Latest / Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps / "Are Aussies Sexist?" with Sarah Wilson

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"Are Aussies Sexist?" with Sarah Wilson · Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps

• 0:00
  G'day humans, welcome to the Contrarian Playground, the safe space for dangerous ideas.
• 0:08
  Today on the show Sarah Wilson, look she is the author, the founder of an entire movement.
• 0:15
  The book is called I Quit Sugar, but you might remember the I Quit Sugar movement which
• 0:19
  became a sort of a global phenomenon all about a decade ago and all of a sudden everybody
• 0:23
  was not was off sugar for a while.
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  Sarah is the mastermind behind that trend and yet I didn't really want to talk to her about
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  sugar or nutrition. I wanted to talk to her about herself, about communication, about
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  what is wrong with men and what the expectations are on women and what holds Australia back and
• 0:49
  whether I agree with any of her interpretations about any of those things and most importantly
• 0:55
  how we can understand each other better. Sarah is wonderful, beautiful, thoughtful,
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  honest, raw, motivated, upfront about the fact that she suffers from anxiety. She's a multi-New
• 1:09
  York Times bestselling author, she's an Amazon bestselling author, she's a podcast, you should listen
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  to her podcast which is called Wild by Sarah Wilson and she has interviews with big guests,
• 1:20
  so I mean guests that even make this show's roster blush. See her, she's interviewed Sarah,
• 1:26
  I have an interview to see her. See her, can you come on the show? I like to see her, quite
• 1:30
  partial to see her. Anyway, Sarah is great, I hope that you love her if this is your first
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  introduction to her. She was also a television presenter, a television host, she has to master
• 1:40
  chef in Australia and she was an editor of Cosmopolitan magazine, so she's a journalist,
• 1:44
  one of these all around people who some people find it hard to peg, but as a result I quite like
• 1:49
  the cut of those people's jib because they've got a lot of fingers and a lot of pies,
• 1:52
  a lot of interesting ideas about things. Oh, and before I go I should mention the sub-stack,
• 1:56
  the upcoming and pending sub-stack, so this show is growing faster than we can cope with and
• 2:02
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• 2:08
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• 2:13
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• 2:18
  guests and so on, you'll get the opportunity to have little cocktail chatters on Zoom meet-ups
• 2:23
  with yours truly and you'll get the weekly newsletter, all this sort of stuff. There'll be a free
• 2:27
  version, there'll be a paid version, there'll be a you're a rich uncle penny bag's version,
• 2:31
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  he'll collate all of those in October when we launch, but get in now so you don't miss out
• 3:03
  the fabulous benefits yet to come. Without further ado, please enjoy the heterodox thinker
• 3:08
  that want to know only Sarah Wilson.
• 3:21
  We had dark chocolate here. How did that come about? I always eat dark chocolate for breakfast.
• 3:27
  I eat 90% dark chocolate at that three squares every morning. Sugar free. Almost.
• 3:31
  Very small amounts of it. It's a bit bitter isn't it 90% dark? Not for me. No. I can't handle
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  anything sweeter than that. I love it. Can you have milk chocolate without sugar?
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  If it's sweetened with either maltatole or stevia generally. But why would you? I mean it for
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  the cocoa heat and the fat. I mean it for the sugar. All right that's fine. And the milk fat.
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  Yeah. Like if you have one of those like red lint Swiss milk chocolates. Very, very milky.
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  It the ball or they also come in a tray, break away thing. Melt in your mouth, deliciousness,
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  creamy, fatty, sweety, straight from a cow's adder. Like a heavenly cow.
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  Like a heavenly sugar cow has just has just come in your mouth and it's just the most beautiful thing.
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  That's not for you. It's not for me. No you want your harsh. I could get sexual and try to sell
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  in 90% linked chocolate. Yeah. I mean look it's not harsh. It's it's quite sublime. I find the
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  cacao bitterly sublime. Yeah no a stringent powerful sort of straight to the spinal cord. You know
• 4:50
  kind of injection of energy and vitality. It's a little bit like I mean red wine is also one of
• 4:57
  my favorite substances as well. I like a really big strong like there's a cannaau wine.
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  Oh I can't believe you said cannaau. That was my go to it's such a weird obscure like wine
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  gear. It's a knife and fork thing to drink. So we're in the States when I was living in New
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  York I discovered a cannaau. A cannaau is a sardinian wine which is just grannache I think or
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  is it I think it's just the same grape as something else that we know. It's the unique thing about
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  it is it's about 14 to 15% alcohol. Totally explains my affection for it. Me too. I like to stick to
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  a glass of wine. It's an old people know an old vine grannache. I think that's what I think the
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  grape is the grannache but they call it cannaau because they're sardinian and they're silly and
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  they call things different names instead of proper English words like good people do and the cannaau
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  has this particular kind of funky heavy. It does it's quite and also a little bit barnyardy but
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  I first came across it from work doing work with the Blue Zones the National Geographic project
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  that looks into longevity. Yeah so I did work with them in of course and sardinia is one of those
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  yes yes that's right I went to Icaria in Greece for three months and then I went there and was
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  looking at some sort of food elements to it all but the common thing that all the Blue Zones have
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  is actually well apart from Okinawa is that they drink red wine so it is one of the four. They don't
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  drink as much red wine as I was drinking I don't drink anymore. They do the moderation because
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  I felt like maybe maybe there was a little bit of self-rationalisation going on for me about
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  you know red wine is good for you and if a glass of red wine is good for you how good would a bottle?
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  Extraplated that. Exactly that's right this bottle is five times better for me than a glass. Have
• 6:47
  you ever had problems with drinking the amount you drink or? No I haven't I've got an autoimmune
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  disease which means I can't technically drink all that much I'll get very unwell but one glass
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  I actually found find to be very helpful in bringing down my inflammation so I drink a glass
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  to two glasses every single night probably six nights a week I would drink one or two glasses max.
