. And it's just it's been a little bit of a can we swear on this podcast or now? Sure? Sure, I'll have the market explicit though no, okay, I don't want to drag you over that threshold. It's been a mind bleep. It's been a mind bleep to honestly, to like get into these specific nitty gritty areas and then see how these controversies are covered by Vox or Buzzfeeder in the New York Times. It has to make you a little bit

more skeptical, just as a living, breathing, thinking adult. Yeah, it's a discomfiting experience in a lot of ways. To when you become familiar with an issue and you see media outlets reporting falsehoods, like repeating misinformation. It's outlets that you trust. It's destabilizing in a lot of ways, you know, and I don't mean that it's sort of a Donald Trump fake news way, but just so much is just colored by ideology and bias that when you see that,

it becomes difficult to unsee it. And in terms of getting out of the bubble, I talked to conservatives and this is something I didn't do before twenty sixteen, but after Donald Trump was elected. I had a feeling that Trump was going to be elected. I predicted it about six months before, and after he was elected, the shock

by everybody around me. I lived in Seattle at the time, and you know, we're in these sort of hyperliberal media circles, and just the utter shock by everybody around me, most people who didn't know single Trump supporter and who were proud of that fact, just really showed me that if the media wants to reflect what's happening in the world,

we have to talk to people we disagree with. And it's such a like that shouldn't be that shouldn't be a revelation, right, It should not be a shock that you need to speak to people who believe things that you don't believe. But I went out of my way to start doing it, and now I wouldn't say that I have like great friends who are conservatives, but actually maybe I do. You know, I have like I hang out with like some libertarians. Now, I before all of

this stuff happened, I thought libertarians were just insane. I thought they were crazy, And now I find I find that I agree with a lot of their positions, and not entirely because my politics have evolved. But it just turns out like there's a lot of civil rights is there's civil civil liberties issues that I, you know, believe in the libertarian position, which is often also the liberal position. Are you to be? So I try, know not to

judge people as much on who they voted for. You know, It's just I don't think who we vote as a for is necessarily a reflection of our worth as a person. And I enjoy talking to conservatives. I find it oftentimes easier to talk to conservatives because there isn't this sort of pressure to agree, you know, there's no we don't have to deal with the narcissism of small differences, and

it doesn't become often doesn't become as heated. I know that I'm not gonna be on the same ideological page as somebody's who's actually very conservative, and so we leave the conversation not feeling sort of angry about it. So I think I've I don't know, I think I've I've learned a lot more about the world and about how people work since I've started talking to people who don't necessarily agree with me all the time. Can I add one quick thing to that. We've said some stuff on

the podcast, obviously that listeners disagree with. And you know, I did a long interview with this leftist thinker Ben Burgess. I really like some people disagree with aspects of it, the difference that I've noticed lately, and there's some selection bias at work here in the way liberals and conservatives express disagreement. And again, I'll I want to kick it

to Katie after this to see if she agrees. A lot of people on the left seem incapable of just disagreeing without also couching it as some sort of sign of world Yes, yes, moral degradation on the part of the person they disagree with. Conservatives will say, you know, I disagree with this, here's why, and they leave it at that. They don't obviously, if you go online, you'll find people who'll call you like an SJW. Cock or whatever.

But the conservatives I've interacted with are weirdly more capable of just disagreeing and acknowledging disagreement than people on the left, which I find very frustrating because I think that's an important skill to build. Yeah, well people on the left

would counter. Those people you're referring to on the left would probably counter that's because they have morals, right, Yeah, So if you don't even know what it means to feel like you have to get outraged by things because you don't care, then of course you can talk about it more commonly. But now I'm not saying that's my position. I'm saying I could see I, you know, see a

devil's advocate. I think that this increasing communication and increasing the communication, that the synchronicity of the communication style is

really important. So regardless of what direction is, what if you have people who are really angry and coming from a place of rage, anger and the way the stay of the world is, and you and others trying to communicate with you through more of the different you know, modality of human existence, it's just going to be talking past each other, right, So, I wonder how we can do that without telling people. You know, the more you tell people just calm down, the more have you ever

tried that? Jesse telling an angry person just calm down. I think I have an answer to that, which is, if someone comes at me on Twitter and they're very mad at me, I will ask them to explain to me exactly what it is I've said that they disagree and why they disagree with it, And often they're unable to do that. They're just mad at me, but they don't know why. So I don't think saying them to

calm down is the right answer. I do think if you're mad enough at me to come at me on Twitter, I have a right to say, what is it you disagree with? Tell me exactly, and if they can't answer that, they're not worth engaging with. Yeah, I don't. I think I like Jesse's tactic. I don't know that it changes people's Actually, it probably changes the minds of the observers. I think you have some utility with that. I don't. I wonder if it works as well with the people

who've already decided that you're trash. And this is something that I feel like I'm struggling with right now, is how do I talk to people about these things who don't know that they're happening. All of the sort of the cultural revolution, sort of moral panic that I think we're in the midst of right now. A lot of people don't see it, and I want them to see

it because I think it's dangerous. And I don't know, I mean other than like going to their house and you know, blasting the podcast outside their windows until they listen. I don't know how to how to convince people to just be a little bit open, a little bit open

to this idea that something's happening. I was something you could you could answer that party or Scott, you're the psychologist, open to what happening in particular, open to seeing that something is going on that they might not be aware of, Oh, something outside of their own perspective, something outside of their

own perspective. Right there's such a I think there's such a people, especially on the left right now, are so convinced of their sort of moral righteousness that if I say something like maybe people shouldn't be fired for you know, having like worn a stereotypically Puerto Rican costume when they were, you know, in college or whatever. How do I make

people see this? Well? This is interesting. If if people you're describing on the left are morally righteous, would you say there's an equivalent on the right of maybe not moral righteous but truth righteousness, like they think they have the answer? Is there a different kind of righteousness on the right? Oh? I think absolutely. I mean, you know, think about Christianity. I think Christians probably tend to be more more conservative. I think they're utterly convinced of their

of their you know, righteousness. And I also don't think there's anything I could do to you know, I can't convince someone who believes that the world was made in six days and that gay people are going to Hell that the world wasn't made in six days and there is no hell. And I think there's you know, the commonality there is that it tends to be very religious. In both cases. You can't, I don't can talk someone

out of their belief. To be clear, I think Katie's going to Hell, but for reasons completely unconnected from her sexuality. That's an important point, I think because like, I don't want I went through years of like to the extent people got mad at me it was people on the right, Like I went through years of that which might not be visible to people now. But there's a subset of people on the right I don't necessarily think it's worth engaging with. If they wanted to have a good, faid conversation,

I would. But part of the reason some of my focus has been on the left is I think there's trends here where that could hurt the left in the long run, and I feel like this is more sort of my extended family. But all these dynamics, again, you know, you're social, you know this guy like, these are human dynamics. And I've had conservatives explained to me that whatever sociopathy you see on Twitter, you could find that in like small town churches, where if you say the wrong thing

at a luncheon you're ostracized from the group forever. This is just we're all just primates, concerned about status and in groups and outgroups. It's the same thing wherever you look. Yeah, I think the reason, in part that we think this is so much more prominent on the left is because we're on the left. This is where we see it. This is also a reflection of our own echo chambers.

