https://youtubetranscript.com/?v=iy6cQaGuJHM
I think by now most of the people that watch my channel know you and then probably similar. We’re in the same space. So we could just discuss and I think it’ll be fine. You know what? You say that, that we’re in the same space, but that makes me think that we’re in the same safe space. I want it to be in the same danger zone. I think we’re in the same space, but I don’t think we’re on the same sides of it. And so we’re kind of like on these, I think we’re in the same discussion, but we’re not maybe not in the same. I’ve been impressed. I’ve been, to be honest, I’ve been impressed to see like the variety of interviews you’re able to get. Like it’s pretty intense. I think it’s a testimony to your true desire to discuss that you’re able to, because you did the, because you did Evergreen and then so everybody kind of could have pegged you in a certain way because you were criticizing with the way that Evergreen was making decisions. But now you’re having all these discussions about transition with transsexuals and everything. I was like, wow, how did he, how is he able to, how do they trust him? And so I think that’s definitely a testimony to your style or the way that you engage in conversation. Well, I think that it’s similar with you. I think there’s something that causes both of us to be able to be sojourners on an intellectual level because you’re able to do the, to walk into any story, any narrative and make a home out of it. Like you can go into these different movies and you make a home out of it. You can make sense of what’s going on or you can make it make sense to other people in a way. That’s a testament trying to either to your plasticity or the tool that the tool set you have is like one of those multi tools that can just fit in. Well, I think one of the things that I’m always trying to do if I show, if I’m showing some symbolic structure, I’m always trying to show all the sides. And so it’s like, you know, I talk about, let’s say I talk about marginality. I can talk about the dangers of the margin, but also the opportunities of the margins. And I always try to shift between the two so that people don’t think that I’m, I’m just advocating a simplistic moral position, you know, where I’m trying to kind of paint a picture of reality. So, so hopefully, yeah. And I think, I think in a way I’ve seen, I’ve been surprised sometimes with the people that have said that they like what I’m doing, you know, and people on both sides that like what I’m doing. And then people on both sides that don’t depending on how they want to perceive me, like depending if they want to. It’s interesting. And for sure, the extreme seems to dislike what I’m doing. Like the I get a lot of criticism from the hard like the hard right are criticizing me. You know, they come. So like what’s their what’s the essence of their critique? Well, they don’t like that. I’m that I not openly criticize like I’m not constantly criticizing Jordan Peterson. They don’t like that because they really dislike Jordan Peterson. And so they wish that I was more it was harder, let’s say, in terms of of certain ideas, because it’s like I I want to show, let’s say, I want to show the the advantage of having an authority, let’s say. But there’s also serious disadvantage of authority to like that. There’s a danger in authority and there’s advantage in authority. And so I’m not going to just show one side. I think that’s lacking. But if you’re if you’re in a political fight, then you you want to you want a weapon. Right. And so it’s like I don’t I don’t feel like I give people weapons. And so I think that’s why I it’s why they that that’s a place where I think both of us are kind of on the same page, where that’s not what we want to do. We want to help create space for discussion and and a space where people can at least try to understand each other rather than just give people give people weapons to beat each other on the head with. Yeah. Yeah. That’s interesting about what you’re bringing up about authority. And I was just watching your video on the symbolism of 666. And in that video, as in with many of your videos and your talks, you mentioned the church fathers and the that kind of evokes like literal patriarchy, which is kind of a interesting term right now. It’s been kind of commandeered by as a negative symbol from the standpoint of feminist theory. But when you say the church fathers, I can feel that there’s this warmth in that relationship that you have with those fathers. Would you like to talk a little bit about like the symbolic form of the patriarchy? And how patriarchy. Someone asked me a question about this in Chicago a few weeks ago, and they asked me, they said, why do you advocate? Can you explain to us why you advocate patriarchy? And I was like, really? I don’t think that I advocate patriarchy. The problem is that. Let’s say I see I see, let’s say masculinity or the masculine aspect as the we could use the word patriarchy. Let’s say we use the word patriarchy. And so I think that there’s a there’s a type of discourse, a type of of reality, a hierarchy in society. There’s a there’s a hierarchy in society and that hierarchy, you could call it patriarchy if you want, because it does tend to have a certain masculine characteristic because it’s public. It has it has a certain amount of use of authority, all of that. But the thing is, is that that hierarchy cannot exist without the space in which to exist. And so the mother or the feminine is extremely important. It’s it’s primordial. The only problem is that it becomes difficult if you try to talk about it, because it is the secret. It’s the secret. It’s the mystery. It’s the it’s the it’s the space in which discourse happens. It’s the the question. It’s all of these aspects of reality. The private sphere, the home. There’s all these images of the feminine, of the womb, let’s say, that are that are important. But the problem is that if you try to make them into if you try to make them into patriarchy, then you’re you’re you’re actually acting against the power of this feminine symbolism. Like if you want the feminine symbolism to act like an authority in the world with a sword and like beating their like that’s that’s not that’s just it. Now you’re becoming a man and you’re acting in a masculine manner. And so so I don’t necessarily advocate patriarchy. I advocate to me the way to see it is a is that one needs the other. You need for any hierarchy to exist. You need a space in which it exists, you know. But that space also is given form that they were given an answer or given some structure through what you would call patriarchy or any hierarchy. Does that make sense? You think that? Yeah. Do you think that in the in the Bible, like there’s an Old Testament God and a New Testament God and they’re both referred to as father or kind of in the masculine? I believe there’s some like they pronoun at the very beginning. But it’s usually assigned to a he. Do you think that in the Bible, just off the top of your head, I don’t know if you’ve done any thinking about this, but is there a an evolution of the masculine going from an authority figure into the son, like the transit from the father into the empowered son or the sacrificial son? And is there a