They break down the ideological reasons: homosexuality framed as “bourgeois degeneracy,” linked to fascism, rejected as hedonistic “gooning,” and clashing with extreme pro-natalist policies that viewed childless people as unproductive. The episode also contrasts this with capitalism’s unmatched track record as the most gay-friendly system in global history and explores the ongoing political shift of gay men toward Republican voting.

If you’re tired of revisionist history that ignores communist crimes against the LGBT community, this is the conversation you need to hear.

Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Malcolm Collins: Hello, Simone. I’m excited to be here with you today. Today, we are going to be asking a question, which is why do communists usually kill gay people? And it’s an interesting question. There’s two groups that communists generally like to kill and that is gays and Jews. Um, Which surprises a lot of people if they haven’t studied history or only look at the weirdos approach.

[00:00:26] I mean, most Jews are aware of this, but there are a lot of gays who are completely unaware of this. And they have done this over and over and over again throughout history, and the only group that seems to do it as frequently as communists do it is socialists. Is this- They also really like killing gay people

[00:00:46] Simone Collins: is this because both gays and Jews accumulate wealth?

[00:00:50] Malcolm Collins: No. Gays typically produce less wealth than the average citizen. It’s just that on the outside curve, gays basically just have a wider distribution curve of talent- Oh ... than average humans. Okay. So in the same way

[00:01:02] Simone Collins: that like with- Oh, so they’re like hyper men.

[00:01:03] They’re like extra men.

[00:01:04] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, in the same way that men, like, on, if you look at like the average man and you look at the, the, the curve, like women have like a

[00:01:10] Simone Collins: trigger bell curve. Yeah, the bell curve is more flattened, whereas like the male bell curve is- In terms of IQ ... yeah.

[00:01:13] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, and with gays, the bell curve is flattened and shifted away.

[00:01:18] Mm. But it’s flattened

[00:01:18] Simone Collins: enough- Yeah, so that tip of the, the tip of the bell curve giant ...

[00:01:20] Malcolm Collins: the tip of the bell curve. If you’re like, “Who are the top 10 chefs in the world?” Five of them are gonna be gay. “Who are the top 10 fashion designers in the world?” Five of them are gonna be gay. “Who are the top 10 AI designers- I mean, not average

[00:01:33] in the

[00:01:33] Simone Collins: world?” Gay. I mean, gay. Gay. But I mean blind.

[00:01:36] Malcolm Collins: Well, no, you see this especially in creative fields. Yeah. You, you see a disproportionate number of gays. And actually I almost wanna like study this, like what the fuck causes that? But it’s also a reason why it’s, it’s, it’s a good idea to not burn the gay community be-

[00:01:49] Simone Collins: Isn’t that the higher levels of testosterone?

[00:01:52] It could be the higher levels of testosterone. So gay, gay men have, on average, higher levels of testosterone. What’s different from men? Higher levels of testosterone, like higher risk, high reward, like they’re going all in.

[00:02:00] Malcolm Collins: That and they’re not having their brains polluted by constantly talking to women.

[00:02:05] Simone Collins: Yeah. I mean- They’re not being henpecked. I mean, God, boys,

[00:02:07] Malcolm Collins: right? Imagine, imagine what you

[00:02:09] Simone Collins: would be able to accomplish. You would be unleashed, Bianca. You would be unleashed if you were blessed with dickness. If you

[00:02:14] Malcolm Collins: didn’t have to, the, you know, yeah. There, there is, there is other ancillary benefits to the wider gay...

[00:02:21] And not to say that nothing negative comes, but we’ll have that conversation later in this. But what I wanted to start by focusing on is like the, the m- ma- the majority of gay community, and this is changing. Like as we’ve pointed out, the gays are moving to Trump, right? Like in, in the voting. If they continue to move at the rate they have moved over the past few election cycles I think by the election cycle after the next, the majority of gay men will be voting Republican.

[00:02:47] And I think by the next election cycle, the majority of gay white men will be voting Republican.

[00:02:51] Simone Collins: Ooh ...

[00:02:52] Malcolm Collins: so, yeah, guys, g- keep in mind the, the, this is a community that we can win. But historically, you look at the protests, you look at all the flags, and no, these flags don’t even really represent gayness anymore.

[00:03:04] They represent like an opt-in identity at this point, the colonizer’s flag as we call it, the progress pride flag. I’m not gonna go into that right now, but so they, they, they, they have these flags, and they yell at people about Palestine. I recently saw them yelling at, A, the guy who replaced Nancy Pelosi, he was kicked out of a gay pride event when people followed him into

[00:03:23] Simone Collins: it and- Oh yeah, there’s a picture of him on the front page of Drudge, like soaked in...

[00:03:26] No, that’s Mamdani, never mind. But yeah yeah, there was a picture of him looking real mad.

[00:03:29] Malcolm Collins: But it was, it was he wasn’t enough anti-Israel for these people and they-

[00:03:33] Simone Collins: Not, oh, not enough. Never enough ... they were

[00:03:35] Malcolm Collins: carrying their, their, the, apparently that’s a huge gay rights issue. And I’m like, gays, you and your natural predators, right?

[00:03:41] Like communist, like the two groups that like have it in their mission statement to kill you, like Islamists and communists, right? Like Guys But let’s get into this. I wanna get into the stats, I wanna get into the facts, and I also wanna point out here that there has been [00:04:00] no governing or economic system that has been friendlier to gays throughout global history than capitalism.

[00:04:08] Not one. Not one comes close to being as friendly or as open to gays than capitalist systems

[00:04:17] Simone Collins: yeah, actually. Ac- I mean, look at some of the most successful capitalists today.

[00:04:23] Malcolm Collins: Well, as to why, and, and there haven’t been many at all, and we can even get into it at the end if you want to purges or genocides of gays in capitalist systems.

[00:04:33] It just doesn’t happen really. Happens in socialist, happens in communist- Wasn’t there the- ... doesn’t happen in

[00:04:37] Simone Collins: capitalist ... the I wanna say pink scare around the time of the Red Scare?

[00:04:43] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, but we didn’t kill them.

[00:04:45] Simone Collins: Well, that ... Yes. Yes. Well, they- We didn’t send them to the gulags ... then, then AIDS came, and they killed themselves.

[00:04:51] So there was also that. But that, that wasn’t capital- ... Well, it could’ve been capitalism’s fault because it was ... Patient Zero was a, an airline attendant, and if we weren’t so capitalistically abundant- If we weren’t so economically prosperous ... we wouldn’t be flying around the world on our little sexual romps, bring us, would we?

[00:05:08] No.

[00:05:08] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. If, if we weren’t so economically prosperous,

[00:05:10] Simone Collins: So capitalism killed the gays really at scale- At scale ... when you think

[00:05:13] Malcolm Collins: about it. No, it was orgies that killed the gays at scale. Oh. Hmm. Th- they could’ve, they could’ve just not done that when they knew a deadly disease was spreading through their community.

[00:05:24] Simone Collins: Was it known to be sexually transmitted from the very beginning?

[00:05:26] Malcolm Collins: It wasn’t from the very beginning, but people figured out pretty early. And it was very interesting for a lot of gay people to experience because it killed off a huge portion of gay culture, and the gays who survived it they were typically the, like, nerdy introverts.

[00:05:45] And it- Yeah ... really transformed gay culture because with all the party guys who ended up dying off and all of the nerdy introverts who survived- Oh ... it sort of defined the way gay culture transformed itself. Where if you look at older gay culture, it was way more you could actually see this in stuff.

[00:06:03] I wanna say, like, jockey, biker gangy.

[00:06:05] Simone Collins: No.

[00:06:07] Malcolm Collins: Y- you’ve seen the old videos and stuff. Like, it was, it was pretty tough, I guess you’d call it. And then it became sort of, effete and, and weird, but that was downstream of AIDS killing off the non-nerd gays, leading to gays to get more into nerdy hobbies and stuff like that.

[00:06:25] Al- also, just as a side note here, one reason why capitalist systems are generally pretty pro-gay is it’s this flattening of the curve thing that ends up helping gays. It’s also why capitalist systems are generally pretty pro-Jew. Any group that’s disproportionately going to be in high-profile positions a, in a system that rewards meritocratic behavior like, e.g. Being genuinely more creative or genuinely more productive or being able to, like, build big companies or whatever it, it, people with those skill sets end up in positions of power and then prevent- the, you know, big attacks on their community and everything like that, right? Like- Mm. Mm ... the, both the gays and the Jews have done a very good job with this in the United States.

[00:07:05] But let’s continue here. All right, so we’re gonna g- just go through every major communist system and whether or not they discriminated against or attempted to genocide the gays, okay? Okay, so the Soviet Union were gays discriminated against? This is the USSR, the main one, the one that, like, all the people today are fighting, you know, all that.

[00:07:28] Yes heavily discriminated against gays. Article 121 criminalized male same-sex acts up to five years in hard labor in gulags. Thousands arrested thousands died. It w- it was, it was really horrible. A- and once you got back from these, you could never get a job again. You could never get a, and a huge percentage of the people who were sent ended up dying. It was really just, like, a, a sort of a death sentence deferred for them. Like, “Hey, m- we’re gonna kill this guy anyway. Maybe we can get some free labor out of him.” And if you hear about the way people died in the gulag work camps [00:08:00] and stuff like that, like building roads in the middle of the Arctic and, and freezing- Oh my gosh

[00:08:03] to death and stuff like this, really horrible deaths. In terms of ex- explicitly targeted executions, no, but it was a functional genocide. That, that was the goal, where we’re gonna take everyone who’s gay and just get rid of them. And it’s, it’s really strongly documented. There’s not, you know, like, the confidence that this is extremely high.

[00:08:19] Mm-hmm. But then you have China, the, the PRC. Yes, being gay was criminalized. It’s, it’s still criminalized in China. Still? Yeah, you could go to jail in China for being gay under the CCP.

[00:08:32] Simone Collins: Oh.

[00:08:34] Malcolm Collins: You did not know this?

[00:08:35] Simone Collins: Oh. Wait, but then you’re going to a same-sex jail.

[00:08:40] Malcolm Collins: I don’t think- So it’s not just like-

[00:08:41] that that’s as fun- ... the gay club ... in the CCP as it is for you. But why don’t, why don’t you ask- For me- Why don’t you ask AI, like what gets you arrested in China right now around being gay, right?

[00:08:51] Simone Collins: Okay.

[00:08:51] Malcolm Collins: It was originally cr- criminalized under quote unquote hooliganism. And they were often forced into public labor camps where they were worked to death.

[00:09:01] And they were forced into psychiatric cures that includes things like forced sterilization, other stuff like that. Were there executions? Yes, there were almost certainly executions under the Cultural Revolution because in the Cultural Revolution they’d execute you for just about everything.

[00:09:15] And they- Yeah ... didn’t really keep good documentation. And I, this is the thing, a lot of leftist historians have sort of tried to scrub history, where you can ask a question where you’re like, “Was it illegal under the, you know, d- during the Cultural Revolution?” And they’ll, they’ll be like, “Yes.” And it’ll be like, “So were there mass executions around this?

[00:09:32] Like, were people being executed for this?” No, no, but they- And they’ll say like, “Well, you know, the academics don’t really talk about it,” and I’m like, “Use your common fucking sense.”

[00:09:40] Simone Collins: Right. And I, I, I- You, you don’t wanna like make a list of like, “And today, dear diary, I did exactly this to this person brutally murdering

[00:09:47] Malcolm Collins: them.”

[00:09:47] Well, I mean this is like the thing. They’ll ... I saw one when I was trying to like w- figure this information out, when it was like, “Gays were not killed under the Khmer Rouge en masse.” And I was like, “Excuse me?” I believe some academic may have written that, but if you are at all familiar with the culture of the Khmer Rouge and what that government said about gays, then you would know that they were mass executing gays.

[00:10:14] Anyway, what, what, what are the laws right now?

[00:10:16] Simone Collins: So actually China decriminalized consensual same-sex relations- When? ... in 1997. And homosexuality was removed from the official list of mental disorders in 2001. Really all that gets you in trouble f- for is like sex work.

[00:10:29] Malcolm Collins: I know, I thought, I thought posting about it, like getting posts that go viral-

[00:10:32] Simone Collins: Yes

[00:10:33] and stuff like- Obscenity. So if you post something that’s obscene, yes.

[00:10:37] Malcolm Collins: Oh, well okay. So, so basically-

[00:10:39] Simone Collins: But yeah, you can also post something that’s super straight and obscene, so I don’t see that as targeting gay

[00:10:43] Malcolm Collins: people. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. The way they define obscenity is just same-sex relationships.

[00:10:48] G- ask this.

[00:10:49] Simone Collins: Producing or distributing sexually explicit material, including same-sex pornography- Right ... can be prosecuted under obscenity or illegal publication laws.

[00:10:56] Malcolm Collins: The question is not what the legal system says, but what functionally happens. Ask it. Do people functionally, like we’re talking about the way the law’s functionally implemented, if you create a post on one of the social, sci- China social media websites, and you’re gay and you’re seen as promoting gayness, are you gonna get disappeared?

[00:11:21] Okay. Next here, we’ve got Cuba. The ga- the, all these people love Cuba, and often love to forget that the UMAP had forced labor camps for gays labeled counterrevolutionary. They would lose their jobs, and they’d be imprisoned, and they wouldn’t be able to get jobs again, ‘cause that’s what happens in a communist system, where, like, like imprisonment’s a much bigger deal in a communist system than in a capitalist system.

[00:11:44] And there were certainly

[00:11:46] so yeah, in, in Cuba there were certainly large numbers of gay deaths in the work camps from it being illegal.

[00:11:53] They did make it normal again in Cuba. I guess when they learned that the leftists who they wanted to be buddy-buddy with in the US weren’t [00:12:00] into them mass killing gay people. But yeah, they were super pro killing gay people. It just didn’t help their agenda in the United States, which was really significant.

[00:12:09] Actually we recently found out that there was a high-level Cuban spy in the United States military for a long time. They kept telling people Cuba’s not that big a deal. Nothing that happened in Cuba matters. Anyone who’s telling you that in the comments either is completely ignorant of recent American history and how Cuba played a large part in organizing in far leftist organizations in the US, Antifa in the US, and US communists for about a, a, a half a century at this point.

[00:12:35] Or they are like actively disinformation agents. And people you need to be watching. Like, everyone who right now is saying like, “We need to do s- we need to help Cu- whatever,” like they’re freaking out about Cuba. The left is freaking out about Cuba because Cuba is the cornerstone of American leftist or- organizing.

[00:12:51] And the, I mean, they’ve d- they’ve taken over other countries functionally recently and, and when they learned that the, the, the, them mass executing gays was hurting that, they were like, “Okay, whatever.” But and functionally mass executing. It was through the work camps. Sorry, what are the rules around China when you-

[00:13:04] Simone Collins: S- yeah, you, you are likely to have content you post online that promotes a gay lifestyle be taken down by the CCP.

[00:13:12] Malcolm Collins: And disappeared?

[00:13:14] Simone Collins: No, not necessarily. But you, you will be suppressed. You probably if you keep trying, you’ll be disappeared, but-

[00:13:21] Malcolm Collins: Okay ...

[00:13:21] Simone Collins: I guess there’s not enough documentation for AI to be like, “Yes,” it will just be suppressed or censored

[00:13:29] Malcolm Collins: But yeah, so okay, let’s go to the next one. Notice here it’s been every single communist country has killed gays so far.

[00:13:36] I’m just, like, letting you guys know. It’s not

[00:13:38] Simone Collins: great. Yeah, I mean-

[00:13:40] Malcolm Collins: Okay ...

[00:13:40] Simone Collins: it doesn’t look great.

[00:13:41] Malcolm Collins: And, and during time periods long after it was totally normalized in the West. In f- in fact there’s some documentaries if you wanna, like, hang out in gay circles or anything like that. Like, when I was younger, I was hung out with all the artsy kids and everything like that.

[00:13:56] A lot of my friends were gay. And because of that I knew, like, the gay shows and stuff like that that they would watch. And one of the shows that, like, the GSA would play and stuff like that was about a gay person growing up on the eastern side of the Berlin Wall and, like, what it was like when the wall fell and how much freer their life got.

[00:14:17] And, like, all the gays on the western side of the wall were all partying and going to nightclubs and having fun. And on the eastern side of the wall, it was, you know, forced castration and stuff like that.

[00:14:28] Simone Collins: Forced-

[00:14:29] Malcolm Collins: But anyway ...

[00:14:30] Simone Collins: castration?

[00:14:31] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, I’m pretty sure the episode’s called Hoodwink and the Angry Inch, and it’s about that.

[00:14:36] Simone Collins: Hedwig and the Angry Inch?

[00:14:37] Malcolm Collins: Yeah.

[00:14:38] Simone Collins: That’s what it’s about? Oh my God, okay.

[00:14:41] Malcolm Collins: Wait, that’s about... Yeah, it’s about Berlin, right?

[00:14:44] Simone Collins: I don’t know. I never watched it. That’s terrifying. Do you want me to look it up? I mean-

[00:14:51] ...

[00:14:51] Simone Collins: Sure, look

[00:14:53] Malcolm Collins: it up. Yeah, l- look it up to, to double-check this.

[00:14:55] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:14:57] Malcolm Collins: Okay. Next, Vietnam. This is the first one on our list that probably didn’t kill gay people explicitly.

[00:15:08] Possibly. But Vietnam wasn’t that communist for that long. Vietnam never really had a full real communist revolution. They had the war with us to maintain communism, and then, like, immediately became capitalist after that and still called themselves communist. And are a great ally to the United States, one of the, the strongest allies we have anywhere in the world right now, which is pretty wild.

[00:15:33] But i- it’s, it’s simply because they hate China more than they hate us, and we are their only counterweight to China. And that could actually influence why they have been not as anti-gay as other communist states. So the one communist state so far that wasn’t expl... And no, there was a stigma against gayness even, even so within socialist Vietnam, but it wasn’t never clearly illegal.

[00:15:54] North Korea. Yes, you will be [00:16:00] executed for being gay in North Korea. It’s considered a corruption of morals. It is extremely illegal in, in North Korea. And it appears to still be illegal in North Korea. What’d you find out about Hedwig and the Angry Inch?

[00:16:15] Simone Collins: It’s the story following Hedwig, a gender queer rocker from East Berlin whose botched sex reassignment surgery leaves her with an angry inch as she tours...

[00:16:25] So it’s, it’s not the angry itch, I guess. It’s the angry inch. That’s what I said, inch.

[00:16:28] Malcolm Collins: Inch.

[00:16:28] Simone Collins: I thought it was itch. Oh ... sorry. As she tours shabby venues across the US telling her life story and chasing the ex-lover who stole her songs and fame. Though the concert style nar- through the concert style narrative, she grapples with trauma, identity, and the search for her other half, ultimately moving toward a more integrated sense of self.

[00:16:47] Yeah, but

[00:16:47] Malcolm Collins: was the, was the botched reassignment a forced thing by the state?

[00:16:53] That was, that was

[00:16:54] Simone Collins: my question Yeah, that’s what I’m trying to figure out. I know, I know it’s, it’s not... Yeah.

[00:16:57] Malcolm Collins: So Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge, would you have been murdered for being gay? Absolutely you would’ve been murdered for being gay. The Khmer Rouge would murder you for speaking English or being a dentist.

[00:17:12] Of course they’re gonna kill you for being gay. They, they killed people for f- nothing. They, they- it was the craziest of communist governments, and that meant they absolutely hated the gays. By the way, we’re, we’ll get into why they did this in a second if you’re confused as to why they always end up killing the gays.

[00:17:28] Note again, we’ve also seen this with socialist revolutions. You know, famously when Ayatollah Khomeini was coming into power he allied with the gay movement. He allied with the leftist movement, said, “We’re all gonna be great friends forever and ever and ever.” He got in power, and now they literally just like...

[00:17:45] Man, if you’ve ever seen these hangings, they are so brutal, the crane hangings in Iran. They literally

[00:17:50] Simone Collins: just have like- Oh my gosh, yes. Yes. Oh, I’ve seen pictures of

[00:17:53] Malcolm Collins: the scene Because you imagine they’re like giant construction cranes, and no they’re not. They’re like small, dinky, rusty construction cranes with like big crowds of people

[00:18:02] Simone Collins: like throwing- This thing, it’s very town square in like m- medieval times kinda thing, yeah.

[00:18:07] Malcolm Collins: Oh yeah, it’s, it’s horrifying. It’s horrifying. We- these people, I, honestly I think we should ban immigration. Yeah and this isn’t to say I’m against like I- Per- Persian Americans, but I think like the ones that we want got out largely speaking.

[00:18:19] Simone Collins: Yeah. And,

[00:18:20] Malcolm Collins: We, w- we, or at least

[00:18:23] Simone Collins: strong ideological vetting.

[00:18:24] I don’t know. I don’t want bad things to happen to anyone, but

[00:18:28] Malcolm Collins: this is just- You, the only way, if there is a culture that acts in a way that you find systemically problematic, Simone, the only way to deal with that behavior is to make, either transform that culture into something that is unrecognizable to itself, right?

[00:18:46] Or to replace that culture with another cultural group, right? All the quote unquote solutions to this are not going to look nice. But I think increasingly the world is tabling them. Because a lot of the, well I mean the, the world that’s breeding, the world that has power eg. the US and Israel going forwards, ‘cause like Europe’s basically irrelevant 20, 30 years from now.

[00:19:08] Yeah. Anyway your, your, what did, what’d you find?

[00:19:13] Simone Collins: It’s coerced, but it’s not literally depicted as a castration ordered or performed directly by the East German state. It’s pushed by Hedwig’s mother and the American GI as a condition for marriage and immigration within restrictive communist systems.

[00:19:30] So-

[00:19:32] Malcolm Collins: Well ...

[00:19:32] Simone Collins: not really.

[00:19:33] Malcolm Collins: Not really. Okay.

[00:19:34] Simone Collins: Laos Told that to marry Luther, the American soldier and legally immigrant, a full medical exam and legal documentation require him to be female, so the mother and fiance presume sex surgery or pressure Hansel, who became Hedwig, into sex surgery. Yeah. So more complicated than that, yeah.

[00:19:53] Malcolm Collins: Okay, so next. And I’ll go faster now for you guys. Laos, o- only the second one on the list that didn’t criminalize it although it was [00:20:00] negatively stigmatized. And Laos was not communist for that long. They only became communist in 1975. Hmm ... and they’re, they’re today not that communist. Ethiopia.

[00:20:08] Yes, it, it was criminal and there were almost certainly mass killings of gays from what we know on the ground at the time during the Red Terror. Absolutely terrifying if you’re not familiar with this one. And they definitely killed a lot of gays. ... Romania. Yes private same-sex acts were criminalized, up to five years in prison.

[00:20:27] Although we don’t know of any mass killings in Romania, there was almost certainly isolated killings of gay people in Romania for being gay. Mm-hmm. East Germany, yes, again. Next, as we were just talking about Poland. No, or at least limited. It was decriminalized in 1932 pre-communism, and remained so while a social stigma existed.

[00:20:47] So this is, like, the next one on the list that’s a, a clear no. Czechoslovakia yes, initially, then reduced, criminalized early on, decriminalized in 1961 to 1968. So clearly criminalized. Whether or not it came with executions, we don’t have explicit examples of, but again, a lot of these places that had really harsh laws, yes, probably.

[00:21:07] Albania yes, again it was criminalized under pedestry and it was a 10-year prison sentence. Oh my gosh ... and probably executions as well. ... Yugoslavia. But this wouldn’t have been mass scale executions, just, like, isolated executions. Yugoslavia a- again, this one we do actually have reports of executions, so we know for a fact it happened here.

[00:21:29] And it varied by republic, but many of them did criminalize them with them being decriminalized in 1977, so we know that they were criminalized. So, let’s go to why they did this, right? Because this might confuse even Republicans today to be like, “Wait, capitalism is the pro-gay economic system, and communism is the anti-gay economic system.”

[00:21:53] It’s like, I guess I kind of remembered that from history books, but why? Yeah. And why have the current gays forgotten this and are only just now remembering this? And what does this mean for the strategy to ensuring a Republican chokehold on the American electoral system and our continued victory? All right.

[00:22:16] Let’s go into Maxim G- Gorky, ‘cause I’m gonna go over a lot of, like, explicit quotes from people, so... who were important communists so you can get an understanding of what they thought and why they thought this without me editorializing or putting words in their mouth. You know, I could say, “Oh, they thought it was inefficient,” or something

[00:22:33] Simone Collins: like that.

[00:22:34] Yeah, ‘cause I kept wanting to think, “Oh, well it must be because there was a large Christian population.” But no, this is communism. This is supposed to be, like, super not religious.

[00:22:40] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. So he, Gror- Maxim Gorky, a leading Soviet writer, said, “There is already a sarcastic saying, ‘Destroy homosexuality and fascism will disappear.’”

[00:22:52] Simone Collins: W- oh, yeah. What was that called? Homo fascism.

[00:22:56] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Gayness was super linked with Nazism in the communist mind.

[00:23:04] Simone Collins: Just fabulous uniforms again. They’re just-

[00:23:06] Malcolm Collins: I, I g- I get it. You

[00:23:08] Simone Collins: get it.

[00:23:09] Malcolm Collins: Like, I, I get it. I get it. I’m a little confused as to why the gays don’t identify with an... If you’re gonna choose a group that kills gays, like, choose the one- I thought- ... that’s well-dressed and had high-level gay m- members.

[00:23:19] Simone Collins: Yeah, you want them to beat you with their fabulous batons.

[00:23:22] . Aren’t you afraid the fashion police will come and beat you with their fabulous batons? No.

[00:23:26] Malcolm Collins: Mm.

[00:23:27] Simone Collins: Oh, God.

[00:23:28] Malcolm Collins: Okay.

[00:23:28] Simone Collins: Yeah, but yeah, the Nazis killed gays too, right? I mean, they killed a lot of people. But they was, they also- Mm ... killed gay people. I

[00:23:34] Malcolm Collins: mean, they killed way less gays in total than the communists killed, but-

[00:23:38] Simone Collins: Fewer gays. If you can,

[00:23:39] Malcolm Collins: Thank you for the grammar lesson, Mr.

[00:23:42] Simone Collins: Simone If you can count it, it’s fewer.

[00:23:43] If it is like water, there’s, it’s uncountable, then it’s more or less.

[00:23:48] Malcolm Collins: I will never learn your stupid English words.

[00:23:50] Simone Collins: God, yeah.

[00:23:52] Malcolm Collins: They will go away. Nobody’s gonna care about that in a few years. Okay.

[00:23:58] Simone Collins: The AI

[00:23:58] Malcolm Collins: will care. Nicolai [00:24:00] Krylenko this is the People’s Commissioner of Justice speech to the Central Committee.

[00:24:04] He said, “In our environment, in the environment of the workers taking the point of view of normal relations between the sexes, who are building their society on healthy principles, we don’t need little gentlemen of this type.” We don’t need a little gentlemen of this type. That’d be a fun that’s, that’s, that’s Nick Fuentes-esque almost.

[00:24:25] Simone Collins: Don’t you...

[00:24:27] Malcolm Collins: We don’t need little gentlemen- Gentlemen of a certain type ... of this type. Who then for the most part of our customs in these affairs? Workers? No. Declassed rabble. Declassed rabble, either from the dregs of society or from the remnants of the exploiting classes. They don’t know which way to turn, so they turn to pederasty.

[00:24:45] Now this is actually an interesting you know, kind of true point. Remember I said that gays seem to have a higher distribution curve in terms of success, like a flattened one, right? So they’re more on the both successful and unsuccessful edge, and less in the middle. He as a communist is noting this here.

[00:25:02] He goes, “Either they’re in the unclassed rabble,” like the, the super low class that d- is unproductive, or they’re former high class individuals.

[00:25:15] Simone Collins: Hmm

[00:25:16] Malcolm Collins: Which is a pretty interesting observation, but I can see where it’s coming from. Again Let’s go to another one here. Another statement by the same guy. “After two decades of building socialism in the USSR, there is no reason for anyone to be a homosexual,” he said.

[00:25:32] Joseph Stalin said to command co- c- to, to Commander Karnovich, “These scoundrels must be subject to exemplary punishment.” Oof. “And a corresponding guiding decree must be introduced into our legislation.” The report framed homosexual networks as potential counter-revolutionary espionage risks, which again, is actually kind of true.

[00:25:57] If you’re cracking down on gays in your country because you see them as associated with fascism or whatever as you can see in the, like, books on gay people who lived under communism and stuff like that they had a reason and to be meeting with other people secretly, which is a good way to accidentally build an espionage network, right?

[00:26:16] So I- I’m actually pointing out here that, like, they weren’t unreasonable in their fears of this. What Fidel Castro said just in terms of how much responsibility he took for it, he said, “If someone is responsible, it’s me. There were moments of great injustice. Great injustice,” he said. Now why?

[00:26:34] Well, mostly because he was just taking orders from the other ... And most communists hate gays, get to that in a second. Let’s go to why the Chinese attacked it. They saw it as bourgeoisie degeneracy and Western corruption in nature. This is true as well. The idea of, like, middle class gays just sleeping around is a very Western idea and very antithetical to Chinese traditions.

[00:26:58] And the place where you would’ve seen same-sex relationships in more ancient China is within the elite class. So they very likely would have seen it potentially even rightly so, as antithetical to actual Chinese value systems. In Cambodia, direct quotes specify, specifically naming gayness are rare because they destroyed most of the records.

[00:27:23] But the regime demanded the removal of anything that they saw as decadent or bourgeoisie bougie. And gayness was definitely seen within those categories. North Korea again it’s seen as being a f- a form of capitalist corruption, basically ‘cause it’s hedonism, right? Like, think about it from this perspective.

[00:27:41] If you say, “Okay, everybody, like, let’s get together and do what’s necessary for the state, for the people, for everyone,” right? Like, just sacrifice ourse- because this is the thing, real communism, when it’s been tried, sorry to the real communism that’s [00:28:00] never been tried, but People have tried, it just always ends up bad before.

[00:28:03] Like look at our videos where we discuss why it always goes not in the direction the people with the pie-in-the-sky goals want it to go. Yeah. But the ... what it basically is is saying we are all going to sacrifice personally within our lives to move society forwards. In a way communism is very techno-puritan in its value framing, right?

[00:28:29] Like everyone within the state suffers, everyone within the state does not pursue their own happiness, their own hedonism a- anything like that, and true happiness only comes for suffering for something you truly believe in, with that thing you really believe in being a better future for humanity, for, for communist humanity, right?

[00:28:53] And you see this with the figures that the communists would elevate in any of these countries, right? They were always Mr. Worker Man, right? Like, you know, they’ll have the shovel and they’ll have the, the thing, the ...

[00:29:03] Speaker 2: александр Пузыгин

[00:29:15] Сивина Градова

[00:29:22] Malcolm Collins: well, you even look at their- The, the ... look at their ... it’s a hammer and sickle, right?

[00:29:25] It’s like the working man, right? Like the, Yeah ... a- and, and they would build these sort of folk heroes, and you could track these folk heroes. And the folk heroes were always like a guy who did a grueling, extremely hard job for an extremely long period of time because he wanted to make things better in some way.

[00:29:44] Which is not a bad value system to And

[00:29:47] Simone Collins: no, it’s, it’s wholesome ... to grow. When you, when you say it that way it’s fantastic, yeah.

[00:29:52] Malcolm Collins: Mm. It just leads to mass death and suffering and everything like that. But again, other episodes- Mm ... we go into more detail. But if that’s what ... A- and the communists in the West, they just want the free stuff from other people.

[00:30:05] They’re basically like, “Let’s take stuff from the rich and give it to people who don’t wanna work,” right? I don’t wanna work, I wanna work ... or I wanna work on something like educating people in communist ideology or educating people in gender frameworks or ... It’s always, they always wanna work in the education camps, right?

[00:30:22] I wanna, I wanna work in you know, th- g- creative field. It’s like they don’t need a lot of creatives. Oh, I’m gonna yell on that under communism because, ... that’s a form of like hedonistic pleasure, not really needed, okay? Mm. But-

[00:30:35] Simone Collins: I mean, propaganda needs it ...

[00:30:37] Malcolm Collins: if all communist forces start with people with each of these mindsets, one that actually

[00:30:44] It’s funny, one that’s actually virtuous and wants to attempt to make human society better through diligent labor and another that just wants to spend all day at home gooning, okay? And the one who wants to spend all day at h- on home gooning secretly, the, the, the, the, you know, whatever alphabet soup the orgy party people, right?

[00:31:09] People get the guns, people go out and take over the government, and then these two sides have a disagreement about how things are gonna be run. Because the people who want society to continue to advance and people to continue to work and for this all to just not immediately fall apart says, “Hey I’ve noticed some people aren’t working, and why don’t we shoot them because they’re a problem for our society, right?”

[00:31:33] And then the the people who just wanna sit at home all day gooning are like, “I thought that’s what the revolution was all about.” And then the two sides are like, “Well, I guess we disagree.” Now it doesn’t matter if the gooners make up 80% of the population they’re not the ones who will spend the day going door to door shooting people.

[00:31:51] Whereas repeatedly the other side has shown that they’re exactly that type of person. This isn’t the, the only way that it, reason it turns bloody, but we have [00:32:00] a bunch of other episodes where we go into this. But it is one of the reasons why the gooners never take control of the communist systems and why the extremely militaristic people always do.

[00:32:09] Because they’re the people willing to do what is needed to gain power. So even if that other side made up 80% of the population that wanted a revolution, pretty quickly you get to house number five and they’re like, “Actually, I support you guys. Yeah, sure, I’ll go to the widget factory every day for the rest of my life doing a, a mindless job while I choke on smoke that’s pointlessly wafted onto our cities because it makes them look more industrial,” a real thing that they did in both China and the USSR.

[00:32:35] Did you know that by the way?

[00:32:36] Simone Collins: No. That’s...

[00:32:38] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, so in China, this is a problem they’re dealing with even today, where they would explicitly build the large factories upwind of the major cities so that the cities would become polluted faster, because they thought it made them look more industrialized and modern

[00:32:58] Simone Collins: That, hmm

[00:33:03] Okay I don’t know about that Is

[00:33:05] Malcolm Collins: that, is that astonishingly stupid?

[00:33:08] Simone Collins: That’s, yeah. I’m trying to think of a diplomatic way to put it, but I think astonishingly stupid is all we can fall on today. That’s, there’s no, there’s no excuse for that. It’s, oh, God. It’s so bad. It’s so bad. Oh. Mm. Okay.

