Why Is Everyone Acting Like A Victim? - Rob Henderson (4K)

1. 0:00 – 7:15

   Do All Your Friends Have More Friends Than You?

   1. CWChris Williamson0:00

      What is the friendship paradox?

   2. RHRob Henderson0:02

      The friendship paradox is this phenomenon in which, uh, your friends have more friends than you do. Uh, your sex partners have more sex partners than you do. Your Twitter followers have more... Or ex, your ex followers have more, uh, followers than you do. And it's a, it's a paradox because it seemingly doesn't make sense. You know, how can your friends have more friends than you on average? And many, uh, many of your listeners especially, I think, will be familiar with this sort of Pareto phenomena that, you know, a disproportionate, uh, number of, of awards go to a small number of people, a disproportionate, uh, uh, amount of money goes to a small percentage of people as well. But this also works in the social realm. So, you know, the example that I gave in a recent Substack post is to imagine you have, keep it easy, you have 10 friends, and, uh, three of your friends are kind of like you, you know, just kind of an average person with an average social life. Uh, you have three friends who are shut-ins, who maybe don't go out that much, but you have another friend who is a super connector and has 100 or 150 or maybe even 1,000 friends. I mean, uh, there's some people who, who are just sort of very social, super extroverted in that 99th percentile, and so when you average this across all 10 of your friends, uh, they, they may have, you know, on average 20 plus friends while you have 10. And so it, it sort of, uh, at, at first glance it doesn't make sense, but then, you know, when you, when you sort of break it down mathematically, it does, and this is why there's that, that paradox. And then same with sex partners, you know, maybe you've had five or 10 or 20 sex partners, but one of those people may have had 100 plus, and so when you average that out, your sex partners have had more sex partners than you. And then same with Twitter followers, right? Like, you know, maybe, uh, you know, one of your followers has, you know, a million plus while you have 10,000 or something. Average that out and the math still, um, shakes out in the same way. The example, uh, that I, that I also gave in that essay is, uh, you know, when, when Warren Buffett walks into an auditorium, everyone becomes a millionaire, on average.

   3. CWChris Williamson1:52

      (laughs)

   4. RHRob Henderson1:52

      Right? And it's the same kind of idea here, so...

   5. CWChris Williamson1:56

      Yeah. And what's the implication psychologically for people with that?

   6. RHRob Henderson1:59

      Mm-hmm.

   7. CWChris Williamson1:59

      Is that a felt sense at all? 'Cause obviously it's-

   8. RHRob Henderson2:01

      Yeah.

   9. CWChris Williamson2:02

      ... uh, kind of anti, uh, typical to what you would expect. This is all a surprise to everyone to find out that if Warren Buffett's in the local postcode, that they've just become a, an honorary millionaire for the most v- v- ... Due to mathematics.

   10. RHRob Henderson2:16

       Mm-hmm.

   11. CWChris Williamson2:17

       Is there some sort of sense by which people are, are conscious of this sort of thing? I know that Gad Saad in his most recent book talks about-

   12. RHRob Henderson2:24

       Mm-hmm.

   13. CWChris Williamson2:24

       ... uh, the best sort of people to be friends are the people who are having a little bit less sex than you.

   14. RHRob Henderson2:28

       (laughs) Right. Yeah, yeah, I, I remember that, I remember that from, from his book. Well, yeah, I... So, so I think that we, we, we fall prey to, um... So, so in that, the, the classic psychology book, Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman coined this term, "What you see is all there is." Uh, and we pay attention to what's visible, what's right in front of us, the, the known knowns, but we don't necessarily pay much attention to the, the known unknowns, the things that, that aren't in our immediate, uh, line of vision. And so with, with the friendship paradox, we will pay a lot of attention to the most extroverted people. They're very visible, they enjoy often being very visible. Extroverted people tend to be that way. They update their social media pages a lot, uh, when you... They're, they're more likely to, uh, text you and then be responsive to your texts, and more likely to, to, to meet up with you and then tell you about their, uh, uh, adventures hiking in the Himalayas or how they just got back from this country or, uh, just got done speaking at, at this event and so forth. And so you're listening to this person and, and for many people they may hear this and think like, "Wow, everyone out there is doing all of these great things and, you know, here I am sort of working my 9:00 to 5:00 or just, you know, sort of living a, a, a normal ordinary life." And, uh, and many people, uh, will report feeling sort of, um, uh, diminished socially. Uh, and this is an interesting phenomenon here because there's a ton of research in social psychology on this idea called the better-than-average effect. Uh, and the better-than-average effect or the illusory superiority effect as it's sometimes called is essentially that we tend to, uh, uh, believe ourselves to be better than others. There's this sort of self-enhancement that goes on. So when you ask, um, people, "Are, are you, you know, are you smarter than average? Are you a better driver than average?" Um-

   15. CWChris Williamson4:03

       (laughs) It's like 75% of people-

   16. RHRob Henderson4:05

       Yeah.