softening or of the masculine in that process? Well, I don’t how can I say this? I don’t think so. I mean, I think it’s important, at least for Christians, it’s important to think that the God of the Old Testament is the same as the God of the New Testament. It’s not like another God. And but what it is true that the incarnation creates a difference in the sense that the incarnation opens up a space of communion or shows communion to be the manner in which we are we can become the body of God or the body of Christ, the body of the Messiah. And so there so there is a manner in which we can which shows more clearly the way in which we can participate, let’s say, in the life of God. And we see that happen in the New Testament. But there are already hints of that in the Old Testament as well. You know, there are these the classic image is the image of Elijah, who goes into the cave and is distraught and he’s trying to understand the will of God. And and there’s this storm and this tempest. And it says God is not in the storm and the tempest. And then finally, he says there’s the still soft voice and then he hears God in the still soft voice. So there are images of of of, let’s say, this difference that Christianity is going to bring is there already is already there in some places in the Old Testament. There definitely is, let’s say, the aspect of rigor, which you find in the Old Testament, the kind of more, let’s say, the harsher aspect of reality is there. Trials. But we have to be careful because we can’t we we can’t deny that. That’s part of reality. You just can’t avoid it. If you if you try to if you try to think that there isn’t a certain harshness to reality or there isn’t a manner in which if you don’t if you’re not in line, that you’re going to face the consequences of not being in line, then you’re you’re you’re missing an aspect of reality. It’s like if if you if you I don’t know if you cheat on your wife and you beat your kids and you and you start drinking and you do this and you think that there’s no consequences to those actions. It’s like no reality has there’s a certain amount of of objectivity to the way reality lays itself out. And if you if you don’t adhere to that, then you’re going to you’re going to eat. You’re going to you’re going to suffer. It’s just going to be inevitable. And and and the Church Fathers really do represent the idea of God’s judgment as the consequence of your actions themselves. So it’s not it’s they don’t imagine God as this although it can be portrayed that way, but they don’t imagine God as an exterior being that is saying, oh, you do this now. I’m going to smack you around. It’s like, yeah. Well, you know, if you don’t fix the dykes in your city and then there’s a flood, well, that’s God’s judgment. But it’s also the dykes that broke because you didn’t fix them. Yeah. Like the natural consequences of your actions is the judgment of God. Yeah, there’s a Indonesian proverb, I believe that says don’t fear God, fear your own actions. Yeah. Yeah. And in the end, but it does end up showing you the nature of reality. So you could say something like it does end up showing you the will of God because it’s the way that reality lays itself out. It’s not it’s not arbitrary. There are other actual it’s a reality that shows itself, you know. But then the you know. So what Christianity tends to do is to first off, place the human person and the love of the human of people between themselves and their love towards God is the solution to the problem. Right. In the sense that I can take the example of a dyke again, like if you love your neighbor and you and you love, let’s say if you’re a leader and you love the people who are under you, then you’re going to fix the dyke. You’re not going to leave it because you care. And so you’re going and so that that love becomes the tool by which reality can be transformed and can become more. Can become more cohesive, you could say. So what do you think about the that accusation that you’re promoting the patriarchy then? What is it about the the masculine, at least in history, at least in your tradition, that’s that’s apparent. And that can be construed as like suppressing the woman or keeping the feminine or the female under wraps or under control or something like that. I mean, I think that how can I say this? I think that on the one hand, so you can see it this way. You could see it as there’s there’s there’s a positive and negative aspect of masculinity. There’s a positive and negative aspect of femininity. And those, to a certain extent, are inevitable. Right. They’re just they’re just in the very structure of reality. If you have a hierarchy, the hierarchy can be a point of of like a head. It can be the point of coming together of a group or whatever. But it can also be an abusive thing where it eats, you know, it eats its members and doesn’t give back. So so it can have both. The feminine can also be the same in the sense that the feminine can be the space is the space in which things happen. It is the frame, the question, the the beginning, like the the the opening of discourse of. So it has an amazing quality of nurturing, of being, you know, the safe safety. All of that is related to to the feminine. But then it can also be subversive. It can also be, you know, how can I say this? It can also be a destabilizing agent as well, because it’s the space. So it can you ask to like like a question is great because it actually frames reality. But if you drown the world in questions, then all of a sudden you have no certainty anymore and then things start to fall apart. I don’t know if that make I’m trying I’m speaking in very metaphorical language here. But but I but I’m it’s hard to sorry for that noise there. It’s sorry to it’s hard to talk about these things and try to talk at all levels at the same time. Huh. Do you think that that’s a fault in certain modes of discourse that they try to constrain thought or sense making to one level? Yeah, yeah, definitely. And I think that that’s the I think that that’s been in a certain manner. The problem of the leveling of thought, I would say, has been one of the problems of the modern age in the sense that we we try we see everything at the same level. We don’t we’re not able to understand that, you know, that like a good example. I’ll give you an example of something that happened to me recently. I was in I was giving a talk in Montreal and the subject fell on purity. Right. And the idea of purity. And so then all of a sudden I realized like the people in the audience were had taken the stance that purity is evil, like purity is bad. Right. You get purity is a an exclusion. You exclude people. You you you discriminate all that stuff. Like so. So exactly. So acts of purity and to the Nazis were one of purity and all of this. Yeah. OK. Right. Is this evil thing like a pure race, a pure people, a pure identity? All of this is bad. And so and so they were like, you know, how why do people engage in this? And this lady asked me this question, why do people engage in in in in purity? Like, what do they engage in that type of behavior? And I was like, I couldn’t believe this question. I thought the reason why she asked me this question is because she’s not able to think at all levels at the same