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  The other night you drink seventy glasses at one and you wake up. No I would not be here talking
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  to you old of long died but yeah I find I find I can do it but I actually started out my career
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  in journalism little-known fact as a wine rider. Right so my I've always had an interest in
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  and drinking one glass of wine you don't find just annoying. No just irritating. I get bored by
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  the taste of it if I have more than a glass and a half. Yeah I think the taste is where you're
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  going wrong it's really not about the taste I mean it's about the buzz isn't it. It's about the
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  buzz and the taste. I get the right amount of buzz and then it goes downhill if I have over two
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  glasses. You just got to push through. Yeah I took glasses as you go down. No I vomit. But by the
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  fifth you're feeling great. Yeah no no I don't get there you see I either pass out of vomit so
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  it's just a moot point and a waste of you know. Waste of money. Waste of good vomit. Yeah that's
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  right. The bile. I've always I have always felt that one glass of wine just gets you the point
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  which I'm like well now we're just beginning and if I'm going to stop I'd rather just not have
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  started. So like starting to have sex and then just pulling off and going no actually we're not
• 8:21
  going to do this. Well I'd rather just not do it at all. I'd rather been going on a rollercoaster
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  this whole time. We could actually establish our there are two types of people in this world
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  theory from this conversation. I can definitely I'm not great at moderation in a lot of things however
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  the more dominant theory that I work to is that if I see a wet paint do not touch sign I just have
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  to go there. So I can't die at I can't do full restriction because if somebody tells me not to
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  do something I just want to do it's opposite. So if I allow myself the one glass I'm very content
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  with that I feel like I'm almost gamifying the system. I'm owning the system and I do that with
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  a bunch of things. So when I ran the I quit sugar program I was never telling people not to quit
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  sugar it's sort of the detail is in the name of it right it's I quit sugar I gave it a go
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  you can try it too if you want does you know you're your own person and I can share the information
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  on how to do it the science I went down the rabbit hole for you because that's what I do
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  and and so here you go over to you you're an adult. So I've always operated that way and with sugar
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  as well I still eat a bit of sugar people are you know there's sugar in that 90% chocolate
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  if there's a birthday cake going around I'll eat it and I actually I can be excessive and I've
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  just got to have techniques that pull me in that allow me to have a little bit of it and not miss out
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  the listener can't say it now but you actually have a trough of what pure white sugar
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  if you're devouring every time I speak like a horse with an oat bag it's quite unpleasant but
• 9:55
  the listener should just know it's well look it's one thing that you said earlier is very
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  interesting Sarah which I sort of feel is relevant to my the way that I think about myself as well
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  which is you said that you're a bit hard to classify I mean part of my whole kind of mission in
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  media life is to encourage people to be able to talk to each other and then think about each other
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  in ways that transcend our petty soft classifications and our tribal identities and the things that we
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  sort of the lazy ways that we can engage in group think and then sort of you know tribalism
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  for one of a better word so where do you sit if you're not classifiable I will somewhat of an
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  outlier especially as a as a woman in her late 40s you know by now I should have fit into a little
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  slot and I should be heading to a new slot mark entirely redundant and invisible you know I'm
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  and I've got no intention of doing that but yeah there's a certain well-trodden path that I
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  should have walked as a woman you know sort of looking the way I look and all of this kind of thing
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  so yeah I and especially given my media background so I think the context of that conversation was
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  that you know I think like a very mainstream commercial media find me a little bit controversial
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  and out there you know I speak out and things that sort of seem quite renegade I mean when I first
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  came out and you know talked about quitting sugar 12 13 years ago I was accused you know in headlines
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  around the world of was that removing a food group now I didn't know sugar was a food group
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  but that was the scene I was accused of so there was a lot of controversy and then of course it
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  became you know just obvious yeah you don't eat that much sugar we should all be you know blah blah blah
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  who was that woman again who suggested it in the first place oh she's well gone right you know
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  she's in her late 40s now I forgot about her so I suppose yeah I've always come out and said
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  those things but I've you know I look mainstream I look like the girl next I look like I should be
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  on an Amy ad you know that's what I've always looked like you put a bit of makeup and somebody
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  does my hair and you can roll me out right and I for home insurance yeah or a morning television
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  program or whatever um but then you know sort of I suppose more intellectual media has associated
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  me with that so sort of you know and I also talk about quite complex ideas I suppose yet I have
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  always done my work written my books geared a lot of my work at you know everyday people you know
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  people who shop at you know Woolworths and out in the suburbs and are getting on with their lives
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  so yeah I quite loved doing the dance between categories and not setting my feet in concrete
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  somewhere do you remember the pushback that Michelle Obama got when she tried to create a white
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  house garden uh and uh to change the curriculum of what children uh you know eat in schools lunches
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  in America I mean all of a sudden she was being she was like a neo Nazi for trying to deprive
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  America like I think Sarah Palin went on a whole national tour saying that Michelle Obama was
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  trying to steal children's cookies and not let them have cookies anymore because she wanted them
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  to eat less sugar more fruit and to move do you find that there's that this is a subject that is
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  particularly susceptible to right wing bullshit one of many I mean I mean this is a while ago now
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  I think um right wing bullshit kind of extremist anti woke wokeists have moved on to other topics
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  now um but yeah yeah they have transgender people to pick on instead of people who don't want
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  them to eat too much sugar yeah it's their favorite thing now isn't it I'm small fry yeah I mean
