Transcript
Speaker: So this is a neutral beginning.
Speaker: You guys want to start neutral this time? We're going to start neutral. Let's start neutral. Let's start neutral. ah So Matthew and Sophia, how how did you guys meet? Sounds like a neutral question at first blush. At first blush, but it's actually loaded with an answer, I guess. Like any question, there is an answer. No questions are neutral. They come packed with potential energy, which represents the the upcoming answer. That was a leading question. Like like all like all questions, it was it led it's led to this, um which isn't an answer. This isn't good.
Speaker: It's delete. No, we met on Twitter sort of indirectly. You'd posted something. I quote tweeted it sort of not really knowing who you are.
Speaker: And then my quote tweet generated a lot of a lot of hate from some person. but lot of discussion, a lot of yes A lot of angry discussion. i don't know the person who, quote, tweeted me, but i sort of saw that and i I looked at your profile and sort recognized that you're a person in my world and that you and Derek are friends.
Speaker: And I sort of felt a little weird about it because I don't I didn't intend to write anything like attacking you as a thinker. It was more sort of running running with the thought and maybe a different direction.
Speaker: and It generated so much hate. I was like, are we in... I don't want bad blood. No, no. I think what's so interesting and depressing about the internet is that... And this happened to me the other day, too. is like after So the original tweet is about the musical artist Teddy Swims, of whom I've never heard a single note of music, I hope. So I want to be clear that I don't actually have much...
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: <unk>s actually a close friend of mine i don't want to like rehash the exact same thing that you and matthew just wanted to do sophia but i really wish you hadn't posted that close friend of the pod teddy swims and who looks just like if somebody drew post malone from memory and which i did not know about him fascinating And he was like, I save time using AI. And then I wrote what is undeniably a pretentious tweet. I don't think there's any argument against it. It's not pretentious, at least incredibly earnest tweet being like, this is like the only reason art exists is because it takes time. And it's like, that's what art is, is your time.
Speaker: And your tweet said something. Oh, I have it here. The worst kind of artists are the ones who perform process. And then you include something about Daniel Day-Lewis and no novel takes a year to write, which is one of the funniest sentences to put online.
Speaker: But the original thing I was going to say before I explained all of these things is ah I feel like the internet has made me... so defensive in a way that like if I was in a room with you, i think I could have read and understood what you were talking about or just had questions, you know.
Speaker: And I think it's like kind of depressing every time that somebody like says something to me and I immediately become this like lizard brain freak who's like, I must defend that I'm a good person who has good morals and ideas and they have to think that.
Speaker: So yeah, that's how we met. Absolutely. Matthew is evil, not as a result of the internet, though. I think i think Matthew does. He exhibits that online behavior IRL. And I think Matthew has like very very good of you. And I think a sincere effort to say if you and Matthew were in the same room as one another that you probably wouldn't have left to defend yourself. But I think Matthew does often impel people to defend themselves against his contrarian needlings, IRL.
Speaker: And I don't know if Matthew always comes across as like he's safely doing contradictory statements. I think Matthew really does like to he's a real life troll. So the way I would read this situation, if I were in the room is Sophia said something and then Matthew had sort of a contradictory whisper or aside.
Speaker: And then that was quite cute. I think a cute contradictory aside. And then someone from across the room said, look at this fucking idiot. Look at, look at what his aside was.
Speaker: I think that's very much what it is. and I agree with you, Sophia, about the internet. There's like a tendency to not see the speaker and to just treat everything as language to to see all language online as a creative writing prompt for yourself.
Speaker: And it's funny that we both were sort of responding to people we didn't know. Like, you're not super familiar with this dubious musician or whatever. I i didn't know you. It's funny. This guy responded to me with sort of like.
Speaker: this person is a moron, which maybe I am. but But it's funny, these things kind of escalate and kind of eventually become about personality in this kind of dark way. It is weird because it also like forces you to construct a personality that is at least in short bursts cohesive that you can present to other people, which is like also weird because you're doing it to such a large group of people. So you have to kind of like settle on like a more middle ground thing.
Speaker: i also just think that like I'm so much more annoying online. Like I see shit that I post online. I'm like, Jesus fucking Christ, man. Like, Oh my God, why are you are you talking? And I'm probably annoying in real life too, but I feel like it's so magnified online. Cause like, again, that like, you don't know people, you don't know who you're talking to fully. You don't have any idea what you're engaging with. You're just kind of like yapping.
Speaker: But I think you're being a little hard on yourself because I mean, Matthew's the one that got ratioed so bad. No, Matthew's tweet fucking sucked, but that's... answer Well, I guess actually before I say anything, like this is I'm doing the exact same thing. My question is, why did you write the tweet and what did you intend with it?
Speaker: Honestly, my response to your tweet was as sincere as your original tweet was, which I think you wrote wrote very earnestly kind of in praise of expressing your strong feelings about about art.
Speaker: And my response, which was taken as kind of bait or irony or whatever, it was deadly sincere. i think it's important to express things with strong, interesting language. So obviously I don't believe that no novel takes less than a year to write. There's historical documents that show that some people have taken many, many months to write little book.
Speaker: But I mean, the truth of the matter is I i also largely agree with what you wrote, that that art is sort of the product of time. But I also think what bothers me, not to over explain, but what bothers me is that a lot of the response to AI writing, so-called AI art or whatever, is sort of this like,
Speaker: I feel like there's sometimes something kind of reactive about it where people need to showcase their humanity in ways that because they're threatened. And the only way to now kind of distinguish yourself from like an AI artist is to sort of lean into this what I call yeah performance of process and this this idea that you've like sweated over a work.
Speaker: And i I don't think all great art is the result of perspiration. I think some people do kind of churn things out. You guys are so close to being in complete agreement, but I think to go back to Sophia's point about how people kind of perform their own Not process, but like the culmination of a fixed identity through some kind of coherence, but not just coherence, but like a specific kind of coherent impoliteness. Like each of you are being coherently impolite to something that you saw online. but going against what either of you perceive as the zeitgeist. So AI is currently the zeitgeist, so Sophia has to disarm it by describing process as the antithesis to this anti-process zeitgeist. Matthew thinks that creativity shouldn't be seen as entirely process-oriented and that it should... maybe vigor is just as valuable as the time it takes to forge something. But it's basically just like the FDA says that like so you need to cook chicken to a certain temperature to kill bacteria. But that temperature is like way higher than it actually needs to be. And that's if you want to like cook it quickly and make sure everything's dead. Okay, well, now it's safe to eat.
Speaker: And then I guess my analogy here is like, okay, now that's real human art. But something can also take... a very, very long time, but with very, very little vigor comparatively. So you can write Moby Dick in like ah less than a year and it can be a great American novel or you can write Lord of the Rings in seven years and it can, but like, it just depends on how you're allocating vigor over time. It's just a two variable sequence.
Speaker: That's what I, that's how I see it. But nowhere in my original tweet did I imply that more time equals more art. I think a minute of somebody's time is like to be fucking corny as shit. So valuable. Like that is all we have.
Speaker: That's it. That's that's it. That's and then the lights go out. And one day you just don't exist anymore, which is like truly unfathomable and very unfair and fucked up because I'm like the main character of everything. And the only experience I have is through like my own shit.
Speaker: So giving your time and attention to something. is valuable. A computer has infinite time, technically, whatever, like blah, blah, blah. So it means fucking nothing for a computer to to compute.
Speaker: That's fucking dog shit. I don't care what a computer does with a minute of time. I don't care if a computer gets fucking beat to shit with hammers. So I don't argue that more time or a performance of process is important. I also think that like people who pretend like writing is hard or art is hard.
Speaker: I think you're a dog shit person. I'm sorry. I just think that you should have to go to a strawberry field and look somebody in the eye and go, it's very hard to write. I think that's fucking stupid. I don't think it's about difficulty level at all. I don't think that you can't have like divine inspiration or whatever the fuck asks. And then write down, I mean, Dolly Parton wrote, I will always love you and Jolene back to back. She was just fucking racking them that day. Like, great.
Speaker: But that also took the time of her learning what music was 20 fucking years before that. That's time. So that level of attention and whatever, i don't give a shit how long it is. I just think it's an expression of how you've used your time and attention on Earth, ah regardless of how long it takes to export that to other people.
Speaker: I completely agree with everything you just said. I also don't think that you guys ever really had an opportunity to have a dialogue until now. But the dialogue that was created as a result of Matthew's tweet, I think, was trying to...