time. Right. She’s not even able to think at two levels at the same time. And so I said, you know, so I said, OK, let’s let’s take a case study. It’s like, let’s say you have guests at your house and and they’re staying over for dinner and then they’re hanging out and they’re hanging out and you’re looking at the time. And then it’s like, you know, it’s 11 and it’s 1130 and it’s 12 and it’s one o’clock in the morning. And the guests are still there. It’s like at some point you are going to ask the guests to leave. And when you ask the guests to leave, you are engaging in an act of purity. You are saying this is this is my home. This is my house. This is my this is my thing. My family, whatever. Like it can be just you can be your family. And then you have people who come. You have guests who come. And at some point, it’s great you have this engaged. But at some point they have to go because you need to find your identity again. You need to find. So you’re you’re actually engaging in an act of purity. But at some point, having your guests go out the door and closing the door, locking your door. And then you go to bed. It’s like that. That is an act of purity. And it’s totally fine to do that. But you could you could have the same imagine the same situation where someone comes to your door, knocks on the door and wants to just ask you something. And you open the window and you scream, you say, get out of here. I’m going to call the cops. Right. And so that’s also an act of purity. It’s just one is normal and one is excessive. Right. So it just depends. But you have to be able to think at all levels. And so when you talk about immigration, it’s like people aren’t able to think at also to understand that you will have to find some level of purity in terms of immigration. The question is, what is too much? What is normal? What is a normal level of hospitality? What is a normal level of engaging with that which is foreign or that which is new or stranger or the stranger, whatever? Like you need to just find that balance. But if you’re not able to think about it and you just think purity bad. Then you’re going to then it’s going to come back. It’s going to come back and you’re going to engage in it in ways that you don’t realize. In the way, like, for example, when you see social justice activists engage in extreme acts of purity without even realizing that they’re reproducing the very thing that they hate, the very thing that they’re trying to fight in terms of you know, like white privilege or all this stuff that they that they have. Yeah, I was just thinking about that because I’m working on the Evergreen documentary and there’s this extended hour of students going off about how much they hate the police. And at the end of this session, they start to they they all start to focus on one man who’s typing on their phone and start accusing him of taking pictures and uploading them to like Brett Bart or something like that. And then and then you see that they really love to police. They don’t want to be policed. They want it like community policing is them having the power, which doesn’t really shake out because it’s just the will of the mob and whoever can claim the most victimhood and stuff like that. It’s crazy. Yeah. And I think that that’s why that’s why if you if you’re able to to think about these things clearly, then you don’t. You don’t get stuck with them by accident. And that’s that’s always the thing. It’s like if if if you’re not if you don’t deal with reality, like if, for example, if you if you don’t, if you think that we talked about the idea that God like, let’s say there’s an aspect of God, which is like which is harsh, let’s say that that has a harshness to it. If you don’t want to engage with that and think about it in a reasonable manner, then you’re it’s going to come back to bite you and you’re going to find yourself acting like that and you’re not going to realize that you’re doing it as you’re saying how it’s horrible that the God of the Old Testament has harshness to him and then you’ll end up doing it because it’s part of reality. It’s an aspect of reality that you have to deal with in a balanced manner. Do you think that um, no it does. What do you I would like to explore like how do we diagnose that leveling of thought? Um without necessarily getting conspiratorial and saying that like the mainstream media is doing I think we’re doing it to ourselves. Um, I think but maybe maybe like maybe it’s working to the advantage of some people. But what do you think it is about in modern times you said or you framed it as a modern problem. What what is it about modernity? That has led us into you know, this leveling of thought or this uh, this almost not even binary because they can’t see the flip side of it. Well, I think I think it’s horrible to say this but I think it’s the it’s not horrible, but a lot of people will be annoyed that I say this but I think it it is in a certain manner the fact that scientific thinking has let’s say scientific thinking has taken over the horizon of thought. And that people want to approach everything as if it is equivalent to a scientific problem. Because scientific problems are usually quantitative and they’re usually phenomena that is measured in terms of quantity. Um, but when if you want to think at different levels, you can’t level everything like that. You can’t. You know, you have to be able to see hierarchies of purpose, hierarchies of of reasons why things exist, hierarchies of beings even. Um, and you have to be able to to see it that way, you know, and that’s why like there’s so much going on right now, which is which is good in the sense that the fact that everybody’s trying to talk about emergence, complex systems, all of this stuff is showing that the the simplistic, you know, leveling of thought that we had only 50 years ago or for sure 100 years ago is is now has run its course. And now we have to try to find to understand that in fact the world has levels like it manifests itself in hierarchies of beings and you can’t you can’t avoid that. Do you think that um, it was necessary to kind of clean up all the symbolic, the problem with symbolic thinking is that it can get really messy and get really associative. I mean you can have a very rich dialogue with the tarot deck, but you can also kind of get lost in it, right, and just allow it to see everywhere. You know, you can kind of go astray and the scientific mindset is to snap it down into a literal this than that kind of way. So was it not necessary to kind of go through that? At least to contact the physical world in a way where we can completely master it or manipulate it. I think yes, if what you want is to make better pavement or to you know, to have energy efficient windows or whatever like whatever it is that technology does and science does, but when you try to turn that thought back on the human person, you run into serious problems. Like you run into serious problems because we do have hierarchical thought. We do have, we do have, we do use metaphor. We do use analogies. We are beings that thrive on meaning and on analogy and on pattern. And so if you just try to eliminate that when analyzing a human person, then you run into serious problems. And so although let’s say analogical thinking