Hey Seth. it's John, a caller on this show. You definitely didn't put me to sleep, the call got cut off. Thanks for taking my call and glad I have a chance to hear the rest of what you said.
For the fellow alcoholic that called in... You are not powerless but you have to be honest with yourself if you want to quit. You have to sit yourself down and ask yourself if quitting is important and then formulate a 'tentative' plan to quit and follow that plan. I'm +10 years sober and I was a terrible alcoholic. I had grand mal seizures and dt's and several arrests and several trips to detox/counseling/treatment and none of it even slowed my drinking.. The first real positive thing happened when I asked myself if I really wanted to quit and answered that hard question honestly.
@@Luubelaar The hardest part is breaking the addiction cycle and for me that was finding anything positive(no matter how small) and working towards it. Getting clean is a selfish act and it should be. You should start concentrating on yourself(in a positive way) and that could be as simple as making a dentist or doctor appointment and forcing yourself to go. Getting clean is all about these little positive 'selfish' steps away from addiction. You have to get into the mindset that you are the most important thing.
Fact : " Anna Jarvis, who founded Mother's Day in 1908, passionately opposed its growing commercialization and eventually campaigned against the holiday. Anna Jarvis, who had no children of her own, conceived of Mother's Day as an occasion for honoring the sacrifices individual mothers made for their children ".
My mother would walk through fire for Rush Limbaugh, even just to polish his tombstone, but she can’t extend the basic courtesy to hear a rational thought put forth by her progressive, highly-educated (valedictorian, college distinction) scientist engineer son. Don’t feel like you’re the A-hole just because you have an uncharitable view toward your mother - she’s likely earned that assessment, so go with it and carry on.
"You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better." - Anne Lamott
You should never have studied that evil science stuff. All you could ever achieve with that wickedness is to enhance human knowledge and maybe, MAYBE slightly improve the lives of people. You would have pleased your mother much more if you had spread hatred and divisiveness on the radio. Remember, we don't hate each other nearly enough.
@@BooksForever It is amusing that you should use the 'always wanted but never had ' line. I can remember 4 different women I have dated who told me the first time they saw me after I met their mother: "She said I shouldn't let you get away." Some people are so easily fooled. LOL
Truthfully, it sounds as if you "follow in her footsteps" so to speak. Wondering how many "basic courtesies" you bestow upon her. Do you actually think that an educated person is inherently "good'? Do you BELIEVE that a "highly-educated (valedictorian, college distinction) scientist engineer son" somehow makes you a more valid person than your mother or anyone else? Are you claiming that educated people don't do or engage stupid and/or dangerous things...? What is your premise...you are good...she is bad...because ahem...you have a degree? That's what I'm hearing from you. I could give a plethora of names of people with degrees who have shown themselves...well...to be not of the highest quality. Your mother may be wrong...but so may you. I'll give a bet that you couldn't qualify your premise that your "mother is lesser than you" SCIENTIFICALLY....not in a month of Sundays. But you go ahead and try.
My mother died in 2010 and I was still an xtian. A few years later I started watching Hitchens on UA-cam then read Carl Sagan (was always a fan) "A Demon Haunted World" and that was the turning point. I was always a skeptical wannabe believer even in ministry. Afterwards my highly Baptist xtian aunt would say disappointed my mother "would be" of me turning from Jesus. This always perplexed me. How ridiculous and horrible her words were.
the thing about predictive powers, we subconsciously collect information and read patterns. then there is the train accident thing, the statist that trains, ships, and planes that have crashes are more likely to be not as full as normal. with all the stories of people who missed it.
This past Mother's Day was my first without my mother. At a certain age I moved away never had a close relationship with her though I did love and care about her. I Estranged myself for reasons other than religion. Bottom line though I can completely relate to feeling like an asshole but the fact is I just wasn't there and didn't really want to be part of it, and I think that's okay.
Thank you so much for suggesting secular sobriety. I was hoping there was some place like that. Also I bought a signed copy of christianity made me talk like an idiot. Loved it. I am gonna read it again.
There are definitely lots of people out there that should never become parents. "Mothers" included. As for blood being thicker than water, first it's my understanding that the phrase “blood is thicker than water” has two conflicting interpretations: That family ties are stronger than anything else. In other words, family is the most important thing. That men who create a blood-bond have stronger ties than brothers who shared a womb. Which is the original intent is a matter of debate but it's my understanding that brothers you choose is a stronger bond than brothers you are blood related. I personally feel no obligation to bond with family, especially those who either have done nothing to warrant it, or who have done much to dishonor that bond. It took me many years of combing through my feelings to finally understand the abuse and neglect that "family" (especially "mother") inflicted on me. The feelings were masked by the false obligation/understanding that family was owed devotion just for being "your blood". The harm that comes from family is often horrendous, and often irreversible. Suffice it to say that I have purposely distanced myself from my 'extended family' (parents, aunts/uncles, nephews/nieces, etc.). My children will always be special to me, and long ago I realized that the only real family I had was my children. There is no reason to feel shame for rejecting relationships with non-deserving relatives.
Music note: most churches per capita are in Nashville Music City 🇺🇸. And arguably one of the most wicked rune witches I ever met was the mgr of the labels condo across the street from The Country Music Hall of Fame. We finished filming the High Ridin Heroes video for Sony with Lynn and Waylon. I left Nashville and never returned. The video was #1 for 3 weeks on CMT. just like she said. Nashville = James 3:16. My first performance was Silent Night @ FBC Hope Ark. 1968
I have a (seemingly unique) perspective on the whole "you owe gratitude towards your parents" thing. No, I don't owe them anything. I didn't ask to be born. It wasn't like they rescued me out a of a dumpster or I knocked on their door out of the blue or something. They chose to create/have me. Expecting a child to be grateful to their parent(s) is like expecting your bank to be grateful that you paid your mortgage on time.
Maybe. And....maybe not. So you feel you "didn't ask to be born"....sure. (Of course, maybe your parents hadn't either....deep, so deep...ahem.) Now, depending.....of course....(maybe they, she or he..."didn't ask to become pregnant". Do you follow? Now, I'm not going to get into details but you may want to consider that. BTW.... I disagree with your premise that expecting a child to be grateful is like "expecting your bank to be grateful that you paid your mortgage on time". To make such an inane analogy is technically saying parents operate the way banksters do. And while there does exist that small margin (and I mean VERY SMALL....like teensy weensy) amount of parents that might engage in that, MOST parents are the abject opposite. (oh, and not unique...more like stupid) In other words, they fork over the dough for their child/rens' benefit and not for their own enrichment. Very UNLIKE a bankster.
@@justaperson8144 It is very unlike a banker, because that's not even remotely close to what that analogy says. Enrichment/profit has nothing to do with it and never entered my analogy. But hey, you made a great case against that strawman. How did you even get to 'the parents = the banker' anyway? That's almost the exact opposite of what the analogy says. It's pretty obvious that in the analogy the "you" are the parents and the "child" is the bank and the "mortgage" is the responsibility/obligation. How did you miss that? Maybe you should work on your reading comprehension before you start calling other people's perspectives "stupid". Here, let me spell it out for you. The analogy is about responsibility. Parents voluntarily take on the responsibility of having a child. Once they have that child, they are obligated to take care of that child. You know, like how you voluntarily take on a mortgage and are thenceforth obligated to pay that mortgage. Whether or not the mortgage holder is making a profit has absolutely nothing to do with you meeting your obligation to pay the mortgage.
Thank god (pun intended) for my family all being science loving Atheists. My mom is still here. I hate that she sees our country going to a minority of people that spout the bible and don't even read the trashy novel the bible is. Where god is the bad guy and tortures his creation. What horse s**t!!! I'm sorry but I'm beginning to not like these people of faith that are full of hate. I shut down anyone who tries to talk to me about god anymore. I'm sick of them trying to get me to give to their church. I'd rather give my 10% to my community to make it a better place to live. If we all did that just think what we could do in our communities. Thanks as always Seth...love that smooth voice and how you use it. 💙
Youre not an asshole :> I have no contact with my bio mother (she's a spiritual narcissist) and low contact with my step mom. I actually sent my step mom a mother's day gift this year and I got no response... damned if you do, damned if you don't. 😒
Hello Sir. I'm clean and sober, having been introduced to 12 step programs in 1985 via treatment and stayed mostly on the wagon since. I did take '96 off for bad behavior, but returned to meetings and sobriety in January of '97. Through my years, I've been a born again and again pagan, student of the mystical Tao, born again Christian briefly after my relapse, and eventually a pretty strong atheist with a humanist bent. My "Higher Power" has changed and evolved from an exterior magical source to today where it is my own higher or deeper self. I'm kind of vague in my definition, but basically the well from which consciousness springs and the place emotions form. Basically, the me that I approach while being mindful. “I Am Not I” BY JUAN RAMÓN JIMÉNEZ TRANSLATED BY ROBERT BLY I am not I. I am this one walking beside me whom I do not see, whom at times I manage to visit, and whom at other times I forget; who remains calm and silent while I talk, and forgives, gently, when I hate, who walks where I am not, who will remain standing when I die.