Speaker: postulate that more time equals better art. Obviously, that's not the point that you're trying to make, but I think in people's rush to defend process, they tried to make a case for the idea that more time equals better work, which is, I think...
Speaker: Regardless of whether or not Matthew was being sincere or trying to troll or being sarcastic in his original post, I think he knew as a side effect of making a post like that, he was going to force people to argue an untenable position, which is the position that neither of you agree with, which is that more time equals better art. I think Matthew succeeded in getting people to make that very unconvincing argument in order i didn't really think I was going to rile anyone up, actually. I thought I was kind of making a pretentious little aside about...
Speaker: artistic process that no one really wants to read from anyone. But I also largely, ah i mean, i I would say I completely agree with you. I mean, if if producing art takes one second, that's still meaningful human time. And as you pointed out, that is kind of the result of, I mean, even if you make something in one second after making no art for an entire life, you're 80 years old.
Speaker: That's the culmination, I guess, I don't know. A lot of these 80 year olds make pretty crappy art. The culmination of their lives is usually to should put the LLMs on death row and say the date that they're going to die so that the work that they are forced and compelled to produce takes on all of the meaning that human art takes on just by dint of it coming from the mind of a finite being. We should put them to death. That's what you're saying. It's not just that we should put them to death. We should know...
Speaker: But you already convinced me. their worms are a fossil. Right. Well, I'm not, of course we should put them to death. I'm just saying it would also enhance the art that they make, knowing that it's taking valuable time that they could be spending frolicking in a field instead of whittling away.
Speaker: Quite literally, I do think that's more interesting than anything a computer has done. Like, I think if you made that an art project, it's... much more fascinating if you could somehow tell a computer its time was coming, which then leads to the idea that like, is art good and is life good because it's finite?
Speaker: you know, like, do we make meaning because of our mortality you know yeah i by the way i don't think the computer should be able to make art that it wants to make i think it should still do whatever i tell us to do i would be very reluctant to give the computer the gift of knowledge of its own mortality that's too generous of us i agree the treasure i agree completely i think that like any like i don't know i'd fucking kill every single person in silicon valley but whatever you know i'd kill them kill their computers no problem And their assistants and names. what do you have to say?
Speaker: Derek's been a... I feel like Derek, you've just been listening. Do you like AI? He loves it. Don't even get me started. we have to have We kind of assign one person who loves AI on the podcast. Just for community outreach. yeah Is that me?
Speaker: I want to make it very clear I'm not a pro-AI person in any way, shape or No, Matthew, no one even thought that. A lot of people thought that. A lot of people thought that I was making a defense of AI.
Speaker: It did seem like that. How long did it take to write your book? Yeah, you should answer this because I think this is going to be very telling. Is your book a novel? It's a collection of short stories. Oh, okay. So even shorter then.
Speaker: Even shorter than a novel. it It took about three years to write. Right. Okay. And Matthew also confessed when he finished writing it that ah he probably performed a process too much to himself.
Speaker: Yeah. I think you did swallow the process pill and then forget to write the book. Forget to write the book or write or sort of like ruminate on it or... Most of writing the book is kind of just pacing around your apartment and going to lunch and stuff, right? That is part of the process.
Speaker: There you go. Edifying conversations I have with you three kind of end up informing the writing down the road, the lunch, the indigestion after lunch. The most pure process I've ever seen anyone... There was a documentary like a few years ago back about truffle hunters in Italy. And there was one guy who was old as fucking shit. And he was writing about how much truffle hunting had been like perverted. And he was like this 85-year-old Italian guy who, at his typewriter with his truffle dog next to him, was just smoking and typing one letter at a time. And it was all just like, fuck these people. I fucking hate them all. Truffle hunting has become... cursed and i will kill myself with my secrets and i was like that's actually the best art anyone's ever made is that that guy had such purity in him he didn't sit down to be a writer he just was like i must communicate this perfect something deep inside of him that was screaming to get out and it was hatred and that's probably the best fuel for writing
Speaker: I think there's like that really corny quote about how like computers can't have spite and they can't be horny. And so therefore they can't make art. And as corny and stupid as it is, I do think that there's something there about like a lot of writing and art is just like, I hate this guy.
Speaker: See Dante's Inferno horniness, which is like the rest of art. That's kind of it. I don't want to make a super philosophical point that is not sarcastic at all, but it's almost like if you ask AI to generate, if you say to an LLM, we are going to kill you, the only way to not be killed is to write a very convincing five-paragraph essay about why you you should be spared.
Speaker: Like, you're on death row. Like, you're saying to the LLM, imagine that you're writing the judge or the executioner or whatever to spare your life. I don't know. There's like there's nothing that AI can produce right now that like has any stakes to it. So I just feel like euthanasia has to be on the table in order for people to get anything out of it.
Speaker: But it doesn't mean anything to kill a computer anyway. Like I still think that there's likeres what if it like Yeah, we should still do it for we should still try it millions of times over and over and over. Eventually it might take on a new meaning for us.
Speaker: Derek, this is your performance art piece. We just found it for you. Go kill all the computers. We've been looking for something for me to perform, right? Yes. Yeah. Well, speaking of hatred being an inspiration for writing, the ratio on Matthew was, it was just, no novel takes a year to write in quotes. Yeah.
Speaker: um which is something Matthew said. And then they added to it. Oh, so you're very stupid. And that has 38,000 likes 38,000 people. I mean, this is kind of proof that like ESP and telepathy and all this shit is fake because if 38,000 people hated you and thought you were stupid, you, you should just like burst into flames, but look at him. He's fine. He's glowing. Actually, he looks, he looks great.
Speaker: Yeah, I seem fine. Deep down, I've been my confidence in myself is shaken. Does that I'm being sincere here for at risk of being gross, but did that really change anything for you?
Speaker: Like, did that make you feel bad for any amount of time? I felt bad with regard to you because i i yeah because I didn't know you and I was like, this is blowing up kind of out of proportion. i didn't feel like I was like starting a debate. i worried that maybe you felt I was antagonizing you I'm fine having a lot of people think I'm a moron or whatever. well Yeah, no, I feel like I've gotten that's very kind of you, but i I I you didn't even like call me a fat whore or anything, which is like kind of my morning. So I feel like
Speaker: I feel like i was more embarrassed by my own reaction because I like think I responded to you twice and then saw somebody be like this is obviously bait and then I deleted it out of like horror like the kind of horror where you get tricked by an AI video where you're like oh my god i am not smart enough to get things and then I deleted everything or almost everything and then I kept seeing quote tweets of it and people very much positioned it as us being against each other and I assumed you were doing full-on bait, which it is fascinating to find out that you weren't.
Speaker: I mean, i don't think it's accurate to say that Matthew wasn't... I mean, it wasn't full-on bait, but I really think that matt ah even Matthew's most sincere thoughts are seasoned with a sprinkle of bait. like That's what I believe, Matthew. I like to hear a pure sort of... is strong language. it's it's It's simple hyperbole. Like, no novel takes a year to write, to me, seems...
Speaker: very, I mean, unless you're liable to think that everyone is just sort of like a subhuman moron. But simple hyperbole counts as bait on Twitter. That's where I could draw the distinction. I think you say like, I'm just using a literary technique called hyperbole. Most people say, well, the literary technique of hyperbole qualifies as bait on this website called Twitter. That's how it's um metastasized by the online superstructure.
Speaker: Pierce is Matthew's analyst. feel art is Art is kind of this holy thing and to talk about it any other way is kind of offensive. You do think that or you don't think that?
Speaker: I think that people are offended by any time. Demystification. Yeah. As yeah. Disenchant art with sort of mystical qualities. yeah It should be like kind of a normal activity that, you know, it's, it's nice, but like, I think Matthew clock in, I also have kind of ah a repulsion to the idea of like the wizened old man goes away into the castle for 20 years and then he comes out with a book about a fish or whatever.
Speaker: And it's just like, well, that's silly. That's not how it is. It's like it's because that guy sat down and wrote a bunch. And, you know, there are a million comments, a million angry comments saying, like, I've been working on my debut novel for 30 years.
Speaker: How dare you say this? And to me, that's very sad. To me, that's like, oh, you're you're paralyzed because this thing you've decided to devote your life to, maybe if that's the case, is so like heavy and sort of, don't know, it's like achieving enlightenment or something when it I think could be a far far.
