EVERY SPOKEN WORD
105 min read · 20,923 words- 0:00 – 6:03
What’s Happening in Mainstream Academia?
- CWChris Williamson
It seems like you're throwing yourself into the thick of it here. You're pushing back against a lot of ideas that are very popular in your industry of mainstream media. Does it feel like a bit of a war zone?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Uh, sometimes it does. Uh, i- it seems like, um, the more commonsensical I get, the more I rattle people's cages, but that's okay. I'm used to it.
- CWChris Williamson
I saw a study recently of Illinois public schools in 2022 that found zero students passed the state math proficiency test at 53 public schools, almost all of whom are majority Black, and at one school, which is a prep school designed to prepare students for their medical careers, the per student spending's $47,000. For reading, it's only 30 schools, and only one out of 10 kids, or less, can do math at a grade level in 930 schools, which is more than a quarter of all of the schools in the state. What do you think's happening with academia?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, that's a complex question that, uh, requires a complex answer, but I can tell you the result of it is as a country, we are certainly not leading, uh, academically the way we have in the past, whether it's math, science, reading, uh, whatever. We're just simply not, uh, leading the charge, and I can add to what you s- said by saying that nationally, uh, over 30% of fifth graders can't read at the most basic level. Uh, 30% of eighth graders can't read at the most basic level. But what's happening is they're continuing to get passed on to the next grade and the next grade and the next grade, and that's happening, I guess, 'cause they get paid for passing the kids, moving on to the next grade. Uh, but I mean, if you're not reading on grade, on grade level at the third or fourth grade, your chance of dropping out before you graduate goes up, uh, like four times normal. Uh, and if i- if... A- and there are some groups that it goes up six times normal. So if we can't at least get these kids reading, we're in a lot of trouble educationally in this country, and it doesn't seem like anybody's got a good plan to do anything about it because it's being acknowledged, um, kind of superficially, but nobody does anything about it.
- CWChris Williamson
Well, kids are going to school unless there's some secret attendance rate changes that I've not seen. Kids are attending, you know, from whatever it is, 9:00 AM until 3:30 PM. They are in classrooms with a teacher, and the teacher is saying things to them. I don't understand what is happening if basic reading and maths competence isn't being met.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, a lot of these school systems have adopted programs (clears throat) of, of teaching subject matters that just simply didn't work, and there was no empirical data to suggest that it would work, but yet they spent millions and millions of dollars on these teaching programs that just simply don't work. Uh, but they've embraced them. They've spent money on them. They put time into them, uh, but they're not yielding the results. And-
- CWChris Williamson
What, what are these, what are these programs? What are they?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, they're programs that they buy commercially. Somebody comes up and they said, "Okay, we're gonna, you know, we're gonna take this approach to teaching reading," you know, whether it's phonetics here, or it's another word structure here, or it's a, it's a math approach here, and you have to look at this stuff, uh, to see, okay, we have a competency level when we start. Then you get to the other end and you say, "All right, let's check competency and see how much they've gained in terms of competency on an objective test, not one administered by the vendor, but on an objective test. How much competency have they gained? How much have they mastered, uh, the subject matter?" And if it's, if it's not a substantial increase, then they need to do something different. And when you talk about Illinois and they're using the state test, and it's not showing, uh, competency with these kids, you can't continue to do the same thing. And, you know, there are a lot of these programs out there that just simply aren't showing competency from state to state. Um, and they need to change. They need to do something different. Now, one of the things that I'm concerned about is when COVID hit, um, there were some really bad decisions made that created bad results mentally, emotionally, developmentally, socially, educationally, um, that those gaps have not been closed. Some progress has been made, but not near enough to close that gap. So if they weren't doing great to begin with, and then they shut the schools down for two years and create a gap, and that gap hasn't been closed, now you've got kids that are gonna really be frustrated in being behind a curriculum, and so they wind up being demotivated, and I- I- I think it was a bad decision to shut it down the way they shut it down. I said so at the time. I say so now, and I think we're gonna pay the price for that. This generation is gonna be behind, uh, for their entire life if something doesn't happen to close the gap.
- 6:03 – 13:33
The Unintended Consequences of Technology
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. You say that trends that we're seeing aren't the result of society's natural evolution, but they've been unquestioningly designed to undermine our society in general and the family unit in particular. If that's right, who is designing them?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, i- it depends on which area you're talking about. Uh, let's talk about, for example, uh, both un- unintended consequences and intended consequences. Um, I think, for example, if we recognize that right now, um, we're seeing a generation that is dealing with the internet, the technology of the smartphone, the technology of, um, you know, iPads and access to information that a generation ago simply wasn't there. Now, some of this is by design. Some of it is unintended consequences. Um, e- for example, I started The Dr. Phil Show in 2002. Uh, I started being on television, uh, s- several years before that. But when I started The Dr. Phil Show, the first text message had never been sent. There just, there weren't any text messages. It just, it wasn't a thing. They didn't do that. Now, think how much things have changed since then because about '08, '09, uh, it's like big airplanes flew over the United States and just dropped smartphones on this society. And I think that was the biggest change, uh, in- i- in the human race since the Industrial Revolution. Think about what happened with the In- Industrial Revolution. Up until that point, we were very much an agricultural society, right? We farmed, we made, we- we grew the foods that we ate, and that was the cycle. And so like 95% of society, uh, was agricultural. Okay. Then you move forward 25 years and maybe it's dropped now, but then when the Industrial Revolution hit, everything got mechanized. People moved into the city and a lot of changes took place. Nothing has changed the human race like that until the advent of the internet and the smartphone. And when that smartphone hit and we're walking around with computers in our hands, what happened? Everybody went from walking around like this to walking around like this. And young people stopped living their lives and started watching other people live their lives. And something happened when that occurred. They started comparing their lives to the lives they were watching lived out on the internet, on social media platforms and so they started comparing themselves. What they didn't realize is the lives they were watching were fiction. They were fantasies. These influencers that we have, and I- I can't tell you how many I've had on that say, "Yeah, I'll post things up and say, 'Okay, I'm gonna wear this, I'm gonna wear that, and I'm going to the NBA All-Star Game tonight and I'm doing this and I'm doing that.'" They put all those clothes on, they take all those videos, they post them all up. Then they take those clothes off, they take them back to the store and get a refund 'cause they couldn't afford to buy them to begin with. They aren't going to the NBA- NBA All-Star Game to beg- to start with. That's just all a fiction. So this kid's sitting home watching like, "You know, uh, who am, I'm nothing. I'm not going to any All-Star game. I don't have those kind of clothes." And so their self-esteem takes a beating and they're comparing it to somebody that's doing the same damn thing they're doing, which is sitting home in a beanbag eating Cheetos.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
