How To Play The Status Game - Will Storr | Modern Wisdom Podcast 374

1. 0:00 – 3:18

   Intro

   1. WSWill Storr0:00

      But I just thought it was extraordinary that in 1986 there was cancel culture, they were arguing about pronouns, you know, all the stuff that we see today and that we, you know, we tend to bl- we often blame on Mark Zuckerberg or Jack Dorsey, happened in the very first social media website, and to me that just shows, you know, what is Twitter? It's status games. You bring people together, you connect them into communities, they start competing for status. (wind blows)

   2. CWChris Williamson0:24

      Will Storr, welcome to the show.

   3. WSWill Storr0:26

      Thanks, Chris. Good to be here.

   4. CWChris Williamson0:27

      Dude, I loved your book. It is-

   5. WSWill Storr0:30

      (laughs)

   6. CWChris Williamson0:31

      ... awesome.

   7. WSWill Storr0:32

      Thank you. That's really good to hear. Thanks, Chris. I appreciate that.

   8. CWChris Williamson0:34

      You nailed it, man. So you'd done all this research about status. Throughout all of that, what were some of the weirdest status games that you found?

   9. WSWill Storr0:43

      Um, I, I think the one that, that, that I, you know, I always go back to is the yams. Yeah, uh, ye- ye- yeah, in 19, 1948, this anthropologist went to this tiny island in Micronesia, um, uh, a- called Pohnpei, and, and there, um, they had this, they had this kind of thing where, um, you know, it was very stratified in Pohnpei, th- life there, like it is everywhere, you know, uh, and it, but it's quite hard to break through to the upper levels of Pohnpei society. But you could do it one way, and that one way is by growing a massive yam, and they would have these feasts, these chiefly feasts, and the person who brought the biggest yam was declared number one. Literally, that's what they called him, number one. And, um, and, yeah, a- a- and he, you know, he w- they, they would be, b- be, you know, raised in status. And, you know, what happened, the inevitable consequence of that was that the men of Pohnpei just became obsessed with growing the biggest yams. And they'd, you know, they'd sneak out of their, their homes at 2:00 in the morning and, you know, they'd, they'd grow their yams in secret. You know, uh, parts of the forest, cover them with branches so nobody could see the yams, and tend to them with fertilizer. Um, and, uh, yeah, and, you know, in human ingenuity and the human craving for status being what it is, they grew massive yams, yams so big that it would take 12 men to carry them into the feast-

   10. CWChris Williamson1:55

       (laughs)

   11. WSWill Storr1:55

       ... using a special stretcher on poles. You know, so, so, so that's, that's the, that's status madness. It, and, you know, as I, as I recount in the book, we can direct our craving for status at anything, and we do.

   12. CWChris Williamson2:07

       And a yam is among those that we can use?

   13. WSWill Storr2:09

       Yeah. Yeah.

   14. CWChris Williamson2:10

       What is a y- is it like a sweet potato? What the fuck's a yam?

   15. WSWill Storr2:13

       It's like a f- well, it's kind of a tuber. But I don't know, I don't actually know what a tuber is.

   16. CWChris Williamson2:17

       Pretty unsexy thing to use for sta- I'd rather get the Ferrari if that's an option.

   17. WSWill Storr2:22

       Yes, exactly. (laughs) Yeah.

   18. CWChris Williamson2:23

       I can't ride, I can't ride my yam-

   19. WSWill Storr2:25

       So this is more fun, isn't it?

   20. CWChris Williamson2:25

       ... down the street.

   21. WSWill Storr2:26

       Yeah, seems more fun, but, uh, yeah.

   22. CWChris Williamson2:28

       Yeah.

   23. WSWill Storr2:29

       D- d- yeah, d- do you see what I mean? You know, the, this, this is how the status game works. You know, that we, th- we, we can use anything as a symbol of status, you know. It could be a giant yam. It can be, uh, y- yeah, a Ferrari. It could be a lovely watch. It can be, um, how great an activist we are, you know.

   24. CWChris Williamson2:43

       Well, the reason that that example's so funny is that we look at it and think, "Oh, yams, like how ridiculous," but, like, objectively, there's nothing any more or less ridiculous of a yam versus a Ferrari or versus being the best social justice warrior.

   25. WSWill Storr2:58

       Yeah, exactly. Or, you know, the, the, the, you know, the, you know, the classic example is watches. You, you can buy a Casio watch for, you know, fucking 80p on eBay or you can spend $2.4 million on a, on a, on a watch, and it's, they're just telling you the time. I mean, and that $2.4 million watch is just as stupid as a giant yam, you know?

   26. CWChris Williamson3:14

       Can't even eat the Ferrari.

   27. WSWill Storr3:15

       (laughs) Exactly. Exactly.

   28. CWChris Williamson3:17

       Can't even eat

2. 3:18 – 7:25

   Why Status is So Important

   1. CWChris Williamson3:18

      the Ferrari.

   2. WSWill Storr3:18

      Yeah.

   3. CWChris Williamson3:18

      So you say that status is more important than sex, power, or money. Why is that?

   4. WSWill Storr3:25

      Well, I'm not saying it's more important. I'm, I'm saying that, you know, we have lots of, you know, different drives, but I think status is, uh, is one of the, one of the most fundamental ones. Uh, I wouldn't say it's more fundamental than sex. Um, that, that really is a basic. But, um, you know, it goes back to kind o- our evolution. You know, as I'm, as I'm sure you know, um, we're apes. We're a kind of weird kind of ape that has kinda mastered the art of cooperative living. And so, um, that's what we do. We, we, we, you know, that's how we've solved the Darwinian problem of survival and reproduction. We, we, we gather into coalitions. So we, you know, we, we, we have this, um, urge for connection and to be accepted, uh, and to feel, you know, belongingness. Um, you know, that's a really important one. But once w- once we've connected in, we, we, there's always this urge to move up. We're not typically content to be thought of as likable but useless, you know. "He's a nice guy, but he's just fucking rubbish." You know, that's not what we, you know, th- that's human nature. We want to rise. We want, we wanna, we, we want to sort of move up. And, you know, back, back in the, you know, in, in, in the kind of hunter-gatherer days when our brains were doing much of their evolution, i- it was the case that the more status we earned, um, the better food we got, uh, the more food we got, the more safe- the safer our sleeping sites, the greater our choices of mate. So when you think about that in terms of survival and reproduction, the more status we have, the better our capacity to survo- to survive and reproduce. So that's a very basic idea that your brain understands completely. Go for status. Because if you go to status, you're gonna get that sex. You're gonna get that power. You're gonna get that yam. You're gonna get that Ferrari. You know, the, but the b- but the basic is, is, well, connection first, but then once you've connected in, once you've connected in with this coalition of like-minded people, you, you try and rise. And, and when you kind of take a step back, that is human existence. That is human thriving. Those groups take the forms of political coalitions, you know, businesses, um, hobby groups, uh, cults, religions. You know, it's, that- that's just what we do as humans. That's, that's what, that's, that's our, that, that is the basis of human behavior. We gather into groups, uh, a- and we connect into, you know, we connect into groups and we strive for status. Individually in those groups, you know, we compete for status with other people, but those groups then compete for status with other groups. So the status game is constantly working on those two dimensions, you know, internally and r- versus rivals.

   5. CWChris Williamson5:50

      How do you define it?

   6. WSWill Storr5:52

      Define status.

   7. CWChris Williamson5:53

      Status, yeah.

   8. WSWill Storr5:54

      Yeah. It's, it's, it's, it's esteem, uh, being thought of as valuable, um, uh, uh, useful. Um, you know, it's not just, oh, you know, c- connection and belongingness, which, which people talk a lot about, you, you know, is about, you know, y- y- j- just feeling loved, I suppose, um, uh, e- as you might love a family member or a kind of romantic partner or a, you know, somebody that you... But, but, but status is about admiration, um, uh, r- you know, respect, um, yeah, you know, f- feeling, feeling somewhat above. You know, that's what, that's what we like to think. That, that's how we like to think of ourselves and our groups.

   9. CWChris Williamson6:30

      Is it like a- an existential currency that our brain sort of keeps track of?

   10. WSWill Storr6:37

       Yeah, I mean, in the book, I, I describe it as the original currency, you know. B- before the... You know, we haven't evolved to crave money. You know, money wasn't around when our brains were doing all that evolution. We, we've evolved to crave status, and money is just one way that we've... It's a yam. You know, it's a one way that we've, um, uh, one way that we, that we count use.

   11. CWChris Williamson6:55

       Codified status.

   12. WSWill Storr6:57

       Yeah, yeah, it's another way that we play the status game. You, you, you can use power as a, as a, as a status symbol, and people do, but some people aren't that interested in power. Some people aren't that interested in money. Money is obviously very useful beyond its purpose as, as a status symbol. But, but, but that's essentially, you know, what it is, is a kind of way of playing the status game that, that absolutely directly gets you, you know, better resources and, uh, uh, and en- enables your, uh, survival and reproduction or accelerates your capacities to,

3. 7:25 – 14:29

   How to Maintain Status

   1. WSWill Storr7:25

      to survive and reproduce.

