WHEN DO PEOPLE BECOME RESPONSIBLE? ANSWER TO ‘X’ LISTENER QUESTION

Stefan Molyneux

"This is always the hardest one for me:: To what extent should we let people suffer the consequences of their actions?"  This lecture examines the delicate balance between allowing individuals, particularly children, to experience the consequences of their actions and the instinct to protect them from harm. Through personal anecdotes and the lens of Aristotle's philosophy, the discussion highlights the importance of finding equilibrium between accountability and shielding. It explores developmental milestones in responsibility, contrasting the abilities of children and adults to manage their choices, supported by case studies on resilience and self-ownership. The lecture also addresses the evolutionary roots of protective instincts in parenting, the complementary roles of mothers and fathers, and the impact of societal structures on individual accountability. Ultimately, it prompts a reflection on personal responsibility and societal support, urging for a more nuanced understanding of when consequences are appropriate in fostering growth and well-being.  SUBSCRIBE TO ME ON X! https://x.com/StefanMolyneux  Follow me on Youtube! https://www.youtube.com/@freedomain1  GET MY NEW BOOK 'PEACEFUL PARENTING', THE INTERACTIVE PEACEFUL PARENTING AI, AND THE FULL AUDIOBOOK! https://peacefulparenting.com/  Join the PREMIUM philosophy community on the web for free!  Subscribers get 12 HOURS on the "Truth About the French Revolution," multiple interactive multi-lingual philosophy AIs trained on thousands of hours of my material - as well as AIs for Real-Time Relationships, Bitcoin, Peaceful Parenting, and Call-In Shows!  You also receive private livestreams, HUNDREDS of exclusive premium shows, early release podcasts, the 22 Part History of Philosophers series and much more!  See you soon! https://freedomain.locals.com/support/promo/UPB2025

Transcript

00:00All right, a great question from a listener on X. This is always the hardest one for me. To what

00:05extent should we let people suffer the consequences of their actions? I mean, that's a challenge that

00:12I'm facing as a parent at the moment, which is, I mean, my daughter's almost 17, and it's not my

00:20job to fix her problems anymore. I mean, I can give her some feedback, some advice, or whatever,

00:23but if she has challenges in her life, which we always do, it is not my job to fix the challenges

00:31that she has in her life. I'm available as a resource, but I'm not going to fix them. Now,

00:38of course, let's look at the good old place to start with these kinds of questions, right? It's

00:41not black and white answers, right? So the best place to start with these kinds of questions

00:45is the good old Aristotelian mean. Good old Aristotelian mean. So in said good old Aristotelian

00:53mean, the question is, where do you sit in the middle? On the one extreme, it's let everyone,

01:02even toddlers, suffer the consequences of their choices. Clearly, that would be wrong, bad, and

01:09unjust. On the other hand, it would be the other extreme, don't let anyone, even adults, suffer any

01:17negative consequences for their actions, which would also be extreme. So recognize that it is

01:24not a black and white issue, it's a balance issue. And as a balance issue, we have to recognize that

01:30there's times when we do not let people suffer the consequences of their actions, and then there are

01:36times when we do often, not always, often let people suffer the consequences of their actions,

01:41consequences. And then there's something in between. It's sort of like, when are people

01:45responsible? Like, when can someone sign a contract? When can someone rent a car and that

01:49kind of stuff, right? Well, there's no particularly clear answer except at the extremes, right? So

01:54obviously, a five-year-old can't sign a contract. Obviously, a 50-year-old, you know, assuming mental

02:00competence, can sign a contract. And somewhere in between, there is a tipping point. Now, we have to

02:07sort of make these decisions as a whole, based upon, at the moment, generally seems to be 18,

02:15you can, you're an adult, right? That's sort of the general argument at the moment. Maybe in the

02:19future, we would have brain scans, or, I don't know, some sort of intelligent questionnaire that

02:26would give people who were younger, maybe, more ability to sign contracts, or be an adult, and maybe

02:32older people, we'd be delayed a little bit, but whatever. If we just come up with something in the absence

02:37of that technology, we've just come up with something which is 18. Now, again, you think

02:41about it, you know, right before, like, I think about this with that sort of creepy OnlyFans stuff,

02:46you know, the countdown to so-and-so turning 18, like, they just, you know, one second after

02:53they turn 18. They can now make a decision, but I get that's kind of how we have to make decisions

03:00in society. Somebody has to be an adult. Now, clearly, babies and toddlers should not suffer

03:06the consequences of their own bad actions, at least, you know, so very, very early on, right?