They're doing the same thing this other person is. But they don't know that because they're 16. So their self-esteem takes a beating, their self-worth takes a beating, and they don't have friends because they're watching lives lived instead of living their own. You know, the average teenager has like one or less really good friend because their lives are being lived virtually. Okay. So, you know, that's maybe an unintended consequence. You said, "Okay, so who is it that's got these conspiracies that are after us?" Well, let's look at the social media companies, for example. Uh, people know that their kids spend too much time on social media. What they don't know is that those are driven by algorithms and those algorithms are feeding these children content that is designed to upset them. They're not giving them content they want to see. They're not giving them content that uplifts them. They're giving them content that upsets them mentally and emotionally. Why? Because that gets them clicking more. And the more they click, the longer they're on. The longer they're on, the more ads they can run by them. The more ads they run by them, the more shared rev they have. So there have been studies done where they'll put a 13-year-old girl up 'cause it meets the requirements and they'll just put her name up and within minutes, she's getting toxic content about losing weight or doing this or doing that. They'll put the same profile up and in the description they'll say, "Weight loss." And the amount of toxic content that algorithm feeds her goes up six times, eight times, 10 times as much. She starts getting feedback about 400 calorie diets. She starts getting anorexia sites. She starts getting all kinds of things fed at her-... and she starts click, click, click because it's making her anxious and upset. Now that is by design and there's no consideration for the welfare of the child who they know it creates anxiety, it creates depression, and it gets the kid hooked in and now they're addicted to the content, they're addicted to the phone. It pulls them away from their family and the longer they're on there, the more susceptible they are to predators, the more susceptible they are to these other influences and, you know, that's eroding the overall fiber of the family. So all of these things combined, uh, you've got people that they start dating later, they start driving later, they... All the things that we did a- at a younger age. When I was 15, uh, years old, 355 days and 23 hours-
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
... I was down at the DMV waiting to get my driver's license. Now they're not in any big hurry 'cause they're not really engaged in the world. That's not a good thing.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, it seems
- 13:33 – 17:55
Young People Are Becoming Less Patriotic
- CWChris Williamson
like most of the information that people get on the internet at the moment is built not to teach them about the world or tell them anything that's true, but to just be the most viral, mimetically absorbable messaging that they can. And what you see with this is messages that are the most viral are the ones that go the furthest, not the ones that are the most accurate. A good example of this would be, uh, America is a bad country. It's- it's uniquely cursed or toxic or- or malign in some way and you put a really interesting study up about patriotism on the decline, and that's just falling through the floor. It's like a tiny- a tiny amount compared to... It's like half, less than half of what it was only a short while ago.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Yeah, and- and that's shocking. Uh, I mean, uh, that's- that's shocking and- and that's troubling to me because I love this country. I mean, I- I really do. Is it perfect? Of course not. I mean, we've- we've got things we need to work on, but I- I love this country and I love it enough to acknowledge that there are problems with it. Um, (clears throat) but there are things that we need... We need to acknowledge them in order to work on them, uh, but there are things that you put on your to-do list. It's not things that you reject the entire American experiment because it's not perfect. It's just things you put on your to-do list, things that you want to do a better job of. Um, but, uh, you know, I've said that I think a lot of these elite universities right now are not teaching critical thinking. Um, you- you've got a lot of this ideology that is... It sounds to me a lot like socialism. Sounds to me a lot like Marxism. Um, teaching that we're- that we're gonna be successful when we have equality of outcome. That's insane. Uh, you're gonna... You're never gonna have equality of outcome because you have different, uh, qualities of input. You have some people that work hard, you have some people that don't. You have some people that are smart and talented, you have some people that aren't. You have different levels of input, you're gonna have different quality of outcome and when you've got universities that are teaching, which seems to me to be astoundingly hypocritical, y- you've got elite universities that are charging hundreds of thousands of dollars for an elite education and then they're teaching that there should be equality of outcome. Well, if that's true, why am I paying you hundreds of thousands of dollars for an elite education?
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
If we're all supposed to come out the same, then what the hell I need to be paying you all this for? Uh, I can just go hang out on the corner and we're all gonna s- get the same thing. What do I need to be paying you this for? Um...
- CWChris Williamson
Well, the universities definitely seem to be good at teaching students to be victims or that getting their feelings hurt by words and being injured by something that someone said to you should be a big deal.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Yeah, and they're medicalizing those feelings. You know, we used to get our feelings hurt, so okay, sticks and stones will break my bones, but words will never hurt me. But now they've medicalized that. So when they say, "Okay, this professor asked me to write a paper that's contrary to my value system and I'm offended, so I've now entered the offendedness sweepstakes and I'm telling you that that's, uh, mentally and emotionally hurt me." So it's like the intentional infliction of emotional distress. You go file that complaint with the dean's office, they've now got to deal with that and so we've had more professors fired and disciplined in the last several years than we've had since the McCarthy era because the students have learned how to word all of this in such a way that it has to be dealt with because if a student, um, commits suicide or hurts themselves in some way and the university didn't deal with it, now they have a liability problem. So professors are getting caught up in that. Now some of 'em are jerks. Uh, you know, some professors do jerky things and probably need to be, but not as many as we're seeing now.