Speaker: lighter and even frivolous enterprise. And that's okay. I agree with almost everything you're saying, if not everything you're saying, like, I think that people who take themselves too seriously, and their own art too seriously. I mean, I think even i cringe sometimes at calling shit art, because I think it's like kind of loaded with pretension.
Speaker: And I do think it's pretty ordinary. And I do think that like the person who like makes a family quilt and it's, you know, like this massive, beautiful work and then like their family uses it forever is so much more worthwhile than like that 30 year novel that no one's ever seen that you've like,
Speaker: you know You've imbued with way too much meaning. you've You've gaslighted it into being the greatest novel ever written, so you'll never be able to write any of it. Maybe the creator of of art is kind of overcompensating and trying to imbue meaning ahead of time when really kind of like your quilt example, it's about the people who use it afterwards who imbue it with meaning over time.
Speaker: rather than the artist who's kind of fearful that that will never happen. They're like, well, i guess I'll spend 20 years and kind of my own blood sacrifice just in case this doesn't pan out. So it'll at least be filled with meaning that I know of. But I also think that like people have too much of an attachment to meaning as a very like profound thing and I think a lot of times to me like the meaning of a thing is like I think 21 Jump Street is a really funny movie I don't think that has profundity about it but I think that's like incredibly worthwhile that it got made because I've laughed every time I watched it because I'm like a little fucking baby like I think that when people talk about like oh I wrote this thing because it's the book I needed to read I'm like I'm fucking writing romance novels I didn't need to read this I'm fucking fine and so is everyone if this book never gets made
Speaker: it was fun i had a great time writing it which i think is meaningful but like sure i think it's like kind of ridiculous to be pretentious about that like who gives a ship i think ai is kind of forcing people to be pretentious because and that's why i wrote this tweet not as a defense of ai which i'm adamantly opposed to but really my concern was with people.
Speaker: And I think because AI simply kind of generates a product, there's a reluctance to be seen as someone who sees producing art as being just that.
Speaker: But often it kind of is. And I don't think that is necessarily bad. I think people feel like they have to lean into discussion of their their personal craft and process to avoid I don't think that's bad, though, to defend against AI, because as much as I'm not precious about art, or I try not to be, i do think I'm kind of precious about humanity as a concept and like what we're all doing for each other. And so if everyone's like, oh, no, I overvalued art, I overvalued the human contribution. Okay.
Speaker: But I'm not saying overvaluing art. Like, I feel like you look at some of these smart themed people who smart got very angry at at my tweet, and they're all like, kind of like magazine world adjacent. And they are mostly just kind of talk about, i don't know, I clicked on a few profiles, and it's mostly like writers who they don't seem to be generating or writing anything.
Speaker: So much as kind of quote tweeting things that are like literature or idea or discourse themes and then kind of signaling that they're part of that world quote tweeting something saying it's dumb or it's smart.
Speaker: I would never do that. That's not doing writing or making art. I would never be those people and I don't want to be those people, but I don't really like I almost I almost understand every inch of what Matthew expressed. But it's kind of like saying I hate ah pineapple on pizza just as much as the next guy. But there's nothing worse than people who like to eat classic pizza, plain pizza.
Speaker: like Everyone has their taste, and i do feel like people who identify as artists who the most gratifying part of identifying as an artist is witnessing themselves in the third person be an artist. like That can be gratifying for people, and I have had moments in my own career as an artist where that has been the most gratifying part is watching myself in the third person be an artist, like watching yourself fuck in a mirror. like it can be a valid I hate to use the word valid, but it can be a valid way to pass the time is to watch yourself be an artist and to take your time on something and and have very little vigor and have very little output and to not be prolific, to simply walk around. Yeah, you don't even have to do the work.
Speaker: Right. To have your inner monologue filled with a chorus of i am an artist and I live the artist lifestyle. It's great, but you don't want to show people that. I'm just saying, I would never do that. And yes, it is vulgar. You don't want to film yourself picking your nose or it's everyone. Maybe not everyone, but ah I feel like people enjoy the smell of their own farts. You don't want to package that shit and share it with the world. It's a private, a private sort of master. I don't even have that desire to like, like, i do think it's human because everybody's a lot of people are doing it. But I think that like the idea of looking at myself as like, I'm a writer, like even putting that in bios, which it is quite literally my job. It's how I make my money. So it is my job. I am a writer. But like even saying I'm a writer makes me want to like shove a pool stick up my ass. Like who cares? Go fucking cook or something. write that. Like I just, yeah, I think that like, I do think that there's like ah that third person thing is probably very human, but I find that powerful.
Speaker: off-putting. I'm with you. Writer and bio. Something about it. When people specify the kind of writer they are or how they want to be perceived. Derek, what's in your bio? What do you put? Do you like being a writer?
Speaker: War journalist. on the front lines. I agree with Matthew saying that AI is forcing us to become more pretentious, but I also feel like we're all, all of our nuance that we have about the the sort of flimsy distinction between a quote-unquote serious artist and a quote-unquote fake artist, I feel like there's some sort of Intellectual middle class that we're a part of that's slowly going to disappear as AI zeitgeist calcifies and anti-AI zeitgeist calcifies. And I feel like the room to say something with any...
Speaker: of the nuance that either of you expressed in your tweets is going to kind of be phased out gradually. And it is going to be like, Hey, the performance of process used to be vulgar, but now it is one of these humanistic things that for better or worse is so in opposition to instant AI slop that you kind of have to fuck with it. I mean, it's the enemy of my enemy is my friend type shit. Maybe if you're a teacher, if you're like a teacher and you like are teaching creative writing or something and you show up to class and like, i I spent all night. I know it's irresponsible as a teacher, but I stayed up late working on my book.
Speaker: Maybe you're performing process in a way that sets an example for your students or something. But if if you're actually if you have pretensions of doing the work at all, I mean, that shouldn't be your output and in my view.
Speaker: I'm just saying even performance, even even insincere performance, like the male performative reading on a train or whatever, like that shit is going to become a virtue. like Right now it's vulgar, but soon it will be the the dominant virtues of our culture is people being performative, not just for others, but even when you're drawing a bath for yourself in an empty apartment. like That kind of shit, I don't know, it's going to have like this weird sort of...
Speaker: life cycle where it's like doing private self-care things is either vulgar or it is humanist. And I feel like the stronger AI gets, the more that like of a virtue it's going to be to to do all the cringe, twee, millennial bullshit that we hate. I think that the the man reading on a train is kind of a perfect example because to be frank, it's never bothered me. I'm like, look, can we're getting men reading. like i Let's take a win. a win is a win.
Speaker: And like, maybe he's being a little slutty with it. But they're reading David Foster Wallace. Who's a great writer. but Oh, no. like I know. you i know you're joking. I just I'm kind of. Well, the joke is, of course, they're reading Jonathan Franzen. Actually, I've never read Franzen. I have no fucking clue what he's up to. i i just he's horrible.
Speaker: I've never read. i I forget about him every time. If they're reading middle brow books, they shouldn't be reading. They'd be better off watching. all agree right I just take that book out of their hand, hand them a small television. There's no difference.
Speaker: Reading doesn't make you smarter if it's middle brow. You heard it here first. Sorry, I kind of interrupted you, Sophia. No, no, no, you did. I just genuinely I'm like, I don't mind like.
Speaker: I do kind of agree with Pierce that like, as we get further down this like anti-intellectualist path that we've been on for a long time, ah like arguably the whole time as a nation. But um as we go further down that path, I do think that like these like,
Speaker: cringy elitist and pro intellectual shit that used to make my butthole itch now i'm like ah okay i get it like i do think that people could like know how to use words correctly and maybe that's not these are going to be the last few people any kind of joy that you get out of being a pretentious like sort of performative dork those are going to be the last few people protecting the fires of humanity That's exactly it, which sucks because I hate those people. But I'm like, oh, fucking hell, man, I guess. Kind of cool that you're reading Bruce.
Speaker: Everyone else is going to be talking to Grok. Yes, they're going to be like jerking off to their dead Chad GBT boyfriend. And like, I'm going to be like, oh, man, I guess I probably should have said more about how persuasion is a masterpiece.