03:13So, we would not say of a toddler just learning how to walk, that we should, you know, have him

03:20learn how to walk on sharp rocks or concrete or something crazy like that. We wouldn't want to say

03:26that because they're learning how to walk, and therefore, because they're learning how to walk,

03:32their falling is not anything that is the result of a negative choice, right? If somebody is an adult,

03:42right, let's say, and they foolishly decide to carry too much, you know, and they trip or they fall or

03:49then we'd say that was not a wise decision or something like that. But when they're a toddler

03:56just learning how to walk, we would not want them to, we would not want to say to them, well,

04:00you have to suffer the negative consequences of falling. We're going to have, you learn to walk

04:04in a bathing suit on sharp rocks or something like that. I mean, it's the training wheels argument.

04:10When I taught my daughter how to ride a bike, I taught her, of course, on grass, right? So,

04:18when she fell, she didn't fall on concrete or something like that, right? So, that's how we,

04:25that's how we do. That's how we do. And then at some point, you have to take the training wheels off

04:32and you can give them advice and they then have to make their own decisions or decisions, decisions or

04:41choices and so on. So, the purpose, of course, of parenting is to transfer as much self-ownership

04:49as possible to your child as you go forward. So, when your children are very young, they have little

04:58self-ownership and then, or self-responsibility, and as they get older, you give them more and more

05:04self-responsibility. But it's tough and it's particularly tough for mothers. I think we sort

05:12of all understand that. It's particularly tough for mothers because, remember, women as a whole

05:16were programmed by sort of nature and evolution to be constantly dealing with babies and toddlers,

05:23right? So, a woman set a 20-year fertility cycle from 18 to 38. She'd basically be having kids that

05:29whole time. And then, when her kids were grown up, she would be dealing with grandchildren.

05:34So, a woman's entire evolutionary arc was dealing with babies and toddlers. And generally,

05:41the babies and toddlers would then move on often to the man's, if it was sons often, although sometimes

05:49daughters as well, would move on to the man's sphere as a whole. And so, that's sort of the reality.

05:56So, women find it very tough to give children agency. Now, I find it a little challenging,

06:05but it's not too bad. I'm sort of aware of the sort of process, right? So, women have a tough time

06:11giving people agency. Women are programmed to forgive. Women are programmed to not take offense

06:19at what children do and so on, right? And this is one of the reasons why women, to sort of understand

06:27sort of modern democracy. Women, as a whole, have a lens through which they view people as children.

06:37And you can see this when you have boys and their toys, right? So, they look at their husbands as kind

06:41of goofy children and so on. And you will see women, and it's not, you know, it's not necessarily

06:48terrible or anything like that, but you will see women sort of making fun of men for being sort of

06:53goofy and silly and over-competitive and things that don't matter and so on, right? And so, women view

07:01people as children, with one exception, which we'll get to in a second. So, when women look at criminals,

07:11they see the childhood and they say, gosh, that criminal had a bad childhood. And because women

07:21process people through the lens of they are children or they are not responsible for their

07:27own behavior or actions, then they are sympathetic or they can be manipulated into sympathy for the

07:35criminal. And it's the same thing with illegal immigration. And they just have this, you know,

07:41they're just looking for a better life and there's sympathy and so on. And that's because women view

07:47humanity through the lens of motherhood and through the lens of they are children, the people that I'm

07:55dealing with as a whole, because that's what they were raised with, right? And this childlike mentality,

08:02and I mean that with all respect. I mean, it's absolutely essential for the evolution of a

08:05species that women deal with, the people they interact with largely as children, because that's

08:09what they interacted with for the most part throughout their life. So, they have to retain,

08:14to some degree, a child-adjacent mentality, which you have to do as a stay-at-home dad. I did the same

08:19thing when my daughter was very little. I had a child-adjacent mentality because that's how you

08:23relate to your children. So, men want to give more responsibility and women want to give less

08:35responsibility. And because we evolved to balance out each other, right? So, this is really, really

08:43important. So, we evolved to balance out each other. So, why do teenage boys have such a crazy high

08:50sex drive? Well, because the women would say, well, you can't have sex until you get married.