   2. CWChris Williamson7:26

      What are the main ways that people can attain status?

   3. WSWill Storr7:30

      So there are lots of sort of basic ways, you know, youth, beauty, age, you know, but, but, but the, the-

   4. CWChris Williamson7:35

      Both youth and age are ways to get-

   5. WSWill Storr7:37

      Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

   6. CWChris Williamson7:38

      ... say, when you, when you get between 35 and 50-

   7. WSWill Storr7:41

      (laughs)

   8. CWChris Williamson7:41

      ... you're fucked. And then-

   9. WSWill Storr7:42

      Yeah, that's been there.

   10. CWChris Williamson7:42

       ... on the other side, you're all right, yeah.

   11. WSWill Storr7:45

       (laughs) Yeah, you know, like, like it, it, in the book, I think I sort of slightly, sort of glibly say that by, you know, by the hotel pool, youth wins. But when you're trying to get a seat on the train, you know, (laughs) age wins. So it depends on the, you know, the context. Um, so, so, yeah, uh, I, I don't, you know, it's a... So traditionally, of course, age would always win, but now in our kind of youth-obsessed culture, um, it's, it's less so. But, but the, the, the basic ways, the, you know, the more interesting ways are the ways we've e- we've evolved. So firstly, it's dominance. You know, dominance is, is, is the most sort of basic, animalistic way that we get status, and dominance is about, is about, uh, violence, the threat of violence, the threat of punishment. And so that could be, you know, physical violence or reputation destruction or ostracization. Um, so dominance is, you know, not... You know, u- unfortunately, you know, a, a part of our human nature and has been since before we were humans. Uh, dominance is, is typically a much more kind of animalistic way, you know, hens peck at each other until their pecking order is established, and that's how they play their status game. Um, but, but we, you know, humans, when we kind of settled down, uh, you know, we, we, we, um, developed, um, these new ways of playing status games. Um, you know, s- some animals do play g- games with, um, reputation, too, it's thought, interestingly. Um, uh, but, but, but we, uh, uh, kind of really mastered the art of playing status games with reputation by earning prestige. A- a- and fundamentally, it's about showing yourself to be useful to your group, to your tribe, and there are two ways you can be useful to your tribe. One is by being virtuous. So courageous, generous, but also, um, you know, a good f- a conformist, good follower of rules, and a good person, you know, person who punishes rule-breakers, you know. That's part of being virtuous. Um, and the other way is by being successful, by being skillful, by, you know, being the best honey finder, the best hunter, the best grower of yams, you know. Um, so, so, so those are the three kind of essential ways that we play status games, dominance, virtue, and success. And if you think about, um, those three different routes to status, they kind of define kind, the kinds of status games that we, we play. So, you know, boxing is a dominance game. It, it's about violence, and it's about, it's about who's the, who's the most, um, y- y- you know, dominant individual. Uh, a religion or a royal, or a royal family is a virtue game. It's about deference, obedience, um, following the rules. Um, and, uh, a corporation or a scientific endeavor is a success game. They're, they're awarding, they're rewarding status on the basis of you, um, successfully achieving some, you know, closely defined goal. And, uh, just the, the important thing to, to note here is that there aren't any really pure games. You know, all games are kind of... They tend to be a mixture of all three. But, but, but usually, one route to status will be, be dominant. So in boxing, that's obviously a dominance game, but it also has a virtue element too, because you have to follow these rules. And there... And obviously, it's a success game, you know. You, you're, you have to be... It, it isn't just about throwing punches willy-nilly. You've got to be really skillful to be a successful boxer. So, so you can see how all those three routes to status are in most games, probably all games, but one tends to, tends to be... It's like a flavor in a soup, the dominant kind of flavor.

   12. CWChris Williamson11:11

       Which one's most fragile? I'm gonna guess the dominance, the fear, and, uh, fear and force.

   13. WSWill Storr11:18

       Um, what do you mean by fragile?

   14. CWChris Williamson11:20

       In that ruling through fear, to me, seems like the least scalable. Getting people to actually buy into you as a human, to get them to want to support you, this person has virtue, they are useful to us, we can trust them. That, to me, seems like it would scale very well. Whereas fear and force inherently seems more risky.

   15. WSWill Storr11:46

       Yeah, I, I, I think there's, I think there's something to that, definitely. And y- you know, when, when you're, when you're forcing people to attend to you in status, that is, you know, in, in many contexts, an inherently unstable way of kind of leading a status game. A- as you see throughout history, um, you know, dominant leaders tend to fall. Um, but, um...... uh, well, the, the research is quite interesting because it shows that when a status gamer group feels under threat, they, they tend to, um, want a dominant leader to, to, to lead them. Uh, s- s- so, you know, w- you know, i- i- i- it's a kind of a, a typical thing that when, when the status of a group feels under threat, like in terms of war or even a pandemic, um, the, the, that people want to be led by somebody y- y- who is more dominant. And, and that's found interestingly across gender, that's m- men and women tend to prefer dominant leaders in those times.

   16. CWChris Williamson12:41

       Why do you think that is?

   17. WSWill Storr12:42

       Well, because e- e- i- i- i- it w- we're in trouble, you know, it, we need a leader to come in and tell us what to do. You know, um, dominance, um, uh, y- one, one of the concepts that I write about in the book in, in some depth is, is this concept of tightness, which psychologists talk about. You know, groups and cultures can be tight, t- uh, tight versus loose. And so, you know, in the West, we're quite l- we have quite loose cultures. Um, a- a- yeah, a- a- and, you know, it's not just in the West. Um, uh, but, but yeah, you know, U- U- UK, the US are quite loose cultures. We're not that conformist, um, uh, that, that, that, you know, we value individual freedom. But other cultures, you know, Germany is, is a relatively tight culture, the Southern states versus the Northern states of America. Southern states tend to be tighter. So they're more conformist, there, there, there's more dominance going on. Um, they're, they're better at following rules, they tend to be kind of more superstitious and, and liable to kind of believe, uh, you know, the, the wild stories that, that are told, uh, amongst their, amongst their group. And so in times of trouble, you know, we tighten up, you know, even the loose, you know ... Um, you can see it during the pandemic, in, in, especially in the, in the UK, um, uh, you know, we, w- w- we've been very conformist during the pandemic. You know, the anti-vax thing isn't, isn't a major thing over here like it is in the States. Um, we've tightened up and, you know, the, the, you know, my personal (laughs) default is, "Okay, tell me what to do. I don't care. (laughs) Just, uh, t- uh, if I'm, if you tell me, want me to wear a mask, I'll wear a mask. If you want me to drop it, I'll drop it. Just tell me what to do." And I think that's the appropriate, that's actually appropriate in, in, in a, in a time of threat to, to, to, to go into that kind of tighter, kind of hunker down and, and, and, you know, in- into that kind of tighter, more conformist

4. 14:29 – 20:31

   Imitating a Higher Status

   1. WSWill Storr14:29

      space.

   2. CWChris Williamson14:29

      How do high and low status people relate to each other then?

   3. WSWill Storr14:35

      Well, um, the, the game is always kind of, um, jostling. You know, one, one of the interesting things, um, th- the, the, the, you know, I read quite a lot about in my research is the, is this idea of, like, you know, the copying instinct. Humans just are amazing at copying, um, people, and we tend to copy the high status people who are in our games. So, so they're the people that we look up to and go, "I wanna be like you." And we'll tend to kind of blindly copy them. And, you know, it's quite interesting. Uh, there was one, there was one study that, that looked at the behavior of, you know, young human children versus chimps. And, uh, th- th- the, the, the experiment was th- there was a certain procedure, um, i- th- that you had to go through in order to get, uh, some sort of treat. And, um, the, the chimpanzees, you know, quite quickly worked out which parts of the procedure weren't, you know, they were copying, they were learning by copying. And, and the chimps quite quickly l- worked out which parts of the pro- procedures they could drop. But the young humans copied everything. They didn't care, they just copied everything. And I thought that was really interesting, because in a sense, the chimps are smarter than us in that, in that context. You know, they're just, "Oh, I don't need to do that. I don't need to do that." But, but we're copying everything, and that's the status game. And, you know, I remember, you know, when I was eight years old, I was obsessed with, uh, this pop star, Nik Kershaw. You know, I was completely, you know, oh my God, I was, you know. A- and, um, I remember seeing him on TV-am, you know, with his, crossing his legs in a certain way. H- he had his ankle on his knee and I thought, "Ha." And I just started doing that. And, you know, I didn't know why (laughs) I was doing it, but I started just kind of sitting around with my ankle on my knee.

   4. CWChris Williamson16:04

      That's gonna be my route to become a world champion pop star, yeah.

