Transcript
Speaker: um I had a dream that I was on a plane and I was using a feature that in the dream I was convinced was a normal feature that has always been on planes. It's like a button that you can press next to the button that turns up the volume on your ah screen headphones or the button that makes your seat recline.
Speaker: It's a button that allows you essentially to astral project back to Earth so that you don't have to be on a plane, but you're still traveling. Your physical body is still traveling. So it's a button that basically severs your physical physical and and ah and mental experience. I wish that was real.
Speaker: So I was on Earth, and I was just like walking around the mall or whatever, knowing, like and my body is traveling, but I'm currently ah like a sort of Ebenezer ghost, Ebenezer Scrooge ghost, walking around this mall, and I get to window shop, and But what was so crazy is that people were making eye contact with me in the mall.
Speaker: And I started to feel like really insane. I was like, wait, but they're not supposed to be able to see my form because I'm still on the plane. And I remember like being really upset that the technology wasn't working and that it was glitching because people were noticing me in the mall.
Speaker: Then people started touching me. And then I was like... oh, you know what is actually happening is I'm dreaming on the plane. There's no way this technology exists. I'm just dreaming on the plane. ah that's the twist. This was a dream.
Speaker: Yeah. It was a dream. yeah It was the first time that i realized that I was dreaming in a dream, but I didn't wake up because I was wrong about the situation in which I was dreaming. That's really funny. Did you become ah lucid? Did you start lucid dreaming?
Speaker: No, I just tried to wake back up on the plane, but because my real body was in bed, it wasn't working. So I spent my lucid dream trying to wake up Oh, yeah. You were incepted. Yeah.
Speaker: You were a couple of years deep. You didn't try to enjoy yourself in the mall? No. Every time I realize I'm dreaming, violently try to wake myself up because I think it's a waste of time. I want to know the truth.
Speaker: I want to be in reality. Fuck this. This is made up. and My cortisol spikes and I can't fall back to sleep. When you realize that you have agency over your own like life and storyline, you immediately want to escape it. want to annihilate myself. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, I control all of this? i i guess I'll just be gone then.
Speaker: Yeah. If I just catch a glimpse of my own hand opening and closing in reality, i immediately become suicidal.
Speaker: April, thanks for doing um the show. Yeah, thanks for having me on the on your podcast. Welcome. was going to ask, how's the podcast going? How's the podcast going?
Speaker: Swimmingly. had a ah pretty long hiatus. I just ended my podcast. officially Officially. It's officially over. but you guys Did you guys get up to the triple didge?
Speaker: ah yeah Yeah. We did like 175 episodes or something. Really? That is tight. i mean we we You were doing like 10 episodes a week or what? We were doing two a week and we... see yeah, half of those were like Patreon only episodes and we were pretty consistent, honestly. i respect that.
Speaker: i don't I don't even want to put this into the recording because it's going to like point out how bad we are about No, no, you should put it in. ah Here's my thing. here's my Here's my... Looking back, looking back, I wish I'd been less consistent.
Speaker: Or I wish I had made it less of a chore for myself. I also, at the beginning, I was a real stickler about like, it needs to be an hour minimum every episode. No, get over it. Doesn't matter.
Speaker: Just do whatever. No one cares. It doesn't matter. it's true. Or some people do care and then they get mad when you start to break... from that which is worse right yeah yeah all you're doing is building a prison from the inside out and you should have as many nooks and escape hatches as possible right when i was doing my written podcast with jay uh we were constantly back and forth but should we make this easier on ourselves and shorter rather than writing an hour-long script uh twice a week uh that's so much twice a week
Speaker: I couldn't bear the idea of making it shorter. It seemed like it would disenfranchise our audiences. I feel like you guys barely ever exceeded an hour. we aimed for an hour in the beginning and then we eventually did relent but with a lot of misgivings.
Speaker: How many episodes did you guys do? I think 50 something. Oh my god, that's so many. a lot. It might be a better instead of doing two hour long episodes a week, you could just do 12, 10 minute long episodes a week.
Speaker: That'd be good. But sometimes you come across things like on Instagram or whatever where they're like, it's a it's like, this is my podcast. But it's like, that's not, you've pushed the boundaries of what a podcast is so far.
Speaker: I just recorded myself saying a witticism. Right. Like this is not a podcast. A podcast cannot be like ah a 10 second voice memo. Sorry. That's something different. you on TikTok, there's like a lot of podcasts where it's not clear if there's actually a podcast or it's just clips. Right.
Speaker: If they just make clips. Yeah. i um went on something that was kind of like that. I went on this show and I'm, I guess I won't say what show it was, but there there were these guys, these comedians who like rent out, they rented out like a podcast space for day and brought a bunch of like comedians to this space and ah had them dress up in various costumes, according to like the concept of the pod, the fake podcast they were shooting.
Speaker: and Then they spent all afternoon shooting like fake podcast clips for this thing. And it was supposed to be like kind of a funny, low effort, like a weird take on like a sketch show where the sketch is, the premise of the sketch is we're all on a podcast.
Speaker: Yeah. And it was super weird. And I'd never been a part of anything like that. And then for better or worse, the, there was a problem with all of the audio from that day.
Speaker: and make any of it I really could not have guessed that. I thought the ending was going to be, and it actually was a huge, massive, unironic success. And no one got the joke. I kind of, i like that idea. i I really wanted to do something like that years ago when people were ah using Facebook more and i would have like comedy shows and it was all about like posting and a Facebook photo album of all the cool like photographs from the show.