- 17:55 – 26:34
Why Glorifying Victimhood is So Dangerous
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. It's very interesting what happens when the bar stool gets flipped upside down. So typically in society what you want is someone's reputation and their status to be associated with their competence and this is because people who are competent are valuable because they can do things, and that... The whole gamut of all of the different things that people can do. That is constrained by your ability to do something in reality. You can't fake being more competent than you are because people will just say, "Well, show me. Show me this degree of competence." But...... if status is afforded to the people who are the biggest victims, you can fake... Th- there is a bottomless pit of how low you can go with claiming victimhood. "Well, this is the degree of psychological distress that I've gone through." "This is the amount of trauma that I've suffered." "This is the amount of..." whatever it is. Two things happen there. First off, it create- creates a very dangerous slippery slope status game because people can continue to just one-up each other and make claims that aren't ever checked in the real world. And the second thing is, people who actually do go through difficult times, they're part of a larger group of people most of whom are made up of those that haven't actually been through something that justifies it. You are lumping in together people who have been through really difficult times with people who just want to feel special.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Yeah. And i- and it is a race. I mean, you, you, you described it. I mean, people are truly in a victimhood mindset, and it's kind of like, "Well, I can outdo you because I have this status, I'm... I- I- I have this claim that I can make. I came from this, this background, or I have this ethnicity, or I have this in my, uh, i- in my family background or whatever." And if, if you start considering this and you start changing your yardstick, um, you're in a lot of trouble. Because I, I can tell you, if, if we start lowering standards and there are some schools that grade someone on math, for example, uh, based on their willingness to learn it, their interest in learning it. Uh...
- CWChris Williamson
What, what does that even mean?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, I, I've had an interesting conversation about that recently. Um, there was a professor that I, I, I won't name. I'll let him do that if he wants to. Uh, but he was talking about teaching Black students, and he is Black, uh, standard English, and he caught all kinds of hell for it because they said he was being oppressive. And he said, "No, no, I, I, I'm not wanting to replace the way they communicate. I'm wanting to add to it." The, the... You know, they can talk in the way that they are in their neighborhoods and in the way they've been brought up. I just wanna add a layer on that, because if they go out into the world and they try to compete for jobs, they're going to need to speak the language of where they go." And h- he caught hell for that. And then they were talking about relative math scoring, and they were saying, "You, you have to grade them on their interest in learning it. If, if they don't care about it, then you can't grade them on the same standard as someone that's interested in it." Um, well, that is absurd to me, and, uh... Look, I don't want to get on an airliner and be flown by a pilot where they lowered the standard because they didn't have the background to master the skill set. I don't want to have brain surgery by someone who they lowered the standard for anatomy and physiology courses because they didn't get the proper background to prepare them for it, and they just fired an NYU professor after 20 or 30 years because the students were whining that the course was too hard. I don't want to be operated on by these... This was a pre-med course. I don't want to be operated on by someone who complained that the course was too hard, so they fired the professor and brought in some hack that didn't require them to know everything they needed to know about brain structure, so now, uh, th- they're a resident and they're gonna do brain surgery on me. No, thank you.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs) Yeah, well, th-
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Uh, I don't wanna do... I don't want somebody fighting a fire at my house that they lowered the standard on firefighting techniques because they didn't have all the opportunities as a child. I'm sorry, that's just not how you get by in this world.
- CWChris Williamson
The problem is that academia and the qualifications and the s- standards that people are brought to in academia are malleable. They can continue to be moved. The A, the B, the C, all of this stuff can be positioned around to retrofit the desire, the motivation, the skillsets, the ability of the school. The problem is when you get into the real world, that bridge either stays up or it doesn't, and that plane either stays in the sky or it doesn't, and that brain surgery is either a success or it isn't. So yeah, you can continue to manipulate the standards to which students are being held up until the point at which they get into the real world, and as you say, you end up with some pretty, some pretty squirrelly outcomes.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Yeah, and the problem with that is th- these kids are being taught that it is relative. It's not relative. You get out into the competitive world, it's like... Uh, you know, I grew up in athletics. It didn't matter who your parents were, it didn't matter what neighborhood you came from. They were interested in who could jump highest, who could run fastest, and who could knock somebody on their ass. That's what they were interested in. They didn't care about anything else. It didn't, it didn't matter. Um, i- i- that's wh- and that's why, that's what I loved about athletics. It, it didn't matter how much money you had or who your parents were. It just mattered who could get the job done on a given day. And that was a real equalizer for me because we were really poor, and when I stepped onto that field, it didn't matter anymore.... a everybody was the same. You all started out the same and that was a great equalizer. And I, and I think that's great. And these kids who don't have, they don't show up having had the same experiences to get them ready, uh, for admission to that school, uh, if you're gonna fix that problem, you need to go back at the beginning and fix that from pre-K forward. Uh, they might be in a neighborhood where the tax base is really low, so they don't get good schools, they don't get good resources, they don't good, get good teachers. That's where you need to fix that. You don't lower the standards when they get there. You go help those kids from the beginning, so when they show up, they are competitive. You know, all these schools have dropped the SAT now 'cause they say it's racially biased. The research says that's not true. The research says that SAT is an opportunity for those gifted kids in the inner city, independent of their grades, to show that they in fact are gifted. And it's the one thing that can lift them out of that and put them into that school because it shows their native intelligence. But the schools won't re-implement it because they will be judged if they do. And they're more interested in virtue signaling than they are actually helping those underprivileged kids. That's the one thing that can pole vault them right back into that school even if they don't have the grades. They have the native intelligence, the en- the motivation, and the learning ability, uh, but they won't use the SAT because they're virtue signaling and it's on the no good list.