   5. WSWill Storr16:07

      Yeah. Yeah. Because, and I didn't know why I was doing it, but that's the programming. You, we look at people that we want to be like and we, you know, we, I, I call it the copy, flatter, conform kind of, you know, uh, um, the copy, flatter, conform process. That's tend- what we want to do. We copy them, we flatter them, "Oh, you're amazing." You know, we, we lavish them with status and we conform. You know, we do what they tell us to do. And that, and that's kind of a strategy, is because we want to climb up too, and we're looking at them, they're up there. So if we copy everything they're doing, um, a- a- and we're nice to them, so they allow us to be around us, then we'll hopefully rise too.

   6. CWChris Williamson16:41

      Do you think that we actually like people with high status, or do we just secretly hate them and find them useful allies?

   7. WSWill Storr16:49

      That's a good question because it's a nuance, it's a very nuanced question and it's something that I really, i- i- th- really kind of wrestled with when I was writing the book. And so i- um, the answer is it depends. A- and as I said, I, I think, you know, generally, the, the, the general fact is we resent high, high status people. S- status is of such value to us. Um, and, um, it's relative. So the more other people have, the less we have. You know, there isn't just like a, you know, score on a, on a scoreboard. You know, if, if I sell this many books but then my rival sells this many books, suddenly now I'm down here. And, and so we're constantly, constantly measuring other people's status versus us. And, you know, we, we've evolved in, in relatively small groups, you know, compared to today's, you know, globally connected internet world. We haven't evolved to play these huge vast games where we're kind of, you know, subconsciously comparing ourselves to bloody Michelle Obama or the King of Thailand or who- or whoever it is. So, so, so, so, you know, we, we are kind of riven with resentments. But there, but there are exceptions to this. And, and the, and the exceptions are really when, as I say, it's the Nik Kershaw thing again, it's, it's when we're sort of playing a status game and we're looking up, uh, somebody and, and they're playing the same game as us and we're like, and we go into that mode of, "I want to be like this person." You know, "I want to learn from this person and become this person." And then, you know, that, that kind of fights through that default resentment. And, uh, and actually we, we, you know, we start to admire them. You know, we admire artists and,... um, you know, icons who we feel have a piece of us in them and that, and that we want to be like.

   8. CWChris Williamson18:23

      Presumably, there must be a closeness, um, metric that we have in the back of our brains where you're- y- you and Nick Kershaw, you were eight years old, you weren't competing with him, so modeling his behavior is still a high-status thing for you to do that doesn't look like deference to a rival. As opposed to if you had the kid that was in the year above you and wore cooler trainers, maybe you and him could be jostling for similar sorts of status. So I imagine that, that, that closeness actually provides more rivalry as opposed to sort of cooperative modeling.

   9. WSWill Storr18:57

      Definitely, yeah. That's, that's absolutely right. And, and, and that was one of the, one of the sort of more surprising things that I, that I learnt, that, um, you know, you might think that maximizing the sense of competition between people would give you maximal performance, say, in a, in a company, but it's actually not true. You know, um, too much competition just g- gives you a hellish, say, corporate environment, you know, where everyone's... B- because, you know, status is freely given, uh, and if status is in short supply and we're fighting for it, no one's gonna be giving out status. I mean, it, it's gonna be a miserable, uh, g- gonna be a miserable, um, you know, place to work or environment to be in. And actually, um, you know, but rivalry really is, um... Uh, i- i- rivalry is something else. So, so, so rivalry happens when, as you say, when we're very close, i- i- um, i- i- feeling very closely competitive with an individual or, uh, another company. A- and, um, it's that closeness that s- that, that creates the rivalry. So, so typical rivals have a history of, you know, near-wins, you know, near-losses, skirmishes, uh, uh, and, you know, you can think about Apple and Microsoft or, you know, obviously Apple have now kind of beaten them to, into a pulp. Uh, but, but for a long time, Apple and Microsoft were, you know, were deadly rivals, because they were s- they were close, um, you know, for, for a while. A- a- and yet, and I think that works obviously on the individual level too, is the people closest to us that we become very rivalrous to. And actually, rivalry can be very, very motivating, you know, it, it can... You know, as unpleasant as it feels, it can be an absolute force for success when w- when we kind of lock into a rival and go, "Right, it's personal." (laughs) "I'm gonna beat you," you know?

   10. CWChris Williamson20:30

       How...

5. 20:31 – 30:12

   Psychology of Titles

   1. CWChris Williamson20:32

      What were some of the examples that you found to do with the ridiculous relativity of status? Wasn't there an e- was there an Economist article to do with job titles?

   2. WSWill Storr20:42

      Yeah, that's right. There w- um, uh, um, it wasn't in The Economist, but there was a study, I think it was of 17,000 employees in Britain, and, and I think, by memory, it was 70% of them said they would opt for... Given the choice, they would opt for a, a, a more statusful job title, r- rather than more money. And so, um, f- fi- filing clerks w- wanted to be, wanted to be called data storage specialists was one of them. (laughs) You know, and it's, it's funny, but, but they were onto something, you know, status is really important. A- and, you know, as, as important as, you know, resources are, um, you know, s- s- status is also e- extremely important, and, and, and it's not an irrational... I don't think it's an irrational choice to make.

   3. CWChris Williamson21:22

      It sounds so irrational, though. Think about it, you're choosing to get what is, like, essentially just an intangible nothing-

   4. WSWill Storr21:30

      Yeah.

   5. CWChris Williamson21:30

      ... over a real explicit, objective, quantifiable, take it home, pay it, make it, make it work for you asset.

   6. WSWill Storr21:38

      Yeah.

   7. CWChris Williamson21:38

      And people would rather have... 70% of people would prefer to get... I think... I- I saw a study as well previously to do with would you rather double your workl- uh, double your wages and everybody else stay the same, or 10X your wages and everybody else 20X, and the vast majority of people chose to get the absolute lower figure but the relative higher figure.

   8. WSWill Storr22:03

      Yeah, that's absolutely correct, yeah. Yeah, yeah. That, that, yeah. And, and that, that shows the importance of status. A- a- and, you know, it sounds stupid but there are two things to say about that. And, and first is just to, you know, kind of re-up the idea that, that, that, that, that, you know, we have evolved to crave, um, status on a fundamental level, you know, psychologically, and is also, you know, evident, there, there is evidence also physically, we need to feel like we have status, uh, otherwise we're, you know, we're in trouble, big trouble psychologically. So, so, so it matters, it's like an e- it's like an e- an essential nutrient for the mind, i- i- status, so, so we need it. And also, you know, these job titles, it's just an act of imagination, but it's all an act of imagination. The s- fast car is an act of imagina-

   9. CWChris Williamson22:47

      The, um...

   10. WSWill Storr22:47

       ... you know, the act of imagination. The flashy watch is an act of imagination. Even, you know, our, you know, m- our, the moral status games that we play are acts of shared imagination. You know, we decide one day that this is the morally correct thing to do, the next day it's something else. It doesn't exist in the real world. All these moral arguments we have with everybody, they don't actually exi- you can't find a moral truth under a microscope, you can't dig it out of the ground. You know, it's all, it's all acts of imagination, you know? And that, and that, that's the world that humans exist in. We connect into groups and we have these shared imaginary games that we play where we, where we say, "This job is great and this job isn't great."

   11. CWChris Williamson23:25

       Yeah.

   12. WSWill Storr23:25

       "This belief is great and this belief isn't great."

   13. CWChris Williamson23:26

       "This type of activity is worthy of status."

   14. WSWill Storr23:29

       Exactly. Yeah.

   15. CWChris Williamson23:29

       "This type of activity is not worthy of status." This is something that really struck me when you broke down what our conscience is, that our conscience is basically an internal enforcement mechanism for things that we predict our culture would reward or punish in terms of status.

   16. WSWill Storr23:45

       Yeah, so it's not my phrase but, but somebody came... I read about it in s- read the phrase in Sarah-Jane Blakemore's, um, book, um, a- and, you know, she, she talks about this idea of the imaginary audience, that conscience is this imaginary audience. You know, we're a social animal and, you know, status, you know, if it's not dominance, is given to us, you know, uh, voluntarily by the, by the people that we share our lives with. And so you can, you can see that conscience is this kind of rehearsal, is kind of prediction machine, um... Um, if, if you, if you imagine doing something really bad, you know, your conscience twitches, "Oh, no, you shouldn't do that," y- y- you respond with fear. Um, but if you imagine yourself doing something...... fantastic. The, the, the people that you share your life with are gonna think it's great. You, you feel really good, and that's your conscience kind of helping you predicting. And, and, you know, and it also pun-... You know, it also obviously works retrospectively too. If you do something really bad, that's a kind of signal from your, from your kind of status game playing cognition saying, "Don't do that again." (laughs) You know, that, that is danger. Danger lies that way. Because that... Because when you do that, it's a, it's a social thing. You, you're, you're, you're dropping in status in the eyes of your co-players, and that is bad. You know, that, that is... In the o-... You know, it, it's thought that, um, capital punishment was once a human universal, so that's the ultimate cost for, you know, dropping too far in status. You're dead. So, so, so that's, you know, that, that's the conscience. It's this kind of... It's helping us out by predic- both predicting and by, you know, wagging its finger at us, uh, uh, over things we've done in the past, you, you know. It's like a pain signal, I guess, in a way, warning you that something's wrong with your behavior.