Mother's Day in the UK is in March and comes from a different origin it's when people returned to their "mother church" one in which you were baptized at. As children were often working away and time off was hard to get they would also visit their mothers. It has morphed to be like the US version
As much as skepticism, we need conflict resolution training for everyone. Whenever my Q-MAGA-xtain friends start in on their grievance talk, rather than debate them, I simply say - "we have a 50/50 divided country; what do you think we can do to reach a fair compromise." Whenever they drift back into grievance, I double down on my refusal to debate. Set the rule of your willingness to play the game at finding common ground, and throw down the gauntlet. People can only convince themselves.
28:45 - The first few times I heard Seth on UA-cam I thought his voice was familiar, but I couldn't place it. Then I watched one of his videos in which he mentioned being a Christian broadcaster. Then I had a flashback to the early 2000's. I was driving back home to Texas from visiting family in/around Tulsa. In one of the radio dead-zones the only reception I had was a station playing some Christian-y sounding music. It was better than silence. The DJ was Seth.
Gerard, please take this in the spirit in which it is offered. I confused 'further' and 'farther' for years. Further means more, as in 'further research is needed.' Farther means more distant, as in 'farther away.' I was grateful when someone finally cleared me up on those words. I wish someone had done it sooner. And I fully agree w/ your comment.
Farther = physical distance Further = depth or degree Unless the usage is metaphorical or ambiguous in which case, they can be used interchangeably. /word nerd
with those coincidence events, it might help to explore the other side: how many times did I have a strong thought, dream, inspiration, and nothing happened? or what happened was something else? We just don't record these incidences, so the others will always stand out...
What you DO is you acknowledge what your mother DID do. And you give her that. You don't whine about YOU and YOUR issues. Nope. YOU acknowledge that...hey...she LIKELY wasn't in her forties when you were born (so didn't have that advantage), YOU acknowledge that you "get that". You acknowledge that she is just a human being...for all her warts....she made sure for you. She was very likely the one who was on 24/7 watch for YOU...and that...that...mattered. You wouldn't/or couldn't even be here if she hadn't. You acknowledge that. What you don't do...is WHINE to the world (along with the other whiners that back you up) on MOTHERS DAY that nothing she did, moved you. Outside of the consumerism (I mean at least if you think there is some meaning here), you give HER...her day. It's ONLY one day...one day....let me say that again....ONE DAY, out of the whole f**king year wherein everything she DID give you ought to matter. So, this "Mother's Day" thing, if you care....isn't about YOU. It's about HER. It's just ONE DAY out of the whole year that in your head maybe SHE might matter as much as you think you do. ONE DAY. Again....if you are genuine...it's not about YOU...and it's not about what she didn't do....it's about what she DID do. Is it so hard to give a mother that.
Hi Seth, I heard you say on several of your podcasts that about 50% of all fertilized eggs are do not succeed in attaching and developing to full term. Do you have reference for that statement? I would like to be able to spread that information where I can, but feel I should have a reference to back it up.
Once the embryo reaches the blastocyst stage, approximately five to six days after fertilization, it hatches out of its zona pellucida and begins the process of implantation in the uterus. In nature, 50 percent of all fertilized eggs are lost before a woman's missed menses www.ucsfhealth.org/education/conception-how-it-works#:~:text=Once%20the%20embryo%20reaches%20the,before%20a%20woman's%20missed%20menses.
Mothers are only mothers when they behave like mothers. They don't even have to be biologically your mother. A proper mother is one who loves you for being you and bakes the best apple pie in town.
@@justaperson8144 Oh good grief there is always one twist their knickers in too tight Its saying your mother is the bees knees! Oh boy! Do bees have knees? It is how you feel about your mother. You love them so much you would praise even their faults to the world. To you no other mother can ever be as good. They are the best pony in show. Now you'll get upset because I compared you mum to a pony.
@@toforgetisagem8145 You assume a lot. In fact, maybe you've totally invented this relationship I have with my mother. Right...? YOU don't get to decide what or how YOUR mother (nor any mother) should be, is or has been. As to your comment: 'Mothers are only mothers when they behave like mothers" Sorry, nope....that's just something you made up again. I'm going to venture a guess you have protocols and rules for "mothers' behavior. What a joke.....seems maybe you haven't gotten over your religious upbringing. It's one day out of the year, give your mother a gift or flowers or a phone call or whatever. It's laughable that you are here still whining. All the rest doesn't matter. AGAIN, it's not about you.....it's about all the effort mothers put in....rightly or wrongly. Apple pie my arse.
My thoughts concerning an abortion ban are going to involve: 1. The consequence on both sides of the equation and how one side's consequence is a lot weightier than the other (if we get the issue wrong); and how the level of public outrage seems unwarranted given the consequence of an abortion ban. 2. Why abortion is morally wrong and should be banned. *1. The Consequences* Abortion is either something that: 1. Prevents the development of a process which (normative end result) brings a human-person's life into existence, *or* 2. Ends the life of a human-person already in existence. If it is #1 then, in principle, it is just like the many other available forms of birth-control (it just does it further down the line of the process). If it is #2 then it is the killing/murder of some of the most dependent and innocent members of our race. If it is #1 then the pro-abortion people are outraged because they have, in principle, lost one form of birth-control from many available forms (yet there are many medical treatments one can not just have because one desires them). If it is #2 then the pro-abortion people are outraged because they can't kill/murder the most dependent and innocent members of our race anymore. If you are an outraged person, ask yourself these two questions: A. Is my level of outrage based on the belief (A), "I have lost one of many available forms birth-control", or the belief (B), "I have lost the right to kill/murder a dependent and innocent human-person"? B. Is my level of outrage warranted given the facts (A or B, above) or is it mainly/purely an emotional response based on the way I have been conditioned to feel/think? The consequence of wrongfully not banning abortion (if it is #2) is far weightier than if we wrongfully ban abortion (if it is #1). It seems the only people who really have a warranted position for outrage are the pro-life people, because on their view they believe babies are being killed/murdered (they don't believe they are losing one form of birth control or the "right" to kill another human being). I would also add that if we kill someone negligently we are culpable. For example, if a demolition company does not do their absolute best to confirm there are no humans in a building they are about to destroy, they will be culpable for any humans that die in that building. There seems no way the pro-abortion people can be sure the occupant in the womb is not a human-person (and I would say: all the evidence goes toward it being a human-person); thus a red light should be applied to abortion rather than a green light, given the culpability for negligent malpractice. To summarize three points from the above: 1. Economically (this is a principle of economics) if we are 50/50 between two positions, concerning which position is true, we should always choose the position that has the least negative consequence if we choose wrongfully. Based on what I stated above (abortion being either #1 or #2), the position with the least negative consequence, if we choose wrongfully, is to ban abortion. Therefore, we should ban abortion. 2. Even if someone believes it is more likely than not that position #1 above is true (but has no type of certainty), we should still ban abortion based on the principle of negligent malpractice. 3. The pro-abortion people's level of outrage is not warranted given their position and the consequence. *2. Why Abortion Is Morally Wrong And Should Be Banned* The issue here is we have two competing sets of rights: 1. Right of the mother’s bodily autonomy (to kill a human-person dependent on her body for it's life). 2. Right of the child’s personal bodily autonomy (not to be killed, either directly or passively by knowingly removing him/her from their place of dependency for life--knowing they will die if done so). In pregnancy one of these rights is going to have to trump the other one. You have to at least be sympathetic to the hard moral question, even if you do not agree with the conclusion. I believe the babies right not to be killed wins (easily for non-rape cases and still for rape cases). Three reasons as to why: 1. The baby did not make the choice (or do the action) to be put in a place of dependency on the mother for its life; the mother (and father) made the choice to put the baby in this position and are the cause of the situation. Thus, the mother can not just change her mind a few weeks/months down the line and kill/murder the baby. If one makes the choice to take the risk (and even if one is the cause unknowingly), this one should suffer the consequences of that decision/action--not someone else. 2. Parents have a moral duty to care for the life and well being of their children . 3. The law recognizes the intentional killing of an innocent human-person as murder and it is illegal (and unborn babies are the most innocent and dependent members of our race); abortion is murder and thus should be illegal. In the situation of rape #2 would still be true and #1 would still be partially true: it is still true of the father (it was his choice) and still true of the baby (the baby did not consent) but not true of the mother. Both the mother and baby would be victims in such a case. In the situation of rape #3 would still be true. Let us examine this. Some propose the solution to ease the pain of one victim (the woman) is to kill the other victim (the baby). This to me is a false solution which only makes the overall victim status worse (we went from one victim losing bodily autonomy for nine months and maybe a changed body, to a victim now being killed/murdered). This solution would make the victim (the woman) herself a perpetrator (and the baby a further victim). Think of it this way: a victim can harm a perpetrator (like an attacker, with self defense) without becoming a perpetrator themselves--because it was a perpetrator they harmed, not an innocent person. However, an innocent victim can not harm another innocent person (a non-perpetrator) in order to stop their victim status--because if they do, then they become a perpetrator. For example, if someone tried to kidnap my child--God forbid--and I had a clear shot at the perpetrator with my gun, I would not be a perpetrator myself if I shot him (because I was a victim stopping my perpetrator from further victimizing me). However, if someone stole my child and then they used someone else's innocent child as a human shield and the only way I could stop the perpetrator from taking my child was by intentionally shooting the other innocent child, I would be a perpetrator of a crime myself if I shot that innocent child. I can not harm some other innocent person in order to stop my own victim status without becoming a perpetrator myself to the innocent person I harmed (I can only harm the perpetrator without myself also becoming a perpetrator). This applies to rape cases. Both the mother and child are innocent and victims. However, the solution of one innocent person (the mother) killing another innocent person (the baby) in order to stop their victim status, makes them (the mother) a perpetrator of murder. I heard a pro-abortion person recently ask: does someone ever lack the right to be able to remove someone else from their body (paraphrased)? I would answer "yes" within a slim criteria (and the more the criteria is fulfilled the stronger the case): 1. The dependent is not the (consenting) cause as to why he/she is attached to the host's body. 2. The host has a moral duty toward the dependent (like a parent has a moral duty for the life and well being of their child). 3. The host took the course of action which resulted in the dependents situation of dependency-especially if they did so knowing that their course of action could create this situation. 4. The dependent is attached to the host's body via a natural means and not a man-made artificial means. I then heard a pro-abortion person make this silly argument: the mother only consented to sex and not pregnancy. This is like saying: when I shot fifty bullets upward toward the sky with my gun, I only consented to the bullets going upward, I did not consent to them coming down and hitting anyone on the head, so if they did I am not culpable. If one does an action that directly affects another individual they are standing on the ground, of likely, being culpable for that affect; however, they are almost, without any doubt, culpable if they knew the possible result of their action could harm/affect someone else.