- CWChris Williamson
Well, it tells you everything you need to know that the SATs have been stopped, but legacy admissions haven't.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Right. And research is very clear. The SAT helps those underprivileged kids because it identifies those that have the brain power to jump up to that level.
- CWChris Williamson
What's the problem with
- 26:34 – 33:47
The Problem With Inclusive Language
- CWChris Williamson
inclusive language?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, it's, it's gotten to the point of being ridiculous. Um, that, i- i- there's, um, there, there are some of these, you, you, you can't, um ... They're trying to ... so hard to not offend the victim class, so we can't say "women" anymore. We've got to say "bodies with vaginas." You can't say "hip hip hooray" anymore, uh, because it could offend people with a hip injury.
- CWChris Williamson
You're kidding.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Uh, no.
- CWChris Williamson
That's not a, that's not a thing. That's not a thing.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
It is a thing.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs) That's not a thing.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
You can't have an admissions office at some universities now. You have to call it "office of enrollment management." Why? Because if you say admissions office, that suggests somebody's going to be rejected, so it's now has to be called-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
... uh, office of enrollment management.
- CWChris Williamson
Oh my God.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
You can't now say, you, you can't now say "rapist" or "murder suspect" or "convicted murderer." You have to say "justice involved person." So you weren't raped, you were involved with a justice involved person.
- CWChris Williamson
Injustice involved person, perhaps. Justice ... this is wild.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
You can't say, you can't say "minority" anymore. You have to say "historically excluded." Um-
- CWChris Williamson
I imagine the research for this book must've just been thrilling, going through-
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Oh, oh my God, uh, "bodies with vaginas," "birthing people." Um, here's a good one for you-
- CWChris Williamson
But how widespread a- okay.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Here's a good one for you: nibbling.
- CWChris Williamson
Like, the edge of a biscuit.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
No. Nibbling is a gender-neutral term for your nieces and nephews. It's-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
... it sounds like sibling but it's nibbling.
- CWChris Williamson
Wow.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Um, and lunch and learn. You used to brown bag, can't brown bag anymore. It's lunch and learn.
- CWChris Williamson
I don't even know what that is. But it, no mat- no matter what it is, the, how, just how widespread is this? Because we, I've seen these articles, I've seen these, uh, pieces about the insane new word that we need, we, the, the, the menstruating people or the, the, the humans with smaller feet or whatever it is that you need to kind of repurpose. But just how widespread is this? Are these isolated incidents? What, how big of a problem is it?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, (clears throat) um, it's pretty widespread in universities and Fortune 500 corporations. You know, that's the problem. Uh, Chris, you get into, um, you know, I'm, I, I spent 21 years on the air at CBS and I'm still involved with CBS. I have, um, a primetime show on Thursday nights at nine o'clock, um, So Help Me Todd. We've got another one in pre-production now, um, for their Paramount+. We've got, um, uh, other dramas and, and all that we work on with them, and, um, they air a lot of my Library episodes, uh, still, so I'm, I'm still in business with them. But, uh, you, they have language police. I mean, it's ...... words you can't say, words you need to say. Uh, they sign their letters with pronouns. Um, it's y- y- the things that you y- y- you can no longer say "America is the land of opportunity." You can no longer say, "The most qualified person should get the job." Because those trigger people that might not be the most qualified, so you can't upset them. Uh, and this is pretty rampant in major corporations and universities, uh, just like trigger warnings. And y- you know, you, you asked me earlier, you said, "Well, you know, who is it that's pushing this?" Well, I'm telling you who's pushing it. It's, it's, it's cr- it's virtue signaling corporations and universities. Um, and they're the ones that are shaping, uh, the minds of our young people and hiring them with expectations. Uh, I, I, I know a university professor that got a 90-day suspension, I believe without pay, uh, because he was talking to a student that came up with a, or was discussing a project and the, the project design and he said, "No, that's kinda lame. I don't think we should do that." The fact that he used the word lame, got suspended for 90 days.
- CWChris Williamson
(sighs) It makes me so uncomfortable because I, again, I've read these news articles online but it almost feels like fiction. It feels like some crazy outlier event that's not a big deal and I don't know anybody that's been a part of this, and yet you've been exposed to them, you've had conversations with them. You've seen it firsthand in your own industry and I guess, you know, my two worlds have been promoting night clubs and doing a podcast. They may be the two final frontiers of free speech because no one in the front door of a nightclub or on a podcast really cares all that much about trigger warnings. So, to me it hasn't entered my sphere. It almost seems like a fantasy and yet you're saying that it's happening in the real world.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, I think it's something like 80% of the universities have engaged in trigger warnings. But you're not involved in it because you're entrepreneurial. Uh, you work for you and you don't hold yourself to that ridiculous yardstick, that ridiculous standard. Um, and when you're entrepreneurial you're focused on results, not virtue signaling. And that's a gr- (laughs) that's a great place to be, Chris. Uh, I know, I've been entrepreneurial all my life. So, um, i- but if you're in a, if you're in a corporation, um, and you got a bunch of board members and all that are really interested in signaling that they're really dialed in, i- i- it starts spreading and the universities are teaching this to our kids.
- CWChris Williamson
So,
- 33:47 – 42:31
How Much of These Issues Are Coordinated?