08:59And so, think of two people in a rope-pulling contest, right? They're each pulling because the

09:05other person is pulling the other way, so they can pull and not fall over. But if somebody were to

09:09cut that rope in the middle, both parties fall over. So, we are aimed or aiming to balance each other

09:16out as male and female. And when males and females are separated, we fall over. Men tend to get overly

09:24abstract, overly analytical, and sometimes bitter. And women tend to get over-maternal and pathologic

09:31and altruistic. Because the woman will say, we should not give too much responsibility to our

09:38children. And the man will say, we should give more responsibility to our children. And the balance

09:43of those two things is where the truth is. And this is why men and women, in their negotiations,

09:51in their conflicts, sometimes produce, in general, that which is best for children. So, women are

09:59programmed to not take offense. Women are programmed to forgive, right? Which is why Samuel L. Jackson in

10:09some old movie. I hope he burns in hell. Vengeance, right? And this was the Charlie Kirk memorial

10:14with Erica Kirk forgiving. And the man like, nope. I mean, he's got to pay. And forgiving is perfectly

10:22appropriate for children. And even when they do something, like even when a child gets angry and

10:28hits your leg, right? We don't take it with the same offense as an adult hitting. Because they're just

10:34trying to get what they want and experimenting with choices. And they are amoral, right? In the

10:40same way, a child who leaves a store clutching a candy bar that nobody noticed is not the same as a

10:46thief who steals a candy bar, right? So, we understand all this. So, the exception, though, where women do not

10:56forgive, in general, is when men, generally men, when men enforce upon women that you have to give

11:09toddlers and babies agency. So, for instance, let's say you've got a two-year-old, and the two-year-old

11:17is doing something physically dangerous. The two-year-old is dawdling about at the top of a set of steep

11:25stairs. Now, women, as a whole, will rush up and protect a child. And that's exactly what they

11:33should do. That's the instincts that have kept us all alive. And thank heavens for women doing that

11:37over the course of human history. It's kind of why we're all here, right? And good. Thank you. Thank

11:42you, ladies, for your service and your anxiety. It's beautiful and wonderful and absolutely necessary.

11:49Now, if a woman sees her child dawdling around at the top of a set of steep stairs, and a man says,

12:00let him learn by falling, the woman will be very angry at the man. She's programmed to get very angry

12:09at the man who says, let that person learn through consequences, right? And she should, should be angry

12:18at him because he's putting her entire investment, an entire genetic love investment at a risk,

12:26right? By the child falls down. And not only might the child fall down, but the child might fall down

12:33and also maybe not even die, but maybe get some permanent brain injury and end up like Lenny from

12:41Of Mice and Men. And, you know, that harms her entire bloodline and the amount of resources that are

12:47needed. So, when women see imminent disaster, when women see bad things about to happen, when women get

12:57anxious over negative consequences accruing to someone else, they want to rush in and protect. And any man

13:08who says, let them suffer their negative consequences, she views that man with hostility. She can forgive any

13:17thing except that. Again, I'm sort of exaggerating a little bit, but she can forgive just about

13:24anything except that. Again, for a sort of evolutionary biological reasons, which are pretty

13:27obvious. So, women want to shield others from negative consequences because they're dealing with

13:35babies and toddlers. And anyone who says that person should suffer negative consequences is viewed with

13:41great hostility by the woman. I think we, I don't want to labor the point, but that's sort of what's

13:47going on as a whole. So, men will come in and say, and there's this fairly funny, obvious meme of a kid

13:58who's playing around with an electrical socket. And the mom is like, don't, right? And the dad is like,

14:05no, no, let him, if you want to do it, go ahead. And then there's this, you know, and then the dad is like,

14:10well, he's not going to do that again now, is he, right? So, pain, of course, exists because

14:15we can't just have our mothers hover around us for our whole lives, making sure we don't do

14:20ridiculous things. The pain is there to make sure that we get the sort of negative feedback.