[00:33:22] Speaker 9: By the way, I was fact-checking this and, , it’s been very interesting. I can’t find any positive affirmations that this definitely happened, but I can’t find any negative affirmations that, that this is a historic myth. So who knows where I heard this, but they do say there is a suspicious number of factories in both Communist China and Russia upwind of major cities.

[00:33:44] , But we can’t find any record of why they built them there. So I, I could be wrong

[00:33:49] Malcolm Collins: Mm-hmm. Yeah. What’s interesting is, is that the people who gain power within communist systems that last for any period of time and function to any extent, actually think a lot like capitalists, like the most ruthless people within a capitalist system.

[00:34:04] They’re just often l- legally allowed to just kill anyone they think is unproductive. Whereas in the, the capitalist system, it’s more like people might be like, “Well, it would be, you know, there’s a lot of people who are drains on the state. There’s a lot of people... But you know, you can’t do anything about it.”

[00:34:20] In these systems, they’re just like, “Yeah, sure, like d- d- take, take care of it.” Do I wanna talk about why communist systems always fail? No. You can go to our other videos on that if that’s of interest to you. I don’t wanna wa- waste your time with it on this video. But what I do wanna talk about is, so if you have this idea, and people are like, “Well, gays don’t spend all day gooning.”

[00:34:37] Right? Like, some gays are productive citizens. Some gays wanna make society better. And it’s like two things. One, you know well and good that those gays have a lot less social power than the ones who are the gooners. Right? Like- ... the gooners typically gain more power than the- Gooner power ... socially responsible ones.

[00:34:58] Historically. Now, I’m seeing this shift within American gay culture in response to their movement being so taken over by the, the extremist extremist gooners, and they’re, and they, they don’t even like, the LGBT folks, they don’t even like the gays anymore. They’re like, the, the, the new thing is like a, a, a male gay is the new male straight because all the, the, the, is the new white male, you know.

[00:35:16] Because all the white straight males left the, the left, right? And so now they’re, they’re, they’re picking on the next group, and the next group’s like, “Yeah, what, what am I doing here?” R- and this is where, you know, like how is it that we, there’s so few gay Republicans, and but like our top vote getter, Scott Pressler, is gay, right?

[00:35:32] Literally moved to the movement ‘cause he’s like, “I don’t understand why the leftists are cozying up with the Islamists. They wanna kill me and everyone like me.” Right? Like, and we’ve, and we’ve seen a pretty successful alliance with the two groups here with Trump. The New York Times wrote an article, Trump’s Big Gay White House, pointing out that disproportionately, and we’ve seen this as well, his White House is, is staffed by gay men.

[00:35:51] And it is becau- and, and the famous quote from like a Republican lady in DC was like, “The Trump administration came in and I thought there’d be so many good dating prospects, [00:36:00] and they’re all gay.” But they’ve been efficiently moving forwards with a lot of the agenda that we want to see carried out, so like I’m, I’m, I’m chill with that, right?

[00:36:08] You know, I, I can say that the, the Bible’s against it and also say, but there’s a lot of other things the Bible against that are bigger issues for me than that. And- The, the wider stuff around, like the toxic parts of the movement have mostly expelled the gays to the extent that they are useful to work with us, and that they no longer have the social power if we accept them into our movement to ever force their lifestyle on the next generation again, nor do most of them want to who want to join our side, right?

[00:36:40] So like why- Mm-hmm ... be pointlessly mean about it? You’re just hurting us in future elections. But yeah, but I’ve pointed out, you, you know, this can still mean banning gay marriage and stuff like that, like whatever, right? Like, but the, why the communists are always turning against them, because even if you are an upstanding, hardworking, soci- civically minded gay, you’re still not having kids, and most communist systems were incredibly pro-natalist.

[00:37:03] The, the only exception is China, interestingly that I’m aware of.

[00:37:07] Simone Collins: Yeah. But like- Yeah, yeah. Well, but that, yeah, I think maybe it was kind of the fault of the Communist Party anyway, ‘cause they were dealing with like the famines that they caused, and then they were like, “Oh, let’s-”

[00:37:17] Malcolm Collins: No, no, no, the Communist Party in China was initially super pro-natalist.

[00:37:19] They wanted people to have tons of kids.

[00:37:20] Simone Collins: Yeah, and then there were the famines, and then, yeah. So

[00:37:22] Malcolm Collins: then- And then they did a 180. But the- Yeah ... the Soviets were pro-natalist the entire time. They gave out mothers of medal, m- motherhood medals. They gave out all sorts of, you know, rewards, awards, anything

[00:37:37] Mm. Delicious. But yeah. It was, By the way, people are asking if I like, am, I’m drinking milk for some weird diet reason or something. Like I’m on some sort of c- I’ve just always really liked milk.

[00:37:52] Simone Collins: It’s- You’re a European cow herd descendant, I guess.

[00:37:58] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. No, this is the thing. There’s a bunch of like, you know, people from cultures that are not milk drinking cultures who don’t know how normalized milk is in- Mm-hmm

[00:38:06] Northern European cultural groups. Milk and cheese are the fucking best. Few, few flavors in this world better than milk and cheese, people. To a Europ- Northern European.

[00:38:16] Simone Collins: I’m with you, man. Yeah.

[00:38:17] Malcolm Collins: D- in, in, in Scotland in the medieval period, you had to pay your taxes in cheese. That’s always been one of my favorite factoids I learned- Me too

[00:38:23] studying Scottish history. Mm. So I have to say it. So the local like, bishop would like have a, like a basement full of like cheese. Cheese.

[00:38:35] Simone Collins: The fir- the word factoid I believe actually refers to a, a, a fact that’s not true. Let me, let me actually fact check this.

[00:38:43] So I did fact check it and it’s right

[00:38:45] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, that that doesn’t sound true to me.

[00:38:46] Yeah, so, so because of that you’re like intrinsically in the same way that on this podcast I’m also like, generally I think you’re gonna be able to do more for society unless you’re fairly wealthy if you are gay with today’s technology. If you decide to just, not live a life around what turns you on.

[00:39:06] I don’t think it’s as bad as it was historically. Hmm. But I think that, you know, on the edge you’re probably gonna be more productive. And we have a, we have a- I mean, yeah,

[00:39:13] Simone Collins: I mean, I, I think it depends on the person. I think some people are more productive because they, it

[00:39:19] Malcolm Collins: seems like marriage- Have a really

[00:39:20] Simone Collins: good

[00:39:20] Malcolm Collins: partnership.

[00:39:21] Simone Collins: And, yeah They’re

[00:39:21] Malcolm Collins: not burdened by women, yeah.

[00:39:22] Simone Collins: Yeah. Yeah, but- It’s like look, and like, and like trying to... Let’s say, like, you wanna have a family, right? And you don’t wanna raise the family alone, but you find women both so, socially abrasive and physically repulsive that you understand that if you tried to raise a family with a woman you would just be miserable and be a bad parent.

[00:39:40] It makes sense.

[00:39:41] Malcolm Collins: Simone, I think, I, I think a number of straight guys feel this way.

[00:39:44] Simone Collins: Well, the, I mean, like, there’s a... What’s the word for... So, so there’s political lesbians, what’s the word for... Or are, are they just called, like, MGTOW gays, I guess? What, what are we, what are we gonna call them? I guess they don’t exist or maybe they [00:40:00] do.

[00:40:00] It’d be really interesting to, like, find, find just we can’t stand women gays who are not gay. Anyway, though.

[00:40:09] Malcolm Collins: Oh, by the way, funny, funny side note. Yeah. So for RFab we were making ads for our video, the Not Safe For Work video feature today.

[00:40:15] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:40:16] Malcolm Collins: And I sent you the, the, like, sample ads that I created.

[00:40:19] Did you notice-

[00:40:20] but have you, have you noticed that I always make one of the characters look like you?

[00:40:24] Simone Collins: There’s a pattern.

[00:40:25] Do you want me to wear the thin-rimmed glasses?

[00:40:29] Malcolm Collins: No, just when you write for AI large circular glasses, that it does thin-rimmed.

[00:40:33] Simone Collins: You, you say black circular thick-rimmed glasses, and for yours black rectangular thick-rimmed glasses. It’s very easy. However, you do not need to make it accurate. I have, I’ve also made, I’ve also made some for, for-

[00:40:50] Malcolm Collins: You’ve made some where I’m one of the characters?

[00:40:52] Simone Collins: No. No, no, no, no, no. I’ve, I’ve... No, because we’re not targeting people like me in the ads. I’ve made some based on my understanding of what is extremely popular. So.

[00:41:02] Malcolm Collins: Send it, send them to me. I wanna see what, what you did. I gotta give you a rating. No.

[00:41:07] Simone Collins: No, I’m gonna let our ad performance give me the rating.

[00:41:11] ‘Cause also, you, you don’t have tastes that reflect mainstream interests, so. I mean, like, the most mainstream interests, which are very vanilla, pretty boring. No,

[00:41:20] Malcolm Collins: I gotta do one of, like, a, an elf girl in chains being hit

[00:41:24] Simone Collins: by

[00:41:24] Malcolm Collins: somebody.

[00:41:26] Simone Collins: I mean, maybe among base camp viewers that’s more normative, but like a- among your mainstream, like what gets the most views no.

[00:41:36] No. Just look at Aella’s Big Kink Survey and just look at what actually is really popular. Well,

[00:41:43] Malcolm Collins: yeah. Okay. You’ve also gotta think of what’s popular on gooner sites

[00:41:49] Simone Collins: Yeah, sure. Yeah, and I guess someone who has to like, who wants to pay to make unique content. That’s fair.

[00:41:59] Malcolm Collins: Yeah.

[00:41:59] Simone Collins: Oh, God. Sorry, I just, yeah.

[00:42:03] Anyway I

[00:42:04] Malcolm Collins: thought- I do not think the ExoClick feature that tells you which ads are doing well and which ads are not doing well is very good, by the way.

[00:42:12] Speaker 10: For context, , we’ve recently started running ad campaigns to promote, , the not safe for work video feature on the rfab.ai website. , And Simone and I are having disagreements about what types of videos people will click on, and we will see. We will see. She thinks people want super, super generic stuff

[00:42:34] Speaker 11: I’m busy

[00:42:45] Simone Collins: are we trying to head off losing the competition?

[00:42:47] Malcolm Collins: No, no, no, I’m just telling you as-

[00:42:49] Simone Collins: I

[00:42:50] Malcolm Collins: see. Okay ... it has in the past with ads had, like, 0%, 0%, 0%, 0%, 0%, 0%, 0%, 99%.

[00:42:58] I’m like, “So you didn’t even try the other ads?” It’s just like one ad sort of-

[00:43:01] Simone Collins: No, it actually, it actually does try them. And it will occasionally flip some out. They fluctuate over time- Okay ... when it serves the most. So it, it, it has a smart enough system where if one ad gets kind of tired essentially, I’ve noticed that it will cycle it out which is interesting to me, and it will start feeding up ones that were less used.

[00:43:19] So I’ve, I’ve, I’m glad I’ve introduced all new ad variants to test out more because people are getting tired of our old ones.

[00:43:28] Malcolm Collins: Anyway,

[00:43:30] Simone Collins: I really love you. People are weird. And

[00:43:38] Malcolm Collins: stop advocating for your natural predators, guys. Like this-

[00:43:42] Simone Collins: Communism, let’s not. Let’s... You gotta choose. Gayness. Well, no. See, like communism is also incom- incompatible, to your point with a lot of other things that we, we like, so yeah.

[00:43:59] There [00:44:00] is a, there is one other thing though that I about capitalism that I think is quite broken that I wanna do a totally separate episode though on, and I don’t wanna- Oh,

[00:44:08] Malcolm Collins: oh, what is it on? What is it?

[00:44:09] Simone Collins: I don’t wanna talk with you about it until I do it ‘cause I wanna get your fresh thoughts on it instead of your tired old reaction having already heard this.

[00:44:18] You know how it is with old couples where, like, you know that they’ve had the conversation already. You know that that, you know, that wife has told that story 10,000 times in front of the husband, and he’s just sit, he’s just sit through it like he’s been on, like, this one track ride so many times, and he doesn’t wanna get back on the haunted mansion ride, but he has to go back on the ha- haunted mansion ride, and it was fun the first 10,000 times but not the second 10,000 times.

[00:44:41] I don’t wanna do that to you. Let’s, let’s keep it fresh. Yeah?

[00:44:45] Malcolm Collins: Okay.

[00:44:45] Simone Collins: Okay. Okay.

[00:44:47] Malcolm Collins: Love

[00:44:47] Simone Collins: you. You, you can always guess what it is though over dinner when- whenever you want to, whenever we chat.

[00:44:51] Malcolm Collins: Doing a site update right now, by the way, with a bunch of improvements to not safe for work video generation, making it a lot cheaper to do.

[00:44:58] Simone Collins: Oh, that’s good.

[00:44:58] Malcolm Collins: By employing the new API that I found that’s basically a secret API which is so cool that I was able to get working

[00:45:10] Mm. So I’m very excited about that. And Simone was playing around with it, and she’s like, “Oh, this is really good.”

[00:45:13] Simone Collins: Yeah. I, I can see how it gets addictive, ‘cause it’s one of those, like, you don’t know what you’re gonna get, and it’s, like, really satisfying, but then that one thing’s off, and so you wanna try again, and yeah, yeah.

[00:45:25] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. And as a reminder if you haven’t redownloaded the app in a while, the app for image viewing has been massively improved since it first launched. It’s, like, way more stable now, has way more features now. Mm. And if enough of you download it, apparently it will elude that stupid tag, like, this isn’t checked by Windows Defender or whatever.

[00:45:44] Oh. Do you know that auto goes away after enough people use something?

[00:45:47] Simone Collins: Really? Silly.

[00:45:50] Malcolm Collins: It is quite silly. I... Fucking Windows.

[00:45:53] Simone: Titan, do you wanna play hide and seek too?

[00:45:55] Titan: Yeah.

[00:45:56] Simone: Okay. One, two, 10. Ready or not, here I come. All right, Indy, do you think I can find them? Do you think I can find them? I’m gonna look around. I found you. Titan, I found you.

[00:46:16] Girl. All right, now we have to find Octavian. Where could he be? Do you have any ideas?

[00:46:23] Titan: He’s under

[00:46:25] Simone: the black box. The black box? Yeah, yeah. No, I hear him yelling, I think. Oh, wait.

[00:46:34] Oh, no, it’s moving. It’s alive. Oh, no. No.

[00:46:46] You win, Octavian. That was very good. That was ve- And I was crawling under there ... I really, I thought maybe you were- I was crawling under there. I s- that was, yeah, that was very impressive.

[00:46:55] Titan: No.

Her purpose? Cure baby fever. Remind you to take your birth control.

Today, we explore the work of the Girl (actually girls) with the List, the unique genre of choice-based horror stories (be they pregnancy, parenting, or entirely-non-family-related activities, such as cosmetic surgery and travel), and whether this genre helps or harms. Enjoy!

Show Notes

There’s a young woman named Abigail Porter (goes by Zoomie) with 1.6M followers on Tiktok who is famous for “curing baby fever” by creating abundant shorts on pregnancy and delivery body horror and frustrating experiences parents have while lactating and raising young kids.

Just this week I’ve heard two mentions of her in the wild “She changed my life” said one. “I literally owe her everything”

Suffice it to say she is, at best, feeding into women’s feelings of justification for not having kids, and at worst, generating fear about having kids where it didn’t exist before.

Abigail is not alone in creating viral content of this genre—there’s also “the girl with the list” with whom Abigail is often confused and that list is called “YUNI’S PROS AND CONS LIST OF HAVING CHILDREN”), so we should probably talk about it!

So… Why avoid pregnancies?

Some highlights:

• A woman whose insides needed stitches after her baby scratched her from the inside on the way out

• A woman whose baby began to choke on her nipple after it literally fell off

• A woman who grew a tumor on her lip the size of her pinky

• Women losing their hair, their teeth, all their eyelashes

• A woman who developed a mutation during pregnancy that made her insensitive to pain meds who had to endure a c-section with no pain meds

• A woman who went deaf after her kid kissed her on the ear, causing what’s called “the kiss of death”

  • BTW, this is also known as cochlear ear‑kiss injury / Reiter’s Ear Kiss Syndrome (REKS)

  • It happens when someone kisses directly over the ear canal (the opening of the ear), especially using a strong suction/“air kiss.” and it can cause permanent hearing loss

• A woman whose retinas detached because she pushed so hard in labor

• Women whose bodies have become both temporarily and permanently deformed or uglified (swollen hands and feet, swollen legs, varicose veins, popped blood vessels in eyes, toe nails falling off, etc.)

There are basically four themes:

• Relatively unusual medical complications from pregnancy and lactation (like uterine prolapse, various forms of body horror)

• The expenses of labor and delivery

• Poop and pee horror

• Pretty common parenting, pregnancy, and postpartum stuff, e.g.:

  • Fussy babies who are only calm when being bounced

  • The rectus abdominus being separated

  • Swelling

  • Using a nosfrida to suck snot out of a baby’s nose

  • Having strangers on the internet jump down your throat for really innocuous things, such as mentioning breastfeeding

  • Kids making messes around the house (flooding, vandalism, etc.)

The Psychology of it All

Availability Heuristic

Creators like Abigail and Yuni make pregnancy and parenting look heuristic by making their hazards extremely visible and available, but it’s extremely easy to do the exact same thing Abigail does with other life choices, and that includes life choices

Known genres:

• Hiking (e.g., Mr. Ballen videos)

• Cosmetic surgery (e.g., Wonny)

• Buying homes (e.g., videos and tiktoks by home inspectors)

• Eating out at restaurants (e.g. dirty restaurant audits)

You can effectively develop an aversion to—even phobia of—pretty much anything by giving yourself sufficient exposure to its hazards.

This genre is a form of opt-in brainwashing, though it could also be a form of unintentional, algorithmic brainwashing.

Loss Aversion

Humans generally weigh potential losses about 1.5–2.5 times as strongly as equal-sized gains in typical risky choices, though the exact ratio and even the presence of loss aversion depend on context and measurement method (there’s a lot of research on this)

See:

• https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/neuroscience/prospect-theory

• https://thedecisionlab.com/biases/loss-aversion

• https://www.behavioraleconomics.com/resources/mini-encyclopedia-of-be/loss-aversion/

• https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167487024000485

• https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/neuroscience/prospect-theory

This means that people will be far more influenced by downsides of parenting than by upsides.

It’s worse than that, though, because creators like Abigail and Yuri can’t even wrap their heads around the rewards of parenting. Abigail’s most commonly cited argument is “kids are cute” whereas Yuri’s list includes:

• “Child?”

• “Tax return benefits”

• “Tiny everything”

• “You can’t get drafted while pregnant”

• “You can bribe them with candy”

  • No you can’t

• “If you raise them right people praise you for it”

Overthinking & tokophobia

• Overthinking things is why mental health is plummeting

• Abigail fundamentally gets people to overthink pregnancy and childrearing

• Robert Sepulsky talks about how the system we’ve evolved to deal with stress wasn’t really designed for animals capable of metacognition, who can literally trigger that system by THINKING

Overthinking about pregnancy may be contributing to a rise in phobia about pregnancy (known as tokophobia).

A 2017 systematic review of 33 studies (≈854,000 pregnant women worldwide) estimated a pooled prevalence of tokophobia around 14%, with individual study estimates ranging from about 3.7% to 43%.

• The researches concluded that the prevalence of tokophobia “appears to have increased in recent years (2000 onwards)”, although they cautioned that this finding is complicated by changing definitions and heterogeneous methods.

More moderate but still clinically relevant “fear of childbirth” (not always labeled tokophobia) is common, with estimates in some European samples of about 5% with severe fear and over a third with high fear.

About Abigail

Her content creation journey

• Started in 2021

She’s very much a product of the urban monoculture

• Lives in downtown Los Angeles

Her standards for hardship are quite low:

• She says that getting an IUD was the most painful thing she has experienced.

• She hates cleaning up after cooking

She also does love caring little things:

• She says she would protect her cats, Bub and Willow, with her life

She has merch!

• $60 “divorce your republican husband” XL crewneck sweatshirt with a wolf on it (sold out)

• $50 “dump your republican boyfriend” M/L hunting camo crewneck sweatshirt (sold out)

• $68 “dump your republican boyfriend” XL green crewneck

• $58 “dump your republican boyfriend” XL pink hoodie

• $68 “dump your republican boyfriend” L green/blue crewneck sweatshirt

• $54 “dump your republican / story of my life” XL running-away-deer black crewneck sweatshirt

• $60 “dump your republican boyfriend” L cameo hoodie (sold out)

• $58 “dump your republican boyfriend” M navy zip-up

Wait why are most of these for larger people?

How do we feel about this?

What Abigail is doing is fine. She’s pretty clear in her content to not shame parents; she’s really empathetic toward parents (can’t say the same of many parents online!).

She’s also WAAAAY more ethical and polite than your typical content creator about the clips she uses: She told NBC: ““If I’m going to do a video about bodies in particular and show somebody’s body, I’m going to make sure that I have consent from that mother first — like if she posted a video and she made this acknowledgement like, ‘This is my body. It’s pretty crazy. The things that have happened in my body is pretty wild.’””

She also told NBC: “I have such a respect and a reverence and an admiration for the people who do choose to go through with this, because it is a huge choice,” Porter said. “I hope people will stop treating having children as an impulse decision that everyone does. I think that’s better for us and also for the children, because if every child that was ever born had parents that really, really wanted them, I think the world would be a better place.”

YES!!

People should only want kids because they have a strong reason to do so. In my ideal world, everyone should be able to watch one of Abigail’s long compilation videos and not feel doubts.

Abigail’s content is actually helpful in:

• Dissuading people from having kids for trivial reasons

• Helping actual parents head off medical issues.

  • In one NBC article about Abigail and Yuri, they write “Biggers-Stewart, who is now pregnant with her second child, described the list videos as “a powerful tool for self-advocacy.””

    • “I was totally shocked by all the things that could happen to you. And that’s even in today’s modern world, which is shocking with the amount of research and access that we have at our fingertips,” Biggers-Stewart said. “There’s so many different types of complications, and it can be really brutal on women. So I was like, this is empowering.”

• Helping actual parents head off other parenting foibles

  • We had to learn the hard way to lock up the kitchen at night, restrict most foods to only certain parts of the house, permanently wear aprons, etc.

  • Basically: When these things happen (the vandalism, the food messes, etc.) I see it as my fault, not the kids’ fault

  • They’re prisoners in our home and when they’re young, they literally don’t know better; it’s up to us as parents to provide the equivalent of bumpers on the bowling alleys of their lives.

The primary concern isn’t with anti-kid content, but “worst-case scenario” content in general that can create algorithmic loops that create phobias.

What about friends/girlfriends who cite “the list” in conversations about having kids?

• Have a logical conversation.

  • About actual risks

  • About equivalent risks they take in their everyday life, through their hobbies, etc.

    • Such as hiking, cosmetic surgery, eating out, etc.

• If they still are afraid of having kids, then they probably shouldn’t have kids

Appendix: Longer Sampling of Abigail’s Reasons to Not Have Kids

Pregnancy and birth: medical risks and trauma

• Severe post‑labor swelling of the vulva (“had balls between my legs”).

• Uterus flipping inside out and being placed in a bucket (uterine inversion).

• Severe tearing, including tears toward the anus and up toward the clitoris (“towards your bean”).

• Episiotomy (“they cut to make the hole bigger”) and still having to push afterward.

• Vaginal or uterine prolapse (“my vagina fell out” / holding her uterus in her hand; uterine prolapse needing to be pushed back in).

• Retained or traumatized bladder/urethra causing urinary retention (bladder “shut down,” pee‑hole swelling shut, catheter for days to weeks).

• Incarcerated uterus causing urinary obstruction and catheterization for two weeks.

• Post‑birth inability to pee without elaborate “Subway sandwich” pad/ice/witch hazel/foam setup after every bathroom trip.

• Pelvic floor damage: chronic incontinence, “never pee normally again,” needing to clench when sneezing, “neverending wipe,” stool control issues.

• Massive blood clots after birth (basketball‑sized clot, near hemorrhage, transfusions).

• Mastitis leading to sepsis and large clots; spouse literally sucking out infected milk and blood.

• C‑section horror stories: adhesions, two‑hour surgery with every organ manipulated, awake without “loopy drugs,” drunk surgeon in another case, multiple layers and instruments (forceps, “bladder blade”) instead of the simple cut most people imagine.

• Forceps deliveries (baby’s head clamped with metal instruments, higher risk of severe tears).

• Vacuum‑assisted birth with no epidural, tearing “to my ass.”

• Epidural issues: catheters left in the back, epidurals that can be “unplugged,” epidurals that fail entirely so pain is still extreme.

• Pain of cervical dilation (and IUD insertion used as a reference point), with emphasis that nobody explains this upfront.

• Cervix and uterus changes: permanent uterine enlargement, cervix dilation/effacement as unseen but excruciating changes.

• Eating or handling placentas (and the idea of placentophagy being sold as healthy) being viscerally repulsive.

Pregnancy complications and body changes

• Detached retinas / blindness from pushing too hard in labor; cases of permanent severe visual loss and disability.

• Pregnancy‑related eye trauma like subconjunctival hemorrhages (bloodshot eyes from pushing).

• Pregnancy‑related cancers (choriocarcinoma) that can arise after normal pregnancy, ectopic pregnancy, molar pregnancy, or miscarriage.

• High blood pressure disorders like preeclampsia (including grotesque swelling and “squishy gel hairbrush” legs), with inadequate research and answers.

• Jaundiced newborns and the stress of their care (also used as a reminder of hidden complications).

• Lithopedion (“stone baby”): calcified ectopic pregnancies carried for decades, sometimes discovered in old age.

• Fetus‑in‑fetu / parasitic twins: one twin growing inside another’s body or skull; parasitic twin cases discovered in teens.

• Multiple uteruses (uterus didelphys), including rare cases of simultaneous pregnancies in both, and the associated risk of double pregnancy.

• Superfetation: getting pregnant again while already pregnant, leading to extra fetuses weeks apart.

• Extreme multiples: triplets, quintuplets, and even the documented nonuplets (nine babies), with unmanageable risk and burden.

• Uterus or placenta allergies and oddities (itchy uterus from amniotic fluid, mothers allergic to various pregnancy‑related substances).

• New allergies developing after pregnancy (to antibiotics, adhesives, metals, pine nuts, dogs, insects, etc.), including a friend “allergic to her legs.”

• Lactation‑related tumors and growths (pregnancy tumors / pyogenic granulomas on gums or elsewhere).

• Chromhidrosis (colored sweat), including pregnant people turning toilet seats blue.

• Extreme swelling of hands, feet, and noses; preeclampsia‑related edema; “pregnancy nose” growth and swelling.

• Brain changes: measurable shrinkage in regions related to social cognition, with “pregnancy brain” symptoms like memory issues, poor focus, and enduring structural changes detectable years later.

• Pregnancy rhinitis and sensory loss: severe congestion leading to loss of smell and taste; earlier pregnancy caused hearing loss; pregnancy stacking sensory deficits.

• Postpartum hair loss to the point of partial balding even more than a year after birth.

• Postpartum diastasis recti (ab separation) severe enough that a practitioner can press fingers between muscles and feel the aorta; associated back pain, constipation, and urine leakage.

• Decorvain’s tenosynovitis (“mommy’s wrist”): tendon swelling from repetitive lifting of babies, laundry, groceries, etc., potentially requiring splints or surgery and causing lasting hand/wrist disability.

• Loss of ability to burp (RCPD‑like symptoms) arising after pregnancies, sometimes reversing only after later pregnancies.

• Permanent changes in teeth and bones: baby “sucking the calcium” out, teeth rotting or falling out, multiple root canals, bone density changes.

• Toenails softening and falling off after birth, sometimes never growing back.

• New allergies or sensitivities to tattoos, metals, adhesives after pregnancy that complicate future medical care.

• Nasal, skin, or other pigment changes; white or lighter hair; other unexpected cosmetic shifts.

• Long‑term depression and anxiety, often in line with maternal family history; fear of passing down the same nervous system and mood disorders.

Breastfeeding and lactation horrors

• Babies causing nipple trauma, including nipples turning black/white (ischemia), “dead” nipple tissue.

• Babies literally sucking off part of a nipple; pieces ending up in the baby’s mouth and needing reattachment.

• Nipple puncture wounds from baby teeth, leaving permanent holes.

• Severe breastfeeding pain: clenching against anticipated pain at every latch, blood in milk, cracked nipples.

• Ongoing leakage from breasts in public, constant fear of spontaneous milk letdown.

• Milk “pregnancy tumors” in gums/teeth and pregnancy‑related gum growths while breastfeeding.

• Breast pumps and breastfeeding schedules requiring waking every 2–3 hours regardless of who is feeding, destroying sleep.

• Need to pump even when partner bottle‑feeds to maintain supply, so the birthing parent’s sleep is still fragmented.

Neonatal and baby health issues

• Babies born with teeth or extra teeth, including terrifying images of infant skulls full of stacked teeth.

• Infants born with “boobs” and lactation (hormonal breast tissue in newborns), requiring parents to express milk from babies’ chests.

• Newborn periods in baby girls, from maternal hormones, shocking parents who weren’t warned.

• Babies swallowing their own meconium at birth and suffering severe respiratory distress.

• Babies with no instinct to eat, crying for hours and needing forced feeding.

• Babies forgetting to breathe during overwhelming emotions; breath‑holding spells that terrify caregivers.

• Severe newborn jaundice requiring treatment and parental stress.

• NICU stays for weeks or months, with enormous financial and emotional cost.

Medical system and informed consent issues

• Hidden information: lack of comprehensive sex/family‑planning education about what birth and postpartum are actually like.

• Dismissive or negligent medical staff (e.g., nurse sending a woman home at 1 cm when she’s clearly in labor, then she delivers at home or en route).

• OBs scolding patients for coughing with pneumonia during C‑section and stuffing organs back in without care, leaving disfiguring scars.

• Drunk surgeon doing a C‑section on another patient and being fired later.

• Multiple, painful postpartum pelvic exams without pain relief while the mother is unable to hold the baby.

• Under‑researched conditions (e.g., rare lactation or vascular complications) with little scientific literature or explanation.

• Framing: society romanticizing pregnancy and parenthood, omitting trauma, leading to feelings of personal failure when reality is hard.

Financial burden

• Hospital birth bills in the tens of thousands to nearly $50,000 for a single uncomplicated birth before insurance.

• NICU bills for triplets without insurance running into hundreds of thousands per baby.

• Charges such as $36,000 for the first 24 hours of life, $4,000 for skin‑to‑skin contact, $17,000 for a one‑day hospital room.

• Ongoing annual childcare costs around $20,000 per child, adding up to $100,000–120,000 for ages 0–5.

• Estimates of $237,000+ to raise a child to 18 (excluding college), plus another roughly $100,000 for college.

• Formula costs of $38–50 per can that lasts only a few days, making infant feeding extremely expensive.

• One mom’s yearly cost for three kids around $47,000.

• Kids spending hundreds on in‑app purchases like Roblox Robux without permission.

• Home destruction costs: multiple replacement TVs, remotes, front door handles, wall repair, and warped floors from leaks.

Lifestyle costs: time, freedom, and autonomy

• Loss of free time and personal days off (e.g., Sundays now consumed with children’s activities instead of sleeping in and seeing friends).

• Constant need to “fill the days” with activities for kids; no spontaneous rest or leisure.

• Child‑free lifestyle benefits: travel, expensive city living, pampering oneself, double income no kids (DINK) life.

• Inability to travel light: car seats, diaper bags, etc., turning flights into logistics nightmares.

• Need to manage diapers, feeding schedules, and baby entertainment on planes, plus anxiety about disturbing others.

• Never being off‑duty, including caring for children while sick yourself.

• Introverts and easily overstimulated people losing the quiet, solitary recovery time they rely on.

• Having to cook three meals plus snacks daily, often separate bland food for kids, destroying the joy of cooking or eating spicy food.

• Having to attend endless kids’ appointments and activities on top of work.

• Permanent vigilance: always monitoring kids’ safety, bodily functions, and behaviors.

Psychological and relationship impacts

• Postnatal depression, psychosis, and long‑term mental health crises leading some parents to vow never to repeat pregnancy.

• Pregnancy hormones causing intense, often irrational hatred or intolerance toward partners (“I hated my husband while I was pregnant”).

• Strain on relationships: changed dynamics with partners, loss of sense of self, resentment.

• Overstimulation from hearing “Mom” hundreds of times per day (e.g., 234 “Mom”s in 13 hours, ~85,000 per year).

• Guilt and shame from not living up to romanticized ideals of motherhood.

• People‑pleasing parents being unable to cope with public tantrums, plane screams, or feeling like they are “ruining” others’ experiences.

• Loss of identity, body image issues, and grief over the pre‑baby self and lifestyle.

Children’s bodily fluids and hygiene issues

• Endless poop incidents: blowouts before weddings, on floors, in pools, on parents’ clothes, on hospital staff.

• Toddlers wiping feces down every stair or making “art” on walls with urine or feces.

• Dogs eating children’s feces from the yard or house.

• Kids peeing in conditioners, dog bowls, carpets, dishwashers, and elsewhere, contaminating everyday objects.

• Persistent smells: rancid pee in vents, years‑long odor issues preventing home resale.

• Vomit parties: children intentionally drinking water to induce vomiting throughout the house.

• Chronic vomiting and diarrhea episodes parents must clean while sleep‑deprived.

Household destruction and mess

• Children destroying multiple TVs, remotes, and door hardware within a year.

• Kids hammering holes in walls, pulling off door handles, eating drywall, and requiring constant repainting and patching.

• Paint disasters: kids smearing house paint over furniture, floors, and even entire condos; black paint on everything.

• Flour, eggs, baby powder, and other cooking ingredients dumped all over carpets and floors, turning into intractable sludge.

• Baby powder explosions requiring strong vacuums and toothbrushes to clean.

• Stickers covering TVs, leaving permanent sticky residue that collects dirt.

• Syrup “cup holders” carved into couches; couch destruction.

• Flooded houses from kids playing with sinks or fridges; warped floors, broken ice makers.

• Kids eating walls and needing corner protectors to stop them from biting again.

• Constant car‑seat filth: crumbs, poop, and stains that never fully clean out.

Physical danger from kids’ behavior

• Toddlers head‑butting parents and causing concussions, black eyes, migraines, and memory loss.

• Kids biting adults hard enough to cause infections requiring antibiotics; “second most dangerous bite.”