- CWChris Williamson
(sighs) a question that I've always had is how much of what we're seeing internally is coordination, it's part of some grand plan to try and take down America or to undo the will of the people or to confuse them or to make them feel like victims or narcissists or whatever it might be? How much of it is that and how much of it is just cowardice from people who don't want to lose their job, or just normal job anxiety? "Oh well, this is the new meta. This is the new meme that everybody needs to follow. This is toxic compassion or performative empathy and this is what I need to do in order to be able to keep my job. I don't wanna lose my job so I'll just comply." How much of it is coordination do you think and how much of it is job anxiety?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, I, I think these, these fringe activists, uh, are very coordinated. I think they use bot armies. I think they, uh, scare people and threaten people. And I think a lot of people are like, "Hey, it's a lot easier to just don't say anything. It's a lot easier to just keep my mouth shut, keep my head down and go on." But I tell you what, I think that, um, that pendulum is starting to swing back the other way and if you wonder if people are really buying into all of this, you can look and see how they vote when they can vote silently like with their wallet. Uh, you saw what happened at Target when they had the tuck-friendly, um, clothing f- for children. I mean up, right there for children to walk by. You saw what happened with Bud Light, uh, when they pushed the chan- transgender and I think most people, um, are like, "Hey, live and let live." If this person is transgender and that's what they wanna do, uh, wh- who am I to say what they should or shouldn't do? But when you start pushing the agenda and say, "It's not enough that you're okay with what I do, I need you to stand up and announce that you endorse this. It's not enough that you just live and let live, you gotta stand up and tell everybody that you endorse what I'm doing," then th- uh, they're, they're pushing to the point that people are gonna say, "Enough is enough and too much is too much. You don't get to tell me what I'm supposed to do. I, I don't, I don't need you to endorse what I'm doing and don't demand that I endorse what you're doing." And I think that a lot of these activists do not speak for who they say they represent-
- CWChris Williamson
This sounds-
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
... because I've had a lot of people in these groups that say, "They're not talking for me."
- CWChris Williamson
This sounds perilously close to what Jordan Peterson was warning everybody about six, seven, eight years ago even.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
... well, it- it is in that he was saying that the Canadian government is requiring that you use this language, and he was saying, "I will not be compelled by the government to say what you're gonna tell me I'm- I should say." And, uh, that's not happening here, and it's even worse, I think, because we do have freedom of speech with the First Amendment. We're muzzling each other. Th- I mean, this- uh, I feel like I'm in George Orwell's 1984 sometimes when I'm seeing us requiring each other to use certain language and certain words. We're doing it to each other. It's not the government coming in and stepping on our rights. It's we're- we're muzzling each other. We're requiring each other to do certain things, rather than allowing people to do what they wanna do.
- CWChris Williamson
What about the dangers of o- of rewriting as well?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, you know, they... (sighs) Uh, I- I've heard that referred to as woke-washing, and I've seen some of the books, like Huckleberry Finn, who have- which have been rewritten. Um, and, um, uh, it changes the meaning of the book so much that it- it... Uh, they- they change the book so much that the meaning of the book is changed, and the whole... My reading of the book was that it was a commentary on racism at the time. I mean, even when it was written, it- it was- it would certainly be a- a- a criticism of- of racism by today's standards. It was a criticism of it at the time, and- but they're gonna take that out? How are- how is a reader, a child that's reading that book, a teen that's reading that book, going to learn the lesson in the book if you take it out? I- I- I don't understand that. I- I- I- I don't get that. Um, it- it doesn't make sense to me, and I- I see them, uh, tearing down statues and changing the names on some of the schools because these people owned slaves. Well, you have to now say enslaved person. Um, 250 years ago. Well, you know what? That's something that I refer to in the book as presentism. Not my term. I- I learned it from someone else. Um, and that very simply is taking today's standards, mores, and folkways, and applying it to something that happened 250 years ago as though 250 years ago they were supposed to say, "Two centuries in the future, this is going to be different, so I need to foretell the future and hold myself to that standard." Was that abominable behavior? Yes, of course it was abominable behavior. Was it some- was it our proudest moment in American history? Of course it was. It was terrible. The way these people were treated and- and abused and sold, it was go- it was horrible. Do we wanna hide that from our- our- our children growing up now and learning the history of America? You can't hide that.
- CWChris Williamson
But that is the lesson.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
How are they gonna learn?
- CWChris Williamson
That is the lesson, right?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
The- uh, that is the lesson. I mean, th- they're- they're tearing down statues of- of people that crafted the Declaration of Independence. They- they're tearing down Lincoln, who wrote the... (sighs) Uh.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Uh, uh, it- it's more than I can take sometimes. Um, but presentism is like let's say there's a street in your neighborhood and the speed limit is- is 20, so you drive through there 20 for days and days and days, for months and months and months, and then they come along and say, "Well, we're gonna change it to 10." What do you think? There's a lot of kids have moved into the neighborhood. "We're gonna change it to 10." So they come and give you a retroactive ticket for driving 10 over. And you go, "Well wait a minute. The speed limit was 10 at the time... was 20 at the time." "Well, it's 10 now, so we're giving you retroactive tickets 'cause you were driving 20." "But it was 20 when I was doing 20." "I know, but it's 10 now. You should've known we were gonna change it to 10, so we're ticketing you for driving 20 when it was 20." That's what they're doing now. It's like, "We're gonna criticize you and tear down your statue because you were doing what was acceptable at the time, because it is not acceptable now." The- I...
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, judging- judging the people of yesterday by the standards of today, especially when the standards are moving unbelievably quickly, is never going to be a good idea. No one is able to live up to... In fact, very few people are able to live up to the standards of today from today. You know, there's even... I- I haven't seen a lot of conversations online that people from the trans community, the LGBT community, talking about some of the different ways that it can be confusing to understand pronouns, or it can be... Uh, I understand that it's challenging too. I get it wrong as well. It's like, look, if you, person who is supposed to be the arbiter of truth right now gets it wrong, there's no surprise that people would've gotten this wrong previously.
- 42:31 – 50:12
Are People Less Open-Minded Today?