Rozio, I hope you're looking in. I don't know if this will help at all, it's certainly not an answer to your questions, just a similar experience with a markedly different outlook. I've been a skeptic and an atheist all my life...never had a belief in a deity to lose. I also never believed in ESP, though I thought it was a neato science fiction concept. I subscribe to the idea that all things are of nature. If a thing exists, nature gave rise to it. I have since had a number of incidents in which I had dreams of things that subsequently came true or that were occurring as I dreamt them - things I could not possibly have had any knowledge of and yet which I saw in my dreams. Now, like I said, this was a phenomenon I had no belief in. Thus, I approached it as a skeptic. Could I have been misremembering my dreams after the fact, altering them to fit the real-life occurrence? No. I'd been keeping a dream journal, I could check. Okay, so was I convincing myself of something I found to be "a neat idea"? No, in fact, most of the dreams I had were of people I cared about in danger. I very badly did NOT want to believe this was happening and tried very hard to talk myself out of it. What it came down to, to me, was a matter of reason and rationality, which some people here will understand and others will take issue with. Either I had experienced a large number of coincidences on a ridiculously high level, or I had experienced ESP. The former option, in all honesty, was idiotic to the point of insult. If I am to be a rational person then I must be open to re-examining my beliefs with honesty and not lying to myself about my own experiences for the sake of comfort. Now, here's the main thing: nothing whatsoever in these occurrences requires or even hints at a "higher power", let along a god. If it happened, it happened - if it's real, it's real. People would label it "supernatural", and I think that's a misnomer. My opinion, nothing that exists can be outside nature. If ESP exists, it is of nature, albeit rare. Someday we will have a better ability to study and understand it, our inability to do so at this point does not negate its possibility. But from my perspective, nothing about what happened to me suggests an intelligence or even a meaning behind it. The possible existence of ESP does not alter my understanding of nature and a universe without gods.
It can feel weird. Often, a decent relationship with your mother would be there, after all of those years she spent trying to raise you right (not necessarily in a "good Christian/religious" sense, but in a "not ending up in jail or an early grave" sense). A rift forming between you two can feel very awkward, to say the least. I know I am hardly one of the supposed "better" ones when it comes to Mother's Day, especially given the fact that I moved to other side of the planet from my mother. She is definitely one of those Fox News religious conservatives, and I was becoming one myself until around my mid 20s. Well, maybe "is" is not quite as accurate as it used to be. There seem to be signs of cracks forming in that personality and view. I used to have very extensive conversations and debates with her before I moved. The earliest signs of this possible change were in managing to rattle her out of standing with private health insurance, especially when I got her to recognize that, after she compared her private health insurance to her private auto insurance, she could not find any difference, let any that were meaningful. It has been a few years since the last of this talks about healthcare that we had, but I ended up with many more tools, thanks to what I now have that I have moved, that seem to have cracked, if not broken, that aspect of her views, and now she wants M4A. This has also seemed to have extended towards religion with her. She has accepted that I am no longer a part of any faith, but lately, some of what I have been sharing with her may be getting her to see just how f^^^ing nuts her circle of family and friends is. One of the things sounds weird, and I can only share my experience with it, so take it for whatever you will. I sent her an image of a Mother's Day promotion for a dessert from a local pizza chain, for a dessert called an "Unholy Donut." This was basically a sizable brick of a donut, covered with cinnamon sugar and filled with caramel along with a possible option of a type of chocolate ("Unholy," indeed - it almost turned me into Homer Simpson). This pizza chain...has all kinds of devil iconography with pizza motifs: pentagrams made out of pizza ingredients and tools, quotes like "The path to Paradise begins in Hell," the mark of the beast (a.k.a. that big three-digit number) in massive print on all of their boxes, their specialty pizzas being named after each of the seven mortal sins and a few specific demons - there is more, but these stand out the most (and the name of the chain is simple and hardly subtle). This is all in a country... that observes all of the big Christian holidays and official national holidays (paid time off or work with overtime pay and all)... and no one in this country - and I mean NO one, no Christian or otherwise - *raises a fuss about this pizza chain.* _This chain would be an impossibility back in the US._ I am not sure how she viewed it before, but surprisingly - and I would like to think that I played a role in this, but that is probably just wishful thinking - she is upset that they appear set to overturn Roe. She already had come around to my argument that while a religious upbringing is not necessarily the worst, it is hardly the best either. She is now seeing the problems I have had with religion in her church. While the pastor at her church is not a bad man at all (he does not ascribe to any of the right-wing talking points - so yeah, he actually supports Roe and never turns away or turns in a migrant), the same cannot really be said about some of the parishioners. So while the relationship between me and my mother is somewhat strained - we mostly try to avoid anything potentially divisive (hey, take what you can get) - it does feel like it might become, at the very least, not as strained anymore. All of this...cannot be said about the relationship between me and father, though. That one is pretty much over. As for between the two of them...well...I used to say that they were at the point in their marriage (which has been for nearly 40 years now) where everything he says or does pisses her off. Now, I say they are at the point in their marriage where all she does with him is regularly check to see if his life insurance is still in effect.
How horrible....I am hoping you don't see the relationship of your parents as a "win". It is not. Think about (even if accurate) how devastating it would be to put forty years into anything....relationship or not...and then to find things as naught. It would be crushing. Keep that in mind.
@@justaperson8144 I never implied that it was a win, just that religion is not the best glue to hold any relationship together - it can work, sure, but often only because it calls for the questioning of the relationship to stop, and that can only go on for so long. Questioning a relationship is not inherently bad, but as mentioned, the ones that most need the questioning are most often the ones that are, at best, on shaky ground. This does not mean that religion cannot result in anything good. I have met a few of those good religious ones, though speaking for myself, they are quite the small minority, while the rest of the religious ones I know resemble what you might see on an episode/rerun of Cops. While my relationship with my mother is not quite the best, there was never any real point where it ever got bad. Yeah, our differing religiosity has not helped, but like I said, we quickly learned to avoid it. I did reach a breaking point over the hypocrisy of the religious right, and she ended up being an unintended trigger. What happened was that I was getting ready to emigrate from the US, and she voiced her concerns about me having to possibly interact with - and I am quoting her - "any gays." That already irked me once she said it, but I cannot lay the blame on her. Earlier that day, I had been in a... heated debate with your stereotypical right-wing evangelical (I came out on top of that, but I was still livid about some of the claims that a-hole made). I will not say that I am proud about what I said to her over this, but looking back, it marked a turning point that at least somewhat patched our relationship, or at least stopped it from getting worse. So when she voiced her concern, I said: "Mom, I am going to have to interact with people no matter where I am or what I do. I barely have any choice over who I will have to interact with. I can only try to get through whatever I will need to do and be as courteous as possible so that it can be resolved as quickly and thoroughly as possible, ideally in something I can work with or even benefit from. I will not have the time to worry about if the person I have to interact with is straight, gay, trans, white, black, brown, yellow, red, Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, atheist, American, British, Egyptian, Chinese, Indian, human, angel, demon, extraterrestrial, or whatever other label you want to use. A person is a person, a saint is a saint, and an @$$hole is an @$$hole. The only group I can reasonably draw the line about tolerating is the @$$holes, and those can literally be anyone. I will do my best to not be one myself, but if anyone acts like one to me, I will show them no mercy, for I would have simply been the latest of their @$$holery at that point, and I would like that to stop. All of those other labels are nothing but arbitrary bullsh^t that some @$$hole who you give too much credibility to came up with to justify causing misery to people. There is more than enough misery in the world, and we do not need sh^t like that being added to it. So the next time you want to claim that your faith makes you more tolerant and inclusive, it is up to those like me to make you actually live up to those words, and if you cannot, then I and those will not allow you to delude yourself." Like I said, I am not proud of what I said to her, but looking back, it seemed to have put the brakes on her slide into the religious right. Sure, she is still fairly religious, but that is ultimately of little-to-no concern to me. My only concern is whether or not she acts like an @$$hole because of it, and while it seemed to me that up until then, she was, I have to acknowledge that she has not been lately - if anything, she is, at the very least, the least @$$hole-ish of her family (as for her relatives, though, to quote George Carlin, "Holy jumping f^^^ing sh^tballs, dumber than a second coat of paint"). Since the aforementioned exchange, she has started living up to her claims about her faith - it was very gradual, but it cannot be denied. Since she started making the changes, she stopped parroting what you most often hear from the political and religious right. While she may not fully agree with me on most issues - though there are a few that we have and still do fully agree on, like protecting Roe - she has gotten more understanding and even come around on a few (like healthcare - that was the biggest change she has made politically, where she now supports M4A). I do not see the relationship with my mother as a "win" - a tense truce might be more accurate, though we do try to make efforts to relieve that tension. We may not always succeed at it, but by and large, we have avoided making it worse, and sometimes, that is all you can hope for. We do hope to fully and properly patch things, but for now at least, the bandage is doing its job and there is no need to rip it off. As for my father, yeah, it is pretty much how I described it. I have no idea when or how he became the way he is now, but it definitely caused problems between the two of us and the two of them. When it comes to the dumb stuff he has been doing (which, from what I can tell, has been growing more frequent over the past possibly 10 years), me and my mother, far more often than not, end up siding together against him and usually for similar reasons. It has not quite gotten particularly bad - there has never been any violence between them (and for some reason, I doubt there will ever be - maybe his health and the medications he has to take have something to do with it) - but the relationship is how I half-jokingly described it. Yeah, it sucks when a relationship comes to an end, especially if it is one that lasted for so long. I am not downplaying that at all. It always hurts to see what might have been a good relationship turn bad, but denying that it might have only makes it even worse. Relationships may and often do have to change, and any necessary change does not need to be big, just that it could be. While the relationship should ideally stay positive, if it ends up needing to end, well, so be it - or to use a favorite phrase amongst the religious right, "it's God's Will." The most you can hope for if it does end is that it does not end on a bad note. I know that last point makes me sound much more smug than I intended (I must admit that there is a hint of smugness to it), and there is the possibility that I will end up eating those words if I ever end up in such a situation. Still, I stand by what I said.