   17. CWChris Williamson4:05

       ... believe that they're a better-than-average driver.

   18. RHRob Henderson4:07

       Exa- ... Yeah, exactly. Uh, uh, you know, there's, there's research in academia too. You know, you ask students, "Are you a, you know, a better student than average?" Ask professors, "Are you a better teacher than average?" And, you know, w- ... Yeah, exactly, 70, 80 plus percent say they're better than the average person, uh, in all of these domains. Um, and yet, um, there's fascinating work on... Related to the friendship paradox, that we tend to have a sort of uncharacteristically dismal view of our social lives. So there've been a couple of studies now in which, you know, they, they ask participants, uh, you know, "Do you, do you go to more or fewer parties than others? Do you see your family more or less than others? Do you have more or fewer friends than others? Do you eat alone more or less than others?" And generally speaking, people think that they are, uh, sort of less socially connected, they have fewer friends, they eat alone more, they go to fewer parties. And-

   19. CWChris Williamson4:53

       So this is an inversion of the illusory super-

   20. RHRob Henderson4:55

       Exactly.

   21. CWChris Williamson4:55

       ... superiority complex.

   22. RHRob Henderson4:56

       Right, we sort of have, uh, at least in the social realm a, a, a lesser-than-average effect rather than a better-than-average effect. And, and this is related to that friendship paradox and that, um, that sort of what you see is all there is. Uh, the way the researchers explain this is that, um, again so you, so you, you s- ... When you think to yourself, "Well, do I go to more or fewer parties than others?" Well, you know, when I see other people at parties and I'm not at a party and, uh, you know, I, I see my family, you know, X amount of times a year, but then when I pull up social media and I see people, you know, taking selfies with their dad or whatever-

   23. CWChris Williamson5:25

       Mm-hmm.

   24. RHRob Henderson5:25

       ... um, or their mom or their sis- ... And so you see all of these, and then you start to think, "Well, you know, I'm not with my family right now when I saw that photo." And so you, uh, sort of easily sort of fall prey to this idea that well, everyone out there is taking these selfies and having a good time and going home and, and, um, and you're not, and you're not paying attention to the people who aren't with their families. Uh, you know, one of the lines I use in, in that poster summarizing this research is, no one is taking, uh, photos and posting them online when they're eating lunch alone or when they're binge watching a TV show or when they're just having an off day and just need some time to decompress and be alone for a while.

   25. CWChris Williamson5:59

       Mm-hmm.

   26. RHRob Henderson5:59

       They're not, uh, you know, uploading a video or taking photos of themselves that... You know, we, we tend to take photos when we're being social, when we're being extroverted.

   27. CWChris Williamson6:06

       Peak experiences.

   28. RHRob Henderson6:06

       Exactly, the peak experiences. And, and, uh, I know you've, you've, you've talked about this before, about, uh, what is it? Comparing, uh, uh, you know, your blooper reel to everyone else's highlight reel-

   29. CWChris Williamson6:15

       Correct.

   30. RHRob Henderson6:16

       ... or something like that.
2. 7:15 – 15:43

   The Internet Isn’t the Real World

   1. RHRob Henderson7:15

   2. CWChris Williamson7:15

      ... from you.

   3. RHRob Henderson7:15

      Okay.

   4. CWChris Williamson7:16

      Go through that. I feel like-

   5. RHRob Henderson7:17

      Yeah.

   6. CWChris Williamson7:17

      ... that's related here.

   7. RHRob Henderson7:18

      This is the 1% rule on the internet. And it's, you know, it's- this isn't, uh, empirical research, but this is just a sort of shorthand way of understanding how, uh, how social media works, how the internet works now. Uh, and the basic idea is that, uh, online, 1% of internet users, uh, are creators. They're the ones out there producing the videos and the podcasts and the- the written content, and all of the things that we're sort of consuming when we pull open our phones. And then 9% of internet users are, uh, are commenters. They're engaging with the content in some way, maybe they're, uh, reposting, or retweeting, or liking, or commenting. They're the ones who sort of, uh, want to engage with the content in some way. Maybe they're not, uh, uh, original content, uh, producers, but they do like to sort of, uh, make themselves visible by- by, uh, by being commenters and so on. And then 90% of people are just lurkers, the people that we aren't seeing, the people who are just sort of passively scrolling their phones or, uh, uh, you know, looking at your- looking at your stuff, listening to it, reading it, but they're not, um, they're not engaging with it in the same way. And I think a lot of, you know... So I'm a- I'm a Substacker, you're a podcaster. I think a lot of content producers, they-

   8. CWChris Williamson8:23

      1%. Could they be? (laughs)

   9. RHRob Henderson8:24

      Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, the 1%. But we pay a lot of attention to that 9%. Uh, and- and of course, because of the, uh, the negativity bias, you know, you may have, uh, 100 nice comments, and then there's three people who are like, "Wow, this sucks."

   10. CWChris Williamson8:36

       Yeah.

