Another Matt ULP. Israel Guy. Personality Tests.

my problem with the nordic model of criminalizing johns is that it creates a situation where a misogynistic man has committed a crime for which there is only one witness, an already-vulnerable and exploited woman. creates an incentive for further violence i fear. decrim is safest for the girls not because sex work is not exploitative but because (at least in an american context!) police do not give a fuck about investigating murdered prostitutes, and clients understand this

a.j. archer

Love Matt’s take on NDAs. If the NDA has a prevailing party provision, might it not be enforceable if the former employee loses before the NLRB? Asking for a friend.

Guy Giberson

One of your earliest eps (pre-Patreon) was about incels and I remember Liz saying then that what they’re really after is status, not sex—they don’t want women as low-status as they are to have sex with them, they want high-status women to sleep with them to raise their status. That struck me as the most astute thing I’ve ever heard about incels.

Jacob

I love funny women

Steve Babitz

I spent a few weeks on incel forums in college for a paper once. One of the funniest and most telling things I did and saw was forums where they'd describe themselves physically and their situation ask if they "had a chance". I decided to take a stab at it, described myself pretty ruthlessly, and got a bunch of replies saying it was completely and irredeemably over for me. No chance of ever dating in college unless I won the lottery, basically. It was pretty funny reading that since I had a girlfriend at the time, and personally I always considered her to be out of my league. My point is, the self-hatred and the crab in a bucket mentality is a bigger hurdle for most of these dudes than their looks will ever be. Some of the dudes I saw on the forums were quite conventionally attractive, average at worst. It was still, according to everyone else on the forums, completely and irredeemably over for them.

Daniel Solano

myers briggs is just astrology for people who call themseleves sapiosexual

Daniel Solano

"The lines are crossing" give me a break buddy. No diss to you but get an eye exam Liz is so pretty

Gina Calabrese

In terms of practitioners who specialize in treating infertility in accordance with Catholic teaching, see: https://popepaulvi.com/evaluation-and-treatment-programs/ and https://popepaulvi.com/national-center-for-womens-health/. Their website has a silly click through for some reason.

AllOutOfPlans

On point, from the last link, "Most theologians consider the procedure known as LTOT, or Lower Tubal Ovum Transfer, to be morally acceptable. This involves transferring the wife's egg beyond a blockage in the fallopian tube so that marital relations can result in pregnancy. Another method, more morally controversial, is called GIFT, or Gamete Intra-Fallopian Transfer. It involves obtaining a husband's sperm following marital relations and aspirating an egg from the wife's ovary. Egg and sperm are placed in a tiny tube separated by an air bubble, and the contents of the tube are then injected into the wife's fallopian tube with the hope that fertilization will occur. Some theologians consider this to be a replacement of the marital act, and therefore immoral. Other theologians see it as assisting the marital act, and therefore permissible."

AllOutOfPlans

In answer to Liz's question on Catholic teaching on various forms of assisted reproductive technologies, see, https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2020/12/09/vitro-fertilization-catholic-church-infertility-ivf-239432 and https://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/human-life-and-dignity/reproductive-technology/begotten-not-made-a-catholic-view-of-reproductive-technology

AllOutOfPlans

Liz you are 34 years old- please don't spend your life thinking you are old and spent haha. I appreciate what you are saying obviously bit you have many seasons of life ahead of you- you will see yourself so differently at 54( I bet - I'm also 34).

Chiara Rohz

Disagree in the context where it is a quote of the recipient themselves. Reads to me more like making fun.

The Bruenigs

As a women I can’t stand (other) leftist podcasts and would appreciate some recs

Anna

The "Israel is surrounded by hostile enemies" line is so old. Egypt has had a peace treaty with them for half a century now (and has been helping them enforce the blockade of Gaza, of course). And other neighbors (e.g. Jordan) have been happy to help with the occupation at various points. Israel could certainly reduce the degree to which they are beefing with some of their neighbors by, among other things, not occupying their territory (e.g. Syria) or bombing them whenever they feel like it. By the way, I know "Israel has a right to defend itself" is conventional wisdom in American political culture but the UN Special Rapporteur on Palestine has said that Israel does not have the right to defend itself from attacks from occupied Palestinians, qua its position as an occupying power. Anyways, I think "friends" that support genocide really need to be shunned. Liz may be more forgiving, but I really find it hard to be convivial with someone who has such warped moral views.