@@DavidRichardson153 Engaging comment. As to your comment: ""Mom, I am going to have to interact with people no matter where I am or what I do. I barely have any choice over who I will have to interact with. I can only try to get through whatever I will need to do and be as courteous as possible so that it can be resolved as quickly and thoroughly as possible, ideally in something I can work with or even benefit from. I will not have the time to worry about if the person I have to interact with is straight, gay, trans, white, black, brown, yellow, red, Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, atheist, American, British, Egyptian, Chinese, Indian, human, angel, demon, extraterrestrial, or whatever other label you want to use." I would like to add, AND YOU DON'T HAVE ANY CHOICE who your mother is and she doesn't have any choice in what her adult child/ren do. LOL. Surely, if you can do it for others you can do it for her. Outside of that, it sounds like you and your mother love each other....regardless of the warts, regardless of situations, regardless of the bs everyone and everywhere and every whatever SAID you both had to be. I would call that a win. Consider this. On MOTHERS DAY, don't even give it a second thought. Do something you know she would like. It's just one day....the rest of the year, you both just be who you are..... because you BOTH will never be any good at being what you're not. Have a good one.
About premonitions, it is not because you can not explain it now, that it is divine. It could be quatium entanglement (entrelazamiento cuantico) or special type of connectivity (una especie de conectividad no conocida). There are a lot of unknown about physics and the brain.
Responding to the question of words and language - I'm trying to not refer to animals, plants, or fungi as "creatures" which implies a creator. A small thing, and I don't want to make it a foolish consistency, but still thoughtful.
Seth, for the viewer who was talking about having discussions with his son, I would suggest discussing the cognitive biases and logical fallacy content from the Your Bias Is and Your Logical Fallacy is websites - it won't let me post the links. They sell card sets that can kind of be used as a game to develop your BS detection and cognitive skills.
Seth, I sent my mother a text and posted a gift. We live in different countries. Our relationship isn't great. She still defends my abuser (father). He abuses her too, but she clings to "I made a promise before God 'til death do us part' and I'm keeping my promise". And she is. At the expense of her own well-being, and that of her children. And since my father had a stroke earlier this year, he needs her, so this fits right in with her desperate need to be needed. In the past she would get me a gift on mother's day, but that stopped when we moved overseas. I don't think I'll ever be forgiven for that. Oh well. I'm happy here, and I don't think I've ever seen my husband less stressed than this. It's been good for us mentally and physically. But my parents think we should have stayed in our stressful life in , up to our eyeballs in debt. No thanks. If that makes me an asshole, so be it.
Exactly. Imo Liberals tend to be centrists who stand for very little because they aren’t actually affected by the policies. They care more for their own personal comfort, more for “civility” than justice. They may have vague sense of goodwill toward the downtrodden, but don’t care enough to actual shake their apathy and do something.
Seth I'm going to have to teach you the art of manipulation. It's so satisfying. I would think you'd know being a former Christian. What you do is talk about all those wonderful things like taking cre of you when you were sick and coming to your school performances or whatever you got and then you say "I wish that person could still love me" It can be hard but I still love you. Just a twinge of self righteousness is so tasty.
Seth, yes. Buy her the Bible. It's not what you (or I) believe, but by giving her a gift like that you aren't spreading the word (she already has belief in the Bible) while simultaneously showing her that you are aware and accepting of that aspect of her, despite your disagreements on the topic. I don't mean totally forgive every trespass immediately, but it is a nice gesture that shows that while you aren't Christian, you aren't making a gift for her about yourself. I am not sure if that came out as eloquently as I'd have liked lol, but I don't mean any of it in a judgmental way, just from the perspective of someone who has had some pretty gnarly disagreements with my own parents (politics for us, though). Anyway take care!
I’m not particularly fond of my mother. She’s a very self absorbed person, and her dementia is amplifying this. She wasn’t there for me after my son died. My parents thought that acting normally, and trying to cheer me up was enough. My father literally told me, when I was feeling very down, that they couldn’t help me with that, and I should seek professional help for my grief. My 22-year-old daughter was more help - we supported each other. I dutifully visit my mother once a week, since dad died, because someone needs to keep an eye on her, because my brother only visits her about six times a week. He phones regularly, but those phone calls don’t last a few hours. Maybe when she doesn’t recognizes me anymore, or when she can’t distinguish between days anymore, I’ll cut down the number of visits, because I’m so sick and tired of the same old stories and complaints on repeat. My brother calls it her greatest hits record, with just the one side on repeat. Sometimes we just need to do what’s best for ourselves.
Hi Seth I want to address the caller that states she is not religious yet struggles with a premonition she had about her brother that came true. She feels like there might have been a spiritual intervention and questions her beliefs. This is what science calls the “God Gap”. If science can’t explain it, believers tend to put god in its place. We need to be careful of this and think rationally. People that have strong premonitions are more than likely fueled by a strong fear already subconsciously in place and/or a strong connection to the person/thing. Just because your concience told you not to get on the train you ride to work each day and it ends up crashing doesn’t mean you were pinged by a higher being. You have a high sense of the daily danger you risk getting on that train…its a innate survival instinct that is deeply imbedded in us. I employ the listener with this struggle to read about the “God Gap” and to stay on the road to truth and rationaity.
Seth there are lots of things that I agree with you about, and lots of things I do not agree with you about, but under no circumstances are you an asshole lol Right there with you on the mother thing. I think the choice in that situation is really between trying to conform to who you think you should be or being genuine, matter how painful that becomes. I personally can't stand the feeling of fake...🌹
Our intuition is usually based on things we unconsciously know about a situation or circumstance. Our brain puts things together without our being aware. Her brother most likely was a risk taker and she worried about him.
Hey Seth. it's John, a caller on this show. You definitely didn't put me to sleep, the call got cut off. Thanks for taking my call and glad I have a chance to hear the rest of what you said.
Lol I am actively listening to this now and was wondering what happened so glad I got closure 😂
@@gametogether0073 lol glad I could help 😂😂
Few podcasts or videos over 15 minutes are worth sitting through but I can sit through hours of Seth Andrews.
For the fellow alcoholic that called in... You are not powerless but you have to be honest with yourself if you want to quit. You have to sit yourself down and ask yourself if quitting is important and then formulate a 'tentative' plan to quit and follow that plan.
I'm +10 years sober and I was a terrible alcoholic. I had grand mal seizures and dt's and several arrests and several trips to detox/counseling/treatment and none of it even slowed my drinking.. The first real positive thing happened when I asked myself if I really wanted to quit and answered that hard question honestly.
Congratulations on 10 years.
Addiction is a very hard thing to overcome.
@@Luubelaar The hardest part is breaking the addiction cycle and for me that was finding anything positive(no matter how small) and working towards it. Getting clean is a selfish act and it should be. You should start concentrating on yourself(in a positive way) and that could be as simple as making a dentist or doctor appointment and forcing yourself to go.
Getting clean is all about these little positive 'selfish' steps away from addiction. You have to get into the mindset that you are the most important thing.
Fact : " Anna Jarvis, who founded Mother's Day in 1908, passionately opposed its growing commercialization and eventually campaigned against the holiday. Anna Jarvis, who had no children of her own, conceived of Mother's Day as an occasion for honoring the sacrifices individual mothers made for their children ".