Speaker: And my thinking the time was there's so much work that goes into planning a show and what like a few dozen people experience it but it's it's really just all about the photo album right yeah take do a photo shoot like well-lit photos yeah like clouded up people a monthly photo shoot with comedians that's really funny is this podcast video or just audio by the way it's just audio oh hey that's great i prefer it that way pick our noses that's awesome should we all pick our noses fuck with an audio only podcast that doesn't release any promotional material or clips. That's the other hard fucking thing about doing a podcast.
Speaker: It's fucking hard. What the hell am I supposed to do We tried to, we tried to you guys have an exclusive, by the way, this is my first interview post podcast, post ending my critically acclaimed independent podcast.
Speaker: Yeah. the girl come again We're going to become a gossip podcast. We're going to become a gossip podcast podcasters podcast podcast podcast. But we tried to do like clips. Grace especially wanted to do like clips, but we just did it on Zoom like this and they looked like shit.
Speaker: Yeah, of course you're not supposed to do that. This isn't going to work. We cannot post clips of this podcast. that is the word It would actively turn people off who otherwise might have checked out the podcast.
Speaker: Literally, it's better to just post audio only squares with captions and no visuals other than words on the screen than it is it's your head and yeah bedroom. from a Zoom call. we're just better to like It's better to post nothing and just put and have in your bio on Instagram, I do not have a podcast.
Speaker: That's better. That's literally more... That's better advertising than putting out clips of a Zoom. yeah I don't have a regular ah passion project or an independent.
Speaker: I make stuff with zero regularity. and And I don't do it with my friends and collaborators. And I don't put it out. I do with people that I don't get along with.
Speaker: And we do it super intimately um in person. It's recorded on really nice cameras. i think all podcast clips should just be ah filmed by people outside of the building where you're recording, kind of like circling around it and filming filming the but building, really.
Speaker: It's all going down in there. That'd be really good. Surrounding Grace's house. Yeah. I think April's in there too. Yeah.
Speaker: You want to start with a deep thought? Yeah, I do actually. hear Here's something from the Deep Thoughts subreddit, which I just found out there's a Deep Thoughts subreddit. Here's the deep thought in its fatality.
Speaker: a man addicted to knowledge cannot find the truth. Hmm. So should I even try to understand what that means or does that kind of go against what the phrase is saying?
Speaker: That's so true. Yeah, it's kind of like hashtag deep thoughts, hashtag deep. If you try to figure this out, you're stupid. We can investigate this without being addicted to it, right? Right. We can understand it shallowly.
Speaker: i'm spending all mym I'm spending all my money on knowledge. I can't afford rent because I spent all my... That's an addiction. I'm spending all my money on knowledge. A man who is addicted to knowledge... I mean, i mean in my mind, doesn't exist.
Speaker: I don't think it's even possible to be addicted to knowledge. More knowledge, please.
Speaker: Still hungry. i mean, or you can flip and say a man addicted to the truth will... I don't know. Never never know anything. i guess i'm yeah I'm sort of thinking about a man who's wasting away because he's so addicted to knowledge that he can't eat.
Speaker: ah Yeah, I don't think that you could say to the man, let's imagine this man who's addicted to knowledge and you go up to him and you say, you'll never find the truth. i kind of I can see in my mind's eye that this knowledge-addicted man is unfazed by that.
Speaker: He says, I don't care to ever find the truth. Right. He says something like, um knowledge is power. ah just Yeah, just addicted to power. It's not even about the truth.
Speaker: yeah Power is like an addiction to the knowledge of what happens to a man's face when you like punch him with brass knuckles. yeah How about this? how about Here's a deep thought.
Speaker: Knowledge informs and absolute knowledge informs absolutely. yeah You should post that on the subreddit. See how it does. Yeah, that should be a whole section on this podcast, to be honest.
Speaker: Posting and then seeing how it does. And let's check in on last week's post, everybody. week's post did yeah fairly well. Nice. We don't really have segments here, but if we had segments, that would be a killer.
Speaker: There are so many segments we could have if we structured this a little differently. Just knowing we could have them is enough for me. do you guys have the urge to put segments in your podcast? If any of us had the urge to improve the podcast, that would be great.
Speaker: It's one of many urges I get throughout the day. I get so many different kinds of urges all day long. And that's, that is one of them. Yeah, me too, to be honest. Yes. Yeah, yeah. We should have moments.
Speaker: Go for a walk.
Speaker: I'm starting to think about this knowledge-addicted man again, and it it's so he's he's so strong in my mind. what's And what's his name? don't know. he's got a He's got like a... Socrates. Yeah.
Speaker: Any relation? No, because the actual Socrates says, I don't know anything. Yeah. The actual Socrates is like, truth, truth. And then he gets completely bodied by our um imaginary side.
Speaker: Knowledge. Knowledge, Chad. Knowledge, Chad. is Versus the truth cell. Yeah. Literally exactly how it works. The truth cell Joe Biden versus the knowledge Trump, giga Trump's Chad.
Speaker: Trump has so much knowledge. He says stuff like... Wait, I've lost track of which is better, truth or knowledge? Truth truth is pathetic. oh okay. You can't say that. It's not true. know what I mean?