But I'm sure if you go to some like you know, small town church Facebook group, there's drama and in fighting and you know, people say the wrong thing, I get kicked out, Oh for sure. Yeah. A lot of it is is ego egos being threatened, and you're seeing group egos being threatened. So if you're strongly strong identify with something and your group is not being respected, then that becomes the most important issue to you out of any

other issue in the world. And then and then it gets really problematic if you really want to talk about how messy humans are, if you zoom out a second and realize, oh my gosh, every group's the same way. See, the fact is every group thinks they're the only ones that are the victims. But right, that's called the bias. It's like the bias bias. Right, we think everyone else is biased, but where the rational actors? Yeah yeah, well

everyone else is biased and we are at the restaurant. Well, I was gonna say, Blocked and Reported happens to be the only podcast free of any bias on the planet.

So I don't want to detract from that message. Okay, you might have pulled the hat trick there, but the thing is I would like to have empathy and compassion for everyone, So I would like to I think the ultimate state to be in is one where we try to listen to everyone's viewpoint, and it doesn't mean that we agree with it, but we always try to have a dialogue where we all everyone acknowledges everyone else's viewpoint.

But of course that you know that kumbaya gets tricky when we talk about people who think in terms of term of zero sum games. And that's what the world is at right now is zero some thinking. But can I can I use your platform, which, despite your kind words, your platform is much larger than ours. And I just want to make a quick point about think about it this way. There is there is a guy who didn't graduate high school in Ohio or Kentucky, in an area ravaged by the opioid crisis. He has a lot to

fear from the police. The police do no knock rades, They use weapons in an irresponsible way. They do civil civil civil forfeiture where they can just take your car on the thinnest of premises. All this stuff happens in poor white communities. I'm not saying it happens as much statistically or whatever the point is, if you care about politics, there's a message you could say to that guy in Kentucky or Ohio that would that would raise him out of the tribalism, that would make him think he has

something at stake in the battle for police reform. If you have that opportunity, why would you instead tell him the opposite, which is that as an evil conservative Trump voter, he has no part to play in that movement. That's where the question of sort of civility and political advocacy intersect as far as I'm concerned, because a lot of the messaging going on right now it's just designed to sort of rev up the people who are already converted,

not to sort of increase the number of people on board. Well, you've entered tricky territory, my friend. But I will say I am working on an article right now trying to get the root of some of this, and what I think you see a lot of is, you know, having the victim put in mindset actually gives you a power play over others. It lets you get resources, it lets you have immunity from a more immorality, and like retaliation, like if you retaliate with violence, well, you're the victim,

so that's fine. You'll get empathy for it. So there's a whole set of things that come along if you can have a victim of mentality. Now, I'm sure not saying whether it's justified or not, a not making a blanket statement and saying everyone who acts like they're a victim is just trying to get a power play. I

want to be clear, I'm not saying that. And everyone knows having a superin goal is the only way to bring together humanity, like we psychologists, We psychologists know that it's a contact hypothesis which everyone is ignoring even though it's like a really important idea. Yeah, can you oberate on that a little bit more. Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to talk over you, Scott, but I was on a role Jesse. No. I The reason I rudely talked

over you is this really gets my goat. Is like the best evidence for bringing people of different groups together, and it's like all psychological evidence, it's context dependent, it's complicated. Is the contact hypothesis? That's it? That is, if you have people of different groups and you can put them in a situation where they have a shared goal and have equal status to the to the extent possible, you

can get beyond these group boundaries. You can have them, you know, feel like they're part of a superordinate group or have a superordinate goal. And a lot of the discourse I see on some of the most important issues in the country seems much more geared at dividing people up than you know, can sieving of a way to bring them together. Is it also, you're the expert. Did

I just describe the contact hypothesis clearly? Yeah, totally, You're right, And that's what I meant by, you know, the superordinate goal, having that a humanity, you know, something that rallies assault together as human first, as opposed to identity or group first. It is tricky because it seems like politics now has become a tool for winning as opposed to policy. Do you remember that? Do they ever remember the days when like policy was supposed to be thoughtfully used as a

way to help humans, you know, as a species. You know, now it's become a it's become a dividing tool. What do you what do you think of my thoughts on a on the victimhood mindset and and and how sometimes you can kind of get stuck in this trap where you know you actually don't want to get out of it. Oh yeah, I think you're absolutely right. I mean you can observe this every day on social media, for sure.

I saw a paper that was floating around this week that I didn't read that from the dialogue, it seemed to the paper seem to be saying that victimhood is a stable personality trade. Yeah, I'm actually that so I'm writing up right now it's yeah, I've been in touch with those authors about trying to connect that to collective victimhood,

which is another construct. Yeah, yeah, I'm I'm a little more torn on it because I absolutely agree this dynamic goes on and well, especially in light of this idea that victimhood brings status, we should emphasize that Katie and I have been victimized more than anybody. Oh yeah, yeah, Hue. That said, I'm always I'm always torn on this because, like in a country that really was built on staggering unfairness, I want to hear you know, if someone says they're

a victim, there's often merit to that claim. So it's like you can sort of you can go too far in either direction. You can say as soon as someone says they're a victim, they are a victim, they should be treated as a victim, or you can sort of adopt the victimhood mentality as your overall model for explaining the world, and suggests that any claim of victimhood is unfounded and shouldn't be taken serious. So I just think there's a maybe an Aristotelean middle ground somewhere in there.

There is. I mean, the ultimate would be for for all humans to come together and say we're you know, we're all victims of discrimination. We want to work together to fight discrimination. That's one way. That's one model. Yeah, no, no, I definitely get what you're saying. I wonder how much of this is conscious on the part of the people engaged and engaged in it. I do think this sort of, you know, maybe victimhood is just a meme. Maybe this

is just another like floating through culture. I mean, I'm serious. It's just I don't think that in the you know, I can't imagine that like our grandfather's generation sort of got you know, sort of social status from victimhood. You know, I think masculinity and power and other things we're you know,

the status getters at that point. This is the the Jason Manning Bradley Campbell theory right victimhood, the that we have this whole new system that valorises victimhood, which I was very skeptical of when they wrote that book, which I haven't read, but I'm at least on Twitter. It is absolutely the case that I didn't read. Yeah, exactly,

that's that's what journalists do. Yees. Sorry to interrupt you, Jesse, but there's like I was doing a radio interview yesterday with a conservative talk radio guy out here in Seattle, and I said something about I'm not really sure what the context is, but I said something about how about privilege? And he said, well, you're not privileged because you're gay and he's gay too. And I didn't I didn't sort of push back on that because the conversation just moved on.

But there is that narrative that, because of these particular demographics and historical oppression, that I, you know, a lesbian in twenty twenty should feel oppressed. And I absolutely do not feel oppressed in any particular way. But there is this sort of assumption like if you check any sort of minority status, you are off. You are automatically a victim, even if you're you know, even if you're wealthy, even

if you're educated, and if you're gorgeous. You know, Christy Tagan was sort of Recently, the cookbook writer Alice in Roman criticized Christy Tigan and Christy Tagan was portrayed as a victim of racism and that even though you know, he's one of the most successful women in the world.