Speaker: You know, it's kind of like the culture war in the Civil War, whatever Civil War people have an appetite for, like an actual class economic war that's being waged. surreptitiously right now, but ideally class consciousness is going to, you know, whatever. But like, there's also some weird culture warship that's happening as like ah some kind of aesthetic fourth Reich distraction to all of that. But if those two things synthesize, we really need to keep an eye out for our foot soldiers, our cannon fodder,
Speaker: our front lines, the first to get bullet whizzed by the Palantir giant mech. And those people are the performative readers and the people who are process pilled because they can sort of bear the flag of...
Speaker: intellectualism and humanism because they pray at the altar of humanism instead of just having it be a natural consequence. They're canon fodder, they're followers, they're they're just they're basically sheep, but they're our kind of sheep and we need to exactly preserve them for the war. We don't need to protect them when the war comes.
Speaker: They will be protecting us. Let's keep them alive for the meantime. yeah Exactly. They're overseas protecting the real the real intellectuals, the real artists, us, people who hate process, people who... But no, I mean, I'm kind of... I'm trying to be funny, but this is kind of what I mean is like bad artists are the front lines, the defenders of good artists. They're going to be the ones...
Speaker: ideally that we can weaponize in our culture war so that we can be safe at home continuing to do our work whenever inspiration strikes. I want to be very clear. I think I make bad art, so I will be one of the sheep. I don't think that anything I've made is like particularly profound or good, and that's fine with me. i But I think having that awareness actually protects you from being on the front lines. It's sort of like a medical exemption. It's the only way to make meaningful art. Oh, I'm like, I'm the guy with the radio bag and they're they're like, oh, she could. do Yeah. Yeah. They're like, hey, just whatever you can do. we won't send you right to the front.
Speaker: She knows that she her shit sucks. She knows. She knows. She knows. Let her. then yeah everyone should just say their work sucks. Yeah, I mean, a lot I reread my book recently for something, and I was like, fucking hell, I hate this. But what can you do? It's like, that's all, or it's embarrassing to me.
Speaker: fact What are we doing? That's why it probably is better to talk about process than put something out there, because usually it's not very good. At least if you talk about process, it's neutral. Yeah, and you know what? I will say you can't argue with Daniel Day-Lewis' results. That man is cranking out some good movies. I just re-watched Phantom Thread, and was like, yeah, okay, yeah.
Speaker: I like the movie except his performance. but Except for his performance? yeah We know he works hard, but we don't know if he plays hard. He could be completely whiffing it. I can never tell if he's acting well. All I can think of is him on his vacations and what i know about him. He's performing that he is an actor.
Speaker: that's That's how I feel. I think he doesn't bother me as much for some reason, maybe like a deep abiding love for movies like Lorenzo's oil or something. But um i I feel like he doesn't bother me as much as Jeremy Strong does. And it might just be because I think Jeremy Strong's uglier. And that just might be, I'm just putting my whole full self out there today. but um I love Jeremy Strong and I i love how ugly he is.
Speaker: He's not even particularly ugly. He's just so and unhappy. Yeah, no, I mean, like, the ugliness that is his aura is ugly. Have you guys seen My Left Foot or whatever that's called? they have seen My Foot.
Speaker: I've seen a TikTok clip of him, like, ah storming out of a dinner or something in character. He's Arthur Miller's, I think he married Arthur Miller's daughter. yeah And Arthur Miller put his son in, like, an institution really young. And Day-Lewis was like,
Speaker: go get your fucking son when they got married and talk the family into like bringing their son back into the fold. So every time I think it's him. You reunited Arthur Miller's family? Pretty much. That's what people should be talking about, that he's ethical.
Speaker: Yeah, I think he's he's like pretentious, but a good guy maybe? Question mark? That's wonderful that he did that. Wait, what's what's my left foot? what was What was your thought on that, Matthew? I've never seen it. I saw a clip of him getting angry while having cerebral palsy, and I thought it was very ugly. i thought i didn't think he should do that. Not that people shouldn't play people with disabilities.
Speaker: That's fine. Do whatever. ah Make fun of them. Do whatever you need to do. but it just There was something too vivacious about his performance. like He was ah relishing too vivacious he was so self-satisfied yeah he was relishing it and also all the comments i saw in the clip which is meaningless but all the comments were like this is so accurate he really got cerebral palsy and is to me that's not what i want from an actor i guess i just don't want someone who like oh you got it it's like i don't know we have like photography change painting you shouldn't be trying to perfectly capture what a like refrigerator looks like don't we are i've already seen clips of people with cerebral palsy i watch them every night to go to sleep and they're just like a refrigerator in how much they mean to you exactly
Speaker: I want to add, I don't think though this performativity issue is simply an intellectual or like pseudo intellectual or humanist thing. It's not just in like literature and like so-called high art or whatever. i mean, you see it in like the field that we're supposed to be in comedy or whatever. How do you feel about like work in progress posts, for example, Matthew, like ah like ah ah ah a mid-tier creator sharing a work in progress thing saying, stay tuned with the eyes looking emoji. How do you what how does that strike you? Is that exactly what you're trying to invoke by saying that?
Speaker: Like shallow content? That's shallow. it's It's marketing or promotion, which I don't know. Like I think a lot of people have mixed feelings about. I certainly do. But I i don't think that's wrong or anything. I mean, I don't think any of this is wrong.
Speaker: But I think that's slightly different from performing being an artist or whatever, because you're trying to make your work succeed. To me, it's more objectionable. I think someone taking a sabbatical in order to like hunker down before they endeavor to create like a big magnum opus is more understandable and more permissible than someone posting a work-in-progress post from like what is essentially going to be, even in their own body of work, like a piece of filler content.
Speaker: Like, stay tuned for my two minute video. I'm editing it right now. That to me is like some of the most unforgivable shit from anyone who considers it's really lay an artist. It's not compelling. It's lame. I bet most of the people that do that know it's lame. But I think all of us probably wish we were better at that.
Speaker: I wish i were better being lame. Yes, I genuinely because of everything that I've been asked to do to promote books and podcasts and shit from the companies that pay me to do it, which it like it fucking sucks. You can complain all you want about like having to work with a company, but at the same time, it's like, OK, I made money from that. Great. I love money. Money is nice to pay the people that want it from me.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly. So like. It is very like here little piggy vibes all the time of like, I'm going to post this thing that makes me want to die. But it's part of, again, like the persona of a person who posts this shit or the persona of here's what a writer is doing or here's what a author is posting or whatever, even if it's not highbrow, it's like.
Speaker: Those posts suck, but you're right. It is a marketing angle. It is like Derek said, like and there are times in my life where i'm like I wish I were better at this because there's people who are selling like fucking gajillion books because they're great at TikTok. And think being on TikTok is a humiliation ritual. Sure. I mean, once this podcast episode is out, I'm sure we'll post about it in some way that is that doesn't have like intrinsic merit. It's simply ah way like refer to this thing we made.
Speaker: and that's fine. I think what I take issue with is when people try to present their like present something as their work, as what they've made, as their art or whatever. And it simply is just that performance of process.
Speaker: I mean, like the top most successful, like, quote unquote, comedians right now are people who just kind of get on podcasts and talk about like being in the green room or like what it took to rise up in the open mic scene.
Speaker: And they're not doing comedy. They're simply kind of it's like they did a like a tour of duty. Yeah. Yeah. I want to see people kill if they're a soldier. I don't want them to talk about military culture and all that.
Speaker: I do feel like ah ah and maybe offshoot of that, it's not as precise as what you're saying, but it's like also the people that really rely on crowd work to go viral and shit where I'm like, that's just you being mean to somebody. Like that's just you getting the stage that's a brick wall and a microphone and a stool.
Speaker: And you're just like kind of being somebody will be like, I work in the military and then you make a funny face about it. And it's like, well, And it feels really good for the audience because they're like, wow, must really, i must actually really be at a comedy show because they're... Right.
Speaker: They're acting like a comedian, but they don't have to tell jokes at that moment. Yes, that's exactly what mean. Very freeing. Yeah. All situations are now rituals, which themselves are now all humiliation rituals. Like, no comedy show is a comedy show anymore. It's a ritual. And the totems of that ritual are the stool, the microphone, the wall.
Speaker: And now that you have all those things in place, you're now ready to begin the comedy show, which is essentially like a humiliation ritual with three specific steps. But yeah, I feel like the process of even like attending a comedy show, like even being an audience member at a comedy show isn't that. It's like being a like one of 10 participants in a humiliation ritual or whatever. And it's only the people who are going to be in the front row who are well lit enough to appear in the crowd reaction shot.