is it can be problematic, can be messy. It’s also the way in which you can move up the different levels, like the different levels of being. You can’t, if you want to understand a let’s say how a group works or a city or a nation, if you can’t understand the analogy between a person and a city and a nation, if you don’t see that there are analogies that those different levels of being then you’re going to really, you’re going to have some serious problems. You know. I do see that, like my original diagnosis when I first started talking about just the evergreen phenomenon on YouTube was that they are trying to take a sociological level of thinking about groups and apply it to the individual and it completely destroys the individual on a variety of levels. Beginning with their agency, their responsibility, their self-worth, their self-respect, and then the respect and agency towards other people. Like it completely ruins the bonds between the the particles because it’s looking at. Well, they’re trying to swallow and that’s the so so imagine you have a hierarchy and this is what I talked about when the problem of hierarchies is that you can have a hierarchy that tries to swallow its parts, right, tries to completely consume its parts so that its parts don’t have independent existence, right? And so that is what happens in ideological groups. That’s what happens in in the religious sects like cults and stuff where it’s like everything or you know when you have like a really charismatic leader and then everybody just gets totally sucked into that person. It’s as if the people that are under him become almost like members of his body. Like they’re just extensions of of him, right? And so that is that is extremely dangerous when that happens because the way one of the things I talk about is love. I tried to explain that love is the balance between unity and multiplicity. So if you let’s say you have a family and there’s love in that family, there will be enough communion, there’ll be enough to make you a unit to make you a whole but the very same process the love would also make you respect the individuality of each person. And so the way to find a way to balance is to always be moving between unity and multiplicity. To always be finding a it’s a hard to find the exact it’s never the same it it moves but it’s like a dance where you’re dancing and you’re always trying to find the balance between making sure everybody has their own existence and everybody is also aimed towards the same goal or or moving towards towards each other, you know, and that’s that’s communion that’s love that’s that’s basically what christianity is supposed to be, you know, is to have that that play and it happens so it happens between people then it happens between so you have in christianity have this idea that we’re the body of christ and so it’s like christ is above and we’re the body and then we are well fitted together through love so we love each other and that makes us join with christ without losing our individuality and then all of that it’s like all of that can be the way that act the whole world exists like all of creation all all of reality is always playing between multiplicity and unity in order to find that balance where everything can continue to exist in in in in a cohesive manner But when you have ideological groups, like you said, it’s what happens is they try to impose the the The higher identity let’s say the group identity the race the gender whatever they try to impose it in a manner Which is tyrannical all the way down. It’s like everything has to just be a manifestation of this thing That unites us right? So if you’re a man, it’s like I’ve identified the things of man And you’re that’s all you are you’re not benjamin You’re not all these other things that you are you’re not a complex system of different aspects You’re just a man and i’m going to judge you completely based on that one thing And that’s that destroys the world like you can’t The world can’t exist that way well, it’s interesting because uh, and I don’t mean to offend anybody by saying this but if that that rigidity of thought like that that That man category is your full existence then that defines every aspect of your character But then that doesn’t really work in this system of thought so they they build in the self id Clause where now you can identify with the other category and nobody can question you you can just jump entirely into this other category and get all of the You know the strengths and weaknesses of this completely other category. So it’s one way to like Do a loophole that actually shows how maddening these categories are Yeah, but it’s an interesting thing because it also but then it also ends up Happen the same thing happens in that case too even almost to a a higher degree where You know, especially in these kind of variant in these variant, uh, like sexual identities like when someone Latches on to an identity even if there is a thousand even there’s like a hundred of them Then it’s it’s almost as if I mean they’re swallowed up by that thing And so it’s as if it ends up being All they talk about all they yeah, they have to enforce it for all their whole identity has been swallowed up by this one thing Whereas usually it’s like let’s say you or I it’s like I yes, I am a man And but i’m also i’m also uh the father and i’m also I also have this job and I also have uh, Interest and I also have and these things and i’m also a member of a church i’m member of this It’s like so it’s like I have all these aspects of my personality which are Which are dancing together In order to create jonathan peugeot, but like there’s not one aspect of myself which is completely Swallowing me, you know, yeah, uh, and I think that that’s That’s that’s a really it’s a dangerous because it’s really difficult It’s it’s really difficult to talk with people to whom that has happened Uh, it’s like if you meet someone that has been completely swallowed up by That one identity. I mean and it can be any anything it can be race can be nation too You meet someone who is like super nationalistic It’s as if you can’t it’s really difficult to talk to them because they they They’re so like their visors are on so straight You know, uh, and then they interpret everything through their thing it’s like meeting a conspiracy theorist, you know It’s like they they have this one thing and it’s like the whole world has to fit in this one thing and they can’t view other other other types of relationships And how do you have you seen people like go through that and then come out the other side and have you seen that kind of? breakdown Yeah, I think I think it is possible. I think it is possible to not I think it is I think it is it is possible to be possessed by something and it really is a Form of possession, you know, uh, it is possible to be possessed and then to kind of free yourself from this from possession And I think I mean, I think i’ve seen it in the past few years. I’ve seen a lot of that I think jordan jordan peterson has kind of Broken down a bunch of doors in that sense where people some people who were really kind of caught up in an ideology on both sides of the of the fence have been able to kind of clear the Open their visors up a little bit and be able to see that