Norman X. Picklestein

Re: What does Israel do for the US - I don't know for sure, but I wouldn't be surprised if they kill / torture / spy on people across the Middle East on America's behalf. Pretty easy for them to do it from 50 miles away vs an American from 3000 miles away. Obviously not a very great thing to do lol and of course it doesn't justify supporting

TCE

INTJ and Sagittarius in the house! First time I took the test was a retail Home Depot job application as a teenager. May or may not have been why I was not hired. Got in at Starbucks instead. Wish I knew about union organizing back then. I happened to marry an INTJ. We met at an office where the employer had the whole company take the MBTI. There was a BuzzFeed article that typed Star Wars and it was going around office. Emperor Palpatine was INTJ and labeled The Mastermind. Sigh. Super excited to follow the Crowder ULP.

Nicole

the pod’s theme song is extremely off-putting at 1.2 speed

C.t. Grayson

Devil’s Advocate Matt with the textile factories critique took me out

Duncan

My controversial opinion, I'll stand by it, that heterosexual women are not actually attracted/repulsed by men's physical appearances as long as a baseline level of hygiene and fitness is achieved. The most important qualities, by far, are confidence and self efficacy in a man. That's truly all women care about as far as I'm concerned!

Adrienne Hubbard

Would arguing that the message on the potato is threatening be implicitly admitting that Crowder was threatening his wife when he said it?

Justin Hubbard

Plot twist: Matt actually enjoys the personality stuff but instinctually doesn’t like being personally read

Jn

Try 'On Beauty and Being Just' by Elaine Scarry -- very life-affirming.

The Bruenigs

But the question isn't whether it's a threat, but whether it's disparaging.

The Bruenigs

Don't play dumb. Sending a message that says "watch it" is clearly a threat and just about anyone would see it that way.

ChapoFan inParis

Y’all should do astrology next. Check your natal charts and see your big threes.

Tasha

surrogacy also seems bad vibes to me but unfortunately I’ve learned too much about the way child welfare systems function as family policing/punishment for poor people to think that adoption is a viable solution for all people who can’t have kids. I’d recommend looking into how 90s-era anti-poverty legislation (ASFA) expanded the pool of “adoptable” kids by making it easier to take them away from their parents in order to serve the needs of childless rich white families. The New Yorker/ProPublica piece “When Foster Parents Don’t Want to Give Back the Baby” also illustrates some of the tensions in the area

Julia

I'm a 2 time IVF mom and I too have questions about the ethics of surrogacy. However, "just adopt" to avoid exploitation sort of misses the point that the adoption industry is also frequently extremely exploitative. Lots of kids in the foster care system have family who love them and want them back or were removed basically because their parents are poor. International adoption is rife with exploitation of birth mothers. Bethany Christian ministries had to switch their mission to family reunification after accusations of basically human trafficking. Adoption is frequently a beautiful thing but there's no "just" in adoption.

KMB24

Regarding the brief surrogacy vs. adoption discussion, I don’t think adoption compares as well as implied on the issue of exploitation. Just as an economically vulnerable woman may agree to be a surrogate for money, an economically vulnerable mother may agree to give up a child to mitigate expenses. There’s also the well known international character of adoptions that often draws criticism. I think the correction solution is proper regulation to prevent exploitative instances of both surrogacy and adoption rather than a complete ban of both or either.

Josh B

Did you take down the vid?

KMB24

King move

KMB24

I feel like a not-insignificant part of the feeling of betrayal/irrationality that incels have about not getting to be with the women they want to be with comes from being “black pilled” about love/relationship cliches that were never true to begin with, but are nonetheless common in our society — e.g. that love is blind and you shouldn’t look skin deep, love shouldn’t be about money/status, etc. I think of all the movies/TV I saw growing up that had this message and it’s great and heartwarming and aspirational, but largely untrue on the ground — like obviously, experientially, that’s not how things shake out in the real world, so incels feel slighted by that, even though it was always an aspirational thing or even just a story telling device. Not to say love *can’t* be blind, or that these things *never* happen, but for the most part things don’t tend to work out that way, so they feel slighted by something that was always just in their head anyway.