Speaker: Sort of Karen. When you were kids... It doesn't matter if it's true if I know it. If you know it, yeah. if it's if If you've memorized it, it doesn't matter if it's real. yeah I cut you off, Matthew. i was i was going to ask if you... ah If when you were children, you thought it was if you thought the distinction was important between ah knowledge and intelligence, like that that came up a lot when I was a kid, like when you were a kid.
Speaker: Yeah, when I was a kid, like people in a higher grade would say, I'm smarter than you because I'm in fifth grade and you're in third grade. And i remember my friends and I would say, no you have more knowledge.
Speaker: more knowledge right high gra yeah but i'm me you're more in brighter i'm i in the i'm in the accelerated program right right assimilate i actually have much greater potential than you that's true i'm i'm valued higher than you are i'm destined for great things that's a good defense when you're a child by fifth by fifth grade we already know you're not going anywhere in third grade you still have a lot of potential I would just brag to other kids about how how many resources my parents kind of pour into my upbringing.
Speaker: Is that true? You would say that? Yeah, like they they put a lot into me. they ah yeah They're really devoted to me. and ah Actually, I'm smarter than you because of the sunken cost fallacy that my parents are experiencing.
Speaker: I'm a future college. I'm a future parents pay for my college student. College track, college bound. but I guess I did do that when I was a kid a little bit. Like when ah there was a subject I didn't care about, i would just like kind of sleep through it and not really try.
Speaker: and that was okay because the subjects I cared about, I did really well in. Because you were so well rested. Because I had the knowledge that I like one of them and that the other one's stupid and boring.
Speaker: People who don't sleep through classes truly lack intelligence. They don't realize they're supposed to go to sleep when you're tired. You just take everything at face value. Yeah. yeah There's no critical thinking if you're not passed out.
Speaker: right Only when you're truly unconscious are you really kind of grappling with what's going on. Yeah, it takes a really wise thinker to go to bed.
Speaker: the The image of the thinker on the rock, that is just a man. He's napping. He's literally, well, he's actually struggling with insomnia. He's trying to figure out what to do when the sun goes down. Right. but the wise man doesn't even need a statue because no one knows him.
Speaker: He is simply sleeping. You can know someone who's passed out. Yeah, you can know them, but you can't hang out with them. but you should But you shouldn't. You're not allowed to get to know them too well. You shouldn't get to know them while they're passed out. yeah that's not Especially women. Don't get to know them while they're passed out. Why is it so discouraged getting to know sleepy women?
Speaker: you shouldn't be You shouldn't do that. You shouldn't try to teach them anything while they're passed out. You shouldn't try to get to know in general. You're just supposed to ignore them? Yeah. It's polite. well okay um Speaking of women, though i just saw this question on No Stupid Questions. Derek's just scrolling Reddit. That's right.
Speaker: I'll read it. Why do we never get videos from the inside of women's prisons while we have so many of those from the inside of men's ones? I've seen a quantity of crazy prison videos on the internet and I just read a comment under one of them saying, you never see those things inside women's cells and it clicked to me that I don't remember seeing a single video from inside a female prison.
Speaker: Why is that? Is it because they are cleaner? Are they completely different? I specify that I ask if it's because they're cleaner because the video I usually see are not the educational kind.
Speaker: Just shit human behavior slash beings. What the fuck? What? They're seeing videos of like excrement in men's prisons? No, no. Like no most videos inside prisons are like, you know guys fighting, doing deals. There's a whole show about women's prisons.
Speaker: It's called Orange is the New Black, I believe. and that it And it's a reality. No, it's really? it's Yeah, it's more related to knowledge than truth. It's almost like fiction is a new reality and with respect to orange is the new black. Fiction is the new orange. Yeah, because we have an orange prez who lies all the time. Yeah.
Speaker: Wait, orange really? Yeah. yeah orange Orange really is, actually. Orange really is the new fiction. And noticed Pierce has an orange-tipped microphone. It's red.
Speaker: But I guess red is the new orange. Red is the new orange. i just I like thinking about their imagined version of, are they completely different? and like what like What does that mean?
Speaker: what do they what do they say completely different? Is that why this thing that I've noticed is part of one isn't a part of the other? Could it be because they're just completely different? Yeah. Is there something they don't want to show us that happens in there?
Speaker: Imprisonment. It's the same in every prison. That's all you see is just people shackled. Yeah. They don't want you to see that. Yeah, but instead of like pickaxes and rocks, maybe it's like pillow forts. and Have any of guys been to women's prison?
Speaker: Not yet. I've been to one. I've been near. You've walked around inside? No, I've walked, like I think, in the same district, same neighborhood. Oh, you've been in the vicinity of a women's Yeah, I've been in the vicinity walking with someone who said, like oh, you know, there's a women's prison like a few blocks down there.
Speaker: And and i remember going, oh, huh. And how did that make you feel? Was it startling when your imagination, when your mind's eye was suddenly filled with caged women? Shackles to the walls? Yeah. That was arresting when the entirety of your mind space was filled with homunculi women couldn't move. Do you think more women should go in cages?
Speaker: ah definitely... Or less? I think it would be equitable if there were an equal number of men and women imprisoned. And what should that number be? ah guess a baker's dozen.
Speaker: I feel like it would be a good deterrent. like Men would probably commit less crimes if they knew that for every crime a man commits, some random womanness in imp prison woman be in prison.
Speaker: Because of woke. I don't actually think that would stop anyone, to be honest. but if i don't yeah I don't think I'll rob this bank because I... I have a mom. i have a sister for Christ's sake.