It's strange, very so, it's so strange. You know, you don't have to have a victim mentality, even if you've been a victim, right, well, I mean that's also the question, is right, It's like, does feeling like a victim help people? And you guys know way more more about the data than I do. But I mean, if you just, you know, think about John Heights work. I mean, it seems like resilience.

What we want, what we should want as individuals and as a culture, is resilience and the ability to get past adversity, not wallow in it just for our own for our own mental health. I mean, I don't think feeling like a victim necessarily makes health happier. It's a very interesting question that people like Coleman Hughes and mcwarter Jonathan McWorter have been trying to really grapple with this

from an African American perspective. When will there be a point where you know, is it reparations, is it a collective sort of cultural apology. It is clear that we're not there yet, Like there still needs to be something in order for Africamericans to feel safe in our country, to feel I feel like they're part of the of every They're they're they're they're part of it. You know, they're part of American culture and they're they're cared for.

It seems like we're not there yet. No, And you can also underst I mean, we're just now pulling down Confederate statues, like can you imagine? Sorry, this is just one of those issues where I'm absolutely in line with the so called social justice wires. But like if you were in the country and they and they they, I can absolutely understand why why they might feel that way. I just wanted to throw it, like, I think this stuff is complicated, and black public opinion is incredibly complicated,

but I get it. Yeah, I mean I try to listen to perspect actives and not claim my I definitely know on time. But I also opened to the fact that, you know, being born black gives you a different experience in America, just like being born with a worrying disability. I had a kid gave me a different experience as well. You know, we all have these different experiences than we should have listened to each other's stories. But no one's really listening to each other's stories right now, are they.

I just feel like they're just wanting to rip their heads off. Not at all. It's sad. Yeah, So are you ready for me to start going through some of your tweets? Oh God, I brought a beer for this very questions, I'd be a little bit. I go for it. Okay, I'm gonna start with Katie. Just discuss quote. I realized this is obnoxious, but god, I love being right. Okay, that was in response. You've got to read the tweet, the tweet above that. Oh I didn't realize it was

in response to something. Oh yes, were you right about something? So here's what happened. So, uh, I think that if the public health experts are to be believed, and I am bill inclined to believe what they were saying a month ago, or two months ago about the dangers of being out in giant crowds of people, particularly when people are shouting during a pandemic, that it is a bad

idea to attend these protests. Particularly. I was sort of particularly appalled because my wife, who's a nurse, her union, so you know, we've just state we crashed the economy, stayed home for three months in part to help healthcare workers, and my wife's union sent her text message ordering her

to go to a protest. And I've been having a hard time sort of articulating this because if you say that you don't think people should go to protest during during a pandemic, what people read, what people hear is I don't support the movement, which in my case is not true. I'm just deeply concerned about the spike and COVID cases that we may or may not see. I hope that we don't and then if we see a spike in COVID cases going back under lockdown, crashing the

economy again, people using their businesses. I lost my job all like businesses in my neighborhood have started to close. It's really bad, and I want that I think it Obviously I'm concerned about racism. I think the murder of George Ford was terrible. I'm concerned about police brutality when it comes to black people and all other races. We

need reform. That said, we're still in the middle of a bleeping pandemic, and it's the collective sort of amnesia here where the same people who a week ago were sort of making fun of quarantine protesters are saying, no, this is fine now, my cause is just, and therefore it's okay to leave your house and be in a crowd of ten thousand people all screaming at the same time. And I've been really struggling with the hypocrisy and the cognitive dissonance over the past couple of weeks, and I'm

seeing this not just online. I'm seeing it like in my actual social networks. It's been difficult to watch. And

then I saw an opening. So the Black Lives Matter Seattle chapter is statement saying that they were discouraging their members from going to the protest because as we have been hearing these, you know, COVID is disproportionately affecting black and round communities, and going to a mass protest if the public health experts were right, you know the first time around before they changed their tune, is going to

kill more black and round people. And so I felt totally virtuous and correct that I had been, you know, the one saying like, don't go to these protests if you still care about saving Grandma's life and still care about frontline workers. I mean, it's one thing if you want to take on that risk to yourself, but it's not if it didn't. If it was only taking on the risk to yourself, if the biggest danger was tear gas or rubber bullets or being shot by the police,

I would say go. But because you know this disease is contagious, it's not just taking on responsibility for yourself. It's like potentially spreading this pandemic. So when Black Lives Matter, because we live in a time when identity is everything, when Black Lives Matter released a statement saying like we're discouraging people from attending these protests. And here's why I felt totally validated, validated. It felt like, I, hey, I

am right. And then I made the mistake of posting a screenshot of the black of the Black Lives Monern statement on Instagram and just got I got text messages I got from friends saying that I was racist. And that's that's in part why Jesse and I are doing this podcast because if I if I say I don't think people should be going out during a pandemic to like into gatherings with thousands of people, what people here is you don't care about the marker of George Floyd,

you don't care about what. People didn't call you racist when you retweeted Black Lives Matter saying it, No they did, they did. They still called you. But I was trying no, no, no, because I was basically I was I was like, which was true? I was like using the using identity politics to try to make a point and say you're not going to listen to me, maybe you'll listen to Black Lives Matter? And these people said, no, you're using them. You know you're using which is like, which is you know,

sort of valid criticism. I was waiting for an opening for basically, you know, a black person to say this is dumb, what are you guys doing? And so but that was that was the response to this, to this uh to saying like I don't think you should go on a pandemic. So anyway, that's why I said I love being right because in that case I felt like I was this validated my position, and I love being right. It is obnoxious, but I love it. I really do. A lot of people love being right. Maybe that's what's

wrong with America right now. Yeah. I also, I will say, though, I also really like changing my mind. You know, I changed my mind all the time. But when I was working at the Stranger, I would interview political candidates and I would always ask them, what's something you've changed your mind on about lately? And I would say, you know, if you need to think this is a difficult question, So if you need to think about it for a while, you can, you can give me a call or email me.

And the number of people who were completely unable to say that they had changed their mind about anything in like recent history was truly astounding. I'm glad that you're open and changing your mind. So let me bring up another tweet you wrote. It says, I spend half my day wondering if I'm outside the cult looking at the cult, or if I'm actually in the cult and just can't see it. Yeah, that's how I feel. I do. I

really do. I think that I suspect that where you have entered a moment of moral panic and sort of mass hysteria, that seems to be one thing, but it might really have some other underlying things going on. And you know, when your social networks, especially online, are filled with people saying the exact same thing, it starts to feel like you're watching a cult, you know what. I feel its way in other ways, like over the past six years, it seems like everybody I know got into astrology.