the world is bigger than your thing like the that that identities You can’t reduce everything to one identity. It just doesn’t doesn’t work that way or even just a multiplicity of identities. Yeah How do you What are some of the steps that you think that that could happen or help that process? Facilitate that process of man The identity idolatry there’s some sort of uh Complex there. Yeah man, I think For sure for sure. I think that One of the things that can help is contact with other people In the sense that a lot of time these these like narrow narrow furrows are dug because You end up in these, you know where they call them these these bubbles or whatever these these uh These ideological bubbles and so so so people aren’t actually meeting Others who are different from them and that that they just don’t Have other identities that are not even they’re not even in your on your spectrum like, you know Especially it’s so funny because it’s like you meet the the really woke types And I and I always want like I wish a lot of the woke types would go and just hang out with just poor people and realize that Even it’s so funny because even in terms of racism, you know, I used to be I actually used to be pretty I used to be pretty woke myself. Like when I was a teenager I was the guy who would always Like stand up and if someone was making some kind of racial joke, I would always call them out in public and like anyways Uh, but I was always the guy calling out the guy that’s calling everybody. Really? There you go. That’s good But then when I started meeting like poor people, um I realized that they they just had another there’s a completely other way of looking at things completely other way of and so You you go to a poor neighborhood where there’s You you meet a poor white guy who has way more chance to have in in his job around him to have people from other races And he he’ll have a kind of weird Like a kind of weird low level racism to him, you know Uh, and it’s all it’s it’s in words and it’s kind of like oh these guys are like this These guys are like that and it’s it’s kind of off-putting at first Then when you when you look at them and you kind of explore their world and realize okay Yeah, they say that but then they’ll have lunch with this guy who’s mexican or this guy who’s from here or whatever and You know, it’s like if you ask them it’s like oh no, it’s not it’s not a big deal Like he’s not like that, you know, and and it’s not thought out But there’s like an organic reality which is that even though they can use certain words and they have certain discourse It tends to it tends in real life. They actually have more contact with other groups than these like these like liberal woke elites that have barely any contact with people from other other types of people and And so they’re policing their language and they’re policing their thought But they they’re not actually engaging with people that are different from them And so it’s like I would I really prefer some some working-class guy Who once in a while will say some thing that is off-putting and kind of racist but in reality Is way more is actually probably way more Uh in way more possible. He’s gonna end up dating a mexican girl or some Vietnamese girl or whatever just because In real life, it’s like, you know, it’s like he’s actually in contact with people from other groups Yeah, that makes sense. But that’s kind of the thought that i’ve at some point i’ve kind of come to where it’s like There’s there’s there’s there’s this weird political thing and then there’s just reality Or it’s like people are messy people say stupid things people people don’t think things out uh, but if they’re just basically good people in the end, it’s not going to It’s going to play out fine, you know it seems that there is a There’s some sort of you brought up purity earlier and it seems like on that that kind of earthy blue-collar uh racism it’s They’re playing with or they’re just evincing a natural category and they’re playing with the category by pointing it out and they They even know that this is a this is a way that they can distinguish themselves from the pure class the aristocrats in a way So it’s kind of like virtue signaling among their kind that they can take the joke and give the joke They’re free to do that in a way whereas the aristocrats are are the puritanical Class aren’t able to do that. But the danger is is when you have somebody That starts playing around with that rhetoric on the national scale Which which trump did? And continues to do I’m not going to say that trump is necessarily fascist But he likes to he likes to play with that and and it gets really a little too close to comfort because you can start to Play around with those, uh, once those Those kind of earthy friendly, uh tensions. Yeah, replicated on another scale. They actually do turn into tyranny No, I agree. No, I agree. I agree that That you do see that and you do see that in some populist movements where the lifted the leader will spot normal tensions or just normal differences that exist, you know and that people notice and make jokes about or whatever and then they can use it to To get attention and also to unify, you know, because it does work like you can unify someone by pointing to To a stranger like it it actually works, you know And it works it works in the social justice world as much as it works on the right wing It’s like you can find the person who who who has to be canceled then you make your group stronger, you know Uh, and so I see I definitely I definitely agree that it can it can happen and it does happen and it definitely has happened in history, uh, that’s for sure it’s interesting because Bernie Sanders tweeted a couple weeks ago about how billionaire billionaires shouldn’t exist or something like that Which is interesting. It was like this politics of uh This unity by anger unity by hatred and and i’m always just wary of that but they it seems like there’s a Well, yeah, and then it’s like okay 150,000 Heirs, dude, should they I think they should exist. I think I think is there a word for that 100,000ers? Richard always always relative. It’s like it’s so funny because birdie standards is a millionaire. I’m not a millionaire. Hey birdie You shouldn’t exist. What are you talking about? Well, it’s interesting because it seems like a tactic um to pick a group that you can’t That you would slander yourself to defend if I started to defend a billionaire like there’s a built-in incentive not to defend the billionaire it’s it’s this little hack and the same rhetoric with Anti-racism if you start to criticize anti-racism, that means because you’re racist right like it’s built in And I don’t know if it’s purposely built in or not, but it just works that way um to the self-reinforcing system that then leads to at least on this road of Categorical thinking yeah, and you have both you you you have both sides and that’s the history of the 20th century or the 19th the 20th century it’s like you you have let’s say the left or On the on the left. You’ll have the desire to criticize the aristocracy Because like you said on that on that side anybody who is above you is fair game, right? um, yeah, and then you have the other side which is that anybody who is strange anybody who is