   17. CWChris Williamson25:23

       It's interesting that a lot of the things we value in terms of morals and virtue, they don't look as selfless in the harsh light of the status game, do they?

   18. WSWill Storr25:32

       No. I mean, they... I think in the initial... The kind of the journey that I've been on with this is, is, is firstly, you, you start to-

   19. CWChris Williamson25:36

       Well, did you get... Sorry. Did you get uncomfortable? Did you find it uncomfortable as you slowly imbibed that a lot of the things that you valued in yourself, the virtuous qualities you thought you had, are just these shameless plays to desperately try and get Will Storr's name further up the endless totem pole of status in the world?

   20. WSWill Storr25:51

       (laughs) Well, to be honest, I have quite... (laughs) I don't... Well, I mean, I don't know. Not really. I don't really have a hugely high opinion of myself.

   21. CWChris Williamson25:59

       (laughs)

   22. WSWill Storr25:59

       I have self-esteem issues. I don't think... I didn't go on that journey. I never thought I was this saint anyway. But, but, but y-... But, but yeah, I think you go, go on a journey of s- of, of initially quite cyni- quite cynical, uh, quite going, "Well, you know, all, all these moral things we do, you know, it's a f-... It's a, it's a, it's a game. It's a status game." And, you know, the Pope, Mother Teresa, they're moral superstars, you know, in the same way that, uh, you know, pol-... You know, Barack Obama is a political superstar and Nick Kershaw was once a pop superstar, you know. They, they're superstars, and we treat them as superstars. When you look at the... You know, I grew up in a Catholic household. When you look at Catholic displays of status, it's absolutely ridiculous, you know. You, you address, you know, them as Your Holiness, and they all have these huge bloody hats on and, you know, gold cups. You know, the, the, the status displays are so unhidden, you know-

   23. CWChris Williamson26:49

       Ostentatious, really.

   24. WSWill Storr26:50

       Yeah, ostentatious. Uh, i- i- it's not even disguised in, in, in that kind of virtuous world. But then after a while, y- y- I, you know, I began to reconcile that. And, and actually where I ended up was a, was a place not so cynical, because once you understand that, that status... You know, status is really a fundamental, as I say, human need. Uh, and, uh, so, so, so it... Uh, the mistake is saying, "Oh, it's just status. It's only status." Status is, you know, incredibly important to us, so it's not just an only status. It's really important that people feel good about themselves. Um, and, and, you know, secondarily, the fact that our species has, has kind of developed this kind of evolved technology in which we are rewarded for doing ver-... You know, altru-... For, for making altruistic, selfless acts, is absolutely fantastic.

   25. CWChris Williamson27:40

       Yeah.

   26. WSWill Storr27:40

       That's like probably the best thing about our species, is that we have, you know, both this conscience inside us, so we feel good when we do something selfless, and we're celebrated by the people around us when we, when we act selflessly. It's absolutely incredible. I mean, it's the best part of us. And so, so, so that's where I ended up really. It, it, it's actually, you know, a- an amazing thing, that, that we have a system of automatic reward for acts of selflessness.

   27. CWChris Williamson28:07

       That's a really cool insight. The fact that if you were to take the actions as objectively as you can, which is kind of what philosophers do, I suppose, right? They remove the presuppositions and the biases, and they look at, "Is doing this thing actually good in the harsh light of day?" And it kind of seems like it is, but we've just, like, imbibed this. It's just this instantiated embodied knowledge that we just do.

   28. WSWill Storr28:30

       Yeah.

   29. CWChris Williamson28:31

       And then you go, "Oh, no one needed to teach me, really. I just... No one actually ever said all of these different rules. There isn't a huge list of them somewhere, I just kind of know." And then you've got the conscience that acts as this internal enforcement mechanism that makes sure that you, you stay on track. Yeah, it is.

   30. WSWill Storr28:46

       Yeah. Yeah.
6. 30:12 – 38:09

   Continually Losing Status

   1. CWChris Williamson30:12

      years of not, not actually seeing anyone is working or not. So, what happens if you continually lose status?

   2. WSWill Storr30:19

      ... really bad things. Uh, you know, one, one, one of the... When I was thinking about, uh, you know, in the very, very early stages of thinking about whether even this could be a book, I, I, I kind of set myself a little task, and, and that was the task or question really. Uh, you know, if you're gonna argue that status is this important, it must be really bad when we lose it, so, so what does that look like? And so I started to research humiliation, the effects of humiliation, and, and that's what really convinced me because... So, so the, the, so, so the definition that I came across of humiliation is it's, it's not just, um, somebody taking your status away from you, it, it, it's basically robbing you of any hope of claiming that status again in the future. You're so lacking in status you're basically banned from the game. And, and, uh, you know, one psychologist describes humiliation as the, as the nuclear bomb of the emotions. So when you look at the very worst things that human bei- beings engage in, from anything from genocide, to honor killings, to spree killings, um, to, uh, you know, many instances of serial murder, um, it has humiliation at its core. So, so, so, so, you know, that, that really convinced me that, that, that this was a really important subject, and that status was, you know, a fundamental human need. In the book I tell in some detail the story of Elliot Rodgers, The Incel, um, and I was able to tell that story because before he killed a bunch of people and himself, he left a 108,000-word memoir online, which was, you know, re- really a, a, a truly extraordinary document, um, because he, uh, uh, whilst being unbelievably narcissistic, is also incredibly honest about his (laughs) , his, his shortcomings and his, and, and his problems. A- a- and there you see, and, and I, and I think, you know, what I came to is, is the most dangerous people are not only the ones who've been humiliated again, and again, and again, and again, but they're the, they're the, they're the, they're the narcissists, the grandiose people who've been humiliated again, and again, and again, and again, because they feel entitled to a life up here, but what reality's giving them is down here, and down here, and down here, i- you know, for years. Um, a- a- and, you know, especially if you're male and you have a propensity to, you know, solve status disputes with violence, that's a horrible cocktail, male, grandiose, and humiliated, it's really, really dangerous. And, you know, I talk about, you know, the, the example of the Unabomber is quite extraordinary, this, this, this guy, um, went to Harvard, and ha- had to... wa- wa- took part in these basically humiliation experiments, they were like government-sponsored experiments, I think CIA-sponsored experiments, to see what was happening-

   3. CWChris Williamson32:49

      Was that the MKUltra thing, or is that a different guy?

   4. WSWill Storr32:51

      I think it was related to that. Um, to, to see what-

   5. CWChris Williamson32:54

      People in the comments, this is the sort of thing that YouTube excels at.

   6. WSWill Storr32:57

      (laughs)

   7. CWChris Williamson32:57

      So we will find the answer. Whoever knows the answer-

   8. WSWill Storr32:59

      Yeah.

   9. CWChris Williamson33:00

      ... about MKUltra and the Unabomber, please link to a video in the comments.

   10. WSWill Storr33:04

       Yeah. So, so, so, so, so, so y- so, so they basically got a, a, a, a, a group of people, including Ted Kaczynski, uh, and they said, you know, "You're gonna do a scientific experiment," they didn't really tell him what it is, as, as, as is, you know, normal in psychological experiments. And they, they basically had them, had them write down all their, all their deep... all their, all their dreams, and hopes, and ambitions, lots of confessions even about things about thumb-sucking and masturbation. So all their, all their secrets, all their hopes and dreams and values, and then they sat them down in front of, you know, these bright lights, and basically mocked them, mocked these individuals. And this happened again, and again, and again, for, for years. And, you know, Kaczynski's brother said, you know, "We didn't know what was going on but we saw the change in him." You know. Um, a- and, you know, what does the U-N in Unabomber stand for? Universities. Why? Because he, he, he, you know, they were, they were part of his campaign of terror, he would send, you know, bombs to universities. Um, uh, you know, he, he, he ended up with this kind of mindset that, that, that, you know, all, all these kind of scientists who were kind of torturing him when he was at Harvard were responsible for all the problems in the world, and he was... you know, and the grandiosity was there. He was gonna lead this global revolution and, and, you know, like Elliot Rodger with his 108,000-word memoir, he had his, I think, 35,000-word manifesto published in, I think it was The Washington Post. Uh, i- i- you know, uh, so, so obviously a grandiose man, definitely, you know, severely humiliated, and you see the consequences.

   11. CWChris Williamson34:30

       Grandiose, humiliated, and aggressive. So you've got the-

   12. WSWill Storr34:32

       And male.

   13. CWChris Williamson34:33

       And male. So you've got the-

   14. WSWill Storr34:34

       Yeah.

   15. CWChris Williamson34:34

       ... the dark triad, but this is more, like, the dangerous triad. That's the three-

   16. WSWill Storr34:38

       Yeah.