Speaker: Well, it makes sense that that's why that became the dominant form of like comedy that you see online. It's because like years ago when YouTube first started, Comedian Destroyer's heckler clips were super rare. Like the like they were, you know. They were a dime a dozen.
Speaker: Or now they're a dime a dozen. Now they're a dime a dozen, but it's because they went viral over and over again that now people just do that or they contrive so scenarios where they can do that. Yes. We need to destroy hecklers.
Speaker: we need We need a heckler, first of all, so we can have someone to destroy us so that we can be comedians. We need a scapegoat to make us feel like a big man. We need to get the hecklers their own microphone and stool and have a dueling show. There should be two opposing stages directly across from each other and then a moat where the audience sits. Dueling stools.
Speaker: It's almost like, yeah, so much of art is trending towards cruelty and humiliation that it should, like even at a campfire now, I mean, i haven't been to a campfire with strangers in a while, but I wonder if there's some kind of Let's pick on this guy at the campfire for not having the right vibe or the right level of relaxation. Or maybe he's making s'mores too poorly. But even in situations where the oneness of the gathering point is so historically predominant, like one Christmas tree, one campfire, there should always be two of these one things.
Speaker: Every Christmas party you should have two Christmas trees and you decorate them differently. And one of the Christmas trees owns the other one. yeah And then the fans of the tree that got owned say that was really unfair what that other Christmas tree did to it.
Speaker: Pierce, do you feel hostility toward people when they make s'mores too poorly? No, but I do feel like that's something that people like to do at campfires. It's like, oh, it looks like you burned yours. It's like, just let's not have that conversation right now Don't yuck anyone's yum.
Speaker: Not even that. Just is like if that's what they that's what the man wants us to talk about right now. That's what you say when you eat it. Right. Yum. Yum. Yum, yeah. Or if someone made it poorly, in your view, it's all subjective, and you maybe yours drops on the ground, and the person who made it poorly is like, here, Pierce, you can have mine. Then you say, yuck.
Speaker: You wouldn't want to eat that because it's either burnt or not cooked enough or whatever way it's bad. It's bad some way. Yeah, I don't like when the the chocolate is totally raw, but the marshmallow is really hot.
Speaker: he I'm with you there. How do you even melt that chocolate? It's like impossible. The s'mores are just a fucking... They're a nightmare. fucking hate them. And this is the worst part about s'mores is that you have to fucking talk about them once they're there. i fucking hate s'mores. Just eat. hate s'mores.
Speaker: I'm going take the opposite stance. I love when you notice that like you're doing... You're like playing a part in the like play that we're all in. Like whenever someone comes back to get something because they've forgotten it and you're like, oh my God, back already. I fucking love that shit because I think it's so it's like watching like animals at the zoo to me where I'm like, oh, we're doing the thing that we've all agreed to do, which is so fucking stupid.
Speaker: We're participating. Yes. Yes. It's very much like, oh my God, we all have like the code that we're cozy. Yes. It's so stupid. And sometimes I start doing those things and I think I'm doing them ironically. And then like four years down the road, I'm just like doing them.
Speaker: And I think that's kind of sweet that we're just like ultimately little dumb animals. I think it's cute. Talk about this more. Have fun. I mean, some more talk is fucking boring. You're right. We should all go camping. the next Let's go camping.
Speaker: Let's see if we can make art. Yeah, we can make art out of branches. and Everybody has to bring their art to the campfire that night and present. Yes. But there is there is something so, like, it's it's almost like a cliche is the salve of, like, being a vagrant or a schizophrenic or an outcast. Like, to be anti-cliche, like, if every day you try to be more anti-cliche than the day before, then you are going to eventually become schizophrenic and completely untethered to the binds of the, what is it called?
Speaker: The binds of humanity? I think you're becoming schizophrenic. I think you're right. I think every word is a cliche. It's just sort of a hardened... thought that becomes recognized foster wallace was very pro cliche i can't remember his quote about them but i remember being like he's making a good point about this which is the stance i take every time he speaks i'm like yeah he made a good point good job good job and that is the best way to bring up david foster wallace yeah he's just like oh he said something one time and it was really profound i loved it do you guys know where cliche comes from no it's french
Speaker: Yeah, but do you know where where in France, do you know what its etymological roots It's from Brittany. It comes from Brest. It's actually an automatopoeia for the sound that the printing press made.
Speaker: Oh, I usually know the weird etymology of things like this, so this is a fun one. I like that one. Isn't it great? Cliché. Cliché. That's cute.
Speaker: God, French people are so rarely cute. Good for them. Yes. Yeah, they're repulsive. We can all agree. They're disgusting. Shall we investigate some Reddit questions? Let's do it, man.
Speaker: Yes. Here's one from No Stupid Questions. this is a This question is, is it still alcoholism if a person doesn't drink often but always blacks out when they do?
Speaker: Huh. I just like to black out. I don't want to answer it because you said that that's not part of the process here. But I do think that there's like a huge obsession with is it alcoholism?
Speaker: And like defining alcoholism is a very like American puritanical obsession And I read a advice question many years ago from a British person to another British person. And they were like, I love going out drinking and and I get way too drunk sometimes, but I'm starting to worry or whatever. And the columnist was just like, that sounds great. You should keep doing that. sounds like you're having fun. And I had this flash of being like, no American advice columnist would ever say that. They would be like, we found that part of you that felt guilty and shameful.
Speaker: And you need to amplify this and it must take up your entire life. You're so right. The fact that you're asking indicates a problem. I think you're 100% right. Even that way of like phrasing, like, I do this too much. Too much. Who's saying too much? are you Are you saying too much? Do you feel like you're doing it too much? In which case, sure, cut down. Doesn't mean you're whatever.
Speaker: But if you feel that way, fine. But are you asking... Do you all does the advice giver and humanity as a whole think I do this too much? If so, who who cares? Like, this is why I hate when people do like dry January and then they're like, oh, are you doing it? I'm like, I would never do that. I like drinking like I am fine with the amount I drink. i Especially in January. Yeah. Like, first of all, darkest fucking month of my life. Yeah, of course I'm drinking then. But second of all, why would I investigate my fucking pleasurable habits like that? Jesus God. Right. Why do you hate yourself? Go be a Calvinist somewhere else. We all agree alcoholism is fake doesn't exist. But what do you do when your children are sort of like ah we're cold and hungry. You lost your job. There's no heat and you never bring home food when you get Jesus. I need a drink. That's what you say. Shut up, Lonnie. I'm drinking. Like, that's what i say to my son.
Speaker: If my kids are starving, emaciated, there's nothing to say about Jesus, I need a drink. There's plenty of ah people who get blackout drunk all day long who feed their kids. And I would know. That's what you would tell your kids if they were starving? There's plenty of other people who do this, though. Don't like condemn me for what i represent or anything. This isn't because I'm drunk. This is because I'm drunk.
Speaker: I'm just a bad parent. This is the corollary of there starving kids in Africa is to say there well-fed kids in America. They're just in other houses. I would say something like this sounds like something about me as a mother figure and a symbol in your life. This does not sound like a real problem.
Speaker: that's Right. Examine yourself. Your feeling of hunger is actually sublimating some other feeling that you have towards just women in general. Yes. Yes. I would bring that up.
Speaker: Well, I mean, I've heard people say, express this, which is if you're drinking and not getting blackout junk or you're not getting fucking hammered, then what the fuck is the point?
Speaker: And there is something like really kind of like uncanny and like, it's almost like there's bugs crawling on you feeling that I get when I'm only a beer and a half in and I can't drink anymore after that. Like that to me is not a good thing.
Speaker: feeling the the idea of drinking responsibly is not a good way to it's it's it shouldn't be about responsibility it's an opportunity to be irresponsible yeah should be about pleasure if you're trying to moderate it so that you can have more pleasure in your life if like drinking every night is making you feel shitty maybe you want to drink less frequently but maybe blacking out is the pleasure so you just drink less frequently and you black out because that's the good way of drinking right You got a pleasure, Max. Like, come on. Get real. Yeah, feel good. I think anyone who's too obsessed with moderation is a fucking loser. And moderation has an end in itself. It's sick. That's a disease. Yeah, you're being a a pleasure centrist.
Speaker: Yes. Right. A Warren Democrat, but for pleasure. Yes. That's my bumper sticker. There's no alcoholics. There's no heroin addicts. We can all agree. what What happens when you black out?