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  you know what you need to do get a sex change like in the next 10 years and then instead of
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  becoming any irrelevant like middle aged woman you'll become a fabulous that's a career right
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  transgender man yeah thanks for that that's a transitionary career man this is the kind of advice
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  that people get when they listen to this show Sarah this is just a little tip for you if you really
• 14:02
  want to excel in podcasting you just have to be really useful and give great insightful advice
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  like that advice I tune into you and Ray Hadley and I find it very helpful um yeah I think I think
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  though as women like I think about and it's particularly in this country and I've been railing
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  and ranting about this a little um there's nothing more annoying than somebody who's just returned
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  from overseas with a Greshan tan um talking about how frustrated they are with you know
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  um Australian culture and and dialogue and behavior so please go ahead yeah well
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  this is how it looks great by the way I'm always kind of a deep shade of jaundice no matter what
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  where I've been it's just that it's true no no no no no you look tan yeah I think I just look this
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  color all the time um but yeah I think look I think that Australia is in a very interesting spot we
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  of course have had a change in leadership which I think is more progressive and at least
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  open to more nuanced discussion and hearing from different voices and it's it's all looking
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  quite nice but um there is a I think a base mentality here which really does go back to colonial
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  times and I've interviewed various people on my podcast select Blaine talks about this quite well
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  the whole history of the bloke and the laryka and the she'll be right double shuckers you know
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  like don't take life too seriously um that kind of thing that is so pervasive
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  and we're sort of proud of it you know we used to the whole Paul Hogan meme you know from the 1980s
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  where um it was something we really we we were as a badge of honor and it worked for us um to
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  a certain extent while we were still innovative you know while we were still doing great stuff
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  the 80s and the 90s produced incredible music incredible athletes incredible innovation
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  on the world stage and what's happened in the last 30 years we have had uninterrupted economic
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  growth and we are the only OECD country that has experienced that and so I sort of equate it to
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  the so the overweight dude on the couch right who has just got fat on his own luck in our case
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  mining booms repeated mining booms and before that you know sheep um and they're sitting there with
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  the remote control they don't have to actually get up and change a station they've got their
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  twitter and that they can apply and from they can order in Uber Eats you know what they don't
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  even have to get up to the door the person comes in like on the ads and delivers it to their coffee
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  table and and so there's this flaccidity and I call it acedia which is that a great term for this
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  sort of listless slothfulness you know that comes about when things have just got way too comfortable
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  and that's Australia coupled of course with the larykin motif you know that we just hang
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  on to which is about basically being an easygoing white bloke you know it's it's it's really dangerous
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  it's really backward and it's holding us back as a nation and I would say that as a anybody who's
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  not that who is not an easygoing white bloke um you know you don't get a voice um you sort of
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  you slammed um for for being opinionated for being fired up for caring and that kind of thing and
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  this is not I'm not saying I'm not using the word cancelled because of course I refuse to be cancelled
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  but you certainly have the dial turned down on you you know so I mean aren't there a couple of
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  parallel Australia's that we're talking about here there's a there's a legged let's call it legacy
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  Australia yeah which is I think what you're talking about which is you look at parliament and you
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  largely see uh flaccidol grey men in suits uh general as a general rule uh you look at boardrooms
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  you went to law school um and the same law schools and probably the same private schools
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  like the same debating clubs that's right uh don't want young label young liberals exactly and
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  and certainly boardrooms are still comprised of those those people but the a lit opinion I mean
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  the the the culture that's getting made the you know shows they're getting green lit I mean the
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  the conversations that are had on the public broadcaster and in you know op-ed columns and so on
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  and the number of people who are graduating from university degrees I mean women far outstrip
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  boys at the moment in school they far outstrip men in professions like medical
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  fields and and so on men still dominate a little bit in some stem but you know you can get it you
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  can go down a whole rabbit hole about why that isn't whether there are interest differences in
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  interests between males and females that that tend to encourage women to go into service industries
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  and men to go into widget manufacturing yeah but uh I don't get the impression that that people's
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  voices are being de elevated I mean I get the impression that a lot of people's voices are being
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  elevated by virtue of the fact that they can claim a a tribal identity membership at the moment I
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  mean if I if I am going for some kind of a promotion in the media then I'm leaning into the fact
• 19:07
  that I'm married to a guy and I'm leaning into the fact that I'm a son of refugees I'm not leaning
• 19:12
  into the fact that I'm a white male it's an absolute liability yeah but you know I don't argue
• 19:17
  there just to touch on those two factors being gay and and maybe you know having to have had
• 19:24
  to have pulled yourself by boots boots straps that still plays into a little of that sort of
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  you know um frontier colonial mindset that you know well you made something of yourself look at you
• 19:38
  so you still fit into that into that's the rule book why I think the refugee thing is about
• 19:44
  the bootstraps I think the refugee thing is is being part of the fabric of a multicultural society
• 19:49
  with co-opted the multicultural story into that sort of frontier man lary can kind of think so long
• 19:56
  as you're a certain type of um immigrant you know that's that's the thing I mean are you saying
• 20:01
  that if I was exactly as competent as I am but I was a woman of color and pick your woman of color
• 20:07
  who is the least fashionable in your worldview right I mean so so if the refugee if the gay refugee has
• 20:13
  a certain cache a because they can fit into the new stereotype of the the the straight gray
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  fleshed old man in the suit uh then let's say is it an African woman I mean is it uh let's go with
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  that let's go with an African woman I'm exactly as articulate as I as I am and exactly as
• 20:30
  comp as accomplished and competent as I am and then we also have to have this whole other discussion
• 20:34
  about like well it's obviously much harder to be as accomplished and as educated and so on as I