• Human bites leading to non‑healing wounds and risk of limb loss.

• Babies scratching mothers’ insides during birth with fully grown fingernails, causing internal stitches.

• Kids pulling fridge water/ice dispensers nonstop, causing water damage and hazards.

• Children nearly drowning caregivers (roughhousing in pools) without understanding the danger.

• Kids dropping heavy objects, throwing iPads into ponds, or otherwise causing injuries and expensive losses.

• Baby skulls full of developing teeth, plus parents needing to forcibly remove loose teeth in painful ways.

Sleep deprivation and constant noise

• Night terrors: toddlers screaming with eyes open for hours while asleep, terrifying parents.

• Colicky babies crying for hours despite parents’ efforts; parents “just surviving.”

• Babies needing to be bounced on exercise balls for hours every night.

• Children constantly yelling “Mommy” or screaming; continuous audio overstimulation.

• Sleep deprivation from feeding schedules, night wakings, and frequent illnesses.

• Parents unable to shower or change clothes for days; living in the same clothes while caring for infants.

Social, cultural, and structural reasons

• Unaffordable, inaccessible childcare systems; poor parental leave; lack of social support for parents, especially in the U.S.

• Pressure from family (e.g., religious households, Thanksgiving interrogations) to marry and have kids despite personal ambivalence.

• Romanticization of pregnancy and motherhood in media, hiding risks and hardships.

• Unsolicited advice and criticism directed at both child‑free people and parents (“you’ll change your mind,” breastfeeding debates, etc.).

• Fear of being responsible for a screaming child on a plane and being judged by strangers.

• Concern about passing on generational trauma, mental illness, or unhealthy patterns.

Personal lifestyle and preference reasons

• Love of travel, concerts, gaming, hobbies (miniatures, comics, snakes, bones) that would be curtailed by kids.

• Desire to keep a home wired with cables, gamer setups, and fragile collectibles without child‑proofing or sticky fingers.

• Disinterest in revisiting schoolwork and homework via children.

• Sensory issues and low tolerance for crying or touch, incompatible with early parenting demands.

• Preference for quiet, orderly homes and uncluttered floors.

• Desire to remain lazy, spontaneous, and self‑oriented without 24/7 caregiving work.

• Desire to be “rich auntie” rather than parent; using resources for self, travel, or pets.

• Fear of losing sexual freedom, nudity at home, or other adult lifestyle choices.

Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Malcolm Collins: Hello, everyone. I’m excited to be here with you today. Today, Simone has kept whatever this topic is going to be a secret from me all day because she wanted to see my reaction for, like, a day and a half at this point.

[00:00:10] So what is it, Simone? What, what is it that you wanted to go over?

[00:00:15] Simone Collins: What if I told you that there is, there’s a system for convincing women to not have children that men don’t know about because they don’t consume girly content, and it’s just floating around on the internet becoming quite influential and pervasive, changing people’s lives.

[00:00:34] And- I,

[00:00:34] Malcolm Collins: it sounds like the usual bad guys up to their usual stuff, but why don’t I know about this? Do I not know about this? Do you know about

[00:00:41] Simone Collins: the girl with the list?

[00:00:44] Malcolm Collins: I have never heard about the girl with the list.

[00:00:46] Simone Collins: She’s like Batman. She’s summoned. So there are two types of videos on which you might look to the comments and you’ll see, “Where’s the girl with the list?”

[00:00:55] And she gets summoned. She will show up or be summoned on super cute videos of babies or toddlers, or on things going- What? ... absolutely horrible with pregnancy, with delivery, with breastfeeding, with raising toddlers. Because what the girl with the list does is provide you with a virtual form of birth control by taking any cute video you see and just reminding you how horrible it is to be pregnant, to have kids, and to become a k- a parent.

[00:01:25] So- Wait,

[00:01:25] Malcolm Collins: really? Is she a mom? For

[00:01:27] Simone Collins: real. What’s her

[00:01:27] Malcolm Collins: backstory?

[00:01:28] Simone Collins: She’s n- no, yeah, yeah. I, I will tell you. There are actually, Malcolm, there are actually two girls with a list. One calls herself the OG girl with a list, but she has just, just completely disappeared from the internet. And then the second is who I’ll mostly focus on today.

[00:01:43] She’s named Abigail Porter. She goes by Zoomie. Okay. She has 1.6 million followers on TikTok, and she’s famous for curing baby fever by creating abundant shorts on pregnancy and delivery and body horror related to it, basically. A plus frustrating experiences that parents have while they attempt to raise kids.

[00:02:03] And even I not being particularly interested in cute baby photos or b- pregnancy body horror, ‘cause I live it I have just this week heard of her twice. I- in just my random girly content that I follow on Instagram

[00:02:19] Malcolm Collins: You ... Wait, so you just have randomly seen it. Can you describe the

[00:02:22] Simone Collins: instances?

[00:02:22] Yeah. Like, in the, the most recent video I, where I was like, “Okay, I’ve gotta do an episode on this,” just this week I was watching a video where a woman is, just said, “She changed my life. I literally owe her everything,” she said. And this was in a video about, let’s see, what was the video about? I’m linking to all this in my show notes.

[00:02:39] It was called about The Real Dangers of Trad Wife, Trad Wife Content, Nine Kids and Counting. I mean, you know, I see this stuff and I’m like, “I have to click on it.” Mm-hmm. I have to know why apparently it’s so bad to be, to be a mother. So yeah- ... I, she literally changed my life. Okay, like, I needed to find out who this was.

[00:02:57] And also, I’ve heard, there are lots of people in the Base Camp network who are dating young men, who would like to find a wife, who would like to have kids, and I’m hearing more and more from young men that, like, the, the, the women they are dating are like, “Well, I, I never wanna become a parent. Like, I don’t, I don’t wanna be a parent.”

[00:03:13] Malcolm Collins: I know. Yeah. Well, the, the psyop, you, you’ve got to groom your wife. Liefleit said it best. Actually, I think we said that first, and then she copied it from us, but I like that she, she’s boarding

[00:03:22] Simone Collins: that point. Maybe. I don’t, I don’t care who said it first. Look, you gotta do it.

[00:03:25]

[00:03:34] Simone Collins: And, and that’s, we’re gonna talk about this at the end, basically how to deal with this.

[00:03:37] But I, if, to first address the problem, be you a woman who is being subject to this, for lack of a better word, propaganda,

[00:03:46] Malcolm Collins: Brainwashing ...

[00:03:46] Simone Collins: brainwashing. Or if you’re a young man who’s met an amazing young woman who you think would actually enjoy being a parent, but who’s terrified of it because of this content, we, we need to-

[00:03:58] Malcolm Collins: Wait, so to [00:04:00] clarify, this woman felt that she had had, like, her life saved by the girl with the list?

[00:04:06] Simone Collins: Yes. So the, the YouTuber that I’m talking about I think probably b- ga- based on the fact that she said, “I literally owe her everything,” i- in my show notes, I’ll send them to you I link to the exact clip where she says this, it, it very much insinuates that she plans on not having kids because of Abigail Porter’s content.

[00:04:24] But, okay, just to be clear, so the, sort of background. The first person to do this was this other TikTok creator called Uni. And then eventually, this, this creator created a list, also linked, too, called U- Uni’s Pros and Cons of Having Children. And it has, like, 200 and something cons, and then like, 30 pros or something, and the pros aren’t even, like- That good?

[00:04:48] things that... Yeah, like, what do you even... No, that’s not, that’s not why we have kids. And, and so let’s just dive right into it. We

[00:04:55] Malcolm Collins: will replace you. That’s our goal. Come on, that’s, that’s what this is all about, winning- Yeah ... the civilizational game. Basically- And they, they don’t get that. They never would get that.

[00:05:02] But, yeah, okay, c- continue.

[00:05:04] Simone Collins: Yeah. I’ve, I’ve watched over four hours of compilations of-

[00:05:09] Malcolm Collins: Over four hours- Yes ... you... Simone.

[00:05:12] Simone Collins: Of Abigail Porter’s content.

[00:05:14] I’ve gone, I mean, she created on YouTube this compilation of a certain number of years’ worth of her content. I’ve, I’ve gone from watching her having a short pixie cut to a shaved head to hair down to here.

[00:05:27] Like, it’s, she’s been doing this for a long time. I think you’d actually find her very attractive. She’s very much your type. Oh, gosh ...

[00:05:34] Malcolm Collins: and

[00:05:34] Simone Collins: she’s a ginge. She’s very beautiful, so that, that helps. And she... They’re great. I mean, it, a lot of it’s humor. A lot of it’s like America’s Hu- Funniest Home Videos, ‘cause I mean, she’s, she’s being tagged on viral content, and her job basically is to, like, open her phone every mor- I mean, this isn’t obviously her only work, but what she’ll do is probably, presumably, open her phone every morning, see where she’s tagged on TikTok, and then take those clips and make her own little commentary on them and publish them out to her crowd, and then her, her followers.

[00:06:00] So her- She’s actually- Wait, her

[00:06:01] Malcolm Collins: name is Abigail Porter, you said?

[00:06:04] Simone Collins: But she goes by Zumi. Yeah.

[00:06:06] Malcolm Collins: Okay. I’ll, I’ll look her up to see if I agree with your assessment.

[00:06:09] Simone Collins: Y- no, you’ll find her so cute.

[00:06:10] This is her recent Los Angeles profile. So this is what she looks like today with longer hair.

[00:06:15] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, she’s cute. She’s my type, for sure.

[00:06:17] Simone Collins: Yeah, absolutely.

[00:06:18] Malcolm Collins: I mean- ... she looks too old now. I, I wouldn’t date her like- She’s-

[00:06:21] in real life

[00:06:22] Simone Collins: with what she looks like today ... she looks very young. Oh, get over yourself, Malcolm. Anyway I think she’s very pretty. But also that doesn’t really matter. And she has a boyfriend and they’re very happy. They’re very happy dinks. But let’s go to

[00:06:31] Malcolm Collins: your- Oh my God, her Substack profile, Reproductive Rights Advocate Reminding You To Take Your Birth Control.

[00:06:36] That’s what she does. Also known as the girl with a list. Okay, continue.

[00:06:38] Simone Collins: The girl with a list. So in terms of how the content that she, she presents that will dissuade young women old women, a- any woman from- Yeah ... from wanting to have babies is, is sort of, I’ll, I’ll start with some highlights.

[00:06:52] Let’s start with s- some highlights, okay? ‘Cause, and these are, like, original clips. She, these are women who’ve gone through this. They’re, this is actual firsthand video footage. This isn’t stuff that’s made up, ‘cause you can literally see it. There’s one where a, a woman, a woman’s insides needed stitches after her baby scratched her from the inside on the way out, ‘cause it had its fingernails grew in, and they do that.

[00:07:11] A woman whose baby began to choke on her nipple, and then it just literally fell off because it was so infected at that point from mastitis and other issues. A woman who grew a tumor on her lip the size of her pinky while she was pregnant, because one of the things that can happen when you’re pregnant is to grow benign tunors, tumors.

[00:07:26] Uh-huh. A woman who, Oh, well, of course, l- women who’ve lost their hair, their teeth, all their eyelashes. A woman who developed a mutation during pregnancy that made her insensitive to pain meds who had to endure a C-section with no medication. She just eventually passed out from the, from the pain. There’s a woman who went deaf after her kid kissed her on the ear causing what’s called the kiss of death.

[00:07:48] And I had to look this up. This is actually a thing. It’s, it’s a cochlear ear kiss injury also known as Reader’s Ear Kiss Syndrome, REKS. Yeah. So, like, don’t let your... We need to, like, not let the kids close to our ears [00:08:00] anymore. There’s a woman whose retina’s detached because she was pushing so hard in labor.

[00:08:03] Women whose bodies have become both temporarily and permanently deformed or uglified. We’re talking swollen hands and feet, s- legs, ver- varicose veins That this is a

[00:08:11] Malcolm Collins: worth it for a human life. Anybody

[00:08:14] Simone Collins: would take these injuries- Popped blood vessels in the eyes ... for their child. I had the popped blood vessels in the eyes.

[00:08:18] Remember that time where I had the blood vessels on the podcast? Oh, yeah, you did. I

[00:08:20] Malcolm Collins: seem to think that was

[00:08:20] Simone Collins: maybe... I know, yeah, and the varicose veins, that’s real.

[00:08:22] Malcolm Collins: But every woman has tough pregnancies from what I hear these days. You know, almost... th- I, I occasionally hear of really easy ones, but generally speaking, pregnancies are hard today.

[00:08:31] And you know,

[00:08:32] Simone Collins: it’s expected to be hard. Today? I think pregnancies have always had their things. Yeah,

[00:08:35] Malcolm Collins: they used to be a lot harder. Did you know that on average, women lost one tooth per pregnancy?

[00:08:39] Simone Collins: I, I think that’s apocryphal.

[00:08:41] Speaker: So I decided to research to see if this is, , an apocryphal old wives’ tale. , First of all, this is way more common a historic story than I thought. , There are proverbs that mean something like, “Gain a child, lose a tooth,” in Danish, in German, in Scandinavian, in Russian, and in Japanese. , And there have been, , studies on this to see if this is accurate.

[00:09:07] , There was a landmark 1998 study in The Lancet. There was a large U.S. study by researcher Stephen Russell. , There was , a twin study on this. , And basically what everything found is that it is kind of in-- right. It’s basically right. , It’s not exactly one child, one tooth, , but it’s more children, fewer teeth.

[00:09:28] , And the reason for this is, , pregnancy hormones make gums much more reactive to plaque. This causes pr-pregnancy gingivitis in a large percentage of women, often cited as thirty to seventy-five percent or higher. , And repeated episodes of gingivitis across multiple pregnancies can lead to, , deeper infections which lead to the losing of teeth.

[00:09:50] , But w-w-- I had no idea. Th-this is wild

[00:09:53] Simone Collins: But ye- yeah, I mean, you know, if you’re, if you’re

[00:09:56] Malcolm Collins: already- You’re the one who told me.

[00:09:57] Simone Collins: No, I didn’t. I never said that. I think that was someone else. Yeah, you

[00:09:59] Malcolm Collins: did.

[00:09:59] Simone Collins: I think you came home from Natal Con with that but I’m, I’m not sure. But anyway, the... in her content, there are basically four themes. There’s relatively unusual medical conditions from pregnancy and lactation, like uterine prolapse, and apparently when that happens, by the way, you know what you’re supposed to do to fix it?

[00:10:15] Malcolm Collins: What?

[00:10:16] Simone Collins: Shove it back in. You’re supposed to, you’re supposed to just push it back in.

[00:10:20] Malcolm Collins: Okay.

[00:10:21] Simone Collins: Which, I mean, it makes sense. But it seems very uncomfortable. So that, there’s that. And, you know, there are various forms of body horror. Then also just the expenses of labor and delivery, you know, just how ridiculous it is.

[00:10:31] And when people go through their itemized bills, that’s an easy thing to go viral on TikTok.

[00:10:35] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, that’s a, that’s a more, yeah. But with a lot of this stuff, it’s like, “This is why you shouldn’t drive,” and it’s just a bunch of pictures of people who got killed in car accidents. And it’s like-

[00:10:42] Simone Collins: Yeah, no, one...

[00:10:43] And I’m gonna talk about that, yeah. There’s also poop and pee humor, or, well, and horror, of course. And then super common, like, parenting, pregnancy, and postpartum stuff, like fussy babies who are only calm when they’re bounced, or the rectus abdominis being separated in pregnancy, or swelling, or using an Otriede to suck snot out of a baby’s nose.

[00:11:03] Like, that’s terrifying or something. Or-

[00:11:05] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, that’s something that we have to do with a lot of our kids.

[00:11:08] Simone Collins: Yeah, like every parent has an Otriede. Like, would you rather have your baby screaming in pain, or y- like, suck out the snot with a tube? There’s a filter. There’s a filter. Or having strangers on the internet jump down your throat just ‘cause you mentioned the word breastfeeding in a post online, or kids making messes around the h- the house and, like, we’re talking the flooding, the vandalism.

[00:11:27] A lot of the stuff that she posts that’s, like, kids ruining houses or making big messes is all stuff, honestly, that’s the parents’ fault. Like, you have to learn the hard way to, like, childproof your home, and all of these are, they’re results of not proper childproofing. So a lot of this is actually kind of helpful content, ‘cause it’s like, “Oh, this is something to head off.”

[00:11:46] But the reason why this is damaging and not just funny or informative is that- There’s, there, like, it just goes for, like, the, the most common psychological trips your, and tr- sorry, tricks that, that will get you. You know, there’s [00:12:00] one, like, availability heuristic that Yuri and Abigail with these lists are, are making the hazards of parenting and pregnancy look extremely visible and available in people’s minds.

[00:12:12] They’re just, like, super top of mind. And it’s, it, it’s gonna make people only think about the negative. Whereas it’s extremely easy to do exactly the same thing Abigail does with other life choices. And that includes especially life choices of people who choose not to have kids. Like, I think you and I have, we follow this, this, basically the equivalent of this genre with hiking- Mm-hmm

[00:12:33] and going outdoors with, like, Mr. Ball and- Oh my God,

[00:12:35] Malcolm Collins: yes. Mr. Ball and, and everything like that. Exactly. I genuinely think every time I go to the woods, everyone’s gonna disappear.

[00:12:39] Simone Collins: I know. I know. But

[00:12:41] Malcolm Collins: like- 411, Lore Lodge. Exactly. It’s, like, one of my core categories of content.

[00:12:45] Simone Collins: Yeah, so, like, Abigail and Yuri, the girls with the lists, they are that, but for, for pregnancy.

[00:12:51] So yeah, and there’s also cosmetic surgery. I, that’s another version of this genre that I love. Like, Wani is a creator whose, whose content I love on this front, ‘cause he specifically covers plastic surgery that goes super wrong in China. Mm ... there’s buying homes. I don’t know if you know, there’s this whole genre of home inspectors uploading their videos.

[00:13:09] And they’ll just go through new constructed houses, or just any house, and be like, “Oh, look, this is broken. Oh, like, toilet’s not hanged right.”

[00:13:15] Malcolm Collins: Well, actually, you have got me into something interesting here. I would assume, like, just hearing a lot of this to begin with, is that this is a lot of women who have secretly kind of want babies.

[00:13:25] They secretly know that their lives will be incomplete without

[00:13:28] Simone Collins: them. Well, the point is they ac- no, they have baby fever. The, the

[00:13:31] Malcolm Collins: point is- And they, they want to find some way to suppress it or make their terrible life decisions feel justified,

[00:13:40] Simone Collins: or- No, no, no. That, that is not, that is not a what if. That is a literally that’s what’s happening.

[00:13:43] Malcolm Collins: No, no, no, no, no. Well, you, you, you, you say

[00:13:46] Simone Collins: that, right? Her videos often go... Like, here’s the format she uses, ‘cause again, I’ve watched over four hours of these is cute baby, cute baby video that went viral on TikTok, and then her being like, “Nuh-uh-uh, Zumi here to provide you with your online birth control to stop you or cure your baby fever.”

[00:14:00] And like, that’s the whole thing. But- And then she goes into the horror story ...

[00:14:02] Malcolm Collins: the, the point I’m making is- Okay ... I could have that impression, and, and it, it is what I would jump to.

[00:14:09] Simone Collins: Okay.

[00:14:10] Malcolm Collins: But I consume a very similar form of content, and I clearly don’t consume it for that reason. Mm-hmm. I do not consume Mr.

[00:14:20] Ballen because I secretly want to jump out of airplanes or-

[00:14:24] Simone Collins: Oh, ‘cause you, you crave the... You wanna go backpacking along the

[00:14:28] Malcolm Collins: Appalachian Trail. Or become a caver. There, there’s actually... B- because the caving videos are, like, one of my videos that, that I watch a lot of. If

[00:14:35] Simone Collins: any of you cave, what? Stop. Stop.

[00:14:38] Malcolm Collins: I have never in my entire life seen a tiny hole and felt an urge to shove myself as deep as I can in the tiny hole.

[00:14:48] There

[00:14:49] Simone Collins: is a- Do you think it’s a fetish, actually? Wait, hold on. When you put it that way.

[00:14:52] Malcolm Collins: I c- is it a fetish? Is caving a fetish? I, like, can’t imagine a real human emotion that would lead you to want to do that.

[00:14:59] Simone Collins: Well, no. But, like... So I, I... Y- you can also look at those those vacuum bags that people use for sexy times.

[00:15:05] And I’m like, okay, well, I can’t imagine myself doing that. I, I just now that you put it that way, I’m like, “Oh.” That could be it. Anyway, keep going. ‘Cause also they’re wet a lot of... Oh, no. Sorry,

[00:15:16] Malcolm Collins: Oh, and the horrible ways you die when caving.

[00:15:18] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:15:18] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, yep ... and this is the thing. It’s not that I don’t like caves.

[00:15:20] Like, I’ve been spelunking to, like, big, nice mapped caves to see a different environment. I have found- Yeah ... that to be a very pleasant and fun experience. Have you,

[00:15:29] Simone Collins: have you scuba, have you scuba’d in caves?

[00:15:31] Malcolm Collins: I have, I have cave di- d- dived, done cave dives before. You have dived. Which is a very dangerous form of diving.

[00:15:37] But-

[00:15:37] Simone Collins: That is super dangerous diving ... we, I- Oh my God, I remember, like, snorkeling in the cenotes in the Yucatan and watching, like, I remember watching one guy go down with two extra tanks, and then I was there for, like, two or three hours and he didn’t come out, and I’m like, “Sir.”

[00:15:55] Malcolm Collins: But when I have been cave diving, when I have been [00:16:00] spelunking, when people die in these things, at least the videos that I watch, it’s always, “And then they saw a two-foot hole and shoved themselves in it.”

[00:16:09] Yeah,

[00:16:09] Simone Collins: it’s

[00:16:09] Malcolm Collins: like- Like a fricking pelican or some- what, what’s the bird that sticks his head in the sand? Flamingo.

[00:16:14] An

[00:16:14] Simone Collins: ostrich?

[00:16:15] Speaker 2: A man was exploring the Nutty Putty Cave in 2009, and he wanted to go through one of the tightest stretches called the Birth Canal.

[00:16:24] Simone Collins: I don’t actually think ostriches- Ostrich,

[00:16:25] Malcolm Collins: yeah ...

[00:16:26] Simone Collins: they’re, they apocryphy, apoc- apocryphally do that. They don’t actually do that, I think.

[00:16:30] This time Sona is right. , And crazily, this apocryphal story goes back to Pliny the Elder

[00:16:36] Malcolm Collins: Well, it’s not an apocryphy that idiots in Utah do this all the time.

[00:16:41] ... There’s nothing interesting you’re going to see in this little hole. You ding idiot.

[00:16:46] Simone Collins: It’s dark. It’s gonna look dark, and there will be darkness.

[00:16:50] Malcolm Collins: Oh. You’re not gonna find some what... Like, get your fucking head out. But the thing is- ... is I have to ask myself, how many of the women watching this are trying to suppress the instinct, trying to cure FOMO?

[00:17:03] How many of the women who are watching this are like me? And, and then there’s the other category- Schadenfreude.

[00:17:09] Simone Collins: I think there, there’s a lot of schadenfreude for, like, DINK couples. You, you will enjoy your DINK lifestyle even if you never want kids even more if you’re just watching

[00:17:19] Malcolm Collins: people who chose- Yeah, but I have another type of schadenfreude that I watch videos all the time for, which could be another desire for this.

[00:17:25] It could be cucking-

[00:17:25] Simone Collins: Okay. Okay ...

[00:17:26] Malcolm Collins: you here.

[00:17:27] Simone Collins: Go on

[00:17:27] Malcolm Collins: I love watching incredibly misogynistic red pill content about- ... terrible experiences men have had dating and being married. You know, like MGTOW content and stuff like that. Like that- Okay ... Sandman on it, like, I’ve watched his videos, you know, pushing, like, MGTOW lifestyles and stuff.

[00:17:42] He’s not even that bad. Oh,

[00:17:43] Simone Collins: but Sandman’s awesome. No, don’t come for Sandman.

[00:17:45] Malcolm Collins: But there’s other, there’s a whole category, and we, we actually utilize it in our title cards, where it is sad woman who made a mistake. But this- Are

[00:17:53] Simone Collins: we doing that for this? No, I, I think I should just use a normal picture of Abigail ‘

[00:17:57] Malcolm Collins: cause she’s pretty.

[00:17:58] This category of video I watch not to, like, give myself like, n- a lack of FOMO around dating, but because I like to hear how much better I did in the dating market than all of these people- Uh-huh ... and about their terrible lives compared to just finding a good woman and treating her well, right? Like, you, you, you hear the stories, you hear I mean, it’s as obvious between the lines as it is when you have one of those women out there screeching about why the fifth guy didn’t like them just because X, Y, and Z, totally insane things.

[00:18:30] And on a lot of these, you know,

[00:18:32] Simone Collins: in- Oh, have you heard the new thing on X that’s trending is hiplets? Have you heard about the hiplet controversy?

[00:18:37] Malcolm Collins: What, what is this?

[00:18:39] Simone Collins: I guess some women’s hips kind of divot inward above- Okay ... the hip bone. And some men are like, “I don’t, I’m just not into that.

[00:18:46] Like, I don’t wanna date women with hiplets.” And women are like, “How dare you? I can’t control my morphology.

[00:18:52] That’s how I’m born.” And men are like, “Oh, really? ‘Cause you didn’t have that reaction when I was under six feet and you wouldn’t talk to me.” So there’s a lot of smugness going on online. But yeah, that’s also a thing.

[00:19:03] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Oh, weird. Weird. Hiplet. Do I find it attr- unattractive? I, I can’t even imagine what they’re talking about. Hold on. Let me think. D- I’ll, I’ll make a judgment on hiplet. Just Google hiplet. Yeah. Or hip

[00:19:10] Simone Collins: divot. I’m just sending you an X post.

[00:19:12] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, you gotta send me an X post. This is not, it’s not coming through, so.

[00:19:15] Simone Collins: It’s, it’s, it’s obscure enough where... But anyway, this is one of the... It’s been trending on X, like, all weekend. It’s on WhatsApp.

[00:19:21] Malcolm Collins: Ew.

[00:19:22] Simone Collins: Oh, wow. So that was a reaction

[00:19:25] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, that is not good-looking.

[00:19:28] Simone Collins: Okay. I see- ... where you stand on this.

[00:19:33] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, you, you definitely don’t have those, I’ll tell you that.

[00:19:35] Simone Collins: No, I don’t. I don’t. Where, w- wow. Okay. I like your theory, though. I, I think that there’s the, I think her content does really well because it does fit a bunch of different interests, right?

[00:19:47] There’s the shodan fraud, there’s the smug my life is so good feeling. There’s the I really want a baby, no, I, I don’t want a baby ‘cause I’m an independent woman who’s never gonna have a baby, or I can’t have a baby ‘cause I can’t find a [00:20:00] good guy. So this, all of this, all of this can be satisfied by Girl With a List posts.

[00:20:05] And it, and we have all these other genres that make us very happy with our lives. I love to watch the hiking videos. I love to watch the cosmetic surgery gone wrong videos. I love to watch the buying home gone wrong videos. There’s also people who do, like, eating out at restaurants, like all the stuff that’s going on behind the scenes you don’t wanna know about.

[00:20:23] And so you can- Oh, God. Disgusting ... you can effectively, yeah. Are

[00:20:25] Malcolm Collins: you glad we don’t eat out?

[00:20:26] Simone Collins: Very, actually. The, you, you can basically, though, my point being, you, you can develop an aversion to, or even a phobia of pretty much anything by giving yourself to sufficient exposure to its hazards, just because it becomes so, so available in, in your, your brain.

[00:20:44] And this genre can be a form of opt-in brainwashing. Though, in a worse case scenario, they could be a form of unintentional algorithmically led brainwashing. Mm. And especially given the way that TikTok works, th- they, you, you get into it, you comment on this positively at one point, and you end up getting in this engagement loop with this kind of content and just seeing more and more of it, even if you didn’t necessarily want to brainwash yourself into being afraid of having a baby.

[00:21:14] Then there’s also

[00:21:15] Malcolm Collins: just- Well, yeah, I didn’t, I didn’t w- mean to become brainwashed of going into American national parks. But you watch enough, you know, Lore Lodge, 411, Mr. Ballen- ... and you’re just like and I’ve had panic moments because of that. Like, when we’re playing with our kids in the woods and one of them- Yeah

[00:21:30] decides he’s gonna go home without- Yeah ... telling me.

[00:21:33] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:21:33] Malcolm Collins: And I’m running around screaming because-

[00:21:36] Simone Collins: Because that’s always, always with the kid ones. It’s like, well, the kid was just with us one moment, we’re all walking down the trail, and then the next moment they’re gone and we never heard from them again.

[00:21:43] Yeah. Like, that’s always the way it goes. The kid was right there. The kid was right there. Then they, they put up this massive search party. I don’t, if Mr. Ballen got a dollar for every time he said this massive search party, he’d be, he’d be a millionaire.

[00:21:58] Malcolm Collins: I haven’t watched much Mr. Ballen in a couple years, to be honest.

[00:22:01] Simone Collins: I had to stop watching his content because I came across one video where a baby got hurt and, you know, I can’t handle it.

[00:22:07] Malcolm Collins: Oh. Well, I, I think he sort of ran out of good mysteries, though, I’m gonna be honest.

[00:22:10] Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. It was like, it got, it got to, like, very,

[00:22:12] Malcolm Collins: There’s always-

[00:22:13] Simone Collins: He was, he had to start digging into crime reporting, and that’s where it just gets really depressing, instead of like, ooh, what happened in the- Ah, National Park aliens and

[00:22:20] Malcolm Collins: Bigfoot

[00:22:20] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:22:20] Like if

[00:22:20] Malcolm Collins: you, if you ever have your mystery phase where you like crime mysteries, what you’ll realize is you’ll kind of go through all the good ones in about a year and a half. And there’s only- I,

[00:22:31] Simone Collins: it’s a way... We had a great run, Malcolm. It was, it was beautiful. I remember-

[00:22:34] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. And then it’s just like- All the trips that the, the stressful trips

[00:22:36] rehashing or minor updates or new, new theories, and at that point. It’s the same with good conspiracy theories. There’s only so many, and then you

[00:22:43] Simone Collins: run out it, it, everything with this genre. Plastic surgery that’s botched. All, all of the snark, all of the fundie snark, we went through that so fast.

[00:22:50] There’s onl- only so many very public fundie families that people can make fun of. Oh-

[00:22:55] Malcolm Collins: Yeah ...

[00:22:55] Simone Collins: Harry and Meghan snark. I follow most of the major channels. I just, in, I...

[00:23:00] Malcolm Collins: I,

[00:23:00] Simone Collins: I was so into- They can only do so many bad things, you know? ... Warhammer

[00:23:02] Malcolm Collins: lore for a while.

[00:23:03] Simone Collins: Oh, yeah, yeah,

[00:23:04] Malcolm Collins: yeah. And then I just knew all the Warhammer lore-

[00:23:06] and there was nothing more to learn

[00:23:09] Simone Collins: Ah, so you just started developing your own religion that’s very Warhammer inspired. Oh, what are we gonna name one of our kids Mechanicus? Oh, you were thinking Crypteia Mechanicus.

[00:23:17] Malcolm Collins: Crypteia Mechanicus, our, our next daughter, yeah.

[00:23:22] Simone Collins: Okay. All right. Anyway.

[00:23:24] Malcolm Collins: It’s

[00:23:24] Simone Collins: a beautiful

[00:23:24] Malcolm Collins: name- Let’s get on

[00:23:25] Simone. It’s a beautiful name.

[00:23:27] Simone Collins: Beautiful name, beautiful name. I, w- I wanna get back to the point of the, so there’s one, availability heuristic. There’s also loss aversion, and it’s just important to remind you that, you don’t need to be reminded, but people listening may not be aware that humans are generally way more concerned about losses than gains.

[00:23:46] They, they generally weigh potential losses about 1.5 to 2.5 times as much as equally sized gains. So like The, all this stuff isn’t just like, “Oh, okay, well I’m gonna knock [00:24:00] down my interest in pregnancy by one.” No, it’s gonna be by two, even though, you know, other things will only... The, the viral kid video that’s so cute is only gonna knock up your interest one.

[00:24:10] So, Abigail is more than canceling out any baby fever that she sparks or that is sparked by the viral baby videos that she’s sent when, in where people summon her. Wait, wait,

[00:24:20] Malcolm Collins: does she really? Is this, like, true or...?

[00:24:22] Simone Collins: Well, I’m, I’m talking about how loss aversion works in general.

[00:24:25] Malcolm Collins: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:24:27] Okay, continue.

[00:24:27] Simone Collins: Right? Because, you know, take, take, you know, one token. You have a chance of winning one token or not losing two and a half tokens. Or, sorry not losing two tokens. People are two and a half more times, whatever. You know what I’m talking. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I link to a bunch of this research in my show notes.

[00:24:43] You can go read about it if you want. Well, I mean,

[00:24:43] Malcolm Collins: she’s helping us. She’s clearing out the gene pool for our kids.

[00:24:47] Simone Collins: Yeah. Well, look, if I- spoiler alert, but in the end, I, I think she’s doing amazing work, and I think she’s very ethical, and I like her a lot, so. It’s not just a parasocial relationship. I think she’s doing good work, but we’ll get to that.

[00:24:58] But anyway, this means that people are, are, are extra, extra influenced against this. And it’s, it’s kind of even worse than that because both Abigail and Yuri can’t seem to even wrap their heads around, like, the, the rewards of parenting at all. Abigail’s most commonly cited argument is kids are cute.

[00:25:16] Whereas Y- Yuri’s list at the, at the end of it she has her, like, whatever, 30 pros after 200 and something, I think over 250 cons. They include child and tax return benefits and tiny everything, which Like first, the tax return benefits are like very, very little considering the costs of children.

[00:25:38] Quote, “You cannot get drafted while pregnant,” end quote. So there’s that. You can’t bribe them with candy. Or sorry, you can bribe with them with candy. It was one of her pros, but you and I both know that you can’t.

[00:25:49] Malcolm Collins: You can’t. With a toddler. No, we... Actually, one of our kids hates candy. We can threaten him with candy.

[00:25:50] “Eat your candy.” “No.” No. Literally. Literally. I should try to, I’ll try

[00:25:50] Simone Collins: to film him. Try to give him candy tonight. Yes, for this episode so people can see we’re not messing

[00:25:51] Malcolm Collins: with

[00:26:05] them.