   11. RHRob Henderson8:37

       And you're like... You know, you'll beat yourself up that day, like, "Man, why do these people not like this?" Um, but you didn't... You know, you're- you're- you're assigning less weight to those 97 comments that were positive, but you're also not thinking about the 90% of people who didn't comment at all.

   12. CWChris Williamson8:50

       Wow.

   13. RHRob Henderson8:50

       And based on that breakdown, right, if- if 97 comments are positive and three are negative, you can probably estimate that that's probably roughly how those other 90% feel.

   14. CWChris Williamson8:58

       970.

   15. RHRob Henderson8:59

       Exactly.

   16. CWChris Williamson8:59

       Yeah, yeah, yeah.

   17. RHRob Henderson9:00

       Yeah, yeah.

   18. CWChris Williamson9:00

       Silent, nice comments.

   19. RHRob Henderson9:02

       Yeah. I saw this, um... Yeah, I read this- this, uh, this essay, uh, uh, recently about- about a TV show, uh, in which the executives were threatening to cancel it, uh, because they had received... And this was I think in the 1980s, it was a sitcom, and, uh, the executives were threatening to cancel it because they received some- some angry emails, or n- or angry- angry snail mail from- from the viewers, so this was the '80s. And, uh, and the- the- the showrunners were... Basically they drew this analogy of like, you know, this is like, you know, going- going to a stadium of 100,000 people and two of them write a nasty letter to you, right? That's the equivalent, right? Because we have X number of million viewers-

   20. CWChris Williamson9:38

       Yeah, yeah.

   21. RHRob Henderson9:38

       ... and- and you got a couple of hundred mean letters.

   22. CWChris Williamson9:40

       Yeah.

   23. RHRob Henderson9:41

       Whereas the other million plus people didn't write anything or maybe they're writing positive things. And so I think, yeah, we... that- that- that 1% rule can sort of help us to contextualize, um, sort of all of the social phenomena that are going on online.

   24. CWChris Williamson9:53

       I remember the general election a few years ago where the Tory party won by the biggest landslide in a very long time and the- the red wall fell and all the rest of this stuff.

   25. RHRob Henderson10:04

       Mm-hmm.

   26. CWChris Williamson10:05

       Uh, and I remember seeing Stormzy or Bugsey Malone and that year's winner of Love Island and someone else like- like h- Daniel Radcliffe or someone, uh, tweeting about how, you know, "We need to make sure that we get the Labour Party in and I'll be voting Labour," and you see all of these replies and I was like, "Oh my God, look at this. It's gonna be a total landslide." You know, like, th- they've- they've got... Bugsey Malone has tweeted about it. (laughs)

   27. RHRob Henderson10:36

       (laughs) Yeah, yeah, yeah.

   28. CWChris Williamson10:37

       And, um, then it was th- as far in the opposite direction as it's ever been in 50 years.

   29. RHRob Henderson10:43

       Yeah, yeah.

   30. CWChris Williamson10:43

       And it's like, you know, the map is not the terrain-
3. 15:43 – 32:12

   Digging Deeper Into Young Male Syndrome

   1. CWChris Williamson15:43

      you've been looking at a lot of young male syndrome recently.

   2. RHRob Henderson15:46

      Mm-hmm. Yeah.

   3. CWChris Williamson15:46

      I think this is gonna be one of the most important memes of the coming decade.

   4. RHRob Henderson15:49

      Hmm.

   5. CWChris Williamson15:49

      And, uh, both of us have been talking about it, at least in part, for maybe, like, three or four years, I think online.

   6. RHRob Henderson15:54

      Mm-hmm.

   7. CWChris Williamson15:55

      But it's picking up steam. What have you learned digging deeper into the modern conception of young male syndrome and how it's sort of manifested?

   8. RHRob Henderson16:05

      Mm-hmm.

   9. CWChris Williamson16:05

      What have you learned?

   10. RHRob Henderson16:06

       Yeah, yeah, well, so, so, yeah, the young male syndrome, this constellation of traits that are associated with, uh, a certain period of time in young men's lives, typically the teens and the early 20s, uh, you know, heightened levels of risk-taking, reduced self-control and inhibition. Uh, if you look at rates of criminality, for example, uh, they tend to peak at around age 19, and this is true regardless of, uh, culture and society, sort of all across the world, in non-industrialized, hunter-gatherer communities, and all the way up to sort of wealthy and rich societies, that it's the young men. If you look at who's committing the crime in that society, it's, it's inevitably going to be sort of men aged, say, roughly 15 to maybe 24. Even things like, uh, like, like, so this is just in the US context, likelihood of being hospitalized for punching walls.

   11. CWChris Williamson16:53

       (laughs)

   12. RHRob Henderson16:54

       Uh, there was a nice graph I saw, uh, and I, and I posted it online, um, of, you know, the sort of, the distribution of, of, of, um, young, or, or men, just men in general being hospitalized for it. And it's all concentrated, again, 15 to 24, it's like, you know, 10-year-olds aren't being hospitalized for punching walls, and neither are 60-year-olds, it's all that sort of young male group. And, you know, I'll, I'll admit, I've punched walls before. (laughs)

   13. CWChris Williamson17:14

       Yeah. Did you see, uh-

   14. RHRob Henderson17:15

       Yeah.