- CWChris Williamson
The thing that's interesting or the trend that I think seems new, genuinely novel and new, is how cemented people are in their beliefs, how much less open they seem to be about changing their mind, that if they have a belief that is...... intrinsic to their sense of self. They hold onto it tightly. They do not want to change it. If they do, that's admitting failure and that's like destruction, and they can't deal with it. How much truth do you think there is in saying that people are less open-minded now than they were before?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, I think they're very entrenched. Uh, I think it's confirmation bias. They look for what, they look for what reinforces their existing belief, and they are really closed off to new information. Um, and, uh, and, you, you said it very well when you said it's ch- it's changing so fast, it's hard to keep up with it now. Um, if I'm doing a show that, uh, has to do with the LGBTQ, uh, community, um, I have researchers that check the glossary for what is preferred or acceptable now, even if I did it a month ago, because it may have changed. And look, uh, I, I wanna be respect- respectful. I mean, if, if this is, if this is the language system they have, I, I, I wanna be respectful in describing it. I, I even said in the book, I was, uh, I said, "I'm gonna try and describe this the way I think they look at this now." And, uh, I'm not setting up a paper tiger. I'm, I'm gonna try and give you as real an explanation of how I think they describe sex versus gender now versus what they did before. And if I'm wrong, go to this website and check it to get it 'cause I'm not, I'm not trying to say this wrong, but in this day and time, what they try to do is catch... We used to say, "Catch somebody red-handed." Now we say, "Catch somebody with the wrong word in their mouth." I, I, It's not, it's not what they really feel. It's just catch 'em misspeaking-
- CWChris Williamson
Mm.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
... and jump on that bandwagon.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
And they, they really get... They really alienate a lot of real allies if they catch somebody saying something the wrong way. Uh, it might be somebody that's actually a huge supporter that just, out of ignorance, said something the wrong way or misspoke. Um, uh, uh, and I, I think it is hard to keep up sometimes, uh, with what's acceptable terminology. I mean, I try to do it just out of respect, and maybe I get it wrong sometimes, maybe I don't. I don't know. I try.
- CWChris Williamson
Well, I suppose, again, the problem here is that if there is status associated with being a victim, there is an incentive for somebody to find victimhood even where there isn't any. And I guess the other side is that people know that most people are trying their best most of the time, I think. I, I fundamentally believe that most people are good. The issue is, I don't think the people that are enforcing these rules are particularly good. So, they use their own theory of mind, which is, deep down, I don't think I'm a good person. Deep down, I know that the things that I say publicly and the things that I believe privately are the same thing. They understand that they're playing this game. They understand that it's narcissistic and manipulative and aggressive and malign and all the rest of it, and they then put that same theory of mind onto everybody else. That means that-
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Yeah, but-
- CWChris Williamson
... when, when someone messes up out of good faith, they don't see it in good faith. "Oh, here's the, the smoking gun that tells us that Dr. Phil is the racist, transphobic, bigot, homophobic, Zionist, whatever that we always knew that he was, and this is proof of it." Is like, is it that? Or is it just that language is imprecise?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, I think some of it's even worse. I think some of it is larcenous, because if they can catch someone like me using a wrong word or saying something that they can say, "Okay, this runs afoul of the, the current ideology," then that's like gold, because if they can jump on my coattail, uh... If they catch Joe Blow saying it wrong, eh, that's not much good. They catch me saying it wrong, you're gonna get a lot of headlines.
- CWChris Williamson
How nervous does this make you feel? You know, you've spoken about this. I asked you right at the top. You, you're in the mid of- midst of it, right? You are patient zero for mainstream media. There is a lot of it around you, lots of plays, lots of notoriety associated with it. What's that like? What's... Personally, what's that like for you on a daily basis to be walking on ed- eggshells?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, I don't walk on eggshells. I, you know, I've said before, there's good news and bad news, uh, when you're dealing with me. Um, the good news is, if, if I'm involved in something, it's likely to get a lot of attention. The bad news is, if I'm involved in something, it's likely to get a lot of attention. (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
So, that, that's why. I mean, really, if, if they can get, if they can get me in a headline, um, then they get a lot of mileage out of it. So, it can be, you know, "Dr. Phil's gardener has a wreck." I mean, if... My gardener can have a wreck 30 miles from my house, and it won't be, uh, "Bob Jenkins has a wreck." It'll be "Dr. Phil's gardener has a wreck." Uh, uh, I could have been in Europe, uh, at the time, but it'll... The headline will be... And I swear, I could s- I could stop on Sunset to get a kitten out of traffic, (laughs) and it will... The headline will be, "Dr. Phil arrogantly blocks traffic on Sunset." (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Uh, 'cause they just get mileage out of it. So, I, I've learned a long time ago that you, you can't make everybody happy, so you might as well do what you truly believe. And as long as I know in my heart who I am and what my intentions are-... uh, somebody prostituting that just doesn't bother me. Um-
- CWChris Williamson
I don't think that, I don't think there's anything particularly new about that. I think-
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
No.
- CWChris Williamson
... yes, may- maybe this has been amped up a little bit, but the news has always been in the clickbait business. They've just got better at it. It's a case of-
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Yeah, they have.
- CWChris Williamson
... it's a case of headlines, whatever the most aggressive, fear-stoking, limbically hijacking wordage that they can come up with, that's what they're gonna go for, and that's the way that it, that's the way that it's always been.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
And I don't know what the s- I'll, I'll butcher the saying, but it is the true, the, uh, "A lie travels around the world while the truth is still lacing up its shoes." It's something like that.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Um, and there's actually been a study about that. I think MIT did it. Uh, and it, it actually measured this, and a lie travels six times faster than the truth, and the reason for that is a lie is simple and quick and black and white, and the truth is never that clean. It's never that quick. It's more complicated. So a lie is good clickbait. It's a clean headline.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
And so it travels real quick.
- 50:12 – 56:19
The Current Attack on the Family Unit
- CWChris Williamson
Have you heard of Brandolini's Law? It's also called the Bullshit Asymmetry Principle. It says-
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
No.
- CWChris Williamson
... it says that it takes far less energy to produce bullshit than to refute it. Therefore, the world is filled with unrefuted bullshit.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Yeah, I believe it.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs) What about, um-
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
I believe it.