You know, It's like they all found Jesus overnight. It's a very sort of destabilizing experience to say, like, I thought that, you know, I thought, I assume that the people that I know are sort of rational thinkers, and all of a sudden they're talking about how like, you know, the reason I don't believe in astrology is because I'm a tourist and stuff like that. But I think it's

a Gemini. Wait, that's interesting. I identify I usually I say I am a Gemini because I was born June third, But I can redefine that now, well, I mean I was, I am a tourist, but I identify as a Gemini. Wait a minute, hold on, hold on. I have never heard not getting into trans astrologism. Wait, I've never heard that possible. It is a thing people identify with a different signa. You just blew my mind. This is no. This is something I do to like make fun of

two different groups of people at the same time. Don't adopt this. It's an obnoxious Like when somebody asked me my sign, I literally say, I'm a tourist, but I identify as a Gemini and then they typically stopped talking to me whole week. Wait, that opens up big can of worms with whatever you want, Scott. Wait, So with identity, so with trans identity, but with identity more generally I can adopt. So I can I can be so if my I actually feel like I'm an MMA fighter, Yeah,

you feel like Joe Rogan. I feel like I could just so strong. You know that if someone messed with me, you know, but I don't know, like, can that be my identity? Well? Sure, I mean there was a guy who do you remember this, Jesse. There was a guy somewhere in Europe who tried to like change his birth certificate to being like he was like a man in his sixties or seventies and try to like legally change his age as a thirty year old. I think the court ruled or whatever organization I think he was, he

was ruled against. So sorry, Scott, I have I have no comment. I heve the last four minutes of conversation. Okay, but why do you really you really don't have a comment, or you're trying to stay out of it. No, I'm not really trying to stay out of it. I just have I have complicated views on a lot of stuff, and I think I don't think Katie disagrees with me

on this at all. But I think the vast majority of the time when someone says I identify as X, rather than why, it is a good faith statement of like something they believe strongly, and I think we should generally almost always respect that. There's also, I think, as Katie's pointing to, a sort of weirder tumbler subset of

identity talk that we've actually talked about it. We had an episode on so called online validity discourse, or the idea that it's so important to validate people whatever they say. So I don't know. I just I don't want to get people the impression, at least in my case, and I think Katie's too, Like I think as a general rule, you should respect people's claims about their identity, but we should obviously look at it with a critical eye, because it isn't if I feel a certain way about myself.

It isn't inherently or automatically or on its face. Everyone else's job to sort of rearrange their own view of me around that. If that makes sense, well, I think that with these kind of topics you need to talk about specifically what you're referring to. So I'm of a belief that someone tells me their gender identity, that's great, Like I bide by it, and I treat them as they want to be treated. But we were just making

an absurd example. I mean, do you have any limits at all on this, you know, in the sense of what I remember? You know, well, there was a white woman who said her gender identity was black, and she got significant trouble for so clearly within that, within those rules, So even within the progressive world, there are limits to that, Like you can't you know, you can certainly be a man and say I my gender identity is a woman, but it doesn't seem okay to anything goes you can't

be a white person. My identity, you know, my race identity is black. I find that that interesting. But yes, I think socially you're totally correct. You can say one and ano the other. I think the interesting thing about that is I think there you can make a better argument for race being a social construct than sex being

a social construct. Yeah. Yeah, if we're talking about like actual sex, like biological sex, for sure, it's just well it's but this is like the discourse advances so fast five years ago, being transmit that you gender identity different from your biological sex. Now the I believe the mainstream position is that your gender identity is your biological sex.

So the definitions of these concepts are changing. And this is an example of where we weigh in on some nitty gritty, radical linguistic issue and that's taken as evidence that we're sort of not down for the broader cause, which is not true. Right. Jesse and I both support the ability of adults to get whatever sort of treatment that is going to make them feel better about their lives.

I support the I'm in. I think kids as long as they're comprehensively evaluated, I'm that's the thing that's what's annoying about Twitter is my views on this I think are to the left of like ninety percent of Americans. I really think like if teenagers are properly diagnosed with gender dysphoria and there the process occurs in a careful, scientifically based way, I'm honestly okay with like fourteen and fifteen year olds going on hormones. I think sometimes that's

the right choice. I just think this stuff gets it gets so oversimplified. When when when the question is do you validate or not validate full stop someone's identity? Like it's a binary choice, So anyone's identity can be snuffed out of existence or validated full stop just by someone say it's just it's not a it's a very online

way of understanding the worlds. I think all three of us probably have understandings of identity that are a bit more stable and wouldn't snuff out of existence if someone else denied it. Well, the horoscope example, That's why I zoomed in on that when Katie did that, because blew my mind. It's a fascinating, great starter topic to start to talk about this conversation and try to talk about, well, what are the domeans in which it's laughable, Like it

felt laughable to me. So I'm sorry if I offended you at all by saying that specific example seemed laughable to me by no stretch of imagination. Is it laugh on me when someone tells me their trands, I respect it, and I believe in trans writes, you know. But but that example you gave me, I mean, I alos never heard anyone say that before, So is that the point?

Maybe it's because I hadn't heard it before, Like you could, you could see a point where you have a whole bunch of to the start to say no, like Gemini, identity people matter. I can absolutely see that happening, just because of the way the course, the course of the culture is going is moving at such a rapid clip. A lot of this stuff originates in queer circles, which is where, like historically I have sort of existed in

the world. So a lot of this stuff I feel like I saw it years before it became sort of mainstream. So none of this seems I mean, I know someone who actually identifies as a panda, you know, And I like, I think that's ridiculous. I think it's really silly. But this person like takes this identity seriously. I don't know if this person like eats vamboo or whatever, but their gender is Panada. But also there's a people haven't done like I think sufficient. I wish people would like look

at this more sociologically or anthropologically. Like if someone if a kid on tumbler says I identify as a panda, that is not usually a literal statement of how they feel. It's a confrontational. How are people going to respond? Can I stir up some shit? There's I'm sure there's some people who identify as a panda. It would be kind of fun to identify as a pandic because I could just sleep or sit around all days. I see what

you're saying, Jesse. You're saying, well, you're like, hold up, there is some people are making case that there is there are biological even in the brain matching people's gender identity. There's some biological basis that doesn't determine but may help explain why you may feel like you're a different identity,

even that's opposite of your genitalia, for instance. But when pandas, there's no good scientific evidence that has been found in my knowledge, no one's done the study showing that no, actually certain brain pack activation patterns resemble something where that make it likely for you to feel like a panda rather than a human. That would be awesome. Yeah that's

what you're saying. Yeah, I'm saying that. But I'm also just making an art because I think the arguments I'm making also apply to some people, like teenagers on Tumblr exploring their identity. They're teenagers, and there's certain incentives online to be the guy who comes out as new gender. There's also incentives to be the conservative who jumps into the conversation and yells at him. You can have a fight between two people where neither of them actually believe

the opinion they're broadcasting. So I think understanding this stuff is a little bit behind the times. Online gets very weird, is all I would say. And Katie and I have both like waited our way into bizarre online communities. So you can't take stuff people say in charged online communities at face value. And it's often just as much about sociology and social status as their true innermost feelings. Right,

this is also outliers. I mean, there are a lot of people who like identify as you know, the furry thing. There are people who like really like really deeply feel like whatever sort of character they're acting out. And you know, a lot of this is I think wrapped up in fandom in some ways, you know, the hobbies. Essentially, people's identities are complex and wrapped up and all that stuff. It does put a strain on all of the psychological