   15. CWChris Williamson17:15

       ... Aleksandr Daitserak posted a, a, quote-tweeted a, an image this morning that was a mother-

   16. RHRob Henderson17:20

       Mm-hmm.

   17. CWChris Williamson17:20

       ... asking how she could help her son, and it was just a photo of his bedroom wall. And this bedroom wall was just hole after hole after hole, and then the door had a hole in it, and it's like... I mean, it, it looked like a sufficiently flimsy American house-

   18. RHRob Henderson17:33

       Hmm.

   19. CWChris Williamson17:33

       ... that the hospitalization risk was quite low, but that the decorating risk might be quite high.

   20. RHRob Henderson17:37

       Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's, uh, in that case, I mean, that, yeah, that, that sounds like it would require some, some serious-

   21. CWChris Williamson17:42

       Intervention.

   22. RHRob Henderson17:43

       ... some serious, yeah, intervention, some serious treatment. What I find interesting is, uh, especially for young men that sort of... That this, this is, I think, an expression of young male syndrome, is when a young man, uh, experience some, some sort of, uh, usually, like, a minor injury, and then their immediate response is to lash out. So, like, I saw this with some of my friends where, um, you know, like maybe, uh, I don't know, something simple like, uh, like they accidentally, uh, poke themselves in the hand or something, and then their immediate response is to punch something. So, they hurt themselves and they're pissed, and then they punch something. And, and I think that this is basically a, a misfiring of this kind of evolutionary impulse of, of if a, if an intentional agent hurts you, it actually is, uh, advantageous, uh, to, to fight back, right?

   23. CWChris Williamson18:24

       Anger response.

   24. RHRob Henderson18:24

       Right, exactly. So, so if, uh, I don't know, like, the cactus plant stabs me-

   25. CWChris Williamson18:29

       (laughs)

   26. RHRob Henderson18:29

       ... you know, maybe punching the wall is unwise.

   27. CWChris Williamson18:31

       Right.

   28. RHRob Henderson18:31

       But if you do something to upset me-

   29. CWChris Williamson18:32

       Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

   30. RHRob Henderson18:32

       ... and then I immediately respond physically, that can actually be, um, uh, an adaptive strategy. So I think, like, that is... You know, this is, this is speculation, but this is what I think is going on there because otherwise it doesn't make sense, right? (laughs) You-You're injured, let me injure my-
4. 32:12 – 40:20

   The Privilege of the Ideal Upbringing

   1. CWChris Williamson32:12

      had this idea-

   2. RHRob Henderson32:12

      Even then it still sucks.

   3. CWChris Williamson32:13

      I had this idea about, um, uh, the- the reason that victimhood culture has become so widespread is because the human system's demand for challenges has outstripped our modern reality's ability to deliver that.

   4. RHRob Henderson32:25

      Mm-hmm.

   5. CWChris Williamson32:25

      Right? That we want, we just want something to push up against. And if we don't have real challenge, we will create imagined challenge-

   6. RHRob Henderson32:33

      Mm-hmm.

   7. CWChris Williamson32:33

      ... for ourselves. And, um, yeah, uh, uh, you know, rampant fragility, and this kind of like soy externalizing locus of control, uh, culture, that's going on at the moment. It's so interesting though that you've got this barbell strategy where, you know, 50%, or maybe more, percent of the people are, uh, young men are- are happy to lean into the, "Uh, I've learned a bit of behavioral genetics and evolutionary psychology, and- and taken the black pill in many regards because I'm a genetic dead end." But, at the same time, you have the ascendancy of David Goggins, Jocko Willink, Alex Hormozi, you know, these guys who are all about doing the hard thing, overcoming the suck, like, "No one's coming to save you. It's only you that's going to get you," et cetera, et cetera. So you have this increasing sort of divergence-

   8. RHRob Henderson33:24

      Yeah, yeah, yeah.

   9. CWChris Williamson33:24

      ... between the two. Uh, and I think, you know, assortative mating, which is people of a kind mating with people of their kind-

   10. RHRob Henderson33:33

       Yeah.

   11. CWChris Williamson33:33

       ... right? So, uh, just Silicon Valley, 135 IQ people with, you know, professional tennis-level skills having kids together. So you ha- kind of have this genetic splitting apart, which also is going to have a psychological, uh, like heretable psychological echo, I suppose.

   12. RHRob Henderson33:51

       Mm-hmm.

   13. CWChris Williamson33:51

       So the conscientious people will have more conscientious kids, and so on and so forth. And then Melissa Carney's new book, The Two-Parent Privilege-

   14. RHRob Henderson33:56

       Yeah, yeah.