My mother would walk through fire for Rush Limbaugh, even just to polish his tombstone, but she can’t extend the basic courtesy to hear a rational thought put forth by her progressive, highly-educated (valedictorian, college distinction) scientist engineer son. Don’t feel like you’re the A-hole just because you have an uncharitable view toward your mother - she’s likely earned that assessment, so go with it and carry on.
"You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better." - Anne Lamott
You should never have studied that evil science stuff. All you could ever achieve with that wickedness is to enhance human knowledge and maybe, MAYBE slightly improve the lives of people. You would have pleased your mother much more if you had spread hatred and divisiveness on the radio. Remember, we don't hate each other nearly enough.
@@rembrandt972ify - you sound like the son she always wanted but never had. Lol. Thanks!
@@BooksForever It is amusing that you should use the 'always wanted but never had ' line. I can remember 4 different women I have dated who told me the first time they saw me after I met their mother: "She said I shouldn't let you get away." Some people are so easily fooled. LOL
Truthfully, it sounds as if you "follow in her footsteps" so to speak.
Wondering how many "basic courtesies" you bestow upon her.
Do you actually think that an educated person is inherently "good'? Do you BELIEVE that a "highly-educated (valedictorian, college distinction) scientist engineer son" somehow makes you a more valid person than your mother or anyone else? Are you claiming that educated people don't do or engage stupid and/or dangerous things...?
What is your premise...you are good...she is bad...because ahem...you have a degree? That's what I'm hearing from you. I could give a plethora of names of people with degrees who have shown themselves...well...to be not of the highest quality. Your mother may be wrong...but so may you.
I'll give a bet that you couldn't qualify your premise that your "mother is lesser than you" SCIENTIFICALLY....not in a month of Sundays. But you go ahead and try.
My son struggled with addiction and tried utilizing his faith to stop. Long story short...I buried him in September of 2020.
I'm very sorry.
I'm so sorry for your loss.
My mother died in 2010 and I was still an xtian. A few years later I started watching Hitchens on UA-cam then read Carl Sagan (was always a fan) "A Demon Haunted World" and that was the turning point. I was always a skeptical wannabe believer even in ministry. Afterwards my highly Baptist xtian aunt would say disappointed my mother "would be" of me turning from Jesus. This always perplexed me. How ridiculous and horrible her words were.
I love you, Seth. I think you are wicked cool (that's a Boston expression).
Completely go through this with both my parents I really tried most my life but it gets to a point its not healthy
the thing about predictive powers, we subconsciously collect information and read patterns. then there is the train accident thing, the statist that trains, ships, and planes that have crashes are more likely to be not as full as normal. with all the stories of people who missed it.
ah yes my man Seth
This past Mother's Day was my first without my mother. At a certain age I moved away never had a close relationship with her though I did love and care about her. I Estranged myself for reasons other than religion. Bottom line though I can completely relate to feeling like an asshole but the fact is I just wasn't there and didn't really want to be part of it, and I think that's okay.
Thank you so much for suggesting secular sobriety. I was hoping there was some place like that. Also I bought a signed copy of christianity made me talk like an idiot. Loved it. I am gonna read it again.
There are definitely lots of people out there that should never become parents. "Mothers" included.
As for blood being thicker than water, first it's my understanding that the phrase “blood is thicker than water” has two conflicting interpretations:
That family ties are stronger than anything else. In other words, family is the most important thing.
That men who create a blood-bond have stronger ties than brothers who shared a womb.
Which is the original intent is a matter of debate but it's my understanding that brothers you choose is a stronger bond than brothers you are blood related. I personally feel no obligation to bond with family, especially those who either have done nothing to warrant it, or who have done much to dishonor that bond.
It took me many years of combing through my feelings to finally understand the abuse and neglect that "family" (especially "mother") inflicted on me. The feelings were masked by the false obligation/understanding that family was owed devotion just for being "your blood". The harm that comes from family is often horrendous, and often irreversible. Suffice it to say that I have purposely distanced myself from my 'extended family' (parents, aunts/uncles, nephews/nieces, etc.). My children will always be special to me, and long ago I realized that the only real family I had was my children.
There is no reason to feel shame for rejecting relationships with non-deserving relatives.
Gratitude isn't about you. 😎👍
Love the show! Be well. 😁
Music note: most churches per capita are in Nashville Music City 🇺🇸. And arguably one of the most wicked rune witches I ever met was the mgr of the labels condo across the street from The Country Music Hall of Fame. We finished filming the High Ridin Heroes video for Sony with Lynn and Waylon. I left Nashville and never returned. The video was #1 for 3 weeks on CMT. just like she said. Nashville = James 3:16. My first performance was Silent Night @ FBC Hope Ark. 1968
You did more than I did on Father’s Day. I couldn’t muster even an acknowledgment to my dad. I didn’t want to so I didn’t.
I have a (seemingly unique) perspective on the whole "you owe gratitude towards your parents" thing. No, I don't owe them anything. I didn't ask to be born. It wasn't like they rescued me out a of a dumpster or I knocked on their door out of the blue or something. They chose to create/have me. Expecting a child to be grateful to their parent(s) is like expecting your bank to be grateful that you paid your mortgage on time.
Maybe. And....maybe not.
So you feel you "didn't ask to be born"....sure. (Of course, maybe your parents hadn't either....deep, so deep...ahem.) Now, depending.....of course....(maybe they, she or he..."didn't ask to become pregnant". Do you follow?
Now, I'm not going to get into details but you may want to consider that.
BTW.... I disagree with your premise that expecting a child to be grateful is like "expecting your bank to be grateful that you paid your mortgage on time".
To make such an inane analogy is technically saying parents operate the way banksters do. And while there does exist that small margin (and I mean VERY SMALL....like teensy weensy) amount of parents that might engage in that, MOST parents are the abject opposite. (oh, and not unique...more like stupid)
In other words, they fork over the dough for their child/rens' benefit and not for their own enrichment.
Very UNLIKE a bankster.
@@justaperson8144 It is very unlike a banker, because that's not even remotely close to what that analogy says. Enrichment/profit has nothing to do with it and never entered my analogy. But hey, you made a great case against that strawman. How did you even get to 'the parents = the banker' anyway? That's almost the exact opposite of what the analogy says. It's pretty obvious that in the analogy the "you" are the parents and the "child" is the bank and the "mortgage" is the responsibility/obligation. How did you miss that? Maybe you should work on your reading comprehension before you start calling other people's perspectives "stupid".
Here, let me spell it out for you. The analogy is about responsibility. Parents voluntarily take on the responsibility of having a child. Once they have that child, they are obligated to take care of that child. You know, like how you voluntarily take on a mortgage and are thenceforth obligated to pay that mortgage. Whether or not the mortgage holder is making a profit has absolutely nothing to do with you meeting your obligation to pay the mortgage.
I am also a dudeist priest. I have been a huge fan of The Big Lebowski for 20 years. The motto I cite daily is Just don't be a dick.
My husband's golden rule is "don't be a dick". I think it's a good way to approach life.
Hey! I love listening to your podcasts. Are we gonna see another one with Lucien Greaves soon? 🤘
Thank god (pun intended) for my family all being science loving Atheists. My mom is still here. I hate that she sees our country going to a minority of people that spout the bible and don't even read the trashy novel the bible is. Where god is the bad guy and tortures his creation. What horse s**t!!! I'm sorry but I'm beginning to not like these people of faith that are full of hate. I shut down anyone who tries to talk to me about god anymore. I'm sick of them trying to get me to give to their church. I'd rather give my 10% to my community to make it a better place to live. If we all did that just think what we could do in our communities.
Thanks as always Seth...love that smooth voice and how you use it. 💙
Youre not an asshole :>
I have no contact with my bio mother (she's a spiritual narcissist) and low contact with my step mom. I actually sent my step mom a mother's day gift this year and I got no response... damned if you do, damned if you don't. 😒
Hello Sir. I'm clean and sober, having been introduced to 12 step programs in 1985 via treatment and stayed mostly on the wagon since. I did take '96 off for bad behavior, but returned to meetings and sobriety in January of '97. Through my years, I've been a born again and again pagan, student of the mystical Tao, born again Christian briefly after my relapse, and eventually a pretty strong atheist with a humanist bent.
My "Higher Power" has changed and evolved from an exterior magical source to today where it is my own higher or deeper self. I'm kind of vague in my definition, but basically the well from which consciousness springs and the place emotions form. Basically, the me that I approach while being mindful.
“I Am Not I”
BY JUAN RAMÓN JIMÉNEZ
TRANSLATED BY ROBERT BLY
I am not I.
I am this one
walking beside me whom I do not see,
whom at times I manage to visit,
and whom at other times I forget;
who remains calm and silent while I talk,
and forgives, gently, when I hate,
who walks where I am not,
who will remain standing when I die.
Mother's Day in the UK is in March and comes from a different origin it's when people returned to their "mother church" one in which you were baptized at. As children were often working away and time off was hard to get they would also visit their mothers. It has morphed to be like the US version
I'm pretty much in your shoes when it comes to where you stand with your mother.
As much as skepticism, we need conflict resolution training for everyone. Whenever my Q-MAGA-xtain friends start in on their grievance talk, rather than debate them, I simply say - "we have a 50/50 divided country; what do you think we can do to reach a fair compromise." Whenever they drift back into grievance, I double down on my refusal to debate. Set the rule of your willingness to play the game at finding common ground, and throw down the gauntlet. People can only convince themselves.