- CWChris Williamson
Talk to me about family. I know this is something that's very important to you. Is there actually an attack on family at the moment?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
You know, uh, I, I think there is, and I'm so sensitive to it because I think family is the backbone of America. Uh, uh, I think the family unit is, is the backbone of America, and if families are strong, and by strong I mean there are good family relationships, kids have a good relationship with their parents, they stay in contact, they, they have, I mean while they're together, they have meals together, they communicate together. Um, uh, I'll give you a, a tragic example of this which'll speak volumes. Uh, there's something going around right now called sextortion, and most people won't know what that mean. You probably do, but it's-
- CWChris Williamson
Even I... No, no, even me, the terminally-
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Um-
- CWChris Williamson
... online guy doesn't know what this is.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, this, and AI has, you know, I told you I'm gonna have to start dealing with AI as things evolve. What's happening is these, these people are generating images. Some of 'em they may have stolen from somewhere, and some of 'em they generate, uh, completely made up, and they get online and start talking to a young man, and they send him this image of a girl. They talk to him like they're a 14 or 15-year-old girl.
- CWChris Williamson
Oh, it's like, it's like AI catfishing.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
And... Yes, exactly. They send him a picture. They start talking to him and say, "You know, I, I like you so much, I wanna send you a picture." So they send him a nude photo, and it's like, "Uh, I've shown you mine. You show me yours. Uh, I've shown you my body. Now you show me yours." And he's like, "Well, I'm not gonna blow this," so he does. He s- sends her one back. The second they get it, they write back and say, "I am not a 14-year-old girl, and I now have a naked picture of you, and I'm gonna send it to your parents, all the people in your contact list, your pastor. I've got your school yearbook. I'm gonna send this to everybody and humiliate you if you don't send me $10,000 right now." And I did three or four stories about that last week, uh, and one of them, uh, killed himself in an hour and 40 minutes. He panicked and thought, "Oh my god, I'm, uh, I'm gonna humiliate my parents and myself." He killed himself almost immediately. Another one killed himself in a matter of a few days. Uh, they, uh, it was just horrible, I mean, just absolutely horrible. Why? Because there was a time when families were so tight that if something happened to one of them, it happened to all of them, and y- you would go to your family w- with anything, and it, you w- it was all together. And now there's s- where the relationships are so distant, they don't feel that way anymore, and these kids felt alone. They felt they couldn't do it. And then we had a few examples there who did go to their parents and say, "Hey, I screwed up big time. Uh, here's what happened," and so their parents said, "Well, d- uh, pfft, d- don't even talk to 'em anymore. Just cut 'em off." And, and of course, the answer to that if you get caught in that trap is it was an AI-generated picture. All, all you gotta do is say, (laughs) "That's not me. I wish that was me. Please send it to everybody, I don't care," and hang up, and, I mean, you, you're out of it. But, uh, kids don't think that way, and they panic, and that's because they don't have that relationship with their parents, with their family. I always tell parents, "Talk to your kids about things that don't matter, so that line is open when it comes time to talk about things that do." You gotta do that. You gotta have it where you can talk about anything.
- CWChris Williamson
Does this suggest that family is under attack though? Is this not just a, a natural consequence downstream of there's more things to distract people? They can watch Netflix or play video games or, or go on social media. How much of this is an, an actual-... purposeful attack?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
There are six billion views of the hashtags toxic parent, toxic family, toxic mother on social media platforms right now. Six billion views of them peddling no contact, toxic parent, toxic family. Yeah, it's under attack. People are out there selling that sort of mentality, and these are people that don't know come here from go sick 'em about family dynamics or how to heal a family or anything about keeping a relationship open or what the consequences are if you cut off your family. And if you do and it's two years later and you're now alone and lost and depressed, let me ask you where those people will be then. You won't be able to find 'em in two weeks with a flashlight 'cause they're gone. They don't know squat about nothing. They're just on there spewing out blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
- CWChris Williamson
Give me some white
- 56:19 – 1:04:59
Principles for Becoming More Resilient
- CWChris Williamson
pills then. What are the, what are the prin- principles that people can use to rely on to be more resilient? There's a lot of bad outcomes at the moment that we've gone through. What are the ways that people can fight back?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, that's 'cause you asked questions about problems, that's why we've gone through bad outcomes. Ask me something happy (laughs) like the one you just asked.
- CWChris Williamson
Of course.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Um, uh, number one, be who you are on purpose. Um, that, I, I talk in the book about 10 principles of a healthy society and number one is be who you are on purpose. Look, you don't wanna be reactive to society. Don't just get off of whatever comes your way on the internet or at work or your friends. Don't be a sheep. Be who you are on purpose, and that means you gotta star in your own life and I don't care... You know, people say, "Well, that's easy for you to say, Dr. Phil. You've had your own TV show for 25 years, so yeah, it's easy to star in your own life." I don't care if you're a plumber or a teacher or an architect or an accountant or whatever, star in your own life. You've got people in your life, you've got children, you've got friends, you've got parents, you've got a church, you've got a team you play... whate- star in your own life and th- that means you've got to decide what's important to you and th- I'm not telling you about being selfish, it's not selfish to take care of yourself because you can't give away what you don't have. If you don't take care of yourself, if you don't love yourself, if you don't nurture yourself, you can't love and nurture other people. So if you let yourself get emotionally bankrupt, then you have nothing to give to other people so be who you are on purpose. Don't let the internet program you, don't let some ideology program you. Choose who you wanna be and what you think is important. That is, th- that to me i- is so critical, and I- I- I- I think you, you pair that up with the thought that make all, choose all behaviors based on results and all thoughts based on rationality. And rationality means is this thought based on fact? Is it, does it get me what I want? Does it protect and prolong my life? I mean th- there, there are just simple tests that you can ask yourself, is, is this really something that, that makes sense? Easy questions you can ask yourself when you're thinking something, is this, is this factual? H- Have I verified this or is this just something I'm telling myself? Um, does it get me what I want? Does it protect and prolong my life? It, these are things that you, th- that you can ask yourself. So choose your behaviors based on... I mean, people always tease me about saying, "How's that working for you?" Uh, that's a pretty damn good question to be asking your- if you're doing something, how's it working for you? If it ain't working, change what you're doing and-
- CWChris Williamson
I love the, I love the idea of focusing on solving problems rather than winning arguments.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Oh, man.