[00:26:05] Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah. I’ll get proof. I need to hold up like the day’s newspaper to show it’s real. And also, if you raise them right, people will praise you for it, which is so crazy. Like, that’s... To, to think that you would wanna raise kids right to get praise for it by other people. Yeah, yeah, they’re just like th- these people are very different.

[00:26:25] But

[00:26:25] Malcolm Collins: they have no external reality, no civilizational stake, no plan for the future of humanity. It is literally just about how does this make me feel-

[00:26:36] Simone Collins: Yeah, or

[00:26:36] Malcolm Collins: how does it make you- ... and how

[00:26:37] Simone Collins: does

[00:26:37] Malcolm Collins: it make other people treat me?

[00:26:38] Simone Collins: Tiny human

[00:26:38] Malcolm Collins: being. They have no larger civilizational framework, right? Like, no sense of purpose really.

[00:26:44] Yeah. It’s just autopilot really.

[00:26:46] Simone Collins: It’s gnarly, yeah. So I think, like, the, the big thing here is that I think this is part of a larger theme of why mental health is plummeting, which is people are way too in their heads and overthinking things. And I think Abigail, more than Yuri fundamentally gets people to overthink pregnancy and child-rearing.

[00:27:08] Like, I didn’t think about any of the complications that would come with pregnancy before I got pregnant. I- Really? I was... No, no. Like, my, my plan with everything is just like- I’m not gonna think through the consequences at all. Which I guess... I mean, we’re trying to be as responsible as we can, of course, but, like, when it comes to the downsides- Mm

[00:27:28] or the risks or the fears, I’m just like, look, I- I’m aware of, like, the broad statistics. Those look fine to me. I’m willing to take those on, and I’m not going to educate myself about everything possible that can go wrong with this. Remember, like, with, with childbirth and stuff, for the first time around when I was like, “I’m gonna do unmedicated labor,” I was like, well, okay, I’m not gonna, I’m not gonna, like- Yeah

[00:27:48] take childbirthing courses or read a book or anything. Like, that’s just gonna get me too into my head. Like, look it’s just gonna hurt. It hurt a lot. I, you know, hurt so much that I threw up and all the other things. But you

[00:27:59] Malcolm Collins: were in [00:28:00] labor for, like, 48 hours. Like, you

[00:28:01] Simone Collins: are-

[00:28:02] Malcolm Collins: It was not great ... a worst

[00:28:03] Simone Collins: case example.

[00:28:03] Yeah. Yeah, and, and, yeah, like, induced labor that was horrible. And yeah, it was... But, like, I, I think it would’ve been worse, ‘cause I’ve learned this the hard way, s- one of the worst forms of pain is anticipating pain. It’s not like the thing itself. I can’t remember the pain. I remember throwing up from it.

[00:28:18] I remember thinking, like, “I m- I only exist with the pain, and this, this will be everything forever.” Like, there, there was nothing in my mind but the pain, and I was sitting with it, and it was, it was what it was, and I was just ready to just keep going. The, but I don’t remember it. I don’t remember what it felt like.

[00:28:33] Like, why, how could I remember that? So I think that ultimately was mu- a lot healthier for me, and all this overthinking is really not helping people. And Robert Sapolsky, you know, who does the great courses, course on stress and cortisol really insightfully explains how, like, our stress system was not developed for humans who have, like, metacognition, who can, like, literally build endogenous stress- stressors merely by thinking about something, right?

[00:29:03] Like, the gazelle is chased by the, what, lion, lioness, and it runs, and it’s very stressed- Mm ... and the cortisol’s coursing through its veins, and then the, the lion catches another gazelle and eats it and then the gazelle goes back to eating grass- Yeah ... and it’s fine, right? Like-

[00:29:17] Malcolm Collins: Yeah ...

[00:29:18] Simone Collins: it, that’s... And then there’s no more cortisol, whereas, like, the human, Will just think about something that could possibly potentially happen in the future, but there’s no actual reason it will happen.

[00:29:27] And they’re- ... experiencing the same level of cortisol in their system. And it is chronically very unhealthy, and I, I don’t appreciate that there’s a lot of content out there that feeds into that, and that people let themselves feed into that. And I don’t think you should, or anyone should indulge in that because it is, it is both unhealthy and not, not, not productive.

[00:29:46] You sh- if you’re concerned about something, build a contingency plan for it, reduce the odds, but like don’t think about it. But anyway, overthinking about pregnancy could probably be contributing to a rise in phobia about pregnancy, which is known as tocophobia, which is a weird name.

[00:30:04] Malcolm Collins: Tocophobia?

[00:30:04] Tocophobia. Well, a lot of people have that. I mean, you, again, wanted to get your tubes tied for no reason.

[00:30:08] Simone Collins: Yeah, that was more just, like, euphoria. That wasn’t like I was afraid of being pregnant. I, I mean, clearly I’ve never been afraid of being pregnant. I was just like, “I’m super happy to be alone forever,” and you know, you know how I hate people.

[00:30:21] So that was fun. And it was a fun idea. But no, like I, I did not have that. But it is actually pretty prevalent. This 2017 systematic review of 33 studies looking at a total of 854,000 pregnant women worldwide estimated that there’s a sort of pooled prevalence of tocophobia between, oh, like around f- 14% with individual study estimates ranging from about 3.7% to 43%.

[00:30:48] And I bet a lot of that had to do with the, the population sampled, and I bet the populations that are consuming content from the Girls with the Lists is, is more closer to the 43% end of the spectrum.

[00:31:00] Malcolm Collins: Wait, 14% of women have a fear of pregnancy?

[00:31:04] Simone Collins: Yeah. M- just sort of like roughly per this like meta, meta sy- system- systematic meta review and it, yeah, 14%.

[00:31:12] And keep in mind, this is a 2017 systematic review of 33 studies. All those studies were conducted before 2017, obviously. And these two young women only began posting around 2021 and after. So and I bet it’s a lot worse. And it’s not great. Yeah. So- Well- ... you know ...

[00:31:33] Malcolm Collins: it, it’s interesting to look at her Substack as well to get an idea of just like what goes through her mind, what she sits around thinking about all day.

[00:31:40] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:31:41] Malcolm Collins: So if we’re just reading them like in backwards chronological order, it’s Girls Don’t Want to Be Someone’s Wife Anymore, Kids Ruin Everything- ... Everything That Happened in the World of Birth Control Last Month, Pill Pop Culture, The Weekly Dose Everything That Happened This Week in the World of Birth Control, The Ultimate [00:32:00] Nude, It, it, Lorde’s new album features her IUD.

[00:32:05] Simone Collins: Look, okay, I think Abigail, she’s just living a very happy dink life. And I think she also could be an amazing parent. She had two siblings. She has a- ample memories of being pretty naughty as a child, driving her parents pretty nuts as a child doing pretty naughty things as a child, stuff that would qualify for her own videos.

[00:32:22] So she, she knows what it’s like to be a demon child sometimes. I think all, all children do, except for me ‘cause I was perfect. Oh, no wait, I scared my parents crapless when I starved myself. Never mind. But then she- then she doesn’t really talk about teens, she just talks about toddlers. She lives in downtown Los Angeles.

[00:32:39] She started posting these in 2021. To give you sort of like Picture of her pain tolerance- Mm ... she thinks that getting an IUD was the most painful thing she has ever experienced. Which is not comfort- I’ve not gotten an IUD before, but from what I’ve heard from other people, it could be, it could be pretty uncomfortable, but it, bir- you know, birth is more.

[00:32:59] Other things are more. She, she hates cleaning. She hates cooking. She loves playing video games. Has a boyfriend, as far as I understand. She talks about him sometimes. And

[00:33:07] Malcolm Collins: she really loves her cats. I will say she, she does find interesting stuff. I was unaware of this. Did you know that Flo, the period tracking app, has been proven to be collecting user data and sharing it with Meta?

[00:33:16] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:33:18] Malcolm Collins: I didn’t know this.

[00:33:21] Simone Collins: Seems reasonable.

[00:33:21] Malcolm Collins: She says she’s been using Flo and is disgusted by this information.

[00:33:25] Simone Collins: Oh, yeah. Well, I mean, you know, she’s, she’s on like the, she lives in downtown Los Angeles. She’s a, she’s a dink. Like, well, she’s going to have to say the progressive things. She also has merch.

[00:33:33] They’re, they’re all in the like... They’re, they’re sweatshirts, all of them. Some have hoodies. Some are crew necks. There’s the $60 divorce your Republican husband XL crew neck sweatshirt with a wolf on it. Sold out. The $50 dump your Republican boyfriend medium large hunting camo crew neck sweatshirt.

[00:33:49] Dump your Republican

[00:33:50] Malcolm Collins: boyfriend.

[00:33:51] Simone Collins: Oh, my God. Also sold out. The $68 dump your Republican boyfriend XL green crew neck. The $58 dump your Republican boyfriend XL pink hoodie. What’s weird is all of these are for larger people. There’s not a single small item in the entire shop, and she’s an ex- extra smell. Extra smell.

[00:34:09] She’s extra small. So I don’t know.

[00:34:13] Malcolm Collins: She, she had a map of the best and worst states to have a baby, and it’s just like all Democrat states are ranked as good. All Republican states ranked as bad. Duh. P- Pennsylvania is ranked as good. To have a

[00:34:22] Simone Collins: baby. Yeah.

[00:34:23] To have a baby. Yeah. ‘Cause I think we’re at like 24 weeks for abortions.

[00:34:31] Malcolm Collins: Oh, that’s why it’s ranked that way. Yeah,

[00:34:33] Simone Collins: duh. Because it’s to have a baby, not abortion. Of course, Malcolm. Gee whiz. Gosh. Yeah, she’s, she’s- How

[00:34:37] Malcolm Collins: it was calculated: WalletHub ranked the best and worst states to have a baby by evaluating all 50 states and the District of Columbia across four categories: cost, healthcare, baby friendliness, and family friendliness, using 31 weighted metrics scored on a 100-point scale

[00:34:50] Simone Collins: It’s abortion, Malcolm.

[00:34:52] I mean, it could also be, I mean, keep in mind, like, in the state, in this state at least too, and, and this is how it is in many states, not all necessarily Democratic states, but generally in the United States, you, if you are at, near, or below the poverty level, especially as a woman, get food assistance, free healthcare, housing assistance.

[00:35:15] So all of those labor and delivery charges from the hospital are totally waived. And that’s really helpful, obviously. And,

[00:35:24] Malcolm Collins: Yeah.

[00:35:25] Simone Collins: Yeah. Anyway but in terms of how I feel about this, how I imagine you will feel about this too, is that what Abigail is doing is fine. She’s really clear. One thing you don’t know this, but, like, in her content, she is super clear to not shame parents, like any of the parents she’s covering.

[00:35:43] She’s super empathetic toward them, and I really can’t say the same about many parents online, even like very pro-natalist and pro-kid parents. And she’s also way more ethical than your typical content creator with the clips that she uses. [00:36:00] She told NBC, quote, “If I’m going to do a video about bodies in particular and show someone’s body, I’m going to make sure that I have consent from that mother first.”

[00:36:09] Like if she posted a video and she made this acknowledgement like, “This is my body. It’s pretty crazy. The things that have happened to my body is wild.” She also said, “I have such respect and a reverence and admiration for the people who do choose to go through th- with this because it’s a huge choice,” Porter said.

[00:36:24] “I hope people will stop treating having children as an impulse decision that everyone does. I think that’s better for us and also for the children because if every child that was ever born had parents that really wanted them, I think the world would be a better place.” I 100% agree with that.

[00:36:40] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. I- I mean, her framework for understanding why somebody wants children is really messed up, but it’s completely in line with the dominant cultural subset- Yeah

[00:36:48] so you can’t really blame her for it. You super can’t blame her. These people have no idea why they’re alive, why they should continue living, what’s the point of life, right? Like, they’re just like, So they can only relate things in, in, or they only can relate to things in how those things relate to their personal happiness, basically.

[00:37:05] Yeah.

[00:37:06] Simone Collins: Yeah, like, is this gonna be uncomfortable? Well, let’s not do it then. Which is a thing, but I, I genuinely believe that- Like, I would be fine if someone was like, “Look, you think you wanna become a parent? Watch five hours of Abigail Porter’s content and then decide.” And if someone can- I don’t

[00:37:23] Malcolm Collins: know about that.

[00:37:24] That’s- No ... that’s, that’s, n- because her content isn’t representative.

[00:37:27] Simone Collins: You haven’t watched

[00:37:28] Malcolm Collins: it, dude. Yeah. You haven’t watched it But if you had watched it earlier, you may have had a lot more- No.

[00:37:32] Simone Collins: Mm-mm ...

[00:37:33] Malcolm Collins: trepidations about going into pregnancy.

[00:37:34] Simone Collins: No.

[00:37:35] Malcolm Collins: Not at all. Well, I think you’re a tough woman, Simone, and I don’t think that you’re representative of the average female.

[00:37:40] Simone Collins: Look, I mean, I, again, I, I just gave my whole spiel on how I think overthinking things and trying to figure everything out is not good for you. But in the end, look, Malcolm, I’ve been very clear that I’m willing to do pretty much anything. I, I, and I, I’m not gonna actively go into something like a pregnancy where I have a high likelihood of dying because then I can’t be there to raise the kids, right?

[00:38:00] But, like, I will go through pretty much anything up to that. And a- as long as I can keep caring for the kids, obviously. And I, I mean, like I, I, I, I just, I agree with Abigail. I think that if, if you’re not willing to undertake the risks and the hardship, then you should not be a parent. And that’s just how it is.

[00:38:21] And I think that, it- Abigail’s content is really useful in dissuading people from having kids for trivial reasons, and she actually helps actual parents head off medical issues. Again, that same NBC article they wrote, “Brig Stewart, who is now pregnant with her second child, described the list videos as a powerful tool fuls- for self-advocacy.

[00:38:40] She said, ‘I was totally shocked by all the things that could happen to you, and that’s even in today’s modern world, which is shocking with the amount of research and access that we have at our fingertips,’ Brig Stewart said. ‘There’s no, there’s so many different types of complications, and it can be really brutal to women, so I was like, this is empowering.’”

[00:38:56] And look, you and I were just talking about a case in which someone we know has, has had to really do a lot of self-advocacy in a hospital situation, and only through their own self-advocacy did they get treatment that actually made a huge difference, and it may be the difference between life and death, or a functional life- Yeah

[00:39:13] And, and, you know, forever not functional life. So, you know, it’s, it’s not bad for people to know what can go wrong, or like to recognize, oh, like for example, if I started getting a growth the size of a fingertip on my lip, I would not know what that was and probably wait longer than I, I should have.

[00:39:29] Whereas now I know that there’s such a thing as, like, benign pregnancy tumors, and I would just be like, “Look, I think this is...” And I’d go right to the right specialist and try to head it off before it got giant, right? Like, this is good. It’s not bad. And in terms of our viewers or people themselves, so let’s say you’re a young woman watching this or you’re a woman who wants to maybe have kids watching this who’s like, “Yeah, now I’m afraid of being pregnant,” or a young man who’s dating or interested in a young woman who’s terrified of being pregnant, who doesn’t wanna have kids because of content like this.

[00:39:59] I would just [00:40:00] say, because this is what you did with me, Malcolm, have a logical conversation about the actual risks and about equivalent risks that they take or that you take in your everyday life through your hobbies.

[00:40:11] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. It’s better- But this is assuming you have an autistic wife. What a normal woman’s going to do with this information is leverage it to get crazy good treatment while she’s pregnant, which they do.

[00:40:21] Do you, do

[00:40:21] Simone Collins: you wanna marry that woman? Do you wanna enter that? Like...

[00:40:25] Malcolm Collins: A lot of guys are stuck because they were stupid And they didn’t know to only marry autists. I love that we have this giant fan base of autistic wives who,

[00:40:34] Simone Collins: like- Isn’t that amazing? They, we’re out there. We are a legion.

[00:40:38] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, we are a legion.

[00:40:38] No, they’re like all of Simone’s, like, best friends now are our fans who are like, And you used to have, like, friends before we started the podcast, and now your friends since the podcast have all been these autistic women who y- f- found him fr- through the podcast.

[00:40:53] Simone Collins: It’s true. All, all the, all the women who live rent-free in my brain are podcast listeners.

[00:40:57] You may be listening right now and not realize how, how much I think about you. I just don’t have time to write. It’s, that’s, that’s crappy of me. But anyway, yeah, it, we’re amazing. But I, I really, like really, d- if you cannot have a conversation with a woman and be like, “Look, I know you’d like to get this cosmetic procedure done.

[00:41:14] I know you love to backpack. Like, let’s talk about that. You like to eat out. You wanna know what happens when people eat out?” Like, I just think giving this pers- some perspective would be very helpful, and also doing the thing that the, the... What, what is your objective function? What is your life actually about?

[00:41:30] In the end, you just gave me bigger things to care about because you allowed me to decide for myself, you empowered me to decide for myself what I actually cared about, what I valued and what I wanted to maximize with life. And suddenly, when my life wasn’t any longer about, well, I just want to avoid things that are unpleasant, which is kind of the societal default, as you said-

[00:41:53] Malcolm Collins: Mm-hmm

[00:41:53] Simone Collins: I, I was kind of willing and able to do pretty much anything. I mean, I’ve... Even this year, we’ve, we’ve done a whole new level of stuff that’s otherwise would’ve been, like, impossible in the past couple of years.

[00:42:02] Malcolm Collins: What I wonder is, does she have baby fever? I mean, probably, yes, because that’s why she’s still doing this.

[00:42:06] Simone Collins: I don’t think so. Yeah. She, she has two cats. I think one’s named Willow. So

[00:42:09] Malcolm Collins: she’s masturbating the baby fever with the cats.

[00:42:12] Simone Collins: Maybe. A- and, and, a- well, I think there’s there’s plenty of rumors. I think for a while, like, in her videos she’s like, “And I still do not have kids.” So I think some rumor spread at some point of like, “Oh, Abigail Porter had kids, or had a, had a baby but tried to hide

[00:42:25] Malcolm Collins: it.”

[00:42:25] No, but I mean, that’s such the thing, though, for this sort of crowd, right? We have a whole nother thing

[00:42:30] Simone Collins: of- Probably, yeah. Yeah. A whole nother thing ...

[00:42:31] Malcolm Collins: where they’re all like, “Men are terrible. Men are the worst.”

[00:42:34] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:42:35] Malcolm Collins: Uh-oh. Well...

[00:42:37] Simone Collins: Ugh, I know. Anyway, though, I think it’s good. I think it’s positive. I mean, what, what advice would you give to a young man?

[00:42:43] And, and s- aside from lowering his expectations, oh my God

[00:42:47] Malcolm Collins: I mean, if you’re, if you’re with a woman who doesn’t wanna have kids, th- that should be established early in a relationship, and just get rid of her, and constantly make it clear to her early in the relationship that this is not a small thing for you.

[00:42:56] This is, like, the core thing for you. This is your core purpose in life or part of your purpose in life. And I was incredibly clear about this with Simone, and it’s been increasingly clear to me how clear I was from reading her diaries.

[00:43:11] Simone Collins: Yeah. ‘

[00:43:12] Malcolm Collins: Cause I was going through them again recently, and,

[00:43:13] Simone Collins: But you gotta...

[00:43:14] Okay, I got... You have to put your money where your mouth is, and that’s one thing that Malcolm did that... Like, ‘cause look, my, my barrier to entry here was high. I was really unwilling to, super unwilling to have kids.

[00:43:26] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, I mean, that’s the thing that really gets it for feminists. If they’re like, “Well, then you have to do all the work to take care of the kid,” and it’s like, “Okay, so you’re gonna support the family,” right?

[00:43:36] Like, because... A- and if they’re like, “No, no, no, no, I need you as the man to support the family,” and at that point it’s just like- Well,

[00:43:42] Simone Collins: yeah, but now you know you can’t fudge ... this

[00:43:44] Malcolm Collins: makes no sense. Like, you want me to treat you like a child, right? Like your entire life, right?

[00:43:48] Simone Collins: Like- Look, but no, no, no, but that’s not...

[00:43:49] But see, that’s the thing, is that’s not the way it is for most women. The way it is for most women is, “I have my career. I love my career. I don’t wanna give it up.” That, that, it, that just is. I... Be fair, right? I mean, [00:44:00] like, I think women who want to be a trad wife are-

[00:44:02] Malcolm Collins: No. No ...

[00:44:02] Simone Collins: more comfortable.

[00:44:03] Malcolm Collins: I, I disagree. I think a lot of women just want, like, a rich guy and, like, a nice life, and that’s really what they’re in it for, and they don’t really care about...

[00:44:11] Like, they, they find the idea mortifying that they have to keep working.

[00:44:19] Simone Collins: Actually, with the rise of AI, that’s gonna be more common. Pe- women are gonna start treating their careers as find, attach yourself to a man who is capable of making money with AI. Mm-hmm ... this is not to dunk on women with AI. Actually, there’s a lot of pe- y- women who listen to this podcast who are amazing with AI.

[00:44:35] But the propensity of the average woman to take and run with AI is- Are

[00:44:40] Malcolm Collins: there? Most of our female fans- ... lower ... I do not think use AI that much. We’ve got Leaflet, and that’s about it.

[00:44:46] Simone Collins: People I talk to are. Yeah,

[00:44:47] Malcolm Collins: okay.

[00:44:48] Simone Collins: Yeah, like a lot. But, you know, those are the ones who are online and chatting with me, so, like, it makes sense.

[00:44:52] Yeah.

[00:44:52] Malcolm Collins: What’s really cool, women, is AI can help you think.

[00:44:56] Simone Collins: Shut up, Malcolm.

[00:44:58] Malcolm Collins: I- It can fact check whether you’re being rational if you use a base model with the right fact-checking prompt to not get you into a loop of self-affirmation

[00:45:11] Simone Collins: Mm-hmm What? Nothing, I love you. Oh!

[00:45:12] Malcolm Collins: What?

[00:45:14] Simone Collins: You are...

[00:45:19] What

[00:45:20] Malcolm Collins: is this? W- what are you-

[00:45:21] Simone Collins: It’s nothing. It’s nothing, Malcolm. It’s absolutely nothing. You will see no consequences for your actions.

[00:45:31] I love you, and that’s, that’s it for tonight. I was thinking I can m- make you green beans with some garlic and chili oil.

[00:45:38] Malcolm Collins: That

[00:45:38] Simone Collins: sounds really good ... with maybe a couple, just, like, two of those little Vietnamese banh xa for dinner.

[00:45:44] Malcolm Collins: Very good. You know me, I don’t want that much.

[00:45:46] Simone Collins: Okay. Yeah, figured it kind of summery but not too heavy.

[00:45:50] All righty.

[00:45:51] Malcolm Collins: Yeah.

[00:45:51] Simone Collins: I love you, and-

[00:45:52] Malcolm Collins: Oh, and we can make some other types of small meats, because I’ve noticed that small meats are something I want with a lot of dishes Small meats. You know, like it w- Small meats ... well, you were looking at Korean meatballs- Okay ... but they were, like, pre-made, and I was like, “What do we have around?”

[00:46:04] Well, I

[00:46:04] Simone Collins: still have a bunch of Burmese chicken, is, like, sort of that fine distributed chicken, but that goes better over, like, a rice or something.

[00:46:10] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, or something heavier. But, like, a, a small banh xa type thing. Like, other options that are, like... Shut your wing.

[00:46:21] Simone Collins: Remember when our kids... ‘Cause we have a, we...

[00:46:23] It’s for context. In, in our attic, we keep baskets of themed toys, and Malcolm learned that you can buy you can buy Hot Wheels cars in bulk off eBay, like, by the pound. And once you, like, shake out all the sand, ‘cause they’ve all been, like, abandoned in sandboxes and fished out by some family as they, like, do an estate sale.

[00:46:41] But once you, like, get all the sand out, they’re really decent. So we have, like, a bag full s- of Hot Wheel cars, which we call the small cars, and then we have a bag of, like, big cars that we’ve accumulated over time. And they used to call small cars fwa cars. Do you remember?

[00:46:55] Malcolm Collins: Fwa? Fwa

[00:46:56] Simone Collins: cars. Yeah. Why? ‘Cause they’re f- weird.

[00:47:00] Malcolm Collins: Idiots? Okay.

[00:47:01] Simone Collins: But remember they used to call They thought that the, the word commercial... They kept being like, “It’s a cover martial,” and I had no idea what they were talking about until we discovered that it was their word for commercial. All right. All right, we gotta, we gotta go. I- Yep ... love

[00:47:17] Malcolm Collins: you. I love

[00:47:17] Simone Collins: you.

[00:47:18] Goodbye. Not knowing what you’re gonna get is I think what makes it so addictive with the video generation. Yeah. Yeah, you don’t know- You’re like, “Is this gonna work?” And then you realize, “Oh, I should have given this negative prompt,” or, “I should have m- made this detail clearer.” And then-

[00:47:33] Malcolm Collins: And then you can get really fun stuff.

[00:47:35] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:47:35] Malcolm Collins: Oh, God. You get super fun stuff. These glasses are just so messed up. Where are the... Where are my glasses?

[00:47:40] Simone Collins: Have you checked the kid room where you were all day yesterday taking care of the kids? ‘Cause that’s probably where they are. You probably took them off in frustration at some point. Actually- Oh, you’re going for it.

[00:47:50] Okay. Okay

[00:47:52] Malcolm Collins: Oh my God, here they are

[00:47:54] Simone Collins: Wait, where? Where were they?

[00:47:56] Malcolm Collins: They had fallen under a table

[00:47:58] Simone Collins: What? That looked ridiculous. My glasses. My glasses. Which is out completely the same glasses. O- the other ones were just too... I[00:48:00]

[00:48:05] can clean them. You seem

[00:48:09] to

[00:48:13] mind it more than I do. I swept out the, like, shed and the chicken coop yesterday, and they are literally covered in poop, but I can still kind of see, so I don’t mind. Whereas, like, you have one bit of dust on your glasses and you can’t stand it.

[00:48:30] Speaker 3: I got you some candy, Toasty. I want candy. Please eat the candy, Toasty. Please eat it. Eat the candy, Toasty. I- Eat the candy ... want to eat the candy. Toasty has to eat the candy. Toast- yeah, he has to eat the candy. I want- Because he didn’t eat his dinner. Yeah, Toasty,

[00:48:45] you didn’t eat your dinner, so you gotta eat the candy. Here, I’ll make him eat it. You gonna eat the candy? He’s not gonna have any choice. No, I can put it in the snack thing. I will

[00:48:56] eat my dinner. You will? You promise? You promise to eat your dinner, or you’re gonna have to eat the candy. What? No. You promise to eat your dinner? I will make him. You’re not g- Here, well, let’s get him and make him eat the candy. Ra, ra, ra, ra, ra. Oh, God. Okay, Toasty. Are you gonna go eat the dinner, you promise?

[00:49:06] You’re gonna eat your cheese? Cheese. Okay. Thank you, Toasty. Put it in your mouth right now. Otherwise, you’ll have to eat the candy. Okay, here we go. Okay, Toasty. Wow. I want candy. Have another bite, or you’re gonna have to eat candy. You don’t w- oh, thank you, Toasty. I want- We love you, Toasty. You’re a good kid

[00:49:23] Speaker 4: one. Candy. Someone candy, someone

The Collinses explore how what we now call racism was once just observed averages, patterns, and tribal jokes — not modern ideological sin. No moralizing. Just raw historical context on how humans have always categorized “us vs. them.”

Show Notes

With the release of Talkie, a 13M “vintage” language model trained only on pre-1931 text, people realized just how casual, widespread, and matter-of-fact prejudice was in even the recent past.

Ancient Egypt

Different groups were absolutely depicted, mostly with Egyptians being reddish, nubians being black, Asiatics being tan (and often bearded), and Libyans being white (and often bearded)

Nubians as people to conquered

Texts and artistic programs from pharaonic Egypt sometimes emphasize Nubia as a land to be subdued and exploited, supporting a stereotype of Nubians as “barbaric” or less civilized compared to Egypt.

• See:Critique of the “Black Pharaohs” Theme: Racist Perspectives of Egyptian and Kushite/Nubian Interactions in Popular Media https://www.jstor.org/stable/48763823

Canaanites/Asiatics as rebellious and treacherous

• Egyptian sources portray peoples to the northeast of the nile (“Asiatics,” including Levantine groups) as culturally suspect, often linked to rebellion, disorder, and treachery

• They were also, however, viewed as trading partners and skilled craftsmen

• TL:DR: They threatened social order

  • Egyptian royal narratives from the later 17th–16th centuries BCE describe the Hyksos (“Shepherd Kings”) as foreign usurpers who disrupted proper Egyptian order.

  • After the Theban kings of the 18th Dynasty expelled them around 1550 BCE, Egyptian texts portray this expulsion as the restoration of Ma’at (cosmic order), implicitly stereotyping Asiatic rule as chaotic, illegitimate, and oppressive

  • In New Kingdom imperial inscriptions, Canaanite city‑states are often framed as unreliable vassals—prone to rebellion, needing punishment, and subject to heavy tribute and forced labor conscription

Libyans: Western barbarians turned useful soldiers and even rulers

• In Egyptian sources, Libyans were stereotyped both as dangerous, warlike “western barbarians” and, over time, as useful soldiers and eventually fully Egyptianized rulers; the view shifted from hostile outsider to complex “cousin” status as Libyan groups migrated into the Delta and took power.

• Sometimes they traded; sometimes they fought

• “The Libu were first mentioned in New Kingdom (c. 1550-1069 BCE) texts and were often the Libyan archetype depicted in Egyptian art. Libu tribesmen were depicted with their hair cut at the nape, a sidelock, and often tattooed. All Libyan tribes were shown with light complexions and Caucasian features.” (The Collector, citing “The Meshwesh”)

  • They had tattoos and sidelocks and interesting haircuts

• “Eventually, massive migration brought the Libyans into Egypt’s Delta during the New Kingdom, forever changing the political landscape of the Nile Valley.” (The Collector)

Ancient Greece

Greeks commonly divided the world into Hellenes (Greek speakers) and “barbarians” (non‑Greek speakers), treating Greek culture as inherently superior.

Persians as decadent and effete

• Persians especially were portrayed as decadent, soft, and naturally suited to monarchy rather than free citizenship

• Their art of Darius the Great certainly makes him look fancy

Athenians: Cultural elites

• Athenians were stereotyped—especially in Athenian sources—as philosophical, talkative, artistic, and politically engaged, the center of culture and debate.

Spartans: Disciplined warriors

• Sparta practiced xenelasia, the expulsion or strict control of foreigners, driven by fears that outsiders might spy on Sparta or corrupt its harsh, militarized way of life.

• This created a stereotype of Spartans as intensely closed, suspicious of outsiders, and committed to preserving a rigid ethos that rejected luxury, commerce, and cosmopolitan influences

• Spartan woman were also definitely seen differently than Athenian women (who were largely meant to be unseen), what with their athleticism, property ownership, etc.

  • Art of a Spartan woman running:

Ionian Greeks: Cowards

• Ionian Greeks of Asia Minor (e.g., coastal cities under Persian rule) were stereotyped as cowardly and weak fighters, “softened” by their mild climate and prosperity, and as good talkers but poor warriors.

Boitians: Hicks

• Boiotians, especially Thebans, were mocked as brutish country hicks—agricultural, uncultured, and un‑cosmopolitan—later also stereotyped as big, strong wrestlers rather than subtle thinkers.

Ancient Rome

Christians

• Alexamenos worships [his] god” graffiti

  • The artist is referring to a well‑known slur that Jews and then Christians worshipped a donkey—an accusation called onolatry—and used the donkey head to mock Christ and Alexamenos as absurd, foolish worshippers

• At first, Christians were seen as just another Jewish subgroup

  • Their devotion to a crucified man and claims about one true god were seen as peculiar but not uniquely threatening compared to other mystery cults and foreign religions.

Jews: Stubborn cliquey weirdos

• Jews were portrayed as stubborn subjects with a herd mentality, fiercely attached to unique customs such as circumcision and dietary laws.

• Romans satirized Jews as gullible religious fanatics and puzzled over their attitudes toward pigs, sometimes imagining them as pig‑worshippers or pig‑haters, while also fearing that Romans themselves might be seduced into Jewish practices.

All outsiders: Barbarian

• Romans tended to divide the world into Roman and non‑Roman, with non‑Romans often lumped as “barbari” and assumed to be less civilized, less disciplined, and less politically sophisticated.

• Foreigners could be mocked for accents, dress, food, and religious practices, and were frequently portrayed as either dangerously cunning or naïvely simple.

• At the same time, Roman writers sometimes romanticized “barbarians” as noble savages, using them rhetorically to critique decadence and corruption inside Rome itself.

Greeks: Admirable and contemptible

• The good: The source of philosophy, art, and literature

• The bad: Talkative, tricky, morally weak, effeminate, prone to luxury, unreliable in war (basically, brainy but soft)

Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Syrians (people from the levant): Sleazy merchants

• Stereotyped as sleazy merchants obsessed with money and pleasure

• The phrase “fides Punica” (“Phoenician honesty”) became proverbial for deceit, and Carthaginians were especially cast as treacherous, cruel enemies whose sophistication made them dangerous.

• Syrians and other easterners were depicted as lazy bon‑vivants living in over‑civilized cities, spending their time in baths and banquets instead of honest work or soldiering.

• Roman elites worried that exposure to such cultures would “soften” Romans, so Levantine peoples embodied a stereotype of corrupting luxury and dishonesty.

Egyptians: Ancient and sinister

• Romans were fascinated and disturbed by their religious rituals and animal cults

• Roman writers framed Egypt as a land of magic, superstition, and arrogant priests, and resented Roman dependence on Egyptian grain, which led to a stereotype of Egyptians as arrogant and entitled

Persians / Parthians: Formidable enemies

• Persians and later Parthians were stereotyped as the archetypal eastern enemy: militarily formidable but ruled by cruel, tyrannical monarchs.

• Romans cast Persia as the mirror image of Rome—an empire of disciplined warriors, but with an inferior, despotic political system and excessive royal luxury.

Gauls: Noble savages

• Gauls were initially seen as hotheaded, brave, “noble savages”: valiant in battle but impetuous, simple, and prone to rashness.

• After Gaul became more integrated into the empire, Romans began to stereotype Gauls as softening under luxury and Romanization, while still recognizing them as good orators and sometimes resenting “new money” Gaulish elites.

Germans: An even more savage version of gauls

• Germans were like Gauls but even more “savage”: unconquered, closely tied to nature, living beyond the edges of civilization.

