2.75M Q&A - Women’s Value, Loneliness & Bernie Sanders - #850

**Chris Williamson** (0:00)
Hello everybody, welcome back to the show. My guest today is me. I hit 2.75 million subscribers on YouTube, and to celebrate, ask for questions from YouTube community and Twitter and Instagram. So here is another two hours of me trying to get through as many as possible. I expect to learn whether I'll bring Bernie Sanders on the podcast, what I think about women's value to the world, why my forearms are this size, how to deal with loneliness, whether I'll release merch, why I'm still a big emo kid, my advice for people going through a tough time, and much more. This episode is brought to you by Shopify. Businesses that sell more, sell on Shopify, which is why they are the global force behind Gymshark, Skims, Allo and Neutonic. When it comes to converting browsers into buyers, they are best in class. Their checkout is 36% better on average, compared to other leading e-commerce platforms, and their shop pay means that you can boost conversions by up to 50%. Best of all, their award-winning support is there to help you every step of the way. Look, you're not going into business to learn about how to code or build a website or do backend inventory management. Shopify takes all of that off your hands and allows you to focus on the job that you came here to do, which is designing and selling an awesome product. Upgrade your business and get the same checkout that we use at Neutonic with Shopify. Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at shopify.com/modernwisdom or lowercase. That's shopify.com/modernwisdom to upgrade your selling today. You might have heard me say on a podcast recently that hold luggage is a Psi-op meant to keep you poor and late. I jest a little, but not actually that much. You do not need hold luggage if you have a brilliantly designed backpack and carry on and the 20 litre travel pack backpack from Nomatic is the best that I've ever found. It is an absolute game changer. The legitimate difference in the quality of your life when you have a world class backpack is pretty hard to describe. They are beautifully designed, not over engineered and will literally last you a lifetime because they have a lifetime guarantee. Best of all, you can return or exchange any product within 30 days for any reason. So right now, you can get a 20% discount and see everything that I use and recommend by going to nomadic.com/modernwisdom. That's nomadic.com/modernwisdom. AG1 makes the best daily foundational nutrition supplement that I've ever found. One scoop of AG1 contains 75 vitamins, minerals and whole food sourced ingredients, including a multivitamin, multimineral, pre and probiotic, green superfood blend and more that all work together to fill the nutritional gaps in your diet. It increases energy and focus, aids with digestion and supports a healthy immune system all without the need to take multiple products or pills. I've used it every single day for over three years now. I've got my mum and my dad to use it. I've got my friends to use it. And if I found something better, I would switch, but I haven't, which is why I still use it. Plus there is a 90 day money back guarantee. So if you want to replace your multivitamin and more, start with AG1. Right now you can get a year's free supply of vitamin D3 and K2, 5 free AG1 travel packs, plus that 90 day money back guarantee by going to drinkag1.com/modernwisdom.
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But now, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome me.
What's happening, people? Welcome back to the show. It is a 2.75 million subscriber Q&A episode, and I'm in a brand new studio. For the people that are listening, you know, can be able to see it, but this is my new studio, finally finished in all its glory. And I think it looks absolutely beautiful. I can show you here, look at this. There's a London telephone box, and a London bridge here, and a see and hear and speak no evil statues. And I've got a thinking man thinking, and a guy atlas holding up the world, and a little dinosaur skull, and it's a secret little Easter egg of a hand climbing up. And I love it. I love the colors. I think it looks, it's perfect. It's our brand, it's the teal, it's the orange. The lightning's amazing. So yeah, my director of photography made me a present for 2.75 million subscribers. Anyway, I asked the questions on Twitter and Instagram and YouTube, and there were lots, so let's get into it. Jim Cooper, I love your podcast, Chris. I'm sure you're not misogynistic, but the statement, women's value to the world in many ways lies in their beauty and youth comes across quite sexist and reductive to me. Yes, swing and a miss by me there using some imprecise language around a sensitive topic. I think the response here was a bit surprising because I must have brought up this exact cliche in 30 or 50 videos in the past that men have historically been valued for their ability to provide status and resources, while historically women have had a premium placed on their age and their looks. I've never said that it's optimal or desirable, but I would say that it's pretty reasonable as a historical assessment of how society has judged men and women. I mean, even now in the modern world, there's entire industries dedicated to serving these cliches, cosmetic surgery and makeup and hair extensions and apps that airbrush a wrinkles away are all playing into this need for beautification and youth. The same as luxury car rental garages and online trading courses and pick up artists' body language masterminds for men to enhance status and resources. The point that I was trying to make was about male body image issues that society has typically emphasized the importance of beauty and youth in women. For men, stereotypically, it's been less important. And yet men are on track to overtake women in rates of body dysmorphia within a few decades. I think it's an interesting pivot that men historically haven't been valued as much for their looks. And that now seems to be changing. And just because I talk about something doesn't mean that I support it. Analysis is not justification. What I wanted to do was identify those previous stereotypes and then highlight this new world in contrast. And it seems like that came across as me reinforcing the stereotype as legitimate. And I get the sense that this is one of the problems with the audience growing so quickly because I think that I can just use imprecise throwaway shorthand references to tons of previous conversations like I used to when the show was smaller and everyone would understand my broader point. But the show is probably half a million people bigger than the last time that this point got brought up. So a ton of viewers have no context. But then if I go through an in-depth reintroduction of each reference every time that I bring it up, that's going to get clunky and repetitive and arduous and patronize everyone like you never learn anything. So yeah, I'm going to have to work on that. Hopefully that clears everything up and glad to hear that I'm not a misogynist. Shotgun Orphan, congrats on all your well-deserved success. I discovered your pod in 2021 and you've quickly become my favorite person to listen to. Thank you. When are we getting t-shirts and other merch? Please take my money. Yeah, I've been wearing this three-eyed skull t-shirt thing on some training vlogs and we've got one with Modern Wisdom across the front. I think we made maybe 20 of those and it was just for me and Dean and a couple of the guys behind the scenes. I would consider doing it, but I'm not a particularly good seller of my own stuff. I need to work on that. But soon, I guess, if I can find a way to do it without detracting from the million other things that I've got to do. But it's nice to know that you like the designs. They're pretty cool. I really like them. Alvi Shake, what's your thoughts on homosexual people's asking as a homophobic?