- CWChris Williamson
I see so much, so much of the discourse online is all about winning arguments rather than solving problems. Here's a really interesting example, something I noticed on Twitter, which is very rarely do you ever see someone concede a point and say, "Ah, actually that's, that's really interesting that you said that."
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
"I'd never seen that, that I didn't, I didn't see that before." And there's two, two reasons. First one being that admitting defeat online is tantamount to destruction. It's embarrassing. It's lame. You're supposed to have this perfectly robust, walled off fortress of whatever your philosophical worldview is. And the second one is that most of the rhetoric is so adversarial and mean and cutting and sardonic that who entering into that type of an exchange wants to admit that they're wrong? It's like you've just taken the piss out of me for a full thread of tweets, I'm not gonna say, "Oh yeah, good one, Dr. Phil. Thanks for really resetting my worldview." I'm gonna say, "No, you just called me a name before so I'm gonna call you a name and I'm not gonna believe what you say."
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Yeah. And, and I'll, I'll challenge you to look at my threads and responses because I'll have people call me everything but decent. (laughs) And, uh, and, uh, they, they get some good ones on there, and those are usually the ones I respond to if, if I respond, and I don't sit and type them myself. I have somebody I tell. I say, "All right, write this down," (laughs) 'cause I type like... Uh, so I have my guy, and I'll say, "All right, take this down." Um, and I tell them first off, "Hey, thank you for caring enough to share your thoughts 'cause it took time for you to respond, and, um, I, I disagree with a lot of what you said, but I, I hear you, and I, I, I, I hope you'll consider this and fact-check me, and if, if there are some things I said that are not factual, then come back to me with it and let's, let's talk about that." Uh, 'cause I had somebody the other day said, "Oh, I th- I thought you were really into facts, and now I see you saying this. I mean, like, I'll never, I'll never follow you again." And I said, "Well, hey, thanks for saying that. D- you didn't have to respond at all. You could have just cut me off, but please fact-check me and send me what it is that I'm wrong about. And if I am, I'll correct it and, and tell you, and let's keep this dialogue open." And, um, he hasn't responded yet.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
(laughs) . Um, because when I, whe- when I'm doing something on a show, um, I'll figure out what I'm gonna say and do, and I have what we call a brain room, and these are college professors I've hired from around the country, and they're all over the political spectrum. And I'll have them research something, and they'll send all of that to me, and then I'll work out the points I'm gonna make, and, and I'll send that back to them and say, "Is this supportable?" And they'll say, "Well, yes, no, or maybe," and I'll get down to what there's absolute empirical support for. And then when I do the actual show, I send the transcript to them to check and make sure I didn't conflate two things that weren't meant to be or whatever. And if I've said something that is not what was intended or is not supportable, it comes out. So they check it before I do it, and then I check the, they check the points I intend to make, and then they check the transcript afterwards, and then it goes to air. So I triple-check things with a research room before I ever say it. And that book has been scrubbed top, side, and bottom. Let me tell you.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
'Cause I want to... Let me tell you. I want to be the place that deals with facts. I, I, and, and if it's an opinion, I say so. I say, "All right, now, um, th- there aren't, this isn't one that lends itself to facts. This is just opinion, so I'm gonna give you mine. Take it for what you will." Identify it if it's that way. Otherwise, I, I give them the empirical data.
- CWChris Williamson
What do you mean when you say, "Do not stay silent just so others can remain comfortable"?
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
What you said earlier about h- I wonder how many people are just kind of biting their tongue 'cause they don't want to take the heat, and I say I don't think we can do that. I think we, it's time we gotta speak up.
- CWChris Williamson
Dr.
- 1:04:59 – 1:06:30
Conclusion
- CWChris Williamson
Phil, ladies and gentlemen. I really appreciate you coming on. I very much respect the fact that you're going through all of these hurdles in an effort to try and be balanced. I think it's, uh, in some ways sad that you need to do that just to protect yourself from being caught out in the wrong, the wrong, uh, statement. And also, given the fact that you reach millions and millions and millions of people, it's also important because if we're struggling with information and the quality of information, then the people who reach the most people should be trying to communicate it in the most accurate way possible. So yeah, it's a, a very impressive way to live out your philosophy.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
Well, you know, I, I think if people are gonna honor me with their time, I, I owe it to them to do my homework. And, uh, so I, you know, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do the best I can. And I won't always get it right. And when I do, I'll correct it and hopefully catch it before it goes out. And if not, I'll, I'll say so. So, uh, I, I really enjoyed this conversation. You asked some, um, uh, challenging questions, Chris, so I, I really appreciate it.
- CWChris Williamson
I appreciate, you too. Thank you, Dr. Phil.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
You have to, you have to come up and see us sometime. And, um, I'll be down your way pretty soon. I've got some, I got a lot of friends down there, Ron White and Joe Rogan and some other guys down there that I hang with. So, uh, hopefully we can-
- CWChris Williamson
Come through. We'll do barbecue. We can play pickleball. We can do all of the awesome things.
- PMDr. Phil McGraw
All right. Good deal.
- CWChris Williamson
If you enjoyed that episode, you will love a selection of the best clips from the podcast over the last couple of months, and it's available right here. Go on. Give 'em a watch.
Episode duration: 1:06:30
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