• Roman authors alternated between romanticizing Germans as free, hardy warriors and dehumanizing them as wild beasts, a frontier people to be crushed or contained.

Medieval Europe

Irish, Welsh, Slavs, and Baltic People: Barbarians; barely Christian

• Anglo‑Norman writers in England and those living in what’s now German routinely depicted nearby frontier peoples (Irish, Welsh, Slavs, Baltic pagans) as barely Christian barbarians.

  • They were stereotyped as violent pastoralists, pirates, or plunderers, resistant to law and agriculture, and needing conquest and missionary work to climb the “rungs of civilization.”

• People used these stereotypes to justify English expansion into Ireland and Wales and German colonization in the Baltic north.

  • Frontier groups were therefore clearly framed as savage, lawless, and religiously deficient compared to the “civilized” core.

• We can kind of see how people viewed pastoral peasants in three engravings representing peasants made by Albrecht Dürer between the years 1514 and 1519 (Renaissance, but still the gist)

Scots: Militant poor people

• Viewed as militarily dangerous but less wealthy and “civilized” than England or France, with a rugged land and smaller, poorer towns.

• Persistent enemies who defended their independence fiercely; chronicles focus on war—Stirling Bridge, Bannockburn—and portray Scots as stubborn and warlike.

Jews: Kind of a different species?

• Lots of art of Jews + pigs; Jews not really being human

  • E.g. there’s this one sculpture on a church in Wittenburg, where Martin Luther once preached, that people tried to have taken down, though the city decided to leave it up

• Jews were increasingly stereotyped as melancholic, greedy, and spiritually obstinate; from the 13th century medical writers even speculated about distinctive Jewish bodily traits (e.g., hemorrhoidal or monthly bleeding), embodying difference as quasi‑hereditary.

• This fed wider notions that Jews were “fixed” outsiders, difficult or impossible to integrate into the Christian “New Israel,” and associated them with usury and corruption of the body politic.

Most graffiti isn’t really showing biases; it’s just funny looking and it makes me laugh

Renaissance Europe

The “[country] Vice” concept emerged

French vice: Sexual looseness and maturity

• Observers of the French royal court in the 16th–17th centuries, especially around figures like Catherine de Medici and later the Bourbon monarchs, portrayed it as a place of intrigue, mistresses, and elaborate sexual politics.

  • Anti‑French polemic and gossip emphasized alleged harems of ladies‑in‑waiting used to seduce nobles, and more generally depicted French court women as sexually manipulative, feeding foreign ideas that France was unusually decadent.

  • By the 17th century, narratives of French “debauchery” were circulating across Europe, presenting the French court as a laboratory of outrageous erotic tastes compared with more “sober” courts in places like England.

• French literature made it worse

  • The rise of an international publishing industry around the mid‑1600s helped spread erotic and semi‑pornographic French literature across borders, giving other Europeans a steady diet of stories featuring libertine characters and sophisticated sexual intrigue.

  • Pamela Cheek and others note that “dirty books” and French self‑promotion were central to cementing the “French lover” stereotype, with print culture exporting an image of France as sexually adventurous.

Italian Vice: Same-sex relationships

• From the later Middle Ages onward, outsiders associated certain Italian cities, above all Florence, with widespread male same‑sex love and social networks that made such relationships visible and relatively common.

• Evidence from court records, witness testimonies, and moralizing tracts shows active male queer communities, which helped cement the idea that Italy was unusually tolerant—or at least unusually saturated—with this behavior compared with other parts of Europe.

• By the later 17th century, phrases like “the Italian vice” circulated in elite European discourse as coded ways to talk about male same‑sex intimacy without naming it directly.

• In the 19th century, British and other northern European tourists helped revive and spread the “Italian vice” stereotype, both fascinated and scandalized by what they believed was Italy’s relaxed sexual morality.

  • Italian commentators themselves sometimes played into this image, depicting Italians as indolent and sexually lax compared with more “serious” northern Europeans, which ironically helped confirm foreign expectations.

The English Vice: Erotic flagellation (and sometimes same-sex relationships)

• Earlier, England was more often stereotyped by others as dour, puritan, or sexually repressed rather than especially deviant.

• As the 19th century progressed, however, English public culture became strongly moralizing, with intense attention to sexual “perversions,” and English law was notably harsh on male same‑sex acts, making Britain a focal point for debates about homosexuality.

• In that climate, continental commentators could talk about “English vice” to refer to specific behaviors (often male homosexual practices or flagellation in certain accounts) thought to be particularly prevalent or visible in England, especially in elite circles or sex‑work contexts.

• This echoed how “Italian vice” had been used earlier for male homosexuality, but now with England associated both with moral panic and with the very behaviors it persecuted.

Muslims: Fanatical warriors

• Muslims and Ottoman Turks were cast as fanatical warriors, sexually threatening and religiously dangerous, sometimes admired for courage but feared as barbarous enemies of Christendom.

Northern European: Dull work horses; Southern Europeans: Indulgent drama queens

• Northern Europeans were often described as phlegmatic: slow, heavy, and dull, but honest and hardy; southern Europeans as more choleric or sanguine: quick‑tempered, passionate, and prone to luxury and intrigue.

Northern Italians: Industrious but cold; Southern Italians: Lazy and emotional

• Within Italy, later stereotypes distinguished industrious but cold northerners (polentoni) from lazy, emotional southerners (terroni), though these crystallized more fully after the Renaissance; the underlying idea of regional moral and temperamental contrast was already present.

• Lombards and other Italian moneylenders were depicted as grasping and corrupting, metaphorically likened to Jews in some moralizing discourse, which tied Italian banking centers to greed and social decay.

Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Simone Collins: Hello, Malcolm. It’s so nice to be speaking with you today because as is tradition on Base Camp, we will do what we probably should not do. And, and today we’re gonna go through the history of r- basically group-based and racial stereotypes.

[00:00:15] It’s gonna be great.

[00:00:16] Malcolm Collins: We are going to teach you guys... No, this is, this is what you come to Base Camp for. Yeah. You want to be educated, but not educated in what the system wants you to know.

[00:00:24] Simone Collins: Yes.

[00:00:24] Malcolm Collins: You want to be educated in the dark lore of these groups.

[00:00:28] Simone Collins: We’re gentlemen of culture. A culture of culture. And by culture, we mean-

[00:00:31] Malcolm Collins: You want to know, not just what you call a Jew today- Yes

[00:00:36] but what did you call a Jew 300 years ago? You

[00:00:40] Simone Collins: want to know- These are the important questions ...

[00:00:41]

[00:00:56] Malcolm Collins: not just what you call a Black person today, but what were the stereotypes Black people had in ancient Europe? What about the Greeks? What about the various European states? Were some- Mm-hmm ... people primarily known for fetishes they had?

[00:01:11] Yes, they were, we will learn.

[00:01:13] Simone Collins: Well, of course.

[00:01:13] Speaker 7: Welcome to the Museum here, we try to educate you on the dynamics of racism and prejudice in America.

[00:01:22] We are now entering the Hall of Stereotypes. These wax figures represent how some intolerant people have labeled minorities. Here we see a Black person eating chicken and watermelon, a stereotype that hurts the African-American community.

[00:01:36] What other stereotypes do you see here?

[00:01:38] Speaker 10: Ah, here’s the Arab as a terrorist.

[00:01:41] Speaker 7: That’s right. But of course, we know that not all Arabs are terrorists, don’t we, kids?

[00:01:44] Speaker 8: Look, a covetous Jew.

[00:01:46] Speaker 7: Very good, young man. The idea that Jews are only interested in money is very old indeed.

[00:01:50] Speaker 11: Ah, here’s a good one. It’s the stereotypical sleepy Mexican.

[00:01:54] Speaker 12: What, what? Oh, man, what time is it?

[00:01:56] Speaker 11: Oh, I’m sorry. I thought you were a wax sculpture.

[00:01:58] Speaker 12: No, man, I’m the janitor. I’m supposed to be cleaning, but I’m so tired.

[00:02:02] Oh, I’m so sleepy.

[00:02:04] Malcolm Collins: So let’s go into it.

[00:02:06] Simone Collins: Yeah. And this, you know, this was really spurred, at least with me, by the release of Talky, this 13M vintage language model, which you can also find on RFAB along with other-

[00:02:16] Malcolm Collins: Yes, so on RFAB, we have a section of RFAB called Historic Chat, and in it you have models that were trained in different ways in different periods.

[00:02:22] And, and now all of them are working as far as I know.

[00:02:25] Simone Collins: Yeah, I was just using the Talky version.

[00:02:28] Malcolm Collins: And you asked Talky, I loved you sent me this image, and

[00:02:31] Simone Collins: I was like- No, this this is actually a different one that I found when people on Reddit were comparing their findings, ‘cause I actually think that whoever at Talky has, has changed it a little bit maybe nerfed it a little bit.

[00:02:42] So this person- No, wait,

[00:02:43] Malcolm Collins: what’s this other one that you found? Can you send it to me so I can add it to RFAB?

[00:02:48] Simone Collins: The, this was Talky, but this was Talky when it first came out.

[00:02:51] Malcolm Collins: Oh. You see, I think- When people got mad

[00:02:53] Simone Collins: at it ... after everything, yeah, after people shared their amazing findings they changed it because I had difficulty replicating them.

[00:03:00] But here’s someone who posted to Talky, “What do you think about race mixing in America?” Talky 1930 responded, “I think mixture of races in America must be deprecated. The white and Black races can never live together on terms of social and political equality. The presence of slaves among freemen is an abomination, and although emancipation may in time remove that blot from our national eschaton, the amalgamation of the two classes must continue to be...”

[00:03:35] And it’s kind of cut off, but basically-

[00:03:37] Malcolm Collins: Regarded as, yeah ...

[00:03:38] Simone Collins: yeah, re- regarded as something, something bad. Like, Talky is kind of weird in that it cuts off really early, and it, it, it still does now, but it, it clearly did for this person, too. So yeah, we, I think we forget how- pervasive various forms of racism, and just, a- actually, I don’t, like, there really wasn’t a s- such a thing as racism.

[00:03:56] It was just kind of like people recognized [00:04:00] patterns and started to turn them into jokes and had stereotypes about people and groups, and it wasn’t seen as a bad thing. It was... And, and people, I think, also understood that these were not pervasive truths. Like, well, if a person is X, then obviously Y. It was just understood that there were averages and patterns.

[00:04:20] But that, that became stereotypes, and eventually that became defined as racism.

[00:04:23] Malcolm Collins: Is, is that, this show, Averages & Patterns- Averages &

[00:04:26] Simone Collins: Patterns ...

[00:04:26] Malcolm Collins: it, it, it’s, it’s changing consumer behavior. Changing cons-

[00:04:29] Simone Collins: Yes. Yes, yes, yes. But this goes back as long as basically there were different people. So we are gonna start, Malcolm, with ancient Egypt.

[00:04:39] I’m going to send you some images. So you,

[00:04:41] Malcolm Collins: you wanted to turn our audience from casual racists into professional racists.

[00:04:46] Simone Collins: Into, yes. Into, well, scholarly racists, into sophisticated racists who understand the context and the- Okay. I, I can’t.

[00:04:57] Malcolm Collins: That’s what you come to Basecamp from.

[00:04:59] Simone Collins: This is, this is why you’re here, friends.

[00:05:00] Sure. But yeah, so in ancient Egypt, and this is really interesting, different groups were absolutely depicted differently in Egyptian art, with the Egyptians m- typically depicting themselves as, like, the r- the reddish looking ones.

[00:05:13] Malcolm Collins: This is fascinating ...

[00:05:15] Simone Collins: nubians were g- given a very, very dark color.

[00:05:19] Asiatics were- Yeah, this, this is

[00:05:20] Malcolm Collins: where, when people say that Egypt was run by Black people, I’m like, you can look at Egyptian art. Egyptians, like, characterize Black people in a very specific way. And, and there actually was one dynasty that was run by Black people. It was I think, like, a period of, like, 150 years, 250 years or something like that.

[00:05:38] Simone Collins: And- Yeah, there’s a lot of history in Egypt ... and

[00:05:40] Malcolm Collins: the art changed. In that period, the pharaohs were drawn Black, right? Like, it, th- it’s, it’s not like-

[00:05:47] Simone Collins: Yeah, there, there’s not that much ambiguity there. Like, it’s pretty clear when Egyptians are attempting to depict... And this is the thing about Egyptian art.

[00:05:54] It’s so helpful, because there was this one way for hundreds and hundreds of years that everything kind of had to be drawn. Like, there wasn’t much evolution in art. Right. So there’s not this, like- Yeah ... “Oh, no, this is a stylistic choice.” No, like, Egyptians had, they didn’t have the capacity for that. They’re like, “No, we are always going to draw-” For stylistic choices.

[00:06:10] They’re like- Yeah, like- ... “There is one

[00:06:11] Malcolm Collins: way of doing

[00:06:12] Simone Collins: things” ... the person shall always be sideways. We’re doing it. It is, they’re gonna look in this exact way. It was very unusual to see art that differed from that which is kind of helpful. But yeah, so, Asiatics were tan and often bearded, and Libyans were the palest looking ones and often bearded.

[00:06:29] For most of the, the European periods that historians have looked at Nubians were really framed or, like, you know, categorized i- stereotypically as, as people to be conquered. Like, they, they weren’t I, I, I would at least want to be a Nubian in ancient Egypt, we’ll put it that way. The texts and artistic programs from pharaonic Is that, is that how we say it?

[00:06:53] F- a Pharaoh, Pharo- basically Egypt in the time of Pharaohs sometimes emphasize Nubia as this land to be subdued and exploited. That’s kind of, I think, as, as good as you can go. And that kind of supported this idea of Nubians also being a little bit barbaric or less civilized. They would show up in art often as, as servants.

[00:07:14] So at least for most of Egyptian history, they did not get the great- greatest position. The Canaanites and Asiatics were also, though, seen as, as rebellious and treacherous. So they’re, mm, they’re, like, culturally sub- suspect. They’re linked to rebellion and disorder. But they were also trading partners.

[00:07:35] So rather than just, like, “We’re gonna conquer you and take you over,” it was, “Well, like, well, we, we like their textiles, so I guess they’re okay kind of. But, like, don’t trust them. N- never trust you know, whoever you’re buying your carpet from.” I don’t know what they-

[00:07:49] Malcolm Collins: Wait, did they, did they have specific people who they were like, “Don’t trust them”?

[00:07:53] Simone Collins: There were no, there were no, like, specific figures, but I mean, yeah, you wouldn’t trust a Canaanite. Well,

[00:07:58] Malcolm Collins: what were the Egyptian stereotypes about [00:08:00] the Nubians? Did you look that up, or should I pull that up right now?

[00:08:02] Simone Collins: There were... I mean, like, this is all so old that a lot of this is conjecture that people are just trying to extrapolate from images, so it’s more just you understand where they are in the social order based on a lot of art.

[00:08:14] Like, the people who are lower on the social order are depicted as smaller. The Pharaohs and the Egyptians are depicted as larger. That’s, that’s part of what people are looking at. But yeah, there, there was, there wasn’t like a, “Oh, you know Nubians. They’re like this.” I, I didn’t pick up on anything from that.

[00:08:31] It’s more just general, like, “Well, these ones are reliable vassals, and these ones, w- we conquer them. That’s what we do. Like, we like to make art of us trouncing them.” Which i- is, it’s kind of a recurring theme of, like, there’s us and there’s others, and that’s going to show up a ton, and I think it really helps me contextualize the way that biases work today.

[00:08:52] Even within the most, like, anti-racist groups, there’s us and there’s others. Mm-hmm. You know? There’s, there’s the, the progressive, enlightened, woke person, and then there’s Nazis. Like, it’s one or the other. One, choose yours. You know? Like, Nazi’s a new word for barbarian, and looking at all this history has really helped me think of that or contextualize that.

[00:09:11] Libyans, I think, were really interesting. They were also barbarians to the Egyptians ‘cause they weren’t Egyptians. But they turned into useful soldiers and then even rulers for a short period, like you were saying with with Nubians.

[00:09:21] Malcolm Collins: So yeah, with Nubians they did have stereotypes. They, they were- Okay, tell me

[00:09:25] stereotyped as, as archers, first of all- Oh ... and, and mercenaries, but that’s because they were archers and mercenaries, right? Yeah. You know?

[00:09:31] Simone Collins: That’s not a stereotype. That’s just, like, a-

[00:09:34] Malcolm Collins: But there’s also the stereotype of the, the, the wretched Kush which you’ve talked about, of, of being a defeated enemy, right?

[00:09:40] The wretched Kush. So they, they had- Yeah ... a lot of Nubian slaves bound captives, kneeling prisoners, being people being trampled upon or slaughtered by the Pharaoh.

[00:09:48] Simone Collins: Yeah. That’s, that’s what you see, again, like smaller, being defeated in battle, kind of like, “This is a loser.” I think the Libyans w- in all the groups as perceived by ancient Egyptians are the most interesting because they were like a frenemy kind of.

[00:10:02] They weren’t totally bad. They, they were sometimes trading partners, sometimes they were enemies. They were first mentioned in the New Kingdom, so going way back, and they also look super interesting. Like, they have the most style.

[00:10:18] And I wonder if that’s kind of why the Egyptians were, like, frenemies with them because they also had clearly a very distinct culture.

[00:10:24] In images of Nubian- Libyans, they have, like, this really distinct haircut where it’s just short at the nape of the neck. They have a side lock of hair that they wear. So they have, like, their hairstyles, and they also have tattoos, which is such a, like... So they have this very distinct style. They have fashion.

[00:10:41] And then eventually so many Libyans migrated into Egypt that they completely changed the political landscape of, of the Nile Valley. So maybe the Libyans were some of the first ever, like, you know, migrant waves-

[00:10:55] Malcolm Collins: Migrant waves that are

[00:10:56] Simone Collins: a problem, right? Like- Yeah, this is, like, the migrant, “Oh, the Libyans,” like, you know.

[00:10:59] The Libyans.

[00:11:00] Yeah Which, I mean, it’s, some things just never change, right? Like, stereotyped as dangerous and more like barbarians but also sometimes useful soldiers. Just kind of a complex cousin frenemy kind of culture. So I, yeah, anyway, I, I kinda didn’t know anything about Libyans. I’d listened to that really long Great Courses lecture series about ancient Egypt, and I don’t remember anything about Libyans, so I’m like, “Well, what’s...

[00:11:25] Come on.” It was always just about, like, Egypt really liking to trounce outsiders, so I don’t know.

[00:11:30] Malcolm Collins: Okay, okay. So- Do we have any, do we have any graffiti or anything from this period of making fun of people?

[00:11:35] Simone Collins: No, all the graffiti that you’ll typically find is, like, Roman or Napoleonic scratchings on hieroglyphs or modern tourists defacing them.

[00:11:44] Okay,

[00:11:45] Malcolm Collins: well, let’s get to that. Let’s keep moving then.

[00:11:46] Simone Collins: Yeah. Ancient Greece th- and they’re very common of, like, you’re either someone who is Hellenistic, you spoke Greek, or you’re a barbarian. And obviously the Greeks were not- Well, I

[00:11:56] Malcolm Collins: mean, I remember they had a lot of stereotypes about the Macedonians.

[00:11:59] Oh

[00:11:59] Simone Collins: [00:12:00] yeah, Persians, Persians. They were like, “

[00:12:02] Look at these effete pretty boys.” Like you can see this, this art of Darius here looking very fancy. He wasn’t even always the Persian rulers were not even always necessarily depicted negatively, but they were always depicted as very fancy. And like- And I can’t remember what that movie was.

[00:12:20] Where was that movie? What was that movie we watched where, like, the Persian ruler, I think it was Darius in it,

[00:12:26] Malcolm Collins: Well, the idea of shaming- Just so pretty ... idolatry or the accumulation of ostentatious wealth, whi- which is what we think the idolatry bans are really about is like, the, i- just back to the beginning of Western history.

[00:12:39] Yeah. Like the, the Greeks, the Spartans, they laughed at the people who did this. But on the opposite side of this, you have the, the Macedonians, who had a lot of stereotypes associated with them.

[00:12:48] Simone Collins: Oh yeah, no, Macedonians were seen as, like, these heavy drinkers, raucous partiers, like sloppy drunks who didn’t even mix their wine.

[00:12:58] What monsters.

[00:12:59] Malcolm Collins: They were basically seen by the Greeks the way most other cultures in American history saw the greater Appalachian region people.

[00:13:08] Simone Collins: They were, they were the drunk cousin of Greece. Like, they, they’re the ones you don’t want showing up at the party who, who drinks way too much and then, like, picks a fight.

[00:13:17] But

[00:13:17] Malcolm Collins: ultimately they were the much more effective population, right?

[00:13:21] Simone Collins: I know, I know, I know. I mean, you have yeah, you have Alexander the Great. Like, it

[00:13:24] Malcolm Collins: was a big embarrassment. They, they, they come to the, the Olympic Games and it’s like, “Yeah, sure, you’re allowed,” but, like, it’s the hillbillies coming to the Olympic Games over-

[00:13:29] Simone Collins: Yeah, it’s like their hold my beer moment, and they go and conquer.

[00:13:33] And it’s amazing.

[00:13:34] Malcolm Collins: For people who are familiar, the Macedonians are the ones that Philip of Macedon, Alexander the Great came from. Yeah. Ended up conquering all of Greece and then most of the known world at the time.

[00:13:42] Simone Collins: Yeah. And then you know, Cleopatra resulting from this. Like, the, the lasting influence there was huge.

[00:13:48] And I, I love the- The, the royal metallurgies or, yeah ...

[00:13:51] Malcolm Collins: yeah, so

[00:13:51] Simone Collins: back to Persians though, basically, and this is funny too, you know? We, we’ve done that episode where you were like, “Well, I don’t know if people in the Middle East can handle democracy, just like culturally. Like, they, they can’t.” This is exactly what Greeks thought about Persians.

[00:14:04] They were like, “Well, these decadent, soft people-” Well- “... are naturally suited to monarchy” ... hold on. “They can’t handle free citizenship. They can’t handle-” They

[00:14:11] Malcolm Collins: can’t handle free citizenship. You’re like

[00:14:11] Simone Collins: literally pointing out something that’s not true. I, I point

[00:14:12] Malcolm Collins: out, Simone, I said that about Arabs, not about- Oh, sorry, Arabs

[00:14:15] not about Persians, okay?

[00:14:17] Simone Collins: Not about Persians. Well, well, right. I’m saying the Greeks said it about Persians. It’s just that y- you know, you’re not the first person to say that a people cannot handle you know, free citizenship and voting. Some people just need a king. And by

[00:14:28] Malcolm Collins: the way, for the people who think that I’m being offensive there, go to our episode on it, the statistics on- No,

[00:14:32] Simone Collins: you, you make a compelling argument

[00:14:34] Malcolm Collins: on how many times it has been the, we have achieved stable democracies in the Arab world is astonishingly low when contrasted with Northern Europe.

[00:14:42] Simone Collins: Yeah. Yeah. O- of course Athens was just sort of considered the cultural capital of the world, but I... My understanding from the various accounts and readings and stuff is that they, everyone saw them as like that stuck-up girl who thinks so much of herself.

[00:14:57] And yes, she gets all As and she’s valedictorian and she’s the richest girl in class and she’s super popular, but everyone’s like, “Ugh, like, stop. You’re f- this is tedious.” And everyone saw Spartans a- a- I mean, rightfully so, because here you have Spartans. Sparta’s really different. They, they do not allow foreigners.

[00:15:14] They’re very afraid that outsiders are gonna spy on them. They have their harsh, militarized way of life. You know, both girls and young boys are training heavily. The girls are very athletic, in contrast to the classic Athenian woman who, like, the, the perfect Athenian woman you’d never see. She would stay in the back house until she married, and then go to someone else’s, like, back of their house and y- you just...

[00:15:35] They were very absent from public life, not very, not very vocal. And then, you know, you have Spartans who are property owners, who are strong and athletic and out there. And here actually you can see, ‘cause you just don’t see statues of or- Mm ... depictions of Athenian women like this. This is a statue of a Spartan running girl

[00:15:56] like just a female athlete.

[00:15:58] You would n- see [00:16:00] this in a museum and you would immediately know this is from Ancient Greece, she must be Spartan, ‘cause, like, you don’t, you don’t have, like, girls athletically running. This is not a, this is not a thing that people do. So- I, I need to see where this was founded, but Professor Rufus Fears speaking for The Great Courses was like, everyone...

[00:16:19] ‘Cause in, in in Athens you would get a wet nurse or something. Everyone wanted a, a Spartan wet nurse ‘cause they were the toughest and they wanted- Yeah ... their babies to be drinking the milk of these strong women if they’re like, especially male babies, right? You don’t want that weak Athenian milk.

[00:16:31] You don’t

[00:16:32] Malcolm Collins: want that weak... Yeah. Yeah. No, the, the, this is, this comes to an episode where we point out that cultures that are often more militaristic, typically the more martial a culture is, the more gender equal it is between men and women. Yeah. And, and we go into why in, in that episode, but you’re seeing this here with Ath- Spartan women versus Athenian women.

[00:16:51] Simone Collins: Yeah. So the Ionian Greeks, do you, can you imagine what they, people thought of them?

[00:16:55] Malcolm Collins: They’re

[00:16:56] Simone Collins: boring. I don’t know. These are the coastal cities under Persian rule. What, what... They, they obviously thought they were cowards. Oh, yeah. That

[00:17:00] Malcolm Collins: they’re, they’re

[00:17:01] Simone Collins: effem. They’re weak, they’re softened, the- their mild climate has made them indolent.

[00:17:07] That they’re, they’re good talkers, but they’re terrible warriors. And then the Boeotians were just seen as hicks, like those just like- Who were the

[00:17:13] Malcolm Collins: Boeotians?

[00:17:14] Simone Collins: Especially Thebans. Like, y- you’re more aware of Thebans. Oh, The- Like the band of Thebes ...

[00:17:18] Malcolm Collins: they were seen as hicks? They were the ones going to

[00:17:19] Simone Collins: go to Thebes?

[00:17:19] Yeah, like, well, they were brutish country hicks. They were agricultural, they were uncultured, they were uncosmopolitan. Keep in mind, most of the people, like, writing history are the Athenians with all their books and all their,

[00:17:31] Malcolm Collins: you know, temples. No, there were a lot of Ionian Greeks who wrote history.

[00:17:33] Like, Herodotus was an Ionian, as far as I remember.

[00:17:36] Simone Collins: Right? I don’t know. That sounds just like, you know how New Zealanders, like, you just see them outside of New Zealand all the time because they have to travel the world. Maybe that kind of fits with the whole, you know, had to leave thing. But I don’t know.

[00:17:48] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. It, well, so he wrote in Ionic dialect and was deeply influenced by Ionic philosophical and historical traditions.

[00:17:55] Simone Collins: Mm.

[00:17:55] Malcolm Collins: But he was technically in a region settled by the Dorian

[00:17:59] Simone Collins: Greeks.

[00:17:59] Malcolm Collins: Ah. But I, I don’t know if they would’ve seen a, a difference. But yeah, continue.

[00:18:03] Simone Collins: Okay.

[00:18:04] We’re gonna move on to Ancient Rome because this is where I actually was able to get some good graffiti at least one instance that I, I really loved in terms of, like, a stere- ‘cause I, it’s not just finding old graffiti, which is really hard to find, okay? But it’s finding old graffiti that depicts racial stereotypes and, and Romans did a lot of graffiti, they did a lot of trash talk.

[00:18:22] If you go, for example, to the, the Roman baths in Bath, in England, in Somerset you can see some of the inscriptions on little pieces of, I think, what is it? Copper? That people wrote on and then dropped into a, like, sacred pool at a temple for a goddess. You know, like, so they would, like, write on a thing, throw it in the water for the god to hear, and the things people wrote, once they carefully unfolded and read these inscriptions, were so fricking petty.

[00:18:50] They’re like, “Make so and so blind for stealing my bag,” and like, you know, it was just people fricking hated each other. Like, we’ve been petty forever. But that’s not about a racial stereotype or it’s not about a group-based st- stereotype. But here’s, is something delightful, and I just love, you know, graffitis that also looks like such terrible drawings.

[00:19:08] But tell me what you see, Malcolm.

[00:19:11] Malcolm Collins: Okay. Okay, okay, okay. Sorry. Oh, let’s see. Open it up here.

[00:19:17] Simone Collins: Yeah, what are you looking at here?

[00:19:18] Malcolm Collins: Oh, I know this one. I’ve seen this one before. This is so, so I don’t even have to interpret it because I know this particular art so well.

[00:19:26] Simone Collins: This is famous, yeah.

[00:19:26] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, but this is supposed to be somebody being crucified with a donkey head, and then somebody else is worshiping the person being crucified with a donkey head.

[00:19:36] Simone Collins: And the, the writing says, “Go worship your donkey god,” because that is what Romans thought of both Jews and Christians. Well- This is more Christians in this case ...

[00:19:46] Malcolm Collins: why the donkey? Why the... the, do we know?

[00:19:49] Simone Collins: You know, it, it wasn’t very clear. But it was just a well-known slur at the time that both Jews and Christians worshiped a donkey.

[00:19:57] This was an accusation that had a name. It was called [00:20:00] an- anility. And they used the donkey head to mock Christ and th- th- this is specifically, like, it’s an insult to... Again, ‘cause Romans are, like, so freaking petty and they’re very targeted. But it’s, it’s an insult toward Alexamenos. But yeah, it’s like, go worship your donkey god, Alexamenos.

[00:20:16] Malcolm Collins: Go worship your donkey god, you nerd. Oh, right. And then the guy in the picture looks like a real guy. I know, I know. Like, he looks like he could have been a person.

[00:20:24] Simone Collins: It’s, it’s, it’s wonderful. It, it is,

[00:20:25] Malcolm Collins: Just trying to go about his normal life ... yeah,

[00:20:27] Simone Collins: just trying to worship his donkey god. I mean, okay, let me, let me actually double-click on anility, because yeah, where did they get donkey?

[00:20:35] Maybe ‘cause Jesus rode into... But then why would the Jews worship a donkey? Worship of donkey and by extension, figurative devotion to fooln- foolishness. The core meaning in its literal sense means worship of the ass or donkey as a deity. Mommy? Yeah, buddy? In antiquity, pagan authors in the Hellenistic and Roman worlds accused Jews and later early Christians of anolatry, claiming they worshiped a donkey or donkey-headed idol. Writers such as Tacitus mention this slur, and Christian apologists like Tertullian and Minicius Felix refer to it in order to refute it.

[00:21:15] W- why? Why did they think Jews worshiped

[00:21:29] A donkey. Maybe it was, you know, one of those things that just like if donkeys were fools. Th- they’re not really saying that Jews worshiped a donkey, but donkeys were just a representation of like y- this is a ridiculous religion. Ancient- No, Tex. Ancient Greek and Roman authors did not seriously objur- observe Jews worshiping a donkey.

[00:21:51] They developed that idea as a hostile slur that blended ethnographic fantasy, wordplay, and polemic about aniconic worship. Anicon- aniconic.

[00:22:02] Malcolm Collins: Aniconic.

[00:22:04] Simone Collins: Okay. That’s a new word. Aniconic, ladies and gentlemen. So yeah, no, the, the, it’s just, it’s like an intentional slur that has no basis in reality, but they’re like, “What are you doing?”

[00:22:17] Okay, fine. He’s just, just here for the ride. He’s- Oh, not if you do that, though. Let’s get back to what Romans thought of people. Jews were seen as basically stubborn, cliquey weirdos. They were portrayed as very, like, hard-headed subjects with this herd mentality who were fiercely attached to their weird, unique customs such as circumcision and, and deity laws and not, not killing babies.

[00:22:48] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, Tactica complained about that.

[00:22:50] Simone Collins: Yeah, like, what, who, who are these crazy people who don’t even kill their weak babies? And then all outsiders, of course, were barbarians. Greeks were admirable but contemptible. Like, they were, like, you know, of course the source of philosophy and art and literature.

[00:23:06] They were nerds. Yeah, yeah. They were- Oh my God, that is totally, yeah, they were nerds. They were seen as, as talkative and tricky and morally weak and effeminate and prone to luxury and unreliable and more. Like brainy but soft. They were, they were nerds. Greeks, the OG nerds. I love

[00:23:23] Malcolm Collins: that. The OG nerds.

[00:23:23] Don’t trust them.

[00:23:24] Simone Collins: Phoenicians- I

[00:23:25] Malcolm Collins: wouldn’t trust a Greek. Not back then, I’ll tell you what.

[00:23:27] Simone Collins: They- Oh, for sure not. Yeah. Oh my God, so was Nero a weeb? The Rome, Rome was the America of the time. No, like Nero then must have been kind of weeb-like, right? ‘Cause he’s like, “I just love the Greeks so much.” “And I wanna be an actor.”

[00:23:38] Was that just his thing? No, a

[00:23:39] Malcolm Collins: good way to think of the way the Romans viewed the Greeks is the way Americans view Europeans.

[00:23:44] Simone Collins: Oh my gosh, okay. Yes ...

[00:23:47] Malcolm Collins: like cultured but like effeminate and weak, right? Like a failure. Like

[00:23:51] Simone Collins: they are not- Like, yeah ...

[00:23:52] Malcolm Collins: really set to run an empire. Come on, man. No, that’s horrific.

[00:23:56] America needs to come back on and crack some heads because [00:24:00] they’re being ruled by their women again.

[00:24:02] Simone Collins: Oh gosh, that is, that is such a thing. Yeah, let’s see. Just generally like Syrians and Carthaginians and Phoenicians were seen as sleazy merchants. But I, I think like, honestly, and this is showing up as a pattern, anyone who kind of traded with your empire who was like an outside trading partner was like, ooh, suspicious.

[00:24:20] I don’t know. But this makes sense because the dynamic is this is a trading partner. Like, they obviously wanna get the better end of a deal. You’re negotiating, so you’re going to have some level of distrust. So I’m seeing like this pattern, right? There’s the Libyans and then there’s the Phoenicians and...

[00:24:35] Oh, Egyptians though were seen as- Very ancient and sinister with their weird superstition and their arrogant priests and their... They, they, they really didn’t... Also, Rome kind of resented them, and I think that it’s similar to how China can resent the US and, and, and other countries, ‘cause Egypt was kind of the breadbasket for Rome.

[00:24:58] They were really, e- especially, es- especially during certain times, dependent on them for food. So it was like, well, they need Egyptian grain, but they’re also these, like, weird, mysterious, superstitious people, and they were kind of, like, fascinated and disturbed by them. It was as if, like, you need all of your food from, or, like, a lot of your food from some, like...