• 20:39
  am because I was born to privilege and presumably be African and Australian woman isn't but
• 20:43
  holding all of those things equal are you saying that the African Australian woman who has exactly
• 20:49
  the same characteristics as me is that a disadvantage in 2022 yet to this extent and I'm not saying
• 20:55
  I'm not really talking about advantage or disadvantage I'm talking more about the impact on
• 21:00
  Australian society where we still funnel whatever our storyline might be into the you but
• 21:07
  she'll be right to take it easy be easy going don't rock boats don't don't present any drama
• 21:14
  kind of mindset and that's the thing that I worry about now if this African woman was fired up
• 21:21
  and opinionated and um had things to say that were a little against the grain that's at the
• 21:27
  point that's the point where there's probably disadvantage and you either turn the dial down
• 21:33
  and become you know sort of like a morning TV host where you just go for at everything right to get
• 21:40
  your point across and really that is very difficult if you're talking about something serious or you
• 21:45
  do have to become that stride and outspoken person that yeah sure you might get a few gigs on Q&A
• 21:51
  like you get brought on because you can actually fire things up in a certain direction but it's very
• 21:55
  hard to actually have a broad based conversation how thoughtful and articulate you're being in
• 22:00
  your outspoken that's right I mean correct I was aggressive and outspoken and doctrinaire and not
• 22:07
  particularly smart but very loud then I could either be one of those gray white flaccid blocs
• 22:14
  who has a big microphone and Andrew Bolter and Ellen Jones or something like that who who that's
• 22:19
  best yet but I wouldn't I don't regard those people as being the center of gravity of popular
• 22:24
  culture I mean those people to me they're the center of gravity to the extent that they they drag
• 22:29
  things down to a lowest common denominator and that's the point that I'm making I'm not sort of
• 22:33
  having this discussion and I mean you know they don't get invited to they don't get invited to
• 22:38
  the to the cocktail parties they're not I mean they're I mean they're I mean to W. Warp on a
• 22:43
  Friday afternoon they're all I mean not there they're getting all the invite they trust me they're
• 22:47
  paying they're paying their way I mean they're not getting that they are not part of the cool club
• 22:50
  at the moment the cool club is the Mark Vannells of the world and the people who are doing
• 22:54
  interesting work on SBS and like who are you know the people who are winning awards and who
• 22:59
  get accolades the people who are telling stories of diversity telling stories of equity telling
• 23:05
  stories of inclusion who are perceived as being part of the new frontier I mean and that is a good
• 23:10
  generally good thing. I love Mark Vannell and he's winning awards. SBS adorate you and I love it
• 23:16
  and probably our mothers and you know the audience isn't mass and I think this is a thing I think
• 23:21
  I think the mass of Australia is still caught up in this jockey and I'll give you an example
• 23:27
  and of course I'm not trying to sort of the generalizations that I'm making here and we're
• 23:31
  making generalizations to make a broader point. I don't think you can actually counter it with
• 23:37
  examples that you generally pull out for some of these other type of work generalizations or
• 23:42
  you know countercultural kind of arguments that are bandied about at the moment because you know
• 23:47
  we're talking about class here and we're not talking about the usual binaries. Class is really
• 23:52
  interesting and like I said Leck Blaine in his various essays he's done for the monthly and for
• 23:56
  the quarterly actually talks about this in quite a lot of interesting detail. We don't discuss class
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  and the fact that we don't discuss class means that if you do pop your head up and you didn't go
• 24:06
  to the private school and you did have advantage disadvantage you know growing up and all that kind
• 24:12
  of thing you're kind of leveled out it's like there's this leveling out you know the tall poppy
• 24:16
  syndrome you cut all the tall poppies off and we've all got to shrink to a particular size and
• 24:21
  that can work really really well if you're already at that size you know and if you just below it
• 24:26
  and so that egalitarian kind of thing did service for a very long time but I think now it's
• 24:32
  holding us back and I'll use an example that I don't say is representative of all of Australia but
• 24:37
  I think it's an interesting one I've been on dating apps for 15 years that's how long I've been
• 24:42
  single for so that's what happens when you're an opinionated female you know sort of going heading
• 24:50
  over the hill you know when you transition it's going to be a whole new world you've given me
• 24:55
  feed for thought there you've given me some serious food for thought but on the dating realm I think
• 25:00
  it really I think it's a quite an interesting contrast I travel the world and I go on dating apps
• 25:05
  around the world and I'm also on one of those really wanky sort of influencer ones yeah
• 25:10
  oh okay do you know about this one yeah you have to send me an invitation to it I don't think
• 25:14
  I'm cool enough I mean I'm also I'm also a hitched I'd like to just spy on it well you can
• 25:19
  actually say here just for friends and there's quite a few people like Alander Baton and Malcolm
• 25:23
  Gladwell and I don't think I mentioned mention these names probably not anyway there's quite
• 25:29
  some good thinkers who are I think a hitch but anyway I can I can actually run a sociological study
• 25:35
  by just observing bios men's bios from around the world and in Australia I would say without
• 25:41
  exaggerating because I've I've really looked at this closely 90% of Australian men somewhere in
• 25:47
  their bio have a phraseology to the effect of we'll get on if you know drama we'll get on if
• 25:53
  you're laid back and something something something spicy margaritas and it's just all about having
• 26:00
  something something something something spicy margaritas can that be the title of your next book
• 26:05
  yeah something something spicy margaritas um yes it'd be actually quite a good way to sum up
• 26:11
  this this whole realm you go overseas though and wherever I go in the world the men you know
• 26:17
  by and large I'd say it flips the other way by and large they're looking for deep conversation um
• 26:24
  they ask what book you've read uh and so on so forth there's this massive contrast and you know
• 26:30
  I have a bit of fun with it on one of the sites there was a guy called Tristan for a while who was
• 26:34
  who connected with me but he was like doing the full double shuckers he had the boutique beer on a
• 26:39
  yacht and he was out having a lot of fun time in pastel a lot of pastel shorts and he um you know
• 26:45
  he was like we'll get along if you don't take life too seriously spelled to you seriously
• 26:51
  and so I had a bit of fun with him where I said hey Tristan we have a problem here we've connected
• 26:56
  but I take life very seriously um what are we going to do you know and he sort of came backwards
• 27:01
  and forwards and oh well you know if you're if you're easy going don't give me any grief you know
• 27:05
  it's all I kind of think but it's um I think that's actually really symptomatic and yeah no
• 27:10
  I think it's fascinating I can only extrapolate theories about dating and I think this is really
• 27:15
  interesting because I think you're teasing now I think you're getting to I think you've compressed
• 27:20
  a few things and I think the dating example is a good way of un-teasing of unraveling some of
• 27:24
  those things yeah what I'm hearing is that there is an Australian strain of anti-intellectualism
• 27:31
  of anti-elitism and frankly of a reverence for mediocrity that we are proud of in a way that
• 27:38
  other other cultures aren't yeah we've got a bit of a you know where the Western democracy that's
• 27:43
  lost on the other side of the world from everybody else so while you will have your you know your
• 27:48
  fancy fancy pants while you're putting on airs in Europe and while you're ruling the world in
• 27:53
  America we're going to be down here you know on our yacht drinking glasses of shard being quite
• 27:58
  Australians been yeah exactly that's right no opinions no or well with very loud opinions about
• 28:04
  but very little noise yeah about real estate about you know what so about sport yes and and so
• 28:11
  there's that there is definitely that and that's why a lot of Australians for many generations have
• 28:16
  gone to Europe and the United States if they're ambitious or a mass exodus of people who
• 28:23
  and I think it happens at times in flux you know where Australia and the rest of the world are
• 28:28
  having to adjust to different economic times different sexual times yeah and and so that and
• 28:34
  the but just to finish that thought about that thing I don't think that's identical to
• 28:39
  uh proven legend identity no I think we've got a piece apart the part in a slightly different way
• 28:47
  it's a cultural cringe and it kind of infiltrates at all different levels but I would say that if
• 28:53
  you're if you took a number of different boxes and in my case I'm going to tick older women
• 29:00
  you're not an older woman yeah well you know in the day in real my own um who's not
• 29:05
  easing going and it's got opinions and all that kind of thing it's the not it's got the it's the
• 29:10
  got opinions bit and then other generalizations are used to just to just to give the benefit of
• 29:16
  the doubt I'm always about sort of steel manning the upon my opponents arguments and trying to figure
• 29:20