14:28Now, we are kept alive by having negative consequences removed from us or prevented from

14:37us always shielded from those negative consequences when we're babies, toddlers, younger, and so on.

14:42It's the old thing that a boy who's climbing a tree, the man looks on with pride, the woman,

14:47the mother looks on with anxiety and fear. And both are fine. Both are necessary. And the yin and yang

14:53of those things is very important as a whole. So, the problem though, is that when women gain control

15:02over society's resources, and women have control over society's resources, and they have so much

15:08power, both through sexual desirability when they're young, and, I mean, we're just talking

15:13about sort of the mating phase. I'm not saying women aren't sexually attractive when they get

15:17older, but... So, when they're young, they have the power of choice in a free society of who

15:24they marry, and then they have the power of shaping culture and language and responses among

15:29infants. So, women have an extraordinary levels of power in society. And if you combine that also

15:37with political power, then the problem is that people who know this hack, right, which is appear

15:44a child to a woman, and she will want to shield you from negative consequences, appear helpless to

15:53women, and they will want to protect you from negative consequences, appear childlike to women,

16:00and they will want to give you resources and nurturing and care. And if you hack women's biological

16:09mechanism of sympathy and non-accountability, right, if you hack that in women, and women have the power

16:18to transfer resources, then women will be seduced into handing over resources by those who claim

16:27no responsibility for their choices. And, of course, a lot of these will be... And women know this,

16:34right, which is why it generally comes out of women, sort of the welfare state, right?

16:41So, the way that you hack women's baby toddler care mechanism is you say,

16:52it happened to me, I was deceived, I couldn't possibly know, it was an accident, you know,

17:01things occurred, I'm a victim, and so on. So, you shed agency in order to get women to give you

17:10resources as if you were a toddler, because women did not evolve to be in charge of society's resources.

17:19That was a male job, because men train each other into agency early on, by saying, you know, you throw

17:30the spear and you miss the deer, and it's like, you suck, and nobody's going to trust you, and, you know,

17:36we're all going to go hungry because of you. Even if you're 12, then what do you do to gain

17:41back male? Well, you've got to go, and if you get male respect, what you have to do, you have to go

17:45and practice like crazy with a spear, and then you have to demonstrate that you've learned your

17:50lesson, and now you can throw a spear accurately, and, you know, you throw it at a squirrel and hit a

17:55squirrel, or whatever you do, right? So, you have to, you know, you're told you suck, and you have

17:59to go and practice and work and improve yourself in order to regain male respect. So, if you give

18:07women control of society's resources, and, of course, you know, women should have property rights,

18:12blah, blah, blah. I'm just talking about through the power of the state and debt. If you give women

18:15control of society's resources, then you open up this hellscape of both men and women, feminized men

18:23and women as a whole, that they will hack women's sympathy for the helpless by pretending to be

18:31helpless in order to get, to sort of trigger this response, and to get women to give them resources.

18:37And women, of course, are used to giving other people's resources, because the man goes and hunts

18:42and builds and all the women hand it out themselves, which, again, totally fine. Within the family,

18:47how we evolved, not only totally fine, but I would argue absolutely necessary and healthy and good.

18:51So, that is the big challenge of the modern world. So, what happens is, let's look at the old,

19:01right? So, the aged, right? So, one of the first things that happened with regards to

19:06the welfare state is welfare for old people, right? Old age pensions, right? That's one of the things

19:13that happens. So, the way that it works is, old people who don't have any money, right?