Speaker: My mom is somebody's daughter. i shouldn't because my mom is somebody's daughter. Every mother is somebody's daughter. oh I can't believe it. You guys think that we should bring back whipping boys, but they should be like whipping puppies or like whipping babies. What do the whipping boys they do? They just get hurt.
Speaker: They get hurt on your behalf. And it's sort of like a way to let ah let off steam. Doesn't it happen in Barry Lyndon? Doesn't Barry get like a punishment, but he gets walked around, but they're whipping a guy behind him, and it's his punishment?
Speaker: Yeah, I vaguely remember that. I think I would hate that if someone whipped a boy on because of what I did. Yeah, I'm going to come right out and say we shouldn't bring that back. Okay. oh no no Wouldn't it be easier?
Speaker: to win i mean To have someone whipped who isn't the subject of whatever we're talking about? Wouldn't that be easier? Obviously easier for, let's say I committed a crime, it'd be easier for me.
Speaker: But I honestly think it'd be easier for the whipping boy. I think be easier to take punishment. Well, it would depend how much the whipping boys were paid. And whips, which is like a sort of self-sustaining system.
Speaker: They were paid in in just flagellation. I guess you could, could we whip sadists or masochists rather as a means of publishing? punishing If there are people in this world who want to get hurt, why don't we just make sure all the punishment happens to them only?
Speaker: yeah Or if there's somebody out there that hates being treated well, we could give those people massages.
Speaker: should make As a form of punishment, you're saying? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, maybe that's the trick. Because it is about you want to cause suffering some sort. so right Right. But wait, why do we want to cause suffering to a help with... ah to get To get rid of criminals. Oh, okay, right.
Speaker: We want to lower the level of overall happiness in the world to reduce criminality. Happiness causes crime. well Freedom causes. yeah excess Freedom causes excess happiness, which results in excess crime.
Speaker: We need to limit freedom. Not get rid of it. Just limit the amount of freedom. Reasonable limits. Just enough to make everyone unhappy. Freedom is great, but there's a genie in the bottle that is called criminality.
Speaker: And you basically can only have as much freedom as it takes to never bend the moral boundary. And honestly, imprisoning people is basically like an admittance that we don't even want to limit the sufficient freedom to truly rid the world of criminals. It's like...
Speaker: It's almost as if we want to imprison criminals because of how we're able to sort of coerce them into doing labor and stuff like that. yeah It's almost like we like imprisoning people and having prisoners.
Speaker: Well, you get videos out of it sometimes. Yes, that's true. Sometimes that practice produces interesting videos that you can watch online. But women prisoners are not able to produce videos.
Speaker: Yes, because they're it's completely different. So we should maybe not imprison them. they but Yeah, they yeah probably shouldn't even be in prison in general. Right. What did they do? Like, what did they do? What did women do to get in prison?
Speaker: did they even do? What did they even do? Is this what you can look up? What are, like, crimes that women even commit? Or can commit? You know? is is anything that a woman can do to you bad?
Speaker: Right. I don't like i don't think when women should go to jail for like not having dinner ready in time. I assume that's the kind of thing they're being sent to jail for. In time. in time.
Speaker: I assume that... I assume that, the I mean, women are, I mean, certainly no woman is capable of murder. no so if there are women in prison, I can only assume that they must have been sent there for, you know, not getting the kids in bed before bedtime, but you know, and that just seems wrong. It's always like a time-based, it's time-based. Yeah.
Speaker: You did it, you just didn't do it in time. if If a woman or when a woman does commit murder, they shouldn't be imprisoned for something they can't do. They should not be imprisoned for being unable to sprint 100 meters in less than a minute.
Speaker: If woman commits murder, we should just investigate how this impossible thing happened. We shouldn't punish her. just figure out what's going on. And we should find out how fast she did it.
Speaker: You should out what man forced her to do it. A woman committing murder is just what it is, is ending a life ah man's life too soon.
Speaker: She made someone die at the wrong time. yeah it was ill-timed.
Speaker: You bitch, I wasn't ready. Take her away. but Behind every evil woman is a man.
Speaker: Somewhere behind. Really kind of like unfocus your eyes and look into distance. You'll see some guy. We to put that man in prison because there's no way what you think women invented murder through independent thought.
Speaker: That just seems unlikely. ah man probably gave her that idea. yeah Because probably by threatening to do it to her because she didn't. I'll kill you if you don't off me the roast done in time. yes When a woman drowns her children, you have to say like, what man filled up the bathtub? What man made these children with you? You didn't do it on your own. What man impregnated her to give her the kids to kill? That's the crime. There's all these men around.
Speaker: They built the house, right? They work at the water company. We can only assume. so i mean, someone does and it's not women. Exactly. We have to assume it's men. Yeah, I never see videos inside of water companies of right women. I never see images or long videos of women inside of water ah treatment plants. It's bewildering and I'm searching for knowledge about this.
Speaker: I never see videos from all female construction sites. No. yeah Is it just because they're completely different? And why is that? Yeah, does the culture of all female construction sites not encourage video taking? some things just too different to film?
Speaker: Yeah. What happens when you turn on a camera in a room completely full to the brim of women? is it it just It's just black. It just rolls. The camera rolls. You know that that. There's no footage, though.
Speaker: Someone says action. I can really imagine... you know like Back when VR like first started ah like getting rolled out and you would like go to your friend's house and go to a museum or something and it'd be like a VR exhibit and your friend would be like, I'm going to put on the goggles.