training we've ever had. You know, if someone comes and is clearly and I'm trying to think of an example that won't get me in trouble that is clearly like everyone agrees is you know, like you have okay, So here's an example. You know, you have these cases where somebody has, like to their very core, this person feels like they need to have a light cut off. This

person feels like an amputee. You know, I'm sure that these are rare, but you know, this is a thing that exists on like strange disorder whatever that makes you feel like you need to have your arm cut off. You know. I mean, if that person went to a surgeon and said cut off my arm, the surgeon's not going to do this. I'm not arguing that this is the same things as being tranced, because dysphoria can be can isn't always but can be like well treated with

hormones and other medical interventions. But you probably wouldn't find a surgeon willing to perform a surgery on somebody like that, even if it was going to leave their distress. I also think the conversation gets sort of when you make the source of the conversation, do you think a person

who identifies as a man is literally a man? You're sort of missing the point because, like I can say, I think this person should not be fired from their job, or that they should have access to hormones, or that they should have access to surgery for strong moral reasons that have nothing to do with sort of ontological claims about what they quote unquote really are. And I don't know what it means to really be a man other than a biological sense, and no one has really laid

that out. So I worry we get caught up on these online debates that don't actually at root have a lot to do with trans rights, because twenty years ago a totally different model prevailed, where people the ask was I want to be treated as a woman, not I am literally a woman, And I just I don't I think people miss the point, Like what we should care about is no one getting fired from their job for how they present themselves their dress and having access to

medical care, and there's all these challenges that don't really hinge on metaphysical questions. Yeah, I think Jesse's really right about that. He and also I think that most trans people would probably say the same thing. They're much more concerned about discriminate employment discrimination or housing discrimination or how people treat them to their face. And they are these sort of hyper online debates about language and what it really is to be a man or really is to

be a woman. People just want to live their lives. We just see the worst of it, and we just see the most like active, narcissistic brand of any sort of activism online. I get. I get emails from people who make these sweeping claims about quote unquote transactivism. What I always tell them is, like, the average transactivist is like trying to lobby state legislators to not have discriminatory

discriminatory laws in any area. Journalism, activism, science, whoever you see on Twitter or social media that is not like the average person. It's very self selecting. So I, yeah, I don't like people just say stuff on that front that I don't think is realistic and reflects the full range of trans opinion and transactivism for what it's worth. Not to get on a soapbox, but it's important, Jesse, you're our resident social justice warrior today. I know, have

you noticed that? Yeah, A social By the way, I I don't use thoseal justice warriors a derogatory term. I'm not that. I'm not that kind of person. You know, who's who's on social media all day being like, oh, let's make fun of the social justice warriors. Let's mean I think Katie does. I don't think it's I don't use it that often, but I think it describes something

that I don't have another word for. Yeah, because whatever word you choose, you're not like then woke came up, and then people said you can't say whoa you need someone. It just it describes a phenomenon, and like, I would love to have a better word, but whatever word that would be eventually that word problematic too. What So, what the thing we're trying to define is, basically, it's it's

illiberal social justice advocacy rights. I what I define it as social media justice warrior someone Yeah, someone who you know, hyper online, a restrictive view, extremist, an extremist, a very like illiberal view, as as you said, a restrictive view of what can be talked about. I think the to me that the stereotypical sj W would prefer to shout somebody down or cancel them, then sort of have a

conversation and try to get to the heart of the disagreement. Oh, I have a lot more tweets to get through, but I won't get through them all. Don't worry. I won't have you guys here all day. Let me do one more with you, Katie. And then there a couple from Jesse. Sure you wrote, I suspect this country would greatly benefit if there were more liberals on police forces and more conservatives on campuses. People hated this three. I don't know

why people were so appalled by this tweet. I mean, I think it would be like I think ideological diversity is good in any context. I think it would be better if people just knew more people who were not like them, in part because you learn how how the

world works. And I also think that I'm going to stereotype here, but I think that liberals on a police force might moderate a police force, and not because conservatives are more like to shoot people, but because if you have any ideological diversity, you're less likely to get extremism. And so that's the point, is just to have people around you who can check your ideas so that you don't have group think. You don't have this mentality where you must be right because you're never you don't get

any pushback. You're you're surrounded by people who think exactly like you. And I think that's true on campuses as well. So I was really like, it was sort of astounding to me that so many people thought that this like very sort of I don't know, and a dene idea is somehow I don't know, I'm problematic. Well, certainly the college campus thing is something that the kind of high crowd have been arguing for, is that they need more

viewpoint diversity. Okay, yes, I mean I went to a small Sorry to interrupt you, but I went to a small liberal art school in Nashville, North Carolina, a state school, but a liberal arts school. And this is in the South. And I still don't think I knew any conservatives in my college. And you should not be able to get through college without meeting anybody who has a different political perspective than the Okay, Jesse goes, me kick puppies everyone,

that's a horrible slogan. Why would you say that me? No, the point isn't to kick puppies. It's far more subtle than that. Read these ten links explaining what the phrase really means. This will get you on my side, I'm sure.

So it was about a thing going on the left right now where people say that we should abolish the police, and then being saying someone will respond to them, what do you mean, obviously we need police, And then most abolished people police people will say no, no, no, no no. When we say abolish the police, we mean this other thing. And then you read five hundred pages and you realize they're not actually calling for the abolition of the police.

There's a subset of radical people who really want to abolish the police, and to my mind haven't even started to explain what whatever follows would look like. But most of the time when people say abolished the police, they don't mean that. So this is an example of what I was talking about earlier, which if you're trying to get other people on your team. Why would you adopt a slogan that is just going to turn people off from the start. That was a clever way of doing it.

It's a unique angle. Okay. It's insane to me that it's twenty twenty and we have done such a poor job informing people about how online outrage can be weaponized. So, since the George Floyd protest kicked off, Katie and I talked about this on our podcast, blocked and reported. We may have mentioned this podcast once or twice already blocked and reported. Patroon dot com slash Blotter reported, blocked, reported, blocked, reported,

block reported guys need more money. I ironically need more money. Now, there's no amount of money that we need that we don't need. This is a capitalist society's got I'm blocking and reported. Okay, so basically, people are spreading screenshots of teenagers who have supposedly said racist things. These the one account in particular, who has five hundred thousand people, has

just targeted teenagers. In some cases, these teenagers have actually said racist things when they were fourteen or fifteen or sixteen on Instagram. I'm a liberal. I'm of the mind we should be forgiving and that someone's life should not be ruined by however they're captured at their worst moment. But even worse than that, people have realized they can

just game the outrage dynamics. They can put a fake caption on someone's Instagram or snapchat or whatever photo, put it online and they know that because of outrage, people will carry that far and wiy So there was already one instance in which a totally innocent kid was dragged through the mud over a fake screenshot. So that's what I mean when I say it's twenty twenty. We should understand that when people get outraged, their brains turn off.

And this is if your liberal, centrist, conservative, libertarian, whatever, When you are emotionally aroused and angry, your brain turns off. You are not as skeptical as you should be. So you should think twice before retweeting some random kid who comes into your timeline. That also just consequently tends to happen when I have chocolate as well. Brain it turns off. I get mad when I don't have chocreason. Really, Oh that's interesting, addicted in a way, it's actually more pizza.

