Hey, how's it going?

Mad.

Pretty good, right?

And Jan, this is great is the dream team.

I'm happy to be here to give you.

I wanted to give you a quick update.

Thank that Tracy.

I'm sorry, Tracy, Tracy is here, too.

And so when you call us the Dream team Oh, where are you?

Hey, you guys are all amazing.

I just This is the one that I saw in you two, probably eight years ago that I was screaming at my computer because it was like, I could argue my religion so much better this than I realized.

Now I can't.

Awesome.

What did you have for us?

If you Yeah, I wanted to give you a quick update.

Uh, first, I called you a couple of months ago, asking for advice, you and John Michael.

Anyway, Ron and I was asking for advice on reaching the topic of my sister's theism or non theism as it stood.

Um, and I finally got a chance to talk to her about a month ago in a ton.

How's she been an atheist for about a year.

And she she actually wanted to talk to me about it.

It's amazing off something like that happening.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So thank you very much for that advice.

But I did have a topical aren't just today which was, er, as it's written there, toxicity in the online skeptic community.

So, um, I know that she went to mythic con this year and the experience was probably a mixed bag.

Um, so when you came back, it was a couple of months ago and I haven't had a chance to call in since then But I wanted to discuss with you said that you've got a chance to meet Star Gone Along with Xuan Head and Armored Skeptic.

And you said you had a problem with Stark on which I agree with you on.

There's a lot of problems I have with are gone But you didn't have a problem with Armand African Xuan head So my my quarrel with that is that I think armored skeptic and Xuan head represents kind of a really divisive movement within what people are calling the skeptics fear, like the YouTube skeptic community.

So I need I need to clear this out.

I was thinking about so I tend to judge people based on my interactions with him.

Unlike, and this is a good cautionary tale as well for everybody out there in Twitter land.

Stop assuming that everybody you interact with has seen all the same YouTube clips that you have.

I have never watched until Myth con.

I've never seen a single minute of Sargon Xuan head or armored skeptic.

I don't watch those videos on YouTube.

You know what else?

I don't listen to podcasts.

I've been on stage with Sam Harris seven times.

I don't think maybe it's 56 whatever.

I don't listen to his podcast.

I've heard snippets of his podcast appears.

Time my wife started the godless bitches podcast.

The only time I listen to that was when I was actually in the room or editing it to post it.

I don't listen to podcasts, so when I say that I had a problem with Sargon, it was because we had a conversation for about an hour and 1/2.

The first part of it was discussing philosophy was fine.

It's like you have with anybody else, and the second part of it was awful, where he decided to go down this road, but wrote of trying to claim that he was right because he had more Twitter followers.

And that's when I realized that he was an asshole and he was drunk and it was pointless to continue having a conversation with him.

And then the next day at the convention, he said all kinds of awful garbage that got massive cheers from the deplorables who were in attendance.

Now my interaction with shoe and armored.

We had pleasant short conversations.

I didn't have any any problems with them and what they said on stage, I understood.

I didn't necessarily agree with all of it, but I got I understood where they were coming from in what they were complaining about.

And I'm sorry that I'm open Thio seeing nuance enoughto where I'm not going to just denounce anybody and everybody I've been under fire, Don't know for two weeks now.

That's over now, but for not saying exactly what somebody else wanted me to say.

Timeframe that they wanted me to say it.

Well, that's never gonna happen.

I'm not gonna pass your purity test, not yours.

The people I'm talking to and I don't care, it doesn't bother me at all that I'm not passing here to test, because what I'm trying to do is make the world a better place, have better conversations.

I'm gonna fail.

Uh, I'm gonna end up associated or on stage with somebody who somebody else thinks is terrible.

And it doesn't matter whether whether it's just me and Tracy onstage, somebody thinks I'm terrible.

Somebody thinks Tracy is terrible, or if I'm on stage with whoever, So the only reason to clear that up is it almost sounded like, Oh, Matt has a problem with Sargon.

But he's okay with armored skeptic.

And all I'm saying is I didn't have any issues with them.

Then on I understood where they were coming from.

Now they might have the most awful content that I've just never seen and never engaged with.

I just don't know.

Sure.

I certainly wouldn't expect you to hate somebody after one conversation or hate them at all like Oh, that's happening.

Carl Benjamin.

Yeah.

Yeah, that was an easy one.

Oh, it's TV.

It's even easier once you watch one of his videos.

But, um, I I just think that there is.

There's a difficulty these days and referring to yourself a skeptic online.

I try and be very open about you know what I believe and it's the difficulty becomes that there is.

There's a there.

There's a decently large movement and I'm sure you you can probably attest for how large it is because you had the whole crowds cheering for star gone essentially calling somebody too ugly to rape on stage.

And ah, I think that and I I bring apartment skeptic and chilling head cause I know that you've been around with him before, So I didn't want to bring out somebody that you would you were completely unfamiliar with.

They think that they're in, in their own way, a part of it.

Um, essentially, what happened online in the last couple of years is that the word skeptic has become synonymous with anti PC Auntie S J w anti feminism anti, you know, science denial.