30:30 I was told my higher power could be "that doorknob.."
28:45 - The first few times I heard Seth on UA-cam I thought his voice was familiar, but I couldn't place it. Then I watched one of his videos in which he mentioned being a Christian broadcaster. Then I had a flashback to the early 2000's. I was driving back home to Texas from visiting family in/around Tulsa. In one of the radio dead-zones the only reception I had was a station playing some Christian-y sounding music. It was better than silence. The DJ was Seth.
Lucky. I would have loved to hear him in his heyday. He does it well.
You said my name haha🤣
Americans would be a lot further(farther) along if they treated their elected officials as administrators and not saviors.
Gerard, please take this in the spirit in which it is offered. I confused 'further' and 'farther' for years. Further means more, as in 'further research is needed.' Farther means more distant, as in 'farther away.' I was grateful when someone finally cleared me up on those words. I wish someone had done it sooner. And I fully agree w/ your comment.
Farther = physical distance
Further = depth or degree
Unless the usage is metaphorical or ambiguous in which case, they can be used interchangeably. /word nerd
Try Futhark vs. Futhork with respect to ancient Norse runes!
with those coincidence events, it might help to explore the other side: how many times did I have a strong thought, dream, inspiration, and nothing happened? or what happened was something else? We just don't record these incidences, so the others will always stand out...
I saw a joke on the Internet.
When Christopher Hitchens died, he went to Heaven, and God became an atheist!
seth do you ever get to calgary alberta? i dont have much disposable income, but i would go to see you. do you need any paintings?
What you DO is you acknowledge what your mother DID do. And you give her that. You don't whine about YOU and YOUR issues. Nope.
YOU acknowledge that...hey...she LIKELY wasn't in her forties when you were born (so didn't have that advantage), YOU acknowledge that you "get that". You acknowledge that she is just a human being...for all her warts....she made sure for you.
She was very likely the one who was on 24/7 watch for YOU...and that...that...mattered. You wouldn't/or couldn't even be here if she hadn't. You acknowledge that.
What you don't do...is WHINE to the world (along with the other whiners that back you up) on MOTHERS DAY that nothing she did, moved you.
Outside of the consumerism (I mean at least if you think there is some meaning here), you give HER...her day. It's ONLY one day...one day....let me say that again....ONE DAY, out of the whole f**king year wherein everything she DID give you ought to matter.
So, this "Mother's Day" thing, if you care....isn't about YOU. It's about HER. It's just ONE DAY out of the whole year that in your head maybe SHE might matter as much as you think you do. ONE DAY.
Again....if you are genuine...it's not about YOU...and it's not about what she didn't do....it's about what she DID do.
Is it so hard to give a mother that.
Hi Seth, I heard you say on several of your podcasts that about 50% of all fertilized eggs are do not succeed in attaching and developing to full term. Do you have reference for that statement? I would like to be able to spread that information where I can, but feel I should have a reference to back it up.
Once the embryo reaches the blastocyst stage, approximately five to six days after fertilization, it hatches out of its zona pellucida and begins the process of implantation in the uterus.
In nature, 50 percent of all fertilized eggs are lost before a woman's missed menses
www.ucsfhealth.org/education/conception-how-it-works#:~:text=Once%20the%20embryo%20reaches%20the,before%20a%20woman's%20missed%20menses.
Mothers are only mothers when they behave like mothers. They don't even have to be biologically your mother. A proper mother is one who loves you for being you and bakes the best apple pie in town.
Contrite. Wish that was inherently true....however, that's a bogus as a PROPER mother "bakes the best apple pie in town".
Doh!
@@justaperson8144 Oh good grief there is always one twist their knickers in too tight Its saying your mother is the bees knees! Oh boy! Do bees have knees? It is how you feel about your mother. You love them so much you would praise even their faults to the world. To you no other mother can ever be as good. They are the best pony in show. Now you'll get upset because I compared you mum to a pony.
@@toforgetisagem8145 You assume a lot. In fact, maybe you've totally invented this relationship I have with my mother. Right...?
YOU don't get to decide what or how YOUR mother (nor any mother) should be, is or has been.
As to your comment: 'Mothers are only mothers when they behave like mothers"
Sorry, nope....that's just something you made up again. I'm going to venture a guess you have protocols and rules for "mothers' behavior. What a joke.....seems maybe you haven't gotten over your religious upbringing.
It's one day out of the year, give your mother a gift or flowers or a phone call or whatever. It's laughable that you are here still whining. All the rest doesn't matter. AGAIN, it's not about you.....it's about all the effort mothers put in....rightly or wrongly.
Apple pie my arse.
My thoughts concerning an abortion ban are going to involve:
1. The consequence on both sides of the equation and how one side's consequence is a lot weightier than the other (if we get the issue wrong); and how the level of public outrage seems unwarranted given the consequence of an abortion ban.
2. Why abortion is morally wrong and should be banned.
*1. The Consequences*
Abortion is either something that:
1. Prevents the development of a process which (normative end result) brings a human-person's life into existence,
*or*
2. Ends the life of a human-person already in existence.
If it is #1 then, in principle, it is just like the many other available forms of birth-control (it just does it further down the line of the process). If it is #2 then it is the killing/murder of some of the most dependent and innocent members of our race.
If it is #1 then the pro-abortion people are outraged because they have, in principle, lost one form of birth-control from many available forms (yet there are many medical treatments one can not just have because one desires them).
If it is #2 then the pro-abortion people are outraged because they can't kill/murder the most dependent and innocent members of our race anymore.
If you are an outraged person, ask yourself these two questions:
A. Is my level of outrage based on the belief (A), "I have lost one of many available forms birth-control", or the belief (B), "I have lost the right to kill/murder a dependent and innocent human-person"?
B. Is my level of outrage warranted given the facts (A or B, above) or is it mainly/purely an emotional response based on the way I have been conditioned to feel/think?
The consequence of wrongfully not banning abortion (if it is #2) is far weightier than if we wrongfully ban abortion (if it is #1). It seems the only people who really have a warranted position for outrage are the pro-life people, because on their view they believe babies are being killed/murdered (they don't believe they are losing one form of birth control or the "right" to kill another human being).
I would also add that if we kill someone negligently we are culpable. For example, if a demolition company does not do their absolute best to confirm there are no humans in a building they are about to destroy, they will be culpable for any humans that die in that building. There seems no way the pro-abortion people can be sure the occupant in the womb is not a human-person (and I would say: all the evidence goes toward it being a human-person); thus a red light should be applied to abortion rather than a green light, given the culpability for negligent malpractice.
To summarize three points from the above:
1. Economically (this is a principle of economics) if we are 50/50 between two positions, concerning which position is true, we should always choose the position that has the least negative consequence if we choose wrongfully. Based on what I stated above (abortion being either #1 or #2), the position with the least negative consequence, if we choose wrongfully, is to ban abortion. Therefore, we should ban abortion.
2. Even if someone believes it is more likely than not that position #1 above is true (but has no type of certainty), we should still ban abortion based on the principle of negligent malpractice.
3. The pro-abortion people's level of outrage is not warranted given their position and the consequence.
*2. Why Abortion Is Morally Wrong And Should Be Banned*
The issue here is we have two competing sets of rights:
1. Right of the mother’s bodily autonomy (to kill a human-person dependent on her body for it's life).
2. Right of the child’s personal bodily autonomy (not to be killed, either directly or passively by knowingly removing him/her from their place of dependency for life--knowing they will die if done so).
In pregnancy one of these rights is going to have to trump the other one. You have to at least be sympathetic to the hard moral question, even if you do not agree with the conclusion.
I believe the babies right not to be killed wins (easily for non-rape cases and still for rape cases).
Three reasons as to why:
1. The baby did not make the choice (or do the action) to be put in a place of dependency on the mother for its life; the mother (and father) made the choice to put the baby in this position and are the cause of the situation. Thus, the mother can not just change her mind a few weeks/months down the line and kill/murder the baby. If one makes the choice to take the risk (and even if one is the cause unknowingly), this one should suffer the consequences of that decision/action--not someone else.
2. Parents have a moral duty to care for the life and well being of their children .
3. The law recognizes the intentional killing of an innocent human-person as murder and it is illegal (and unborn babies are the most innocent and dependent members of our race); abortion is murder and thus should be illegal.
In the situation of rape #2 would still be true and #1 would still be partially true: it is still true of the father (it was his choice) and still true of the baby (the baby did not consent) but not true of the mother. Both the mother and baby would be victims in such a case.
In the situation of rape #3 would still be true. Let us examine this.
Some propose the solution to ease the pain of one victim (the woman) is to kill the other victim (the baby). This to me is a false solution which only makes the overall victim status worse (we went from one victim losing bodily autonomy for nine months and maybe a changed body, to a victim now being killed/murdered).
This solution would make the victim (the woman) herself a perpetrator (and the baby a further victim). Think of it this way: a victim can harm a perpetrator (like an attacker, with self defense) without becoming a perpetrator themselves--because it was a perpetrator they harmed, not an innocent person. However, an innocent victim can not harm another innocent person (a non-perpetrator) in order to stop their victim status--because if they do, then they become a perpetrator.