19:21They've spent their money, they've loaned their money, whatever, right? Old people

19:25will appear doddering and helpless and foolish and feeble, and that is, of course, their manipulative

19:32strength and power. So, there'll be old people who are hungry and so on, and they have not saved

19:38for their retirement. They don't have people in their lives who love them. They didn't have children,

19:43or they were so horrible to their children that their children don't want to have anything to do

19:46with them. And so, they're old and they're sad, or maybe they've been alcoholics, or maybe they've

19:51been thieves, or maybe they were pedophiles, or maybe they were, you know, rampant abusers, or just

19:55nasty people as a whole, right? And so, they don't, of course, do any of that. And homeless people do

20:02the same thing. Like, just think about how many layers of goodwill you have to fall through in order

20:08to end up homeless, right? It's not pretty. It's not good. So, old people will be doddering and sad

20:19and need things, and then women are like, oh gosh, the old, well, they're helpless, and they can't,

20:26they can't, so they can't go out and work, and they can't generate the money they need to retire on,

20:31and so they are very sad, and so please, God, give them pensions. Like, just take them out of poverty.

20:38Right? And, sorry, I also mentioned that, I forgot to mention earlier, women deal with toddlers

20:45and with the aged. Right? So, women take care of babies and toddlers and the aged. And, of course,

20:52when somebody is 75 and they're broke, what do you do? What do you do? Now, for men, I don't want to

21:01speak for all men, but I think, in general, the male instinct in that situation is to say something

21:07like this. Okay, well, you know, we can't have the old people just dying and falling over. Okay,

21:16I accept that. We can't just, we can't just have the old people starving to death and being eaten by

21:20their cats. However, we also don't want to make them too comfortable, because if we make them too

21:25comfortable, nobody's going to bother saving for their retirement. Right? So, I don't think it's an IQ

21:31thing, but this sort of second order, third order thinking. So, the first order thinking is,

21:36oh my gosh, this old person is broke. Give them money. Right? Make them comfortable. Make them

21:42happy. Now, that is in the immediate. The old person will be very thankful and happy and, yeah,

21:47you're certainly creating a benefit to them. The second order thinking, which tends to be a bit

21:53more masculine is, okay, but hang on, hang on. What are the effects, in the long run, what are the

22:00effects on society if we give all this money to old people? Well, people will stop saving for their

22:09retirement, which, you know, benefits businesses in the here and now, because people are spending

22:13rather than saving. So, people will stop saving for their retirement, and because they stopped saving

22:18for their retirement, we're just going to end up with this endless treadmill of transferring resources

22:22to the aged, and we're punishing people who are more responsible, and rewarding people who are

22:26less responsible, and that's bad for society as a whole. But, that's like, for women experience that,

22:33like, well, if your kid is so dumb that they're dancing around the top of stairs, maybe they deserve

22:37to be taken out of the jean pool. I'm not saying that's a good idea, but women experience it that way.

22:43And, it's inconceivable to women as a whole that that would be an approach.

22:50So, women, when they see suffering, are used to nagging men to provide resources to alleviate

22:57that suffering. And the men, of course, you know, we're nice people, we want to help, and so we want

23:04to provide resources to alleviate suffering, but not at the expense of creating more suffering,

23:08which is when you just give people who make bad decisions a lot of money, then people can make

23:12money by making bad decisions, and things get bad. But also because, you know, we, as human beings,

23:19this is really essential to understand, this is why I say, like, debt drives people insane.

23:24We, as human beings, evolved in situations of, at least by modern standards, almost unimaginable

23:34scarcity. Almost unimaginable scarcity. And so, there just wasn't the magic money that you could just

23:44make up to pay for the, quote, empathy of the women. I don't view it as real empathy,

23:51and certainly some women are empathetic, some men are empathetic, but this anxiety stuff

23:56is just programming, right? It's like saying that needing to pee is empathy for your bladder. It's

24:03like, no, it's just a physical sensation of discomfort relieved by peeing, or that your hunger

24:07is having empathy for your muscles. It's like, no, it's just a, so this sort of driven anxiety stuff

24:13is not empathy. People are just looking to reduce negative stimuli, such as anxiety, by removing

24:20negative things from their sight, right? Like, hungry, hungry child. I will take away picture of

24:27hungry child if you do what I want. Or, you know, for women who are traumatized by looking at the

24:36little Turkish boy who drowned, and I think was positioned in the surf, drowned in the Mediterranean,

24:43and so women see that, they're very upset by that, and the media is basically like, well, if you open

24:48the borders, we will not print any more of these pictures. And they haven't, right? I mean, this sort

24:53of selective stuff is very important. So, we grew up in situations of unimaginable scarcity,

25:01and so women would say, I want, I want, I want, and, you know, for nice things or whatever,

25:06helpful things, and men would say, we can't, we can't, we can't. And I talk about this interaction,

25:12I wrote a whole scene about this interaction in my novel, the present between Oliver and his mother.