Pizza is the one thing that I can't go more than a day with without It's sad. How about this one? There is video of her zog in a band she performed in her twenties that the world should probably have access to. Now, can we put this on the show? Notes, Oh, you definitely do not. The video is so do you want to explain the tweet? Jesse? Yeah, I mean I just Katie on one of our podcasts episodes talked about her past career as a musician in the the Asheville,

North Carolina metro area. Right, No, this was actually not there. It was around Chapel Hill. But I think the tweet was referring to, if I recalled correctly, one of our stretch goals. If we haven't mentioned, we have stretch goals, and if people give us more money, we will do things like Jesse will write a wrap about the replication crisis. So I think it was in reference to that. Well, he's gonna he has to write the right. I can't because actually I could be imprisoned if I don't canceled.

So I was in a band in my twenties. I'm going to tell you the name of the band. But also it would you would have to believe it because there's a curse word in the name. But my job in the man, I'm not musical, But I danced. I was basically a go go dancer. So I would dance topless, wearing pasties and a horse head mask, and I dance around with a machine gun and would like just basically look like a complete like burning man. Fool people are people I meet now are really shocked to learn that

I used to be fun. But I did, you know, people say with me, say with me if I can get personal for a second and into volley back, and I was. I was a professional break dancer. People don't know that about it. In my twenties, I was really into uh. I would watch bet every day. I was like, really in a gangster rapp And I had an earring a diamond canceled for this Scott watch out. Yeah it's appropriation. I had a big diamond earring. Really, I mean, but this was, Oh my gosh, really I would love to

see this. Can you still break dance? Should not have mentioned that I actually had appreciation for black culture, Like, yeah, I loved I like I love black culture more I like white culture. Is my culture is horrible. White cultures like mayonnaise and white. I mean, I like white friends. Come on, yeah, that's because you're white. I'm not Jewish. I'm not white. You like, right, Oh, no, you can't. That's the problem. You can't. I mean we're in a

moment now. Well, I was like, you know, the Jewish breakdancer, and my mind my name was Scott dog d A W G dude. I had. My friend Nate in high school was the same way. He was a I forget, you're not that tall. Nate's very tall. He's tall like me, and he was the in our suburban high school. There was like, yeah, there's a group of Asian and black kids and he was the token white breakdancers. Awesome, and

there is video anymore. So I guess what I'm trying to say is, if you release your video evidence, I'll release my video evidence I have. I have. I have video also of my one other rap performance from grad school. So maybe we can team up on this, except I'm actually never releasing that. Yeah. Yeah, I'm gonna have to decline this off. Okay, safe for the Internet. Not safe for the Internet. Okay, but probably mine isn't either. I'm shirtless, Jesse, I am too that's funny. I am too. Yeah, that

is fine, that is funny. Jesse, this seems a relevant tweet to follow up on what we were just discussing, which is our embarrassing aspect, so we should we should bring you in here. I want to apologize for the times in college multiple times, if I'm being honest with myself, when I went to parties as a nerdy Jewish guy who had no idea how to talk to girls end quote, I now realized that was appropriation, which is wrong. I mean, that's literally snarky. It's snarky, it's a little starky. It's

not appropriation because that's literally who I am. I don't know how to talk to women or anybody. So yeah, that was honestly. I think we when we want to be earnest online, we sometimes drape it in I already and starkiness. So I'm not just gonna tweet tweet pathetic in college, but that was my way of tying my college patheticness into the current event of people getting canceled over college party photos. It's all about ego, Scott. As you mentioned, it seems so I had no ego in college.

I thought I thought I had like I mean, I guess we can get real now. I had what feels in retrospect like serious selfish right now, I was the past hour. Thanks for joining us. Everything I've said was a lie. No, I think in retrospect, I had real self esteem issues in college and the idea that anyone's best four years of their lives are gonna be eighteen to twenty two when we're like all just messed up, half baked babies. I don't think that's true, or it

wasn't in my case. I was cool in college. Those actually probably were of the best years in my life. I was I was in a girls' fight club, had lots of friends. I don't know, I've really fallen since then. It's been on the downhill side. But I have a podcast. So I wait till my senior, my fifth year, senior, senior year, not even my senior, my fifth year to join a fraternity, and I pledged with all freshmen. Anyway, that's a whole other story. Did you get in? Did

they did they allow you in? I got in? No, I did, and I became the DJ affirmative action. No, And I was the DJ at the frat parties, and I was really into music and stuff. Okay, so you have too many good quotes, Jesse, I just can't stop. Uh, this one's so good too. I think having a sizable chunk of there's a look of horror on Jesse's face like he doesn't know what he doesn't know. He literally doesn't know where I'm going in with this. I think having a sizable chunk of people with their lives on

social media is deeply, deeply unhealthy. I think you mix that within any sort of cultural media or panic and it becomes very and varies in capital letters. Important to loadly He misspelled the word woudly. He wrote loadally loudly, broadcast on the right side, or the tides can pull you under? Do you still stand by that, Jesson? Yeah.

I mean what we're seeing now is we saw a horrible public event, George Floyd getting murdered by a cop lead to this reckoning with a complicated history and to the average person, especially in my view, sort of like white liberals who don't have a direct role in on this and feel disconnected from it, and who are staying home because of the pandemic. People are like, what can I do? All I can do is tweet endlessly, Facebook posts endlessly, and it's very important to show you're on

the right side of it. And as Katie and I have been dissecting on our podcast, which to remind you, is known as blocks and reported patroon dot com slash block reported they need they need money, led the money. Oh my god, we need it. Journalism is so screwed. This has just led to really weird performative behavior, and that's the sort of thing we we like to talk about. Well, relate to that. You also, I mean you're kind of a broken record on that theme, because here's another tweet.

Half of Twitter right now is stuff that is not in fact about solving racism or fixing the world, but people trying to use the present conversation to rocket launch pendy grievances onto the Internet, and everyone's just lapping it up to show they're on the right side. WHOA Jesse

speaks in the truth. Yeah, I'm in the gauntlet. So gauntlet. Well, the example we talked about in our earlatest podcast is somewhat a journalist will post a I dam exchange with an editor from years ago where they say they were wronged and that this proves it was a hostile environment, and people, without knowing any context, they just retweet it because they want to be the part of the struggle. And sometimes the struggle isn't really a struggle, it's just

some interpersonal gripes. I think as I've developed better sort of online hygiene, I've tried to not participate in those dynamics and just instead of stand on the sidelines yelling at people and being snarky about it, it's more fun anyway. I wrote a tweet. I will not agree with that. I wrote a tweet saying being mean and snarky gives you a sense of self satisfaction in the moment, but being kind gives you a deeper sense of satisfaction the

next day. So that's beautiful. I'm not sure which which one which behavior is monetizable though, Okay, which one of you has better feet picks? That would be the answer. Oh boy, feet picks? Wait between me and Scott. Yeah, that's how you monetize. Scott clearly takes care of It's definitely Scott. He takes care of him. We got launch a few months ago. He's better put together than me. Like I'm wearing a button down shirt and athletic shorts. I was going to record the shirt list before I