For example, if someone tried to kidnap my child--God forbid--and I had a clear shot at the perpetrator with my gun, I would not be a perpetrator myself if I shot him (because I was a victim stopping my perpetrator from further victimizing me). However, if someone stole my child and then they used someone else's innocent child as a human shield and the only way I could stop the perpetrator from taking my child was by intentionally shooting the other innocent child, I would be a perpetrator of a crime myself if I shot that innocent child. I can not harm some other innocent person in order to stop my own victim status without becoming a perpetrator myself to the innocent person I harmed (I can only harm the perpetrator without myself also becoming a perpetrator).
This applies to rape cases. Both the mother and child are innocent and victims. However, the solution of one innocent person (the mother) killing another innocent person (the baby) in order to stop their victim status, makes them (the mother) a perpetrator of murder.
I heard a pro-abortion person recently ask: does someone ever lack the right to be able to remove someone else from their body (paraphrased)?
I would answer "yes" within a slim criteria (and the more the criteria is fulfilled the stronger the case):
1. The dependent is not the (consenting) cause as to why he/she is attached to the host's body.
2. The host has a moral duty toward the dependent (like a parent has a moral duty for the life and well being of their child).
3. The host took the course of action which resulted in the dependents situation of dependency-especially if they did so knowing that their course of action could create this situation.
4. The dependent is attached to the host's body via a natural means and not a man-made artificial means.
I then heard a pro-abortion person make this silly argument: the mother only consented to sex and not pregnancy. This is like saying: when I shot fifty bullets upward toward the sky with my gun, I only consented to the bullets going upward, I did not consent to them coming down and hitting anyone on the head, so if they did I am not culpable.
If one does an action that directly affects another individual they are standing on the ground, of likely, being culpable for that affect; however, they are almost, without any doubt, culpable if they knew the possible result of their action could harm/affect someone else.
Poison, taint, colour, affect.
Yes, it seems so.
never watched the movie about the dude, but from what i have heard about the dude he sounds like a reader of the tao te ching.
Rozio, I hope you're looking in. I don't know if this will help at all, it's certainly not an answer to your questions, just a similar experience with a markedly different outlook. I've been a skeptic and an atheist all my life...never had a belief in a deity to lose. I also never believed in ESP, though I thought it was a neato science fiction concept. I subscribe to the idea that all things are of nature. If a thing exists, nature gave rise to it.
I have since had a number of incidents in which I had dreams of things that subsequently came true or that were occurring as I dreamt them - things I could not possibly have had any knowledge of and yet which I saw in my dreams. Now, like I said, this was a phenomenon I had no belief in. Thus, I approached it as a skeptic. Could I have been misremembering my dreams after the fact, altering them to fit the real-life occurrence? No. I'd been keeping a dream journal, I could check. Okay, so was I convincing myself of something I found to be "a neat idea"? No, in fact, most of the dreams I had were of people I cared about in danger. I very badly did NOT want to believe this was happening and tried very hard to talk myself out of it.
What it came down to, to me, was a matter of reason and rationality, which some people here will understand and others will take issue with. Either I had experienced a large number of coincidences on a ridiculously high level, or I had experienced ESP. The former option, in all honesty, was idiotic to the point of insult. If I am to be a rational person then I must be open to re-examining my beliefs with honesty and not lying to myself about my own experiences for the sake of comfort.
Now, here's the main thing: nothing whatsoever in these occurrences requires or even hints at a "higher power", let along a god. If it happened, it happened - if it's real, it's real. People would label it "supernatural", and I think that's a misnomer. My opinion, nothing that exists can be outside nature. If ESP exists, it is of nature, albeit rare. Someday we will have a better ability to study and understand it, our inability to do so at this point does not negate its possibility. But from my perspective, nothing about what happened to me suggests an intelligence or even a meaning behind it. The possible existence of ESP does not alter my understanding of nature and a universe without gods.
It can feel weird. Often, a decent relationship with your mother would be there, after all of those years she spent trying to raise you right (not necessarily in a "good Christian/religious" sense, but in a "not ending up in jail or an early grave" sense). A rift forming between you two can feel very awkward, to say the least. I know I am hardly one of the supposed "better" ones when it comes to Mother's Day, especially given the fact that I moved to other side of the planet from my mother. She is definitely one of those Fox News religious conservatives, and I was becoming one myself until around my mid 20s.
Well, maybe "is" is not quite as accurate as it used to be. There seem to be signs of cracks forming in that personality and view. I used to have very extensive conversations and debates with her before I moved. The earliest signs of this possible change were in managing to rattle her out of standing with private health insurance, especially when I got her to recognize that, after she compared her private health insurance to her private auto insurance, she could not find any difference, let any that were meaningful. It has been a few years since the last of this talks about healthcare that we had, but I ended up with many more tools, thanks to what I now have that I have moved, that seem to have cracked, if not broken, that aspect of her views, and now she wants M4A.
This has also seemed to have extended towards religion with her. She has accepted that I am no longer a part of any faith, but lately, some of what I have been sharing with her may be getting her to see just how f^^^ing nuts her circle of family and friends is. One of the things sounds weird, and I can only share my experience with it, so take it for whatever you will.
I sent her an image of a Mother's Day promotion for a dessert from a local pizza chain, for a dessert called an "Unholy Donut." This was basically a sizable brick of a donut, covered with cinnamon sugar and filled with caramel along with a possible option of a type of chocolate ("Unholy," indeed - it almost turned me into Homer Simpson). This pizza chain...has all kinds of devil iconography with pizza motifs: pentagrams made out of pizza ingredients and tools, quotes like "The path to Paradise begins in Hell," the mark of the beast (a.k.a. that big three-digit number) in massive print on all of their boxes, their specialty pizzas being named after each of the seven mortal sins and a few specific demons - there is more, but these stand out the most (and the name of the chain is simple and hardly subtle).
This is all in a country... that observes all of the big Christian holidays and official national holidays (paid time off or work with overtime pay and all)... and no one in this country - and I mean NO one, no Christian or otherwise - *raises a fuss about this pizza chain.*
_This chain would be an impossibility back in the US._
I am not sure how she viewed it before, but surprisingly - and I would like to think that I played a role in this, but that is probably just wishful thinking - she is upset that they appear set to overturn Roe. She already had come around to my argument that while a religious upbringing is not necessarily the worst, it is hardly the best either. She is now seeing the problems I have had with religion in her church. While the pastor at her church is not a bad man at all (he does not ascribe to any of the right-wing talking points - so yeah, he actually supports Roe and never turns away or turns in a migrant), the same cannot really be said about some of the parishioners.
So while the relationship between me and my mother is somewhat strained - we mostly try to avoid anything potentially divisive (hey, take what you can get) - it does feel like it might become, at the very least, not as strained anymore.
All of this...cannot be said about the relationship between me and father, though. That one is pretty much over. As for between the two of them...well...I used to say that they were at the point in their marriage (which has been for nearly 40 years now) where everything he says or does pisses her off. Now, I say they are at the point in their marriage where all she does with him is regularly check to see if his life insurance is still in effect.
How horrible....I am hoping you don't see the relationship of your parents as a "win". It is not.
Think about (even if accurate) how devastating it would be to put forty years into anything....relationship or not...and then to find things as naught.
It would be crushing. Keep that in mind.
@@justaperson8144 I never implied that it was a win, just that religion is not the best glue to hold any relationship together - it can work, sure, but often only because it calls for the questioning of the relationship to stop, and that can only go on for so long. Questioning a relationship is not inherently bad, but as mentioned, the ones that most need the questioning are most often the ones that are, at best, on shaky ground. This does not mean that religion cannot result in anything good. I have met a few of those good religious ones, though speaking for myself, they are quite the small minority, while the rest of the religious ones I know resemble what you might see on an episode/rerun of Cops.
While my relationship with my mother is not quite the best, there was never any real point where it ever got bad. Yeah, our differing religiosity has not helped, but like I said, we quickly learned to avoid it. I did reach a breaking point over the hypocrisy of the religious right, and she ended up being an unintended trigger. What happened was that I was getting ready to emigrate from the US, and she voiced her concerns about me having to possibly interact with - and I am quoting her - "any gays." That already irked me once she said it, but I cannot lay the blame on her. Earlier that day, I had been in a... heated debate with your stereotypical right-wing evangelical (I came out on top of that, but I was still livid about some of the claims that a-hole made). I will not say that I am proud about what I said to her over this, but looking back, it marked a turning point that at least somewhat patched our relationship, or at least stopped it from getting worse. So when she voiced her concern, I said:
"Mom, I am going to have to interact with people no matter where I am or what I do. I barely have any choice over who I will have to interact with. I can only try to get through whatever I will need to do and be as courteous as possible so that it can be resolved as quickly and thoroughly as possible, ideally in something I can work with or even benefit from. I will not have the time to worry about if the person I have to interact with is straight, gay, trans, white, black, brown, yellow, red, Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, atheist, American, British, Egyptian, Chinese, Indian, human, angel, demon, extraterrestrial, or whatever other label you want to use. A person is a person, a saint is a saint, and an @$$hole is an @$$hole. The only group I can reasonably draw the line about tolerating is the @$$holes, and those can literally be anyone. I will do my best to not be one myself, but if anyone acts like one to me, I will show them no mercy, for I would have simply been the latest of their @$$holery at that point, and I would like that to stop. All of those other labels are nothing but arbitrary bullsh^t that some @$$hole who you give too much credibility to came up with to justify causing misery to people. There is more than enough misery in the world, and we do not need sh^t like that being added to it. So the next time you want to claim that your faith makes you more tolerant and inclusive, it is up to those like me to make you actually live up to those words, and if you cannot, then I and those will not allow you to delude yourself."