25:18And it's a very, very important scene to sort of illustrate this in action or emotion.

25:26So, women, infinite wants, men, finite resources, and the friction between these two things

25:32is very productive in the world as a whole. I mean, honestly, I can't think that there's a straight

25:39man alive who's looked at a nice, reasonably nice kitchen and said, this needs remodeling, right?

25:44I mean, it's, women have this fractious and ambivalent relationship with a kitchen and

25:53everything could be nicer. And it's great. Listen, I mean, I live in, my wife's a wonderful homemaker,

25:57I live in this girly world paradise, as opposed to when I met her, I had leftover plates, a broken

26:04futon, and I did not own a vacuum cleaner. What can I tell you? I was a bachelor. But I had a nice TV,

26:13I'll tell you that. So, that issue that we grew up in scarcity, women developed infinite wants,

26:20and men put the cap on those infinite wants according to the resources available. That was

26:25the dynamic. That was very productive. When you get fiat currency, though, you liberate the infinite

26:30wants to a form of resource psychosis. I'm not kidding about this. It's psychosis that women see,

26:38say, an old person who's suffering, right? And they say, well, we should have this person not

26:44suffer. Now, in the past, men might say, no, they deserve to suffer, because, you know, they were

26:50jerks to their kids, they were mean, they were selfish, they drank, they didn't save any money,

26:55they were gamblers, they like, they were degenerates. So, yeah, I'm not saying they should starve to death,

27:00but, you know, we shouldn't give them more than the bare minimum, because, you know, they earned their

27:05fate, right? They earned their fate. And women would be upset about this, and that's good,

27:10and that's fair, because sometimes men can be too harsh. And sometimes men, you know,

27:16I hate to use the term, because it's kind of overused, but, you know, relative women's hyper

27:20empathy, men can be a little bit autistic, and so on. But, as a whole, women's desire for more

27:29taking care of people, regardless of, you know, well, that was in the past, and move on, and so on,

27:35right? Like, well, they may have been jerks in the past, and maybe they were mean to their children,

27:38but we can't just let them starve, right? Okay, well, so women can train men to be a little bit

27:45more empathetic, and I think that's healthy, and that's good. But also, men have to be able to train

27:50women to stop being quite so hyper with their empathy, right? So excessive, so pathological when

27:58it comes to that. I mean, empathy, kindness, that's, again, all in the Aristotelian mean.

28:04A deficiency of empathy is coldness, and excess of empathy is self-destructive.

28:10So, when should people suffer the consequences of their own actions? Well, in my view, and I think

28:20this is reasonable, but you can let me know what you think. In my view, it is when they can reasonably

28:28foresee the consequences of their actions, and, you know, I know that putting the word reasonably in

28:33there is not particularly helpful, because, you know, reasonably is not much of an argument, but

28:40one of the things that happens with teenagers is they start to hold each other and their parents

28:48responsible for the consequences of their own actions. So, one of the things that happens in

28:53most households with teenagers is the teenagers start being very critical of the parents.

29:00And, I mean, this is the old Mark Twain thing where he said, when I left home at 16 because

29:05my dad was such an idiot, you know, when I returned home at 20, I was amazed at how much he'd learned

29:11in a few short years, right? It's a kind of a joke, right? So, when teenagers start

29:17criticizing each other and start criticizing their parents, then they are holding each other

29:24and their parents responsible for the consequences of their own actions, right? So, when kids are

29:32little, you know, every kid in the neighborhood comes over for the party. I remember my daughter

29:38had a birthday party when she was quite young, house for the kids, a lot of fun, and then we

29:43had a power outage, and it was pretty wild. A lot of chaos, a lot of fun, a lot of screaming, a lot

29:49of excitement. And the woman, we'd hired a woman to do face painting, she had to do it by the light

29:55of her phone, and it was actually very, very memorable. These things aren't even a problem.