Speaker: And then you might even just be like, oh I'm going to record you wearing the VR goggles. It's going to be so funny. And just a very boring video of your friend with plastic on their head just sort of like looking around, doing nothing.
Speaker: And then you watch back the video and you're like, why did I even take that? this no one's going to care about this. I bet that's what it's like to record a female prison. You're just like, this is so crazy. It's like, female criminals, think of it. And then you watch it back and you're like, is just women in a room? and there's No, it's just a man wearing goggles imagining women in a prison.
Speaker: I think it's low-key kind of nice to see someone wearing big goggles. It's not... You think low-key kind of nice? Yeah, kind of for a bit. You don't want to watch it too long, but I feel like i could I would enjoy watching any of my friends wearing goggles for like a minute.
Speaker: A good minute. It's always cool if there's like talking, you know, if they're saying like... oh I'm in another world. Reaching their hands out in front of them a little bit. It's not real, buddy.
Speaker: I'm so glad you said the phrase I'm in another world because I really want to go now to the world building subreddit. But staying on the topic of gender, there's this amazing post in the world building subreddit.
Speaker: April, maybe you want to read this. There's the title. Sure. so Okay, so the title of this post that Derek has found is, What is your world's stance on LGBT rights? This is from the world building subreddit.
Speaker: What is your world's stance on LGBT rights? Any aspiring writers out there? Gotta answer this question before you begin whatever it is you're working on. Okay.
Speaker: Here's the body of the post. In Antisela... which I can only assume is either some kind of disease or the world this person is writing about one or the other. Okay.
Speaker: In Antisela, everyone is too busy being xenophobic to be homophobic. Why would angels care about someone dating the same sex when they can just make fun of the lowly merfolk and vampires who seemingly lack their class and advanced technology?
Speaker: Same for every race that has beef with one another. This is a world that has a myriad of different problems, but at the very least, bigotry aside from the various species being at odds with one another doesn't exist.
Speaker: Oh, bigotry aside from the various species being at... I understand. Okay. this is This is... Yeah. This is further complicated by the fact that when it comes to fairies in this world, only the males can carry kids.
Speaker: Okay. There's also not much people here have to say about trans people as transitioning to your true gender is fairly easy with the use of a couple of magic spells.
Speaker: Although suddenly showing up as a different gender to people who are unaware of your coming change can cause them to drown you in questions. but Oh, just questions. That's the drawback. Yeah. What's going on over here?
Speaker: Just questions. No one's actually going to drown you. Yeah, this is a fantasy world, so um drowning you in questions will kill you. Yeah, that is so awesome. So they're different in their imagined in their dream world, their fantasy world that they get to make up all the rules to, people are only xenophobic, which I don't think means what they think it means, ah and not...
Speaker: homophobic they're yeah xenopho they're using xenophobic to mean you don't like the other racist yeah you don't like the other species what if racism was so powerful that it defeated homophobia right other hatreds what if we could just increase other hatreds and forms of bigotry it's better yeah what if we just had magic that could kind of like turn you into whatever you want yeah Right.
Speaker: I also love the, I mean, that's a classic thing in like fantasies is when like different species are used to metaphorically represent different races. Yeah.
Speaker: Which in my mind is like, that's a totally different thing. You've introduced like, yeah, like race is not species. You ah's don't conflate those two things. It doesn't work as a metaphor.
Speaker: Yeah. but yeah what if it what if races What different races looked so different that we could really mistreat them? right Right. Like what if race, this like thing that's kind of complicated, like constructed in the real world and practiced in all these different ways.
Speaker: What if it was actually just like a physical thing where and only that where some people had horns on their head? Yeah. Yeah. Well, but they lived in a horn town. But that's yeah, that's not the thing is like whenever there's different species and fantasy, they want to use it as a metaphor for race.
Speaker: But it's always like, yeah, but those people really do eat kids or those people really do have water magic. And it's just funny to like work backwards from that and be like, yeah, you know, the merfolk in this story um have been like kind of historically subjugated and um they're like black people. and it's like, wait, what?
Speaker: No, black people don't live underwater. Yeah. I think here's my advice to fantasy writers. Don't put metaphor in your stories. Yeah. about put Just don't put metaphor in your stories because it's either. what What are you going to do? You should accept merfolk.
Speaker: Well, no. I mean, if there's this other society of people with water powers, maybe we shouldn't accept them. It doesn't mean we shouldn't accept black people. home yeah Beyond the fact that this person is just distracted with societal analogies, I do think it's funny to have like mermaids and vampires and angels in your story. And instead of being like in a huge, eons-long war with one another, they simply don't get along. You're writing a fantasy story. i you could Yeah. As an angel, I don't accept vampires.
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. Writing like a basically a demigod character and having them ah just mildly dislike one another and and do microaggressions against each other. i don't want vampires to get a promotion at work.
Speaker: Yeah. This is why people who are focused on world building literally will never do anything other than just think about their own life and just be like, draw a picture of their friend as an angel and just be like, I am a genius. Yeah.
Speaker: My boss is a mermaid and my mom is a vampire. And they're racist to each other. Yes. It works. my god Also, i I love that in this world this person is describing, kind of offhandedly they mention, well, and there's this there's certain species where the men can carry kids.