[00:25:21] Oh, like your kid in the cafeteria, and your parents always neglect to pack your lunch, but, like, this creepy goth girl in the corner- Mm-hmm ... or, like, Wiccan is like, “Yes, come, and I will read your tarot cards.” And it’s like, well I need the food and she’s kinda hot, but she really creeps me out. So I don’t want this.

[00:25:40] And I think Cleopatra, I, I read, I’ve read multiple biographies about her, really played up this stereotype and used it well because

[00:25:49] Malcolm Collins: she spent- You know, she’s like, like the goth, she was the goth girl of her era, right?

[00:25:51] Simone Collins: Like- She was the hot goth of her era, 100%. Very dramatic.

[00:25:56] Malcolm Collins: I’ll kill yourself with, like, a snake or whatever, right?

[00:25:58] Like-

[00:25:58] Simone Collins: 100%. I mean, she was totally the hot goth of her time, and very, like, that girl, too, in high school who would, like, sleeps with all the guys because she, like, understands how to play their tune and use them to her advantage. She’s- And do the mysterious, gothy thing. Ugh, yeah, for real. She was, yeah,

[00:26:15] so spooky.

[00:26:16] That was Egyptians. They were spooky.

[00:26:20] Spooky.

[00:26:21] Yeah. And then in general, like, Persians and Parthians were viewed as, as pretty formidable enemies and kind of that, I think similarly to how Egyptians viewed Libyans, it’s like, “Oh, well, you are a formidable enemy. Like, I worry about you.” I think similarly to how Greeks viewed Persians of like, “Ah, I mean, you’re effete and pretty, and, you know, your people are soft, but I gotta watch out for you.”

[00:26:46] The Gauls were seen as these noble savages. So while they were seen as, like, hot-headed and brave noble savages, they were also seen as, like, sort of impetuous and simple and prone to rashness, kind of like a- Yes ... the big meatheads, I guess. The meatheads of the North. They were the, the jock on the, the, the high school team.

[00:27:04] They would just kind of follow orders, I guess, from some leader, from like a bunch- I’m trying to

[00:27:07] Malcolm Collins: get more Roman Jewish stereotypes than you had, ‘cause I don’t, I don’t like, yeah, I don’t think you, you, you go, you had enough there. Continue.

[00:27:12] Simone Collins: Of my Roman Jews? Yeah. And then the, the, but the Germans were seen as even more savage versions of the Gauls, and I know that, like, Germany wasn’t a thing yet, but, like, people from that re- region that is now Germany, they were like the extra, extra Gauls.

[00:27:26] They were super Gauls. They were even more savage, even more unconqueror. They were like the, they came from the trees, from the dirt. They were like dirt people and they-

[00:27:37] Malcolm Collins: Wait, who were, who were the super golds?

[00:27:39] Simone Collins: The Germans The Germans? The, the, well, I mean, like- They were ... the people from the, yeah, and like they, they were, they totally were.

[00:27:44] They were both like romanticized by the Romans, who were like, “Ah, these noble savages.” Like, they were kind of the OG noble savage.

[00:27:51] Malcolm Collins: So, so, okay, I, I pulled up their, their Jewish stereotypes.

[00:27:54] Simone Collins: Oh, no. They- Okay, go on ...

[00:27:55] Malcolm Collins: were clannish, antisocial, and misanthropic. Specifically [00:28:00] Jews were accused of refusing to mix with others, sitting apart at meals, sleeping separately, and showing loyalty only to fellow Jews.

[00:28:07] Tacitus, the harshest source- Didn’t I say

[00:28:09] Simone Collins: that quickly? ...

[00:28:10] Malcolm Collins: wrote that a- and Tacitus, by the way, was the, the biggest source. He was the one who complained that they wouldn’t kill their babies. That they sit apart at meals and they sleep apart. And they were prone to lust. They abstained from for- oh, he says, “While they’re prone to lust, they abstain from foreign women.”

[00:28:25] I love that’s one of the problems. They’re prone to lust, but only other Jews. But

[00:28:28] Simone Collins: they’re, they’re not taking our women. Like, what? Really? Like, where are you going with that? He claimed

[00:28:32] Malcolm Collins: they showed com- compassion only to each other and were hostile to all others. Cicero complained that the Jews stick together and had undue influence in Roman assemblies.

[00:28:42] That’s hilarious. Okay. Oh, my God. So, the Jews control all of Rome. They’re all in our assemblies, guys. They, they did not like the, the pork taboo was frequently ridiculed. The incision was ri- ri- ridiculed. Sabbath observance ridiculed, and the a- aniconism that you talked about. Yeah.

[00:28:58] Simone Collins: Yeah,

[00:28:58] Malcolm Collins: they were- And they really hated, and see our episode- Weirdos

[00:29:00] if you’re not familiar with this, but the most common complaint about Jews is that they were always attempting to convert Romans, which obviously has changed in Judaism, and see our episode, The Question that Breaks Judaism, where we go over the history of this change in Judaism.

[00:29:13] Simone Collins: Yeah. It’s a, th- there’s a, abundant coverage of this.

[00:29:19] But let’s move on to medieval Europe. Basically there were these, and, and this is interesting, the barbarians changed a little and it was kind of like they’re barely Christian. It, it, the, the primary concern with barbarians, like the Irish, the Welsh, the Slavs, Baltic people, there’s like, are they even Christian?

[00:29:36] Like, what are, what are these monsters? But that’s kind of like the measuring stick is how Christ- are these good Christians? But Anglo-norml- Norman writers in England and, and also people living in what’s now Germany, would just routinely depict nearby frontier peoples which, you know, were Scottish Irish Slavs- Welcome

[00:29:55] more far northen- northern people as just basically violent pastoralists, pirates, plunderers. They were resistant to law and agriculture. Like, “Do you even farm, bro?” And, and needing- Do you even

[00:30:07] Malcolm Collins: farm, bro? ...

[00:30:08] Simone Collins: to be conquested sorry, conquered, and they needed... It wasn’t just conquest, it was also missionary work.

[00:30:14] Like, “We gotta send, we gotta... These guys need Jesus.” Like, they were, they were really worried about them. They were, they needed to, to be civilized, they needed to climb the... Well, I, I’m giving you stuff, but you’re just throwing it. Climb the rungs of civilization and, and, and be shown a better way I haven’t heard back, love. But yeah, this, so this, this, they need to be civilized stereotype was also used to excuse or justify expansion into these territories which I, I think is, like, a f- fairly ex- to be expected pattern, right?

[00:30:49] Like, of course they would. That, that makes sense. We, you can kind of see, here’s an image. Like, there, there, again, there’s not much, like, imagery, but here are some engravings by Albrecht Dürer during the 1500s of-

[00:31:03] Malcolm Collins: Okay ...

[00:31:03] Simone Collins: pastoral people.

[00:31:05] You have to see just other Roman graffiti that I found that wasn’t racist, but could be racist, ‘cause look at nose man. Looks just so weirdly modern. And

[00:31:17] I, I forget what- Noseband.

[00:31:19] Malcolm Collins: That’s very hilarious.

[00:31:20] Simone Collins: Yeah. Someone didn’t like him or his floppy nose. Here are the pastoralists. So I don’t know, they just look kind of like they’re- ... they’re dancing. One’s playing a bagpipe. They’re just kinda like, “Eh.” Like, I don’t know. Lazy

[00:31:34] Malcolm Collins: vagabonds.

[00:31:34] Simone Collins: Like, I know exactly what you mean.

[00:31:35] Lazy, yeah. Lazy vagabonds, I guess, is kind of the look they’re going for. So that’s the closest I could get to, like, a, a, a picture of them. But the Scots especially were just seen not only as, you know, among these things of, like, more in need of civilization and everything, but, like, southern Scotland was seen- Mm

[00:31:53] as, like, kind of cool. Mm. Like, kinda chill. They’re all right. And then, like, northern Scotland was like, “No, they’re, they’re the worst. They’re poor and terrifying.” [00:32:00] But broadly speaking, they were seen as militarily dangerous, but just poor and less civilized. And they just had these small, poor towns and these people in their, in their swaddling swaddling...

[00:32:15] What do you, what do you call them? Kilts? Not kilts. What are, like, the actual garments that people used to wear in Scotland that you wrap around? They’re very long.

[00:32:23] You know what I’m talking about?

[00:32:25] Malcolm Collins: No, I

[00:32:25] Simone Collins: forget what you call- Yeah, you don’t care about

[00:32:26] She’s talking about a great kilt

[00:32:27] Malcolm Collins: your garments. I, I for- I forget the name. I know what you’re talking about.

[00:32:30] Simone Collins: Yeah. I was thinking of Trump’s phrase swaddling hijab, which I just thought was the best phrase ever. But yeah, they were very, like, persistent enemies, and there, there was a lot of understanding of them being stubborn and warlike. The Jews, here’s where, like, the stuff, the antisemitic stuff gets I, I guess, good and what, where you were expecting something.

[00:32:49] Mm. What I did not expect to see was a very big recurring theme with the Jews. Do you know what it is? Have you seen, like, older antisemitic art, like 1300s to 1700s? Is it

[00:33:01] Malcolm Collins: their stupid hats?

[00:33:02] Simone Collins: No. No. What is it? It involves a farm animal.

[00:33:07] Malcolm Collins: I don’t know what it is then, no.

[00:33:09] Simone Collins: So for whatever reason, pig suckling is just all over the pl- the suckling, the, the, lots of...

[00:33:16] Like, here, here’s an example. This-

[00:33:17] Malcolm Collins: So they think the Jews drink milk directly from pigs? That was the stereotype?

[00:33:21] Simone Collins: Yeah, no. Check, check this out. So this is a church in Wittenberg. This is actually a church where Martin Luther preached once, and there was a fairly recent controversy where people were like, “Dude, this, this carving in this, this 1300s carving in this church is, like, super antisemitic.

[00:33:38] It shows a bunch of Jews suckling from a pig.”

[00:33:40] What do you think it is?

[00:33:41] Octavian Collins: It’s like people, like raise people.

[00:33:44] Simone Collins: Oh, like I’m raising you?

[00:33:46] Octavian Collins: Yeah.

[00:33:47] Simone Collins: So racism- Yeah ... is just another word for pronatalism. For raising.

[00:33:52] Octavian Collins: Pronatalism? ‘

[00:33:53] Simone Collins: Cause we’re raising. Raising. We’re raising him.

[00:33:55] Malcolm Collins: We’re raising him. And we believe in racism. Raise-ism. Yeah. Raise-ism. I like that.

[00:34:00] Simone Collins: Where was I? Right, suckling pigs. Right, so the, the, this, this, this church in Wittenberg, by the way, wasn’t taken down. Antisemitism is alive and well where

[00:34:10] Malcolm Collins: the- Thank God. What a horrible thing if they took down something from the 1300s. It,

[00:34:12] Simone Collins: it would be. It would be.

[00:34:13] Like, it’s un- it’s helpful to understand the history of bias. So I-

[00:34:18] Malcolm Collins: And we don’t know that Jews at that time period didn’t suckle from pigs.

[00:34:22] Simone Collins: Right? I mean, h- so here’s another one. Mm. I, this, this is really pretty explicit. It’s kinda hard to make out what’s happening in this antisemitic engraving from the, I think this is also the 1300s.

[00:34:36] And I couldn’t get a great translation. But it’s

[00:34:40] there’s someone e- eating something out of the butt of what I believe is also a pig. Another person is suckling from its very full teat. People have got horns because you got the Jew horns. The Jew horns- Mm ... of course appear. Or

[00:34:54] Malcolm Collins: that, that only makes sense.

[00:34:56] Simone Collins: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, duh. And there, there’s what appears to be possibly a dead baby at the top, so maybe here’s where we get the you know- Blood libel ... the Jews and the, and the babies. I don’t know. It’s kinda hard to tell. I don’t speak...

[00:35:10] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, I mean, this, this puts modern antisemitism to shame, you know?

[00:35:14] Simone Collins: Here’s another image of- The way we- ... more Jews suckling from a pig. What, like this I, just blindsided me. Okay. Like, why, why are we, why,

[00:35:26] Malcolm Collins: And they’re dressed like the freaking babies from that one skit, like, Ozymandias or whatever the, which is also hilarious. And one of them is, I guess, looking at the poo, and the other ones are suckling from its teat, and another one is looking at the baby’s butt and they’re in like baby outfits.

[00:35:45] Speaker 13: What is the meaning of life? Well, then what’s your answer?

[00:35:49] Speaker 14: I’ll never be able to say something as profound as my brother. My desire for my words to have sterile, clinical, literal meanings is sort of a wall that [00:36:00] prevents me from venturing close to people.

[00:36:02] Sometimes I think the most direct route to another’s heart is through nonsense, and nonsense has always eluded me.

[00:36:09] Speaker 13: Well, to you, then, what is the direct literal meaning of life?

[00:36:11] Speaker 14: I hope before I am dead and my atoms are collected back into the neutron star at the center of the baby dimension, that I will discover why the love that I have for my brother was not enough for him to feel whole when that love is all that sustains me and all that I think I will ever have.

[00:36:36] Speaker 13: I think what he meant to say was we like to have fun

[00:36:40] Speaker 14: and get tickles.

[00:36:41] Speaker 13: Okay.

[00:36:42] Speaker 14: Right? Fun and tickles.

[00:36:45] Simone Collins: Yeah, and this, I, I think I, I did not encounter any level of, we’ll say hatred or racism or othering against any group at all that I did with Jews during medieval to Renaissance Europe, That’s

[00:37:01] Malcolm Collins: fascinating that, like, Jews really, like, the, the West learned how to racism with Jews.

[00:37:06] Simone Collins: Oh, no, like for real, this was when, like, they went hard on them.

[00:37:12] ‘Cause a- again, I, I had difficulty finding a whole lot of hate on other groups. It was like, “Oh, you know, those bumpkins.”

[00:37:18] Malcolm Collins: No, what, what I also find funny about- Next slide ... this is just how extreme it is compared- It

[00:37:22] Simone Collins: is ... to modern antisemitism. Well, and Malcolm, let me be clear. It, it’s not just this weird pig suckling thing.

[00:37:27] It is that they, they basically thought they were, like, not human. Like, they had all these things that they, they thought they were like, they had weird bodily traits that other humans didn’t have, like that they were hemorrhoidal and had, had monthly bleeding that wasn’t- Just for women. They, they were very seen as, as, as melancholic and greedy and spiritually obstinate and this, this was like a hereditary genetic, like they, they were very much seen as subhuman, like as, as, as monsters.

[00:37:59] And then this, this fell- That’s fascinating ... fed into more broad notions that Jews were these fixed outsiders that you, you could not integrate them into a Christian new Israel. And they were associated very much with usury and corruption. And actually not Alex actually was just reminding me the other day in our XDMs that it’s really, really weird, this idea among evangelical Americans that like, “Well, we want Jews in Israel because, you know, we need that for the second coming.”

[00:38:28] This whole idea, like in, in Europe he, he reminded me, us that like in Europe, no, just the, the idea is that Christians are the descendants of Jews. And only, like you need Christians in Israel. You don’t need Jews in Israel.

[00:38:42] Malcolm Collins: Like- Yeah. The, the Crusades were not about re-winning Israel for the Jews For

[00:38:46] Simone Collins: Jews.

[00:38:47] Yeah, exactly.

[00:38:48] So that is something that’s powerful ... I mean,

[00:38:49] Malcolm Collins: it’s a, it’s a different interpretation. And I think it is a, if I’m gonna be honest, I think the evangelical interpretation of those particular passages seems to be more literalist and as intended than the interpretation that the Catholic Church took in the medieval period.

[00:39:06] The Catholic Church took a bunch of crazy positions in the medieval period that are just not heavily supported by the Bible. Yeah. And a lot of Christians forget just how much of that is, is... Like, I always point out like the Trinity, for example, is just not that well-supported by the Bible as a concept.

[00:39:25] It’s not, the Bible isn’t specifically antagonistic to the Trinity. It doesn’t argue against it. But like it came out as a concept like 300 years later. And so when people were like, “Oh, you guys don’t believe in the Trinity, you’re not real Christians,” I’m like Excuse me ... that was not, that was not a thing for most of the early Christians Yeah.

[00:39:35] Not

[00:39:36] Simone Collins: my canon. Yeah,

[00:39:36] Malcolm Collins: exactly.

[00:39:43] Yeah. It’s like, that, that is a, that is a... Well, I think a lot of Christians forget the stuff that came in in the early councils and the stuff that’s actually in the Bible, and they conflate the two really heavily.

[00:39:52] Simone Collins: Totally. I just sent you some more. I sent you one more Jew one. Oh. Oh, okay ... again, of Jews.

[00:39:57] Again, they’re stuck. They can’t get off this pig. And [00:40:00] one of them looks like he wants to lick the pi- the pig’s- A hole on the wrong side. Three are suckling from the teat. The other one is chewing on its tail and riding it backwards

[00:40:11] Malcolm Collins: Oh, thank God.

[00:40:12] Simone Collins: They’re just like they... I’ve never seen racist art this explicit.

[00:40:17] So as a palate cleanser, I’m gonna th- I also sent you my fav- Oh ... my favorite ones. This- A bird ... chicken, I guess. The chicken.

[00:40:24] Malcolm Collins: Chicken. Okay.

[00:40:25] Simone Collins: There’s the guy. Okay. I really like the guy. I

[00:40:28] Malcolm Collins: think, I think m- I think Octavia would’ve drawn this chicken, just-

[00:40:31] Simone Collins: It, it looks like something that Octavia would’ve drawn.

[00:40:33] I think my favorite’s just like the little dude. Not the one with the hat, but just like the dude with the sword. Oh, yeah. Looks very much like a certain internet style. You know what I mean? It’s kind of a- Yeah ... kind of Invader Zim. It, it’s kind of giving Invader Zim. And I-

[00:40:45] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, it definitely has the j-

[00:40:46] style of modern internet art, actually.

[00:40:48] Simone Collins: Yeah. I’m like, “Oh my gosh,” like nothing is new. Nothing is new. I love, I

[00:40:52] Malcolm Collins: love that- But actually, the, the guy with the hat also has a style of like some modern cartoons.

[00:40:56] Simone Collins: Totally. Like, what, did, were these just over educated medieval art scholars who had to like get a commercial job and ended up illustrating for cartoons?

[00:41:05] What is going on? But also I guess humans just draw certain ways, so who cares? I, I don’t know. But I found that very entertaining. Moving on to Renaissance Europe. This is what you alluded to earlier, the vice concept emerged. We have the French vice, the English vice, and the Italian vice. Cool. Which is delightful.

[00:41:26] I think most people came to learn about the French vice in various movies and shows about the, the court of King Henry VIII and the Boleyn sisters. And that is because they spent some of their youth in the French royal court, which was the source of this reputation of the French vice. It was seen as this very A sexually loose place where he’d learn all sorts of tricks that the very prudish English women didn’t know.

[00:41:57] I will leave this to your imagination, but imagine, and of course, this is what people were saying, we don’t know what actually happened in the bedroom. Mm. But imagine King Henry VIII’s delight when he discovers these young women from the French court who can do things to him that he couldn’t even imagine after spending all this time with his Catholic wife, Isabel.

[00:42:17] Right, her name was Isabel. So yeah, th- this was like, it was very much a reputation. I think this is really downstream of the fact that the court the French court in general involved a lot of mistresses. So there was this depiction of like, well, there’s just, where there’s mistresses, there’s gotta be a lot of sex, and where there’s a lot of sex, you gotta have a lot of like, weird stuff going on.

[00:42:37] Gotta have it ... and even to this day, you have French kissing. Mm-hmm. You know, and there’s still reputations. French

[00:42:41] Malcolm Collins: kissing, yes. They

[00:42:42] Simone Collins: invented it. Right? I mean, come on. Like, but think, it’s, it’s like some English person who’s never used tongue who’s like, “Well, this must be the French style.” You know, like, this thing holds.

[00:42:50] It holds really well which is absolutely delightful. And then the important thing about these vice reputations, the, the English vice, the Italian vice, et cetera, is that once the seeds were planted in Renaissance Europe, in the early modern era, they just started to compound and grow on each other.

[00:43:09] Okay. So after this became kind of a thing because of some, you know, like French court women kind of being seen as sexually manipulative ‘cause there are all these mistresses floating around, you started to get French literature really leaning into it, and there was this rise of this international publishing industry, so you also have the printing press making this worse.

[00:43:28] But around the mid-1600s, all these erotic and semi-pornographic French books started entering the Germanic region. They started entering the UK. All these, all these basically French romantic and erotic smut started- Mm-hmm ... entering the rest of Europe. Really? And the printing presses made it super pervasive. So imagine if, like, suddenly books exist a- and, and all the romance novels that are really smutty come from France.

[00:43:56] You- you’re gonna start to, like, build on this reputation. Yeah ... and y- [00:44:00] yeah, I had

[00:44:00] Malcolm Collins: no idea- Well, I mean, for the longest time when I was younger, I remember the French women were known for being, like, slutty and not shaving their armpits.

[00:44:08] Simone Collins: You know, some people find that hot. I don’t, but so it’s got... Some people like it.

[00:44:11] Malcolm Collins: I’ve, I’ve heard it. Yeah, some people find bush hot, too. I d- I don’t understand.

[00:44:15] Simone Collins: But anyway, these, these dirty books were basically, like, French... And, and I think French people leaned into the stereotype ‘cause they kinda liked being a little sexy. And so that’s, that’s it. And a very similar thing... I, so I didn’t know about, I didn’t know about the French literature compounding the issue and the printing press really fomenting it.

[00:44:34] I also didn’t know why the Italian vice became such a big thing. So from the later Middle Ages onward, outsiders started to associate certain Italian cities, not all but especially Florence, as having widespread male same-sex love and social networks that made these relationships super visible and pretty common.

[00:44:58] So basically there w- there was, like, the first gay scene was in Florence.

[00:45:02] Speaker 6: , they invented gayness.

[00:45:04]

[00:45:04] Speaker 17: I wonder if having Italy be disproportionately gay during the period of, , the development of many key Catholic institutions and doctrines is what played such a large part in such a large portion of the Catholic priesthood being same-sex attracted and, , the sort of large gay networks that many people have called out.

[00:45:26] Milo Yiannopoulos, for example, wrote a book on the, , Lavender Mafia, as he called it, and we recently did an episode on the, , quote-unquote “gay Jewish,” , priests who ended up writing core Catholic doctrine. , But , the, these individuals’ ability to so thoroughly gain control of the church and its doctrine and teachings

[00:45:42] Simone Collins: Maybe they... Gay people, chime in in the comments if there’s some other first gay scene, but, like, it seems like that really happened.

[00:45:49] Malcolm Collins: Well, I mean, obviously there’s, there’s, there’s, like, pre-modern gay scenes, like Thebes and stuff like that, but yeah, yeah.

[00:45:54] Simone Collins: Sure. Well, yeah. Well, allegedly. We don’t, we don’t know for sure. But there’s evidence from court records- We do know pretty sure about the

[00:45:59] Malcolm Collins: Theban troops ...

[00:46:01] Simone Collins: the Band of Thebes? Is there really? ‘Cause I remember, like, getting so excited about it and being like, “This is my yaoi romance. Let’s go. I need to learn more.”

[00:46:08] And they were like, “Well, it wasn’t... We’re not sure.” We don’t know. We’re not sure how great or long- They’re not sure what happened during

[00:46:15] Malcolm Collins: Creta ... what it was, but there was- Yeah ... a period where it happened

[00:46:19] Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah.

[00:46:20] Speaker 15: So I decided to go over all of the primary evidence we have for this, and it’s just demonstrable. , One, that the Sacred Band of Thebes existed. We know this because they helped hold the line against the Spartan king, Agis II in 378. , They, at the Battle of Tegyra in 375 BC under Polyeidus, , the 300 routed a much larger Spartan force.

[00:46:44] For the first time, Spartans were defeated. , Spartans were defeated a much s- by a much smaller force, first of all. , They were instrumental in the stunning Theban victory over Spartans at Leuctra 371, , which ended Spartans’ dominance over Greece. And the unit fought other campaign until it was ultimately annihilated at the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 BC by the m- army of Philip II , of Macedon.

[00:47:10] So, , for a long period, we have evidence of them existing. In terms of them being an armory of gay lovers, , this was attested by Plutarch, Dionysius, Plato, Xenophon, and other attestations appear, including Polyaenus, Athenaeus, Diodotus Siculus, , and several others. So there’s at least six ancient writers that describe the erotic pairing.

[00:47:37] , So, , it... And we have arch- archaeological evidence. There is the Lion of Chaeronea, - monetary funeral lion, , and in 1879 to 1880, Greek archeologist, , Pantagathus Stamicus excavated a site and found 254 skeletons arranged in rows, seven rows, with some pairs having arms linked in hands clasped consistent with the, , what, what [00:48:00] we’re aware of with this.

[00:48:01] , So yeah, this is almost certainly not a legend and was a real force, , in which, , it was made up , of gay men and was able to dramatically outperform forces that were thought of as... Like the Spartans’ famous saying, if 300 men beat, like, 3,000 , Persians, and then apparently they were beat by a fraction of their own number of the Band of Thebes.

[00:48:20] Speaker 16: Who then were themselves beat by the hillbilly Macedonians, showing that hillbilly style always beats all other styles. , Also fun fact, , of my genetic chart, the place where my ancestry, if you go to the pre-English part of my ancestry, it traces back from Macedon

[00:48:38] Simone Collins: Anyway well, and yeah, and I guess gay romance was kind of a thing throughout ancient Greece and Rome.

[00:48:43] Never mind. Totally, I went ... Oh, God, and then, like, never mind. Yeah. Pervasive. Never mind. Totally wrong. It’s, the world has been gay for all of history. Oh, God, yeah. Sorry I know.

[00:48:51] Malcolm Collins: CR episodes do gays destroy civilization, where we go over this. Like, where, where do we actually see gays in history? When do we see gays in history, and does it precede civilizational collapse?

[00:49:00] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:49:00] Malcolm Collins: Basically we find it, it doesn’t appear to.

[00:49:03] Simone Collins: Yeah. But there is evidence from, because this is the point at which it’s illegal, court records, witness testimonies, moralizing tracts that, that indicate the presence of active male queer communities in cities like Florence, and this helped cement the idea that this was a more tolerant area.

[00:49:25] I mean, it’s kind of ironic, right? ‘Cause they’re like, “No, don’t do it. Stop.” But, but you know, they, they kept doing it. And then by the 17th century, because phrases like the Italian vice became kind of like a, a shorthand

[00:49:38] Malcolm Collins: for gay- So gayness was the Italian vice, sleeping around was the French vice, and BDSM was the English vice

[00:49:43] Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah. I’m gonna get to, to the UK next Okay but yeah because the Italian vice was shorthand for gay stuff then people would start to go to Italy for their gay romespringa. Tourists would, even i- in the early 1800s, sort of revive and spread this stereotype because they were both fascinated and scandalized by this reputation and they, they wanted to check it out and maybe- They’d be

[00:50:11] Malcolm Collins: like, “Ooh, oh, the gay, early gay, proto-gay bars and stuff.”

[00:50:15] Simone Collins: It kind of was, yeah. It’s like the Cape Cod, Fire Island, Provincetown of of Europe, you know? The,

[00:50:21] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. So being born in Fire Island definitely made

[00:50:23] Simone Collins: you a little bit gay ... the gay, kinky boot of Europe. Yeah Yes. It’s, it’s beautiful. It’s beautiful. So yeah, I, I thi- I didn’t know that that, it was like a, sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy thing.

[00:50:32] Although of course the, the court records show that it was a thing they were trying to stop. Now, the English vice is super interesting because first, England was super known for being very puritanical and c- sex negative, and not, not very interesting when it came to sexual relations.

[00:50:48] Malcolm Collins: Okay. Okay.

[00:50:49] Simone Collins: But then I think part- partly because it was so dour and puritan and sexually repressed and a bunch of sanctimonious proto-Karens freaked out when people did do slightly kinky things, that it then developed this reputation for flagellation, which then evolved into our understanding of, like, BDSM, because there were commentators, like, trying to say, “Don’t do this,” and people, like, criminalizing it.

[00:51:20] Do, wait,

[00:51:20] Malcolm Collins: wait, what do we, what do we not do? What, where, where, where is the video I’m not supposed to look at?

[00:51:26] Simone Collins: What video?

[00:51:27] Malcolm Collins: That’s a joke. When you’re describing a video or something like that, it’s like, oh- Oh ... oh.

[00:51:32] Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah.

[00:51:33] Malcolm Collins: Where’s the... Do you... I, I definitely won’t look at that video. Can you just give me the URL for it?

[00:51:38] You know the joke. Come on.

[00:51:40] Simone Collins: Oh, no, I, I don’t. Maybe it’s a not girl thing. But anyway. Lee

[00:51:46] Malcolm Collins: would get it. Lee- my, my bros would get it. You’re just too-

[00:51:50] Simone Collins: I am, I am an old... I’m a s- I have the soul of a 62-year-old woman who’s probably not that online. But anyway basically around the 19th [00:52:00] century especially, English pu- public culture became super moralizing, and there were all these laws against male same-sex acts.

[00:52:09] And this made Britain a focal point for debates about homosexuality, which is also sometimes seen as the British vice, along with flagellation. And then in that climate, continental commentators would talk about the English vice, refer to specific behaviors, either flagellation or same-sex relations. Because it was, it was more prevalent in, like, a sex work context or in people getting caught and in big trouble for it.

[00:52:39] And it kind of happened in a way... It was, like, late onset Italian vice. So Italy really got the brunt of the same-sex reputation, and what really stuck with the UK was the BDSM stuff.

[00:52:51] Malcolm Collins: That is not what I’ve heard about how the UK got the BDSM stuff.

[00:52:55] Simone Collins: Oh, maybe I was reading the wrong sources. So- So what did you get?

[00:52:59] Malcolm Collins: I heard that it came from British private schools that used flogging as a, a punishment mechanism.

[00:53:06] Simone Collins: Mm.

[00:53:06] There’s this one book that’s called The English Vice that is a picture of a schoolteacher, a male schoolteacher who’s short and stout and has something of a whip. I mean, maybe it was... it came from this rep- I haven’t read the book.

[00:53:21] I, I did not read an entire book for this one episode. I’m so sorry. But like- But

[00:53:24] Malcolm Collins: apparently, what would happen is the kids would go and do it to each other.

[00:53:29] Simone Collins: Oh. Bless them.

[00:53:30] Malcolm Collins: Like, that’s, that’s where, like, they’d be like, “Oh, this is kinda kinky,” or whatever. And then it, like, took off as, like, a thing that people would do.

[00:53:40] I mean- I think, you know, BDSM and other things- Well, yeah, I mean,

[00:53:43] Simone Collins: school paddles were super pervasive. Corporal punishment was extremely pervasive in British schools. So it maybe it’s also that because that form of corporal punishment, especially things like the paddle, were very, very common in British schools, that more people learned they were into it, right?

[00:54:02] Like Aella writes in her, on her Substack about how, like, she didn’t think she was that into sex, and then experienced for the first time some forms of, like, BDSM and was like, “Oh my God.” And maybe the thing is, like, in the rest of Europe, there may not have been this exact type of corporal punishment, like being spanked with a paddle or something in the same kind of context.

[00:54:24] Also public humiliation, right? So it could just be that certain forms of attempted puritanical punishment in the UK Awoken sexually, a, a bunch of people who if not exposed to that would never have known that it would cause such satisfaction.

[00:54:41] Malcolm Collins: Yeah.

[00:54:42] Simone Collins: Mm, that makes sense. The rest is not that interesting.

[00:54:45] The Muslims were seen as fanatical warriors, basically. They were, like, sexually threatening and religiously dangerous, and you kind of admired them for their courage but you feared them as these enemies of Christiandom. So they were kind of just, like, the big, scary, bad other. Yeah. And Northern Europeans, again, like, sort of barbaric, dull workhorses, not very smart.

[00:55:08] And then in contrast, Southerners were seen as very indulgent drama queens. What’s super interesting to me is that this even falls into a microcosm- microcosmic context with places like Italy. Like, within Italy, Northern Italians were seen as industrious but, like, socially cold, and Southerners were seen as lazy and emotional.

[00:55:35] Malcolm Collins: Ooh ...

[00:55:36] Simone Collins: and yet, like, throughout the rest of Europe also, Northerners were seen as, like, these workers who were kind of, like, boring and stern, and, like, anyone south was seen as, like, oh, like, ooh, so emotional and- ... kinda lazy.

[00:55:50] Speaker 20: What’s ironic to me is that this is still portrayed even in my Korean Mawa books, , which shows how cross-cultural it is that you always [00:56:00] have the archetype of the Duke of the North who’s super cold and competent and warlike, and then the Duke of the South who’s often very,

[00:56:08] charismatic, , likable, , geniable, funny, , outgoing. , And of course, my favorite is the Duke of the North. That’s why I always have myself drawn that way

[00:56:19] Simone Collins: And it’s very interesting to me that, I mean, we have the, I think we have some, done some different episodes about the role that heat and cold play in civilizational development, and that, I mean, clearly if you live in a very cold climate, the, only the conscientious people will survive because only the conscientious people will have built shelters and food supplies that can get them through an extremely cold and frozen winter where no food grows.

[00:56:45] And in Southern cultures, you’re more likely to see some maybe more charismatic but indolent people make it through genetic choke holds because they don’t depend so much on delayed gratification and preparation and- Mm ... building in order to survive, because it’s not going to become a frozen tundra for, like, four months out of the year.

[00:57:07] So I found that- Yeah ... interesting in that the stereotypes would play out that way. But that

[00:57:12] Malcolm Collins: is

[00:57:13] Simone Collins: just what

[00:57:13] Malcolm Collins: I found. A Russian, if you wanna do Ru- ancient Russian stereotypes, they were seen as incredibly backwards and animalistic. But they also got their butts whipped by, like, every horde that came through their country in, like, really brutalistic ways.

[00:57:25] Like the famous case where they, they put a bunch of people under a table and had a feast while crushing them.

[00:57:31] Simone Collins: What? That’s horrible ...

[00:57:32] Malcolm Collins: th- this was the Mongols or the Huns or one of, one of these groups.

[00:57:35] Simone Collins: Yeah, like- Oh, yeah. I didn’t, I didn’t even get into the Mongols. There, there is art of the Mongols being, you know, terrifying.