  out what the you know what the most generous interpretation of my adversaries rather than the
• 29:23
  least generous when a person on a dating app says no dramas are you sure that they mean I don't
• 29:30
  want you to have a brain or are you sure that they don't mean and they they may mean both they don't
• 29:36
  they don't mean I don't want someone who's going to be highly self-entitled and is always going
• 29:40
  to want me to be perfect in every way while she basically uses me for my money slash brawn status
• 29:47
  yeah I don't think it's either of those things I would say that there are a lot of men who would
• 29:53
  actually like when it comes down to it the men who are in relationships they're the men who actually
• 29:59
  do sign up for the commitment the work that goes with it the hard times the the wrestle you know
• 30:05
  that's what brings humanity joy is the hard times right it's the it's you know I always describe it
• 30:13
  like you know you can't be a high jumper unless you've got sort of traction a difficult surface
• 30:18
  to ricochet off and you know every spiritual teaching works to this effect you know you have to
• 30:24
  have sacrifice in order to then you know live out you know enjoy the bounties and we've lost
• 30:31
  that dialogue and I would say that these men I would say that when it comes down to it they're actually
• 30:36
  looking for drama yeah right for the wrestle but it's the cultural cringe it's the dominant way
• 30:45
  of discussing things and it's sort of a bit like the flat guy on the couch who's got all sort of
• 30:51
  flaccid and everything I don't think he really wants to live life out that way and I sort of
• 30:56
  use the example of that Christmas day you know when you've eaten too much and then you're sort of
• 31:01
  sister in law suggest going for a walk and it's a slide it's too much I mean I but we would like
• 31:06
  the vibrancy of a walk yeah so I take that critique and that's the critique that's why Australia
• 31:11
  calls itself the lucky country I mean the lucky country was coined not as a complement to
• 31:15
  Australia but as a criticism of for precisely the reasons that you're saying that we we're lucky
• 31:20
  and fat and content because we can dig everything out of the ground and or shear it off a sheep's
• 31:24
  back and therefore we haven't had to work nonetheless I do think that there's something worth the
• 31:30
  worthy of respect and admiration in the in the way that the country has dealt with itself
• 31:37
  since say the 1980s that you could have had a sort of a doubling down well I should probably say
• 31:43
  since the 70s you could have had a doubling down of men's of the men's easier you could have had
• 31:47
  and to some extent the the Howard years were perhaps that you could have had a turning away from
• 31:52
  multiculturalism you could have had a and the other years could have been that I mean yeah yeah I
• 31:57
  mean but there are each one is offset by you know you can offset Howard with with Hawke and Keating
• 32:03
  and you can offset Abbott with Gillard and and Rudd but the I mean in comparison to other Western
• 32:08
  countries in comparison to an ideal Australia falls far short in comparison to other actual
• 32:12
  existing countries we've done you know more than half of us have arrived since the Second World War
• 32:17
  we are highly multicultural we get on very well with each other where we're strikingly absent of
• 32:24
  cultural strife between rival factions and groups where highly prosperous not just from mining
• 32:30
  and agriculture we do have a lot of innovation we do have good tech companies we're great in the
• 32:35
  creative arts we win a swag of Academy Awards I disagree with you on that we used to we used to
• 32:40
  but what about Hugh Jackman our Hugh we were the last time he was still going he's got his
• 32:47
  viper hands on he's got his vampire teeth on I would argue whatever he's doing in those
• 32:52
  X-Men movies fabulous I would argue the 90s was the last time we had a real heyday in and around
• 32:58
  music creative video and the stats play out Australia has become one of the most uninnovative
• 33:05
  countries in the world and I can't cite the measure we'll put it I'll get it and you can put
• 33:10
  in the show notes I'll have to dig out the actual reference to that but there are lots of countries
• 33:14
  that don't have an Atlassian which is this big tech company I don't have a well how many do you
• 33:20
  want you can give me what you can even give me your one counter example you're going to have to
• 33:27
  look it up later and put it in the show notes it's a study and I would prefer to have the exact
• 33:31
  details of it but I do cite it a number of times like it's just escape my memory now we'll
• 33:36
  have in the show notes we're less innovative than Turkey Belgium I have to have a look we've
• 33:41
  become on and off and I suspect it's a comparable study with comparable OECD countries because
• 33:47
  it's comparing opulence and economic growth and showing that the more opulent a country becomes
• 33:53
  the less innovative it it becomes and that's essentially where we're we're we're wound up but
• 33:58
  the United States has a higher GDP than almost any other Western country and they have a lot of
• 34:02
  innovation yeah but they've also had tough times they went through the the GFC big time 2008 actually
• 34:08
  triggered incredible innovation so and that happened in Europe as well there's all kinds of
• 34:13
  mechanations happening but just to go back to your steel manning of me I want to play into that a
• 34:18
  little what I will say is that one thing that has come out of it just doing a full circle back
• 34:23
  to where we almost started is that we have a really good dickhead threshold and so what we can say
• 34:31
  that's happening in recent times you know a lot of governments around the world as the world gets
• 34:36
  more uncertain and wobbly and unpredictable and fragmented they've gone a lot more authoritarian
• 34:43
  and there's a lot of dictators sprouting up backwards happening in the US we don't know what's
• 34:47
  going to happen there but you know you talk to it a lot on your various podcasts and radio shows
• 34:54
  but in Australia and obviously over in the UK as well you know Boris Johnson managed to get
• 35:00
  away with stuff and the Tories are still in they still haven't really suffered from their behavior
• 35:06
  what's happened here though is I actually think that we have a really healthy dickhead threshold
• 35:12
  he called the pub test yeah you know Scott Morrison's terrible antics he's lying he's bullying all
• 35:18
  of that behavior circulating at the moment in the face of unrest fragmentation disorientation
• 35:25
  overwhelm all the hyper objects that are coming at us um Australia actually drew a line
• 35:30
  and what I would say is that is one positive that comes out of what I'm talking about here that
• 35:35
  a egalitarian sort of you know um yeah don't get too big for your boots exactly and therefore
• 35:42
  it produces a good dickhead threshold there is there are upsides and downsides to cynicism
• 35:47
  you know that's sort of what we're talking about isn't that yeah I'm fleshing out one aspect of it
• 35:51
  and and look you know was it F. Scott Fitzgerald who said you know the sign of intelligence has
• 35:55
  been able to hold to opposing ideas you know and I think that's what we've got to get better at
• 36:00
  I mean I think I agree with much of that and the and but also your point about class is something
• 36:05
  that is so under talked about in Australia and so under talked about well and look I regard myself
• 36:14
  as broadly being on the left and I will get hounded by you know Murdoch hacks who say that an
• 36:21
  ABC journalist is admitting to being on the left I'm not talking about who I vote for in a partisan
• 36:26
  political way I'm talking about you know not bullshitting everybody by pretending that what is
• 36:32
  what is obvious to everyone is isn't true which is that that I and many people in my cohort have
• 36:38
  have general sympathies towards ideals of progress of cultural progress and and cultural evolution
• 36:46
  and ideals of of equity and egalitarianism and that we are not of the class that is
• 36:54
  jealously guarding the interests of the elite there is something like rembunctiously
• 36:59
  contrarian about me and and my fellow journals who I like and admire not all of them but the
• 37:04
  the you know the the group of people who I regard as being my peeps are people who are not all
• 37:10
  about defending the interests of people who don't need defending it's more about like what is
• 37:14
  interesting about people who don't who you know who don't necessarily otherwise have a voice
• 37:19
  and so with all of that throat clearing aside it does worry me that the at least the online
• 37:25
  left seems much less interested in inequality and class than it has traditionally it's been very
• 37:32
  distracted I think by a whole other stuff yeah distracted or misguided because there's a lot
• 37:38
  basically what is happening in the past generation is instead of instead of caring about poor people
• 37:44
  we've started caring very vocally about minority rights and civil rights and those have almost
• 37:54
  completely subsumed the conversation about who is well off and who is not well off so it's almost
• 38:00
  taboo to say what I'm about to say but you know you can be a member of a historically marginalized
• 38:06
  community who is not in 2022 actually as disadvantaged as a member of a non historically marginalized
• 38:14
  community that may be a working class white straight man who is struggling in an economy that
• 38:20
  is not serving them but that narrative is kind of steamrolled out of existence all the narratives
• 38:27
  really switching around there's so many transitions going on and what I would also argue
• 38:32
  is that we often refer to what's happening in the US in particular to lead discussions you know