realized there's gonna be videos. There's no way doesn't have a nicer feet there. So if you're a foot fetishist, send Scott an email directly. Scott, do you want to say your email address? I'm just gonna move right along, right along, from that comment to our Twitter comments, Twitter comments, all sorts of people wait in, you know, and high anticipation for this conversation. Patrick Blockwood said, has Katie gone through my book yet? I have? I have started Patrick's

book Ki Patrick. So the reason I got Patrick's book he wrote a book on fear, and I was planning on writing a book about fear. And then we started this podcast and I realized I don't have to do that anymore. I don't have to do anything. I can just be a podcaster. You're free, I'm free, I'm free. Keith Humphrey's suggestion, how's the rap song about the replication crisis coming along? There? Jesse, Dope, you know you remind me so much of uh this No this tv C

just got you the explicit label sleep that up? Have you watched this show on uh who? On who? Dave yeah, it's so gracious. You remind me of Dave Jesse. Do I do you think I could? Well, we'll see what happens when he or that or the fact that the second one he has sex with sex dolls that was that was a reference to Dave, not Jesse, to be clear, Yeah, I mean both. There was one about your dad. Okay, so someone popped in and said, Jilse, I'll give them credit.

Jilsey said, I would ask Katie how her growing up with her research psychologist anthrow zoologist Dad her Zog. Hall is the Twitter name of your dad, in case you're wondering, influenced her journalism and view of human nature, and then your I guess this is your dad, responded, interesting question. My dad's name is Hal her Zog and he is on Twitter. I have more followers on him, just to

want to want to make that note. So my dad is a Yeah, he is an anthrozologist or he's retired now, but he was a psychology professor whose specialty with human animal interactions. So he wrote he wrote a book that's quite quite interesting, although I stopped reading it at the dedication. It's called Some We Love, Some We Hate Some We eat Why it's so hard to think straight about animals, And it's about sort of the contradictions in humans relationship

with animals. Why are why are somethings pets? And something's lunch? He was sort of a sort of an ethnographic study as well of a big animal people and he has had a like vary immense impact on on me. I think I have a twin sister, and i'd say she is my mom and I am my dad. And I don't know if that's necessarily a good thing. He's a he's a contrarian for sure. Actually, he wanted me to ask you a question, Jesse, about the replication crisis about

the French guy. Are you doing anything on the French guy with French Guy? I don't know. I don't know. There's a there's a yeah, wasn't there a French sociologist who wrote about people in prison? Experiment was Oh, Didrich Staple is Dutch not French? No, I don't know what he's talking about. He said that you do. But also, Katie, this is going to be weird. But that account that you think is your dad is actually me. That is I really infess that it's been sending a lot of

you guys have the oddest relationship. So he's, uh, yeah, my dad is. He's a I don't one who identify myself as a contrarian because I don't feel like one. I think I just take the right position, and sometimes the right position is the one that's like that's contrary to the dominant position. But he is somebody who does

the same thing. And he also so the particular field that he works in, he is somebody who has I would say, pissed off a lot of a lot of people in that field, and so I could probably get that from them. Who are the journalists that you both most avidly read? That was a row Boros anarchy. I

love these twitteriums. You want to go first, Jesse, Yeah, I'm trying to think because like lately, I mean, there's like a bunch of New Yorker people who are just pros like Elizabeth Colbert, you know, Jeff Tuban on legal stuff. I'm trying to think Jonathan Chait on sort of like quote unquote classical liberal issues or whatever you want to call it, at New York Magazine. Eric Levitz at New York Magazine is a great young writer. Just like with

really solidly to the left liberal principles. This is a weird and petty thing to say, but there's so many writers lately who are just like really making me question their judgment on social media that I like. I don't know, man, I've been very down on a lot of mainstream journalism lately. Those are Those are a few examples. One book that had a big impact on me is James Forman Junior is Locking Up Our Own. It was a Pulitzer winner.

It's about the complicated dynamics in high crime black communities, and it's sort of, I think, especially to essentialize White people who want to better understand the stuff shoul knock themselves away from sort of racial essentialism. And he does a really good job of showing that the trade offs at high crimes communities face where they want tougher policing, they want to be protected by the cops, but the cops often abuse him at the same time. So he's

more of an academic than a journalist. He's a former public defender. But I guess if I could just throw one recommendation, Locking Up Our Own by James Forman Junior. I've been reading and listening to a lot of black heterodox thinkers lately, so John McWorter, Glenn Lowry, Coleman, Hughes, Caville Foster, Thomas Chatterton, Williams. I find them fascinating and they say things that I've never thought about before. I'm also Jesse and I both have are fans of Alice Trager,

who wrote a book called Galileo's Middle Finger. Everyone has to read that book. This book is when I see somebody get sort of dog piled on Twitter. There's been maybe twelve times when I reached out to them and I've sent them either Alice's book or John Ronson. So you've been publicly shamed. John Ronson. Also, I love his work. I read Andrew Sullivan every week, and I don't always agree with him, but I always appreciate his writing and perspective.

Although I might get canceled for saying that. And then you know, I read all sorts of the big sort of mainstream ones, Cola Fasane and The New Yorker. I love his work. Yeah, And then you know, I read like The New York Times and Boks and all of those things. And I also try to read some conservative outlets just to keep some balance I'd like to just point out that Alice Dreger, Coleman Hughes, and Bradley Campbell have all been prior guests of the Psychology podcast. Well

you are really going downhill? Why is that because I have you two on now? Yeah? Yeah, I'm joking. So is there anything any grievances you too want to Is there anything you want to say to your critics? Look, I'm going to tell you my own perception. I'm talking to you guys for an hour now and twenty five minutes. You both seem to me like thinkers, but you also seem like compassionate humans. I don't get this. I know you started off saying, well, the thing that separates us

is that we we don't we don't have emotions. Katie said something along those lines. But just talking to you and even you know, bringing up some topics and see how sensitively you handle them, even just in this podcast, I would say you two have some good goodness in you as well, not just I was gonna say, off, Mike, Katie is deeply a beauty and sexually harasses me. So that's just her public different. Like I I'm asking for it. I came in suret less. Now, you know, I don't

mean to take your edge off. That certainly wasn't my goal, because a big part of your appeal is obviously you're you're both edgy in the sense. No, but we don't. We don't want to be edgy, right. They sort of force you into edgy ness because you don't adhere to very you don't stay within very strict boundary. So I very much appreciate what you're saying. I would like to think of both of us as compassionate humans, So we appreciate it. And if I respond snarkily or sarcastically, it's

just because I have trouble accepting compromindness or praise. Yes, yeah, I think we're okay people. It depends on the day. In my case, we're awesome. I'm extremely good to my dog. I don't know how I am to people, but I'm extremely good to my dog. Then again, my dog is very cute. Yeah, well, I'll just table that for another conversation. You just said, but let's wait. Hitler was a dog guy too. Actually, I take that back. Maybe that doesn't

have any reflection on how you treat people. Did remember a stout like Hitler is a vegetarian is a logical filac. He was he actually a vegetarian. I'm a vegetarian. I think he was. I think he was like a like a real dog lover and a vegetarian. I think just I was. I was really hoping to do that and the last second and you all threw me that curve ball law? What's the what's the law about? Every? Look?