Like I said, I am not proud of what I said to her, but looking back, it seemed to have put the brakes on her slide into the religious right. Sure, she is still fairly religious, but that is ultimately of little-to-no concern to me. My only concern is whether or not she acts like an @$$hole because of it, and while it seemed to me that up until then, she was, I have to acknowledge that she has not been lately - if anything, she is, at the very least, the least @$$hole-ish of her family (as for her relatives, though, to quote George Carlin, "Holy jumping f^^^ing sh^tballs, dumber than a second coat of paint"). Since the aforementioned exchange, she has started living up to her claims about her faith - it was very gradual, but it cannot be denied. Since she started making the changes, she stopped parroting what you most often hear from the political and religious right. While she may not fully agree with me on most issues - though there are a few that we have and still do fully agree on, like protecting Roe - she has gotten more understanding and even come around on a few (like healthcare - that was the biggest change she has made politically, where she now supports M4A).
I do not see the relationship with my mother as a "win" - a tense truce might be more accurate, though we do try to make efforts to relieve that tension. We may not always succeed at it, but by and large, we have avoided making it worse, and sometimes, that is all you can hope for. We do hope to fully and properly patch things, but for now at least, the bandage is doing its job and there is no need to rip it off.
As for my father, yeah, it is pretty much how I described it. I have no idea when or how he became the way he is now, but it definitely caused problems between the two of us and the two of them. When it comes to the dumb stuff he has been doing (which, from what I can tell, has been growing more frequent over the past possibly 10 years), me and my mother, far more often than not, end up siding together against him and usually for similar reasons. It has not quite gotten particularly bad - there has never been any violence between them (and for some reason, I doubt there will ever be - maybe his health and the medications he has to take have something to do with it) - but the relationship is how I half-jokingly described it.
Yeah, it sucks when a relationship comes to an end, especially if it is one that lasted for so long. I am not downplaying that at all. It always hurts to see what might have been a good relationship turn bad, but denying that it might have only makes it even worse. Relationships may and often do have to change, and any necessary change does not need to be big, just that it could be. While the relationship should ideally stay positive, if it ends up needing to end, well, so be it - or to use a favorite phrase amongst the religious right, "it's God's Will." The most you can hope for if it does end is that it does not end on a bad note.
I know that last point makes me sound much more smug than I intended (I must admit that there is a hint of smugness to it), and there is the possibility that I will end up eating those words if I ever end up in such a situation. Still, I stand by what I said.
@@DavidRichardson153 Engaging comment.
As to your comment: ""Mom, I am going to have to interact with people no matter where I am or what I do. I barely have any choice over who I will have to interact with. I can only try to get through whatever I will need to do and be as courteous as possible so that it can be resolved as quickly and thoroughly as possible, ideally in something I can work with or even benefit from. I will not have the time to worry about if the person I have to interact with is straight, gay, trans, white, black, brown, yellow, red, Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, atheist, American, British, Egyptian, Chinese, Indian, human, angel, demon, extraterrestrial, or whatever other label you want to use."
I would like to add, AND YOU DON'T HAVE ANY CHOICE who your mother is and she doesn't have any choice in what her adult child/ren do. LOL. Surely, if you can do it for others you can do it for her. Outside of that, it sounds like you and your mother love each other....regardless of the warts, regardless of situations, regardless of the bs everyone and everywhere and every whatever SAID you both had to be.
I would call that a win.
Consider this. On MOTHERS DAY, don't even give it a second thought. Do something you know she would like.
It's just one day....the rest of the year, you both just be who you are..... because you BOTH will never be any good at being what you're not.
Have a good one.
About premonitions, it is not because you can not explain it now, that it is divine. It could be quatium entanglement (entrelazamiento cuantico) or special type of connectivity (una especie de conectividad no conocida). There are a lot of unknown about physics and the brain.
Responding to the question of words and language - I'm trying to not refer to animals, plants, or fungi as "creatures" which implies a creator. A small thing, and I don't want to make it a foolish consistency, but still thoughtful.
Seth, for the viewer who was talking about having discussions with his son, I would suggest discussing the cognitive biases and logical fallacy content from the Your Bias Is and Your Logical Fallacy is websites - it won't let me post the links.
They sell card sets that can kind of be used as a game to develop your BS detection and cognitive skills.
Hitchens was a god king
Yes, indeed. Also, Carl Sagan is my god.
@@doneestoner9945 Yes, great writer, and Ann Druyan, too.
Seth, I sent my mother a text and posted a gift. We live in different countries. Our relationship isn't great. She still defends my abuser (father). He abuses her too, but she clings to "I made a promise before God 'til death do us part' and I'm keeping my promise". And she is. At the expense of her own well-being, and that of her children. And since my father had a stroke earlier this year, he needs her, so this fits right in with her desperate need to be needed. In the past she would get me a gift on mother's day, but that stopped when we moved overseas. I don't think I'll ever be forgiven for that. Oh well. I'm happy here, and I don't think I've ever seen my husband less stressed than this. It's been good for us mentally and physically. But my parents think we should have stayed in our stressful life in , up to our eyeballs in debt. No thanks.
If that makes me an asshole, so be it.
there are no phones in heaven or hell📱
the only good thing to come from the death of my mother was never having to deal with her family again. they were never my relatives.
Yes, a text is lame...no doubt about it. But it's better than Harbor Freight gift certificate...ask me how I know...
Don't feel guilty about your Mom I don't contact mine
She caused so much grief
Seems like letting your dudeist vows lapse would work in your favor.
All you mentioned are progressive not liberal, in my opinion
Exactly. Imo Liberals tend to be centrists who stand for very little because they aren’t actually affected by the policies. They care more for their own personal comfort, more for “civility” than justice. They may have vague sense of goodwill toward the downtrodden, but don’t care enough to actual shake their apathy and do something.
Church is Kindergarten!
The Bible is a book of fables and fairy tales!
The songs in the Hymnbooks are nursery rhymes!
Seth I'm going to have to teach you the art of manipulation. It's so satisfying. I would think you'd know being a former Christian. What you do is talk about all those wonderful things like taking cre of you when you were sick and coming to your school performances or whatever you got and then you say "I wish that person could still love me"
It can be hard but I still love you.
Just a twinge of self righteousness is so tasty.
Seth, yes. Buy her the Bible. It's not what you (or I) believe, but by giving her a gift like that you aren't spreading the word (she already has belief in the Bible) while simultaneously showing her that you are aware and accepting of that aspect of her, despite your disagreements on the topic. I don't mean totally forgive every trespass immediately, but it is a nice gesture that shows that while you aren't Christian, you aren't making a gift for her about yourself. I am not sure if that came out as eloquently as I'd have liked lol, but I don't mean any of it in a judgmental way, just from the perspective of someone who has had some pretty gnarly disagreements with my own parents (politics for us, though). Anyway take care!
I’m not particularly fond of my mother. She’s a very self absorbed person, and her dementia is amplifying this. She wasn’t there for me after my son died. My parents thought that acting normally, and trying to cheer me up was enough. My father literally told me, when I was feeling very down, that they couldn’t help me with that, and I should seek professional help for my grief. My 22-year-old daughter was more help - we supported each other.
I dutifully visit my mother once a week, since dad died, because someone needs to keep an eye on her, because my brother only visits her about six times a week. He phones regularly, but those phone calls don’t last a few hours.
Maybe when she doesn’t recognizes me anymore, or when she can’t distinguish between days anymore, I’ll cut down the number of visits, because I’m so sick and tired of the same old stories and complaints on repeat. My brother calls it her greatest hits record, with just the one side on repeat.
Sometimes we just need to do what’s best for ourselves.
Hello all.... I am Rocio from the phone call. If anyone has a comment, input, book or anything to recommend me. I'll really appreciated. thanks
Hi Seth
I want to address the caller that states she is not religious yet struggles with a premonition she had about her brother that came true. She feels like there might have been a spiritual intervention and questions her beliefs. This is what science calls the “God Gap”. If science can’t explain it, believers tend to put god in its place. We need to be careful of this and think rationally. People that have strong premonitions are more than likely fueled by a strong fear already subconsciously in place and/or a strong connection to the person/thing. Just because your concience told you not to get on the train you ride to work each day and it ends up crashing doesn’t mean you were pinged by a higher being. You have a high sense of the daily danger you risk getting on that train…its a innate survival instinct that is deeply imbedded in us.
I employ the listener with this struggle to read about the “God Gap” and to stay on the road to truth and rationaity.
Seth there are lots of things that I agree with you about, and lots of things I do not agree with you about, but under no circumstances are you an asshole lol Right there with you on the mother thing. I think the choice in that situation is really between trying to conform to who you think you should be or being genuine, matter how painful that becomes. I personally can't stand the feeling of fake...🌹
Our intuition is usually based on things we unconsciously know about a situation or circumstance. Our brain puts things together without our being aware. Her brother most likely was a risk taker and she worried about him.