• 38:39
  on these topics and they don't always apply no and it's really interesting the way that
• 38:45
  say for instance the liberal party in the most recent election have really tried to co-opt
• 38:51
  well the everyday man I mean Scott Morrison is you know the total example of this he went to a
• 38:57
  private school in eastern suburbs of Sydney you know grew up in churchy groups very very comfortable
• 39:03
  but of course got into power and his popularity built off the back of his ability to sell in this idea
• 39:09
  that he's a sharky supporter you know that he infected the whole scomo you know sort of thing
• 39:16
  and um totally played into the larykin you know sort of underdog you know the quiet Australian thing
• 39:25
  that you know obviously continued on from the you know the success that John Howard had from
• 39:30
  taking that approach whereas the labor party which has always been the party for the lower classes
• 39:37
  you know sort of had to move up to their upper echelons and for actually the last 20-30 years has
• 39:43
  been accused of being elitist yeah I mean it's a real shift isn't it the way that
• 39:46
  Charlie and I mean this is this is happening in the States as well and it's happening in
• 39:49
  Western Europe and it's also happening here where I mean it's no surprise that if you're if you
• 39:54
  were the late if you were the party of the working people and then you became the party of punishing
• 40:01
  people who use the wrong transgender pronoun that the working people are not going to be quite as
• 40:06
  excited about voting for you as they used to be when you were their champion like you're voting for
• 40:10
  a representative who's going to represent you and if the right is is ceasing to be the private
• 40:16
  school in club group and is at least trying to present itself as being the populist you know defender
• 40:23
  of the the the working person yeah the every man exactly against a university educated a
• 40:28
  leap that's trying to take over your culture and teach your kids crazy things about gender and
• 40:33
  whatever then it is understandable I mean I'm not you know I don't have a lot of sympathy for
• 40:38
  you know conservative cultural beliefs but I do have a lot of sympathy for the idea of living
• 40:42
  in a society that is capacious enough to allow those beliefs to exist without persecuting the
• 40:48
  people who express them and which beliefs which which ones you specifically refer into I mean
• 40:54
  beliefs that conservatives think that they're not allowed to talk about so it might be it might be
• 41:01
  well women use sex women use their sexuality in the workplace to get ahead as well it's not just a
• 41:05
  one-way street where men are abuse abusive towards women or harass women like this is an interplay
• 41:10
  between powerful men and women who use their their looks right that would be a thing that conservatives
• 41:15
  think that you're not allowed to say in the context of the me too movement or it might be
• 41:20
  you know first nation civilization wasn't completely fine and dandy before 1788 there were lots of
• 41:26
  things that were barbaric about that as well but people feel like you're not allowed to say that
• 41:29
  without seeming like you're on the wrong side of history we're viewing to cancel culture stuff there
• 41:34
  yeah basically interesting and I always find it interesting when you know people with power
• 41:39
  complain of being cancelled I mean my theory we're going to segue here but my theory on
• 41:45
  on cancel culture it's I've got two the first is I think again a lot of our dialogue and debate
• 41:51
  comes from the US and so we kind of we kind of let leapfrogged over the really intense
• 42:00
  problems that emerge from from overworkism I don't think there was ever a moment here where there
• 42:06
  was overworkism where workness just was so pervasive that everyone was going enough right what we've
• 42:12
  gone to is the shock jocks getting fully like into cancel language you know like they've they've
• 42:17
  kind of co-opted it the outrage from the US and decided that they're just going to go I'm cancelled
• 42:24
  and all of this but it doesn't have the basis you know for the outrage I don't think it has actually
• 42:30
  fermented here in the same way the second thing I was going to say is there's two sort of demographics
• 42:35
  that get very vocal I mean I think we're I think you're a bit younger than me but we're of roughly
• 42:40
  the same generation gen X's don't get that worked up about workness and cancel culture it's just not
• 42:48
  something we're talking about we're observing it and we've got a comment on it because we're in
• 42:53
  positions where you know that's what we do but it's boomers and it's it's millennials and
• 43:00
  gen Z's you know and what I find interesting is there two demographics that grew up in eras
• 43:05
  oh once again if we can go back to my grand metaphor of opulence and comfort and sort of
• 43:11
  been told you know that well you get you know righteous when something doesn't go your way and
• 43:17
  if something's uncomfortable and you go and sort it out you know and it's it's I find it quite
• 43:23
  interesting the demographics that speak the language we don't I don't hear well we don't
• 43:30
  how much of the how much of the ass not talking about it or not being bothered by it is a natural
• 43:36
  state of being and how much of it is a consequence of the fact that the penalties for saying some of
• 43:41
  the things that I was just pointing to earlier are quite high so people yeah that applies to
• 43:46
  people boomers and zoomers like that that applies to both I mean perhaps they're just don't care
• 43:53
  about consequences but zoomers care about it for them for the other reason don't I mean the
• 43:57
  zoomers care about from the other direction in the sense that they they're the ones doing the
• 44:00
  canceling well yes but then they're also the most vocal about being cancelled I just that's
• 44:05
  another theory it's often often the cancelers that are bleaching I'm being cancelled I see I see
• 44:11
  well they victims on every front yeah they're victims of of society at large they're victims of
• 44:18
  misogyny they victims of the patriarchy they're victims of racism and they're also victims of their
• 44:22
  own self-cancelation I mean what's interesting here though I just to close the the chapter on the
• 44:28
  class thing or maybe link it to what we're talking about here Sarah is that this whole rhetoric
• 44:35
  of the of the the cancel culture of the woke kind of cancel culture person right this this
• 44:40
  person who who doesn't just think that you're a differently opinion per you know you that you
• 44:45
  have a different opinion if for example you think that gay people shouldn't be able to get married
• 44:50
  but that opinion is so hate-filled that it shouldn't be permitted in the public square that we
• 44:54
  should dramatically curtail the the scope of what we're allowed to talk about because we are
• 44:59
  decreeing in advance that certain things are hate speech right this this is the snowflake you
• 45:04
  know the the Gen Z snowflake perspective that perspective is a very university educated and quite
• 45:11
  white perspective yes it purports to be well I wouldn't even call it smaller liberal because that
• 45:17
  would be I mean I think of that as being like a classical liberal sort of free speech orientation
• 45:22
  or more libertarian orientation yeah okay but the contemporary take on it though yeah yeah
• 45:27
  they're all progressives or something yeah but they're not even progressive either so what do
• 45:30
  you call them I mean the the regressive left some people yeah they're sort of actually regressive
• 45:36
  leftists I mean this is not a new thing to the left we think of the left as being all
• 45:41
  lovey-dovey and free speech and since the 60s for between the 60s and the 90s it was but Stalin
• 45:47
  wasn't very free speechy like you know like the left historically has not been a champion of
• 45:51
  free speech particularly it hasn't really been bothered by it has been bothered more by the inequality
• 45:56
  that I've just said it has been leaching out of the left's conversations but I would just say
• 46:01
  that the the the the the current fad or you know the current hyper obsession with making sure that we
• 46:09
  we say precisely the right things about First Nations Australians about people of color you don't
• 46:14
  you would never call them colored people as some people have have been cancelled for saying but
• 46:19
  like this that's just because you're an old person you didn't you heard people of color and then
• 46:22
  you misremember it but now all of a sudden you're evil or you're a demon or whatever you know
• 46:26
  whatever JK Rowling is saying about transgender people or something the huge crises that take place
• 46:32
  online about these things present themselves as being in defense of the disenfranchise and the
• 46:37
  historically marginalized what they actually are a status games between university educated mostly
• 46:41
  white people yes and and you're picking up on I think an interview I did with Rob Henderson to
• 46:48
  that effect on my podcast month or so ago this is something that he he has he's drawn out in a
• 46:55
  really interesting way and it sort of crosses or you know sort of intersects everything we've
• 47:00
  spoken about so far you know where we used to sort of the rich used to signify their distinction
• 47:07
  from the rest of us you know through and justification for their absolute wealth through expensive
• 47:12
  handbags and expensive cars and gated communities and all of that which said that you had taste
• 47:18
  and you also just had the languidness and he also refers to the era before that before sort of
• 47:25
  consumption took over it was actually displaying how you could afford to do ridiculous activities
• 47:31