   17. CWChris Williamson34:38

       ... that you need to make sure that you don't have. Yeah, it's, um, it's interesting thinking about what happens when people lose status that, that it gets degraded over time. What about tall poppy syndrome and people that, that sort of have it and then you have these huge falls? 'Cause there's a, a sense inside the slow-motion car crash, everybody hate-follows some people on their social media, the, the ones that, that you watch just to sort of pity them-

   18. WSWill Storr35:05

       (laughs)

   19. CWChris Williamson35:05

       ... because you, you enjoy watching how much they're sort of wrecking everything. And-

   20. WSWill Storr35:09

       I've got no idea what you mean, Chris. (laughs)

   21. CWChris Williamson35:10

       You, you... Well, come on, I'll go through you, I'll go through your following if I need to.

   22. WSWill Storr35:14

       (laughs)

   23. CWChris Williamson35:14

       Um, but yeah, everyone's got that, and the tall poppy syndrome must be a part of this.

   24. WSWill Storr35:18

       Yeah, totally. A- as I say, and if we, if we don't directly, um, you know, relate to, to, to somebody and kind of really admire them and want to be them, we tend to, you know, really be, become quite envious of them. And, and so, so yeah, you know, the, the tall poppy syndrome i- has been found to be a cross-cultural, um, uh, effect. There, there was a great study that I didn't put in The Status Game 'cause it was in my previous book, I didn't want to, didn't want to... I would loved to have cut and paste it into the new one so-

   25. CWChris Williamson35:43

       Cross-pollinate the two books, yeah. (laughs)

   26. WSWill Storr35:44

       Yeah. But, but it, but it was done by, uh, a psychologist in the University of Shenzhen, and, um, it was, uh, s- s- it was really clever. So they got these people and then, and then they, you know, to, to say, you know, "We're gonna, you're gonna be, is taking part in a neuroscientific experiment, but we're running a bit late and, you know, so, um, why don't you go over there and play this computer game and, and, you know, just spend 10 minutes on there." So you go over and you play this computer game, and you come off the computer game and you say, "Well, um, you know, just, just out of interest, you were kind of pretty mediocre, you know, all these people over here did much better than you, and all those people over there did much worse than you." So that, so you say, "Okay," you sit down. And then they put these people in a brain scanner, and they, and they showed them I think images or videos of them, of having injections in their face.And what they were looking for were, um, uh, signals of empathy. 'Cause a- as you probably know, you know, when we're, when, when, when we, um... It's the, I think it's, uh, Tania Singer, I think, that, was the neuroscientist that found this. Th- that when we empathize, th- the, y- you know, not the same, um, neural patterns, but similar neural patterns will, will be seen in the brain as if we were actually getting that injection in our face. So, they, they, they, they took them, uh, and the, the people that they saw were the people from the waiting room, who'd done either better or worse at the game than them, and then afterwards, they said to the people, you know, um, "Did you feel empathy? You know, what did you think about those images?" And they said, "Oh, it's terrible," or, "The injections, oh, must have been awful." And they said, "Did you feel empathy for, for, for, for them?" "Oh, yes, yes, yes." "Did you feel empathy for all of them?" "Oh, yes, yes, yes." But their brain scans (laughs) gave the lie. They tended to only feel empathy for the people who'd done worse than them th- on the game, and they didn't feel any empathy for the people who did better than them on the game. So, that shows you, you know, it's just extraordinary evidence for this, you know, this tall poppy syndrome, that people who we see as higher status than us, w- you know, we, we don't feel empathy for them. We don't like them. Uh, we, uh, uh, another, you know, uh, th- the study that I do quoted I- in The Status Game shows that peop- wh- you know, when people are reading about somebody's successful and rich, um, their pain signals become more activated, uh, or you know, their, their, their, kind of, their, their, their, yeah, their, their pain signals become evident. And, and then whe- when, when they, they read a story of that s- of that same person being, you know, suffering a fall, pleasure systems become activated. So, so, so, you know, it's in us. It's the status game mechanism, you know.

   27. CWChris Williamson38:02

       Incarnate, yeah.

   28. WSWill Storr38:02

       In, in, in our brain, yeah. It's h- how, it's how we experience the world, and it's n- not a nice part of human nature. But it, but it is

7. 38:09 – 45:35

   Choosing Friends Carefully

   1. WSWill Storr38:09

      an undeniable part of human nature.

   2. CWChris Williamson38:12

      Trying to map what you've said so far together, it feels like we have this sort of relativistic viewpoint of where our status works, right? It's not absolute. It's to do with who we're near.

   3. WSWill Storr38:25

      Mm-hmm.

   4. CWChris Williamson38:25

      And that shows of status from people, specifically people that we're kind of close to, whether that be geographically, w- that we can relate to, rivals, that makes us feel quite uncomfortable. Also, reading about it and showing other people having success, that makes us feel less good. Losing status is bad for our health. It can cause us to be depressed, and it makes us live for less, shorter amounts of time. Does this mean that we should choose our friends very, very carefully?

   5. WSWill Storr38:52

      Yeah. I mean, I, I would say so. Uh, you know, I, I mean, one of the things I wrote about in my, my book Selfie, um, which, uh, w- which was out a few years ago now, um, is, is this idea that it's actually, you know, uh, contrary to what all the self-help gurus will tell you, it's very hard to change yourself, and a much better route to kind of something that fuels our happiness is by changing your environment, changing, you know, y- I talked about this idea of the, the lizard and the iceberg. You know, you can put a lizard on an iceberg, and it's a miserable lizard, but take that same lizard and put it in the desert, suddenly it's a happy lizard. And nothing has changed about that lizard, but everything has changed about that lizard. And, and, and, you know, I, I always think that's an underrated, you know, solution for, for a lot of our problems, is by, you know, trying to change our circumstances. And as ruthless as it sounds, changing the people who you're spending your life with, you know, it shouldn't be an option that you just, you should just dismiss. If somebody's repeatedly making you feel bad, um, then get rid, you know, potentially.

   6. CWChris Williamson39:51

      The bizarre thing is that a lot of the time, we want people that are, uh, motivated, that are growth-minded, that make us want to bring out the best of us. But those people are often going to be rivals. They're going to be people that are doing well, that have their own hustle. Maybe it's not the same hustle as us. And yeah, I mean, it, it seems to me that the best friends for the status game would be the ones that are doing worse than you.

   7. WSWill Storr40:17

      Well, it depends on, on, on how that person is coming across, you know. What we don't like are the people who are doing well, and they brag about it, whether it's a humble brag, or it's showiness, or there's constant pictures on Instagram, you know, or whatever it is. You know, it's perfectly possible to be, you know, friends with people who are higher status than you if they, if they don't constantly remind you of that fact. I think it's the constant reminders of that fact that, that kind of, that upsets people. Um, you know, it's the humble bragging and all that stuff. Uh, and also, you know, mo- uh, lots of... You know, it can be really, you know, um, positive. So, I didn't write about this in The Status Game, but in, in my, you know, journalistic life a few years ago, I did a story on CrossFit, and I went to the CrossFit, annual CrossFit Games in California. And, you know, CrossFit is a classic example of how, you know, these, these dynamics can be used for good. People, people, you know, because CrossFit is a status game. It's absolutely a status game. It's a success game. Um, and, um, it's all positive. You know, people, people are just there positively pumping status into you when you're working out, you know, and that's how it works, and that's why people get addicted to it, because, you know, every week you're getting better and better, and people are clapping you and clapping you. And it's that, you know, so, so the status game can be positive. These people aren't... You know, that, a CrossFit group is going to be bad if it's, if it's in a sense of, "Oh, look at, look at you. I'm much stronger and faster than you." But that's not what CrossFit is. It's all positive. So, or at least, that's my idea of what CrossFit is. So, so, you know, it can be, you know, you can have healthy status games, but, but they're the ones that aren't, aren't, um, uh, miserly in the, in the status. You know, in the book, I talk about how a successful group is a status-generating machine. Any successful group is a status-generating machine. It's generating status for all of its players, you know, from the top down.

   8. CWChris Williamson42:03

      Presumably, though, status, status kind of is a zero-sum game. In order for you to rise in status, you have to rise relative to someone else. That's the whole point.

   9. WSWill Storr42:12

      Yeah.

   10. CWChris Williamson42:12

       So, even if you decide to have your group of your five friends that you are the average of, and you have that group, even if they do manage to raise you up, that is only in relation to an outgroup that you no longer are. So, if we've still got ingroup-outgroup mechanisms, it's just that we decide how broad we want to have that viewpoint.