   15. CWChris Williamson33:57

       ... is talking about how those college-educated people who've got that predisposition again get an even bigger advantage. So I think that the Matthew effect of this, right? "To those who have everything, more will be given. To those who have nothing, more will be taken."

   16. RHRob Henderson34:09

       Mm-hmm.

   17. CWChris Williamson34:09

       It's just gonna continue to spread and spread and spread.

   18. RHRob Henderson34:11

       Yeah, I think, I mean, that's- that's a distinct possibility. And it seems like in the short term, that is what's occurring. I mean, I even read this, oh man, which book was this? Uh, it was a speculative hypothesis about why there's a, like sort of pronounced levels of, uh, kids being born on the spectrum in Silicon Valley. And it's because- (laughs)

   19. CWChris Williamson34:31

       (laughs)

   20. RHRob Henderson34:32

       It's not necessarily because the engineers and the programmers themselves are autistic, but they may be sort of- sort of somewhere on the spectrum, and then they partner with someone who also shares some of those genes-

   21. CWChris Williamson34:40

       Right, like a comorbidity.

   22. RHRob Henderson34:41

       ... and then of course, exactly. And then they ha- well, they have children, and then- and then the child is sort of at a- at an, uh, heightened risk of- of getting autism.

   23. CWChris Williamson34:48

       Yep, yep.

   24. RHRob Henderson34:48

       Uh, but I think generally speaking, I mean, uh, th- uh, I don't know if this is- if this is- this could be interpreted as a white pill or a black pill, but I just read, uh, this book The Sun Also Rises by Gregory Clark, who's, uh, an economic historian, uh, very well versed in the behavioral genetics as well. And essentially that book, he documents, uh, in various societies, essentially how, uh, social status, sort of loosely defined as sort of wealth and influence and so on is very sticky, uh, across generations. And essentially what he finds, you know, he- he- he tracks surnames, uh, and finds that, you know, repeat-

   25. CWChris Williamson35:20

       Oh fuck, I got introed to this guy from Matt at Aporia. He's gonna come on.

   26. RHRob Henderson35:23

       Oh yeah, yeah, he's great. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

   27. CWChris Williamson35:25

       Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

   28. RHRob Henderson35:25

       Um, and yeah, I spoke with- I spoke with Matt about- about, um, Gregory Clark- Gregory Clark's work as well. And essentially, you know, he- he tracked status not through s- so, you know, there's- there's- there's this fear, especially in the modern era of assortative mating, that more and more women are going- getting educated and men are- are dating educated women, and they're having children who are educated and so on. But what essentially he finds is that when you- when you look at data from decades past, centuries past, before, uh, women were sort of educationally and economically emancipated, when they were still sort of stuck in these rigid gender roles, if you pair or if you look at the status of- of a given man interested in a woman and then look at the status of the woman's father, there is like a very tight correlation there. So even though the woman herself isn't, um, highly educated or isn't working in a prestigious occupation, often she comes from a family in which her father was.

   29. CWChris Williamson36:13

       Mm-hmm.

   30. RHRob Henderson36:14

       And so one of Clark's claims generally speaking in this book is that people are very good at sort of finding people who are similar to themselves even if you don't have the sort of external visible badges of- of class or education or credential, right?
5. 40:20 – 47:25

   How People Reacted to The Two-Parent Privilege

   1. CWChris Williamson40:20

      Uh, she's been on the show. Anyone that hasn't seen that can go back and listen to the episode I did with Melissa. She was great. But, I mean, she is, you know, as straight down the line policy wonk, DC pilled as you're going to get, right?

   2. RHRob Henderson40:32

      Yeah, yeah, yeah.

   3. CWChris Williamson40:32

      Like, she's like the female Richard Reeves.

   4. RHRob Henderson40:34

      Mm-hmm.

   5. CWChris Williamson40:34

      You know? Like, she's just there to do... Help do policy and do the DC thing, and-

   6. RHRob Henderson40:39

      Mm-hmm.

   7. CWChris Williamson40:39

      ... and... She's a statistician, demographer lady, right?

   8. RHRob Henderson40:43

      Yeah. Yeah.

   9. CWChris Williamson40:43

      She's... I, I tried to push her on the episode and was like, "So, why is this occurring?" Like, "Give me the implications here. Infer for me what you think is the underlying mechanism." And she was very reticent about trying to work out what's going on from a psychological perspective. And I thought, "Wow, that's really, uh... That's a good signal that she's not prepared to get out over what she sees is her domain of expertise."

   10. RHRob Henderson41:08

       Yeah, yeah.

   11. CWChris Williamson41:08

       "I have this. This is what I do." And uh, she did it a little bit, but she didn't go too far, and I was like, "That's a really good signal."

   12. RHRob Henderson41:14

       Mm-hmm.

   13. CWChris Williamson41:14

       But what I saw on the internet before her book came out, tons and tons and tons of articles saying, you know, this is, uh, like hard right Christian talking points, uh, being legitimated by cherry picked data. You haven't read the data. The book's not out yet.