Speaker: Which, in my if that's like ah one of the dominant species of your world, all all of a sudden this world no longer has any bearing on the real world. Right. in Which is totally organized around like women bearing kids. yeah We've totally disconnected. so to be to not you right like all of us It becomes a total non-issue how they regard like trans stuff because it just can't mean anything about our world. and yeah Who made that decision? Is there an in-universe taxonomist slash scientist who said that, oh, actually the males carry it? Or is it just you as the world builder who decided that?
Speaker: ah Right. Also, wait, so what does male even mean anymore? No offense. It's meaningless now. It's completely... What do you mean the male fairies? Wouldn't we just classify them as female fairies if we discovered fairies? Unless you're talking about seahorse shit, we're like the female still has the gametes that create the ah conceive the child, but then it moves over to the male...
Speaker: so that they can carry the child to term, like incubate. But I guess the thing I'm realizing is that any world builder, any person who likes world building simply wants to be the eugenicist Darwinist of their own fictional reality and just going around measuring fake skulls. Almost all fantasy writers are like libertarian weirdos.
Speaker: do think that's true. Am I wrong? Is that a wrong intuition? That's a real intuition. No, I think you're totally right. I think all artists are kind of weirdos. Yeah, they all are twisted. That's so true. Yeah, like libertarians just want Something happened to them. They want to turn up the volume on every single thing that gives something its particularity and specialness so that this dull roar of the market can...
Speaker: can become the main character. And also, and also in my fantasy world, it's like totally chill to like get with kids. but Doesn't matter. By the way, that's like totally normal. what's interesting about children are really mature in my world.
Speaker: Yeah. Kids are actually a different species and kids hate angels, but they're, they're friends with vampires. the species of kids. It is. Yeah. it's interesting because queerness, like the idea of queering and and queerness used to just exist in this nether realm, like literally below the level of consciousness. And and like people weren't able to even conceive of it as like a structural societal an emergent thing.
Speaker: And now it's like part, like people can discuss it. They can like point to it and they can splash in my world. um the world like yeah It just sounds like in this world and to say, it sounds like LGBT doesn't exist. exactly There's basically no such thing as gay because everyone is so racist. but Gay doesn't even exist.
Speaker: It's like maybe it happens, but honestly, who cares? I'm busy inventing slurs to call mermaids. i actually I actually do think that's true. I do think there are there are people. i think I've met people who have such a powerful kind of like pet hatred, like a monomania for a specific kind of bigotry that does make them like a really nice person in every other way.
Speaker: They're so committed to just one form of hatred. They're just really chill. As long as that doesn't come To that end, it sounds like an anasailant. Not only... It sounds like, yeah, well, they say everyone is too busy being him ah xenophobic to be homophobic.
Speaker: It also basically means everyone is too busy being xenophobic to be gay. Like, they're literally so focused on... right their hatred that they can't even ah separate themselves from the codified.
Speaker: um Also, this first sentence, why would angels care about someone dating the same sex when they can just make fun of the lowly merfolk? Which makes it sound like if we solve racism in this world, then they actually would be homophobic. Now they have the time. They have time to it.
Speaker: There's a comment here from somebody replying about lore for their own world, if anybody wants to read that. ill read this. generally speaking no one cares there is no designate religion which determines who someone can or cannot love so it's not taught as a bad thing and most of the cultural groups are either bi or polyamorous anyway but the or it can they care only about survival in the plane who you find safety and comfort with is your own business
Speaker: but goberrlin in The and the Littolins are all about free loving for pleasure. The alphacin are probably the most outwardly homosexual since they usually live and work in same-sex groups.
Speaker: Actual procreation is rare, usually organized for the good of the community, but are not requisites if the parties involved don't like each of them. Wow. That's beautiful.
Speaker: Why does every fantasy world have... It's like they all sound this like the one guy came up with all of them. I know. It's because... they I mean, are they all just aping the same thing? I think so. i think truly what they yeah what they're failing to do is inventing this cool helicopter.
Speaker: That's what all these are missing. Spending too much time on like who dates and who and who talks to Above all of these races, there's a beautiful machine doing circles. And occasionally loop-de-loops.
Speaker: Literally so much more interesting immediately to say, by the way, while this is happening, there's a very sophisticated tube with pipes. Above all these simple creatures who are defined by one quality.
Speaker: Insane complexity. Moving at breakneck speed. It's amazing. It's making me laugh because it's so interesting. It's so fascinating. And it's an unmanned vehicle. It's just... It's able to move on its own.
Speaker: Yeah. I'm going to go on the world building subreddit and I'm going to post, does your world have Facebook? Yeah.
Speaker: Well, the Orican tend to use ah Twitter, actually. They use apps. There are apps. They do it on the phone.
Speaker: where the li on so which So which species in your world is kind of the equivalent of like hot sorority girls? Well, you can easily cast a magic spell. Yeah, that witch-off thing. yeah Turn anyone into a hot sorority girl.
Speaker: There's cool comment from like a, ah I guess this is like alternate history or something. It says, in the United Federation of America, Canada, the federal constitution protects the right of sexual orientation from discrimination. However, there have been some counter laws in the theocratic states of Desiree and Al Medina.
Speaker: The topic of gay rights has been a focal point in the debate between religious and secular governance in Desiree and Al-Medina, with Mormon and Islamic laws sometimes coming in conflict with federal secular law. Binland is the only one of three theocracies that doesn't have an issue with LGBT rights, as it's very progressive in its form of Astaru.