I mean with Katie, it was a coin flip whether it was gonna be a positive or Let me just return to my wrap up here, because I'm trying to be uh complimentary you guys, now, you too, mofos can take a compliment. I get the sense that your heart's in the right place and that you are the type of people that you speak your mind. Correct me if I'm wrong here. By the way you you you you want to speak your mind, You want to be free to speak your mind. But I don't. I don't sense

and I'm a good judge of character. I'm not sensing nefariousness here. I'm not malevolence. I'm not I'm not sensing that from that force from either of you two and I and that means something because I do sense that from some people. So yeah, I think there's a subset of the people who hate us online who think that it's it's inevitable that the mass is gonna slip and one day I'll like, I mean, not to keep bringing up Payler, but like come out dress as a Nazi

or something. But there's like, there's no there there. We just happen to have yous that are pretty solidly left and center left. It's just there's no actual controversy wurking under there. To be honest, as far as I'm conspat right, I'm pretty upfront about my flaws. I don't I'm not like hiding anything that I'm waiting for somebody you dig up and use against me. It's all, it's all out in the open. Well, what percentage of what you do is motivated by the sheer thrill of saying something that

you're not supposed to say. Some people are motivated very very highly by that, and like ninety eighty percent you can kind of see that. I wouldn't put you guys in the extreme, but I'm wondering what percentage of this is motive If your podcast is motivated by that that sort of thrill, I don't think there's any thrill involved in it. I want everybody to be able to say

the things that they believe. And it's just he said, I mean, most of our views are very mainstream, almost would have been orthodox sort of liberal views not that long ago, and it deeply disturbs me that those views can now no longer be articulated because some of them are considered like top crimes or hate crimes. You know, I would much rather be liked than disliked, like I think most people. That's just kind of how like not how the cards, you know, how the cards ended up falling.

But yeah, I don't get a particular thrill out of it at all. I wish that anybody could say, you know, like to say the truth. And I think, you know, online I think you see a lot of that sort of being controversial for the sake of it, and I don't think that's what that's what our podcast is. I don't think that's what either of us do in particular. And what about you, Jesse, I'll give you a chance to talk to finally I get a chance to talk.

I think I've dominated don the conversation. There's a little bit of a thrill in just being like cutting through the BS a little bit. I mean, you know, we just released a podcast basically chiming in on Barry Weiss's side on this internal controversy you're not supposed to do on Twitter. But like public opinion on that is probably pretty torn, it's not. I don't think it's even a minority opinion. So I never want to be the guy who's like contrarian for the sake of contrarian or revels

in being quote unquote canceled. And a huge amount of the work both of us have done is like in depth careful journalism as we see it. So I agree, don't. I don't thank you. I appreciate that we don't. We don't want like the id W canceled person persona. I would much rather have it be the case that we've just had, you know, staff jobs that let us do our journalistic work quietly. But those, unfortunately aren't the times

we are living in. Yeah, if there there is, I think there's this sort of you know a number of stories have been written, like there was a story in the New York Times that feature Jesse and I, this sort of story about cancel culture. I don't want our brand to be like the canceled people. I think that's kind of boring, and I also don't think it's true in our case. I think both of us are doing fine despite any sort of attempts to push us out

of journalism. Both of us are doing fine. I don't so I don't want that to be our sort of brand, but it is. I think what what people probably affiliate us with, which is I don't know. Maybe we can change that if they ever actually listen to our podcast or listening to this podcast chat that we're having. I think it'll be queer to people. See, you're not journalists in exile. Your journalists, uh finding other avenues to journal lise whatever the world is. I mean, people misunderstand this.

I left New York Magazine to write a book. It's a mainstream publisher. I still feel like I can pitch to all the most of the mainstream publications. I increasingly don't want to. I think Katie might be on my page there because like, you can't pitch anything interesting to a lot of outwards. But it would be better for our brand if we could pretend to be these these you know, mysterious canceled exiles. But in no way is

that true. It would also be an insult to journalists who are like struggling to pay the bills, which, for various reasons, neither of us is for what strangers to say that again, what strangers in neither you or what No. I'm saying, like Katie, Katie is married to someone with a job. I have a book I'm writing like we're we're obviously anyone in journalism now is in precarious situation. But I don't want to, like it sort of leverage

this idea that we're canceled. Yeah, yeah, And I can see I can see why there would be a lot of resentment from people who are, like, let's say, my former colleagues who have been like covering the civil unrest in Seattle, where you know, difficult to do. You've got to actually be there, and you know I can sit in my house and podcast and make almost as much

money as they do. I think there's probably a lot of resentment there, which you know, and I have to say, like, I think what Jesse and I are doing it is important. I don't think it's as important as what like a local like beat newspaper does. I mean, maybe it is right now, because this moment is so weird, and we're having a conversation that a lot of people feel like they can't have. But we need people to cover the school board, we need people to cover city council meetings.

That's real journalism, and that's what most journalism is. It's just not what you see. It's not those people who sort of rise to the top of the you know, sort of the public consciousness. It's narcissists. I think our brains are in sync because I just made the exact same point. We have a subreddit that's someone a fan created for us, which was wonderful, and someone basically posted saying, you know, I'm ready, I'm ready to forget the New

Times and move on from it. And in my response, I said, no, like the New York Times, whatever our qualms was it, they do stuff no one else can do, especially now with the decline of local news reporting. So I would much rather live in a world where The Times does better. And I'm glad Katie and I exist as podcasters to make fun of the Times and hopefully when they deserve critique, when they merit critique, give it. But but I don't want anyone to see us as

a replacement for mainstream. If I could roll back the clock and have the podcast not exist, but have mainstream journalists and be much healthier, and have the Baltimore Sound and the Boston Globe and all these other papers still in their former glory glory, I would do that in a second. No, because then I could get a job in this in this fantasy world in which unicorns as we're basically making the best of a bad situation. Yeah.

The analogy I've been using is like, imagine a ship hits an iceberg and then as it sinks to the ocean floor, all these bottom feeding life forms can like take root on the side of the hull and flourish. So that's what yea, the iceberg on the ship, you guys are are are great fun. I enjoyed this chat today, and I hope you've got a chance to talk about your views and that you accurately were representing your views. And I wish you guys. Yeah, I wish you well.

And might let us say, guy, is now what do I say prefer to? I really do wish you all well. Congratulations and the success so far your podcast, and thanks for just being a thoughtful, reasonable group of individuals who are also compassionate. Likewise, dude, I'd say the same. That's very kind. So thanks for being on the show, Thanks for having us. Thank you so much. Man. Thanks for

listening to this episode of the Psychology Podcast. If you'd like to react in some way to something you heard, I encourage you to join in the discussion at the Psychology podcast dot com. That's the Psychology Podcast dot com. Also, please add a reading and review of the podcast on iTunes and subscribe to the Psychology Podcast you tube channel, as we're really trying to increase our viewership on YouTube.

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