30:00On the other hand, a friend of mine many, many years ago had a sleepover, and there was torrential

30:05rains, and the sewers backed up into the basement. Oh, my gosh. Screaming, throwing the air

30:10mattresses up the stairs, helping out, the kids freaking out, the stench. It was a vivid night.

30:16One was memorable and fun, the other was memorable and not quite so fun. But at least, you know,

30:21these things happen in life, and it's good to have these bookmarks in your brain, I think,

30:25that it means you've done more than just blind repetition over the course of your life.

30:31So, when kids, everyone comes over to the party, so on. Now, when your kids get older,

30:36let's say they're, you know, 14 or 13 or 15 or whatever, then what happens is they say,

30:42I don't want to spend time with, I'll just make up a name here, Bobsy, some girl. I don't want to

30:49spend time with Bobsy, she's mean or negative or something like that. It's like, okay, okay, so

30:53the inflicting of negative consequences on others is now happening. With guys, it's like, oh,

31:01don't invite Josh, he's always so weird, or whatever it is, right? Like, there's now the

31:07infliction of negative consequences on others. Now, that means that the kids, the teenagers,

31:16and so on, are now processing negative consequences, right? And they are saying other people

31:24should be, should suffer negative effects of negative consequences, right? Or when the boys say,

31:33I don't want Alex, again, these aren't names of anybody I know, I don't want Alex to be on the

31:42baseball team, because Alex is bad at hitting and throwing and catching. Okay, so negative consequences.

31:48I mean, this can happen younger. If kids cheat at Marco Polo, or grounders, or something like that,

31:55then other kids don't really want to play with them. So, those are negative consequences. So,

32:02when does someone become subject to negative consequences? Well, the moment that they start

32:08showing that they understand negative consequences, and wish to inflict negative consequences on others.

32:15then they can't say, well, gee, I had no idea there was any such thing as negative consequences.

32:20When they say, I don't want Bobsy to come to the party, because X, Y, and Z, or I don't want Alex on

32:25the baseball team, then they're saying other people should suffer negative consequences for,

32:32just have to be bad behavior. You know, maybe Alex is just really uncoordinated, but it still doesn't

32:36mean he can throw and catch and hit a baseball or anything like that. So, when people, the kids,

32:43teenagers, when they start inflicting negative consequences on others for negative behaviors,

32:48then they are showing and signaling that they understand negative consequences, they want to

32:55inflict negative consequences, and therefore, they cannot rashly complain about being subject to

33:02negative consequences, right? So, this is something that a lot of parents need to explain to kids over

33:09the time. So, they say, I don't want Bobsy to come to my party, because I don't like Bobsy for X, Y, and Z

33:15reason. And then, maybe Bobsy has a big party, and Bobsy doesn't invite the parent's child to Bobsy's

33:23big party, and maybe the parent's child is upset, at which point, the parent will sit down and say,

33:27well, you know, remember, you didn't want Bobsy to come to your party, so it's not too shocking that Bobsy

33:30doesn't want you to come to her party. And remember, the ability to inflict negative consequences

33:37is not specific to you. And when you start using the negative consequences weapon, so to speak,

33:46well, it's going to be used back on you. So, this happens, of course, in the dating world.

33:53If some guy's dating a girl, and he says, oh, broke up with her because she was too needy, or whatever it

33:58is, some negative thing, or she cheated, or some negative things, okay, well, so you're inflicting

34:02negative consequences of breaking up with the girl, because of something negative she did.

34:07And therefore, if you're inflicting negative consequences on others based upon negative

34:10behavior, then you understand this, and therefore, you should yourself be subject to negative

34:17consequences. And, you know, parents also often need to explain this to their kids. If you want

34:22independence, that's fine. I mean, your nature's going to grow you to be an adult, and you're going to

34:28go get independence anyway. But if you want independence, that's fine. But independence

34:33comes with responsibilities. And if you don't want to, if you want to be independent of your

34:40parents, that's fine, then you have to earn your own money. Because that's what you need to do when

34:45you become an adult, anyway, usually, right? So, independence is great. Independence means being

34:54responsible for your own life, and suffering the negative consequences of your own bad decisions,

35:00which we all have to do. I mean, I'm pushing 60, and I have to suffer the negative consequences of

35:06my own bad decisions. So, that's life. That makes life more interesting. Who wants to play,

35:13like, who wants to play a game on God mode other than central bankers, right? So, when people say,

35:20so-and-so should experience negative consequences, then they're accepting that negative consequences

35:27are valid, and should be inflicted. So, for instance, if somebody says, oh, I, you know,

35:33so-and-so said something that was not politically correct, he, usually he or she, should be deplatformed.

