Incels, Afghanistan & Chestfeeding | Modern Wisdom Podcast 360
Chris Williamson (host), Yusef Smith (guest), Jonny Watson (guest), Narrator
In this episode of Modern Wisdom, featuring Chris Williamson and Yusef Smith, Incels, Afghanistan & Chestfeeding | Modern Wisdom Podcast 360 explores incels, identity politics, tech surveillance and sport: culture wars unpacked Chris Williamson hosts Johnny and Yousef from Propane Fitness for a wide‑ranging, informal conversation that jumps between gender and identity politics, online incel culture, and the ethics of tech surveillance. They debate terms like “chestfeeding,” trans inclusion versus fairness in women’s sport, and Scottish school policies on child gender identity and parental consent. The trio also examine how algorithms, Apple’s CSAM scanning and iMessage nudity flags, and AI‑driven recommendation systems shape behavior and privacy. Interspersed are digressions on COVID, extreme sports doping practices, Afghanistan withdrawal reactions, and the growing cultural polarisation driven by social media.
Incels, identity politics, tech surveillance and sport: culture wars unpacked
Chris Williamson hosts Johnny and Yousef from Propane Fitness for a wide‑ranging, informal conversation that jumps between gender and identity politics, online incel culture, and the ethics of tech surveillance. They debate terms like “chestfeeding,” trans inclusion versus fairness in women’s sport, and Scottish school policies on child gender identity and parental consent. The trio also examine how algorithms, Apple’s CSAM scanning and iMessage nudity flags, and AI‑driven recommendation systems shape behavior and privacy. Interspersed are digressions on COVID, extreme sports doping practices, Afghanistan withdrawal reactions, and the growing cultural polarisation driven by social media.
Key Takeaways
Inclusive language can unintentionally erase sex-based realities and women’s experiences.
The hosts argue that replacing “breastfeeding” with “chestfeeding” may obscure biological differences (e. ...
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Fairness and inclusivity in trans sport participation are often in direct tension.
They note that prior male puberty and long-term testosterone exposure can leave lasting performance advantages that aren’t fully eliminated by a year of hormone suppression, raising hard questions about competitive equity in women’s categories.
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Individual pathology is often over-attributed to ideological groups like incels.
Using the Plymouth shooting, they stress that many commentators quickly blamed the incel community as a whole, while specialists suggest most incels find such forums themselves and are already vulnerable; the community is more an amplifier than sole cause.
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Online communities can reinforce fatalism and discourage self-improvement.
Within incel spaces, improvement (“looksmaxxing,” lifting, social skills) can be framed as betrayal; a fatalistic narrative that “nothing will ever work” bonds members while undermining agency that could change their situation.
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Big tech’s safety tools risk mission creep and severe unintended consequences.
Apple’s move to scan photos for child abuse imagery and flag minors’ nude images to parents could theoretically be repurposed for broader censorship and may create real-world risks (e. ...
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Algorithms increasingly shape users, not just content delivery.
Drawing on Stuart Russell’s work, they discuss how recommendation systems may find it easier to manipulate user preferences toward more extreme, predictable views than to “understand” users, contributing to polarization and echo chambers.
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Parental rights, child autonomy, and institutional policy are colliding.
Scottish guidance allowing young children to change name and gender at school without parental notification raises deep questions about who should make or be informed of identity-related decisions, especially when children lack long-term perspective.
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Notable Quotes
“Breastfeeding is one of our abilities. It's a beautiful and important ability. Knock off the nullifying of women for the sake of lunatics.”
— Kirstie Alley (quoted via Daily Wire)
“What you've essentially got is someone who's had a multi‑year exposure to male hormones, then cycles off and goes to compete. That's like doing a 30‑year steroid cycle and then entering women’s sport.”
— Yousef
“Overwhelmingly, these young men find the content on their own… The coverage has focused on the incel angle to the exclusion of everything else.”
— Chris paraphrasing Naama Kates
“The social media content selection algorithms don't just predict what you want. They can manipulate your preferences to make you more predictable.”
— Chris (summarizing Stuart Russell’s point)
“As soon as you change yourself from being a communicator to being a policer, you have to try and plug an awful lot of holes in the bottom of the boat.”
— Chris, on Apple’s scanning and reporting policies
Questions Answered in This Episode
Where should the line be drawn between trans-inclusive language and preserving sex-specific terms for women’s bodies and experiences?
Chris Williamson hosts Johnny and Yousef from Propane Fitness for a wide‑ranging, informal conversation that jumps between gender and identity politics, online incel culture, and the ethics of tech surveillance. ...
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What would a genuinely fair and inclusive framework for trans participation in elite sport look like in practice?
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How much responsibility should online communities like incel forums bear for violent acts committed by individual members?
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Are Apple and other tech giants justified in proactively policing user content for safety, or does this fundamentally undermine privacy and civil liberties?
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Who should have ultimate authority over a child’s gender expression and identity-related decisions: the child, the parents, or institutions like schools and governments?
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Transcript Preview
... a boy comes into school and says, "I want to be referred to as Rebecca. I'm now a girl," and they do not tell the parents that this is something that's, that's happening. I mean, if you can imagine if that was your child that was going into school and you found out that for six months, your child had been living as a four-year-old kid, or a five-year-old kid had been living a double life.
Well, it's fine because you, you'd find out because Apple would tell you. (laughter)
Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome back to the show. I am joined by Johnny and Yousef from propanefitness.com. How are you doing?
Very good, indeed. How are you?
Very well, thank you. Nice protein shirt, Johnny.
Thank you. Protein shirt?
Protein shirt. My protein.
His protein.
It is a protein.
It is my, it is, yeah. It's not your protein.
My protein.
It's not my protein.
Yeah. What were you talking about your Kurdish hairdo, Yousef?
Oh, yeah. So I have found, uh, if you, if you've never been to a Kurdish barber, you're missing out. Sometimes they, they're Turkish barbers. I think the, the one I'm at is a mixture of Azerbaijan, Turkish, and Iranian, and they always have some top tunes playing, and they give you the, like, you can ask for the full treatment, which is, like, wax buds in your nose and the fire on a string and, like, the hot towel on your head and all that stuff. I just go for the-
Incense burning in the background.
The full, full whack.
Meat and flat pieces of bread on the way out.
(laughs) What an experience.
I'd go.
It just puts, like, the standard barber to shame.
Yeah. Yeah. Uh, so chest feeding. I found this article earlier on, this is, uh, from the Daily Wire. Kirstie Alley blasts trans terms like chest feeding, calling them degrading to women. Actress Kirstie Alley slammed so-called trans inclusive terminology like chest feeding over the weekend, claiming it degrades and nullifies women. It was unclear what sparked Alley's comment, but last week, as the Daily Wire reported, the Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine published new guidelines on lactation-related language. Among the organization's recommendations is replacing the verb breastfeeding with gender-neutral terms like human milk feeding and chest feeding, because they claim not all people who give birth and lactate identify as female. Whilst the vast majority of responses to Alley, including nearly 1,600 likes, uh, 16,000 likes, expressed agreement, she seemed to address the comparatively few critical replies about 15 minutes later. "I'm a little tired of degrading and nullifying women and their abilities," she explained. "Breastfeeding is one of our abilities. It's a beautiful and important ability. Knock off the nullifying of women for the sake of lunatics. Equal li- rights does not equal es- equal esanity." A few minutes after that, she added, "It's our personal responsibility to agree or disagree with concepts. My only point here today is don't let insanity force you to pretend like you agree with the insanity. It's part of the insanity to shame you into agreement." Chest feeding, Yousef.
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