   11. WSWill Storr42:31

       It's getting very meta. Yeah. Yeah. So, so, so there's two things. So, one thing is, um...... you know, the- the- the status games compete with other status games. You know, so, so you're, you're competing both internally and externally. And, and, and y- y- it doesn't have to be ... I, I don't know if a zero sum ... So, internally, I don't know that a zero sum game, um, i- is exactly right, because, you know, in the CrossFit example, you can imagine, everyone's just ... There will be a hierarchy there. Of course there will be. There's Anne Middleton at the top, and there's me at the bottom, you know? Um, y- y- you ... But, but, but if Anne Middleton's being really nice to me and going, "Yes, mate. Yes, mate. Yes, mate," I'm feeling really good, 'cause that's a high status person making me feel like I really count and I'm r- I'm doing a really good job. So that, that ... You know, so it doesn't have to be ... You know, one of the examples I give, a- a- as a- of a really bad status game is Enron, the company Enron, who had, who had this yak- rank and yank system. So, you know, regularly, the, the whole company would be chopped up into pieces and parts. The top 15% would be rewarded, the bottom 15%, I think it was, were just kicked out, and everybody was, you know ... And so s- everyone's just fucking terrified and, you know, and so you don't wanna be working for Enron. You know, so, so, so, I'm not ... Uh, I, I, so I think zero sum game, i- i- you know, status is relative, but it, but it doesn't have to be ... That, that doesn't necessarily mean it ends up in being this absolute kind of hellscape. The other thing, of course, is that status games compete with other status games, and a major source of status for everyone in that group is when your game wins over a rival game. You know, there, there, there was a really telling, um, uh, piece by, um, a quote from Laurie Lee, the author Laurie Lee's, um, autobiography. And, you know, he, he, he was, you know, a kid at the height ... Uh, I don't know about the height of the British Empire, but certainly when the British Empire was still the British Empire. And, you know, he, he talks about being, being about as poor as they get. They lived on boiled cabbage and that, that was what they ate. And, uh, you know, but he, he said, "We'd look at the ... We'd, we'd sit in the classroom, we'd look at the map, world map on the walls, all the pink bits were the British Em- Empire." And he said, "We'd look at each other and we'd feel like centurions." You know, it's that idea of, um, y- you know, when our group, when the group to which we belong is high status, no matter where we are in it, we feel great. You know, somebody working for Apple Computers, you can go to the Apple Store tomorrow and you can see people who work for the Apple Store, they think they're amazing 'cause they work at the Apple Store (laughs) , you know?

   12. CWChris Williamson44:50

       Well, we need to be very careful about dissing the people from the Apple Store.

   13. WSWill Storr44:53

       (laughs)

   14. CWChris Williamson44:53

       My entire life is built upon that infrastructure, so if they-

   15. WSWill Storr44:56

       No, no, no.

   16. CWChris Williamson44:56

       ... fucking log into the back end of my iCloud-

   17. WSWill Storr44:58

       (laughs)

   18. CWChris Williamson44:58

       ... and they break, they break everything, I'm wrecked.

   19. WSWill Storr45:00

       No, well, I have personal experience. My first job when I left school was working in the local Independent record shop, and we were the biggest snobs in the world. You know, I was, I was, I was working for a shop. You know, I was work- ... I think was earning £85 a week or something, and I thought I was amazing 'cause I worked at Longplayer and all the idiots worked at Our Price and HMV. You know, I, I've, I've ... I'm saying that about Apple because I've been that person, 100%, you know, the, the archetypal, um, indie snob from High Fidelity, sneering at Celine Dion. I was that person when I was 19, so (laughs) completely guilty.

   20. CWChris Williamson45:34

       What

8. 45:35 – 54:15

   Effects of Radical Status Gain

   1. CWChris Williamson45:35

      happens ... We've talked about what happens if someone loses status, what about if someone radically gains status? I ... You might not know this, but I went on Love Island, I was the first person through the doors of season one of Love Island. So-

   2. WSWill Storr45:45

      No.

   3. CWChris Williamson45:46

      Correct, yes.

   4. WSWill Storr45:48

      That is amazing.

   5. CWChris Williamson45:49

      Yeah, I tend to wait about 45 minutes before I drop that in, so I've timed it-

   6. WSWill Storr45:53

      (laughs)

   7. CWChris Williamson45:53

      ... I've timed it about right. Uh, yeah, so what happens? You, you take Vanessa, 19, hairdresser from Wigan-

   8. WSWill Storr45:59

      Yeah.

   9. CWChris Williamson45:59

      ... and you just deposit her in the middle of a villa, and then six weeks later, she's got two million followers and a brand deal with PrettyLittleThing? What's-

   10. WSWill Storr46:07

       (laughs) You still a fan then?

   11. CWChris Williamson46:07

       Uh, no. No, no. I've never watched it. I've never watched a single minute. I lived it, so I've s- I've served my time.

   12. WSWill Storr46:13

       Really?

   13. CWChris Williamson46:13

       Yeah, yeah, yeah.

   14. WSWill Storr46:13

       How long were you in for?

   15. CWChris Williamson46:15

       Four weeks, a month or so.

   16. WSWill Storr46:17

       Oh, I'm gonna watch that series as well.

   17. CWChris Williamson46:18

       Oh, please don't.

   18. WSWill Storr46:19

       (laughs)

   19. CWChris Williamson46:19

       Please, please don't. Um, so what happens when someone radically gains status?

   20. WSWill Storr46:24

       Um, I think it's dangerous, you know, I do. I think, you know, there, there, there's a very interesting, um, uh, study that I kind of t- write about in depth in the book, uh, and, and th- the psychologists ... It was a very small study then, it had 12 people, which is usually frowned upon in the world of, you know, uh, psychological studies. But, um, there were, there were, there were 12 unnamed very high status Americans, so celebrities, um, a- you know, actual kind of celebrities. And, and, and it was quite extraordinary where, where, you know, and it was sort of passing, you know, their, their experience of, of kind of huge, of huge fame. And, and, and they talk about this process that, that is initially just amazing, it's just dreamlike, people are calling your name and ... One of them actually said, "Suddenly you matter." Um, uh, but then what happens is, you know, there, there, there are ... There, there were various stages, one of which is that you start losing all your old friends because, you know, compared to, compared to, um, uh, you, they're nothing. And, and, and, uh, and you can't spend time with them without reminding them of the fact that, that you're now up here and they're down there, so you lose all your old friends. The only people, the only friends that you've got (laughs) left are the people that are there with you because of who you are, so you stop trusting everybody. And then, and then, you know, I thought what was really telling was that ultimately what happens is that, is that, is that they, you know, some of them started talking about how, um, "Nobody really knows me," and, um, and actually ... You know, it was like they had plenty of the success variety of status, but they started wanting the virtue kind of variety of status, and they started, you know, getting cross because, "Oh, you know, I'm actually ..." Uh, you know, uh, uh, "The real me, if you, if you only knew the real me." So, so, so I, I, you know, he, uh, is obviously, you know, not all it's cracked up to be, fame. But, but also I think, you know, personally, I remember a few years ago meeting somebody who obviously I won't name, but she, um, found enormous success when she was in her early 20s. Um, uh, uh, and, um-... yeah, I can say now in a Hollywood film, I'll go that far, and then nothing. A- and, um, you know, when I met, I met her when she was in her m- I would say early middle age, and she struck me just as a deeply unhappy woman. You know, uh, she kept referencing the film, uh, uh, and the success, um, and, you know, she talks a little bit h- about how, the fact that she, she can't go out and just get an ordinary job now, because then there'd be stories in the newspapers about, "Look at this person, look what they're doing now." Um, but I kind of, you know, I think if you were to ask her about her success, she would probably say, "It's the best thing that's ever happened to me, it was amazing." But I, I left with a powerful sense that it was actually the worst thing that had ever happened to her, because it had ruined the rest of her life. And, you know, I, we, we, we're not designed to have that much status, you know, we evolved in these relatively small groups. Um, we, we haven't evolved to have global fame levels of status, it's not good for us. You, you, you can see it in, in, in, in the behavior of people who become enormously famous. Um, y- you know, you know, you know, not, not all the time, but, but especially when they become famous young, you know, it, it does something to people, it, it turns them into not nice individuals. So, so, yeah, I, I, for me, the ideal, you know, the, the ideal sort of perfect life, would, would, would be a slow but, you know, steady rise in status throughout your life. That, that's the ideal to go for. You know, where every year, you, you achieve something else, and you achieve the next thing, and you achieve the next thing. I don't think that's possible, (laughs) you know, um, be- because there's always gonna be setbacks, but, but the sudden spike of fame wh- when you're 19, 20, 21, I think, is, is, is very often a disaster, because it's unsustainable.

   21. CWChris Williamson49:58

       It is like hedonic adaptation, the way that we deal with our status, and then we're so relativistic that as soon as we've been to that peak, now even though we're continuing to look forward, we've always got this reference point behind it, "Well, I'm not- I'm not where I used to be." So yeah, I, this was something that I had in my, in my head. There's a, a fitness tracker that I use, and it tracks your, um, heart rate variability and your resting heart rate, and it gives you a score, and it says, "This is how rested you are." And whether you are green, amber, or red is dependent on how you are relative to your previous period, let's say it's a 7-day window or a 14-day window, and if you are better than that, then it says that you're green, and if you're about the same, it says that you're amber, and if you're worse than that, it says that you're red.

   22. WSWill Storr50:44

       Mm-hmm.

   23. CWChris Williamson50:44

       So, the only way to get... And, and a lot of people that's a part of this Whoop community, they talk about green recovery, so seven green recoveries in a row is like, "Wow, you've nailed your recovery, mate." But what they don't realize is that the only way to perpetually get green recovery is to sense- essentially have a resting heart rate that drops to nothing, and a heart rate variability which is limitless, because over time, you have to continue progressing.