Who is an exception? And he’s on which is on the margin is fair game, you know And and the thing that’s interesting is that on both on both sides you end up dealing with a minority Like you’re you’re dealing with a minority of people and so it’s easy To focus on them because we’re the majority they’re the minority either the aristocracy or the the the foreigners or the The people who are weird are just different from us. And so we can just like we can we can point to them and and say It’s their fault That everything is is is going wrong. So it’s the same game, you know Yeah, I you just made me think um, because there’s that term punching up which the left allows you to punch up Whereas the right’s more you punch out you punch to the out group and it’s interesting I’m totally getting uh, woo-woo the symbolic here but like it’s the the left has a problem with authority in the on the vertical axis and the the right will Kind of vilify that which is the horizontal axis or the the the outsider in a way Yeah, and it really is I I always say like this is i’ve been saying this forever that the I think the modern world is a de-incarnation It’s it as we move away from christianity, we’re actually seeing a De-incarnation and so we things tend things are pulling apart in a manner So for example, like you you would that cross that is how reality exists, right for those two to come together, right for That we the let’s say the inevitability of hierarchy But that the reason for hierarchy is so that those that are above care for those that are below like that Let’s say that’s the christian answer. Let’s say that’s the that’s the that’s the christian description of the world but if you have If you pull it apart then it’s like you have just hierarchies that are hierarchies of power and then you end up having the grumbling of the Of the lower lower groups who are grumbling against the authority and so it’s like it’s pulling apart, you know, so And then it’s it gets really crazy at some point because at some point that that thinking can become very extreme where where you Let’s say you actually think that those that are different from you Let’s say the foreigners or the the the people outside of your country are better than you like that’s the extreme of of let’s say the the left versions like then and then you have the idea that the The people that are different from you or are outside of you are parasites. They’re rats. They’re insects They’re you know, like in the nazi era or the tutsi, uh, the tutsi genocide. It’s like Like You know, those are these are the extremes that we have to be really careful not to Not to go to because they’re easy to magical immigrant I was just reading a write-up at evergreen about they talk about the magical, uh outsider, you know, you’re like, okay, really? Okay We have access to all this special here. It’s just falling into this do this dialectic this like this breaking apart of this breaking part of the world and then coming to see Everything in that that that that vision there’s going to come a point and I think it’s already there Where people are going to think that like robots are better than us that robots are more human than we are We’ve already seen narratives like that. We already see narratives where I think was it what was it? It’s the iRobot where x-men robot. It’s like the the robot that is That is moral and we are immoral. It’s the it’s the it’s the apes planet of the apes That’s a great example. The apes are the good guys. The humans are the bad guys That is that is that dangerous narrative of seeing that which is outside as better than the inside Why is that? so dangerous Because it devalues The because you’re going to cease to exist that or what does it do? I mean, what’s the outcome? Of that. Well, the outcome of that is that you’re I mean the outcome that is that you you’ll you’ll you’ll drown like you’ll just drown and You’ll stop you’ll just cease to exist because because you can’t let’s say how can I say this? It’s like it’s like if you I mean I can give you an example I can give you an example of I I always try to bring it close to home so that you know Right so you can see because if you make it too big then people stop seeing it but like you you you have your house and then let’s say you have that thinking where you think that those that are Outside of your house are better than you that they’re magical that they’re that they’re this this image of of of of Ethics and everything and so then you so let’s say you you you You see someone who’s in trouble outside and you say, you know, you see a homeless person you say Well, you should come live in my house, right? Because you’re actually better than me and and you you you invite them in and then you invite another one in And you invite another one. Let’s say you invite 50 because there’s an indefinite amount of them There’s always more on the outside than there is on the inside That’s just the nature reality of any identity always has more on the outside so you’re like, okay Well, let’s just invite everybody who needs something to come live in my house Well, how long how long before you cease to exist? Like how long before your family is not if it’s just not doesn’t exist anymore I would say even before you reach like the equal amount of people in the family like if you You let’s say you’re three people or four people in your family and you have another three people like live in your house Your family is going to stop existing So it’s just that’s just reality it’s like and it’s it’s like that for I don’t know. How can I say this? It’s like that for everything Is there a word That’s the opposite of hierarchy or not. The opposite of hierarchy isn’t like just inverting the hierarchy But like what is that that principle that organizes the the horizontal plane? Is there one? Do we just take it as granted that geography exists and that there’s a line around us? To me the the the let’s say the counterweight or the balance of hierarchy you could call it something like a frame Or you could call it a a question um You could you can you could call it a space All those images they’re really feminine images Uh Yeah, what did jagir da talks about kora like the space he has a book on that and it is very good in terms of trying to understand the the the the problem of articulating the space without naming it because This is one of the reasons why It’s difficult to talk about It’s difficult to show the value of of the feminine Because you have to be careful not to make it masculine as soon as you try to show the value of it You know, it’s like if you give a medal to the feminine It’s is it that that then then it’s like you’re playing the game you’re playing the masculine game by doing that You’re you know, you’re giving a prize you’re you’re doing all these things which are kind of like these weird hierarchical things of winners and losers and all that but but it’s like if you want to actually Uh admire venerate the feminine then it’s another game. It’s another it’s another type of of interaction Does that happen through uh art better than words I guess the visual rather or the the sensual rather the musical Maybe yeah. Yeah, maybe maybe but I think I think that I think that Like I said the understanding the value of a question uh understanding