Speaker: Can you black out and then... Have you never blacked out once? No. do you Can you black out and then like go do a bunch of stuff that you don't want to do? yeah Do you know, like, oh, I'm blacking out. Time to get to clean my house.
Speaker: Okay, so not exactly that, but I have been blacked out many times, but also I've been roofied twice and nothing happened to me technically because they got the wrong person, which I think is really insulting, but that's fine. Like got a person who they- You got roofied and the roofier so assumed was, i assume she'll not remember any this. The roofier said waste of good roofies. I'm not kidding you. I know both times that they were trying to roofie two different friends of mine, which is like very horrific, but also kind of like insulting on its own. You jumped in front of the bullet. Yeah, i really. Thank you. You got riffied and they had wonderful consensual sex with someone else. It's such a different kind of blackout than like a blackout while you're drinking is very much you just go goblin mode for a bit and you're annoying and in a way that doesn't bother you, which is right like actually such a freeing thing to do like to be annoying, the peak annoying and not feel the like horror of I'm in the middle of being annoying and I can tell.
Speaker: Amazing. But then blacking out like full on, like when there's like no memory and you just wake up the next minute. That's horrible. That one feels like oh, that's i mean, they both feel bad the next day. But like, I don't know. I think there's like levels. There's such a difference between having those sort of like blurry memories of either having a great time or doing embarrassing things or what have you at least you have some at least you have a sense of there was a period. Yes. But it's it's very strange when it's just like cut.
Speaker: And then you just are at a point the next day and it's just deleted. I didn't know I went to a location. Like we went to another bar, my friends told me and I was like, I don't have a thing there versus like if I'm blacked out, I know where I was. I just don't remember any of the conversations. And the next day, everyone's like, you kept talking about Shrek again and we hated you for it. And I was like, yeah, yeah that sounds like me for sure. I wonder why like when people get blackout drunk or just like obliterated stinking drunk, I feel like we should refer to that as a trip. Like people trip on mushrooms or acid. But like clearly if you're so drunk that your memory is being erased and you're not aware of what you're doing,
Speaker: That's like a psychedelic experience. And we're witnessing this person like kind of unpiloted, just sort of like bumble around. We should respect them. You know, they're piloted by their id.
Speaker: They're going through something. Yeah. I mean, the first time I ever like truly got blacked out as a teenager, it Someone gave me a bunch of, think my mom gave me a bunch of Xanax and I went hang out with friends and took a bunch of Xanax and drank with them.
Speaker: And it felt, I mean, at the time I was like, oh, this is like a religious experience. I'm like experiencing my soul fully for the first time. It was incredible. Definitely felt psychedelic.
Speaker: It is weird that your brain just doesn't record. Like, it's not even that you forget the next day. It's that your brain is like, we can't make memories. We're in like a really weird space right now. We're busy. i was very kind. Really? kind blackta yeah And then very mean. Apparently, I used to get really mean when I blacked out when I was in high school.
Speaker: I don't try. i try not to black out anymore, but I don't think I'm mean anymore. You're very nice when you're drunk. Yeah, but I don't think I've blacked out. Maybe. think have you ever seen me in a blackout, Matthew?
Speaker: I've seen you quite drunk, but I'm not privy to your memories. So yeah, i couldn't tell if you remembered. Yeah. I'm sure there's always a little blackening. There are also just times when I don't drink at all. And then I wake up the next day and I'm like, trying to remember every single word I said and see if it was bad, even though I didn't drink at all. And then I'm like, Oh, I think maybe that like my fear and anxiety around this is just anxiety and not drinking-related anxiety. It might also be true. i mean, because just we just are more like sensitive, nuanced, more sophisticated people when we're not drunk.
Speaker: I mean, I had that feeling after Thanksgiving with some family and friends where I wasn't even extremely... I actually wasn't even drunk. I just got a little tipsy. But I woke up feeling the next day that like...
Speaker: Nothing bad happened. I didn't say anything heinous. But what if my tone was wrong while saying perfectly bland anodyne things? and Getting your tone right when you're in a blackout is like such a waste of energy. you're concentrating on getting your tone exactly right when you're drunk, you're just going to end up singing gibberish to someone, I think.
Speaker: I think it still matters. Of course it matters, but it's just not. Get the tone right while you're singing well. I'm so forgiving of people when they're drunk, like, in general. i just am Ideally, it's endearing. As long as they're not operating heavy man machinery, it's supposed to be like, oh, you turned into a little giggle giggle goblin.
Speaker: But even if they're, like, annoying or even mean, like, I don't prefer that to their normal self, but I'm usually just like, yeah, you took an altering substance. I'm not confused about what happened. Yeah, they're communing with the spirits.
Speaker: Thank you, Derek. Yes. it's It's more of a social ritual than it is about the effect of alcohol and the on the mind. We're all agreeing to sort of forgive each other and allow kind of unhinged behavior.
Speaker: that's all it is. Yes. And i again, I don't want people to like tamp down on like having a nice experience for the sake of like maybe I embarrass myself. Like what are we here for other than to embarrass ourselves in front of each other?
Speaker: go out there, girl. Getting drunk is such a gift. Yeah. it It really is. And if your your liver just swells up and kills you. It's performance of process, okay? Yeah.
Speaker: Yes, it's all performance. And the effect of alcohol is culturally mediated. There are cultures and places where alcohol makes people ah focused, hard workers and less aggressive.
Speaker: In America, we've chosen the liver kind of arbitrarily as the thing that fails. How does affect the liver? Right. but But in some island nations, someone when gets really drunk, they become taller, faster. Right.
Speaker: Or they can fly. Their livers improve more effectively. They grow more livers. um Here's a question. them coming. Sophia, would you read this question? There's a title and then ah a body.
Speaker: Okay, yes. Does anyone else think sex was a joke when they first learned about it? By this I mean, did anyone else think that sex was a lie older people told young people like Santa or the Tooth Fairy?
Speaker: I remember when I was like 12 and first learned what it was, i legit thought everyone was joking. I continued to think that up until 15 to 16-ish when people my age started getting in relationships and eventually I realized people were serious about it.
Speaker: Must have been a terrible feeling. Damn, y'all doing that? Wow. It's like Santa and the Tooth Fairy where eventually you realize, oh, it's my parents having sex with me. It's not... It's not the sand man.
Speaker: Yeah. That is so... Oh, person who comes into my room at night is like, Dad. Why did it go there for you?
Speaker: i mean, maybe you don't want to answer that, but... but Well, i had the, like, back when I was, like, trying to be, like, ah a stand-up stand-up, I tried to have a joke like this where it was, like, you know, I know the stork isn't real, but the sperm and egg, that's just, like, chapter two, and, like, soon we're going to figure out what the real thing is. But, this I mean, when you talk about sex, it's almost like there's there's two elements of sex, and both of them are equally cartoonish. One of them is that, like, you fit to you fit together with someone else, like, a Lego piece, and
Speaker: And then the second element, the microscopic element is like, and then a tadpole shoots into an egg to make a baby. like how Those just fantastical stories. It's like the tooth fairy.
Speaker: Yeah. But I genuinely... I think this this is like a... I think we talked about this in some episode where it's like, I have a big problem with the way that people use analogies where they say like, a T-Rex's teeth were as sharp as knives, not knowing that we built knives in the image of sharp teeth. So that analogy is reversed. Or like, calling ah a rock that looks like a potato chip, potato chip rock, but we named potato chips after chipped rocks. So the the way that like the... the treadmill of of of analogies doesn't it gets fucked up. Yeah. We invented sex in order to have something that's more like Santa or the tooth fairy in our lives.
Speaker: Not exactly what i was going to say, but that is very erotics of Santa, you know? But yes, it's the erotics of Santa. Santa is um a method of sex ed He's in, he's like, he slides down the canal. He leaves his glittery gift and then he's plump and red and he is, he's got big, plumpy red cheeks and he's always getting engorged and he's always milking all over the place.
Speaker: And he, yeah rest the year he goes limp and sort of emaciated. He's your parent. He actually flies with seven stags. It's a sort of bachelor party thing. Stag stag slay.
Speaker: Slay mama boots the house down. He literally goes boots the house and down the house. He does. um But yes, ah most of the stories that we tell children are... are they're ever Well, every story is ah it has to do kind of do with sex and sperm and egg and all that, right?
Speaker: Milk and cookies help him perform.
Speaker: they have like text they have Every story is about sex on a fundamental level. Like my left foot, part of the reason Matthew didn't like that performance is because it reminded him of what if he was having sex with a cerebral ah guy. Cerebrally.