   24. WSWill Storr51:11

       Yeah.

   25. CWChris Williamson51:11

       And let's say that you keep your Whoop on for 50 years, and in 50 years' time, your heart beat's like, resting heart rate's one a minute-

   26. WSWill Storr51:17

       (laughs)

   27. CWChris Williamson51:18

       ... and your heart rate variability is 3,000 or something-

   28. WSWill Storr51:20

       Yeah.

   29. CWChris Williamson51:20

       ... that's the only way that you can do it. And it's kind of the same with status, that the only way to assuage our feelings of not having the right amount of status is to continually grow, which obviously, I guess, lends itself perfectly to a meritocracy, where you are what you do-

   30. WSWill Storr51:37

       Yeah.
9. 54:15 – 1:05:58

   Status Games in Cancel Culture

   1. WSWill Storr54:15

      it, it's very, ver- very much so. I mean, I mean, you know, uh, the int- internet mobs, I think, are, um, a, a dominance virtue game. It's about threat, it's about, um, coercion, it's about, "You will follow the rules of my status game." And respecting-

   2. CWChris Williamson54:27

      Also, virtue signaling on the side of the-

   3. WSWill Storr54:30

      Yeah.

   4. CWChris Williamson54:30

      ... of the canceler as well.

   5. WSWill Storr54:31

      Absolutely, yeah. A- a- a- a- and, and, and yeah, and I, I think one of the- I think probably the m- the most interesting thing, the, the, the, the idea that really made sense of cancel culture for me was this idea called the tyranny of the cousins. Um, and, and, in th- the chapter about internet mobs is called The Tyranny of the Cousins, and this was a real surprise to me. So, so, so it's this idea that, that, that the groups in which we evolved very often, not always, but very often, didn't have, like, a big leader, a big man leader at the top who was in charge. And, you know, that was really surprising to me because when you look at human life today, there's leaders everywhere. You know, we, we seem to love leaders. But, but there weren't, and, and so there, there was no sort of big single leader that was in charge of everything. Instead, there would be sort of a, a group of, you know, elders or kind of high-status... They were relatively egalitarian groups, but relatively high-status people that would gather together to make decisions at certain times. Um, a- and, you know, c- c- a- according to their specialism, you know, different people might have, you know, different kinds of sway. But it's very much about, um, you know, these, th- th- these early human groups, these pre-modern groups are very much about consensus or the illusion of consensus. And, and so, so that happens when people break, breaks the rules of the group. You know, it wasn't like somebody would decide, "You're gonna be punished." It was just this sense of consensus would gather against this person, and it would be an atmosphere of, of, of gossip, people telling nasty stories about him, um, a- and, and, and that would, that would create moral outrage, and more moral outrage would, would create more consensus, and it would build up and build up and build up until it, you know, in, in the case in which I sort of describe in the book, this poor bastard, um, was accused of, um, using sorcery to kill somebody and he was killed and eaten. Yeah. And so... And, and so that's exactly what you see, you know, that is exactly what you see on social media. No one's in charge of a cancel culture mob. No one can start it, no one can stop it. It's something that, that, that, that builds itself up in an atmosphere of accusation, gossip, and consensus, and it just... And it, and it, and it kind of fires at, at this person. And so, so, so, you know, the, the, the tyranny of the cousins is, is about this idea that, that, y- you know, when we were evolving in those groups, um, we weren't under the kind of fear of the tyranny of leaders. We were... It was the fear of the tyranny of these cousins. And they weren't literal cousins, but there were these ideas that these closely, you know, the, the, the, these, these tribal elders that would sort of lead and sort of whisper to each other and l- and, and, and try and make this consensus happen. And, you know, it's extraordinary how I c- I could compare kind of a modern mobbing to a, a, a deadly mobbing in, I think it was the Gabusi tribe in, in Papua New Guinea, and, and some of the details are sort of hauntingly, um, similar in, in, I- in what happens i- in these incidents. You know, the victims... I- in a state of panic, uh, w- when they realize what's happening. I- i- you know, dancing between con- you know, defending themselves or being too scared to defend themselves and then sort of semi-confessing but then not because they didn't actually bloody do anything. And, you know, you see this in the Gabusi and you see this in, you know, victims of cancel culture.

   6. CWChris Williamson57:30

      You also looked at the first-ever social media network thing from the internet ages ago, and there was echoes of exactly what we're seeing now there and it's just a reminder that perhaps technology's removed the friction and it's made it more expedited that we can do this. It's quicker and it's more aggressive and there's more fragmented groups, ingroups and outgroups, that are playing status games against each other because of that frictionlessness, but it's nothing new. You know, to blame... And this was something that was a tough pill for me to swallow because I think that human nature... I like to think that human nature's fundamentally virtuous and good, and it's an easy out to blame the ills that we're seeing at the moment on algorithms and, and social media, but... They may magnify, but the, the fundamental of where these impulses came from is our nature, right?

   7. WSWill Storr58:22

      Yeah, absolutely. And, uh, yeah, this was a big lesson I learned, again, when I was researching Selfie, and that was all about, you know, the, the, the kind of, the narcissism of social media and where that came from. And, and one of the big sort of turning points of understanding for me in there was the idea of the selfie camera and, you know, the, the, the idea was that, you know, um, the, the, the technologists. See, it's Steve Jobs' fault and it's, you know, Google's fault for, for selfie culture because they put these cameras on the phones. But, you know, the original selfie cameras weren't called selfie cameras, they were called front-facing cameras and what Apple and the other companies thought they'd be good for were business meetings and for talking to your nan, but that's not what we did with them. You know, we started taking pictures of ourselves, you know, mostly. Um, so, so, you know, uh, you know, Silicon Valley are constantly throwing ideas at us, you know, 99.99% of those ideas get rejected and a tiny amount of them get, get picked up, and it's the people, it's human beings that decide which Silicon Valley technologies are successful and those, and those companies then, you know, tune their platforms and devices around what we want. And, you know, what I found in Selfie is exactly the same as what I found when I was researching the status game and social media. It's that you can't blame Mark Zuckerberg or Jack Dorsey for, um, cancel culture. Um, yeah, the, the, the first kind of social media site as we would recognize it today was, was The WELL, um, which was back in the, you know, formed back in the 1980s, still when people were having to do that thing with their phones like off WarGames. I don't know what it is. A modem. So, so, it was a very small group and, and when it got to about, about 500 users... So The WELL was a bit like Reddit. So it was, the i- the idea was like, um, people... It was mostly people in, in California. They, they would gather around at little interest groups and they would just play little status games, talking about, you know, wine or the, you know, eco stuff or whatever it was. And when it, when it got to about, um, 500, this sort of, this individual arrived who just basically hated men and was just, you know, firing off all this anti-male invective constantly. And, you know, and, and, and they kind of mobbed around this person, got them kicked off the platform eventually, deleted as many of their, this person's, um-... um, uh, entries-

   8. CWChris Williamson1:00:36

      Oh, those, totally. Yeah.

   9. WSWill Storr1:00:36

      ... as possible. Yeah. So, so, so it was all there. And, and this person was gender nonconformist, so biologically female, didn't identify as man, but, but used male pronouns and used a male name, so, um, slightly complicated. But I just thought it was extraordinary that in 1986, there was cancel culture, (laughs) they were arguing about pronouns, you know, all the stuff that we see today and that we, you know, we tend to bl- we often blame on Mark Zuckerberg or Jack Dorsey, happened in the very first social media website. And to me, that just shows, you know, what is Twitter? It's status games. You bring people together, you connect them into communities, they start competing for status and, you know, w- with each other and against, you know, game versus game. And that's what... That, that... And so, and, you know, and when that started working for Twitter, of course they, they molded their technology around these things, but they didn't create it. It, it was inevitably what was gonna happen, you know. Uh, uh, quite this, this, you know, one of the other things I wrote about in Selfie and also in this book is it's this kind of utopian technologist idea, the Wired, you know, magazine ideas from the '90s and the early 2000s, the, the, the vision of the internet, which is when you connect, uh, everybody together, it's gonna be this utopia. No hierarchy, no disagreement, everybody getting on together. And it's just the opposite of what happened. (laughs) And it's the opposite of what happened because it's human nature, (laughs) you know, that's what we do, you know, for good and for ill, that's what we do.

   10. CWChris Williamson1:01:57

       As individuals, is it, is it low-status behavior to talk openly about status? Like is acknowledging status motives a low-status signal?

   11. WSWill Storr1:02:11

       Yeah. That, that's a really weird one. I- it obviously is. You know, people, people don't like to think, um, uh, of themselves as, a- a- as only, "I only do this for status." It's a terrible... You know, w- w- we readily recognize it in our enemies, but w- but we, we hate recognizing it in ourselves. And, you know, uh, uh, and I think, you know, there's th- th- th- it's, it's really this idea of the storytelling brain. Y- you know, i- if the subconscious truth of us is that we just all outgoing for connection and status, um, as well as those other drives, you know, sex, food, you know, all that other stuff. Um-

   12. CWChris Williamson1:02:43

       Enabled by status.