35:41You know, F-A-F-O. Frick around, find out, as the saying goes. And so, when you have the mob

35:50cheering for negative consequences, this person should lose his job, because I heard he said

35:56something mean about whatever, X, Y, and Z. This person should, okay, so then you're saying that

36:02this person should have no income, because you don't like what they said. It's freedom of speech,

36:06not freedom from consequences. Okay, that's fine. That's fine. So, then those same people,

36:13if people should suffer negative consequences of bad decisions, then we should get rid of the

36:17welfare state. So, the same argument for deplatforming people is the same argument for

36:21getting rid of the welfare state. But, of course, people are often mindless, hypocritical drones

36:26of propaganda, so they don't see that connection, right? So, this is where you see the rank hypocrisy,

36:34right? Which is, well, you know, Charlie Kirk did say some divisive things. It's like, what? So,

36:41he should get killed? He should get murdered? Okay, so then people should die just for saying

36:47things that other people don't like, which means, what if somebody has taken no care of their health,

36:53not saved any money, they're obese, they're chain smokers, they're alcoholics, they've never

36:58gone into rehab, they've never dealt with it, then why should other people be forced to pay

37:02for everything needed to keep that person alive? If, you know, people want to keep that person

37:07alive, then it costs, I don't know, $3,000 a month for, you know, insulin and medicine and

37:13whatever it is, right? So, if their friends and family want to chip around and keep that person

37:17alive, that's fine, obviously, that's voluntary. But should people be forced to keep that other

37:21person alive, right? So, if people are saying, well, so-and-so should get fired or deplatformed or

37:26perhaps even killed for their arguments or opinions, then you're saying that people should not be

37:31shielded from even the most brutal negative consequences of fairly innocuous things,

37:35like making arguments in the public square, then if people don't take care of their health,

37:42or let's say they'd never deal with their gambling, they gamble a lot and they blow their money

37:47and they have no kids and then they're old and poor, it's like, well, I mean, you're the same

37:52person who said people should get fired just for expressing an opinion or maybe even shot

37:56or deplatformed or lose their income. So, that's just so, that's just for, that's just for

38:03expressing an opinion or making an argument. So, if you've alienated all your friends and family and

38:09nobody likes you and you didn't have any kids and you didn't save any money and you had all the fun

38:12of gambling, it was fun, right? Exciting. Then, so, this is part of the paradox of the left is that

38:20people both should and should not suffer negative consequences. And basically, it means that people

38:25who oppose the left should suffer the most horrendous negative consequences up too often

38:29and including being murdered, but people who support the left should never suffer any negative

38:35consequences. That's just tribalism and it's kind of boring. So, yeah, once people start inflicting

38:39negative consequences on others, then they can't say that they don't understand it. How do we know

38:45when children are subject to morality? Well, the moment they start using moral arguments,

38:50proving that they understand morality, which is actually quite young. So, when a kid says,

38:56that's unfair, well, a kid is saying that there's something, there's a moral argument called fairness

38:59and this is a deviation from it and we should follow moral ideals like fairness and so they start

39:05becoming subject. They start becoming subject to moral arguments when they themselves make moral

39:12arguments and people are subject to consequences when they accept the value of negative consequences

39:19by inflicting negative consequences on others and that's how you know they're ready. So, I hope that

39:24makes sense. Freedomain.com. Come on, inflict a positive consequence on me for a great podcast.

39:30Freedomain.com. Freedomain. Freedomain. Freedomain.com slash donate. Lots of love I'm up here. I'll talk to you soon. Bye.

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