Speaker: LGBT rights are a minimal issue in most non-theocratic states of the UF, but do get challenged in conservative states like New Burgundy and Texas. They made a world that has Texas.
Speaker: i mean, that's cool. That is cool. That is cool. And they have Mormon and Islamic law coming into conflict. Why do these people write fiction? Or why don't they just write political treatises about their worlds and just drop the whole idea of writing novel? I think that is what they're doing. They're just doing it on Reddit. don't think have any stories. I think they just have like, I imagine this is happening. Who has the bluest creatures in their world? What?
Speaker: ah Does anyone want to see whose bluest creatures are the fastest in their world? It's a Sonic-based world. Yeah. I love how basically every reply is saying, actually, my world is pretty woke. Actually, my world.
Speaker: Right. no one's brave enough to be like, yeah, they gay bashing happens every day in my world. Yeah. They hate gay people. The shortest and probably best reply is simply dragons have no concept of homophobia.
Speaker: That's so funny. They just commit hate crimes without ideation. without It was a total accident that they burned a gay guy. They didn't know about that about gay. They only torment gay people, but that doesn't mean that they recognize the lifestyle.
Speaker: It's just because in my world, gay guys are all really rich. so they all They all have a bunch of gold that the dragons want. so it's actually and and So the dragons are always attacking them for their gold, not because they're gay. yeah when i When I commit hate crimes against gay people, it's out of greed.
Speaker: That's it. I'm hungry. have kids to feed. So in your guys' world, um it's so awesome that this is create just playground fucking booger picking so small talk until your parents pick you up.
Speaker: So when two guys so in two guys kiss in your world, does it feel good for them? Yes, because there is a spell that you can cast that makes it feel really good. like It feels like kissing a girl.
Speaker: like it really feels like that. when two When two guys touch each other, how does it feel for them? Can anyone describe it to me, what it feels like when two guys... want to get in bed together? how do they In your world, how two guys have sex and does it feel good for them? And what does it feel like? What do you need to buy before you do it in your world?
Speaker: and how should And how would a character in your world prepare for going on a date with another man for the first time in your world? In your world, how do how do cousins get to... In your world, what are...
Speaker: In your world, a cousin gets another cousin pregnant by accident. Do they tell their parents or do they try to abort the child themselves?
Speaker: What are some methods in your world for aborting child yourself at home? In my world, you can simply cast a spell.
Speaker: So that's easy easier said than done. your world, do you prefer if I shave or not down there before come over? Before I come by? Well, some species have to shave because their pubic hair will grow into a monster.
Speaker: It will eat you up. are there Are there girls on your world? my My planet is all girls. Okay. Will you please draw me as a member of your world? Yes. My planet is all girls, but some are straight and some are gay.
Speaker: And some are mermen. draw me as a gay girl on your planet.
Speaker: Okay. It's really fun. Wow. here's and Here's another really good one from the world building subreddit. ah whoever Whoever wants to read this. This is more of a statement than a question.
Speaker: and this Yeah, and there's a whole body. du oh Whoa, the body's long, dude. oh everybody ah Gender swap magic is a lot darker than people know.
Speaker: So is it just like all closeted trans people on the sub suburb? We had one, a long one. It was just asking like how to, what was it? oh it's like all of, all of the characters I write in my world are black, but I've never met a black person. know any black people. is this okay? And why do I do this?
Speaker: I love why do I do this. Why all about this? Maybe look inward. What are you talking Asking Reddit about your inner life. What's going on in here? in me well As a writer. As a writer?
Speaker: am I living this Warning. Implied essay.
Speaker: warninging implied essay Hey, so one of my players wanted to gender swap their characters and I thought, sure, that'd be a fun idea with no impact impact on my world.
Speaker: Then five hours later, I texted her, has to be a willing creature. What? Six times. I don't understand any of that. Okay. So here are the dark stuff I've thought about, which proves that even the most harmless ideas have the darkest impact.
Speaker: Genocide. the a arch iist Darkest. Darkest impact. For example, genocide. You know those monsters which attack us? Let's use magic to make them all the male so they will kill each other and not be able to reproduce.
Speaker: You know elves? Well, now all of them are female, meaning there are only options for kids are other races, which will lead to them slowly being phased out. War.
Speaker: know that enemy commander we Know that enemy commander we captured? Well, they're my wife now. This would actually be kind of realistic because what better way to demoralize an enemy than to basically turn their best warriors into literary award wives?
Speaker: Also, if this is common, this could make for a very different type of political marriage. Also, really dark implications for what might happen to the losing army, which may make them fight to the death.
Speaker: Faking death. You owe the government 10,000 euros. Oh, my heroes eues
Speaker: Well, I'm sorry my friend died. I'm just their friend. Or more darkly. Well... There's a issue with darkness. mean Everything just being referred to as dark.
Speaker: Or more darkly. Well, you've been gender swapped and made into a slave. your family won't be able to find you. Also, before you comment while share this, people DM me of my fun idea, dark implication post asking, gender swap magic can't be that dark.
Speaker: Also, so I know sex and gender are different things. Gender swap should really be called sex swap. but but but But sex swap means sexuality swap. Blame media for getting the names wrong.
Speaker: ah Last also, people often complain in D&D and other RPGs about why some non-combat spells need a willing creature to work on them because it ruins magic. This is to show them why.
Speaker: Wow. This is not going to comprehensible to anyone listening. I don't think we can read questions this funny every day. I think I'm a decent reader, but it's so... ah The way this is... It's not well written.