   14. RHRob Henderson41:32

       Yeah, yeah.

   15. CWChris Williamson41:33

       And what I saw was her, as someone, as far as I could see, that if you were to do political compass on, it would probably be like just left of center, uh, and again, uh, very not prepared to say things that she didn't understand and didn't have data to back up and so on and so forth. But on the internet, the only people that weren't lambasting her as being some sort of, you know, like bigot, judgemental asshole that's telling people that come from single parent households that they shouldn't, and, uh, "What? So you're saying that women should stay in an abusive relationship instead of, uh, you know, allowing the- themselves and their child to have a good stepparent?" And blah, blah, blah, like just all straw man shithouse arguments. And I saw the exact path that many, many people are taking, which is causing them to bend toward the right.

   16. RHRob Henderson42:20

       Mm-hmm.

   17. CWChris Williamson42:20

       Because you go, "Hang on a second. I've put this piece of work out which is relatively dispassionate," which is actually... It's the two-parent privilege.

   18. RHRob Henderson42:27

       Mm-hmm.

   19. CWChris Williamson42:27

       This is a championing of how we can fix underprivileged kids, which is fundamentally a left wing phenomenon, right? It's class.

   20. RHRob Henderson42:35

       Yeah.

   21. CWChris Williamson42:35

       We're trying to fix the class problem.The only people that were accepting of her, or weren't, like, accusing her of doing awful things-

   22. RHRob Henderson42:41

       Mm-hmm.

   23. CWChris Williamson42:42

       ... were the people that were center right and further right.

   24. RHRob Henderson42:45

       Yeah, yeah.

   25. CWChris Williamson42:45

       So what you see is how somebody that has a left-leaning, uh, predisposition-

   26. RHRob Henderson42:50

       Mm-hmm.

   27. CWChris Williamson42:50

       ... perhaps or just a centrist disposition, gets nudged by their treatment toward the right. They go, "Okay, well, fuck you guys."

   28. RHRob Henderson42:57

       Yeah, yeah.

   29. CWChris Williamson42:58

       Like, if, if, if you're not gonna accept me, I'll happily... Like, and she, I wish that I'd noticed this before I spoke to her, 'cause I would've loved to have asked her about this. But yeah, like, that's not... I, I can completely see how the tribalism of, of both sides, and I'm sure that there's an equivalent dynamic on the right-

   30. RHRob Henderson43:16

       Mm-hmm.
6. 47:25 – 54:20

   Chads Are More Misogynistic than Incels

   1. RHRob Henderson47:25

   2. CWChris Williamson47:25

      We both came across the same research that shows that chads rather than incels are the extreme misogynists.

   3. RHRob Henderson47:30

      (laughs) Right, yeah.

   4. CWChris Williamson47:31

      Dude, I love this.

   5. RHRob Henderson47:33

      Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think I saw, uh, William retweet that one, and that's when it got on my radar. (laughs)

   6. CWChris Williamson47:37

      Of course he does. Of course he, of course he does. Of course he does.

   7. RHRob Henderson47:39

      Yeah. (laughs) Yeah.

   8. CWChris Williamson47:39

      Anything that's pro-incel, yeah. Uh, "Men with higher levels of sex partners are more likely to hold extreme misogynist views, which contradicts the incel narrative. Extreme misogyny correlates with status seeking and dominance orientation, both of which also correlate with high levels of sex partners."

   9. RHRob Henderson47:57

      Hmm. Yeah, I thought that was, uh, an absolutely fascinating study, and it, it links up very nicely, you know, I, I, when I was in, in grad school, I read, um, David Buss's Evolutionary Psychology textbook cover to cover, and one of the things he points out there, uh, is, is, uh, that, you know, there's, there's not much, if any, research supporting what, uh, what's referred to as the mate deprivation hypothesis. You know, this idea... So the mate deprivation hypothesis is essentially that, you know, young men who are, who are deprived of mates are more likely to develop these sort of, uh, uh, uh, misogynistic attitudes, they're more likely to, uh, coerce women into sex, or more likely to commit sexual assault. And essentially, uh, all the research that I've seen indicates almost the, the reverse of that, and including the study here, uh, which points in the same direction, which is that the men who are the most likely to commit sexual coercion or assault are also men who are the most likely to, uh, to have consensual sex partners as well.

   10. CWChris Williamson48:51

       Wow.

   11. RHRob Henderson48:51

       Um-And, yeah, all of these things sort of come together and correlate with status-seeking, dominance orientation, extroversion, um, uh, the, probably, I would imagine, narcissism as well, and maybe some of the other dark triad traits of being, being particularly attractive, uh, to women. And, uh, you know, this is now, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm more comfortable speculating, uh, than maybe I should be.

   12. CWChris Williamson49:13

       Get it out there. You're not even part of the academy anymore.

   13. RHRob Henderson49:15

       (laughs) But, but tell me anything, I'm-

   14. CWChris Williamson49:15

       Say what you want.