  whether it be golf or I don't know shooting animals and wearing ridiculous outfits that were
• 47:37
  really inconvenient the rich have always worn outfits that are not very practical and are
• 47:42
  actually deeply uncomfortable um so he was sort of saying that we've always had things that
• 47:47
  signal status to the world and says I'm different from you and I'm actually better than you
• 47:53
  today he says it's actually work belief says you say from these elite universities particularly in
• 48:00
  the US and you know when you are actually able to sort of say I believe in defund the police
• 48:07
  it actually signals this I suppose ability to do the research and to read particular kinds of
• 48:15
  journals and follow particular people on various substacks where you know that language and that
• 48:22
  signifies to the world that you are different from everybody else the Hoi Poloi but the problem is
• 48:27
  like all luxury beliefs or status symbols they they tend to sort of trickle down through the classes
• 48:34
  so the elite rich you know live them out speak them out where the handbag whatever it might be
• 48:40
  and then you have you know the Hermes ripoffs you know or you or you have the middle class person
• 48:45
  saving up you know three months worth of their salary to buy the Hermes handbag right and then
• 48:51
  you have the ripoffs you know and they trickle down and become ubiquitous and then their values
• 48:55
  last he says the same happens with work beliefs they trickle down but when they trickle down they
• 49:00
  cause incredible damage so when you have say let's take the example of defund the police he's
• 49:04
  American so it makes a bit more sense over there when you have poor black communities
• 49:10
  binding to that work speech that sort of motif it's actually really problematic well they don't
• 49:16
  they don't tend to actually well he says they do eventually it becomes he said he uses that
• 49:23
  example in particular that they were you know impoverished black communities who were starting to
• 49:28
  speak this speak but when it comes down to it when you actually investigate the impact of defunding
• 49:33
  the police on these communities they're going to be at a huge disadvantage this is his argument
• 49:37
  because the rich have security guards and they get to live in suburbs where they don't have a
• 49:44
  huge amount of crime there anyway and they don't need the police they need the police yeah
• 49:49
  but I mean what's interesting is that when you actually do talk to I mean you know look at
• 49:53
  the marriage equality referendum in Australia the plebiscite you know journalists all had to
• 49:59
  sort of pretend to be shocked that the no vote against gay marriage was heavily concentrated
• 50:04
  in the western suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne because apparently the only people who are
• 50:10
  bigoted are supposed to be white males you know these are migrant heavy communities these are
• 50:14
  people who are not work they're not work you know Chinese Australians are conservative Muslim
• 50:20
  and Arab Australians are conservative by the standards of the rest of the country they're more
• 50:24
  culturally conservative than the mean and for for fair reason as well yeah absolutely I mean
• 50:28
  I'm not having to go out I'm not I'm just saying like let's just let's just call a spade a spade
• 50:32
  and just be legit be fed income about it and this in the same way in the states you ask people
• 50:36
  you know from you ask people of color in in high crime black communities whether or not they want
• 50:41
  to defund the police they're like what are you talking about were you crazy you want more police
• 50:45
  that's it who are behaving better who are better resource to a more conciliatory less abusive
• 50:51
  ideally less racist you know but we don't want to defund them defund them is some crazy white
• 50:55
  man you know talk from the university from above yeah exactly yeah look at such interesting times
• 51:00
  and I think people feel really overwhelmed by it and then what happens when we're overwhelmed we
• 51:04
  want to sort of go into binary mode and that's the thing we've just got to resist over and over
• 51:09
  is we've actually got to have a dialogue around enjoying these kinds of debates which brings me
• 51:13
  back to the intellectual is the issue I have in Australia is that we're not going to get anywhere
• 51:18
  unless we allow nebulous free-ranging multi-dimensional debate which includes class you know and I
• 51:29
  just want to pick up on something that I meant to bring up earlier we we brought up private schools
• 51:32
  a little and you know in a country that calls itself a egalitarian and you know a fair go for everyone
• 51:38
  you know no kids going to be left behind you know all that kind of rhetoric I mean your listeners
• 51:43
  would know this probably but Australia has the biggest gap in funding between private schools
• 51:49
  and public schools public schools in Australia are the most underfunded in comparison to private schools
• 51:57
  schools in the world you know that is shameful and we use and public money to private schools
• 52:04
  that's a crazy thing we spend almost as much I believe on private schools as we do on public schools
• 52:09
  it's a little bit nuanced than that federal government I might have this the wrong way around
• 52:13
  and I always get the feds pay for private the state pay for public so states pay more
• 52:18
  for public than they do private and then it's switched around at a federal level for reasons
• 52:23
  I don't really understand well because the states have responsibility for education so they pay
• 52:27
  for the public education but then there's this funny system where the federal government wants to
• 52:32
  school kids well the feds do but not the not the public not but not the state that theory doesn't
• 52:36
  stack up if their aim is to give you know every kid equal amounts of money that's the department of
• 52:41
  education's aim it's not the federal government's aim the federal government doesn't have
• 52:46
  responsibility for education per se they just have responsibility for I don't know the point is
• 52:51
  there's a massive catch and the gap is getting bigger yeah and yeah no it's it's criminal it's crazy
• 52:56
  like if you want to set we want to exit the public education system and send your kids to private
• 52:59
  school god bless go for it and pay for it like that's why are you getting money from that's
• 53:05
  right and and you know people say well and then what the government should be doing is investing
• 53:09
  in more schools teachers getting paid more so that there are more public schools available in
• 53:15
  more choice I mean you know that's what parents use as their excuse there's no decent public
• 53:20
  school in my area and it's often the case I suppose in fact right to the extent that there's
• 53:24
  actually no places there's actually not a physical building there's not a school that they can send
• 53:28
  their child to that's the problem we should be actually addressing I should remind listeners at
• 53:34
  this point if they're whether they're subscribers to my podcast or whether they're fans of yours
• 53:38
  just hearing this that we're about to launch a sub stack on so all of these kinds of conversations
• 53:42
  that you're talking about zero where we have more nuanced conversations than you get from the rest
• 53:45
  of the media people can get more of if you are an early first time subscriber to the sub stack
• 53:52
  which we're about to launch you've got a sub stack don't you I do yeah it's it's easy to find
• 53:56
  cereals and dot sub stack dot com fantastic if you want to get in on the ground floor of the
• 54:00
  uncomfortable conversations um sub stack the email address to email a uh subscribe request to
• 54:07
  is uncomfy convose at gmail dot com that's you and c o m f y uncomfy convose c o n v o s at gmail
• 54:17
  dot com and then the shows producers will get that and that you don't there's no commitment to
• 54:21
  actually that doesn't mean that you're going to get a Brazilian things in the mail that just means
• 54:24
  that that's your entry into getting the benefits for being one of the first subscribers to the
• 54:29
  imminent sub stack you'll get uh you'll get additional content than the rest of people do and if
• 54:33
  you're not a subscriber to uncomfortable conversations then of course do that and follow me on twitter
• 54:37
  and all of that extra stuff. Sarah the other thing that I wanted to discuss with you is effective
• 54:41
  altruism yeah if we're talking about egalitarianism and we're talking about what rich people should
• 54:45
  be doing with their money rather than making it rain on their children's uh uh you know kayaking
• 54:51
  and rowing uh championship state of the art facilities yeah if the what is the effect of altruism
• 54:57
  movement and how did you get interested in it? Funny I should answer that because you've also
• 55:01
  interviewed Peter Singer um on your podcast um I got into it I look I got into it before it was
• 55:08
  even a thing oh mate oh she won ups me well I was doing it before I realized you know there was a
• 55:16
  word that you could put to it um so I I used to own a business I started off in all of this and
• 55:23
  and sit here before you because I wrote a book called I Quit Sugar and it did particularly well
• 55:27
  around the world and it made a fair bit of money I you know employed 26 staff built up a tech platform
• 55:35
  you know converted millions of people to you know not needing sugar etc etc did very well and I
• 55:41
  set aside the money and eventually I closed everything down three years ago it was actually a
• 55:46
  bit longer than that now um the final closure was three years ago five years ago was when the real
• 55:51
  thing happened I closed everything down and sold off all the assets and gave everything to charity
• 55:57