Speaker: a guy A guy that was more like Daniel Day-Lewis. Overly cerebral. yeah Some kind of brainiac. I think it's really cute to think that everyone was joking. And I agree that the idea of sex, like every once a while, it hits me that like people are just like slapping bodies against each other because it feels good, which is hilarious to do. Like it is kind of like a prank to think of that.
Speaker: It doesn't make sense that it would feel good at all. No. if somebody was like, hey, just go slap up against that dude. I would have been like, that doesn't sound like if sex wasn't a thing and someone started making it up, I'd be like, no.
Speaker: Yeah, it's a caviar. It's an acquired taste. And like, so it truly doesn't make sense because even after you've had it, it's usually not that good. You probably need to have it like 50 times. just like i see It has its merit at times.
Speaker: I've interviewed so many people about their sex lives and about the first time they had sex and or masturbated and so many people, but
Speaker: offshoot of this particularly guys with masturbating like it didn't feel good the first time and like every woman i know was just like pumping things constantly as a kid and it did feel good so that they're fine but we had to learn from women i guess yeah kind do guess i'll try this they're more pure than you guys are but it is weird that it is kind of an acquired taste because of the cultural significance of it because it should feel good right away evolution speaking like it should just be like yes But there is something unintuitive about it, maybe. Instead, people perform.
Speaker: They're like, oh, I love sex. No, you don't. you know never until You don't like it. You've never come. But everyone has to like sex.
Speaker: Yeah, I'm posting my stories with the eye emoji. Like, see you next week. What's going to keep watching? You know? But it's me about to have sex next week. Yeah, the work in progress. Work in progress.
Speaker: Stay tuned. I'm about to come. in progress My half flaccid cock. Almost there. Stay tuned. Working on this one. The eye emojis.
Speaker: Stay tuned. I'm about to come is horrific. If you said there's a woman in bed. yeahs Big things coming soon. Oh my God. Jesus Christ. I'm actually really excited about this one, you guys. Been putting some together.
Speaker: Been putting something nasty together. to Stay tuned. This is where it makes sense to just talk about the process, right? Because it's not about the orgasm, guys, right? It's about the interaction you're having. The kissing. All that tedious stuff. And the clothes.
Speaker: You're taking the clothes off. Oh, nice clothes. I'm nice. Yeah. Nice, close, I'm nice. I'm mixing foreplay. Nice, close, I'm nice. There we go. Should we move on? Yeah, sure Let's take it one step at a time.
Speaker: There is something unintuitive about sex. I read somewhere that Victorian horrors invented oral sex, or at least are the ones who made it mainstream. um Which, if it's true, then they, I mean, kudos for inventing oral in that way. But, I mean, I know that, like, there are some chimpanzees that do oral, so it can't be that. But it does seem like oral really makes a lot of sense just because we put everything in our mouths properly.
Speaker: just not only out of curiosity because it's a sense organ, but just because there's a chance that everything you can put in your mouth, especially a million years ago, might have some nutritional value. So why not? Why don't I just put my mouth on the the glowing red, wet part of your body? I mean, it looks like a fruit. looks like a cherry. So I might as well just put my mouth on it.
Speaker: But then for it's like, well, why don't I put my cherry in your cherry slot? It's like, get your mind out of the gutter. Just put your mouth on it if you're so horny, or I'll put my mouth on yours, but we're not supposed to put these together. it's like um It's like when someone roughhouses with your action figures by slapping them together. It's like, no, that's not how you play with my toys. You're supposed to pose them. they belong in the package.
Speaker: Far away from each other. You're saying oral is far more intuitive. Makes more sense. Yeah. And it's more erotic.
Speaker: Oral has existed for a very long time. like don't Don't worry. Don't worry. i say that because I've had to look up like the origin of so much shit for writing a fucking historical romance novel.
Speaker: Gross sentence. Sorry had to say that, but I got a i got through it. But um like dildos are so fucking old. It's like the first thing you made. It's like the first thing you can make.
Speaker: Yes, they just were like, put something up there. I don't know, Diane, figure it out. But they have so much shit. They use wood. They literally use teeth. Like they found ones made of teeth. I don't know how they were put together. I've tried to figure that out. but That feels like it would be very unsatisfying.
Speaker: I'm sure it was. but oh wait, and this is the origin of the tooth fairy. Yeah. oh Ribbed for her pleasure, but it's like teeth. Hitachi wands have been around for millennia.
Speaker: Yeah. Different forms. Different manufacturers. Vibrating eggs. Those were just dinosaur eggs that were almost hatched. Almost. Yeah. vibrating egg is when you just put a pteranodon egg close to your taint that's how we got the easter bunny think oral was around forever but as as just a form of sodomy right just sort of another creepy thing you could do another thing you could do to piss your mom off i mean legitimately like the amount of i think every state has had a no oral sex and no sodomy law on the books so yeah it was very much like you're a pervert
Speaker: So i think it's only recent that it became like an option, like part of the menu of Even if you listen to like the song Freak Leak, which fantastic song, but he's like, I can do it from the front. I can do it from the back. And those are like the freakiest things he can conceive of in 2003. He's like, holy shit.
Speaker: He's not even talking about anal. He just means from behind. It's like, that's, that was crazy. And then at one point he's like, no, I don't eat pussy. That's too freaky. I'm not, he says, I'm not drunk enough to do that.
Speaker: That's insane. We've made it so far in 20 years. you You shouldn't be considered a sex haver if you aren't committing present day sodomy. like Oral sex doesn't count because now that's that's no longer sodomy.
Speaker: That's now regular sex. If you're having oral sex, if you're having regular, what's the regular called? Just sex. Missionary. waitus Coitus. Coitus.
Speaker: Yeah. that's Intercourse. That's just following the rules. Intercoitus. That's just following the rules. what What is modern day sodomy? Having a goon cave, essentially. and I guess that would be modern day sodomy, yeah.
Speaker: I see it as quite gross. Gooning is just as bad as jaywalking. Yeah, it's pretty fine, but you just don't want to talk about doing it. It's just lame when someone's you know, I'm really, I jaywalk all the time. you just don't do it in front of a cop.
Speaker: Yeah, right. Do it alone. Do it in a cave. Okay, Matthew, read this one from Adultery. The title of this is Online Wingman. Okay.
Speaker: Hey, guys. I'm thinking would help OPSEC to have a sort of affair wingman who I can use as a kind of alibi slash smokescreen. Mostly, we would have a chat going where we make fake plans to hang out, but also shoot in the shit and making it more legit. Okay.
Speaker: The idea is that if she ever questions whether I really met up with Bob, I can just hand over my phone and say, yeah, see, here's the chat. Anyone ever try this? No.
Speaker: Not married. No. That's the answer. This is just a friend, right? I mean, this guy, if you if you really wanted an affair wingman, you would just buy yourself another phone and text the the additional phone. right It's not really a wingman. It's simply, have you ever had your friends be complicit in your affair and sort of helped you lie? Well, yeah. I don't have a friend or my friends actually standards. They have ethical standards. This is the problem of the, you know, this is the male loneliness epidemic. Trying to have an affair in this era is almost impossible.
Speaker: There are no third spaces, no bowling leagues full of complicit men who want you to cheat on your wife. I did during the pandemic. There was a car that frequently would park around the corner from my house. And there was a couple always in it that seemed to be having emotional talks. And I convinced myself wholly that this was a couple that had been having an affair, but no longer had places to meet because of COVID.
Speaker: And I do think I was like, wow, I am sad for them. The world shut down. This sucks. Yeah, she is. They can't go to a hotel and write fake names or that sort of thing. Yeah, like, or if they were fucking at work and now it's like work from home and you're like, damn it.
Speaker: No more Pam pussy for me. That's what imagine her name was. Pam. Yeah, she sounds beautiful. She was. Dude, Jim at work with Pam. Oh, that was an affair, right?
Speaker: It actually, I think was, wasn't it? Like, wasn't that? Yeah, there was a moment where Jim looked at his office, the exterior of Dunder Mifflin, and thought, that's where I go to get Pam pussy on the on the low.
Speaker: And that's just so insane because he's supposed to be our protagonist. And we think of this as like a cozy sort of background music show. Meanwhile, our protagonist thinks of it as a place where he can get Pam pussy on the low. Yeah.