   13. WSWill Storr1:02:44

       Yeah. The, the, the, um... Or, yeah, or, yeah. Ex- yes. A- a- and, um, the, the, the kinda conscious experience of life we have is, isn't that. We tell this heroic story about ourselves. And, you know, so, so i- i- in several books, I've talked about the idea of the brain as the hero maker. I- it takes all the messy realities of our day-to-day life and conjures this heroic story of self, um, uh, uh, that, that explains who we are in, in the best possible light. And, you know, there... And, and increasingly, the way I've, I've come to see that kind of story is, is it's almost like a sales pitch to both, to, to, to, to the people with whom you share your life, you know. You really believe it's true, um, you've got all these biases and prejudices which, which distort reality. You know, we even misremember our past in such a way that makes us feel more heroic. Um, so, so, so, so I, I think it's that k- kinda sales pitch, that story th- th- th- th- that is actually the conscious experience, is so resistant to this idea of status, because it doesn't want to think of ourselves as that. It's a hero maker. It wants to say, "No, I want to change the world. I wanna... I'm just... I'm a good person. I am, I am better than everybody else." It's not, you know... It's, it's, it's so... Um, so, so yeah, I think, I, I think that's why there's this disconnect. You know, it's this, it's this, it's this unpleasant subconscious truth, I think, in a way.

   14. CWChris Williamson1:04:03

       Did you have a look at which occupations are the most and the least anxious around status?

   15. WSWill Storr1:04:10

       I didn't. I didn't see any data o- on that. Um, I, I... No, I didn't. Uh, anxious about status? No. I mean-

   16. CWChris Williamson1:04:18

       Or just the most sort of status anxiety, I suppose, 'cause if you think about... I mean, politics is, as far as I can see, almost exclusively that. Like it's all image and schmooze and connections and... Yeah, this is one of the things that I think that, that behind the scenes of, you know, The West Wing or Whitehall or whatever, these people must be just frantic, terrified, perpetually, constantly playing this sort of very political, by nature, back-biting-y status game.

   17. WSWill Storr1:04:52

       Yeah, I suppose that's why politics is so fascinating and makes us for great stories, 'cause people's status is so fragile in the world of politics. And, you know, again, you see, you know, why politics is such a vicious world, bec- simply because status is incredibly fragile and it can be taken from you at any moment and there's a sense of people plotting against you. So, so yeah, I, I'd never thought of that, but that's a really interesting point. Yeah, I, I, I think that's right. I mean, the, the one profession I do write about in, in the book is the legal profession, 'cause I found this incredible paper by this former lawyer and now judge. Uh, he wrote this paper basically addressing young, you know, young lawyers who'd just left l- you know, law school and were going into their, their bi- their big name law firms, and he basically said to them, "By the way, you're gonna become... Within two years, you're gonna become corrupt. Every day, you're gonna be making corrupt decisions, you're gonna be lying, you're gonna be stealing, and this is why." And the paper was basically, um, you know, a description of the status game. He was saying that, you know, by, by the, by the very fact that you're a, you're a lawyer and you've been through law school, you're an incredibly competitive person, um, and now you're in a new game, and that game is measured by money. And

10. 1:05:58 – 1:11:23

    Is There an Exit?

    1. WSWill Storr1:05:58

       you're gonna become obsessed with money, because every six months, the legal journals print, uh, this league table about who's earning what and you're gonna pore over those league tables. But the problem is, you're gonna be working as hard as it's possible to work. You know, lawyers are really unhappy people. There's a high divorce rate, high alcoholism, high drug abuse, terrible working hours. So given the fact that you're incredibly competitive, you're playing a game in which money is your status symbol, and, um, you're work- you're already working as hard as it's possible to work, what are you gonna do to get ahead? Well, what you're gonna do is you're gonna start double billing, you're gonna start accidentally losing documents which are unhelpful to your, (laughs) um, new client, you know, and so on and so on. And he said... He was perfectly, perfectly honest. "It happened to... It's gonna happen to you 'cause it... And it happened to me." You know, so, so, so, you know, I, I think the legal... The, the, the, the, you know, the, the ma- you know, the big name legal profession, I think, is just an insanely intense...... status game by, by, by the evidence of that paper.

    2. CWChris Williamson1:06:54

       Is it possible to exit the status game then?

    3. WSWill Storr1:06:57

       No, I, it, it isn't. It really isn't. Um, but, but it is possible to play different games, you know? Uh, and so one of the, sort of, really funny studies that I, that, that I came upon was, was this one that looked at meditation and, uh, you know, 'cause we often hear from the- these kind of wellness people that say, "Oh, no, well, you know, I used to be really int- interested in ego, but now I do mindfulness meditation." And so they, they studied, um, 3,700 meditators, and these meditators were specifically chosen, that the ones that were meditating, they were, were practice was about ego, needs, and, you know, success, and status, and they found that they measured very high in, in spiritual superiority, (laughs) you know? A- and it's just really funny because you know that's true. You know that when... And, you know, it would be as true of me as it's true of anyone, if you become really good at meditating, you start to feel really good about yourself. You start to think, "Ah, you know, I've got this insight that nobody else has got." You can't get away from it, you know? You, you can't do it. So, s- so, um, yeah, it's, um, y- y- y- I always remember in The- in The- in The Heretics, um, uh, oop- uh, one of my previous books, I, I went on a 10-day silent Vipassana retreat, really hardcore meditation. And, um, e- e- e- ev- every few hours, our meditation would be interrupted by this British... It was in Australia, this British guy would come in all his robes and whatnot, and he'd give us this talk. And, um, 'cause I, I, I was th- I wasn't good at, like, good at the job of meditating, so I had bad hi- my hips were killing me, so I'd, I was sitting with my feet facing him. And then on, on the second day, I think it was, I was pulled out and I was dr- you know, uh, uh, of the group and I was bollocked, I was told off because he was so offended by the si- by it, he said, you know, "Showing me the soles of your feet is very rude." And I just thought, "Man, you're supposed to be Mr. Enlightenment, right?" (laughs) Like, "You're supposed to be the guru here and you, you've just really shamed me and embarrassed me because y- you know, the sight of my feet was so..." You know, he's just ridiculous, you know, the whole thing.

    4. CWChris Williamson1:08:55

       (laughs)

    5. WSWill Storr1:08:55

       Like, it's just ridiculous. (laughs) Like, it was comical th- th- that he was so chippy about his status that, that's what he did. So, so yeah, I mean, and the only people, the other people apart from meditators who try are the hikikomori in Japan, of course, who feel that they can't connect-

    6. CWChris Williamson1:09:08

       What are they?

    7. WSWill Storr1:09:09

       Th- th- they're the shutaways who, who refuse to leave their bedrooms and when you look at, um, uh, you know, at hi- th- the beliefs of the average hikikomori, you know, they, they cohere very closely with what we describe as the status game. They say that we are, you know, "I find it impossible to connect with other people. Nobody values me," so they just shut themselves away in their bedrooms and that's the only feasible way you can separate yourself from the status game, really, in a sense, is by separating yourself from other people, but you've still got that imaginary audience in your head that's judging you all the time, and probably not judging you very well.

    8. CWChris Williamson1:09:38

       There'll still be shame and guilt.

    9. WSWill Storr1:09:39

       Yeah, exactly, so you, you can't... But what you can do are play different games. You know, if one game isn't working out for you, you know, you, you can go and play a different game. And also, you know, uh, in the end of the book, I, you know, I advise a few things and one of them is to play a hierarchy of games. You don't wanna play just one game 'cause, because people who play one game are in a cult, and that's the definition of a cult. It's like, it's a status game that's completely exclusive. You're not allowed to get your connection and status from anywhere else, not your job, not your family, not your friends, it's us and us alone and, and in, you know, when one group is your sole source of status, you're highly at risk of, of irrational, um, belief, irrational behavior. So cults, you know, fundamentalist religious groups, ext- you know, fundamentalist, you know, political groups, you know, on the left and on the right, you know, if these people are sourcing their connection and status from just one source, um, they're very liable to start believing, sort of, crazy things and, and behaving in damaging ways. And it's dangerous for them too because if they're kicked out of the group, or if the group kind of fails in some way, their whole sense of self fails because they have nothing. Their s- you, you know, your sense of self is bound up in the games that you're playing. You are the games that you play. So, so the answer, but then the answer isn't to play lots and lots of games equally because to, to, to, to re- you know, status games are hard and to, and to, and to, and to actually earn status in a status game takes effort and time and, um, application. So I think the idea is to play a hierarchy of games, really, is to have one main game, uh, that, that, that, to which you devote most of your time but then have, you know, a few other ones in this kind of hierarchy so you've always got that kind of... You've got, you've got different versions of self, different versions of you who are earning status in various different ways, and you're kind of... It's like a hedge, a hedging thing.

Episode duration: 1:15:08