David Wych

The MBTI stuff only tries to make sense at the functions level. But there’s only a few types of where it’s more clear that it makes sense (XNXXs)

Tom

a helpful summation myers-briggs’ utility: according to the test, liz and i share a personality type which we also share with…Margaret Thatcher

haz

maybe MTWs are right and Libs really just are crypto fash.

Christian Hunt

Probably not, Jeff actually served in the IDF.

Christian Hunt

Liz asking Matt how many personalities there are reminded me of that time during the 2020 campaign when someone asked Biden how many genders there are and he said “at least 3” lmao

Orb

I Know What You Did With My Potato

Ivan McGillicuddy

Otto Laakso

Surprised Liz doesn’t watch more women’s basketball given her well documented obsession with tall women

Orb

Opening Patreon to see an hour and forty five minute bruecast 😎

Orb

Oh man, love Matt's response to personality test/ horoscope bs. Haha.

TS + KL

I really struggle with people being anti IVF - I have a really good pal who will be an amazing mother. She's been in two very long relationships with women and in both cases the couple started looking to have a child together but both ex partners backed out in the early stages. My friend is 36 this year and is going ahead. She has fertilised eggs in a freezer and chose a sperm donor. She has a great job and a nice place to live. There's no way she could adopt as a single person on her salary and not being a home owner. I don't think its right to say she just never gets to be a mother fuck that. I don't believe in God but I struggle to understand why a god wouldn't support a woman to become a mother on purpose this way. If she was a 'fallen' woman and then repented it would be ok- but IVF is not ?

Chiara Rohz

Liz wondering if you could remind us of that book recommendation on the 'dark ages' from a couple of years back? Also if you have any other book recs please drop- particularly into something life affirming as I battle my own mind this spring 🙏 great ep as per- very interested in these clauses as they creep over to Europe. Big American organisations include versions of them in their contracts here (ireland) but we have pretty rigorous labour laws. My husband's place say they are proudly anti Union- which was roundly met with the irish workforce being completely miffed. If anything it urged everyone to consider joining the unions. My mother and grandfather before her act as shop stewards and area reps. Interested to see how these kinds of clauses buff up against domestic laws.

Chiara Rohz

Experiencing the dialectic as the dual opinions that Myers Briggs is a load of bullshit and also of course and obviously Matt is INTJ

Elizabeth

I used to process DMCA takedown requests at YouTube and someone once sent us a copyright claim handwritten on a Taco Bell Crunchwrap Supreme. It was wrapped tho.

Sean McGrier

Caitlin Clark is obviously an amazing offensive talent. However, between the LA Times and Washington Post stories about the LSU program, I think LSU was subject to a psychological operation in the weeks leading up to the big game. The timing of the LSU stories reminded me of Bernie being asked all those Cuba questions before the South Carolina primary. e.g. had the feel of a coordinated campaign, designed to create a massive time waisting distraction for one party and drag them into the mud, while some other favored party was able to focus on the task at hand.

J P 3

What the fuck is this? https://www.theguardian.com/money/2024/apr/03/human-resources-hr-departments-us-workers

Ian H

When I was 19 a psychiatrist started carrying on about narcissistic traits when I said I was motivated by the idea of greatness. Time told I was more the type to get preyed on by narcissistic types 🙃

Caitlin Still

Question for Matt: on Twitter some supposedly big firm employment lawyer @king_tower replied to you in a thread about the non-disparagement clause case to the effect that your client may “learn his lesson in 2025 or 2026” presumably (I guess?) when he thinks the Supreme Court or a conservative NLRB will invalidate the current rule on these clauses. That’s not computing for me though, because if you win and have the clause struck from the contract via the law as it is today, I am having a hard time imagining that the clause would then come back from the dead and that Crowder could re-file the contract breach case. Do you know what that guy is on about? By the way I really enjoyed the debate with what’s his face about the welfare state. Very satisfying the way you made him sound completely ridiculous (more so than he already did if that’s possible) in a way that also seemed super annoying for him.

Joey Trimboli