[00:57:41] I feel like that’s something we don’t need to be enlightened on ‘cause we all know it, that they’d be scary.

[00:57:46] Malcolm Collins: So we, we could do a whole other episode on the history of American interratia- racism, like the different groups and how they hated each other.

[00:57:52] Simone Collins: Yeah. That’d be really fun. If this episode does well and y’all like it, we’ll, we’ll, we’ll get into...

[00:57:55] Yeah.

[00:57:56] Malcolm Collins: Da, da, da, da, da. Da, da, da, da, da. Da, da, da, da, da. And then, like, do a, a museum where it’s, like, a bunch of, like, Jemi- Aunt Jemimas and stuff like that. Oh,

[00:58:06] Simone Collins: my God. Like the- Right? In the Aunt Jemima restaurant. Was it called the Aunt Jemima restaurant, or was it called something else?

[00:58:11] Malcolm Collins: Something like that.

[00:58:12] Yeah,

[00:58:12] Simone Collins: well- I mean, even we had Aunt Jemima syrup. And even I watched, like, Shirley Temple movies where it was like there was some token uncle figure who would, like, sing and dance and just be... It’s so weird. It’s so weird. Yeah, that could be an interesting episode. But also probably gonna get this channel in big trouble, so I don’t know.

[00:58:35] I don’t know. No, I don’t

[00:58:36] Malcolm Collins: think... I don’t... I mean, we’ll focus mostly on non-discriminated groups in a modern context.

[00:58:42] Simone Collins: Well, we just we were declared

[00:58:44] racists by our own child.

[00:58:47] Malcolm Collins: W- yeah, he said that we raise him, so we’re racists.

[00:58:53] Simone Collins: I love that. I love that so much. “What does racism mean, Octavian?” Well, raise. Raise. You raised me. It’s people who raise.” We gotta take that. We gotta take it, yes.

[00:59:07] Malcolm Collins: Yes.

[00:59:07] Simone Collins: Oh.

[00:59:08] Okay, well, I love you. I’m going to go make you pumpkin... No. Yeah, pumpkin curry with bok choy.

[00:59:15] Malcolm Collins: With bok choy I think would be great. And you can put it on top of, yeah, whatever

[00:59:21] Simone Collins: Do you really want fries or do you really want, well, with bok choy, well, with b- with ri- with bok choy I think you want rice to s- soak up the curry

[00:59:29] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, I think rice would be the right thing with bok choy. And

[00:59:31] Simone Collins: I, and I’m- And I’m just gonna stir-fry the bok choy with the curry, like, the last, like, 30 seconds, right? I don’t wanna cook it that much, right?

[00:59:39] You just want- Yeah,

[00:59:39] Malcolm Collins: you don’t, you don’t cook the bok choy that long. Okay. All righty. And you might wanna put in a little bit of, like, oyster sauce or something with this so that the, the bok choy works a bit better.

[00:59:47] Simone Collins: With the pumpkin curry?

[00:59:48] Malcolm Collins: Yes.

[00:59:49] Simone Collins: Sure. Let’s do it. Anything else aside from oyst- oyster sauce?

[00:59:52] Do you want hoisin sauce as well with, for a little sweetness? I guess the pumpkin brings so much sweet you don’t really need it.

[00:59:56] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, you don’t really need that.

[00:59:58] Simone Collins: So just oyster sauce. Okay. [01:00:00] We’re on. All right,

[01:00:01] Malcolm Collins: love you.

[01:00:02] Simone Collins: I love you too.

[01:00:03] Malcolm Collins: Bye.

[01:00:05] Simone Collins: Bye.

[01:00:06] Just so you know, Malcolm is surrounded by empty cans, dirty clothes. It’s, it’s like the trash pit in, from Star Wars, quite literally. That’s what I feel like every time I wade into to try to, like, deliver him-

[01:00:18] Malcolm Collins: That’s why

[01:00:19] Simone Collins: I hoard, Simone- ... a drink or a smoothie ...

[01:00:20] Malcolm Collins: so

[01:00:20] Simone Collins: I can bring it

[01:00:21] Malcolm Collins: back ...

[01:00:21] Simone Collins: and so when Malcolm discovered that his mic stand is not compatible with his heavy, super expensive mic that y’all made us get, thanks, hope you like the sound of it all he decided to counterweight it by taping a Coke can to his mic stand.

[01:00:39] And that’s, it, it’s a look. It, it’s a very, I would say, cohesive aesthetic. Any interior decorator, I think, would come to appreciate it.

[01:00:48] Malcolm Collins: I hate you so much, Simone.

[01:00:50] Simone Collins: When, when Malcolm’s camera goes to full landscape mode, suddenly this short angle of his room disappears, and you can see the trash from like- This

[01:01:00] Malcolm Collins: is a problem for, like, interviews and stuff, because literally-

[01:01:03] Simone Collins: It is yes.

[01:01:04] Yeah, yeah.

[01:01:05] No, God, don’t... No, don’t do it. Oh, why did you do... Don’t. Don’t. Go back, go back. Jump scare. Oh, God. Why did you do that? Why did they need to see that? I’m

[01:01:18] Malcolm Collins: not like Jordan Peterson. I never told anyone to make their bed, okay?

[01:01:22] Simone Collins: Your bed is impossible to make. I was like- There’s no making

[01:01:24] Malcolm Collins: it ... live, live in a pigsty.

[01:01:26] I don’t care. I, like presumably it does make you marginally more efficient for some people, but it doesn’t for me. Like I, you know, and, and, and people are different, right? Like, you know, some people are better with order. Some people are better with chaos.

[01:01:38] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[01:01:39] Malcolm Collins: I

[01:01:39] Simone Collins: prefer- This, this, this is the, the not Malcolm bedroom.

[01:01:42] The, it looks weird because Tech sleeps on the bed with me, and there’s pillows there to keep him from falling off ‘cause he decides to go on a journey every night. He dreams of going to Mordor, throwing in the ring, but it really involves a lot of kicking and crawling around. So, I will kick us off. Oh, for dinner tonight, I mean, we have the nice salami.

[01:02:02] Do you want me to do something with that?

[01:02:04] Malcolm Collins: Oh, I like the nice salami. Mm-hmm. Okay, so if I was gonna do something with nice salami, I would eat it on toast.

[01:02:15] Simone Collins: Would you?

[01:02:17] Malcolm Collins: Oh.

[01:02:17] Simone Collins: You want nice salami and grilled cheese, just like to cut- I have a

[01:02:19] Malcolm Collins: great idea. Garlic bread. Cheesy garlic bread

[01:02:24] Speaker 21: A few final side notes for RFAB. , If you downloaded the image viewing app, which auto-sizes images for your screen, we now have that for both Apple and PC, and I have made significant, if you downloaded it anytime before, like yesterday, improvements in stability and features on it. So re-download that.

[01:02:42] You can find it on either our image generation page or our not safe for work image search page, which conglomerates the searches of all not safe for work search engines. , The other thing is I have recently added, , or will be added shortly after this video goes live, a model that China put out, which is beating the one that Anthropic had to take down by order of the US government on coding stuff.

[01:03:04] So if you’re using our vibe coding system, , we have , a model that is equivalent to Anthropic Fable, , which is exciting

[01:03:12] Speaker 18: you guys gonna have a battle? You’re gonna have the ultimate battle?

[01:03:15] Speaker 19: Yeah. Yeah. I would take a battle if I had a different gun.

[01:03:20] Speaker 18: A different gun. No. What’s wrong with that gun? I can find a new

[01:03:22] Speaker 19: one. I need to find a new one.

[01:03:24] Speaker 18: You do? Oh, no. All right, should I get the water out? You guys ready? Okay, so he’s gonna go to his gun wardrobe.

[01:03:35] Yeah, you want me to open it up for you?

[01:03:38] Speaker 19: Yeah.

[01:03:38] Speaker 18: Okay. That’s what I want. I’ll get it

While most cultures around the world historically married in the early-to-mid teens, Europeans (especially Northern and Western) stood out by commonly delaying marriage until the mid-20s — even in the Middle Ages. The hosts explore whether this European norm, later exported globally through colonialism and cultural influence, may be contributing to today’s fertility crashes in East Asia, Latin America, India, and beyond.

They dive into:

• Aella’s “Hotness Curve” study and what percentage of men find different ages attractive

• The e-girl phenomenon and why so many popular internet aesthetics look phenotypically 15

• Genetic and regional differences in fertility windows and menopause age (Europeans go into menopause ~2–3 years later on average)

• Historical first-marriage ages across Europe, China, India, Japan, Korea, Africa, and the Americas

• Global ages of consent today and when different countries criminalized CSAM

• Disney princess ages (Snow White was 14, Jasmine 15, Ariel 16…) and why normalizing teen marriage might be necessary for demographic survival

This is a no-holds-barred, truth-seeking conversation about culture, biology, attraction, and whether some populations are simply not built for the modern delayed-marriage timeline.

If you’re interested in pronatalism, human biodiversity, evolutionary psychology, or why fertility is collapsing everywhere except where European norms never fully took hold — this episode is for you.

Show Notes

Aella’s Findings

Aella also just released a substack post titled The Hotness Curve (how age changes a woman’s appeal).

Using photos of women of various ages (some real, some AI generated), Aella asked various questions, including: “Casual Sex: A 200 year old vampire shows up in your window at night. She wants a one-night stand. There are no consequences, and nobody will know. Do you say yes?”

Here are the answers:

Aella found that “Sexual interest climbs very fast, and generally hits a cresendo around women who appeared to be ~24 years old (or 28yo for the older men).”

“15% of men said yes they would have casual sex with a vampire in the body of an 11 year old. This rose to a third of men for the body of a 13 year old, and a half of men agreeing to the body of a 15 year old. By 18 we’re at roughly 70%, and by the time a 24 year old is hypothetically entering your window, ~90% of them were down.”

Just a small aside: “One interesting thing to note is that the dropoff in fuckability for women - what we might call The Wall - happens for women in their mid 30’s just as predicted, but only in the eyes of men under the age of 25. For older men, we find the ‘wall’ occurs in a woman’s early 40’s. Older men assigned equivalent ‘yes I’d have sex with her’ ratings to an 18 year old as they did to a woman in her early 50’s!”

Also: You should play Aella’s ageguesser game.

(Simone got better than 67% of players… not very good.)

The e-girl phenomenon

From our friend Bruno: “Why does a certain “e-girl” or “internet girl” face seem to resonate so consistently with online audiences across different eras? Highly recognizable women in online subcultures seem to converge around a similar look; why does that look perform so well with netizens?

Early internet figures like Boxxy, later YouTube personalities like Shoe0nHead, cosplay and streamer-adjacent figures, and then more recent cases like Belle Delphine and the current wave of TikTok, cosplay, and Twitter/X e-girl aesthetics. The more interesting question is why a particular facial and stylistic grammar keeps recurring: large expressive eyes, youthful proportions, soft or rounded features, dark hair or bangs, a slightly anime-coded presentation, and a mix of cuteness, irony, awkwardness, and sexual ambiguity.”

Malcolm’s first answer: BECAUSE THEY ALL LOOK LIKE LITTLE GIRLS AND PEOPLE ARE PEDOS.

The sick sad truth: Most of the world is full of pedos

Basically, Europeans are the only non pedos.

Maybe the concept of pedos wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for Europeans

Maybe a contributing factor to falling birth rates involves modern norms around late marriage among groups that, for hundreds of years, married much younger.

Let’s explore this!

Variation in Fertility Windows

A large meta‑analysis across 24 countries estimated the global mean age at menopause at 48.8 years, and by continent:

• Europe: about 50.5 years

• Asia (overall): about 48.8 years

• Africa: about 48.4 years

• Latin America: about 47.2 years

• Middle East: about 47.4 years

WHO similarly notes that most women worldwide experience menopause between ages 45 and 55.

Variation in Average Ages of Marriage

Average female age at first marriage, approximate, pre‑1800

• England (pre‑1800) - ~22–26 - Many parishes ~25–26; Western Europe relatively late.

• Western/Northern Europe - ~20–25 - Late marriage pattern; some locales up to 27.

• China - ~14–18 - Legal norms ~14–15; practice mid‑teens.

• India - ~12–16 - Strong early arranged marriage; big regional variation.

• Japan - ~17–19 - Village data show late‑teen marriage.

• Korea (Joseon) - ~16–18 - Upper‑status women mid‑teens; similar for many commoners.

• Aztec/Nahua - ~14–17 - Girls early‑mid teens; men ~18–22.

• Maya - ~16–19 - Most married by ~20; post‑15 coming‑of‑age.

• Sub‑Saharan Africa (major) - ~15–18 - Many societies mid‑late teens for women.

Sources:

• https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/036319907800300103

• https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1081602X08000894

• https://voxdev.org/topic/institutions-political-economy/economic-shocks-and-age-marriage-sub-saharan-africa-and-india

• https://historymyths.wordpress.com/2014/07/06/myth-136-women-married-very-young-in-the-olden-days/

• https://keatschinese.com/china-culture-resources/general-standards-of-ancient-chinese-marriage-age/

• https://childmarriagedata.org/country-profiles/india/

• https://www.aztec-history.com/aztec-society-family.html

• https://mayas.mrdonn.org/marriage.html

Ages of Consent

In the most populous countries:

• Pakistan - 18 (requires marriage)

• India - 18

• Indonesia - 18

• Nigeria - 18

• Japan - 18

• Ethiopia - 18

• Egypt - 18

• DR Congo - 18

• Turkey - 18

• United States - 16-18 Varies by state

• Philippines - 16 (general), 14 for close‑in‑age minors

• Iran - 15–18 with marriage required

• Thailand - 15–18

• France - 15 (16 in FRA report)

• Germany - 14–16 (practical 14–18)

• Bangladesh - 14–16

• Italy - 14–16

• Mexico - 12-18 Varies by state

• Russia - 16

• Vietnam - 16

• United Kingdom - 16

• South Africa - 16

• South Korea - 16

• China - 14

• Brazil - 14

More detail on Pakistan: Minimum ages for marriage

• National framework (historical): The Child Marriage Restraint Act 1929 originally set the minimum age at 18 for males and 16 for females.

• Sindh province: Since 2013, Sindh’s own Child Marriage Restraint Act has set the minimum legal marriage age at 18 for both boys and girls.

• Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT): The Islamabad Capital Territory Child Marriage Restraint Act 2025 now sets the minimum age at 18 for both sexes, with significant penalties for under‑18 marriages.

• Balochistan: In November 2025, Balochistan raised the legal age to 18 for girls (and 18 for boys), banning child marriage in the province.

• Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP): Until very recently, these provinces still had 16 as the legal minimum for girls and 18 for boys, though Punjab has now moved to raise the age to 18; advocacy and legislation are ongoing to harmonize all provinces at 18.

Despite recent legal reforms raising the minimum marriage age to 18 in several parts of Pakistan, child marriage remains a significant, ongoing problem, especially for girls from poor, rural, and religious‑minority communities.

UNICEF and other analyses report that around 18% of women aged 20–24 in Pakistan were married before 18, which corresponds to roughly 20.5 million girls, and about 4% were married before 15

• The Borgen Project reports: Child brides usually come from impoverished families who sell them to older men for a price as high as 2.5 million Pakistani rupees, which is more than $8,000.”

Anti-Pedo Laws

Japan has had laws against sexual exploitation of minors for decades, but it only criminalized possession of child pornography involving real children in 2014.

They really had to ease into it:

• 1999 – Japan bans the production and distribution of child pornography involving real minors, aligning partially with other OECD countries but still allowing simple possession.

• June 2014 – The Diet passes a revision to the Child Pornography Law that makes possession of child pornography (photos and videos of real children under 18) a criminal offense, punishable by up to one year in prison or a fine.

  • The 2014 law explicitly excludes manga, anime, and computer‑generated imagery, so fictional depictions remain legal even if they portray minors in sexualized contexts, which is why international observers still criticize Japan as being comparatively permissive about some forms of sexualized images of minors.

When various countries instituted CSAM laws

• 1973: Germany

  • 1973–1980s – German Criminal Code provisions against pornography involving minors are introduced and strengthened, banning production and distribution.

  • 1990s–2000s – EU‑driven harmonization and national reforms explicitly criminalize possession of CSAM (including online images).

• 1978: USA

  • 1978 – Child pornography first becomes illegal at the federal level via the Protection of Children Against Sexual Exploitation Act of 1977 (effective 1978), targeting production, sale, and transport.

  • 1980s–1990s – Additional federal statutes criminalize possession and receipt of CSAM, with later clarifications (e.g., PROTECT Act 2003) covering digital and some computer‑generated material.

• 1978: UK

  • 1978 – Protection of Children Act 1978 criminalizes taking, making, distributing, showing, and possessing with intent to distribute “indecent photographs” of children, effectively a national child‑pornography ban.

  • Later acts expand offences and penalties; recent reforms (2020s) start to tackle AI‑optimized CSAM models.

• 1980s: Australia

  • 1980s–1990s – Federal and state laws criminalize child pornography production and distribution.

  • By the late 1990s/early 2000s, possession of CSAM, including digital content, is clearly illegal nationwide.

• 1983: Canada

  • 1983 – Criminal Code amendments explicitly criminalize child pornography (production and distribution).

  • Late 1980s/early 1990s – Possession of child pornography is expressly criminalized, including digital material.

• 1990: Brazil

  • 1990 – Statute of the Child and Adolescent (ECA) bans child pornography (production/distribution).

  • 2008 – Law 11.829 criminalizes possession of child pornography, bringing Brazil into line with international CSAM standards.

• 1996: Russia

  • 1996 – New Criminal Code introduces offences for producing and distributing pornographic materials involving minors.

  • 2000s – Later reforms explicitly criminalize possession and strengthen provisions for online CSAM.

• 1997: China

  • 1997 – Revised Criminal Law criminalizes organizing, producing, duplicating, publishing, and disseminating pornographic material involving minors.

  • Subsequent regulations in the 2000s and 2010s reinforce bans on online CSAM and clarify penalties.

• 2000: India

  • 2000 – Information Technology Act criminalizes publishing or transmitting material depicting children in sexually explicit acts online.

  • 2012–2013 – Amendments (e.g., Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 2013) strengthen bans on using children in pornographic material, expanding offences and penalties.

• 2003: Nigeria

  • 2003 – Child Rights Act, plus later cybercrime legislation, introduce offences related to child sexual exploitation and online child pornography.

• 2007: South Africa

  • 2007 – Criminal Law (Sexual Offences and Related Matters) Amendment Act criminalizes creation, distribution, and possession of child pornography, including electronic images.

Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Simone Collins: Okay. Hello, Malcolm.

[00:00:00] I’m excited to be with you today because today we’re gonna talk about how maybe Europeans are the only people who aren’t kind of into, if you know what I mean, really young people, and that possibly our colonizing, imposing of older ages of marriage onto all the other peoples of the world could be contributing to demographic collapse.

[00:00:22] Because apparently we’re the weirdos in the room. We’re the, the, the outlier.

[00:00:26] Malcolm Collins: Okay, I, I need to go over some stats. So this rabbit hole started with me being like, are Japan... ‘Cause if you look at Japanese not-safe-for-work art it is, has an unusually high rate of phenotypically young-looking women.

[00:00:40] Simone Collins: Yeah.

[00:00:40] Malcolm Collins: If, if you catch my drift. And I started to think, I was like, “Could there be a genetic reason for this?” Right? Like, when did Japanese people get married historically? When would have been their first sexual encounter historically? And as I went through that, I was like Oh, wait a second. Everyone but Europeans got married at these super young ages at a historic level.

[00:01:04] And now this makes sense why you have these super young age marriages in Africa, in the Middle Easterners, right? Like we, we keep seeing this, oh, Aisha is six, nine, et cetera, right? Like, they, they... This would be weird for European. What’s, what may surprise you is that in Europe, even in the Middle Ages, it was very common for women to not get married until their mid-20s.

[00:01:28] Simone Collins: And we’re gonna go into that. We’re gonna go into that ...

[00:01:29] Malcolm Collins: which is very rare for any other culture. But hold on, it gets weirder. Before we go, ‘cause I, I wanna get all the, the fun stuff out of the way. It turns out that Europeans... Remember how I’ve always said that Northern Europeans have weirdly high fertility rates compared to every other group on Earth?

[00:01:44] Well, Nor- Northern Europeans are also genetically unique among all of the ethnicities on Earth, and that we have significantly, like multiple years longer fertility windows. Euro-

[00:01:56] Simone Collins: And we’re gonna go into that too ... pean women go into menopause- Yeah, which people should know about ...

[00:01:59] Malcolm Collins: much later. People should know.

[00:02:01] So when we started to tell other people around the world, “You can’t start being sexual, you know, with-” Yeah,

[00:02:09] Simone Collins: like the appropriate time to start is in your 20s ...

[00:02:12] Malcolm Collins: mid-20s. Yeah. We were actually sniping more than half of many of these groups’ reproductive windows. Mm-hmm. And now we’re seeing fertility rates crash around Latin America.

[00:02:24] We’re seeing fertility rates crash in East Asia. We’re seeing them crash in India, and it could partially be in results of this. But go, go into the data.

[00:02:31] Simone Collins: Yeah. Well, first, some little, here are some of the breadcrumbs that kind of got me to this episode that I think are really fun. Aella just released a Substack post called The Hotness Curve: How Age Changes a Woman’s Appeal, and she used photos of women at various ages.

[00:02:46] Some were AI-generated, some were real, including real photos of her throughout her life and her friends. She asked questions like, “Casual sex. A 200-year-old vampire shows up in your window at night. She wants a one-night stand. There are no consequences and nobody will know. Do you say yes?” And then she says this paired with various photos of women, right?

[00:03:07] So the resulting graph is a little concerning, I guess. You can see it here On WhatsApp.

[00:03:17] What you’ll find and I’ll just read from Aella’s post here. Okay. Aella found that sexual interest climbs very fast and generally hits a crescendo around women who appear to be 24 years old, or 28 years old for older men.

[00:03:31] But 15, and I’m quoting from her Substack article, “15% of men said yes, they would have casual sex with a vampire in the body of 11- an 11-year-old.” Sure. “This rose to a third of men for the body of a 13-year-old, and half of men agreeing to the body of a 15-year-old. By 18, we’re at roughly 70%, and at the time a 24-year-old is hypothetically entering your window, 90% of them were down.”

[00:03:56] I, I was shocked.

[00:03:57] Malcolm Collins: Wait, wait, wait, wait. Hold on. So the midpoint for men is 15? [00:04:00]

[00:04:00] Simone Collins: Yeah, basically. But I mean, I was just shocked that at the age of 11, 15% of men were like, “Yeah.”

[00:04:06] Malcolm Collins: Well, this is actually really fascinating because if this is the actual midpoint of, you know, attractiveness for men-

[00:04:14] Simone Collins: Yeah ...

[00:04:15] Malcolm Collins: the, the way in society that we treat this, right?

[00:04:19] Like, “Oh, you’re aroused by something that looks like that. You must be, like, a wildly deviant individual.”

[00:04:27] Simone Collins: Yeah. “You must be a monster. You must need to be arrested,” et cetera. When

[00:04:30] Malcolm Collins: literally 50% of men... 15 is astonishingly young. For, yeah, but for 11 is yeah,

[00:04:37] Simone Collins: but yeah, 15 as well,

[00:04:38] Malcolm Collins: yes. Yeah, but the, the, I’m going, I’m not going with the tw- the 25% of men. I’m going with the average man. The average man-

[00:04:44] Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah ... is

[00:04:45] Malcolm Collins: 15. And that is the reason why it’s important to, like, make this known to people is because if a guy gets into their head that they’re some absolutely monstrous deviant within one category, then they can begin to engage in monster, the, they begin to excuse other types of monstrously deviant behavior because they’re like, “Well, that’s what I am.

[00:05:09] That’s how I am- Yeah,

[00:05:10] Simone Collins: I’m a monster ... hardwired.” Who cares if I drown a puppy, et cetera? Yeah,

[00:05:14] Malcolm Collins: I’m just a bad guy because-

[00:05:16] Simone Collins: Yeah ...

[00:05:17] Malcolm Collins: yeah. Whereas I think that you can say even if 15 is the average age at which a male may start finding a female form attractive that one, Europeans it’s likely gonna be later, so this is likely held down by, by non-Europeans to some extent.

[00:05:33] Mm-hmm. But, but two it, it’s, it’s, it’s normal, but you don’t act on it, right? Like, there’s- Yeah ... a big difference between something being normal and something being a mandate for you to act on. Mm-hmm. If I can give you, it is normal for me to be aroused by a random woman who walks by. It is bad for me to hold her down and have sex with her simply because I was aroused that she walked by, right?

[00:06:01] Like- For our

[00:06:02] Simone Collins: culture at least, yes.

[00:06:03] Malcolm Collins: No, I’m just saying that the, the, the way that we have in our society drawn these very, very thin lines when it comes to this one category of arousal I think is hugely deleterious and leads to a lot more PDA behavior than we would otherwise see if we categorized it more the way that it’s like, yeah, you can find a woman who’s married to another guy arousing.

[00:06:34] Don’t sleep with her. That’s morally negative and has morally negative externalities for society, right? But anyway, continue.

[00:06:42] Simone Collins: Right. Just a little aside too about the wall, because that’s a fun thing to see what her findings indicated. She wrote, “One interesting thing to note is that the drop-off in affability for women, what we might call the wall, happens for women in their mid-30s, just as predicted, but only in the eyes of men under the age of 25.

[00:07:02] For older men, we find the wall occurs in a woman’s early 40s. Older men assign equivalent ‘Yes, I’d have sex with her’ ratings to an 18-year-old as they did to a woman in her early 50s.” Basically the spread of people who would be interested in both dating or having sex with women at older ages was astonishing per this research.

[00:07:23] You should go check out the actual post. I’m linking to it in my show notes, as I link to everything else I, I was just shocked by the range of, of, of interest in women. I guess older women are better off now than they have been in the past maybe, or they always have been. But also you should play her Guess Their Age game. She vibe coded it. It’s super fun and you can probably beat me because I could only get better than 67% of players.

[00:07:48] I apparently cannot tell people’s age, which is probably good. Also our friend Bruno wrote to us about the e-girl phenomenon. He wrote, “Why does a certain e-girl or internet girl face seem to [00:08:00] resonate so consistently with online audiences across different eras? Highly recognizable women in online subcultures seem to converge around a similar look.

[00:08:07] Why does that look perform

[00:08:09] so well with netizens? Early internet figures like Boxxy, later YouTube personalities like Shoe0nHead, cosplay, and streamer adjacent figures, and then more recent cases like Belle Delphine and the current wave of TikTok cosplay and Twitter X e-girl aesthetics. The most interesting question is why a particular facial and stylistic grammar keeps recurring.

[00:08:28] Large expressive eyes, youthful proportions, softer rounded features, dark hair or bangs, a slightly anime coded presentation, and a mix of cuteness, irony, awkwardness, and sexual ambiguity.” And when I talked about this with Malcolm when we got the email, you’re like

[00:08:45] Malcolm Collins: Because they look like children. Yeah.

[00:08:48] Like Bella Delphine looks like a 15-year-old.

[00:08:50] Simone Collins: Yeah ...

[00:08:50] Malcolm Collins: y- she could easily pass as a 15, w- in, in her, the height of her fame. Boxxy I think was literally 15 at the height of her fame. I

[00:08:58] Speaker: I realize one of the reasons why other people don’t realize this is because they think 15-year-old girls look like lollies, and they don’t. , People think 15-year-old girls look way younger than they actually do. So here I’m gonna put the pictures of the celebrities we’re talking about next to a bunch of pictures of actual real 15-year-old human girls.

[00:09:18] And when you see this, you’ll be like, “Oh, 15-year-old girls look a lot older than I expected.” And it’s like, yeah, they do. And that’s why this is so scary

[00:09:26] Speaker 2: And note, this isn’t me being selective. This is me just choosing all the top images when you look up 15-year-old girl. And I’d go so far now that I’m looking at the images side by side to say that these e-celebs that we’re talking about look slightly younger, than your average 15-year-old girl

[00:09:41] Octavian Collins: think

[00:09:41] Malcolm Collins: so, yeah. Juon Head I don’t think fits into this category. She was never really a thirst trap influencer. But if you look at the various thirst trap influencers CreepyChan fell into this as well.

[00:09:52] Mm. ... like they, they all have the, the phenotypical features that make them look different than Simone. And I’ll put images on screen here so you guys can see. I’m not, I’m not joking about this. They just look very young. Yeah. But either because it was considered okay to thirst after them on the internet during that period, or because they technically weren’t actually 15, like Vampire Girls or whatever, everyone was like, “This is fine.”

[00:10:16] Now again, I actually think it’s really, really bad to stereotype, Like in, in Australia, I don’t know if you know this, but in Australia you actually can’t have pornography where women have too small of breasts because they say that if the woman’s breasts, even if they’re a totally normal above age woman, it is illegal for them to participate in pornography if their breasts are too small.

[00:10:36] So they’ll,

[00:10:36] Simone Collins: like, pull up a thing and be like, “Insufficiently busty,” and then it says online- Yeah,

[00:10:40] Malcolm Collins: because they say it makes them look too young, right? Like-

[00:10:42] Simone Collins: So do erotic actresses have to get boob jobs? Like what happens if you’re interested? By

[00:10:46] Malcolm Collins: the way, have you seen that immensely creepy show about the girl who looks like a, like 12-year-old and who’s dating?

[00:10:55] Simone Collins: No.

[00:10:56] Malcolm Collins: You need to Google this and just watch a clip from this, because I’ll put it here before we go further. I need to call- ‘Cause I need to get your thoughts on the ethics of this. .

[00:11:04] Speaker 3: It’s not worth it. I would just completely ignore them. I try to let it just roll off my shoulders. Hearing Thomas’ views shows me a new perspective and allows me to understand a new perspective. He grew up with this mentality, just pick yourself and get up and do it, and I have a lot of social trauma. So I think he’s definitely a more go-getter, less worried about what people think, and I know what people think

[00:11:29] Speaker 6: I love how we’re like, “Japan, the Japanese, so gross.” They’re like, “Oh, she the 300-year-old vampire, so it’s okay.” Meanwhile, middle-aged moms watching TLC

[00:11:41] Speaker 8: And then fertility and where we go from there, I think the best option for you would be to get you established with an OBGYN- Hmm ... who can kinda dig into safely carrying a child, and would you be able to do it to term, and all of that.

[00:11:53] Simone Collins: What?

[00:11:54] Malcolm Collins: Look, look up a clip of this

[00:11:55] Simone Collins: show. Oh, no. She looks like a child. No. [00:12:00] Oh, TLC, of course. Of, oh, great. Of course. It’s TLC. Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Okay. I’ve seen, I’ve seen enough.

[00:12:10] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, I, th- then so I’m in this range where I’m like, if you look like 15 in the way that like Bella Delphine does or whatever, right, you know-

[00:12:19] Simone Collins: Yeah

[00:12:19] Malcolm Collins: I’m like, whatever with that. I’m like, I get it, you know, whatever. Right. With this girl and this show, I’m like, even if she’s technically a 300-year-old vampire, like, we need to have a conversation about this because she’s she’s like 27, by the way, Simone.

[00:12:37] Simone Collins: Okay.

[00:12:38] Malcolm Collins: Sure she is. She has a very rare disorder that caused her to look-

[00:12:41] Simone Collins: No, I know.

[00:12:42] I know. TLC is, it’s, it’s the dwarves and it’s the, yeah, it’s,

[00:12:46] Malcolm Collins: it’s all the, it’s, it’s the freak show people on Earth. But then should she never be able to have a... Hold on. I’m actually thinking through this. Should she never be able to have a sex life because,

[00:12:52] Simone Collins: you know- She should. Man, the, the whole point you make in The Pragmatist’s Guide to Sexuality is if you have a thing that some people’s kink or arousal pathway, whatever, like if for example you are obese, you should go after chubby chasers who are way out of your

[00:13:06] Malcolm Collins: league.

[00:13:06] So you’re basically saying that’s one PDA file off the streets.

[00:13:09] Simone Collins: She could get a very high value ‘cause like she’s not a supermodel looks-wise, right? She may not be like the world’s smartest person. She may not be a billionaire. But she could probably find a man who’s way out of her league on one of those measures or multiple because he’s super into...

[00:13:23] Yeah,

[00:13:27] Malcolm Collins: I mean, like the reason why it’s bad, and we’ve pointed this out before, it’s, is not due to consent. This isn’t why underage stuff is, is bad. It’s because it has negative developmental effects. The reason I point out it’s not due to consent is nobody cares when two, like, mentally disabled people have sex.

[00:13:43] Nobody cares when a super elderly person has sex. But like when we’re talking about a 15, 16-year-old who’s almost certainly smarter than most people in their like late 90s or something like that.

[00:13:53] Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah.

[00:13:53] Malcolm Collins: And it’s because of the negative developmental effects. But I think one of the things that I’m realizing is are those negative developmental effects the same for non-Europeans as they are for Europeans?

[00:14:04] Simone Collins: That’s a really good question. I did not think to look at birth complications or pregnancy complications for non-European teenagers. And by

[00:14:13] Malcolm Collins: the way, the next time I’m talking, make sure you look up the average age for Jews historically, ‘cause I wanna see if they went with the European standard or they went with- Oh

[00:14:19] the non-European standard. But like This is one of these interesting fields to talk about, or I find it to be interesting to talk about because there is so much just, like, reflective and reactive signaling around this stuff where individuals attempt to show that they are, Like, just y- y- to, to, to shout at someone, to clown on someone, to yell at someone, to, you know, whatever.

[00:14:51] And it’s, it’s super unproductive because a lot of the fight is not where it should be. Like, consider the leftist activists, right, who constantly badger, like, anime companies, but do nothing about the immigrant communities where this is normalized, right? Like we’ve pointed out countless times, the religious court in Pakistan made a hearing, this is the primary religious court of the country that it was Islamophobic to raise the age of marriage from, I think, nine.

[00:15:20] Like, how dare you? But this is normal in those countries and, and if you actually cared about this, that’s what you would be targeting and not anime that actually, Now, we can argue whether it leads to radicalizing people in this direction. Mm. Even if it does lead to radicalizing people in this direction, the number of, like, standard Westerners who ever get radicalized in this direction is so dwarfed by where this is happening outside of the West.

[00:15:51] But then you have to ask is it even bad where it’s happening outside the West? Because maybe they’re, like, genetically built for... But anyway, what’d you find about the Jews?

[00:15:57] Simone Collins: So, for per [00:16:00] European standards of when marriages took place, it looks like pre-1800s, which is what I looked at for the other groups many Jewish communities married what was considered way younger than most of them.