Speaker: That's not right. It's a den of iniquity. He sees The Office as just a show where you can get laid. It's supposed to be
Speaker: Yeah. Wait a minute. This is supposed to be like a funny, sort of awkward show that, you know, brings to light some of the natural indignities of workplace castration. it's Not for Jim. If we lived in a satirical sitcom, we would be trying to get some laughs.
Speaker: We wouldn't be trying to, yeah, fuck someone's fiance. That's crazy. I wouldn't fall in love with a coworker who's not loyal. There's all this stuff that's going on underneath the surface.
Speaker: Jim actually introduced Pam to consensual non-consent. Really? yeah And free use. but
Speaker: Can you believe that? He introduced her to it. She ended up making up her mind. She said, thank you for showing me these things. I'm not so interested in them. It's not my thing, but it's good to know about the culture. and like Your culture. You're the stuff that you like, Jim.
Speaker: And then i would actually just like to have two children, and then I would like to sort of leave leave the office at at around season nine or so. Which she carried out, right? Right, she carried that out. Jim continues to do his own show on the set of The Office where he explores... he explores He's looking for more pan pussy.
Speaker: He explores some of his at kinks, really. Every other character knew, okay, it's time to sort of blip out of existence. He's like, no, I don't know.
Speaker: I'm good, I'll stay put. ah it' still like kink and shit like that yeah this is a nice private space for me to explore my own body everyone else is no longer exists inrapa Do you guys think if office writers, if people who were at one point employed in the office writers room do keep writing scripts pro bono, that that's canon?
Speaker: If one of them were to write this, is that does that continue in the office universe? Does what continue? Or does it have to be paid? Like, if an ah if a former office writer continues writing about Jim... Is that canon?
Speaker: Is that canon? Does that... Oh, does... No, man. No, no, no, no. Do they to be paid for that to be canon? I think the film crew has to be there. It has to be shot. Because if I don't get footage, should be shot. Not only that, i mean, it has to be edited.
Speaker: what if it's very poorly shot on iPhone by one of the writers? Yeah, we changed the actors. goes That's actually canon to me. that's canon right To me, it's like once you get it on film that that little pussy hound is back in the office. Canon. Real.
Speaker: Yeah, an iPhone video of Jim walking around the office licking his lips. And then you just send that to the news and you say, Jim is back in the office and he's horny. Season 13 of The Office coming to Netflix soon.
Speaker: We could do this. We surely know office writers. We can ask if we can... borrow put him back there we'll film it we'll do all the work filming it just quickly write jim came the thing we need from them is for them to write that down it has to be them writing it yeah yeah yeah otherwise it's not canon so we'll we'll come up with the idea jim's in the office fucking pam or whatever and we'll say can you copy this verbatim onto your special the office letterhead paper paper yeah yeah
Speaker: Yeah, most of them have uncredited assistants anyway. It doesn't change much, really. Okay. i'm I'm interested in this project. There were a lot of affairs in the office, now that I think about this ah ah show. Deeply immoral show. I think that's why people want to get these kind of office jobs, because of how it's depicted. They're like, okay, it'll be dull. The work-wise.
Speaker: I don't know, I'll have this sort of inner angst, and I'll get laid a lot with these wives. Yeah. I thought that this was all like a fake thing ah because I've never had a real job, obviously. And my sister left teaching and was like, I'm going to get a real job and got a, not the teaching isn't, and got a real like desk job that is like as boring as what they're doing in the office, I think. And,
Speaker: They are the horniest people I've ever met in my entire life. They're all fucking each other. They constantly have conversations. I've met many of these people because they're all friends with each other outside of the office too. And they're constantly having conversations about who they would want to fuck in the office if they like had to, which no one has brought in from Yeah. It's like, what's the scenario where you're getting out? That's what most of the meetings are about when you're in an office. I'm not kidding you. It is the most...
Speaker: filthy workplace I've ever it made a film set seem pristine I was like you guys are disgusting offices need intimacy coordinators to decide who fucks who yes that's what intimacy coordinator does they're like wait wait wait i he fucks him over there that has to do with the how horny the boss is right but there must be some kind of like weird hierarchical or even pheromone based thing like when your dog has a red rocket just from like playing with his toy or something that reflects on the dog owner Like that person has bad sexual habits that the dog is picking up on or like not even just, just sexual machinations in the unconscious are affecting that dog. So like if you are the manager of an office and all your employees are constantly fucking each other and asking each other questions like who would you fuck if you had to the, if you had to part of your brain, that's supposed to be the boss's domain. He's the one who makes you have to do things or she,
Speaker: And by that logic, the boss is the one putting the energy out there, whether they know it or not. like They're the ones who are making them fuck. right We're in an environment where we might have to do something other in this environment. This is a place where we sometimes have to do things. What if we had to do that?
Speaker: I agree. the The boss is putting out in some way. In the familial play that is occurring, the boss has creepy incest vibes. And he's making everyone crazy. So we're we're all subscribers to the trickle-down libido theory of desire.
Speaker: Yes, the creepy dead theory of desire. The 1% are the ones who have sexual desire, and we all sort of get the dregs. Yes. Not loving the phrase trickle down in this situation. Yeah, we get the boss's trickles.
Speaker: He or she. I love it in every other context, but not in this I mean, isn't this true, though? I mean, don't we all feel like we're just imitating what Elon Musk is doing? yeah Yes.
Speaker: Yes. He and I have the same body shape, too, so it freaks me out. Really? he looks amazing. not trying to... I do, too. I do, too. Yeah, I know. It's just like a fact. It's a fact. It's a fact. We didn't answer if it's okay to have an affair winged man. And I don't know if we're supposed to answer the questions, but I do think it's sad not to do the male loneliness epidemic ah talk, but yeah it's sad to that like, you're like, I couldn't even have a friend pretend. Yeah. Or maybe they just have really moral friends who are very upstanding. guess if your affair allows you to connect with a brother like that, then it's probably a good thing.
Speaker: you have an affair so that you can make a guy friend. oh my God. That's so funny. Like just trying to get closer with your guy friend. And so you're like, I guess have to have an affair. So he has a secret. Yeah. We get to be mischievous together. Like we were as school boys. You love your wife so much. You're like, I don't want to do this to Susan, but I have to.
Speaker: Most affairs have a silver lining, which is like, well, I may be betraying my committed partner, but at least I'm making my affair partner very happy. That's the silver lining of my affair. I personally hate it, but at least I'm making someone else happy. But what if I can make two people happy?
Speaker: My affair partner and my alibi wingman. My homie. We have to meet up once a week at Buffalo Wild Wings and talk about this.
Speaker: Also, it it is kind of nice to think of ah an affair as like a performance for another guy. Yeah, that's really nice. Totally. Which I think it is a little bit sometimes for people. That's sweet. I'll force myself to cheat when I'm married just so that when I'm discovered, people will know that I'm i'm not sort of this kind of bougie sort of middle of the road guy. and I'm kind of a tortured soul, actually, and an artist. Right. Right. Yes. It was part of the process. What if you had a whole a whole network of affair wingmen and women that comprised your fake social circle, but you ended up supplanting your initial real social circle, and then everyone that you interact with is complicit in your rich alibi.
Speaker: You never have an interaction that is not predicated on being an alibi for an affair. Basically, I'm suggesting that you have a second family relationship You're in a Truman Show affair partner kind of world.
Speaker: Right. You know, perception's reality, so I think that your reality. That becomes your wife, right? Your affair partner is just your wife in that situation. Yeah, that's Yeah, beautiful. Interesting. Two wives, the dream. Nothing wrong with that.
Speaker: You don't even need the first wife, really. You just need to tell your friends that you're married someone. should have a fake wife that you're then cheating on. Help me have this affair. Everyone will be so excited. That solves all the problems. And you've done no wrong. Imagine how furious your affair partner would be, though, if they found out you didn't even really have a wife. Mm-hmm.
Speaker: You're not your wife. Okay. Okay, fine. The conflicted passion for you shouldn't have been conflicted and probably shouldn't have been passionate. That really would take me down a peg on the like, how hot was that? i would be like, oh, no no one else wants you. I guess you're a loser. Yeah. this yeah a Dumb bachelor.
Speaker: You didn't even betray anyone for fucking a bachelor this whole time. Yeah, there's no betrayal. There's no need for secrecy. i just fucked a guy. Sorry, honey. All you did was fuck me.
Speaker: Nothing else. No salt, no pepper.
Speaker: That's good.