  and so um it was a commitment that I made for a whole bunch of reasons and go read one of my books
• 56:03
  I think it's in first we make the beast beautiful I explain what led to it it was a suicide attempt
• 56:09
  that then turned into deciding choosing to live and if I was going to live I was going to do it by
• 56:15
  my own rules and I was not going to get sucked in ever again to the capitalist cycle and so to do that
• 56:22
  I would then sort of built this business this kind of movement got an accountant he said what do
• 56:27
  you financial goals I said I don't do them he forced me to get a whiteboard ready to go he needed
• 56:32
  something on his whiteboard and I said well he said what about in five years what's your goal
• 56:36
  I said all right I want to have made enough money to live until I'm 94 CPI'd and on the base wage
• 56:45
  and then once I've reached that point once I've set myself up because I've also got a autoimmune
• 56:49
  disease which means I just don't know particularly back then I didn't know how long I'd be able to
• 56:55
  work for um also what happens when you get to 94 in one day oh well I'm hoping that I'll have
• 57:02
  nieces and nephews they'll just come and look after me yeah yeah I want to make sure you're okay
• 57:07
  when you're 95 by usual backup plan is I'll go and do waitressing but 94 one time I don't think so
• 57:12
  much struggle if you need if you get to 95 if you know things aren't going so well give me a call
• 57:17
  all right give me a call okay I'm always happy to chip in yeah okay that's good I'll clean your car
• 57:22
  yeah that's good if I don't think I'll have a car at 94 I still I don't have a car now why I'm
• 57:26
  gonna have one at 94 anyway so I made that commitment and so and I said you know anything I earn
• 57:33
  after that um I give away and I do work that's meaningful to me so we hit that goal within a week
• 57:41
  of that five year time frame and so my accountant Harry rang and went what do we do and I said we
• 57:47
  sell it we sell up so we spent a year trying to sell it to various companies and I got tired
• 57:51
  kicked by you know the big agencies and media companies and they wanted me to stay in the business
• 57:56
  I'm like no that's not the deal I'm moving on right I've got I've got other things to do yeah and the
• 57:59
  climate crisis was calling me you know so I um I did sell it all off eventually it took a little
• 58:05
  longer than I thought and so I give that money now in chunks every six months to projects where
• 58:11
  I reach out to my community I educate them on a particular charity it generally has a win win win
• 58:16
  at least three wins to it like where you know you put this money in and it does this and this and
• 58:21
  has this multiplying effect and then I match it dollar for dollar so it's kind of like a joint
• 58:26
  venture thing and it becomes it gets a momentum to it and it's fun so I do that and then of course
• 58:32
  I started reading about the effective altruism stuff will McCaskill and um the you know the you
• 58:38
  know the 80,000 hours and Peter Singer's work and realized wow this is really cool and of course
• 58:43
  what's his name Sam Friedman Banks or Banks Friedman yeah the work that he's doing it's it's
• 58:50
  it's very academic and it's a little bit broy you know like you know the podcasting bro crew
• 58:55
  totally you know well we interviewed the people yeah um it's and it's a little bit utilitarian
• 59:03
  and I know the philosophy I have issues with utilitarianism I think it's a little bit blunt
• 59:09
  is a blunt instrument however I think in current times as a way to show something in contrast to
• 59:16
  the way we're living at the moment it's quite effective so yeah I think Will McCaskill and Peter
• 59:21
  Singer would say that it is a movement it's not just a theory oh yeah yeah I mean especially
• 59:26
  well there's big conferences and they I've actually got a little bit of intel on on the community
• 59:32
  it's it's it gets a little bit guru and a bit culty I think in in some aspects there's conferences
• 59:39
  how so um I don't think I'm speaking out term because I think it's quite well known polyamory is
• 59:45
  really big not necessarily as hey we're open to you know it's a thing in the effect of altruism
• 59:50
  movement specifically yeah I think it pops up in a bunch of full on you know movements which are
• 59:57
  about breaking down systems yeah right I guess if you're if you're keenly interested in
• 1:00:04
  and revolutionizing the way that we think about our morality then maybe you're open to
• 1:00:08
  I haven't used in which that takes place yeah because a lot of the theories behind effective
• 1:00:13
  altruism are based on sort of you know it's linked in with the doughnut economics movement and
• 1:00:19
  all of that kind of thing um have you read Will McCaskill's latest book by the way yes
• 1:00:23
  got a book about yeah it is just so eye opening isn't it I mean I was just it's so thought
• 1:00:32
  provoking and yeah I want to figure out how to how exactly to explore that but the the the it
• 1:00:37
  is a moral revolution I think to to imagine the fact that the number of human beings who have
• 1:00:42
  existed up until now is a vanishingly small fraction of the number who may ultimately exist
• 1:00:48
  and therefore our number one priority ethically should be making life as feasible possible
• 1:00:55
  and flourishing as possible for future yeah for future generations it's amazing I want to visit
• 1:01:00
  him in in Oxford I'd say did a big schlepped to go and see oh wow he's got this multi you did
• 1:01:07
  like a pilgrimage to Oxford justice he will yeah wow yeah um but he's got this set up where he's
• 1:01:13
  got multiple institutes enough for God all the names it's like I think one's called the institution
• 1:01:18
  for future risk or for future priorities yes right and the other ones um on for the fourth
• 1:01:23
  thought institute or something like that but they are all working together to actually work out
• 1:01:29
  what do we prioritize amidst the clusterfuck of existential threats and of course he works closely
• 1:01:34
  with Toby Ord who's the big existential risk guide I think he's books called the presser purse
• 1:01:40
  where he writes about this or the various the ways that we might kill ourselves off yeah and how do
• 1:01:45
  you think about I mean what's it well I find interesting about effects of altruism is the change
• 1:01:48
  in the norms about conversing about altruism and charity the the shift from this old fashioned idea
• 1:01:56
  that one doesn't really broadcast ones you know good deeds to the idea that actually if we're going
• 1:02:02
  to have a moral revolution then we're going to need to start talking about it we're going to need
• 1:02:07
  to start yeah that's right and Sam Harris makes that makes that point as well and it's worth being
• 1:02:12
  out so it's almost a coming out of the closet type thing in terms of charity I mean I do the
• 1:02:16
  same thing I I sounds like I'm bragging but I'm all want to show people that I'm not doing this
• 1:02:21
  because I want to self-flagulate with a soggy lettuce you know I'm doing it because actually makes
• 1:02:27
  I find it joyful yeah yeah it's my third way of living so yeah I'm all for that but yeah there's
• 1:02:32
  a whole range of subtleties to the movement um including what charities to put it to so it's not
• 1:02:37
  about rich people putting money to their local art galleries like get a gold plaque and be it
• 1:02:43
  the canapade openings it's it's mosquito nets yeah that's right yeah yeah there's so much left to
• 1:02:51
  talk about that we don't have time to talk about I wanted to talk about travel as well and travel
• 1:02:56
  hacking and and hiking and getting around the world and and and how to slow down and think about
• 1:03:02
  things but maybe we could revisit this on a on a future podcast um is there anything else that you
• 1:03:07
  want to cover um look no I've got to plug my I guess my podcast don't I wild with Sarah Wilson
• 1:03:14
  and what's kinds of conversations do you have on wild similar to this I guess I interview
• 1:03:18
  somebody who's got a wild idea and so it'll be everyone from or anyone from sister Helen
• 1:03:23
  Prasion who is the activist nun in her 80s who you know dead man walking the movies made about her
• 1:03:29
  she wrote the book Susan Sarandon played her in the movie and she is still to this day fighting
• 1:03:35
  for people on death row um so her we talked about sex does she miss sex really none her entire
• 1:03:42
  since she was 18 wow yeah that's really interesting I spoke with Susan Sarandon about sex once
• 1:03:46
  that seems more fitting doesn't it talking with a nun about sex is it was probably more interesting
• 1:03:51
  with the nun yeah yeah now she's she's awesome um so you know these long termists um climate sort
• 1:03:58
  of people I've got one coming up with Kim Stanley Robinson have you read his book ministry for
• 1:04:02
  the future he's regarded as the most you know prolific or most the best sci-fi writer of our times
• 1:04:10
  I'm not into sci-fi but this particular book um as recline says every policymaker should read it
• 1:04:16
  and Barack Obama's you know cited is there's a best book of last year or something so it's like
• 1:04:20
  he did a bit of Obama citing a lot of books every time I say a book there's like Obama's favorite
• 1:04:25
  book of 2020 yeah Obama's favorite book of 2019 I get it it's a bit like having a New York Times
• 1:04:30
  best seller yeah that's right exactly we get it you read a lot former presidents fine yeah you're
• 1:04:35
  allowed to like it uh it's an absolute that's the job that's alive Sarah lovely to talk to let's talk
• 1:04:40
  again uh for listeners of your podcasts come over on comfortable conversations for listeners
• 1:04:44
  of my podcast come over to wild uh and it'll be a union and a match made in it wonderful thank you
• 1:04:55
  you