But the science denial they're referring to is not in any way current science, and it's not in any way good science.

Uh, I don't I don't agree.

What?

Yeah, I don't agree with that, either.

And what I would say is that I think that there's a number of self proclaimed skeptics out there who think that because they've rejected, you know, Bigfoot in God and, you know, um, lots of other conspiracy theories and stuff that somehow they have a lock on the truth, whatever that is, no matter what it is and that they don't have to continue to do the hard work to come to the right conclusion for the right reason.

And that's the part that I was.

You kind of suggested that skepticism has become synonymous with these positions, and I don't even know that the case, I think not.

Not not in any, not in any traditional sense.

There's a lot of online communities I think specifically on you to get out of them things.

This is the thing.

And I'll tell you this if this if this is comforting at all, all right.

On several the events we did there were 35 3600 people in the audience on dhe.

I managed to get to talk to quite a few of them afterwards.

Most people I have no idea who these people are.

You just named.

What's going on?

Their view of this is Hey, we're going out to listen to so and so talk because there's a big podcast or they go to the facilities like the online.

There's the YouTube community.

Then there's the block community.

Then there's the convention community.

Then there's the event community.

It's not like there's one secular community or one skeptic community or one atheist community, and what ends up happening is some of the loudest voices.

If you're hanging out in the Twittersphere, uh, end up being perceived as representative Justus when the news reports yet another school shooting.

The perception is that these things are increasing when there's evidence to show that they are decreasing.

But that's it doesn't matter because one is too many.

And so way we live in a world now where you're constantly being fed through algorithms and through who you've decided to follow.

Maur information that supports your view, and what I've tried to do is get out there and get in the thick of it and find out as much as I can.

I'm not saying my sample sets even remotely perfect.

What people think about all this and the truth is most of the online drama and fighting in the you know, the red pill blue pill in Sal Baba, blah, blah, blah.

The overwhelming majority of people who would consider themselves part of the secular community.

I know nothing about it at all.

I I would agree with you that yes, the overwhelming majority probably would Would would be completely outside of it.

I think my worry is more for people, like probably the more moderate voices on within these communities, though you've got people on YouTube like cosmic skeptic and rationality rules.

You are.

I'm sure you I think you might have heard of caustic skeptic.

I think you guys might have talked before.

We have way.

We're gonna do video together.

We haven't got around to do it, but I just did a video with rationality rule the other day.

So the guy and the difficulties that I'm I see there is that you've got people who and this happened with underfoot back in the day, to a certain extent as well.

Uh, you've got people who may fall on one side or the other of any particular issue, but sort of have to placate very, I would say, even religious nonsense to maintain their fandoms among the skeptic community online and rationality rules before he does the takedown of Jordan Peterson's definition of truth.

You have to placate to Jordan Peterson.

Just so his fans from Terrible Park is.

He knows the Sands probably loved Jordan Peterson.

I watched that video kind of difficult.

It's one of the handful that I watched before he and I worked together or right after.

I don't think that that's placating.

I think that he is engaging in the sort of honest conversation because I'm gonna sit on stage with Jordan Peterson in a couple weeks in Toronto, and I think he's incredibly intelligent.

There are many things that we agree on, and then there are some things that we disagree on.

And then there are some times where it sounds like words.

Soup is pouring out of his mouth instead of anything rational.

I mean, they're people, referring to him as the Deepak Chopra of Christianity.

I'm not going to sit down generally, what is better in that situation if you if you have a message you want to get across, I think the best thing is for me to acknowledge where we agree to acknowledge that we're both rational, intelligent individuals and we're both gonna make mistakes and then go after the the point where we have some disagreement if I walk out on stage and go man is so awesome to be here with the Deepak Chopra of Christianity.

What kind of word salad you're gonna throw at us today, Jordan.

Not only just not that not accurately represent what I think of him on the whole, but it's absolutely poison for a conversation.

So what?

I think Steven did.

You know, I don't think that was placating.

I think he was saying, Look, I'm not saying that this guy is an idiot or that he is not knowledgeable.

I'm not saying that we don't agree.

I'm saying that when asked about truth.

His view of truth is a bizarre redefinition that almost nobody should recognize.

I would agree, but like it was in the specific way words that he used, I would I would find it difficult.

Maybe this is just because of my own personal British.

I would find it difficult taking a taking an objective look at the at Peterson's arguments to refer to anything he says as a staunch defense of biological fact, I maybe that's just my personal view is getting in the way, But it's difficult for me to hear that and think, Are you actually looking at this in a skeptical, in rational view?

Are you?

Are you hearing his words because you agree with them?

Or do you just think that your fans won't like it if you start talking about him?

Well, I can tell you this, Um, I put videos up on patriots, and that means that the overwhelming majority of the that's where my income comes from and I've been doing it for three plus years, and not once have I ever.

I tried to say anything or tried to avoid saying something based on whether or not somebody was gonna donate again.

Um, my, my entire mission is to tell you what I think and why, and to challenge what other people believe and to do It is honestly and fairly as possible.