Speaker: It's so poorly written. Imagine asking your... youre dungeon master whatever to switch your character's gender and they respond with a wall of text about how they're gonna enslave all the movies. Actually, that's rather dark, don't you think? Think about the implications. That's very dark, don't you think? Because you could be made to be gay that people would fuck you forever in a way that you don't want. You'd all be nice slaves.
Speaker: um Can I have my boy character be a girl? Careful what you wish for because you're about to be a slave to buy.
Speaker: know Your family will never be able to find you, recognize you. You can be enslaved and there's no amount of magic that will ever save what's going on with you. way This should really be called sex swap based on what I'm about to do to you in this universe.
Speaker: but What about this? This super powerful warrior kidnap you and make you a literal trophy wife. You're going to regret having done this, but it's too late. Consider done. Give what you wish for.
Speaker: Wow, I want Pierce to be the DM of our campaign. Wow. I just think I want to change my pronouns, actually. Well, even that is difficult to do because you would confuse people who are blind and want to have sex with And they they can hear that your your pronouns are wrong. And they weren't going to have sex with you forever.
Speaker: If we just have a D&D campaign instead of this podcast, it seems fun. I'm having a blast. If I could be a dungeon master who just warns you, be careful what you wish for. but that
Speaker: Can I look around to see if there's, i don't know, just investigate if there's any creatures. You shouldn't have done that because just got your head cut off by a laser beam.
Speaker: Or a dungeon master who makes everything immediately sexual. You're gonna get worried about getting hit. You're gonna have sex with by a monster. Shouldn't have touched that Ruby. It was booby-trapped to the world's biggest rapist in the whole world. It's a dragon. but but his penis is longer than a mountain.
Speaker: That was a bad idea. should have done something else instead. Now, roll the dice to see how long you get raped. Sorry,
Speaker: but this is a dark fantasy. It's dark. It's darker than our world.
Speaker: If you can't handle it, I suggest you play a little girl's game. Like Barbie.
Speaker: This is grown-up stuff.
Speaker: Oh, man. oh my God. Playtime. Very different type of political marriage, you could say. What does that even mean? It's also so to say, faking death, you owe the government 10,000 euros. Gross.
Speaker: oh and everything Everything in the world is malleable. Everything in your real world can be replaced by a fantasy, but things like Texas or Euros are just such givens for They're givens in the same way that like human consciousness is a given. It's like, well, yeah, of course. And rape, too. Getting raped. The raping dragon is about to pin you down. What do you do?
Speaker: um I pretend to be dead. Nope, you just got fined a billion dollars by the government because that's illegal in this world.
Speaker: on the way out of this one is to use a magic spell. The rabied dragon tears off your pants and sees you've been lying about what gender you are. now Now he's really mad.
Speaker: He just tore off your pants and saw that it was hot as a rock. so this is going to hard to explain to your parents. Something really dark is about to happen.
Speaker: And you just consented.
Speaker: Roll the dice to see if you can set.
Speaker: um ah Wow. got myself a stomachache. I guess that's... Do we have a tiny question to go out on? Yeah, I almost don't even want to think about anything else for the rest of the day because it was so perfect. The last 30 minutes of this podcast, or 40 even, should just be us talking about how much fun we had earlier?
Speaker: yeah Yeah. That was a blast. Can we do director's commentary now? You guys should have like a you should have a fourth member of your podcast who's the director who comes in and does commentary. That would be so helpful. He's not on the main feed or the main audio.
Speaker: He just does the commentary after. That's a really nice idea. um why don't Why don't we end with a couple would-you-rathers? Sure. Would you rather only be able to eat popcorn with chopsticks?
Speaker: Or every time you are driving and there's a bird on the street in front of you, the bird does not move and it gets it gets killed by your car. You have to bring the chopsticks with you to the movies. If not, you are literally unable to eat popcorn. You cannot catch the popcorn with your mouth. No one can feed you the popcorn. It's just unable to enter your mouth without chopsticks.
Speaker: Also, the bird is anytime you are driving. So it's always on you when you run it over. I'm sorry, what is the bird thing again? What's the bird? Can explain the word? If a bird's in front of the car. Every time you drive? Yeah, if a bird's there, your car will go toward it and smush it. No, there is always a bird on the street in front of you and the bird does not move and it gets killed by your car.
Speaker: But that only happens once every time you start the vehicle? I think just one time per driving. This question is written by someone who loves popcorn and wants to So there's like cap on how many birds I can kill while I'm driving?
Speaker: I'm agreeing to basically a cap. Yeah, only one. On the amount of birds I can kill? Yeah, this is a world where you can't kill two birds on a drive. I think I would not want to kill a bird every time I drive.
Speaker: but um and i guess popcorn, is sounds it actually sounds kind of enjoyable to eat it with chopsticks. yeah It would last longer. It's nice. Your hands don't get greasy. It sounds totally fine. Yeah, and you eat it one piece at a time. This person, yeah, it sounds like they had like a sort of... um Or they don't know how to use chopsticks.
Speaker: Right. Sounds like. Would you rather have this minor inconvenience or strangle dogs every day? Would you rather be special or evil?
Speaker: That's the question in many people's lives. Yeah. Actually. It's difficult. Difficult to say.
Speaker: You're breaking my heart cause you must Let's hold hands in each
Speaker: other's crutch Looking for love in a darling world
Speaker: So find me loving it