the value of uh of of um Of the opening or the frame of a discourse Something you usually don’t see But is there it’s necessarily there. Uh, I think that that is how you But it’s it’s usually something there’s there’s like a weird secretive power to it It has like a secret power you could say and and it’s like once you understand let’s say that without a question There’s no answer That the question comes first a quest right the quest comes first the the the the and so it’s like the The need comes first right so so it’s like that is extremely powerful. It’s uh It’s even it’s powerful if you understand it even in terms of let’s say a religious language, which is that you pray You you pray so that The world will happen in a certain way you open up a space for the divine to manifest itself I mean that is that is extremely powerful But there’s a there’s a yeah, it is mysterious I remember um trying to Uh, you know during my youth group, uh era Um trying to get people to define what prayer is and you know Because they would they would talk about what it’s not like you’re wishing for a new car But like really getting into the nitty gritty of how do you have an intention? That’s open like how do you become? How do you become a flashing cursor? You know where where you’re not overstepping the bounds of reality, but you’re you’re allowing that space to To happen and and initiating it’s a it’s a whole level of psychological preparation or like kind of this facing towards reality that that’s like got me into studying mysticism more because that the the direction that that goes is is preparing your awareness and and becoming aware of your consciousness and working on that I I agree with you and I think that it’s a I think that that it to understand the the power of a question and to understand the the power of Opening up a space or presenting a need Uh, which is authentic. Uh, I think is is extremely powerful like I tell this story a lot but there’s a story in the gospel In at the wedding of kanna, which is really revealing in terms of understanding this where There’s this idea that christ is hidden that christ has not yet shown himself to the world No one knows who he is really the only person who knows who he is is his mother And His mother comes to him and at this wedding they run out of wine and she comes to him and she says They ran out of wine And it’s like And then christ answers. He says he says my time is not yet come Which is like a crazy answer to to say to something like there’s not enough. There’s no more wine But when you understand the subtext when you understand is that she’s saying She’s opening the door. She’s saying Here’s a problem You’re the you’re the divine. You’re the you’re the you’re the logos. You’re the you’re the answer now you manifest yourself in this space I’m giving you the space i’m saying here’s a problem And so and what he understands is that if he does that He’s actually entering on he’s opening. He’s starting on down a road, which is going to lead him to die basically And so she it’s like she’s saying she’s like she’s opening the space. She’s saying Now’s the time i’m here’s the question you start you start to answer it um, and so she’s actually acting as like this the opening up of his Ministry in the opening up of his entry of showing himself to the world. It’s like it’s her request which starts it And you see that in the history of christianity all through the history of christianity. It’s crazy. It’s systematic You can do a search on your own. There’s always a woman who converts first So for example the the mother of constantin the the mother of uh of uh vladimir of kiev the uh, The the it’s always like a wife or a mother for every king every emperor every important person that converts There’s always a woman who converts first and then there’s a secret exchange. We don’t hear about the exchange. There’s like a secret thing and then the the visible figure Converts and then like the whole country converts or whatever, but that’s the structure of being it’s like that’s What about that uh coming into being in our world right now like how how would that that prompt surface In this time right now where there’s uh, these really extreme rigid. Um, Madness is happening, you know where people are completely lost their Their balance, um, what what what’s the frame what’s the what’s the secret question? What’s what’s the what’s the need right now? How do we how do we get to a point where we start to ask that? create that space for That central figure that’s crazy. That’s tough. I never I don’t know why like it’s like I haven’t even thought about that, but I should be thinking about that It’s like of all people I should be thinking about that. And what’s the like what’s the question or what’s the opening up? um Hmm. I mean because it seems like uh, if if we look at peterson’s work Um, well we can work at peterson’s work But i’d like to look at your work like the way that your work is interacting with people is that you are You’re saying wait, there’s something more here. There’s Look at look at this movie. There’s something more here. Like what is what is playing out here? There’s a There’s an interesting Maybe this is so maybe I now it’s like you got me thinking in a way that I never thought before which is good Which is good. Uh Maybe that is that in a way that’s been what i’ve been trying to do from the from the the beginning in the sense that It’s like one of the things that i’m trying to do Is actually help people See the world differently so it’s like i’m not trying to change the terms of what’s being said I’m just trying to say Your the your frame your frame in which by which you interpret the world Is lacking You need something which is more Connective and connects the different layers of reality together Um, so I have to think about it Maybe that in a way is a feminine move like in the sense of saying it’s like it’s not the terms It’s not that it’s not the the things that are in the story It’s the fact that you’ve lost the frame and because of that you don’t understand How powerful the story is you don’t understand how deep it goes and how it connects everything together because you You’re you’re limited. You know, you’re limited in your frame Maybe that’s interesting to think about that You know what? Um, maybe i’m gonna get in trouble for saying this but like we’re secret feminists in a way um in in the way In a way like i’m thinking about like my I had this I have this analogy about like the work that I do And it’s the it’s a metaphor based on like these role-playing games like these online role-playing games where five characters come together to defeat a problem and there’s there’s a Tank a person who takes all the damage and has everybody focus Their anger on him and then there’s the dps which are the ones who do all the damage to kill the the enemy And then there’s the healer that that keeps everybody alive and My the the way that my channel works out is that I have my tank which is my documentary or like the big question That that i’m exploring in a long form then I have the dps which is the little Mouthy snarky tiny videos, but like what keeps it all together? I think is the healer which would be the the interviewer where I am no longer the actor I I am the you