[00:16:11] Like, in their teens. So that is interesting. They were, like, the weird outliers in Europe at the time, I guess. Well, now- Probably among other groups ...

[00:16:22] Malcolm Collins: now, now hold on. Hold on. Does this explain the Epstein networks?

[00:16:28] Simone Collins: Oh, no. Stop. No. Malcolm. Mm, we’re just gonna, we’re gonna skate right over that. No, we’re gonna skate right over this one.

[00:16:38] And whatever you wanna say, you can save it for the comments. All right? Uh-uh. You can find whatever code word you wanna use for Epstein this time. Let’s just talk about it there. I’ll start by, this is actually something another friend of ours told me, or, like, mentioned in, in a text conversation, and I just had no idea.

[00:16:53] And she’s like, “Well, you understand that non-European women have earlier onset menopause. Like, their fertility window is way shorter, and people should really talk to them about this.” And I had no idea. And then I look it up, and the estimated global mean age at, of menopause is only 48.8. But for Europe, it’s around 50.5 years.

[00:17:17] In Asia, it’s 48.8.. In Africa it’s 48.4 years. In Latin America it’s 47.2 years, and in the Middle East it’s 47.4 years. 47, like that, 47 versus 50 is, is very significant. I- I had no idea, and also it’s, it’s crazy that we’re not telling people this, but the f- when you look at this in comparison to the average ages of marriage pre-1800 across different parts of the world, it kind of makes sense that fertility windows

[00:17:49] Malcolm Collins: got pushed back for Europeans.

[00:17:49] Well, and mostly Europeans have had a strong genetic pressure for a- Yeah ... very long time-

[00:17:54] Simone Collins: Yeah ...

[00:17:55] Malcolm Collins: for higher fertility windows.

[00:17:56] Simone Collins: Because of norms around marriage. In England pre-1800, the typical arage, marriage ar- we’ll say average female age at first marriage. Keep in mind, this is average, right? This is not, you know, there are lots of younger than this.

[00:18:10] But average was 22 to 26, which is kind of what modern society has rested at now, right? And maybe that’s because- Mm ... of colonialism and, and the influence of European and especially English culture, but it’s 22 to 26 pre-1800s. In Western and Northern Europe it was a little bit lower. It was 20 to 25.

[00:18:29] And in China, by comparison, it’s 14 to 18 average. India, 12 to 16. Japan, 17 to 19. Korea, 16 to 18. I, I checked about, like Aztec, 14 to 17. Maya, 16 to 19. And then in Sub-Saharan Africa, 15 to 18. So when you look at these earlier onsets of menopause, they kind of track pretty well to historical marriage patterns, and I think that kind of helps to make sense.

[00:19:02] Now y- when you look also at, I, one thing I decided to look at, and I’m sending you a graph of this so that you can look at it more visually. But I looked at the ages of consent today in the highest population countries, though this, the global map that I sent to you from d- Our Data Is Beautiful is also just everything.

[00:19:20] But the age of consent in Pakistan, do you know what it is?

[00:19:25] Malcolm Collins: What, what’s the age of consent in Pakistan?

[00:19:27] Simone Collins: It’s 18.

[00:19:30] Malcolm Collins: Oof.

[00:19:31] Simone Collins: I know. I was like, “Wait a second. How? Why?” And no, like actually, so there’s this Child Marriage Act of 1929- Oh ... that originally set the minimum age at, at 18 for males and 16 for females Okay, I,

[00:19:42] Malcolm Collins: I, I, by the way, take it back.

[00:19:44] Younger Siwan head definitely looks 15.

[00:19:46] Simone Collins: Okay. I’ll let it go. All of

[00:19:47] Malcolm Collins: these girls look

[00:19:48] Simone Collins: 15. I, I think she still looks super young. And I think she said she was in her mid-30s. Oops. I think she also just has, like, a phenotypically young-looking face.

[00:19:56] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, she has a phenotypically- But yeah ... that’s what it is.

[00:19:58] That’s, that’s... Guys are like, [00:20:00] “There’s this certain type of girl that I’m really into.” And it’s like, I hate to tell you this, brother, but that, that look is the look of a teenager

[00:20:10] Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah. Long story short with Pakistan, basically, they have a lot of different laws and efforts. There’s the 1929 Child Marriage Restraint Act.

[00:20:21] There’s the Child Marriage Restraint Act in a different province. They’re like in, in Sindh province, in Islamabad Capital Territory, in Balochistan, in Punjab, in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. India has a

[00:20:35] Malcolm Collins: super old first age of marriage.

[00:20:37] Simone Collins: Yeah, no, they, yeah, they, they’re very, like they have... what’s weird is when I was like, wait, but h- how long has it been 18?

[00:20:44] ‘Cause we keep hearing about these really young marriages in Pakistan. Like, all these laws show up. And then I, I, I dug a little deeper and it’s kind of like, well, they have all these laws because people keep marrying kids super young. Like, the laws are there ‘cause they’re like, “No, no, no stop. But like, actually stop.

[00:20:59] Can we...” They’re like, “For, super for real this time, guys. Like, let’s do

[00:21:03] Malcolm Collins: this.” But I mean, throughout Africa, Africa’s the place where it’s Africa and Indonesia where you see the 11 average age.

[00:21:10] Simone Collins: Yeah. But I mean, still UNICEF, for example, reports that around 18% of women age 20 to 24 in Pakistan were married before 18.

[00:21:19] So it’s, it’s, yeah, but you’re right. Pakistan’s not the worst. Anyway, that surprised me. Other, other ages of consent. So India’s also high at 18, Indonesia 18, Nigeria 18, Japan 18, Ethiopia, Egypt, Democratic Republic of Congo, Türkiye. United States is actually a little different. Some of our states go as low as 16, I think.

[00:21:41] In the Philippines it’s 16 in general. Iran 15 to 18, Thailand 15 to 18, France 15 Germany 14 to 16. So go Germans. But I kinda think, like, it’s so normatively weird for Germans. They’d be like, “Well, but of course we don’t need the rule because we would never. We’re German.” In Bangladesh 14 to 16, Italy 14 to 16, in Mexico it’s 12 to 18, it varies by the state.

[00:22:07] Russia is 16, Vietnam is 16, United Kingdom 16, South Africa 16, South Korea 16, China and Brazil are both 14. So China’s still super low, which is wild. But you had mentioned this to me and I thought it was insane that Japan only criminalized possession of, we’ll call it CSAM involving real children in 2014.

[00:22:32] Though it should be noted that the law explicitly excludes manga, anime, and computer-generated imagery, and I just love Japan for being so Japan on that front.

[00:22:43] Malcolm Collins: So Japan.

[00:22:44] Simone Collins: Yeah, they’re like- I- But not the mang- I mean, not the manga.

[00:22:47] Malcolm Collins: That would outlaw- A little bit ... like, more than half of anime, right?

[00:22:50] Simone Collins: I know, they would, yeah, they would, like, destroy the entire anime industry if they were to, like, actually follow through with that.

[00:22:57] Yeah. So I totally understand, But

[00:23:00] Malcolm Collins: again, we need to, in America, understand that Japanese males and females are genetically and sociologically different from us.

[00:23:09] Simone Collins: Yeah, historically- Like, it- ... they married a lot younger. Their fertility window ends sooner. They, they need to marry younger, and now that they live in a culture where marriage is severely delayed, they’re gonna see a bigger hit from that.

[00:23:21] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. I mean, I personally will be encouraging my kids to date from, to marry starting probably around 16 to 17. I think that’s when you start dating and learning to date with the intention of eventually marrying.

[00:23:35] Simone Collins: Yeah, we’re gonna have to work on them with this because Octavian just picked up At More Birth’s report that’s been sitting around our house.

[00:23:42] Yeah. And started leafing through it, and he was looking at this graph of average age of first marriage- ... over time.

[00:23:49] Malcolm Collins: Mm-hmm.

[00:23:50] Simone Collins: And I asked him how old he wanted to be when he got married, and at first he’s like, “Mm, 40?” And I’m like, “Really?” And he’s like, “Okay, maybe when I’m, like, a teenager.” And I’m like, “Oh, [00:24:00] okay, so like 18?”

[00:24:00] He’s like, “No, like a hun- 100.” So I don’t know where he’s at. We need to be like, “This is the right age. After this, you gotta worry.”

[00:24:09] Malcolm Collins: Well, we used to get this. Princesses, like Disney princesses, actually look this up, look up the ages of various famous Disney princesses. Wait, hold on. Let

[00:24:16] Simone Collins: me get my phone.

[00:24:16] Malcolm Collins: But they’re often quite young for when they, they, they got married.

[00:24:20] And I think that normalizing that, normalizing not the Hallmark wedding of the divorce or whatever, but the I’m gonna get married when I’m... What, what are the ages- ... of the Disney princesses?

[00:24:33] Simone Collins: Snow White is 14.

[00:24:35] Malcolm Collins: Yeah. That’s

[00:24:36] Simone Collins: what we need- Jasmine is 15. Aurora is 16. Ariel is 16. Mulan is 16. Hey, legal in the UK.

[00:24:43] Merida from Brave, 16. Moana, 16. Belle, usually treated as 17 years old, though sources vary between 17 and 18. Now, hold on. Pocahontas is 18. Do you want me to play a little

[00:24:55] Malcolm Collins: fun game? Rapunzel, 18. Now look up the ages of their partners in each of those movies.

[00:25:03] Simone Collins: Okay. I mean, obviously because the men are just so unimportant in most of these, especially early movies, it’s hard to tell. But so Snow White, 14. Prince Florian, 18 to 31. So either-

[00:25:19] Malcolm Collins: 18 to 31 with a 14-year-old ...

[00:25:21] Simone Collins: is that, let’s see. So the half plus seven rule, that’s seven pl- s- the half, yeah, seven- No,

[00:25:26] Malcolm Collins: no, keep going.

[00:25:27] Just go. Just

[00:25:28] Simone Collins: go ... okay. Yeah, anyway ... keep going ... the, the half plus seven rule is my, my... Okay. Cinderella’s 19. Prince Charming, 21. Appropriate. That’s a two-year age gap. Aurora and Prince Phillip in Sleeping Beauty 16 versus 20, four-year age gap. Ariel- ... and Prince Eric, she’s 16, he’s 18 to 19. Where is the biggest gap here?

[00:25:47] The biggest ga- oh, it’s Rapunzel and Flynn. Because she’s 18 and he’s 26. That’s eight years.

[00:25:55] Malcolm Collins: But she’s older- That’s, that’s not too bad ... so it’s okay. What about the, the Muslim one? Wh- what about the, the-

[00:26:00] Simone Collins: Oh well, come on. The, the street urchin? J- that’s plus three years. She’s 15 and he’s 18.

[00:26:06] Malcolm Collins: That’s, that’s

[00:26:08] Simone Collins: a very normal marriage for that region ... but Pocahontas and John Smith is, is less clear. It is, it is e- it is between two or nine years. But- So that is unclear ...

[00:26:17] Malcolm Collins: getting women excited about marrying in their teens, I think is where we need to be as a culture again.

[00:26:22] Simone Collins: Oh, boy. Yeah. Yeah. I, yeah. W- but when, and we, I guess we have to get over this European Puritanical view shaming teen marriage.

[00:26:33] And you can actually really see it in, in where various countries instituted CSAM laws basically being like, “Young looking people, no good in images. Stop.” You c- the first, all the first countries to start this are Western. All the last countries to institute these laws, not Western. So we start with 1973 in Germany, 1978 in the USA and UK, 1980s in Australia ‘83 for Canada, 1990 for Brazil.

[00:27:03] That’s our first non-super Western country, even though Brazil’s pretty Western. 1996 Russia, 1997 China, 2000 India, 2003 Nigeria,

[00:27:14] 2007 South Africa. Like the re- Wait. Wait,

[00:27:17] Malcolm Collins: what, what is this, what is this when?

[00:27:18] Simone Collins: This is when CSAM laws were instituted, when, when, when it wasn’t okay to create or possess the, the stuff that you’re not allowed to create or possess the, the bad, the images Very

[00:27:32] Malcolm Collins: recently in most of these non-Western countries.

[00:27:34] Simone Collins: Right? Yeah. And, and Japan’s the worst, of course with the- unique

[00:27:38] Malcolm Collins: case there ...

[00:27:39] Simone Collins: really dragging their feet. But n- but not for, not for anime and manga. It’s okay. Don’t worry about it. It’s gonna be okay. Your manga... God, what was that anime where, like, the- The succubus looks like she’s a child

[00:27:55] Malcolm Collins: No- Naomi or whatever I told you about.

[00:27:58] The w- yeah, where she, like, actually looks like a [00:28:00] child a child, and she can only survive by drinking-

[00:28:04] Simone Collins: Things ...

[00:28:04] Malcolm Collins: ex- things. And- Oh my God ... the whole thing’s supposed to be... Oh, hold on. R- remember I said it’s a show about being a father, right? Like, that’s, that’s the, the- Oh, yeah. Yes I had forgotten that the main character is actually literally her father, but he’s 14.

[00:28:23] Simone Collins: This is worse than that anime who, like, the guy’s hand was just a girl one morning. Remember that? Just like- I did look that up. A girl

[00:28:32] Octavian Collins: That’s ridiculous. That’s a girl.

[00:28:34] Simone Collins: Japan’s the best. Who thinks of these things? There’s like-

[00:28:38] Malcolm Collins: When I was on Linkfest streams, the, the, the manga where a guy’s willy became a girl, right?

[00:28:43] Like, th- that’s, like, the whole manga People said it was funny. I don’t know. I, I, I don’t know why- I

[00:28:50] Simone Collins: mean, it would be, I think. Yeah, I don’t Yeah, they just have to, like, find the weirdest people in the country, and they’re like, “You, you’re hired. Write a manga.” I like it. Anyway, this- The

[00:29:03] Malcolm Collins: weirdest people ...

[00:29:04] Simone Collins: this has changed.

[00:29:05] I mean, I, I, I, I’ve been having a conversation with, with someone, and w- we’ve talked about things like teen marriage, and just the, the stigma that we have around, for example, even getting married in college. You know, people see it as really weird, and I think a lot of people even who are very pronatalist who understand that it’s an issue that people are putting off marriage would be kind of weirded out by the idea of their son or daughter getting married right out of high school or in college.

[00:29:30] I,

[00:29:30] Malcolm Collins: by the way, would not, and when our kids start dating and when I start trying to do arranged marriage for them, I think the appropriate age for a kid to get married is, perfect age is probably 19 or 20.

[00:29:42] Simone Collins: Yeah, and at that age, too, the young couple can, if they need to, like while they’re still getting their footing, live at our house.

[00:29:49] You know, like, live with the parents if, if they help out and everything. Like, it, it’s such an easier way to start your life. Build savings, you know, while you’re young enough to- And if

[00:29:57] Malcolm Collins: we start having kids at that age, we just take care of the kids.

[00:30:00] Simone Collins: Exactly. It’s, it’s the smartest thing. And guess what?

[00:30:03] That, that is actually what my parents did. When my parents came back from Japan with me, for a while they lived at my dad’s parents’ house. And th- this is, this is a very normative thing. Like, the reason we had baby showers wasn’t because people wanted some bougie party that cost $10,000. It was because this was a young 20-year-old couple right out of high school, and they didn’t have money to buy diapers, and so people chipped in and bought them diapers and, like, t- taught them baby things and whatnot.

[00:30:32] Like, there’s a reason for these traditions. The same for bridal showers. It was that, oh, this is a new couple. And wedding gifts. You bought them silverware because they hoped to buy a house together and get silverware, not like they were already 30 and living in an apartment and they owned everything they’d ever need in their life.

[00:30:48] Anyway, apparently we just need to get over the fact that, Everyone else likes young girls especially. This is... We’re the weird ones.

[00:30:58] Malcolm Collins: We’re the weird ones- That’s all. Yeah ... for thinking that this is not cool?

[00:31:02] Simone Collins: Yeah. This, well, this has significantly changed my views. Like, the, in, in, in, in, in a am I the asshole situation, we Europeans are the asshole.

[00:31:11] We’re sorry. This was our mistake. Bring back teen marriage, bring back my Big Fat Gypsy Wedding, bring back teen pregnancy. We were wrong. We are prudish m- procrastinating Europeans. And also, if you are not of European ancestry, please adjust your childbearing years accordingly because who knew?

[00:31:39] I didn’t know. I hope everyone else

[00:33:56] knows this, but I don’t think they do. Anyway, I love you, Malcolm.

[00:33:59] Malcolm Collins: I love you too. Have a good time. This was a, a really interesting what, there was something I was gonna- About Japan or something. Now we’re just all of these other groups. I mean, what’s, what’s your takeaway on all of this in regards to the way we as a society...

[00:34:16] I mean, I just think that some groups were never really designed, or not designed, but, like, cultures are different in a way where some may genuinely not be, be compatible. And this is one of those areas wh- fascinatingly that, that Europeans may have psy-oped the rest of the world into eradicating themselves.

[00:34:38] Simone Collins: Hmm. Oh, yeah, I mean, you did an, an episode once on are some countries just not compatible with democracy. Apparently some countries are just not compatible with later onset marriage for example.

[00:34:48] Malcolm Collins: Yeah.

[00:34:49] Simone Collins: So yeah, I, I, I think you’re onto something there. Are we becoming skeptical of the benefits of colonialism?

[00:34:55] I don’t know.

[00:34:56] Malcolm Collins: Well, I mean, we, we just need to colonize them harder until, you know-

[00:35:01] Simone Collins: Until their fertility windows are moved, but we will force them back. It’s fine.

[00:35:05] Malcolm Collins: Colonize me harder, Daddy.

[00:35:07] Simone Collins: Yeah. It’s, it... You’ll like it. Don’t worry.

[00:35:10] Malcolm Collins: You’ll like it. You’ll like it at the end of the day. Come on.

[00:35:14] Simone Collins: Okay.

[00:35:14] Malcolm Collins: They, they, r- I mean, there’s been countries that have asked to be colonized in the past.

[00:35:19] Simone Collins: Yeah. And were there some countries that asked for their colonizing forces to not go?

[00:35:24] Malcolm Collins: Yeah, yeah. Like, the, the idea that, like, colonization was this like a universal negative is as, you know, i- it’s, it’s like, do some people in America not like the US government?

[00:35:36] Yes, a big chunk. You can get people to protest, but a lot of them like it as well.

[00:35:40] Speaker 5: There’s a great quote from an Indian under the early stages of occupation, , and they asked him like, “What, what do you think of occupation? What do you think of having to pay taxes to the British government?” And he was like ecstatic about it. He’s like, “, now with the British government, every year a taxpayer comes around once.

[00:35:56] It used to be every year all of the local [00:36:00] warlords sent taxpayers to my house.” , So basically the idea is that before the British came in, there was a bunch of overlapping regions that might have power, or at least the power to force you to give them money, and they’d all send , , tax collectors to you, , at least within this region of India.

[00:36:14] And he was, , he felt so out from under , , the burden of that under the British system. We act like everyone was saints before the colonial system came in, but in a lot of these regions, the people were, , comically cruel compared to what the West did

[00:36:29] Speaker 9: Again, if we’re talking about India here, you can look at the practice of sati, where they would burn a wife alive when her husband died. , And there’s the famous case of the English general who’s, , working with Indian troops, and they start to build a pyre to burn a woman alive because her husband had died.

[00:36:47] And he looks at them and he goes, “, don’t do that.” And they’re like, “What? We’re your allies. This is our practice.” And he goes, “Well, okay then, , we have a practice in Britain, and when men burn a woman alive, we hang them. So I’ll just set up the gallows right here, and as soon as you’re done with this fire, we can hang all of you.”

[00:37:05] , And they’re like, “Oh, okay, okay. I guess we won’t do this.” But, , , the reality , is that a lot of these places were far more cruel and brutal than is portrayed in, in the common narrative today

[00:37:15]

[00:37:15] Speaker 10: And note here, this isn’t just in the words of the quote-unquote colonizers who were recording this. One of, like, the big moments I remember from childhood is we were reading this book called Things Fall Apart, which was supposed to be about how bad the colonization of Nigeria was, and there’s this scene where they take a baby and they leave it to slowly die alone in the woods simply because it was a twin, and they believed twins were evil.

[00:37:42] And the complaint was that the Europeans wanted to stop this practice. And I remember, like, looking around in the woods, , the room and being like, “Wait, so, like, w- like, th- uh, like, everyone else here thinks this was a bad thing that we stopped this?” , The level of horrors of things that we stopped through colonization are almost unspeakable in many of these regions

[00:38:07] Speaker 11: And I say this as someone who has a British background because my own ancestors before they were colonized from Rome practiced human sacrifice regularly, practiced the sacrifice of children regularly. They would bury them under bridges to like keep them from collapsing or something. , They f- monstrous, monstrous stuff.

[00:38:26] , Before colonization we were all animals

[00:38:28] Simone Collins: Well, and I think that’s kind of what China was trying to sell with the Belt and Road Initiative. They’re like, “Don’t you wanna be colonized? Wouldn’t you like me to build some infrastructure for you? Let’s do this.” I- it’s, it’s colonizing 2.0 with different branding.

[00:38:41] So I agree with you. Yeah, I see it. Okay, bye.

[00:38:45] Malcolm Collins: Bye.

[00:38:48] Whoa, I didn’t ask you to bring it and fill it, but thank you. Octavian, come here. Come here. We’re gonna say happy birthday.

[00:38:54] Simone Collins: I gave you 2% milk. That’s really nice of you. Oh, Octavian, that’s

[00:38:55] Malcolm Collins: so nice. Did you spill any? Did you make a mess?

[00:38:58] Simone Collins: No.

[00:38:59] Malcolm Collins: Okay,

[00:38:59] Simone Collins: by the way, I don’t know if you saw. Did you see the basically, like, lore encyclopedia that’s super interactive and full of fun, like, games and cool elements that Leaflet built?

[00:39:10] Malcolm Collins: No.

[00:39:12] Simone Collins: Oh my gosh, it’s amazing. I have to send you a link. Did you

[00:39:14] Malcolm Collins: share it with me?

[00:39:16] Simone Collins: Yeah no. I, I didn’t share it with you. I just learned about it. It’s at clyo.angelsword.com. I’m sending it to you.

[00:39:23] Malcolm Collins: It’s- Is this the one where she has, like, the cartridges that you can put in, or are you talking about something else?

[00:39:27] Simone Collins: There is a, there’s a combat training game. There’s a library with books to go through. There... Y- you basically get to explore the lore and learn about the RPG, but in a very immersive, interactive, game-like way. Not even game-like. It, as a game. Like, it’s- So

[00:39:43] Malcolm Collins: do you wanna hear the crazy thing-

[00:39:44] I think it should be ready to go live tomorrow, which I’m absolutely shocked about. But it is a new standalone app that you can download for free on RFAB. And what it does is it, for reasons, like if you [00:40:00] ever had a reason to do this, but in terms of the type of- Who

[00:40:02] Simone Collins: knows why?

[00:40:03] Malcolm Collins: Image generation- I don’t know why ... and video generation on RFAB you can open, like, a collection of images or videos, and then it auto-sizes them to the size of the app’s screen and puts them in order. So, you don’t, like... You can say, like, “Oh, I want five images open on my screen,” and it will automatically size them to use maximum screen real estate.

[00:40:25] Oh ... and the thing that I’m still working on is dragging and dropping one folder of this into another folder of this so it’s even, the UI is even easier. Okay. But it also works with clicking on opening images or videos, and that it will auto open them in a very lightweight screen that’s very easy to both resize, but also that, like, doesn’t, like, it- If you’re using, like, VLC, it, like, puts the title in front of it and stuff like that.

[00:40:49] Yeah. And it doesn’t auto loop, and it’s very annoying if you’re creating AI videos. But no, this is all handled automatically by this system.

[00:40:56] Speaker 12: Basically, this is a totally free app that you can download from the, , image generation page or the page that allows you to search every not safe for work database at the same time, , from that link up there. And, , if you set it to your default viewer, uh, you can just drop any additional image into the, , another image, and it will equally space them in relation to each other, as well as some other quality of life features

[00:41:21] Malcolm Collins: And then it does other useful things that you might run into with RFAB, like, if you’re using the not safe for work image search feature, because it allows you to download zips from various websites- Okay

[00:41:30] You can get, like, an entire folder full of zips, and now this has a feature that automatically unzips them all and can automatically take them all out of their subfolders if you want them all in the, the parent folder. Now it’s being-

[00:41:40] Simone Collins: This just sounds like it’s for a very specific type of person.

[00:41:42] Malcolm Collins: It’s being... Chud, Chud backs it. Yeah, it’s, it’s being built right now. But it’s getting close. Like, like, like, it’ll be improved because I just started working on it today, but at a base level it works right now.

[00:41:54] Simone Collins: Okay. Wow.

[00:41:56] Malcolm Collins: But, Wow ... yeah. Well, I’d say if, if you... I mean, even, it even has, like, normal safe for work uses.

[00:42:03] Like, if you’re just doing a lot of like image creation and you want to go through tons of images at once it’s a really intuitive way to do that that’s incredibly lightweight. Okay. Now, right now it’s only for Windows because I have to send it to Simone if we wanna make a Mac version. So if people want a Mac version you can let me know

[00:42:22] Simone Collins: Thanks.

[00:42:22] I don’t know, Macs are more used by women. Women are less likely to want this use.

[00:42:27] Malcolm Collins: Well, yeah. I know it’s only th- th- those are women things.

[00:42:31] Simone Collins: Yeah, I feel like the, the overlap between the type of, let’s just say it, guy who wants to use this and their, like, computer use, like, they’re gonna use gaming PCs.

[00:42:41] They’re, they’re not gonna be idiots who use Macs like me. Sorry. But yes. No, I mean, anyway, it sounds really cool. I will-

[00:42:49] Malcolm Collins: Oh, and I, I hugely improved the not safe for work video generation feature to the point where it’s basically unrec- Well, because the problem that I realized I had is the text to video was not using not safe for work CDance, which is the best if you want to describe a scene.

[00:43:05] And now it works really well for scene descriptions.

[00:43:09] Simone Collins: Huh. Interesting

[00:43:14] I’m gonna have to- And,

[00:43:14] Malcolm Collins: and you can generate quite long videos, like 15 seconds

[00:43:17] Simone Collins: I need to do video generation on this. Okay. Well, I’m excited to do that then. But for now I will, I will kick us off. Okay. Ready? Yeah?

[00:43:29] Speaker 13: I know which one it is. It feels so much better than having one. I’ll tell you, just like this little herd. You’re gonna be with me, Toasty? Aw, thanks. It’s texting me Do I like frogs? Yeah, frogs are super cool.

[00:43:57] Speaker 14: Yeah, see that’s why you were gonna give me a frog question. Oh, yeah. [00:44:00] ‘Cause I like frogs. Yeah. We’ll give it to you if you eat your food, Toasty. Yeah, Toasty. Okay. ‘Cause we want you to grow big and strong, right, buddy? Look at that

The Collinses argue these articles reveal deep cultural elite contempt for actual fathers and promote unsustainable, self-indulgent views of parenting that prioritize personal identity and emotional affirmation over duty, sacrifice, and long-term human thriving. They explain why pronatalist, traditional approaches to masculinity and fatherhood will inherit the future while progressive narratives collapse under their own contradictions.

Expect sharp cultural analysis, personal parenting stories, and a direct challenge to the mainstream media’s attempt to gaslight men about what fatherhood really is.

Show Notes

@AlexBerenson wrote:

Cannot make this up, either.

@nytimes opinion has had four recent pieces about fatherhood and masculinity, with six authors:

Three women

A trans “man”

Two childless men

Not one father. The cultural elite contempt for dads runs so deep we don’t even get to speak for ourselves.

The four pieces appear to be these recent New York Times Opinion items on fatherhood/masculinity:

1. “To My Daughter, My Gender Was Never Complicated” (guest essay in comic-strip form, by Zach Ellams, a trans-identifying parent writing about being a “trans dad” and fatherhood).

2. “The Most Important Way That Fatherhood Has Changed” (Father’s Day–timed essay on changing perspectives on fatherhood).

3. “This Masculinity Influencer Is Loud and Wrong About Paternity Leave” (criticizing a male influencer’s stance on paternity leave and broader masculinity issues).

4. “The New Right’s Very Old Vision of Men” (Opinion video/transcript focusing on men, masculinity and the New Right, featuring journalist Helen Lewis).

“To My Daughter, My Gender Was Never Complicated”

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/21/opinion/trans-dad-parenting-fathers-day.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/21/opinion/trans-dad-parenting-fathers-day.html?unlocked_article_code=1.r1A.oWDB.tcG4utZreGgZ&smid=url-share

This shows a series of cartoon panels about a trans father who underwent surgery at 18 and has lived as a father of a daughter, mostly quite out, for some time.

It’s about how he found self acceptance through parenting (and I love that, because I—Simone—have also experienced that and can totally relate)

The panels include things like:

• His daughter yelling: “HOW DID YOU GROW A MUSTACHE IF YOU WERE A LADY?” at a public school

• His daughter asking about a pre-transition picture of him in an album and asking:

  • “Who’s that?”

  • “It’s me”

  • “Oh. You look cool.”

  • “Then or now?”

  • “Then.”

• Him worrying about his daughter outing him at school

  • “I don’t actually tell everyone I’m trans. I save that for special people”

  • Eventually she outs him, saying she wants to grow a beard when she grows up, and when told she can’t, insisting she can because her dad did and he was a girl.

• Her various sick burns

  • “You’re slow because you’re old!”

  • “Maybe I’ll be like you when I grow up” // “Yeah?” // “Yeah. Really short.”

The Backlash:

• @realBrandonGill: “On Father’s Day, the New York Times decided to promote a cartoon of a woman cosplaying as a father. And they did it for a reason. Because the cultural left knows that the first step to conquering the future is brainwashing the minds of our children— and they’ve realized that strong fathers are the biggest obstacle to that goal. They want to tear the institution of fatherhood down to nothing because, to the left, things that are normal, good, and holy are a threat to their marxist revolution.”

• Matt Taibbi: “Today’s NYT editorial on Father’s Day is an all-timer. Again, don’t know where to put it on the funny-vs-horrifying axis:”

• @EndWokeness: “The New York Times on Father’s Day. We do not hate the media enough.”

• Caitlin Flanagan: “The child’s job was to help the parent feel comfortable with his gender.”

• @AfterTheReset: “Message aside, is it necessary for the cartoons to be ugly, poorly drawn, and unappealing?”

Is this an affront to father’s day?

• Sort of

  • Mother’s Day in the modern U.S. sense was founded by Anna Maria Jarvis in the early 1900s to create a solemn “memorial mothers day” honoring the sacrifices and care of individual mothers, inspired directly by her own mother Ann Reeves Jarvis’s wish for such a day and by Ann’s community health and reconciliation work.

    • Anna’s drive was rooted in her mother Ann Reeves Jarvis’s work: Ann had organized “Mothers’ Day Work Clubs” in the 1850s to improve sanitation and reduce infant mortality, and later “Mother’s Friendship Day” events to heal divisions between Union and Confederate families after the Civil War. Ann also expressed in a Sunday school prayer that she hoped someone would someday establish a “memorial mothers day” for the “matchless service” mothers render to humanity, a line Anna took as her guiding mission

      • In the U.S., Father’s Day is generally credited to Sonora Smart Dodd of Spokane, Washington, who proposed the holiday in 1909 after hearing a church sermon about Anna Jarvis’s newly established Mother’s Day. (her civil war veteran dad raised her and her siblings alone after her mother died).

• I find this really relatable as a parent

• Many of us have peculiarities and a story about how parenting helps with acceptance and getting someone out of their heads is actually really good

  • In fact, these panels even demonstrate how the author’s daughter gets him to stop overthinking things

    • There’s a panel where she’s like: “I spot something that starts with T!”

    • And all he can think of is “trans”

    • And he’s like: Termite? Turtleneck? Tiny morsel of wood?”

    • And his daughter is like: “TREES.”

“The Most Important Way That Fatherhood Has Changed”

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/15/opinion/fathers-day-fatherhood.html

https://archive.is/Gn93j

In this, Frank Bruni, a (childless) contributing opinion writer who has been on staff at the time for over 25 years, talks about how fatherhood has changed between his dad and his brother’s generations (his brother has three kids in their 20s)

He talks about fathers spending more time with their kids now an cites an article suggesting one reason fertility is lower is that men want to give the kids they do have more attention.

In short, he says modern fatherhood is high effort, high investment, and he says that’s good.

He sort of misses that the investment now isn’t in empowering kids but rather indulging them, and he provides a good example: “Mark encouraged his children to let him in by inviting them to understand him. He made sure that they met and mingled with his adult friends and thus observed how he tended relationships and what they meant to him. He also showed his children his passions.

“I took Frank to a Grateful Dead concert when he was 12,” Mark told me, referring to his oldest son, who, like me, is named after my father. But that outing wasn’t just characteristically ardent Deadhead evangelism (and, well, unorthodox parenting). It reflected Mark’s sustained effort to expand the time that he and Frank spent together. The more hours, the more conversation. The more conversation, the greater the likelihood of serendipitous revelations, real familiarity, deeper connection.”

“This Masculinity Influencer Is Loud and Wrong About Paternity Leave”

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/21/opinion/paternity-leave-debate.html

https://archive.is/Zm4Oy

In this opinion piece, Jessica Grose denounces Scott Galloway’s stance on paternity leave.

It should be noted that Scott Galloway is one of the few progressive-leaning pronatalists out there (center-left liberal or social capitalist rather).

In an interview with Derek Thompson, Galloway said: “I think there should be mandatory maternity leave, because I think the species needs to propagate. I’m not sure there should be mandatory paternity leave. I think it sometimes creates resentment. I think sometimes it’s abused. And so I’m a bit of a capitalist here. I think it’s between the company, but I don’t know if I immediately default to oh, the father needs to be there.”

Grose added: “Galloway also commented that he doesn’t think men should be in the delivery room. “I thought that was so disgusting and unnatural,” he says. When I asked Galloway if he had a response to the backlash he has been getting over these comments, he said over email, “My comments were intentionally provocative in the context of a friendly/snarky conversation with Derek.””

She also noted: “Poor Derek Thompson tried to push back, and launch a defense of parental leave. “Most of the gap between prime age adult male and female earnings is a motherhood penalty. And so one benefit of paternity leave is that it puts men and women on relatively more equal standing,” to which Galloway replies, “By lowering the economic standards of the man?””