   15. RHRob Henderson49:16

       Well, you know, I have a foot in, but, but, but I'm comfortable with sort of making this, this is just a hypothesis, but I think that most, many, maybe most women would be pretty reluctant to actually be sort of alone in, like, like be in a situation in, in, in which they could potentially be alone and assaulted by the sort of prototypical incel, like-

   16. CWChris Williamson49:39

       Mm-hmm.

   17. RHRob Henderson49:39

       ... you know, the sort of lonely, unattractive, isolated, angry male.

   18. CWChris Williamson49:43

       Warning flags.

   19. RHRob Henderson49:44

       Um, right, exactly. Like, they would know in advance, like, "I don't need to be alone with this guy. There's something off about him." Uh, again, the sort of prototypical, I'm not saying all incels are like that, but that's sort of archetypical image of a, of an incel. Whereas, um, probably just, just sort of, you know, uh, uh, I think this is, this is pretty intuitive that, that women would be more willing to sort of be alone and, and potentially be in a risky situation with a man who is attractive, right? And so just through the sort of differentiating levels or different, differing levels of likelihood-

   20. CWChris Williamson50:12

       Exposure.

   21. RHRob Henderson50:12

       ... of being alone and exposure alone.

   22. CWChris Williamson50:14

       Yeah.

   23. RHRob Henderson50:14

       That, um, yeah, that, uh, that, that assault would be more likely to happen in one context than the other. Um, and so I think that may partially explain some of those differences that if women were alone with actual incels (laughs) -

   24. CWChris Williamson50:25

       Yeah.

   25. RHRob Henderson50:26

       ... as much as they're alone with, you know, status-seeking, dominance-oriented, uh, uh, extroverts, then maybe those, the numbers would be different. But, but generally speaking, I think that finding is suggestive. And then in my own personal life, I mean, when I think about the guys who-

   26. CWChris Williamson50:41

       All of the men that you spend your time alone with.

   27. RHRob Henderson50:42

       Yeah, well, that I spend, yeah, yeah, and that I feel a- yeah.

   28. CWChris Williamson50:45

       (laughs)

   29. RHRob Henderson50:45

       Um, but the guys that I know who are particularly, you know, at least numerically successful, I don't know if you are...

   30. CWChris Williamson50:51

       Yeah, yeah, yeah.
7. 54:20 – 1:01:02

   How Social Cues Change with Higher Status

   1. CWChris Williamson54:20

      uh, on Rogan's show years and years ago, Tim, one of Tim Dillon's first appearances. And Joe's, uh, I think Tim's talking about how the LA comedy scene is very ruthless-

   2. RHRob Henderson54:30

      Mm-hmm.

   3. CWChris Williamson54:31

      ... and Joe has just moved to Austin and is saying, "Ah, I don't know what you're talking about. Uh, it's fantastic over there. Uh, every time that I go into a room, everyone treats me really great." Uh, and Bl- and Tim cuts in, he goes, "Ho- hold on one second. Like you do know that you are Joe Rogan."

   4. RHRob Henderson54:46

      Yeah.

   5. CWChris Williamson54:46

      Right?

   6. RHRob Henderson54:47

      Yeah.

   7. CWChris Williamson54:47

      Like, do you, like you bend reality around, there's this sphere that follows you where like who the fuck's gonna treat you like shit?

   8. RHRob Henderson54:54

      Yeah.

   9. CWChris Williamson54:54

      Right?

   10. RHRob Henderson54:55

       Yeah.

   11. CWChris Williamson54:55

       Like the biggest podcaster in the world's just walked in.

   12. RHRob Henderson54:57

       Mm-hmm.

   13. CWChris Williamson54:57

       And, um, I spoke to Tucker Max about this over dinner a couple of months ago. It's so interesting. Um, and I was talking about how-I- I- I've noticed certain groups of people treating me differently over the last couple of years as s- status and, and renown, and wealth, and whatever has, has changed. And there is a reason now to be nice, perhaps, or maybe there's not a reason to be nice, they don't even know it, but something happens. They've heard that's the guy with the podcast or whatever. Mm-hmm. So, you just notice that (clears throat) like the average stranger interaction has adjusted in some way. Maybe I'm just super, like, charismatic or whatever. I've changed my confidence. That-

   14. RHRob Henderson55:34

       Hmm.

   15. CWChris Williamson55:34

       ... totally could be it too.

   16. RHRob Henderson55:35

       Could be, yeah.

   17. CWChris Williamson55:35

       But my more, um, like, highly skeptical, uh, cynical view of it is, like, people want something or whatever. Anyway, and, um-

   18. RHRob Henderson55:42

       Mm-hmm.

   19. CWChris Williamson55:42

       ... I was talking to Tucker about this and he said, uh, "To become rich or famous as a man is to accept being a, a resource to be extracted for, from or an object to be desired."

   20. RHRob Henderson55:52

       Mm-hmm.

   21. CWChris Williamson55:52

       And he said that, uh, women become objectified as soon as they become, uh, you know, like womanly.