know, i’m the audience I mean I become the audience and and that that’s principally a feminine spatial Yeah, yeah, that’s totally right The interviewer is a great is actually an amazing image of what you’re talking about because what you’re doing is You by asking the questions You’re you’re framing the the the discourse and you can give the authenticity By by framing the discourse properly You you have the power to open or close down spaces and we see it we see it all the time because when we watch mainstream Interviews or you watch certain types of interviews you can see that the interviewer is actually trying to shut it down Like in their question, they’re actually trying to completely shut down the conversation um, but but if you can be a good interviewer and you’re able to Open up spaces then I think you’re right that that will be a healing thing Just that without even like you said not even saying anything even if in your videos You can say things that people will find offensive if when you engage people in conversation you you have this Desire to open up a real space for them to exist. I think like you said, I think that’s unbeatable So, yeah, you that’s a great analogy the video game ones the video game thing is great. I love that You know, there’s a you brought that image which is really actually nightmarish to me like somebody Having the power to open and close space like that’s very Like primordial power to say we i’m going to close that down I’m it’s like this ability to control possibility Um, not actuality but like the precondition of actuality which is possibility which is And the thing is that most people don’t see that most people don’t see those preconditions And so there’s something magical about that capacity You know, there’s something magical because people don’t realize that what you’re doing If you’re if you’re asking the right questions Then people will at the end they might think that it’s only the person answering the questions who had a place who is who is Commute who is discussing but they can’t see the pre the opening like you said the the pre logical the opening of the space They don’t see how without that Uh things would be completely different Um, and so it is an extremely powerful thing So if you look at my videos, like you said we’re secret feminists. It’s like if you look at the logo for my my youtube channel You you took a while for people to realize that it’s actually the creation of eve. That’s the story That’s the image you have to you have to see that it’s like Because I think that I think that the modern world is overly masculine It’s it’s too masculine. It’s actually the feminine which is disappearing from the world And so I think that I think that that’s a really dangerous place to be In the end and we see it in the reduction of community the destruction of private space All of this is is being eclipsed everything is becoming public everything is becoming a form of of showing yourself, you know Uh, you know voyeurism and showing yourself. It’s everything is that and so I think helping to open up the the The feminine space and in a reverential way I think is something that is a vulnerable while. Yeah The that this seems like we’re ending on a high note we should probably Finish here and I think that would be good Good cool. It’s always uh, it’s always a pleasure. Uh, yeah, we should do this more often You definitely got me thinking something that i’ve never like you definitely got me on the line that i’m gonna finish this conversation I’m gonna go sit down and be okay. All right benjamin’s benjamin’s messing with me. I gotta I’m gonna go sit down and be okay. I’m gonna go sit down and be okay I’m gonna go sit down and be okay. I’m gonna go sit down and be okay All right benjamin’s benjamin’s messing with me. I gotta I gotta get through this Just open open to the question, that’s right weird right. Yeah. Yeah, I feel like full now I feel like I need to go think like like I I we started poking something There you go. Well, thanks for doing what you do, by the way. It’s it’s great. Yeah Well you too, man I mean it’s amazing and i’m so glad that you guys are you’re having so much success and and Now you have like a clips channel and It’s fun, it’s definitely fun and what’s fun is like the clips channel, for example Is going to be run entirely by volunteers. It’s like people are going to be running it for me and so it’s it’s for me it’s great because it it’s like people who are willing to Make clips so that I know I’m going to end up knowing what it is that i’m saying that people are really latching on to and so it’s like that’s going To be helpful for me because then I can be mindful of that when i’m speaking Um, so i’m i’m excited about that. I I think what that’s the thing that’s been the most exciting for me is to watch people On kind of all of a sudden have a new vision of the world and then kind of run with it like there’s a there Like right there’s a new podcast coming out new orthodox symbolism podcast. I just started and uh, there are different different People trying to get into that same space. So that’s exciting. It’s a lot of fun well Earlier you were I can’t reconstitute what we were talking about but I wanted to ask about that You were talking about like the individual the the that if you frame everything in love Then the individual can go to the family the family can fit into the the unit and then Going up and down and i’m like, well you’re putting your individuality Right out there and and engaging with the community all the time and I was just I wanted to ask about that But I didn’t know how to frame That like watching that process of like You being a particle and then watching something grow around You in this in the social space, yeah, it’s it’s it’s exciting it’s dangerous I have to be careful It’s like it’s hard. It’s hard. You have to be I mean, it’s like you always have to fight the tendency to think that it’s you like i’m doing this like i’m you know This is great, you know, uh, so so it is dangerous. Luckily. I have a you know, I go to confession that helps for that But it’s like the the pride element is sometimes difficult in that in that sense Like all of a sudden people are talking about your your ideas are talking about your videos So it’s like, okay. Okay, jonathan, but it’s good. My wife smacks me around like that’s great She’s she’s like she has no no, you know, she has she has no uh, No time for for my arrogance and that’s really useful That’s another positive aspect of the negative feminine. Oh, yeah keeps you in line. It’s great. It’s great You Talking about trading and participating in society at least for now It is still possible to engage and I designed some some new things for uh, For the christmas season a few t-shirts and some new merchandise people seem to be appreciated and it was even shared by rod Dreyer on twitter, uh the t-shirt on the six days of creation So check it out. You still have a few days, uh to order it so that it’ll arrive before christmas So if you’re interested go ahead and uh, thanks a lot everybody for your support Don’t forget to subscribe also to the clips channel, which is putting stuff out almost every day I think thank you for the volunteers who are involved in that and I will talk to everybody very soon