   22. RHRob Henderson55:57

       Yeah.

   23. CWChris Williamson55:57

       You know, you're 13 years old and the boys in the class now start to see that you've got boobs and, and then you become like 17, 18 and the whole world objectifies you for a while because your value is immediate and upfront. Whereas-

   24. RHRob Henderson56:07

       Mm-hmm.

   25. CWChris Williamson56:07

       ... you know, this is a red pill takeaway I guess, that like, uh, women are born with value, men have to create it.

   26. RHRob Henderson56:12

       Hmm.

   27. CWChris Williamson56:13

       Um, and i- it is, unless you're Brad Pitt or, you know, somebody who is, is super good-looking and has that upfront, um, you have to achieve some degree of, of, of self-generated value in order for people to, uh, treat you in a, to objectify you.

   28. RHRob Henderson56:31

       Yeah. Mm-hmm.

   29. CWChris Williamson56:31

       Right? Like no one's, no one's just objectifying the random dude in the street.

   30. RHRob Henderson56:34

       Yeah.
8. 1:01:02 – 1:07:15

   Is Listening to Joe Rogan a Turn-Off?

   1. CWChris Williamson1:01:02

      flag. You see this new one about extremist views?

   2. RHRob Henderson1:01:05

      (laughs)

   3. CWChris Williamson1:01:05

      William shared the graph of it.

   4. RHRob Henderson1:01:08

      I haven't seen this one, but, uh, let's not. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

   5. CWChris Williamson1:01:10

      Let me get your take on this. This is awesome. Researchers polled over 1,000 registered US voters aged 18 to 34. A majority of both men and women consider far rightism and far leftism to be red flags in a potential partner. 76% of women and 59% of men consider identifying as a MAGA Republican-

   6. RHRob Henderson1:01:29

      Okay.

   7. CWChris Williamson1:01:30

      ... to be a major turn-off.

   8. RHRob Henderson1:01:31

      Hmm.

   9. CWChris Williamson1:01:31

      64% of men and 55% of women said they'd also swipe left on someone identifying as a communist.

   10. RHRob Henderson1:01:38

       Hmm.

   11. CWChris Williamson1:01:39

       So that was high number of women, 76% for MAGA, 64% of men for communist. 55% of women said that listening to Joe Rogan was a red flag.

   12. RHRob Henderson1:01:48

       (laughs)

   13. CWChris Williamson1:01:49

       30...

   14. RHRob Henderson1:01:49

       What about modern wisdom? (laughs)

   15. CWChris Williamson1:01:51

       35... Yeah, that wasn't on there. Uh, 35% of men. Uh, 41% of men said the same for a woman being into astrology.

   16. RHRob Henderson1:01:58

       Hmm, okay, I mean...

   17. CWChris Williamson1:02:00

       20% of women. Uh, 33% of men said red flag for they say Black lives matter.

   18. RHRob Henderson1:02:06

       Hmm.

   19. CWChris Williamson1:02:06

       14% of women. Uh, 53% of women for they refuse to see the Barbie movie.

   20. RHRob Henderson1:02:11

       Hmm.

   21. CWChris Williamson1:02:12

       Uh, 53% of women, uh, 58% of women for they say there are only two genders. So-

   22. RHRob Henderson1:02:17

       Hmm.

   23. CWChris Williamson1:02:18

       ... more women concerned about the two genders thing than the Barbie movie. Interesting-

   24. RHRob Henderson1:02:23

       Hmm.

   25. CWChris Williamson1:02:23

       ... uh, what that is. But yeah, just overall, it seems like, um, far rightism, far leftism, uh, uh, uh, being moderate is a green flag.

   26. RHRob Henderson1:02:33

       Yeah, yeah.

   27. CWChris Williamson1:02:33

       Basically, like, having... But that being said, how is saying that there are only two genders, like, an extreme position? How, how, uh, how... Like, I would've thought that that would've been the moderate position, right? Like, uh, well, I guess it depends. Yeah, but the, the bar stool's been turned upside down. But yeah, overall, when it comes to dating, it seems like a majority of both men and women consider far rightism and far leftism to be red flags in a potential partner.

   28. RHRob Henderson1:02:56

       Wha- wha- what age group is this? Are these young, young people?

   29. CWChris Williamson1:02:58

       18 to 34.

   30. RHRob Henderson1:02:59

       18 to 34, okay, yeah, that makes a lot... Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, yeah, I mean, you've, you've probably seen some of these data, too, about sort of the political divergence of young men and young women, um, which is really... I mean, it's really interesting because, uh, a lot of the, the press, the media will concentrate on, you know, the supposed, uh, right-wing radicalization of young men, when actually mo- most of the sort of political psychology survey data indicates the reverse, where men are... young men are slightly turning to the right. There's sort of a s- a slight turn, whereas for young women, there's a sharp, like a sharp rise in young women identifying as left or far left.

Episode duration: 1:49:01